So the last couple of days I decided to watch Record of Ragnarok and honestly it’s a pretty good series. The story behind it is that the gods vote every 1000 years on whether or not they wipe out all human life. This time they decided this would be the time to rid the universe of humanity; however, a Valkyrie points out that a clause in the gods own constitution degrees that this process needs to be determined by an event called Ragnarok where 13 gods fight 13 Humans in a series of one on one matches and the first team to seven victories wins. The Valkrie baits the gods into this conflict by damaging their pride and noting they seemed terrified of the humans. In their vanity they agreed to take part in Ragnarok.

The show goes very quickly into the action which I really liked because when a show is all about a series of battles you really want them to get to that point as soon as possible. As the battles take place you get to see the backgrounds of both the god and the Human in the fight. These backgrounds really help to set both of these characters as larger than life and the show really does pick some well known figures for both competitors. In one match you have the greek god Zeus versus the first human Adam. The show spares no expense to make each blow look incredible as slashes are made, bones are broken and limbs severed. The battles are incredibly intense and you really don’t know what to expect as the show presents their own original takes on these characters. For example there is something special about Thor’s hammer that shows up mid match and the story of Adam is a bit different than the one we are all used to hearing. So even if you are familiar with the history of who these characters are based off of you can still be in for a surprise when you see them in this show. Overall the show is based on the qualities of these battles and nothing else because almost the entire season is centered on the battles and they did not disappoint.

It was in these battles that you really got to notice how amazing the artwork is. Each character is drawn which such detail and the quality is just breathtaking. This does lead to my own and only problem with this show and that’s with the animation quality. While everything looks amazing when it comes to movement everything looks rather stiff and rigid. You see a lot of situations where you expect more movement out of a character only for them to be standing still and other moments where you would expect very complex attacks only for a lot of them to be pretty standard vertical/ horizontal slashes or piercing movements. I don’t think it by any means ruins the show but it really is disappointing to see artwork of that caliber with characters so incredible only for their potential to be limited by the animation quality.

Overall this is a short review because the plot is simple and the story goes straight to the action. This is a show to watch if you love incredible characters going all out in one on one fights to the death. These characters are beautifully presented; however, the animation quality really needs to raise the bar for the next season if it wants to continue having that wow factor. I think it’s well worth the watch as each interpretation of the character has something to them that is unexpected, but if you’re used to the fight qualities of shows like My Hero Academia and Attack on Titan you will notice how this one feels rigid in comparison.