

Juni Taisen: Zodiac War
十二大戦
Every 12 years, mercenaries who possess the highest caliber of brute strength, cunning wit, and deadly precision gather to participate in the Zodiac Tournament. Each warrior bears the name and attributes of one of the 12 animals of the Chinese zodiac. With their pride and lives on the line, they engage in vicious combat until only the victor remains. The 12th Zodiac Tournament begins in a desolate city, devoid of any evidence of the half million people who recently lived there. To raise the stakes, each warrior ingests a poisonous gem, thus setting a time limit on the tournament—and on their life. With one wish for the victor up for grabs, the Zodiac Warriors start their cutthroat battle for survival. [Written by MAL Rewrite]
Every 12 years, mercenaries who possess the highest caliber of brute strength, cunning wit, and deadly precision gather to participate in the Zodiac Tournament. Each warrior bears the name and attributes of one of the 12 animals of the Chinese zodiac. With their pride and lives on the line, they engage in vicious combat until only the victor remains. The 12th Zodiac Tournament begins in a desolate city, devoid of any evidence of the half million people who recently lived there. To raise the stakes, each warrior ingests a poisonous gem, thus setting a time limit on the tournament—and on their life. With one wish for the victor up for grabs, the Zodiac Warriors start their cutthroat battle for survival. [Written by MAL Rewrite]
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Hari_Charan
December 23, 2017
I am sick of people saying that this anime is a non-sense. I loved the anime from the beginning. The first 2 episodes were totally unpredictable and then it got predictable. The unpredictability once again returns in the last episode. I mean who would've thought that. This anime is not just about action but also has awakening meaning.You get pretty awesome action. Intense strategizing. All 12 characters different in their thinking (except for the Dragon & Snake Brothers). Overall I loved it. I was excited every single episode. the OP is excellent. Art could be better though. One Bright spot in the Fall2017.
Pipe
December 19, 2017
Sometimes it is easy to grab a club and hit a series as hard as possible with an unconvincing criticism, and we forget that our tastes are not the same as those of the readers. The plot is about a group of assassins (zodiac configuration) who joined a fight to death called Juuni Taisen, that's all. First, let me ask you something. What story do you expect from a fight to the death or deathmatch? All the characters will die, so the story is easy to follow. The substantial part of the spectacle is not in the fight against death itself; it is in the background fromthe secondary stories. Besides, all the personality, skills and reasons to be in the battle are explained in the secondary stories. Why should an author focus on the deathmatch, knowing the predictable outcome? The anime gives constant clues about WHO will die later, so pretending to be surprised by the plot is a big mistake. Do not have high hopes for the story, it is predictable but you can enjoy the small stories and the animation instead. Remember, it is not Death Note, Made in the Abyss, etc. Furthermore, ¿what will you expect from these characters? In summary, they all are assassins, murderers, most of them are psychopaths and antisocials so what background do you want to see? A killer lover of all living beings? ¿A killer, that have some morals and will cry at night for all the persons that died? They are not like Monkey, and that character was a killer as well. Please, do not overthink a deathmatch plot and do not try to explain it either with false and bold arguments. The art is normal. The show is predictable. Moreover, for an animation studio is hard to invest a significant amount of money and time in some fights when the outcome is evident for the audience. Also, the chapters try to explain the character's perspective, so the animation used is acceptable for this purpose. On the other hand, the sound is typical, it helps with the fights and boosts the events but nothing more. The OP was ok. In conclusion, the show gives the casual enjoyment when you watch any predictable show. For example, you could enjoy the character's short stories, but you already know the outcome, so you will feel a bit disappointed at the end because the show did not fulfill a more significant plot. Overall 6.5 rounded 7.0 Finally, the show has some remarkable short stories, but not all them are fascinating. The plot isn't hard to follow, and it is very predictable. However, the outcome fits the adaptation's objective and relinquish some information about the characters using short stories. Sadly, the pacing could be a problem because the time between the short story and the dead of the characters do not allow any further character progression. Besides, the show isn't as bad as some reviewers are trying to manifest. A lot of spectators will enjoy that genre and the story, but the show isn't fantastic either, so if you expect too much from it, you could receive a hit in the face.
Protaku
December 19, 2017
Juuni Taisen is one of the best examples of a bonafide "what if" anime: What if the show was 24 instead of 12 episodes? What if the art and animation were more consistent? What if half the show wasn't pure flashbacks? What if the character deaths weren't so laughably predictable? I really could go on, and it's a shame imagining what could have been an outstanding show. The anime is plagued by a myriad of small problems which by themselves would be insignificant and ignorable, but when you account for so many of them, it becomes detrimental to the viewing experience. On its surface, JuuniTaisen aspires to be an epic, exhilarating battle royale where 12 warriors representing the signs of the Chinese zodiac volunteer or are chosen to partake in the brawl, with the winner to be granted any one wish. Naturally, comparisons will be made to the Fate/Stay Night series, and while that juxtaposition isn't too far-fetched, Juuni Taisen is far more character driven and in that fact lies the show's greatest strengths and weaknesses. On principle, most of us can't get attached to characters if a said character received little to no screen time, or barely any development or backstory. To meet this principle, the anime dedicates one episode to most of the characters, where we see the conflict from their point of view and learn about their past. The problem here is that their backstory is told through an often intruding and abysmally long flash back that takes up the majority of their episode. I'm not one of those guys that hates flashbacks, heck I loved the original Naruto, but the difference here is that Naruto had dozens of episodes to tell its story and flesh out all its characters; Juuni Taisen does not have that time or liberty, so to see almost all of a character's screen time be dedicated to a flashback feels like a superfluous disservice to them, however effective it might have been to their development. Speaking of disservice, one thing I'm sure that bothered others besides me was how suddenly the majority of the characters are killed off. About 80% of all the characters perish instantly to a sneak attack or die sacrificing themselves for another character. You can hardly call this an action anime if only 2 or 3 of the characters die fighting, while the others never really even got a chance to shine in the combat they so loved. Again, I'm not an action enthusiast, but if you're going to dump a huge flashback on us only to suddenly kill the character off afterwards, you've wasted any potential for growth that character might have had, as well as what could've been a great fight. And that leads to the other problem: Predicable deaths, very predictable deaths. The anime is very formulaic --- The episode focuses on one character, they get a 15 minute long flashback, and about 2 or 3 minutes after the flashback ends, they die, usually without a fight. While this isn't always the case, you can usually guess with surprising accuracy the next character to be killed off by just figuring out which character that previously got no screen time is suddenly getting lots and go from there. In this anime, flashbacks are the death flags, and screen time is the precursor to that. The last bit of bad news if you're interested in this anime is the often wonky art and animation. It's all over the place to be honest, bouncing between amazing and sluggishly lazy. Honestly, at the times when the animation is downright jaw dropping, it only irks me even more for the lack of action scenes that could have greatly utilized it. Even the CGI is fluid and alive, might even be the best CGI I've seen in anime. But again, it all varies as sometimes the art devolves significantly past the point of saying its the anime's art style and just leaves me wondering "why?" But of all the negatives, this one is probably the most ignorable. As for strengths, the biggest one is that its very character driven and knows how to make us care for characters in such a short amount of time, but it comes at the cost of the above negatives and due to the nature of the anime, the characters would not live long enough anyway to solidify a deep connection to. More episodes would have been amazing for this show, but we have to consume what we have been served. I can also say with certainty that not one of the problems I listed was enough to affect my overall positive enjoyment of the show, and my lower overall rating of 6 is mostly due to objective critique. I'm a firm believer of watching a show for the enjoyment rather that to look to criticize it, so if the synopsis interests you at all, I still recommend you give it a try. Just bear in mind the above qualms and perhaps lower expectations accordingly. In all, Juuni Taisen presents a simple yet effective story with compelling characters, though both of these are mired down by easy predictability and a lack of focus on action where there should be more of it. There was a lot of missed potential here, but at the same time it hit just enough right marks to distinguish itself as something truly unique in its field.
CrumbleGarden
December 19, 2017
Juuni Taisen is a very unique breed of anime. It's left me with more mixed feelings than most shows I can honestly think of. Some of it's good, some of it's bad and what we're left with is a very strange package to unwrap right before Christmas. Well, let me try and tackle this with some structure. The three key things that define Juuni Taisen as a show are it's characters, it's thematic storytelling and it's anti climaxes. And all of them have their ups and downs. So i'll start with characters. It's hard not to be immediately drawn in because all the characters have prettystellar designs, both visually and how they're written. None of the 12 participants feel interchangeable and clear work has gone into making them interesting and fun to watch. A lot of the good stuff in Juuni Taisen is just watching these characters interact and deal with one another across the show's runtime. We're given a decent amount of time to learn about most of their backstories, their motives and their goals and they work well with their actions. Unfortunately the strength of these characters is cut short as, since this is a death game, the characters tend to die off very quickly before they can have any actual development in the show. Once you know a character's backstory, for the most part, it's just a countdown to when they'll die, so sometimes it can be hard to get attached to them, especially early characters. There are some exceptions to this, for instance Tiger is easily one of the more standout characters and Rat also have some development, but they're drops in a bucket. Onto the plot, the strength of it is definitely in the themes of the show. Every character having clearly defined goals and methods means their actions and even deaths are particularly fitting. It's nice as well that it's not drawn a huge amount of attention to and there to expand on for the more eagle eyed viewer who spies a cue in a certain backstory or in dialogue. However, the plot itself is very bare bones and basic. It's your standard killing game affair with a rich group betting on it and somehow being able to grant wishes, none of which is given any detail. And on top of that, the plot does get predictable quickly, thanks to the show being based on the story of the Chinese Zodiac, if you're even vaguely aware of the story, you already know who the winner is and who will die in what order, which for a killing game is kind of detrimental. What will surprise about Juuni Taisen is its use of anticlimaxes, something not often seen in anime. These tend to be both good and bad, sometimes they will earnestly catch you off guard for how sudden an action is or how shocking an event was and other times you'll feel somewhat robbed of a potentially interesting payoff. The animation itself can be pretty good when the show actually decides to use it, certain fight scenes later in the show are pretty good but unfortunately a lot of the actual 'animation' is just used on simple talking scenes and it's something of a shame because when fight scenes are present, they tend to be pretty good and make you want more. Overall, while I personally got some enjoyment out of Juuni Taisen, this is definitely not a show for everyone. I'd say give it the three episode rule and if you're enjoying the characters and can get over the predictable nature of the plot, it's a fun but bumpy ride right until the end. If you're just here for action and violent scenes, you'll get some of it, but probably not as much as you're craving. I'm glad I watched Juuni Taisen, but it's only getting a polite round of applause from me.
Snapshot426
December 20, 2017
If you were given one wish to have anything you want, what would you choose? This is the question our 12 combatants have over their heads as they try to survive in this battle royale anime where only one can survive. It is the formula that been used in many battle royale anime and so it also applies here. Who will win? Who will lose? But, most importantly, who will get the longest backstory? So sit back, relax and "Everybody, clap your hands!" as I present to you the anime review for Juuni Taisen. Lets begin: Story: 6/10So like I said, the anime is about the Juuni Taisen. A battle royale where 12 combatants compete to kill off each other in order to win the prize of having one wish of their desires; that's about it. Honestly you don't need to have a complex story for a premise that is this simple. You are given the premise and then you move on to see what happens next. It is the kind of story that develops depending on the actions of the characters and what they do to survive. Now one of the things that Juuni Taisen does that I like is that there is no true protagonist. Almost every character gets the light shine on them for an episode or two and we get to see how they plan to win the Juuni Taisen what actions they are planning to make. We also get to see what actions they took before they entered the Juuni Taisen to get an idea of kind of character they are in backsotries. The problem is that they can be inconsistent in terms of actually being interesting and length. While some are enjoyable to watch, some of them can be kind of boring. It doesn't help that sometimes that the backstories can take an entire episode to just tell us the lives of these characters and their morals. This doesn't help when you get these long backstories and then they get killed off quickly, leaving the viewer disappointment due to it feeling anticlimactic. This is mainly due to the mistakes that the characters make but more on that later. Juuni Taisen also likes to portray the battle royale as a literal war. The city that the anime is based in is a battlefield with soldiers in it; fighting each other in order to survive. Not to win, but to survive. Because by the end of the anime you get the message that there are no winners in war, only survivors. That is exactly what Juuni Taisen is trying to portray. It's not trying to be Fate or Future Diary, it is trying to be Juuni Taisen. But the message can be difficult to understand because the characters aren't really grounded in reality when they can do supernatural things that no normal human could, making it difficult to see that message. Characters: 8/10 One of the best things Juuni Taisen gets right is that it understands that a battle royale anime needs to have a diverse set of characters and thankfully it does. Juuni Taisen has a large variety in characters all representing an animal in the Chinese Zodiac Line. From the weird dressing but psychotic nature of Rabbit to the calm and collective nature of Ox to the carefree but kindhearted Tiger. These characters are interesting to watch and makes for good entertainment when their personalities clash together.....most of the time. Some characters can be one dimensional and uninteresting to watch, making their expected deaths less shocking. I'm not going to say who due to spoilers but they can be uninteresting. Now like I said earlier, their deaths are mainly caused by their mistakes because in war, you can't make mistakes otherwise you are dead. You make a mistake, you die, simple as that. This is something people tend to gloss over without thinking because it is an important factor. They can die because they were overconfident or they can die because they let their guard down. A couple of mistakes do happen multiple times but mainly they die because of the mistake they specifically made. However I do believe that the characters can still make these mistakes and still put on some good fights. There was only a couple of fights in the anime that were noteworthy as the rest ended very quickly. I think that it is a waste considering what these characters can do. These characters can control birds, levitate for no reason, see into different world lines (get it?) and resurrect the dead. It just feels wasteful and I believe that if the anime is not going to be really using all these abilities to the fullest, then they should have more grounded characters. It would certainly make its message about war more easy to understand. Animation: 6.5/10 Now the overall animation can be rather inconsistent. But I must give credit where credit is due though, the fight scenes that are in the anime are well animated, especially in the earlier episodes. There is a lot of smooth action in them, especially since some of them are noticeably animated in 3D, making them an enjoyment to watch. The 3D animation doesn't hinder it and won't bother many people since its mainly animated in the standard 2D animation anyway. However the character designs, while being unique to represent their animal in the Chinese Zodiac line, are rather poorly animated. Most of the time they look like they've been poorly drawn as there are notable black lines in their designs, making them lack detail and look sloppy. This happens a lot in this anime and you will notice it. Sound: 7.5/10 The soundtrack most of the time didn't really stand out besides a couple of tracks at specific times. Most of the time it plays to itself to match the atmosphere and tone at that moment. However I do want to give credit the OP and ED of this show. The opening, "Rupture" Panorama Panama Town is quite possibly one of my favourite OP this year. It has a nice calm rhythm and beat that you don't normally here in an anime opening. It matches the anime well as it is not really explosive and is trying to be different than other openings. However, its ending song, "Keshin no Kemono" by Do As Infinity, is the complete opposite. Its fast and loud which, again, is the complete opposite of what many other anime ED songs matches the anime well because because like the anime, it is trying to be different. I also want to give very quick praise to the dub as I do believe the voice actors do good jobs of capturing the characters personalities well. I specifically like Jerry Jewell as Usagi/Rabbit. While the Japanese voice actor makes Rabbit sound creepy, He makes Rabbit sound quirky and sometimes humorous which I like. Overall: 6.8/10 Recommendation: "Consider it" Like I said, this show isn't trying to be Fate or Future Diary, it's trying to be Juuni Taisen. It wants to be its own thing and I respect it for it. This show is trying to portray the message that "War is hell" in the wise words of Jim Carry and it wants people to understand that. If you are looking for a show like Fate then you won't find it here but if you looking for something different in a battle royale anime then it is worth checking out. It is only 12 episodes long so it won't take you too long to watch.
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