Anime: One Punch Man

One Punch Man is a 2015 TV Anime produced by Studio Madhouse and Directed by Natsume Shingo. It follows... Why am I telling you this? One Punch Man is, as of the writing of this review, the 11th highest rated anime here on MAL, the 3rd on Hummingbird, the 2nd on Anidb and yes... the highest rated TV series ever on IMDB. Not only that, but the manga has been hugely popular for many years now, to the point where I had read it before I was really even an anime fan. It’s HUGE. Anyway, enough talking about the popularity you already know about, let’s get to the show which you’ve already seen.

To address the 90 square foot elephant in the room, the animation in OPM is fluid and explosive. I sometimes joke that “The craziest sakuga in every other show that aired in 2015 looks like every second of One Punch Man. So you can imagine what happens when it goes into hyper drive...” which pretty aptly sums up the fight scenes in this one.

There is one aspect of the animation I feel goes unnoticed. This show understands fight scenes. Similar to something like Kill la Kill, One Punch Man shows a complete understanding of the catharsis needed to make each punch feel not only heavy, but comedic. Every punch thrown in OPM isn’t only satisfying, but also hilarious. I found myself audibly laughing at Saitama’s feats of strength more so than the jokes he told.

The catharsis isn’t only found in the visuals, but also in the narrative. If Saitama were to fight in every episode and win immediately, that would get boring. Luckily, the entire cast of the show is about end-game Naruto strength, which is about a ten-thousandth of Saitama’s abilities. This means that we not only get a lot more unique fights and powers, but also each villain feels menacing and powerful. So after an episode or two of multiple (admittedly awesome) fights between the villain and some of the side heroes, we get to see them rekt by the almighty lord Saitama.

The music in One Punch Man is all about, you guessed it, intense emotional relief. The climax of each song is often timed with the fitting together of pieces, or the release of a long pull back, almost like the shot of a rubber band. The music also has a rather “80s” vibe to it, which is great, considering I just finished Gunbuster and I’m craving anything that reminds me of it. No I haven’t seen Diebuster.

A lot of the running jokes in One Punch Man are also based around gratification. The best example is in episode 3. The start of the episode is the setup. The entire middle section is almost like a long pause before the reveal before the punchline, and the actual punchline is timed with a literal ONE PUNCH along with some loud rock tunes. It’s as if every aspect of this show is trying to make the audience feel tension and then contentment, and it all just fits together like a puzzle.

The side characters are, mainly, used for two reasons. One, having cool and original powers that the animators can have a fun time with. Two, building up Saitama as a badass. However, there is one character that stood above the rest. One that I loved even more than our two main protagonists. He cycled into the show and justly stole all our hearts. Of course, the one and only, MUMEN RIDER!

Mumen Rider’s purpose in the grand scheme of One Punch Man is often understated. He’s the only emotional tie the show has! Well, there is one more but that comes later. His sense of justice and love for the people is what not only supports his character and shows the craziness of the villain, but also helps Saitama’s development reach new heights and pushes forward the main themes of the story.

You see, the true heart in this series comes in the form of what Mumen Rider does. The main theme presented is the idea of what society thinks of heroes, and if passion and hard work are worth it if it leads to nothing. It’s one of those shows that doesn’t present an answer, but rather a question, and shows both sides of said question. Saitama’s development comes in the form of how he reacts to these questions. MINOR SPOILERS! While it’s rather subtle, I do believe that Saitama goes through at least a decently large change by the end of the series. He’s learned to love himself AND love the people, with his final line “Im a hero that fights for fun... and profit” END SPOILERS.

The ethos of this series and all the good it presents is summed up beautifully by episode 9. It’s the culmination of everything I’ve talked about so far. Featuring every aspect of the relief and power I’ve possibly overstated during this review, along with the emotional through-line of Mumen Rider. It really is a stunning episode, and one of my all time favorites.

Other than Mumen Rider and Saitama however, the characters in One Punch Man are often 1-dimensional and stale. While for some characters it works, I do feel like others should have gotten more time in the spotlight. Possibly in future seasons? Though, this season wrapped up really well, and this single cour is certainly a solid enough stand alone anime.

I need to give a quick mention to the finale. It was so bone-chilling, heart-pumping and pure HYPE that I, no joke, lost nearly 9 pounds from how much jumping around and twitching I did before and after watching the episode. It was magnificent.

+ Sense of Catharsis

+ Everything, really

+ Solid thematic structure

+ Legitimate emotional moments

+ Two or three great characters

+ Classic shonen cheese

+ The ending made me explode into joy (and... lose weight?)

+ Episode 9

+ The OP (Alright, I had to mention it at some point)

+ Great additions to the manga

+ The highest tier “good time” you’ll find in recent anime

+/- 1-dimensional side characters

+/- Use of filters and after effects

- Episodes 3, 4, 6 and 10 are rather weak in comparison to the rest, though still good

- The ED is not at all fitting

- It’s over :(

- Tatsumaki is annoying

- In very rare occurrences, the animation shoots down to High School project level (Or OPM webcomic level)

- Comedy is VERY hit or miss

- Lack of true lasting emotional impact

After taking everything into account, I award One Punch Man with a fantastic 8.5/10 and if you are the one person who hasn’t seen it yet, go do that right freaking now

Review
One Punch Man is the most hyped and worshiped show of its season, which I remind you all was definitely one of the weakest seasons of the decade so far. Why it was hyped though? Easy: the concept. This same reason that brought Sword Art Online and Shingeki no Kyojin to the spotlight also worked for One Punch Man. This is a show that toys with known shounen standards, a parody with a character who mimics every other protagonist but do not try to find an excuse for his power. It is an amazing idea, one that can certainly promote a funny experience and that was the reason everyone went nuts because of this show. However, does it live up to such an absurd hype?

One Punch Man is about Saitama, a guy who undertook some average trainning and somehow ended up becoming invincible and bald. No one survives his punches, no villain, no galactic warlord, no ancient evil. If Saitama hits a punch his enemy dies, simple as that. There was never a challenge for him in this world dominated by hero associations and threatened by constant supervillains, so he became bored.

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1. One Line Joke
   Saitama being a bald guy with a weird face, not caring much about being strong and doing random activities while automatically slaying apocaliptic villains in his path, all contribute to making One Punch Man a funny show at the start. The first episode presents us a parody about the standard shounens, such as Dragon Ball Z, One Piece, Naruto, Bleach, Saint Seiya, and many others. All these shows offer doses of challenges for the main heroes, yet they all end up with the good guy beating the bad guy. One Punch Man exagerates this concept, and instead of suffering ordeals to defeat opponents, all it takes is a single punch.
   
   This joke, however, wears off pretty quickly. You cannot do much when your very concept is granting a protagonist that is evidently invincible. Even if you know Goku will triumph, you probably look foward to see how he overcomes his struggles, how he fights off his negativity, how he trains himself, and what new powers he will use to defeat the bad guy. Not here though. One punch and the fight is over, and with that the main joke of the show...
   
   It turns out to be an standard shounen
   Yup. Instead of continuing to be a parody, One Punch Man slowly turns into a standard shounen experience, spiced with bits of comedy in the likes of One Piece. The characters are all exagerated, the villains are pompous and flashy, they die quickly, and the focus of the struggle falls to Saitama's sidekicks and other secondary characters. See now? That's exactly the same thing that happens in every other major shounen: allies fight against villains and fail, protagonist show up and kick their asses. Goku, Luffy, Naruto, Ichigo, Seiya, Meliodas, all of them do that. Add Saitama to the list.
   
   A decent shounen though
   Although not being a true parody and ending up a mimic of shounens around, One Punch Man succeeds in being enjoyable. We have all those rankings to fuel the common shounen trash-talk, the combats between villains and secondary characters are fun, the animation work by Madhouse is superb, and there is a good deal of tension and gore, proving this set that you though was made as a comical relief to be even more mature and serious than in some other shounens.
   
   Saitama ends up ruining the average shounen though
   Saitama is a strange guy. He is a joy to watch, the bored guy with ridiculous strength, bald and bizarre, sometimes looking badass, wearing oldschool hero's clothing with cape and everything else. However, when One Punch Man turns into a common shounen without much of the parody, Saitama becomes an alien element to the show. You can laugh in a few of his appearances, but then you start to feel something is amiss, it won't be fun if Saitama is around, it will be better if you just keep watching all those other heroes with bizarre powers fighting. Fortunately, that's exactly what the show does, changing focus to the Hero Association after the first half and dealying Saitama the most they can so you can have fun watching other people fighting and struggling.
   
   A decent arc
   One Punch Man is yet to finish, but this first half does a great service in being complete and wrapping up things with a good, although not thrilling finale. The animation job contributes to make this enjoyable, with superb action sequences that are perhaps only brought down by some clumsy coloring and quality from time to time. Add that a decent voice-acting and sound direction and One Punch Man is a safe shounen arc with tiny bits of parody here and there.
   

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Comments
Once again the hype is ridiculous. One Punch Man can even claim the title as best of its season, but that's mainly because everything else was terrible. Instead of one super smart parody with dozens of moments to laugh, One Punch Man ends up being a decently made shounen, more exciting and comical, and with a good bunch of secondary characters that take the spotlight from a protagonist that has an awesome concept but is doomed to grow boring if he shows up for more than five episodes.

Okay... One Punch Man is a weird show to describe my thoughts on it, but I will try my best.

This show started out actually fairly mediocre for me, it never hooked me right off the bat, and didn't hook me until around the Sea King arc. But even tho it did hook me really late in the game, it still never sold me on it being a show worth watching again, or even recommending to someone else. But just as each episode went by I found myself enjoying it more and more.

Art/Animation) it looks solid, tho I'm the type of person who would rather take a more realistic type animation style such as Nagi no Asukara/Kara no Kyoukai/Garden of Words. But it still works for the show, it isn't "the best animation I've ever seen" like how some people say it is, but you can clearly tell how much effort the animators loved working on this project.

Music) The OST is fantastic and wish that I could have it immediately but sadly we aren't getting it until the middle of January. As for the ED, I felt as it is was really lacking, it was slow and forgettable. But for the OP... man, at first I hated the song, but over time it began to grow on me even tho it still isn't the best opening of the season... but short answer, I really enjoy it.

Comedy) It was really hit and miss for me, some of the witty dialogue just didn't get to me. But the one thing that i found the most hilarious about this whole show was where in the very beginning of the whole show when Genos first met saitama and started asking him a lot of questions and just continuously speaking faster and faster until saitama snaps and yells "Enough you idiot! Shorten it to 20 words or less!!!".

Story) I found it to be lackluster at first, just being the same shit after each episode: terror in city by some strange monster, saitama shows up, the monsters make fun of him, saitama throws one single punch and the match is over. But over time you were introduced to the hero system, and each class rank. And you met more and more bad guys, then talked about the danger system and other stuff. Tho the plot is super basic, i feel as if just keeps going and might never have a definitive end until Saitama decides to retire and hang up his suit forever.

Characters) As I explained earlier about the hero system and the ranks and stuff, this is where I believe how the writer simply used this as a ploy in my opinion to shoehorn in other "heroes" just for the sake of them being there and having witty dialogue. But the thing is, the show introduced like 10 or more different characters in the last few episodes and we never learn anything about them until the end of the show. But I will say this, they all have very unique and interesting (sometimes) character design and powers.

My thoughts on the last episode were it was fun and good, and left me wanting more... but the thing is, there isn't more. So I'm really perplexed about this "ending" for say, because I know that the manga keeps going, but i feel as if the anime just ended and didn't have any closer for this series. So I really hope to see a season 2 to this series, because I just want to learn more about this world/characters while also seeing how the "story" progresses.

In the long run, I can wholeheartedly say that I would recommend this series to other anime fans to watch... but for all the people saying it is the "savior of anime"... well it isn't so deal with it, and it isn't even the best show to air this season.

This review was written in reply to a YouTube comment asking me why I thought OPM is a bad show. Keep that in mind when reading if the format is a little awkward.
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The comedy is executed terribly. For this example, i'll be using a joke of the second episode.

Essentially what happens is that there is one central joke, and that is that the dialogue of Genos was stupid and too long, however the scene went on for almost 2 minutes before the punchline actually happened, which effectively killed the entire joke. This happens alot throughout the series, jokes with long build-up, superfluously long buildup, that ends in a essentially a 3 second punchline, which is why, for all but maybe 2 times, the comedy completely failed in even making me crack a smile.

The joke of Saitama being able to kill everyone in one punch also ruins whatever could have made the show fun to watch...the fights. Now don't get me wrong, most of the fights were well animated...most because the budget was very inconsistent...but what you, me, and everyone else watched, with the exception of the last episode, were not "fights". They were just people being pulverized. For it to be a fight, the current winner of a fight has to be changing, or else it's a one sided battle, and pretty much every battle in OPM is completely one sided. This is even made worse in the last arc because of the guy who gets killed when you destroy his pearls. That was not at all a "fight" because the guy with the pearls NEVER even fought back. It was just a gangbang with a person who refused to retalliate.

Well it's just supposed to be taken for fun, so why are you being so critical, is what I bet you're about to ask/say. Well...because this is a show that prides itself in how well you can enjoy it. The fact that none of these fights never FELT LIKE or WERE fight, completely took me out of it. We already knew who was going to win every single fight, in every single scenario.

The show also got extremely repetitive, repeating the same formula for essentially 11 weeks straight, once again, the last episode was the exception.

1. Introduce new villain/problem/issue (same thing) - 10%

2. Introduce new character - 30%

3. Show new character getting their ass whooped by said problem - 50%

4. Saitama one punches and the episodes wraps up - 10%

It's the same thing every week, which made the ending punchline (no pun intended but damn I'm clever lmao) not funny and predictable. For the most part, a joke is not funny if you know EXACTLY what is coming, but this does not apply to everyone...it just applies to alot of people, me included. This made every fight and basically everything else that happened in the episode seem pointless, and I was just waiting for Saitama to one punch the person and get the episode over with.

The show was also classified as a satire by the fanbase until people like me pointed out that OPM never mocks what it's supposed to satire, it's exactly the same thing, effectively making it NOT a satire. The 1D characters, the archetypes, the dumb villains...basically everything. It wasn't until the show ended that the SAME FANBASE (not referring to everyone) referred to the show as a PARODY, and NOT a satire...in which case they're still wrong because for it to be a parody it'd need to allude to something which is something OPM never did, it just became the exact same thing.

The OST was pretty average with the exception of the theme imo Kinda like KLK's but it lacked the same impact that that show's OST had. The animation was fluid and the art was VERY VERY VERY inconsistent. To prove it, look at the first episode compared to the second.

So overall...the show sucks. This is viewing my problems for why i didn't like the show, and critically analyzing them. It's not bad because i don't like it, I don't like it BECAUSE of these reasons that I listed, which are what made the show bad, not my dislike for the show. If the fanbase wasn't so cancerous i probably would have the same opinion but wouldn't be so outspoken in stating it. I'd just say the show sucks and be done with it...but nowadays we just can't have that...

But yeah, I hope this satisfied yours and everyone else's request for why I think OPM stinks...please don't euthanize me ;___;

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ANIDB Rating

Art/Animation: 8/10 (Terribly inconsistent)
Sound: 5/10 (Nothing special)
Story: 3/10 (Goes nowhere, exact same thing every episode)
Characters: 3/10 (They're archetypes which add nothing to the show, and fail to satire other archetypes in the medium)
Value: 1/10 (There's no value in watching this, there are tons of other shows that do action and/or comedy better)
Enjoyment: 2/10 (I chuckled maybe twice but that's about all, didn't enjoy the fights :/)

FINAL RATING: 3.9/10

[Art & Animation: 7/10]
The animation was done by Studio Madhouse. As one would expect the quality of animation is very good. All lines are crisp, backgrounds are mostly detailed and not prone to repetitions. There are a lot action and fight sequences which remind me of Dragonball style (which is nothing too good in my eyes). The rapid cuts, flashes and other stuff is done fine, still there is lack in details in some scenes. Overall a decent job. Not a masterpiece or eye-candy though.

[Sound: 5/10]
Neither OP nor ED make any sense to me. They both don't fit to the series and are a wild mash of rock and other music genres. The voice actors are doing their job without fail. Might it be the bored stuff Saitama says or the flashy announcement of others. The cast is mostly male, so expect a lot of cool vibes even if the guy is crushed the next moment. Kind of... irritating.

[Story: 2/10]
Good Lord... that story is boring. Boring beyong belief. You just have to watch the first or maybe second episode and you saw them all. It always repeats itself like some gag-manga. Seriously, I can't understand why OPM has been turned into an animation like this. Twelve episode with 5 minutes each would have been enough. Better shows got turned into shorts, but OPM gets full episodes. Outright trash. Don't try to think too much here, I will just kill valuable brain cells. Antagonist appears, blows all away, gets hyped and more powerfull, almost undefeatable and then... Saitama crushes him with one punch. Ouch! BOOOORING!

[Character: 3/10]
Its hard to write something good about the characters which are not the villians, because they get showtime, they get upgraded, they want to archive something (might it be stupid or not) and at the end torn to gory pieces. There is no progression because of the episodic style. Also our main "hero" is lacking any charm and always make the impression of only remotely connection to the world. I guess this is part of the style. Stil its horrible shallow and superficial, considering that he always saves the day. Nobody has actual development, they just interact with their fists. For me that is not something manly, but something paltry.

[Value: 3/10]
Depends on what you are searching for. If you like dragged action scenes from Dragonball and don't mind any story or its absence you might really want to watch this show. If you are into more serious stuff and well versed plotlines thou shall avoid coming too close to this series. There are a magnitude of plot holes, more questions are asked than answered and whatelse. On the other hand I was pretty impressed when seeing the source material for the first time. The authors definitly managed to pull something from that shallow 4-koma like material. Maybe that is its main value.

[Enjoyment: 5/10]
You can enjoy One Punch Man as good as you can enjoy Dragonball, One Piece or Naruto. Depends solely on your taste. Definitly OPM falls victim to a completly unreasonable hype around it. You might expect something epic based on the fanboys and what they are yelling around - at the end you will be bitterly disappointed. This itself is the most harm a series can receive, because its not terribly bad, but if you raise expections until right under the roof... what do you expect as untimate outcome?

[ASP-Forecast: 25%]
There is absolutly no need for a second cour. The story would be the likewise boring. Still I predict 25%, because of all the fanboys running wild, claiming that is was the best show of 2015. Pathetic display of brain malfunction.

Terrible adaptation. Manga is superb but Madhouse managed to fail it.

Episode one showed so much potential but it was just episode one. Right after that, not a single episode was on ep1's level.
Maybe the last episode but that fight was epileptic as shit. Horrible
The only ones who enjoyed the anime are the ignorant masses that have shit taste in anime.
Other than the amount of money that went into the animation, nothing about this anime was good especially Saitama's seiyuu.

Go read the manga because it's superior.