Review of Devilman: Crybaby
Devilman Crybaby is one of the few anime where not only do I dislike it, I want to dislike it more than I already do. This Review is going to have a few spoilers but there is no other way to explain some of the glaring issues at hand STORY: 2 The story of Devilman Crybaby can be broken into 2 distinct parts, before humanity learns about the existence of demons and after. Before humanity learns about demons DMCB is about hunting down demons to protect humanity whereas the other half is about the collapse of society. Had DMCB stuck to demon hunting I would probablyhave given this show a 7 or even an 8 because it was fun to watch. HOWEVER the 2nd half of DMCB is a god awful mess. The storytelling itself was pretty bad with some scenes getting too much time while others lacked necessary development. As the world collapses it becomes difficult to tell how much time passes which is also disconcerting. Despite all this my main issue is with the story itself.
MINOR SPOILERS
DMCB's story takes a shift from gore action to apocalyptic tragedy with the 2nd half. It tries to make many different statements but they often conflict with each other. It goes for a "demons are living creatures too" plot but this is counteracted by the demons gaining more and more power while being as cruel as ever. It tries goes for a "humans have become the demons" angle but that really only works if you are winning against the demons (which they aren't.) It even tries a "can demons love" thing for a bit before that is thrown out the window entirely and ignored for the rest of the anime. Another HUGE issue I had is that demons are explained to be prehistoric creatures that would parasite off a host and take their power meaning that "demons" are literally just the aliens from Parasyte -the maxim-. Demons are supposed to be creatures that feed of human vice and try to bring out the worst in humanity but DMCB presents them as morphing aliens with a gore fetish. Lastly, while this may be more of a preference I dislike series that have no problem killing off their characters. While killing off characters can be useful to advance the story or to grow the others, if done in excess it becomes a lazy way to make the viewer feel bad.
While I am not the biggest fan of apocalyptic tragedy, I can think of many series who handle it far better such as SaiKano (the manga) and Casshern Sins.
ART: 3
The art style of this show is interesting because it enables both detailed animation and really lazy animation. The fight scenes, gore and characters were all animated nicely but there were numerous occasions where the animators skimped out on detail. It's not my favorite animation style in the world but I didn't have too many issues with it.
My main problem with the "art" of this story is the gratuitous depictions of gore and sex. While usually I am not adverse to these things and if done right they can add to the story, DMCB reaches into ridiculous excess in both regards. The sex never served to further any kind of relationship and was used to just show how depraved the demons and people can be. The gore during the fight scenes was ok, but there was just so much slaughter of innocent people that the gore started to get boring after a certain point. After a certain point the sex and gore came off as edgy for the sake of being edgy, and this is from someone who enjoys Murcielago.
SOUND: 1
HEY KIDS DO YOU LIKE THE HOTLINE MIAMI AND SHITTY RAP BECAUSE I HAVE THE ANIME FOR YOU. The actual soundtrack wasn't bad but it wasn't anything particularly memorable either. The much larger problem is that for no good reason the creators decided to shoehorn in a bunch freestyle rap about how everything sucks. I've heard the rap "gets better" as the series goes on but as an American I already have to deal with enough of these trashcan beats so I just skipped it after the first verse or two.
Another non-musical issue is that this series has a hilarious amount of bad English speaking. It's hard to take important speeches seriously when the character sounds like a comedian doing an intentionally bad accent.
CHARACTER: 3
Most of the main cast are good characters that you wont mind seeing more of, but as a vehicle for the freestyle rap DMCB had to introduce a bunch of wannabee thugs, only 1 of which ends up being important. However one thing I noticed is that character development was completely lacking outside of a single side character. Most developments were physical (i.e. gaining new powers) or temporary leaving the characters the same person they were in episode 10 that they were in episode 1.
As mentioned earlier, this series has no problem killing off characters so if that's not your thing don't watch it.
ENJOYMENT: 5
I can't say I was bored watching DMCB. It certainly did it's job entertaining me for the first half and during the 2nd half I held out to see if it would turn around to to avail.
OVERALL: 3
While it has it's moments DMCB left me thoroughly disappointed.