Review of Katanagatari

I expected it to take me on an entertaining ride. On an action-packed, fun-filled journey with romantic elements between the leads acting as spice to further enhance the flavor of the story. Would it be correct to say that it succeeded in proving itself worth my time? That it satiated my expectations? Yes, it did. It did that and much more. Oh so much more. Some elucidation is in order, yes? Elucidate I shall - Katanagatari is a story about swords. Contrary to what most people would think by reading the synopsis or watching the pilot episode, this isn’t a journey about collection of the swords butrather the focal point of the story is our main lead – a sword – Yasuri Shichika. It is his journey – a journey which shapes him; which showcases his metamorphosis from a sword devoid of emotions and feelings acting on the mercy of their master to an individual, a human being, capable of inhabiting emotions and expressing his feelings as a person.

It would’ve failed as a story if it didn’t possess a likeable cast. For a character-centered story to work, it is very important to make the character in question likeable. Which this anime manages to do quite well. He may seem like a caricature – a cardboard cut-out and a character as bland as he can be; in the beginning, at least. But the story intends for that to be the case. He is a sword, after all, and not a human being. Over the course of the story, he develops into a character. And the development feels organic and not very out of place. Togame, the other main character in this story, is the loud-mouthed female lead. She may seem like any regular protagonist or love interest that you’d find in any generic anime but that’s not really the case considering the fact that her character possesses layers – layers that only become visible over time. And which add up to make her a suitably complex character. The majority of the cast, other than these two, are secondary and episodic characters in nature. Needless to say, they don’t get to develop as characters as much as our main lead does – but that is irrelevant in the end because they merely serve as a means to further enhance the development of our lead. Their strong characterization and distinct persona help them build a strong first impression, no matter how insignificant they may be, and, as a result, they end up being memorable to a degree despite the minuscule screen-time some of them may get.

A story possessing likeable leads and sufficiently distinct secondary characters won’t mean much if the story itself didn’t pack a punch – which, thankfully, isn’t the case here. The overall story of Katanagatari is pretty strong. It packs in quite a bit of content in its 12 episode run, partially owing to its unique episode length, and it deals with themes like revenge, cursed fate and asks you questions about what it means to possess resolve, what is the reason behind people engaging in the act of war, what it means to follow your true objective – how you may have to discard all of your objectives to succeed in fulfilling your one true objective; all the while making commentary on things like correct and altered history – stuff that ties into the overarching story. Also, do not be fooled by its colorful visuals – it is a story possessing plenty of dark stuff. A good deal of the content on showcase here can be taken to attribute the show to possess nihilistic views. Some may argue against it and consider this story, at its core, a celebration of life itself but that’s a subjective view which may vary from person to person. Regardless, content-wise it delivers.

But a good story with shoddy execution ultimately ends up as nothing but a messy bundle of plot-threads. As a result, the question is – does the execution front fail? Nope.

The story is told in an episodic fashion. And each episode consists of the characters engaging in conversations which eat up a majority of the episode length. This may be an action anime but all of the action in the show merely crops up for about 5 minutes per episode at the very end. This would spell disaster for most shows. It works here because the dialogue has been given a lot of attention – none of it is irrelevant or inconsequential. It may serve to fill the viewer in on the personality or motivations of a specific character at one instance or may act as a means to foreshadow future events in a subtle manner. As a result, you won’t even notice that you’d watched an anime with 90% dialogue and 10% action well after you’ve finished it. That’s what happened with me. THAT is how well done it is. Due to that, I wouldn’t hesitate to recommend this show even to people who prefer action over talks – the same cannot be said of similar shows like Bakemonogatari and the like (other creations by the same author, Nisio Isin). But that’s enough of a digression.

With story and characters out of the way, it is time to discuss the presentation and the production values of the show. The only word that comes to my mind when I think about the visuals in this show is – gorgeous. The art style is definitely unique and may not be everybody’s cup of tea but it fits the story very well. Highly detailed vistas and intricately designed backgrounds are to be found aplenty in this anime. The character designs are highly distinct and they all stand out a lot from the generic characters that you’d normally see in any anime. Their designs reflect their personality perfectly – as a result, just their mere appearance can tell you a lot about the kind of character that they are. A good move on the part of the production team considering the fact that most of the characters in question are episodic in nature, and, as a result, do not get significant screen time over the course of the story. Adding shades to their personality via colorful characterization is something this anime does really well as has been mentioned multiple times during the course of this review.

Soundtrack is another aspect of this show where they hit the nail right on the head. They’ve nailed it – the anime boasts a good number of memorable soundtracks and they’ve been used exquisitely to further enhance the atmosphere of any scene in the anime. If it weren’t for the excellent soundtrack, this anime would’ve lost a great deal of its atmosphere and its charm.

All in all, Katanagatari is well worth your time. It deserves multiple watches, in fact, since some details may slip by your eye during the first watch (as it did in my case). A nicely written story possessing likeable characters, gorgeous visuals and an amazing soundtrack – all in all, it is a fantastic package that should satiate your hunger for a well-crafted fantasy tale for some time and may even end up as one of your favorites. Like it very well did in my case.