by: Gen/Esis
The highly anticipated anime Chainsaw Man is finally here. Based on the highly popular manga by Tatsuki Fujimoto, Chainsaw Man is a wild, bloody series that oozes creativity from the devil designs to the powers the devils possess and the many characters this world provides.
Studio MAPPA, the studio behind Jujutsu Kaisen and Attack on Titan S4, is at the helm for this one. It’s safe to say that their track record isn’t too bad.
To say that this series has been hyped up by every corner of the anime community would be an understatement, but does it live up to all the hype?
Denji, the protagonist of this story, is a punching bag. Plain and simple. The world around him is cruel, and all he has on his side are his dreams, almost all of his organs, and a dog with a chainsaw on its head named Pochita—who also happens to be a devil.
Episode one serves entirely to establish Denji’s character and his relationship with Pochita. While his motivation isn’t exactly anything new, (It’s pretty much done to death) it’s his unwavering willingness and naiveness that makes him interesting right from the start.
As expected, the show doesn’t hold back on blood and gore. With a main character that goes by Chainsaw Man, it is to be expected that he’d use those chainsaws to, you know, rip some demons apart. The anime does not disappoint in that regard.
Having read the manga, it’s great to see that we’re in good hands when it comes to adapting the gory events that are to come.
At this point, there hasn’t been more than that. We’re given a few glimpses into this dark world filled with demons, but we are sure to dive deeper into it in later episodes.
As for the animation…well…it’s mostly great.
During the main sections of the story which have Denji walking around or laying in his shack for a home, the animation is stellar. The art fits nicely with shots, adapting the manga as closely as they could while still elevating it as any good adaptation should.
The only major issue for me personally is the CGI.
While it works well enough in most scenes, there’s plenty of times where it feels clunky and rips me straight out of the experience. Granted, I understand why they had to make Denji CGI during the fights, having to draw the chainsaws moving sounds like a nightmare, but I expected the CGI for a series of this caliber to be a little better than it was.
The CGI itself isn’t the worst I’ve seen, but it isn’t perfectly integrated either.
If you can look past that, this episode is pretty solid.
Episode one worked to be what it had to be. Denji’s character was set up pretty well, but for now, he’s nothing that we haven’t seen before.
The dark tone of the world is clearly portrayed through Denji’s misfortune and pain while leaving hints for plenty more to come. That is something that I’ll be looking forward to seeing adapted in the future.
The episode works, but for now, I couldn’t say that it warrants all the hype that’s been behind it. Of course, it’d be unfair to base it all on the first episode, so the series still has plenty of episodes to make it work.
Overall Score: 7/10
