Anime Review: K Anime / K Project (S1, Movie: K: Missing Kings, S2: K: Return of Kings)

First of all, naming the anime K makes the anime a bit weird to search (should have just name Kings or K Project right from the get go). Nevertheless K brings an interesting concept onto the table - the idea of kings and their clansmen who protect the king. Whilst the concept is interesting, the anime is riddled with cliches and plot holes, and by the time I finished the whole series, I was left dissatisfied because of how rushed the story is and how cliche it was.

Season 1: K

Season 1 was actually not that bad because it felt like the story wasn't rushed at all, but it wasn't too slow either. It gave enough time to build up suspension of who the Seventh King and who the Silver King is. It also introduced the three Kings out of the 7 (Blue King, Red King and Gold King). At the start, we are left wondering whether our main character Shiro is the seventh King, because he had killed a Red Clansmen. Every King has a Sword of Damocles, so it is easy to identify them during battles. Unfortunately Shiro's memory is jumbled and he cannot remember. And as the anime goes along, there's cheeky fighting between the Red and Blue clan, and also Shiro getting pursued cause he looks like the person who killed the Red clansman. 

However, it is revealed that Shiro is actually the Silver King (the number 1 King) and not the Seventh King. I personally didn't expect that, but it was plausible since the light he was emanating was whitish. We also realised what really happened that night when the Red clansman was killed. It was the Seventh King's power to possess people, and thus Shiro was possessed that night and killed the Red clansman. We then come to the battle between Silver and Seventh King, where the resolution is a bit iffy. Since it's an anime, there is no way that the main character is gonna die so quick just to defeat another king, but the good thing is that we are left wondering where Shiro went after this battle. The studio achieved a good balance - I would be satisfied without a sequel, but it also brings about the possibilities of a sequel to explain where Shiro is. Also, we see that the Red King has died to the hands of the Blue King, so that his Sword of Damocles doesn't fall down and result in a crater.

The characters are all unique I guess. The Red clan (HOMRA) is full of punks, the Blue Clan (Scepter 4) is full of class and are the "special police" of the country. And of course, studios must always put some fanservice in the anime. The female characters in this anime are extremely sexualised - the blue lieutenant (Seri Awashima) always has this weird seductive pose when she's unleashing her sword fighting move and also weird pans to show her ass. Personally it feels way too forced and it wasn't necessary. The female characters by themselves are already fanservice. Adding more is just overkill. However, overall Season 1 was somewhat well done.

 

Movie Sequel (K: Missing Kings)

The movie serves as a brief introduction to a new complication and the revelation of one of the 7 kings (the Green King - responsible for the Green Clan known as Jungle). Personally the clan system for Jungle is the most interesting. Any person can join it if they are connected to the Jungle network and you can rise up the ranks if you complete missions, but most of the missions usually involve criminal activity. Since the Red King has died, the Red clan has almost fully disbanded and the Blue clan are left to deal with the Green clan, who tries to kidnap one of the Red clansman Anna Kushina. We eventually see that Anna becomes the new Red King (which is pretty PogChamp). 

We are also left wondering where Shiro is, and this is not resolved in the movie, but it is revealed that he is alive somewhere. We also do not know who the Green King is yet, but we see some of the most elite members of Jungle in the movie. At the end, we also given the knowledge that the Blue King's Sword of Damocles is crumbling, which suggests that the Blue King will die soon if he uses too much power. Overall, not a bad movie as it introduced our main protagonist that will be seen in Season 2.

Season 2 (K: Return of Kings)

I'm sure the studio wanted to name it Return of the Kings, but that name is probably copyrighted, and it would have sounded cooler. Anyway, Season 2 was an extremely disappointing watch compared to its prequels. The story felt too rushed, especially for such a bad-ass enemy. The Green King is definitely a bad-ass enemy, probably the redeeming factor of this anime. In this season, it is revealed that the Green King is invincible for a short period of time and he can even stand his ground against the Gold King (the strongest king on the ground). Essentially the protagonists are facing an almost indestructible enemy, and I liked the planning behind it. It was nice to see that the protagonists actually lost one of the battles, but the final battle is a bit cliche. How is Shiro able to manually bring down his Sword of Damocles? Are all the kings able to control that? I guess he didn't die because the slab that gave this power to everyone was destroyed and as a result everyone lost their power and became normal people again. Now Shiro is again gone, since he was always possessing a body, and it is unlikely a direct sequel will be made (even though MyAnimeList shows that there are movie sequels coming out this year - they look like movies to look at backstories/fill gaps in story). 

Furthermore, the revelation of the final king (Grey King) was underwhelming. Sure we see how badass he is, but just randomly bringing him in like this was unexpected. Furthermore his motivation to help the Green King give powers to every ordinary person is not really a good reason. His reasoning was that giving everyone powers could save similar tragedies that occurred to the Grey Clan, which was completely wiped out due to an incident long ago. For me, it was too fast paced and too cliche.

Overall, the series was average at best. It wasn't overwhelming despite having an interesting concept. Would I recommend this? Not really. It's nothing special, and there's definitely way more interesting anime out there to watch.

Overall Score: 7/10

Story: 7/10 (S1), 7/10 (Movie), 5/10 (S2)

Characters: 6/10

Art: 7/10

Sound: 8/10

Enjoyment: 7/10