kihn.kassandra - 2016-08-22 16:34:52

Shingeki no Bahamut: Genesis, aka Rage of Bahamut: Genesis, is a breathtaking fable about friendship, betrayal, demons, Gods, some unknown creatures, and repentance. While it is not flawless, I believe that this series is worth your free time. Not only the animation, but also the beautifully written story-line will make your viewing unforgettable. Rage of Bahamut will tell you a story, where angels, demons, and humans have no other choice but to fight together against even a greater evil, Bahamut.

The story of Rage of Bahamut: Genesis takes place in an alternative world, where humans, demons, and angels coexist and are even at war with each other. However, one day, the black-and-silver winged Bahamut makes demons and angels cooperate and seal it. This creature is so strong that only Zeus and Satan are able to seal it. Alack, even they are powerless and the both Lords are forced to sacrifice their lives to seal Bahamut.  The key to that seal is split in two: one half is given to the Gods and the other to demons. The both Lords are now dead and no one can imagine what demons and the Gods will do. After two thousand years, a human woman steals the gods' half of the key and the peace is destroyed. Who is that mysterious woman and what is she trying to achieve? Find the answer by watching Rage of Bahamut: Genesis.

While the story is not something new for the anime world: someone steals something, they find friends, and are trying to overcome all the difficulties together; the story of this anime is still very interesting to follow. Some events are easy to foresee, but the most important ones; however, are not. I guess it is always pleasant to find an anime that will be able to amaze you and this series can do that. On top of that, I would like to note that the story is very understandable, every important thing about it is explained, and I cannot name you even one obvious flaw.  Yes, the only obvious flaw of the story is that there should be a new season that will be able to conclude the story and this new season has already been announced, by the way.

The art of Rage of Bahamut: Genesis is controversial. On the one hand, the animation seems very western-influenced, which in some cases might be a one huge disadvantage. However, on the other hand, this series succeeds in presenting its animation; it even does not spare neither strength, nor resources on its OP and ED themes, showing that “yes, we even have enough money for that.” Character designs, a huge variety of spells, creatures, all of them are just so beautiful that you want to see more and more. If it is a demon, then it is dark and horrific. If it is an angel, then it is beautiful and majestic. If it is an undead, then it is frightening and disgusting. Anyways, you can watch the opening theme of this anime and you will immediately understand how beautiful this anime is.

The music is worthy, as well. I would not say that I am a big fan of the music that is shown in the opening theme, but, at the same time it fits this anime well. The ending theme also brings the feeling of a closure, helping you to relax. Other music pieces included in the OST are also on the level; however, the only noticeable flaw is that there should have been more tracks. Anyways, it is not even something that I would call a flaw. The voice cast of this series is also another reason for you to watch this anime. While I believe that the Japanese cast did a better job, you can watch it in English, if you are not a fan of Japanese voice actors.  

The characters of this series are all interesting to follow: be it a supporting character, or a protagonist, they all receive enough development. Of course, it is an open secret that the main protagonists receive more development, but it is always pleasant to find a series that even pays enough attention to its supporting characters. Anyways, the anime mostly revolves around Favaro Leone and Kaisar Lidfard. They are amazing! At first, what they do and what they are trying to achieve is unclear and you only think that this series is just some ridiculous comedy. But as the series progresses, you find out more and more about the two and from being funny, Rage of Bahamut: Genesis becomes even more dramatic than funny, or action-oriented. The other two main cast members, Amira and Rita, are less entertaining than the male duo, but they complement them, making them one single unit. Separately, the cast members are weak and uninteresting, but together they are very interesting to follow. 

All in all, Rage of Bahamut: Genesis seems to be more a long running Hollywood movie than anything else. It is surprising that this anime adapts a mobile game. You can rarely find a good PS anime adaptation, but Bahamut is just a mobile game adaptation and it is very good. The series manages to keep you entertained, leaving you absolutely no time to yawn, or to relax. Yes, at some point, it loses its pace and becomes less action-oriented; however, later episodes compensate well for it. Anyways, if the new season, which has already been announced, does not spoil the reputation of the first season and if it reworks all problems of the first season, becoming even better than the previous one, I am more than sure that Rage of Bahamut will become one of these “must buy anime.” Anyways, I cannot even think of one reason that will make you dislike this anime. I would highly recommend it to everyone, be you a male, or a female, a teenager, or an adult. Even if you want to watch it with your parents, or with your girlfriend, this series will definitely not disappoint you.

I hope you will enjoy Rage of Bahamut: Genesis. 

zoe65 - 2015-09-19 08:57:33

O anime é divertido, no qual tem muitos momentos engraçados e uma estória envolvente sua animação é um dos pontos mais positivos do anime, sendo a mesma muito realista, os personagens são carismáticos e prendem a atenção do publico, no geral o anime tende a atender as expectativas de quem gosta de um bom anime de aventura com bastante mistério e humor.

jschaefer - 2015-02-19 13:03:13

ferry.domenick - 2015-02-18 06:57:15

Story: I liked Rage of Bahamut at the beginning, but I feel like at somewhere around the half way point, it just lost me.

At the beginning, it seemed like a fun, swashbuckling action adventure, where they'd be going to different towns on the way to Helheim, Favaro getting into trouble everywhere they go. But then it gets into the stuff about the war between demons and angels and Bahamut itself and then they are stuck in one town...and that's when it started to get boring, mainly because I see this kind of stuff done SO MUCH, and I had hopes that Bahamut would be a show that DIDN'T do that. So I feel like if they had not done that stuff and kept with that lighthearted swashbuckling feeling all the way through.

And the characters were either a hit or miss for me:

-Favaro was very enjoyable as pretty much a younger version of Jack Sparrow (sorry, "Captain" Jack Sparrow), being witty and skilled at different sorts of weapons and acting like a douche but really being a nice person...and the incredible ability to get himself out of any situation, whether it was because of him or not.

-Kaisar was a bit boring, but at first it was boring in a good way. He seemed like the foil to Favaro's fun personality, and I was hoping that they'd have more of a rivalry (they did have one, but I think they were a bit less at-each-others'-throats than I would have prefered)

-While I didn't hate Amira, I definitely think that she had pretty much wasted potential. I usually like characters with fluffy personalities like her, but I just didn't like it as much here- I guess the animation didn't make her adorable enough-maybe? But I did like her at some points

-Rita was frickin awesome- tough and a bit of the no nonsense-type, but overall badass (kind of reminds me of Toph from Avatar). And just the idea of a zombie necromancer is something really unique that I don't think I've ever seen before.

Other things:

-The animation was pretty good- the locations and backgrounds were pretty cool. The facial animation was a bit weird imo, but that's just MAPPA's way. And again, Amira could have been cuter if it weren't for the artstyle. But still, it was pretty smooth, especially in the sword fights.

-The opening theme was really badass. The background music was a bit okay though- not bad, but not really good either.

Verdict: I do think that Rage of Bahamut is pretty fun- even in its second half. I definitely would have liked it more if they kept it a swashbuckling adventure rather than turning it into a more generic almost shonen-esque fantasy series...but even then it was more enjoyable than most generic fantasy shonen anime try to be. I just hope that, if they follow up with another season, that they maintain the feel of the first half.

jaylan.schulist - 2014-12-29 20:24:15

          It's always rather interesting to see what sort of direction a new animation studio takes. Being fresh onto the anime landscape gives you a ton of options to choose from. Will you take the easy path of cute girls and slice of life, or will it be the hard road of heavy action and grandly designed set pieces? As of now, after the three main titles from our latest studio to be born, I'm very happy to say that Studio MAPPA has chosen to take the high road, and the possibilities for their future are only looking brighter every day. So, what sort of work has this budding studio produced lately?

          On the surface, the story seems like a fairly generic setup for a high fantasy adventure, and that's because it is, but there's so much diversity and life brought into this world that it has definitely become a standout setting amongst a backlog of complex high fantasies and Lord of the Rings imitations. There are so many different aspects to this world that are mentioned as either key plot points or just passing glances, and it really helps to create a deep and vibrant world for the characters to interact in. All of this came together to create what I felt was one of the strongest starts to an anime this season.

          That being said, the story itself still feels a bit generic sometimes and ended up being a bit more predictable than I would have liked. Some moments definitely felt like they were starting to check their high fantasy storytelling guidelines a bit too much. There were also quite a few moments where there was actually too much going on and it was a bit hard to focus on the relevant details, and a lot of them ended up getting lost in the shuffle of back and forth tradeoffs of mythological terminology. However, I did find that I was able to overlook a lot of that because this series truly becomes a spectacle to watch. Sure there's a ton of complicated back story going on somewhere, but a good deal of the series is focused solely on its spectacle of epic chases and grandly orchestrated battles.

          The main group of characters, while fairly standard at first, do become endearing enough for me to actually care about. Favaro is our slacker-funnyman bounty hunter charged with escorting Amira to Helheim, and he also seems to take the usual path of being reluctant at first and then gradually warming up to her, but he's such an energetic and colorful character that his generic nature hardly ever shows up. Amira also manages to transcend the quest item/damsel in distress role and actually turns out to be an incredibly powerful fighter, though this is more so due to the fact that she's actually a demon. Kaiser also stands out as our typical white knight character with a grudge against Favaro, but the emotional torment that he goes through on this journey still makes him incredibly likable and endearing.

          However, the minor characters end up being a bit weak by comparison, though that's mostly due to the fact that there are so many of them, with most of them being deities of some sort with either a heavenly or demonic leaning. While some do exist as characters in their own rights, most of them are there simply to advance the plot and are swiftly dropped from the story when they no longer become relevant. Furthermore, I'm not really sure how the Japanese view western mythology and biblical characters, but to have three completely separate characters named Beelzebub, Lucifer, and Satan was extremely confusing for a good portion of the series.

          As previously mentioned, the animation was produced by Studio MAPPA (Terror in Resonance, Garo the Animation), and as a spectacle of gigantic set pieces and grandly orchestrated battles, this anime was an incredible sight to behold. Everything about this series felt immense in size and really helped to push the hype for the series forward. The character designs were also incredibly detailed and original, adding a much needed refresher to the usual fantasy character tropes. However, I do have to point out that there is a massive amount of CG in this series, and a lot of it didn't look as good as it could have been. It's understandable that the scope of this series is so massive that you have to save time and render certain objects in CG, but there were still some moments where it just looked really bad. As for Bahamut himself, I found myself feeling a little bit disappointed. Yes, he certainly felt very threatening, but again, the CG work wasn't all that it could have been, though thankfully it did not give me any flashbacks to the original Fate/Stay Night.

          There is currently no dub for this series, though a FUNimation dub in the distant future isn't out of the question.

          The soundtrack was composed by Yoshihiro Ike (Ergo Proxy, Karas), and this is definitely one of the most massive-sounding soundtracks I've heard this season. Huge, bombastic orchestration combined with grandiose choirs and pounding percussion drummed up a huge level of excitement for each battle, but there were also quite a few more adventurous themes, particularly the music associated with Favaro, which actually had a bit of a bullfighter flair to it. The opening theme "EXiSTENCE" by SiM blasts into each episode with a massively metal "Engrish" track, while the ending theme "Promised Land" by Risa Shimizu (VA for Amira) plays us out with a rolling ballad.

          Overall, while the spectacle aspects of Rage of Bahamut were incredibly exciting, a good portion of the story and characters were rather difficult to follow, and the massive amount of unrefined CG took away from a few of the bigger moments.

yhaag - 2014-11-05 10:12:16

I love it.

The animation is pretty, the story line is interesting and I really like the main character Favaro .

francisca38 - 2014-11-04 15:41:51

So I kind of stumbled across this anime by accident while there was still time to add a few ongoing anime to my list. I saw a gif, decided to check it out and got hooked within the first thirty seconds. 

The animation style is reminiscent of Samurai Champloo, although Shigneki no Bahamut is missing the unique music style that Samurai Champloo is known for. The score, opening and ending themes are still of superior quality- the only "problem" is that it's not as distinct as Samurai Champloo (but then that anime had its own thing going on that makes it entirely different from practically anything else). This is one of those shows that thankfully doesn't suffer from One-Face Syndrome, with character designs that all have their own distinct differences. Not only are the character designs to die for, the characters themselves are a joy to watch. I'm writing this while the anime is still airing and only on episode five, but I have high hopes that that will continue (although I'm worried that with the little attention it's getting, the budget will catch up to them). 

Right now, I'm in love with this. I love the character's back-stories, I love their flaws, I love their designs. Shingeki no Kyojin got a lot of praise for its background designs and Shingeki no Bahamut should get the same praise too. There's no part of this that feels lazy or rushed, which continues to amaze me. The only problem I've had with this anime so far is that after I watched the first episode, I wanted to watch the next one right after, but couldn't (the curse of ongoing anime). 

Basically, if you're looking for something with a lot of great fight scenes, stunning animation, strong characters, and are looking for something that might remind you of Samurai Champloo, then you might want to check this out. Hopefully by the end of this, I won't have to go back and eat my own words. 

mozelle.rowe - 2014-10-16 16:03:40

My impression as soon as two of the characters were introduced was that this was a Western Samurai Champloo. Then the animated Prince of Egypt came into mind, and finally, "this is freaking Pirates of the Caribbean!" 

Story

As of episode two the story is getting better, but, that means nothing in the long run. It starts out with douche bag bounty hunter named Favaro fighting a real uptight knight/bounty hunter named Kaisar. Through a series of incidents Favaro meets a mysterious girl named Amira who wants to go to the ice cold kingdom of Helheimn. And it goes on from there.

Animation

Nicely done, better than alot of modern anime

Sound

Soundtrack is very cool. An orchestral cowboy spanish style mishmash. The opening song was heavy metal rock so i didnt understand a word of the japanese :(

Character

Though i try not to compare new anime im watching to ones ive seen before, Favaro Leone really reminds me of Mugen from Samurai Champloo. He's a devious douche who is probably acting dumber than he really is. The girl im pleasantly surprised with. her character is top notch. I was expecting another wimpy fanservice girl, but she's a strong fighting fanservice girl. Kaisar is kinda uptight, play by the rules type of fellow, and now apparently is crushing on the girl. Saints preserve us.

Overall

Will probably return to edit this. I dare not say anything that might incriminate me when later episodes come out. 

stromp - 2014-10-09 18:37:00

Overall, my expectations were met. The show had stunning animation quality and art style. The lighting is worth mention as well, as it feels very nice on the eyes whether it's an action scene or simple small talk with the characters. A few of the characters can come off as a bit cliche, but for the most part, our main trio of characters all have a very unique design and lovable personalities. The comedy is also above average. There does happen to be a section in the show where my interest dwindled a bit, primarily around the half way point of the show when everything slows down for no particular reason. I also didn't find it necessary or productive to include some filler episodes in an already low episode count show. The CGI was, as I said before, amazing. However, there were some moments here or there when a mythical creature would look way too 3D-ish and it was quite jarring. The music of this series was nice and fit all the scenes it was in, not much more to say on that department. The story is honestly one we've seen before, however, with this colorful cast of characters and compelling turn of events it'll keep you coming back for more. Hoping this may get a season 2 as this is, in my opinion Studio MAPPA's finest work to date. 

yoshiko88 - 2014-10-08 14:13:07

Definately NOT what I expected. *hyped* 

Story revolves around bountyhunter Favaro and demon girl, Amira— she hides something under that badass demon outfit— trying to find mythical Hellheim, so the setting's not exactly new, but I must say the visuals are great. 

Character design in some way reminds me of 2005 Anime— just way more modern— but I got used to it and now I even like it.
I sooo love the way MAPPA mixed world&character design with digitalized images. 
The opening scene is OMG! Seriously, that's top-tier movie quality. *..*

Another thing I like about Bahamut's Rage are the the relationships between characters- definitely not comedy, but amusing and fun! I'm glad the makers found a middle ground and didn't make it *too funny.

Overall .... wow, hot! (=^..^)/HOT HOT HOT!

**Great start!** I already love the fall 2014 season!