Review of Gintama

Gintama It took me practically a decade to start this series and that's a good thing. I kept trying to excuse myself to bypass it and not look at it. And the result is that I was able to watch practically all of the episodes without a break, which was of course worth it. Gintama has evolved symbolically into my "personal" favorite anime, which cannot be outdone by anyone or anything in sympathy. The exemplary, sympathetic characters also contributed a large part to this. And of course the humor, the great pride of the Gintama community. However, if Gintama had remained just a parody comedy from start tofinish, I would be able to mark this anime as a 10/10. Unfortunately, they made the mistake here and actually tried to incorporate a "serious" plot, which mostly backfired. Hideaki Sorachi, had a great deal of knowledge of stereotypes and the usual shounen standards and has often used them for his jokes. I can only talk about the "Anime Adaptation" because I don't know the Manga.

What needs to be considered, Gintama is not for everyone.

Gintama doesn't mince his words. There is a lot of black humor, toilet humor, and also lots of sex jokes. But apart from that, there is also an incredible number of creatively constructed scenarios in interaction with the characters.

The serious episodes or as people like to call them the "Gintama Serious Arcs" - have mostly been subtle in their approach. But Gintama has an ENORMOUS weakness for exaggerated drama. It's more melodramatic than almost any other anime. Although in most of the scenes nobody actually dies (at least no characters with more than 5 minutes of screen time), a single scene is dragged out to several minutes. It was particularly negative in the "Yoshiwara in Flames" and "Red Spider" -Arc. Here the arcs were drawn out in an insulting way, which completely destroyed the atmosphere. In addition, the characters like to turn in circles for minutes and repeat the same dialogues (in terms of content) over and over again, just so that the episode time was reached. The story arcs in the first 201 episodes had considerably little story anyway. And that little was then destroyed as well. Thank goodness the first season of Gintama included a maximum of 20+ story episodes on average and that was it. The rest of the arcs have been pure golden comedy, with splendid approaches and compositions. The various individual comedy arcs were particularly impressive.
A lot of people love the "Gintama Serious Arcs" and I can empathize with that too. However, they are of average quality and have only damaged the series. The transitions from humorous to serious were particularly disastrous. If this had been done on purpose, it would not be a problem, unfortunately, it is not.

Was there actually a real story in Gintama at all? The answer is yes, unfortunately only limited and very broadly divided into episodes. On average, there are 4 story episodes after every 30-40 comedy episodes. The plot practically doesn't develop at all, the series only gets going from episode 300 onwards.
The setting of the aliens and samurai is stunningly ingenious, just as it is incredibly simple. Gintama was able to get some humor out of this concept by combining the old samurai era with modern ideology and nonsense.

In the field of animation, Gintama is pure average. There was a choreographically interesting and respectable scene, but only minimally. The rest are still images that hardly had any dynamics. One would not have expected otherwise with ordinary episodes. Unfortunately, the older Gintama episodes actually have better animation than the later ones. At least it was important that the characters did not look like monsters from a distance of 2 meters, but that you could still clearly see their facial outline.

Gintama owns, among other things, some quite impressive Osts, which could well underline both humorous scenes and serious moments. The theme by Prince Hata [Baka-] or by Hasegawa and Katsura is particularly positive. These perfectly reflected their personalities and practically their presence in the series. Including some of the best Intro Songs, just like -Donten-

And last but not least, the most important and biggest point about Gintama, which is why it has become so popular. What's the point of good humor if the characters fail to remain sympathetic and convey these jokes? Exactly.
Gintama has probably one of the best and most individual character collections. One crazy idiot follows another, each with their own problems, disorders, views, and ideologies. What gives the whole thing the perfect touch is the harmony between wit and character. The author made sure that the jokes harmonize naturally with each character and can get the best out of them.
Anyone expecting something like "profound" characters at Gintama is wrong here. Gintama practically does what it wants, it's the rebellious child of anime production.

Gintoki, the protagonist of this story and one of the most likable assholes among the anime protagonists. Whether he is a self-sacrificing hero is a selfish failure is something you won't be able to say even to the end. But one thing is clear, he is a sympathy bomb with a noteworthy moral.
Kagura, who is by far one of the best female protagonists. Her casual manner, her brutality, sympathy, and lack of femininity make this character outstanding. Like any other character, she is unappealing in every way and you shouldn't really like her. But you still like them, thanks to these traits, which make them much more realistic than you might think.
The glasses, he's the third character and a typical otaku nerd. The anime uses him for jokes almost around the clock. He's still somewhat personable but is far behind most of the other characters.
Zura and Elizabeth, two weird birds that you can't find anywhere else. They are always used for the most questionable and best scenes to get the maximum potential out of the jokes. In that regard, Zura is, among other things, my favorite character.
Hasagawa also known as [Madao] is the person who reflects the inner values ​​of humanity and society. By far the most profound character in the entire series. Which among other things not only has some of the best arcs but is a man among the Madaos on every imaginable definition.
The Shinsengumi also exists as loud bangers that practically form an opposite side of the Yoruzuya. Under the guidance of a real gorilla, they protect the streets of Edo and tyrannize them at the same time with their stupidity. Kondo is a gorilla. Hijikata is a way of life that consists only of mayonnaise inside and Shogo is a complete sadist. Both Hijikata and Shogo have an enormous number of humorous and bizarre relationships and also diverse humorous situations.
The remaining supporting characters are mostly all worth gold in the area of ​​sympathy, insofar as they belong to the neutral or good faction.
One can hardly say anything about the antagonists since their short screen time is practically used as a joke.

If you were to speak here for each character individually, it would take a huge amount of time. So you have to leave it at that.

Gintama is without a doubt a legendary series that has burned itself into the hearts of many people, including mine. Hideo has done a heartwarming comedy that would have been almost unbeaten in its genre if he hadn't tried to add a serious plot to it.

Nonetheless, Gintama is a series that undoubtedly deserves its hype.

Story 4
Art 5
Sound 8
Character 6
Enjoyment 10
Overall 8