Review of Fire Force

Enen no Shouboutai is a mid to late 2019 anime from David Production. Yes, the Jojo, Neptunia & Hataraku Saibou studio. The anime is based off of an Ookubo Atsushi manga. That's right, the creator of Soul Eater. So, this one has a solid pedigree. Hopefully that works in its favour. Story: In the not too distant future, probably next Sunday AD, spontaneous human combustion has become a huge problem. Not only do people combust, they turn into blazing Infernals who rampage while combusting. To combat these Infernals and discover the cause of human combustion, the Special Fire Force is formed. Our protagonist, Kusakabe Shinra,joins the 8th Division with a simple goal. To become a hero. He already has the nerfed powers of Sam Guthrie so he might as well.

There are a couple narrative issues with the series. First of all, some of the redemption arcs feel kind of lazy and contrived. It feels like they want a character to turn out to be a decent person, so they put in some half-assed back story to explain why they went wrong and then just pull them out of their bad situation so they can be a "good guy." The character Feeler is a great example. With that said, most of the time the series actually does a really good job with its redemption arcs, the cases where they don't are in the minority. Another issue is that some of the world building elements feel like they're being made up as they go. Like Ookubo was asked to explain what an Adolla burst is and hadn't even considered the explanation before then. I don't know if it's sub-optimal world building or he's just one of those writers who doesn't do much preparation.

With that out of the way, the story is really good at coming up with creative and varied ideas for fire-based powers. Just in the 8th, we have Shinra going Cannonball, but without the invulnerability, Arthur making himself a plasma sword, Maki controlling little wispy fireballs and Hinawa controlling the propulsion/trajectory of bullets. The series is also very good at maintaining sources of tension and intrigue. There's never a point where things feel slow or dull. The series also ends on a strong point. There's clearly more to come and they definitely leave a lot of open plots but they also have a major climax and answer some huge questions which does make it feel satisfying. The series also does a solid job of mixing in some more comedic moments with somewhat serious moments. It's not one of those anime where they take one or both elements to such an extreme that they undermine each other.

Characters:

Overall, the series does a good job of giving characters compelling back stories, strong relationship dynamics and solid development. That being said, there are definitely some problems with the characterisation. The big one is that Shinra has that harem light protagonist thing going. Where the series loves to give him relationships with women that involve romantic tension. It's definitely not the worst case of it I've see, that goes to Sword Art, but it is annoying. You really couldn't think of more interesting relationship dynamics there? Like, basically anything else? There are also some antagonists who are far over the top. Which is a shame since Ookubo is clearly capable of writing characters with subtlety when he wants to.

Art:

This is another aspect that's mostly really strong. The character designs are good. The action sequences are fantastic. The animation flows well. The one issue I have is that the art can be overly fan-servicey. Especially with Tamaki and her Lucky Lecher ability. So many scenes with her devolve into blatant fan-service.

Sound:

The acting is really well done. Kajiwara Gakuto, Ichimichi Mao, Kobayashi Yuusuke, Kamijou Saeko, Lynn, Nakai Kazuya and most of the cast do a really good job. The acting occasionally goes over the top, particularly with antagonistic characters who don't have much depth. The music is pretty solid as well. They did a good job of getting compositions that suit the atmosphere.

Ho-yay:

There really isn't any.

Areas of Improvement:

1. When you have a redemption arc, you need to put a decent effort into it. Clearly, there's some understanding of that here but they don't always follow through.

2. Important story elements need to either have good foreshadowing or be well extrapolated on.

3. You don't need a goddamn "lucky lecher" ability that solely exists for fan-service. Have some class.

Final Thoughts:

The series has some noticeable issues and things that could be much better executed. But it's a really strong series overall. I'd give it a solid 8/10. If you enjoy super hero works and want to see just how many different ways you can use fire as a basis for super abilities, I would recommend it.