The Official MSBS Anime Review: Soul Eater

"A sound soul dwells within a sound mind and a sound body." - Maka Albarn

Long time no see, happy people of TheTopTens! It's been quite awhile since I have done an anime review since my first one on Sword Art Online. As promised, I will be reviewing the anime series Soul Eater. Keep in mind that I will be mainly focusing on only the anime itself and that I will try to refer to the manga that it is adapted from as little as possible. In other words, I will only review the 51 episodes that are divided into two seasons (Season 1 is episodes 1-26, while Season 2 is episodes 27-51, according to Funimation Entertainment) of the anime itself. Now let's get this show on the road!

Soul Eater takes place at Death Weapon Meister Academy (or DWMA for short), which is located in Nevada, United States in the fictional city of Death City. At the DWMA, Lord Shinigami, or Lord Death, is in charge of running the academy in order to train Meisters, people who fight using Demon Weapons, and of course, Demon Weapons, people who can transform into weapons, to work together to battle against the forces of evil. The anime series revolves around three Meisters named Maka Albarn, Black Star, and Death the Kid, along with their respective Demon Weapons named Soul "Eater" Evans, Tsubaki Nakatsukasa, and Liz & Patty Thompson, as they attend the DWMA and take on missions to collect the souls of 99 evil humans and 1 evil witch (in sequential order) and protect Death City from evil threats while trying to grow stronger as the trio of teams they are in soul, mind, and body.

Let's jump to the animation, art, and music that this awesome anime has to offer. The animation production is done by animation studio Bones. Now if you're an anime fan, you've probably heard the name of that studio at least once in your life. If you did, two anime series that might first come to mind when you think of them might be the original Fullmetal Alchemist and its reboot, Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood. In addition, Bones is also known for having produced other anime such as Darker Than Black, Wolf's Rain, Ouran High School Host Club, and Space Dandy. With all this credibility of all the famous anime they have produced, it should be no surprise that Bones did a very excellent job on animating Soul Eater, everything from its fighting scenes to its Soul Resonance sequences, a phenomenon that takes place between a Meister and a Demon Weapon when their souls resonate with each other to allow them to perform a powerful technique! Moving on, we have the very unique art style of Soul Eater. I'm going to be honest here, when I first saw Soul Eater, I was kind of put off by how different the anime looked from other anime series, which led me to primarily perceive the art style negatively. However, as I looked back on the anime, I grew to understand the true beauty of the art style of the anime. I mean, name 20 anime series straight off the bat without looking them up on Google who have characters that don't look the same... exactly. That's what makes Soul Eater stand out with its art. Nearly all the characters have diverse and original designs that make them very distinct from one another, right down to the eyes! I think I've said enough about the awesomeness of Soul Eater's art style. Finally, let's get down to the music. For me, I really liked Death the Kid's character theme song. Seeing as he wields two guns as his weapons, it's quite fitting that his theme combines rock music with country music. Not to mention that most of the original soundtracks really fit the scenes in the anime that they are being played through! Aside from the original soundtracks, here's where it gets even more good. The opening and ending theme songs? Only one word can describe them: EPIC. I especially enjoyed the first opening song Resonance by T.M. Revolution and the first ending song I Wanna Be by Stance Punks. Those songs were so catchy that I just wanted them to keep on playing and keep them stuck in my head for as long as I live!

With those three things aside, let's cut to the story. Now Soul Eater starts off pretty well with the first three episodes that act as the prologues for Maka Albarn, Black Star, and Death the Kid, all in that order. From there, over the course of the first season, we see these three characters along with their partners embark on many quests as we encounter new characters, tons of super-duper fantastic action, amazing battles, a lot of character development throughout the plot, and HUMONGOUS amounts of over-the-top comic relief. A lot goes on later in the second season, but since I may run the risk of going into major spoiler territory, this is where I'll stop with talking about the story. However, I will comment on the ending of this anime... when I get to a later paragraph of this anime review. Other than that, the story is very unique and is quite the gem of a well-written supernatural anime, right to the max!

Moving on, we have the characters. If it's one thing this anime is memorable for, it's for its great characters. First, let's go through the main characters. Maka as a whole is strong, smart, brave, determined, and has pretty much all the traits needed for an incredible female lead! Not to mention her bond with Soul is very unbreakable and admirable as well! Black Star (though he really makes me wanna shove a large rusty crowbar down his big mouth sometimes) is quite the persistent ninja assassin and lovable idiot who is one of those characters who show you never to give up, so he's kind of like the Naruto Uzumaki of this anime. Death the Kid? What can I say? He's the son of Lord Death. He's badass, hilarious, calm but serious at the same time, kind, has a strong sense of making sure there is balance in the world, and is just an overall embodiment of all-around magnificence! Soul is so laid-back, yet so cool, and despite how much of a fool he makes of himself on some occasions, he manages to still be a great friend and partner to Maka. Tsubaki is not only a gentle and patient person, but she also has a kind heart and really cares a lot about her friends, especially her partner Black Star. Finally, Liz and Patty can be considered the yin and yang of each other. Liz can be considered the mature and cynical sister of the bunch while Patty can be considered the childish and happy-go-lucky one of the two. Either way, you gotta love both of them. Now with the main characters done, let's talk about someone else. Medusa has got to be one of my favorite anime villains ever. Though she is cruel and unforgivable for her actions, she is very cunning, intelligent, manipulative, and bad to the bone. Now that's what I like with most villains in anime. Oh, and by the way, I really enjoyed the English dub for Soul Eater! Todd Haberkorn, who also voices Natsu Dragneel from Fairy Tail and Italy from Hetalia: Axis Powers, voicing Death the Kid, and Laura Bailey, who also voices Lust from the Fullmetal Alchemist franchise, voicing Maka Albarn, were just two of my favorite dubbing roles in the entire anime! That, and Vic Mignogna, who also voices Edward Elric from Fullmetal Alchemist, voicing Maka's dad, Spirit Albarn, was just the icing on the cake for me! I could go through a whole list talking about how much memorable characters I loved, but as unforgettable as most of the characters are, there's simply just too many to name all at once! However, there is one certain character named Excalibur that I hate that I will talk about in the next paragraph...

Okay guys, you know the drill. We've talked all about the sweet pros, so now it's time to talk about some bitter cons. Let's face it, no anime is perfect, and Soul Eater is no exception to that rule. The first thing I would like to rant on would be the ending. Now I'm not hating on the ending solely because it's not as good as the one in the manga, but simply because on its own, it still sucked... HARD. I don't want to give away too many spoilers, so I will just sum up the ending in three words: anti-climatic, rushed, and disappointing. Next, I would like to rant on some characters, especially Black Star and Excalibur. Oh my God, they are the most annoying characters on the show! And their English dub voices didn't make them any better! But if you like Black Star and Excalibur, that's fine by me and I won't hate you for it, but as for me, get ready to see my negative perception of them (warning: I may be a bit harsh while ranting on them). Now forget all the good things I said about Black Star, because that was me trying to be as unbiased as possible as I could, as I see Black Star as nothing but an arrogant, cocky, stupid, wannabe, self-centered brat who only thinks for himself and pales in comparison to how characters like Naruto Uzumaki is known to have matured in his anime series Naruto Shippuden. Sure, I'll give Black Star some credit for having his badass and hysterical moments, but overall, I just find him to be a big pain in the neck for an anime fan like me! Now that I'm done talking about Black Star, now let's rant about Excalibur. His legend dates back to the 12th century... and so does his pure obnoxiousness. Again, there were a FEW moments where he was a little funny... to a certain extent, but when it came to ones such as where he sang a cringe-worthy song about himself that sucks so hard that I would rather listen to a Nicki Minaj song on loop 24/7, that tells you right there how much I am pissed off by Excalibur's presence. Which is why I always found those Excalibur episodes to be unnecessary and too much of a nuisance to the anime. Finally, there were times where I felt that the anime was a tad bit TOO CHEESY. I know comic relief is used a lot in the anime, but I think there were about 1-2 moments of comic relief that could have been either left out or done better.

Overall, taking into consideration the good and the bad in this anime, despite how much I hate the ending (because really, that's the only thing that I hated the most in the entire anime), Soul Eater is nonetheless still an outstanding masterpiece. It seems that it has aged pretty well and it still has a large amount of fans dedicated to it. Besides, from my experience, I don't think Soul Eater gets a lot of hate. It's not my favorite anime of all time, but it sure is one of my favorites. Now that this anime review is over, here is my final score:

8.0 out of 10.0 stars

Thanks for listening to my anime review. Please comment in the comments section below if you agree or disagree with this anime review and what anime you would like for me to review. Otherwise, my work is done here. Until then, peace!

Comments

Good review, Black Star annoyed me. - Skullkid755

Nice review. The ending to Soul Eater is more tolerable for me, but that's the only thing I disagree on. - Elric-san

Am I the only one who thought this would be similar to bleach before watching it? Cause, the Grim Reaper stuff is shared between the two shows, but that's the only similarity I can think of now. - Skullkid755

Hey, another high quality post. - Skullkid755

Okay, you know what? I'm just gonna stop asking what anime people would like for me to review and just start previewing what I'll do next when I write my post. That said, I will review Parasyte -the maxim- in my next anime review. - visitor

I don't take video game requests much, I am just gonna let my reviews be surprises after my next few. - Skullkid755

Great review! - ToukaKirishima

This is one of my favourite anime of all time. Too bad the ending sucked though and I really really can't stand Black star either. Anyways, great review Kitsada. <3 - visitor