Beelzebub Review

Synopsis
As Tatsumi Oga was beating delinquents up and having them grovel at his feet he saw a man floating downstream the river next to him. He threw the man out of the water and split him in half, what emerged from the man was a baby who just happen to be the son of the demon king. As Oga finds himself raising the demon king’s son he also finds himself in a new arrange of situations.

Story
Beelzebub is a comedy, action anime that has a very interesting story line, they took the cliche teenager raising a child story and added the demon world and the demon king to the mix making it into a somewhat original story, going into the anime you learn that Oga is a delinquent that is very strong when it comes to fighting. The story at first is rather slow paced as Oga has to defeat each member of the TKKH in order to find a person who is more suitable as a parent than what he is in terms of strength. This arc in itself is rather long and there are a few filler episodes but I didn’t really mind this as it fit the tone of the anime. One issue I had was that Oga just had it too easy. I understand that he is unreasonably strong but he is taking out third year students left, right and center like it’s nothing. Fortunately this doesn’t last forever and he does need to train to get stronger. The humor in Beelzebub is quite good, I often found myself laughing at the jokes and situations that they would wind themselves up in. Beelzebub doesn’t force the jokes either unlike Seitokai Yakuindomo where the jokes are told left, right and center. Later on in the story the pacing picks up and it seems that the pacing goes too fast at times, yet once again I didn’t really mind this as the story wasn’t hard to follow and everything made sense. Overall I give the story an 8/10.

Characters
The Characters in Beelzebub are very average, the personalities don’t really vary between characters and the designs are average as well, in saying that Kanzaki and Himekawa probably have the best designs in Beelzebub. The development of the characters is good to see. Oga, as the anime progresses becomes more mature and more accepting of his fate with baby Beel and surprisingly Oga isn’t the only one that has development in the anime, Hildegard also gets some development in the anime as well, she turns from a character that only cares for her master to becoming someone who learns to sympathize with the humans. The interactions between characters are very enjoyable to watch, its smooth and believable. One problem I have is that even though some characters seem like enemies they are willing to band together to defeat the enemy way to easily. There are a lot of characters that actually play some sort of important role through out the anime’s life. Oga Tatsumi is your run of the mill delinquent that loves to fight and is dimwitted, he tries to find someone to take Baby beel from him. Hildegard is the demon maid servant of Baby Beel, she is dark, brutal and heartless to anyone other than Baby Beel, well at first she is. Furuichi Takayuki is the strategist, well he claims to be anyway. Furuichi is the only main character that isn’t a fighter, he is often wanting to avoid trouble yet being around Oga makes it hard to avoid it. Normally characters like him I feel sorry for since they normally don’t have the choice to be in their current situation yet Furuichi chose to be freinds with Oga. Alaindelon the Trans-dimensional demon, he has the ability to transport both people and objects from place to place. He is a main source of comedy in the show often cross dressing and giving the vibe that he is in love with Furuichi. Overall i give the characters a 5/10.

Art and Animation
The art in Beelzebub is pretty average, nothing in the anime made me go wow. With the scenery also being average the art isn’t the strong point of the anime. The animation is smooth and interacts well with the scenery. The strong point in the anime is the choreography of the action. The fight scenes in the first half of Beelzebub is mediocre where it really was just one hit knock outs but just seeing how bad-ass Oga actually is has to be the best part about those fights. Sure it’s a bit lack luster but seeing all these guys put all their strength into beating Oga only for them to be knocked out in one hit is what defined Oga in the story. As the story progresses Oga is no longer this strong force as he was before as the opponents become stronger themselves, the most memorable fights would definitely have to be the fights between Oga and Tojo. In saying this the fights Hildegard is involved in against the other demon maid servants is pretty awesome to watch as well. Overall I give the Art and Animation a 6/10

Music and Sound
The music in Beelzebub does do its job in filling the mood yet my problem with it is not that the music doesn’t really suit the tones its the fact that I just didn’t like some of the pieces, these were mainly the songs meant for the scenes where jokes were told. Aside from these pieces the rest of the sound track was fine, the pieces meant for the fights and any scene where things were heating up were actually really good. The sound effects were good as well nothing did sound out of place in terms of effects. The voice acting I especially enjoyed as it really was believable in terms of expressions. Voices such as Oga’s were really good especially when it came to his “demonic” voice, that’s just what I call it but it’s a good fit. overall I give the Music and Sound a 7/10.

Final Thoughts
Beelzebub may not be the best anime that I’ve watched but it’s an anime I recommend highly, with a story that isn’t complicated and jokes that are actually funny its a good anime to show those who are new to anime. Beelzebub does all the basics correct and proves that time and time again through out the 60 episodes it has. Overall I give Beelzebub a 6.5/10. If you enjoy a story full of bare fist fights with a few magical components thrown in then Beelzebub is a good choice for you.