Cannon Busters

Defiantly enjoyed the six fi wasteland vibe and animations style. They action scenes were a little sporadic. I hope the series continues.

This show is pretty entertaining, and I look forward to another season. From episode 1, it drops you right into the action, and catches you up on the backstory as it goes along. The character arcs are interesting, and the various parts come together to an eventual reckoning. Although, the final episode of season 1 wasn't quite as good as I was anticipating. The way some things were resolved (or unresolved) could have been better. Overall, it's a solid anime. If you're an anime fan looking for a loose description, it comes off somewhat like Trigun, but a little more outrageous and over the top. I look forward to future seasons.

Let me just start this review by saying that this anime does a lot of things right. It starts off with an interesting hook and displays a beautiful and intricate world. The animation is fantastic and it has a killer opening that will keep you from skipping the intro. While watching I couldn't help feeling like this anime was kind of a throwback to Cowboy Bebop or Trigun. However, this doesn't display nearly the same quality in writing or polish as either of those shows. After the first couple of episodes the shiny animation and amazing soundtrack couldn't keep me from noticing the shows flaws. And as the show continued, these flaws became more egregious and severely hindered my enjoyment.

The first major flaw I noticed were the characters. While naive and upbeat characters aren't always annoying, Sam's persistent friendly attitude and innocent lack of situational awareness grates on my nerves. Mostly because it undercuts any potential tension that may have been there otherwise but also because there has to be a limit to not understanding when someone is trying to kill you and is not friendly. I don't care that it can be explained by saying that was how she was programmed, the point is that it gets incredibly annoying. Philly has the opposite problem, he is an arrogant and incompetent . I feel like you can either make a character a competent or someone who is incompetent but has redeeming qualities. Philly is neither and makes you question why you should care about his fate and what purpose he even serves for the story. Casey is probably the only character in the main cast I like and Prince Kelby is your typical sheltered annoying brat. Thankfully the side characters tend to have more interesting and likable personalities but we are stuck following Philly, Sam or Kelby most of the time.

The Second Flaw is the action. It is underwhelming and kind of disappointing. This is not helped by the fact that they often cut away from it and to something a lot less interesting. It's a pity since the intro has amazing looking action, however, it looks like they couldn't replicate the pace and intensity for the actual anime. Finally, the pacing for this anime is slow. There seems to be a lot of filler episodes that don't progress the plot and even within episodes there is a lot of empty space where not much happens. It seems like they were struggling to justify 12 episodes and had to drag out the story and runtime to match it. This is perplexing considering that the season ends on a cliffhanger.

All in all I would say that this anime is mediocre. It won't take priority over any shows you are currently watching but, if you find yourself lacking in good shows you could do worse than this one.

This show takes me back to fond childhood memories of anime. The transforming Cadillac is just fantastic, definitely my favorite character. Fun song, fun characters, and a fun story.

The first thing I noticed from the trailer was just how diverse the characters were, I love it! There are black girls and other black characters in anime, but there are SO little of them, not to mention most have no real depth to them, as well as many play into racial stereotypes in general. Cannon Busters is VERY independent of these tropes and even manages to have so many qualities represented like natural black hairstyles, non-stereotypical differentiating fashion styles, skin conditions, short and tall, thick and slim, etc. The first thing I noticed upon watching however, was the opening and ending which tells a story with soft vocals and good beats. The writing is also exponential, especially for a project coming from one man. This series is immersive beyond belief, it's an entire world blooming with detail. I won't get into it for spoiler reasons, but once you watch you'll understand. Overall, as a black girl, I finally get to see representation in something I love, which honestly makes me so appreciative and tearful. Even if you can't relate, giving Cannon Busters a watch should do you some good! It's got a mixture of classic anime in it, but people seem to believe it's a blatant rip off of some manga/anime that weren't even around/popular/classic enough when this series was first published in 2005. This series was among others like Trigun and Cowboy Bebop, and many others the creator watched growing up, but far from a rip off in my opinion. Obviously inspired, but what anime doesn't take inspiration from elsewhere?