Inazuma Eleven Go: Galaxy

I find it odd that despite being the best written of the six Inazuma seasons, this is the one no one talks about. Sure, it's not outstanding compared to a lot of other anime out there, but it's nothing to be ignored. The plot is a little rocky and predictable at worst, but as a children's anime, it's actually very well done and doesn't needlessly drag on certain points for many episodes, especially after around episode 18. The flow was a little too predictable about midway through the anime, but towards the end it definitely got interesting. The new eight characters on the main team aredeveloped super nicely, which is something we haven't really seen in Inazuma since Fubuki Shirou and Kidou Yuuto. All eight characters are given a reason to be there, and backstories that while are not deep, get the job done and fill in the reasoning behind their personalities. For instance, Nozaki Sakura's self-centered behaviour and need to be number one on the team is due to her parents always pushing her throughout her childhood to be the absolute best, and that there is no room for her to make mistakes. It definitely strains her relationship with her teammates The characters that weren't in previous seasons aren't so lucky, as aside from main character Tenma, we don't see much new development in Tsurugi or Shindou. I found Kuroiwa's backstory to be very frustratingly lacking. Very few of the aliens are very well developed at all, which was very odd as they were the true main focus of the anime. A select few aliens such as Bitway and Lalaya are interesting characters as they are, but more insight into their history (especially Bitway's) would've been fantastic. Art and animation is very good throughout the anime especially compared to the very first season of Inazuma Eleven, though I feel the bright colours became a little hard on the eyes after a while. The art style is still slightly cringe-worthy at times, but it's nothing too bad. Scenery was very pretty, the CGI throughout the anime blended much better with the animation cels in Go Galaxy than it did in the previous five seasons. This anime has possibly one of my favourite OSTs in anime. Nothing to rival Gyakkyou Burai Kaiji, Free, or Fullmetal Alchemist, but it definitely has a very captivating musical score, everything from fast paced rock with violins to slower piano melodies. Several tracks from the previous five seasons are reused (I recognized several from Chrono Stone at various instances), but several tracks from the new score top a lot of the old stuff. The voice acting is all very nice and emotions are captured very nicely, but something that really stands out to me are the sound effects. Particularly, there's a scene in episode 42 where the main team plays against the final antagonist team, the captain of the main team falls victim to a sliding tackle, and lands on the ground with a sickening crack. I've never heard anything in an anime so vibrantly painful enough to make my stomach turn, even after seeing gory animes like Higurashi and 3x3 Eyes. You don't notice it as much in other seasons, but you can actually hear small sounds very distinctly such as the vibrations of the rubber of a ball being kicked, footsteps in different environments, and other little things like that. A lot of the sounds used in space and on alien planets are very nice to the ears. All in all, as a fan of Inazuma for a few years, I thoroughly enjoyed this anime. Aside from very few factors like Kuroiwa's backstory, Zanakurou's personality compared to Zanark's from Chrono Stone, and some of the early stuff that happened between the three main characters, I think it could work very well as a standalone anime if you haven't seen the other seasons. Despite being targeted towards children, there's several factors that I feel make it enjoyable for all ages.