Anime: Major (2005)

Major season two, follows the familiar characters of Honda [Shigeno] Goro and Sato Toshiya as they better themselves as athletes, and attempt to get into high school baseball teams. Even though it lacks the great animation and has an overused soundtrack, this is most likely the best season of Major that attracted all of it's fans, and gave it the incredible budget increase that it had for season three. [That's all I can say without spoiling anything :p.][br][br]Animation; 6/10[br][br]Fans of season one are going to be very disappointed by this category. Unlike the bright and smooth animation of it's predecessor, season two has a very washed out and not very detailed look for the majority of it's episodes. I'm guessing that season one wasn't a big hit because of the young characters who played sports, which don't appeal to young people who are yearning for incredible fight scenes and cliche story lines, or older people because of the childish look of the series which they didn't think would include any depth or romance. This, is the very worst animated season of major, not to mention the very overused pitching motions, and simplistic backgrounds. For the date of it's creation it's almost shameful, but of course watchable.[br][br]Sound; 7/10[br][br]Decent. Plain. Very overused. Of course with the low animation budget came a low budget for the sound, so basically all they did was use season one's. It fits the show, but no one wants to listen to the same decent music over and over, it's not unbearable mind you. Just decent.[br][br]Story; 10/10[br][br]Thank God the first two categories are over. Magnificently epic. I loved every bit of the storyline for this series. Sure, a lot of it could be predicted but have you ever seen a shonen that couldn't be :)? I would love to explain every area of this section but there would be far too many spoilers. Just believe me when I say, if you like sports series, you're going to love the story for this one.[br][br]Character; 9/10[br][br]Very wide variety of characters to choose from with excellent seiyuus to match their counterparts. Everyone is given their own strengths and weaknesses, and they aren't very traditional characters. Even though there isn't a lot of emotional growth, however physically and mentally there is more than enough to go around. You're going to loves these guys and gals, and did I forget to mention one of the coolest to ever exist is in this anime? [Mayumura.][br][br]Value; 10/10[br][br]Very high rewatch value [for myself.] I finished this series a little over a year ago and still have it on my hard drive, [don't tell funimation when they license it lol.] I love watching the games over, which even without the excellent animation that season three has, are very exciting to see.[br][br]Enjoyment; 10/10[br][br]Enjoyed every bit of this one, it's a funny, cute, and all around lovable anime series. If you haven't seen this one yet, you need to. But first check out season one, I didn't think from the looks of it I would enjoy it much either, but of course I was wrong and I am an eternal fan of this series.[br]

So the continuation of major and it comes in with a bang. Actually for me I watched the entire 3 seasons in 3 days so its harder and also easier for me to review this anime. Its always harder to rate something when you run through series all at once since you lose anticipation and other things. Anyway on with the review no more ranting. This season starts around 3-4 years after the events in sesaon 1. Goro who hurts his right shoulder and can't pitch anymore. He has also returned to Mifune to join his old friends as they try to save there baseball team. The actually anime is broken into two parts the first one is Mifune high school and the second part is Goro at Kaido so you can consider this season a double season kinda.

Animation
This is one of the things that doesn't change much at all throughout all 4 seasons. Even though the characters age as the seasons go by the characters still are recognizable after there growth. Although after season 2 they don't look THAT different anymore. So the general points of the animation are the reused frames that happened sometimes. Also the simple backgrounds and not very complex scenes in general. I don't think much production value at all CAN be put since this anime is really long.

Sound
Just like the animation the sound isn't impressive either. The same OST is used in all 4 seasons. Actually by the time I reached season 3 I could tell when the climax is and when they want to speed up parts. The EXACT same music is used for every part of the anime making it more and more predictable. I guess it was easier for me to notice since I watched it all consecutively too. Either way it made the anime a little less exciting. The voices are nice and stayed the same and aren't anything special. The opening and endings aren't too great either just average. So the sound is also acceptable.

Story
The story is rather straight forward. Goro wants to win with his baseball team and he does so. The anime usually focuses more on the small little things in the baseball game then the actually overall story. The only main focus in every season is usually a specific goal they want to achieve. For instance season 1 they wanted to beat YL and they did. Thus same thing as this season they work towards the goal. Even though the story is relatively simple they always make the games interesting because all the games are close. They rarely win convincingly and they also don't take too much time to play a game. Thus the anime never drags on and gets boring.

Character
The characters are the greatest part of the anime. Although development is minimal and only happens here and there during the game. The whole psychological parts of the anime make the anime fun. All the characters have lots of mental breakdowns but then must support each other to overcome the obstacles. Thus they make it really fun and believable characters. The only character that really is OUT there is Goro but even him hes not invincible he has his problems as well. Therefore the characters play a great role in making the anime great.

Value and Enjoyment
The value is lost a bit since season 2 does not really make much new messages. They DO have some variations as in not giving up even with injuries and such but the general picture stays the same. I wouldn't be able to rewatch this anime either since its only good once. After that you really don't have much more to see. I did enjoy the anime though I mean I can't ever get enough of Goro and his endless cockiness. He always pulls through somehow to and his pride never fails him. All in all this anime made me happy to watch. I do recommend that if you watch major do not watch all 3 seasons at once like me :(. But I definitely recommend this anime to people who liked first season and also like sports anime. So if you try it out have fun :)