The animation and color design represent the best I've seen in any anime, with exquisite detail in foregrounds and fights where each character's unique color treaty reflects their control over the battle world, while Koyori breaks the "silent girl" cliché by showing genuine agency and feelings ra...

I enjoyed the unique, colorful art style reminiscent of "K," the superb stylish music, and the dark, emotional character concepts involving painful pasts and conflicted bonds. However, the breakneck pacing in just 12 episodes left no room to properly develop the large cast or resolve the excessiv...

While the voice cast delivers occasional grace and the final arc attempts to salvage the narrative with backstory explanations, Hand Shakers collapses under the weight of its own ambition. The characters are nothing but one-dimensional running gags with no chemistry, the plot is vague and sanitiz...

This anime is absolutely fascinating to watch purely to witness how spectacularly wrong the creators got every single element, and it becomes genuinely entertaining when viewed with a group of friends and several alcoholic beverages. However, the visuals are genuinely painful to look at with an a...

While the series works as a fun train wreck at times, the genuinely entertaining restaurant manager loli and her apologetic underling—along with Koyori's creative non-verbal communication before the writers ruin her—provide the only real highlights. Motion-sickness-inducing camera work, consisten...

While I appreciated the character designs—particularly the protagonist's chic jacket that looks good enough for fashion retail—and found the English dub voice acting to be a decent distraction, these small positives cannot salvage this dumpster fire. The animation is an unwatchable mess of poorly...

Hand Shakers delivers a compelling narrative that grows increasingly engaging as it reveals its mechanics, featuring surprisingly wholesome character dynamics where defeated opponents become friends rather than seeking revenge, alongside a vibrant, shiny art style reminiscent of No Game No Life t...

I found the character-driven storytelling and intricate world-building to be exceptional, with pairs like Kodama and Hibiki delivering emotionally resonant arcs alongside Tazuna and Koyori's compelling development, all complemented by what I consider the season's best OST featuring OxT's kick-ass...

Hand Shakers, the perfect "Mediocre" anime. For starters, the "Story" receives a five for simple reasons. It's pretty damn basic. There's a story, but it's not a good one. There is development in the story, but they're not interesting. There are twists, but they come abruptly and awkwardly. I can...

The artwork possesses a beautiful, fanart-like level of detail that I appreciate, and I found enjoyment in how the series attempts to explain the psychological damage behind its messed-up characters, offering more character backstory than similar wish-granting narratives like WIXOSS. However, the...

The opening song is good but completely wasted here, and while the core story concept is interesting despite being overdone, the execution is an absolute disaster. The animation is atrocious with constant off-model characters and painful visuals, the editing uses jarring cuts that create confusin...