Anime Addiction: Kabaneri of the Iron Fortress

Kabaneri of the Iron Fortress brought to us by basically the same team which made Shingeki no Kyogin (Attack on Titan) and to put it quite frankly it is a slightly sub-par clone of the same show. But the thing is; I had so much fun with it that I watched all the eleven episodes in one sitting, which approximately comes to about four hours.

The premise of Kabaneri, lo-and-behold, the same as the premise of Attack on Titan; humanoid monsters, in this case zombies or Kabane, have invaded the earth and humanity has built small cities surrounded by walls in different areas connected by trains which transport supplies and weapons. The zombies are really difficult to kill because their, very much exposed, hearts are covered by a really strong metal cage for some reason.

That is the basic premise of the story. But here is the thing, the only reason that a story exists in the first place is so that cool shit can happen on screen. The setting is feudal Japan but it is the steam-punk version. Think unnecessarily intricate weapons and tons of steam for no reason than that it looks awesome. It’s like the director wrote a love letter to steam. Steamy.

Jokes aside, this show has very stereotypical characters and, once again, they are all either extremely badass or really stupid. The hero of the story is a guy named Ikoma and he is the counterpart of Eren form Attack on Titan. The Mikasa counterpart in this show is Mumei.

Every plot point and every event just happens so that characters can do awesome shit.  The zombies cannot be killed from far away, so you need to get in close to kill them. This is just so that we have awesome close-quarters combat scenes. Samurai swords can pierce their hearts, and this gives an excuse for the creators of the show to introduce an awesome samurai sword wielding bodyguard.

As the show goes on, the enemies get wackier, the weapons get modifications and attachments and there is a lot of blood and gore. Oh and Fan-Service, tons of Fan-Service. You know what I mean.

But despite all the shortcomings in the story, I thoroughly enjoyed it. The characters are animated to perfection and they are some of the most beautiful I have seen on screen. Mumei in particular is so beautiful that I have to remind myself that she is twelve. *sigh* oh anime.

The action scenes are spectacular to look at, and let’s be honest for a second here, who doesn’t like to see a badass twelve year old decapitate zombies, while a guy fires steam powered rockets point blank into another zombies chest and also see notice that there are other half-human-half-zombie-bad-asses wrecking the zombies on screen. Oh and they shout “Rokkon Shojo”, so please excuse me while I scream at how awesome it is internally.

The story does come into play by the seventh episode and while the show does try to put a little effort into it, you know where everything it is going but you are all the more happy for it, because you don’t have to see an unexpected plot twist just because the show is trying to be a dramatic master piece.

If you can’t tell already, I love this show. This is exactly what I needed as I wait for the second season of Attack on Titan. This is in no way better than Attack on Titan but it is just as fun to watch.

I give Kabaneri of the Iron Fortress a 6 out of 10.

In the end, Kabaneri of the Iron Fortress is an anime which is really, really, really dumb. But it is also very, very, very awesome. Please check it out if you get the chance. You will love it despite its flaws. Until next time;

Peace!!!