Super Crooks

I was hyped when the trailer dropped. Coincidentally, I was reading a book critical analysis about superheroes before Super Crooks officially came on Netflix. Pretty fitting right? Cuz like, superheroes? supervillains? powers? The whole sad origins and everything? Ok Super Crooks had an okay- flow of the story. We start the episode with the origins of Johnny Bolt a.k.a our MC and how he came to be the "crook" villain as he is today. We then follow him getting out of this super jail and we meet his girlfriend - Kasey, and his (idiotic) villain friends. Then Kasey introduces him to Carmine and meets othersuperpowered guys. After 10 episodes, there comes a time leap. Thankfully, we didn't miss any important information but only that the gang has been busy in that time period. And I'll stop from there. Story-wise, it's easy to follow. We got the generic bad boy and his bad girl and his bad friends doing bad stuff against this really really bad guy that could literally blow your minds. And of course, a heist! It's not a villain-centered story without a grand heist. We have the scenic backdrops of America and its heavily hero-influenced environment. I have a problem with the synopsis here tho. It says that "they have to head to Spain.." In this adaptation, they went to an Island that is somewhere around Japan. I hope they fix that. Other than that, the premise is alright. Art is good. The backdrops were nice and the colors have fit the mood of the story. There's definitely a noticeable chunk of gore elements like having your guts and heads wrecked. Character designs were decent too. (But probably except the disguise Josh wore in the first heist. Just, why did he pick that?) The animation was decent. The action scenes didn't fail my standards. Sound-wise, not so much. I love the OP and ED though. The background music was my problem. I'm not saying they're bad but some scenes were lackluster because of the background music. There are times it was distracting and some just felt like it's not right. I noticed the bg music was repetitive though it's not that memorable. I can't say that the Characters are unique or "never seen before." In a world that acknowledges superpowers as normal, of course, there are always some after-effects. We have Johnny Bolt that can produce and manipulate static electricity. We have Kasey that has psychic powers. We have reckless dudes that can cut off their limbs and be in one piece later on. We have a ghost, a weather forecast, a telekinesis guy, a closeted dude that turned kinda wholesome in the end, and some old dude past his prime with his lava guns. Despite that, I love their dynamic in the show. But trust me when I say that most of these characters lacked a bit of texture. By texture, I mean no backstories or why any reason why they're like that. They focus on the "now" situation. Thankfully, the voice acting helped flesh out their personalities so props to them. My fave character is Kasey. She arguably has the strongest powers in the group. I'm glad to see her great potential in the later episodes, unlike the start. If I have to be honest, I enjoyed this show. I have seen a lot of heist-related shows and movies so this was kind of predictable but I enjoyed it nevertheless. The casts did a great job and they did not disappoint. Overall, I give this an 8. The show's not THAT bad.

MASTERPIECE!!! If you, like me, loves more realistic stories in superhero worlds (like Marvel and DC) as well as Invicible and The Boys, this is all you'll want to watch. The plotline is amazing, a villain-view of a society of heroes, but with more human and complex emotions. The super-powers and fights are dope, amazing animation and creative work, the plot twist are nice too, always making the story flow wonderfully. The character are totally amazing, every single one, our protagonist is just unique, totally impredictable, the antagonists are totally scary and leave you in a panic all the time, even without appearing. If youlike super-hero worlds adult stories, give it a chance, you will love it.

I watched this show with my friends over Discord, and the opinion was pretty unanimous. We all despised this show, and were honestly shocked that it has as high a score as it does here on MAL. This is a bad anime and a bad superhero show. Allow me to explain why. The pacing is slow, too slow. The episodes drag on and more often than not the action scenes lack momentum. The slow modern jazz that is played over most of them does not help. Though this is more of a matter of personal taste, I must say I also did not like the musicvery much at all. Most of this would be forgivable to me if I liked the characters and story. While many of the side characters have interesting gimmicks, they lack development, which is a shame since much of them have much potential. The Gladiator stood out to me as one of the more interesting characters in the show, but since most of what we know about him is told directly to us rather than shown naturally, it's hard to get invested. This is the problem with most of rouge's gallery here. The two main characters are probably the most unforgivable, but for different reasons. Johnny Bolt is a terrible human being that shows little guilt for the many wrongs he commits in the show. Despite this he gets the girl and is presented as mostly sympathetic to the audience. Kasey, said girl, has more character to her, but you wouldn't know it with how much the camera leers on her constantly. (Something that made me especially mad considering how she states she was a victim of sexual harassment.) She has the best powers in the show, and she wastes them hanging around a man who by all appearances doesn't respect her. -This next part has spoilers so beware- This mostly leads to a happy ending that feels unearned and unrealistic. It would have at least been a 5/10 if it had the guts to be as dark as some people claim it is. It's a bunch of blandly terrible people getting what they want despite all odds. -Okay spoilers over.- That's the worst thing, really. The show is boring. I can't even make it any lower because of that. I guess the one good thing I can say about it is that the animation is solid. The character designs are nice, everything moves well, and I don't remember anything standing out as looking particularly bad. Granted, there were no shots I would call amazing, either. It's competent. There are some alright gore scenes involving certain characters, but the scenes felt jarring more often than not. Go watch Tiger & Bunny instead. Skip this. It's not even worth a hate watch.

This anime manages to fall short in every area. It has some great moments and sequences, but they're buried within a pile of rubbish. The writing is garbage, the animation is underwhelming, and it overall feels like a cheap attempt to copy the likes of Invincible, The Boys, and The Great Pretender--an attempt where the writers of this show completely missed what makes the others great. The show seems like it has promise in the first several episodes--the characters have interesting premises and the powers are creative--but it just keeps getting worse and worse in the middle. Super Crooks is a show that tries tosimultaneously juggle being a fun, goofy superhero show and being a more serious take on the superhero genre, but it fails at both. These different tones end up completely undermining each other, and the setting has no internal consistency. When the situation is tense and emotions are high in one particular scene at the end of the middle arc, the scene is resolved with something so jaw-droppingly stupid that it makes Sword Art Online's "Why'd you do this?" "I forgot the reason" scene look good. The show does somewhat redeem itself in the last few episodes (which end up feeling like a completely different show), but not enough for me to recommend it.

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