Byakuya Togami

Yasuhiro Hagakure

Aoi Asahina

Hifumi Yamada

Leon Kuwata

Kiyotaka Ishimaru

Touko Fukawa

Sakura Oogami

Mondo Oowada

Junko Enoshima

Makoto Naegi

Chihiro Fujisaki

Sayaka Maizono

Celestia Ludenberg

Monokuma

Kyouko Kirigiri

Mukuro Ikusaba

Monomi

Komaru Naegi

Alter Ego

Naegi no Papa

Daiya Oowada

Naegi no Haha

A group of 15 elite high school students are gathered at a very special, high class high school. To graduate from this high school essentially means you'll succeed in life, but graduating is very difficult. The school is presided over by a bear called Monokuma, and he explains to them that their graduation hinges around committing a murder. The only way to graduate is to kill one of your classmates and get away with it. If the other classmates discover the identity of the killer, the killer is the only one executed. However, if they fail to catch the killer, only the killer graduates and the others are annihilated. Which of the 15 will survive the bloodbath to come?


I have seen that not many people have done a review for this Anime... Well... actually no one has on this, so I thought I will!

For someone who has never played the Danganronpa games, I found this Anime quite enjoyable from start to finish, I had already had a few spoilers off one of my friends for this Anime but I still saw and felt the suspense in the Anime of~!Oh, Who is going to be murdered next!?!~
It's a short Anime and I seriously did love it, it holds up all the tension throughout. 
The characters all have different personalities and all have different desires. I quite personally prefer Naegi and Chihiro. my least favourite is Byakuya, he's just kinda douchey


~!I was really amazed at how only, out of the 16 students, only 10 died, I literally thought that all but one would survive, that is the kinda vibe you get during this Anime, a state of horror that literally everyone will die, as they are forced to fight to the death to be able to graduate. The Classroom Trials are pretty amazing too, they make you wonder who actually did the murder and I always tried finding myself, trying to figure out who did it as they were finding the clues, I guess that is exactly what the game is like :3!~

The Animation seems a bit rushed compared to the game (So I have been told), I am planning to buy the game to get a proper feel of the franchise. But I honestly thought it was well executed!
The music in the openings are great, too! I personally prefer the outro music because it is in Japanese and it suits the Anime itself for the dark vibe it seems to have!

Overall, it has some great scenes included, some good Animation in my opinion, music is good and the characters are all balanced and special in their own special way! I rate 83/100!
And I'll see if this needs to be edited after I play the Danganronpa games!

And I do honestly hope there actually will be a second Anime of this, as there is a second game!

Once you have finished this Anime, you should totally watch the Danganronpa abridged series! it's only on episode 6 of 13, but it takes the seriousness of the Anime itself and turns it into comedy, by easily mocking the characters personalities!!

A dark themed Anime about students stuck in school and need to survive... literally! "Kill or be killed"

__GOOD ANIME... BAD CIRCUMSTANCE__

img220(https://m.media-amazon.com/images/M/MV5BNTI3OWE1NGQtMDZiNS00NTE2LWI5NGItZTVkODIyNWE5MjVhXkEyXkFqcGdeQXVyNjc0MDIyMTQ@._V1_.jpg)

Danganronpa is the story of 15 uniquely talented school children who end up in a deadly game of lies, murders and betrayals. With no way of contacting the outside world and the psychotic bear Monokuma dictating the events before them can any of them survive long enough to unravel the secrets of Hope Peak Academy? The Battle between Hope and Despair Has BEGUN!!!

Based off the very popular gaming series of the same name by Spike Chunsoft, Danganronpa is best known from its unique Horror/ Suspense style and of course, its over the top executions through out its lifespan so it was no surprise when they turned the original Happy Trigger Havoc into the anime series known as Danganronpa: The Animation. The Main Protagonist is Naeegi Makoto also known as the Ultimate Lucky Student who arrives at the most prestigious school in Japan known as Hopes Peak, a school that guarantees those who graduate success in their lives... However upon arriving he suddenly faints and wakes up in a classroom with all the Windows covered, heavy security all around and seemingly no means of leaving >.<

img220(https://i1.wp.com/www.relyonhorror.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/08/DAN-09037_COMBO-front_large.jpg?resize=644%2C408)

He soon discovers that he is not alone as 14 other students have also been trapped into and seemingly have no memories of how exactly that ended up in this situation... However it would soon be revealed that they have been "imprisoned" inside Hopes Peak by a bear like mecha known as Monokuma who tells them that if they want to leave they would have to "Graduate" from his school system...and how do they do that? SIMPLE - they have to kill one (or more) of the other students and get away with it in a class trail of course :) Of course failure to do so would result in a rather gruesome PUNISHMENT.

Although they seeming reject this idea to begin with, its not long before Momokuma is attempting to manipulate individuals into doing his desired bidding and thus the story of the series really starts to unfold.

img220(https://vignette.wikia.nocookie.net/legendsofthemultiuniverse/images/5/55/Tumblr_inline_nr8siuplr81txlwvy_500_1_by_moonlightwolf578-d93ms9u.gif/revision/latest?cb=20170303153757)

The biggest issue with this series is its history, to recommend this over the game is impossible because honestly if you haven't played the game yet I highly recommend that you do first because its worthy of the praise it gets in the community...but once you have played the game the Anime does not really do anything majorly different apart from bring the characters to life >.< so you would essentially just be watching a massive 12 episode cutscene recap of the original game and for many that may be a pretty dull idea after you just put up to 50 or so hours into the game itself if that makes sense.

Another issue is that the anime does leave out alot of key facts that really drive home how certain characters are and what kind of people they are throughout and in some cases you will find that someone you may really hate for their "actions" in the anime you will discover were actually the actions of another in the game itself (with no spoilers but those who played the game "Trail 2"..that's all I am saying).

So maybe its all comes down to how you want to approach it - You can watch the anime and then play the game to get deeper into the Lore, the cast of characters and the actual story or you can play through the game and then watch this anime as a massive cut scene because you really loved the game as much as I did... I don't believe there is a right way to do.

In short, I recommend this anime if you are a fan of the game, you may enjoy it if you are somewhat a fan of mild Horror or Suspense Thriller anime but just remember that whether you go game or anime you will spoil a majority of the other so pick which one you wanna do first and make sure you do it before going onto the next :D

img220(https://hardcore-gamer.s3.amazonaws.com/uploads/2015/03/Danganronpa_Trigger_Happy_Havoc_portada-747x309.jpg)

An Anime I want to recommend...but not sure how >.>

#Danganronpa: The Animation
 Amazing anime for anyone looking for a __thriller__ but don't want the same cliches repeated over and over again. People who have played the game may disagree with my statement and they say that the animators butchered the game, so I guess just to make sure you should also play the game just for the experience (Game: __Danganronpa: Trigger Happy Havoc__). The character development in this anime was not that great since it looked really rushed and some characters were just meh and looked like they didn't belong there but that is only the anime in the game their whole story was explained with thorough detail. If people don't like seeing blood but still crave for a thriller it's good for them too since the artist made the blood hot pink to keep the rating of the game away from mature but I guess they continued it one to the anime as well so it would be better on people who take a little violence. The storyline of the anime may seem confusing but the last episode brings the whole storyline together to help you understand. Warning beforehand you will crave for more after the anime ends since it leaves wondering and wondering about the mysterious ending and what actually happened to our main characters. If people like newer art styles in anime this one has a really interesting one it is called __2.5d__ drawing which combines 2d and 3d art style to make a unique pop art effects.
# New Viewers
I won't recommend this anime to new viewers since it won't match their taste, my vision of new viewers is people who just got introduced to anime with Naruto or pokemon so I think this is not for them. If they want to watch thriller anime anyways they should watch something death note
# Who would like this
People who liked __Ace attorney__, __Conan__ or any sort of detective anime would like this since it is basically the same. Light-Hearted people who watch anime for romance purposes etc. may not be interested in this since it is a way different idea. People that like to think will love this anime will probably like this anime more than all the other viewers. 
# Unrelated Note
__This was my first time reviewing an anime so sorry if you think anything is wrong with I tried my best and hope to make a lot of new friends on this platform. Also sorry for the anime being outdated. ＼(*^▽^*)/__
~~~Final Review:~~~
~~~img220(https://media1.tenor.com/images/38200478b91db2d19a12ecf4672391c9/tenor.gif?itemid=10138734)~~~

Amazing Thriller. Meh, character development. I think you should play the game. Great Art Styles. Not for new viewers.

This is my first review lmao...

SPOILERS (Duh)

But anyway, I enjoyed this anime. (I heard the game is better so I'll check it out later) In this review I'll talk about the story, the characters, and my opinions on it. 

The story/plot:

Fifteen highschoolers get trapped in a school with no way out and are forced to kill one another in hopes of escaping. Brutal am I right? I loved the concept! First of all, very interesting and in my opinion it never got boring. The first couple of episodes kinda had the same idea, someone gets killed, the students have to look for clues for a limited amount of time and then the class trial is held to determine who the killer is (decided by a unanimous vote). But, even though the first couple of episodes had the same idea, they were not boring at all! I loved how it had a mystery detective kinda feel to it where they had to look for clues and they only had a limited amount of time. So after times up, they all gather in a little "courtroom" (look I don't know what to call it haha) and debate on who the murderer is. Usually they suspect one person to be it but by some random evidence the Naegi somehow pins it on the true murderer. (usually, the murderer slips up by saying something they weren't supposed to). It is cliche but for me I didn't expect the murderers to be who they were half the time. Now skip the last couple of episodes when there are only six people left. The sixteenth student was revealed (and murdered) so they had to hold a class trial for that. Long story short, they think it's Naegi (because he's the protagonist, duh) and he almost dies but then pulls a Luke Skywalker and falls into the trash room. (thank you Fujisaki). Fast forward to the last episode where Junko is revealed to be the ultimate despair. Stuff happens and she's killed. Then the remaining six students get to finally leave. As they open the door and the light is shed into the room... we don't get to see the world and see if it's actually destroyed or just fine. I wish we could have seen it then the final scene would have come to an end, but I'm pretty sure it's to set up for the next arc?? (Correct me if I'm wrong).
But yeah, overall interesting story! 

The characters:

For this part, I'll just post the name and write a couple of sentences about what I thought. 

Monokuma: I just hate him. Which makes him a good character. Very goofy at times but then also has a twisted dark side. 

Makoto Naegi: Typical protagonist. When he was revealed to be the super-duper high school hope I laughed. I mean his character was very optimistic but the name lmao. I liked him as a protagonist, I don't remember any major development from him. But I did like that he was chosen to be the protagonist. I honestly just like the vibe I get from his character. 

Aoi Asahina: She was my second favorite character. She did get a little too emotional at times but I could understand why (I mean she was trapped in a murder school, who wouldn't get emotional when their best friend died?). I'm glad she was one of the six remaining. 

Byakuya Togami: He gave me extreme Tsukishima vibes. Smart, sassy, and has glasses. I liked him a lot as a character.

Celestia Ludenberg: She was my favorite character. I liked how she was cool, calm, and collected throughout the series. I was sad when she died, but her murder plan was one of the best ones in my opinion. I liked her breakdown at the end before she got sent off to die. And her death sequence was one of my favorites. 

Chihiro Fujisaki: I liked them a lot! I liked how they wanted to be strong and the way they died (That sounds horrible but like, how they died seemed fitting to them if you know what I mean.) I was glad they were reincarnated into a computer that helped the others out later in the series. 

Hifumi Yamada: Typical side character that no one cares about. I wasn't a huge fan of him.

Junko Enoshima: Crazier than Toga. Also how did they not realize she was related in a way to Monokuma?? She had black and white bears on each of her pigtails. 

Kiyotaka Ishimaru: Strong Iida vibes from him. 

Kyoko Kirigiri: She became one of my favorites after Celestia died. I liked how smart she was and the fact she was a literal detective (very useful in finding out the secret to the school). I also loved that the principle was her dad.

Leon Kuwata: Typical jock. I liked how he broke down after he was found guilty. 

Mondo Owada: I liked him. I liked how he went out as well. He wanted to keep a secret about killing his brother because he felt he was constantly in the shadow of him (honestly I love characters who feel like they are always overshadowed by someone).

Mukuro Ikusaba: She seemed cool I guess? I don't know man, she's dead now. 

Sakura Ogami: I liked her and how she was revealed to be the spy. I also liked how she went out because honestly I didn't want to see a death scene. 

Sayaka Maizono: She was the first one to die, so I don't have much to say about her. But she seemed nice?

Toko Fukawa:  Oh my gosh she's crazy. But I liked her as well as a character (although when she was her shy self, she sometimes made me mad lol).

Yasuhiro Hagakure: Is it bad I wanted him to die? I honestly wasn't a huge fan of him.

In conclusion, most of the characters were likable. Although I wish some had character development. 

Final thoughts/my opinions:

Overall, really good anime. The art style/animation was something I liked as well as music. Good plot and characters. I wish the characters had development though, it would have made me rate this higher. The anime moved me to go and check out the game!____

I played Trigger Happy Havoc three years ago. I liked it. It was Saw meets Ace Attorney with high schoolers and could have taken far more risks than it did, but you know what, I enjoyed it. I also played Goodbye Despair, which I liked more than THH. It had the same amount of non-risk taking but it had better characters and more variety in locations. I own Killing Harmony but before I play that, I wanted to watch the animes. Will they be good? Nope. But I’ll watch them anyway!
First up is Danganronpa: The Animation and wow this is a horribly rushed adaptation that is way too short and represents my problems with the constraints of anime length.
The idea of adaptation is to translate a property from one medium into another. Danganronpa should be one of the easiest visual novels to make into an anime. It’s not long (for a visual novel), it’s a very clear-cut story with no branching paths, multiple sequences are already animated. So what the fuck happened? A 13-episode order, that’s what. Structuring this into 13 half-hours is what ultimately killed this adaptation. Does that mean I think it should have been 26 episodes? Well, no. That would be too long. Anime series (for TV) have to be structured at either 11-13 episodes or 22-26 episodes. Of course anime can have more cours, several have them all the time, but the point is that if it’s 3 cours then it has to be 36-39 episodes, if it’s 4 cours then it has to be 47-52 episodes and so forth. For an anime adaptation of Trigger Happy Havoc to truly work (in the way this show WANTS it to work), it needed like 17-19 episodes. Or have the episodes be longer than 24 minutes (hell, the last episode is 34 minutes on the Blu-ray, which I would have preferred if every episode was that long). But you can’t have either of those in anime! Not in 2013 at least. If it had to be 24 minutes per episode, I think I honestly would have preferred if this was 22 episodes and had a shitload of filler. Because I like these characters! I want to know about them from the anime. I had to pause after 4 minutes of the first episode because I couldn’t stop laughing at how the characters were introduced. They shove EVERYONE RIGHT IN YOUR FACE and everything is shown lightning-fast. I can’t imagine someone who hasn’t played the games to know who these characters are based on the anime. I should feel something when someone dies but I really don’t because I’m not allowed to get to know someone unless they’re about to die. In the game, there’s a WHOLE PORTION OF THE GAME dedicated to you going around and picking someone to talk to so you can learn about them. The anime does not allow you to breathe, IT’S TIME TO GO KILL SOMEONE ELSE! After the first three episodes, the pacing gets gradually better now that it doesn’t have to introduce everything, but it’s still too fast. I don’t entirely blame Makoto Uezu for this structure (I blame whoever only gave them 13 episodes) but it’s still the worst part of this adaptation.

The second worst part is the fear of change. In the process of adaptation, it is expected that you change things so that they make sense in the medium that the adaptation will inhabit. For Danganronpa, keeping the story identical is fine, but what should have changed is the PRESENTATION of the story. The investigations are ignored so that they can get to the trials. But that means that when evidence is brought to the trial, all I can think is “WHERE THE FUCK DID THAT COME FROM?!” Every “discovered murder” is hand-traced from the game and presented identically, it is not possible for me to stress how much the executions are the EXACT SAME with some slightly more fluid animation for character models. The trials reference things like the minigames which look stupid in the anime, but even stupider is the truth bullets, which should not have been anywhere near this adaptation.

Since I figure people will want this, I’ll bring up some technical qualities about the show. The animation is fine, but not exactly “great”. When it’s not copying the game it does the job well. The music is identical to the game but THAT’S common for visual novel adaptations so I’ll let it slide.

Danganronpa: The Animation is an amazing anime, in that it is somehow exactly how you should NOT make an adaptation. The first few episodes are “so bad it’s good” levels of extremely rushed, and I think I would have liked it more as an unintentional laugh riot had the pace been the same. Being forced to squish this story into 13 episodes makes it a rushed mess that people who haven’t played the visual novel probably wouldn’t enjoy. It is far too much like the game and far too short to do the story justice. I recommend playing the game for Danganronpa. If you don’t want to play the game, then watch a walkthrough of the game instead. It’s not funny how much of a disservice this anime does to a game THAT WASN’T EVEN THAT GREAT BUT DAMN IT'S A HELL OF A LOT BETTER THAN THIS.

Danganronpa, The Ultimate Rushed Adaptation, steals way too much from the game and represents a problem in the industry

Para deixar bem claro, não joguei os jogos, apenas vi o anime.

Os personagens:
O anime apresenta elementos bacanas, de cara você vê que é um battle royale com personagens interessantes e um mistériozinho bem daora acontecendo enquanto isso.
O protagonista é bem protagonista, tipo, ele é clássico protagonista, não que isso seja um DEFEITO, mas é meio previsível. Os outros personagens são muito legais, cada um tem seu estereótipo bacaninha e agem de maneiras diferentes, isso os leva a fazer diferentes ações e tals.
O design dos personagens é outra coisa muito maneira, não sei quem escolho para pesquisar fanart para colocar de wallpaper.

Os mistérios: 
Os mistérios foram trabalhados de maneira bem legal, eu acho, conseguiram fazer um mindgame bem daora, deveras cativante que te deixa com vontade de ver quem é o culpado. O mistério final foi bem bacana, foi um evento bem grande sendo finalizado usando elementos que temos desde o começo do anime, achei bacana.

As novelinhas:
Eu achei o anime muito rushado, senti que o anime quis passar o sentimento de desespero e medo para o espectador, mas não teve tempo para deixar as mortes e acontecimentos realmente sentidos, eles fazem um drama em cima de um personagem que morreu sendo que eu conheço ele a um episódio atrás, tipo... foda.
O anime precisaria ser mais longo para trabalhar os personagens mais profundamente, para quando um deles morrer, o espectador ficar abalado pela morte dele, mas o anime mostra muito só a visão do protagonista, aí a gente não consegue sentir muito afeto pelos outros personagens, eu sei que ele é o FODENDO PROTAGONISTA, mas é só outro ponto no qual aquele que vos fala queria citar.

A criatividade: 
Por mais que battle royale já seja uma premissa meio batida e genérica, Danganronpa tem um criatividade que eu tenho que pagar um pau. Além de personagens completamente diferentes e daorinhas, o cenário para o battle royale deles é muito incrível, é dentro de uma escola, tipo, nada haver com battle royale. Além do Monokuma, que é um personagem incrível, ri muito com ele, nunca vi nada parecido.

O final:
O final foi a parte que eu mais dei uma broxada. O mistério do final é daora, da uns plot twists muito foda, apesar de passar muito rápido e nem dar tempo de respirar direito, mas beleza. Estava um final legal, mas aí o protagonista se vê encurralado... e para se safar ele vai fazer o que?
Resposta 1: Fazer igual em todo o anime e dar uma resolução inteligente para o caso e fazer um final bacana de se ver.
Resposta 2: Fazer um discurso de moral estilo shonen sobre esperança e conquistar a confiança de todos.

Sim... não foi a primeira opção.

Eu sei que o anime se encurralou no final, não tinha muito o que fazer além de um discurso de esperança meio que avulso lá.
Até seria um final bonitinho se a gente estivesse enturmado com os personagens, mas por conta do anime ser curto (como já citei lá em cima) não da tempo de ficar triste ou feliz pelos personagens.

Essa foi uma review completamente aleatória, não tenho nenhuma moral para estar falando de anime. Não sou crítico nem nada, levem na zoeira.
É só a minha opinião colocada num texto sem sentido.

A... sei lá, uma review aí falando de Danganronpa.

__This review contains spoilers up to the second episode, and contains mild blood & violence (but if you were on this review in the first place, you should be aware Danganronpa is a death game)__

I was aware of Danganronpa's existence; i knew it was a popular game and it had been adapted into an anime series. So I decided to start it with only the knowledge that its premise was basically reverse Assassination Classroom combined with Ace Attorney, and that there was a character in this series named Sayaka Maizono. 

Before you all flame me for starting with the Anime when the games are so much better, hear me out. I had watched and played Ace Attorney in that order, and I found that this order gives the games so much more meaning, because you had a vague idea of where the plot was going, but you had no idea how to get there. So I decided to do that for this series, looking in hindsight, I probably should've watched the gameplay first. I'll be getting to that shortly

__Plot__
The premise is simple and relatively novel seeing as while I've seen battle royale death shows like Mirai Nikki, the confined setting compared to all of Tokyo in Mirai Nikki gives it a much more intimate style. The moment Monokuma popped out of the podium, my interest was piqued. 

One characteristic of this show that simply cannot be avoided is the theme of Despair, it was mentioned by Monokuma multiple times and there will later be developments in the plot revolving around the exact same thing. But, this theme shows up as early as the CD tapes were shown and was reinforced in the entire series. To show this, I'll use the first murder of the series as an example. 


Sayaka Maizono, the name I set out in search for when I started this series, was a popular Idol who was originally in the same class as protagonist Naegi. She was an unreachable flower, very popular and always vied for by others. But when they met, Sayaka not only recognized him immediately, but also took comfort in trusting him, another theme that would plague the series. Naegi promises he will get them out of the Academy, and they switch rooms to guarantee security... and then she was found dead.

img220(https://i.ytimg.com/vi/EqrnFLxjphM/maxresdefault.jpg)

This was undoubtedly a huge blow to Naegi, not only was Sayaka the only person he was remotely close to, he had also made a promise to protect her. What does he feel when he finds her bloodied body in his bathroom? Despair, just plain despair. After playing the game up to that point, I can certainly say her death was just as the series, anime and all, intended it to be—a catalyst. The anime did a fantastic job of showing that despair, even now I struggle to remove the vision from my head (really helps that I had to google the image to find the URL eh?). Not only is she arguably one of the most innocent people in that group, she was the closest to the protagonist, the only bond and ally we had to work with. Now that all that was taken away, our already abysmal advantage was thrown right out the window. 

But, that's where the compliments end. As I mentioned in the intro, this game also involves detective and court skills, which means you gotta scout around for evidence. While in-game it felt like a case of Ace Attorney where I racked my brain looking for evidence, in the anime, we went from the immediate crime scene (like the knife lodged in Sayaka's stomach) to finding a Crystal Ball in front of the incinerator for no particular reason. It took me ages to find that, and the anime just straight up runs past that at mach 20 and doesn't care how we get there. 

Then there's the courtroom part of the anime... Dear god where do I start. First of all, it becomes deftly obvious by the second court case that the three "ammunition" charges Naegi carries will all be aimed at the same person, second of all, the anime makes it blatantly clear of where the contradictions are by __literally putting the text in front of your face, so you not only know which statement is a contradiction, but also exactly which words.__ This, when compared to the gameplay is very disappointing, its effective, yes, but at least don't shove the words in our face to prove that its a contradiction. We like figuring things out too.

__Art and Music__

I have to say, the animation certainly didn't fail in this area, as seen with the image I put above, it has a unique way of censoring blood, but other than that its graphics are also quite clean. The way the school is drawn makes it feel genuinely haunted, and each execution sequence was basically a carbon copy from the game, but enhanced. I also greatly enjoyed the mix of ideas, it was chaotic the first time, but when you see the slot machine go up, you know someone's 'bout to go down. 

img220(https://cdn.gamer-network.net/2016/usgamer/Danganronpa-PC-Header-01.jpg/EG11/thumbnail/1920x1080/format/jpg/quality/65/the-danganronpa-series-explained.jpg)

One minor thing that I noticed, though, is that all the characters lacked that reflection in their eyes, making them appear soulless, this is an odd detail that I only realized was a clever easter egg later, because in an anime character loses their eye glint for two reasons - either they're dead externally or dead internally, so this is a pretty sneaky touch.

The music, oh man that stuff hit the spot, the classroom trail music gives significant on-the-edge vibes, and each execution's music was an eerie upbeat techno riff, which shows Monokuma is just really enjoying his job

__Characters__

Oh boy... The reason why I don't like giving Battle Royale animes high points in character development is that often times they always give each character a motive, so whats really happening is that they're trying to develop all of them simultaneously. Danganronpa made the smart choice of killing off a few people early, but immediately after the problems started pouring in. You will basically be blind-guessing what made these character interactions so intimate most of the time because almost all of that content is locked behind the actual game, the anime makes it infuriating to guess why some characters would act the way they did, and that, is just dumb. 

With that being said, this anime ultimately feels like a hypercondensed version of the original Danganronpa games, it takes you from point A to B, but they never tell you the process, and savvy road trippers can always vouch that its always the journey that matters. To end off, I'll leave a quote from the friend who recommended me this series, and the person who implanted Sayaka's name into my mind to haunt me of her unfortunate death: "Oh, you watched the anime? You're honestly better off watching gameplays on YouTube."

Have you ever hated a show so much that you need to keep watching in just so you can rant about it with more legit arguments? Have you ever hated something so much you need to research it so you can explain to anyone why it sucks? Because those are my feelings towards this series.

I'm not gonna talk about the premise. You already know it if you are reading this. And actually, I thing the plot could be good, if well done. Which might have been the case on the game. I didn't play it, so I have no idea if it was. The thing is, in the series, it is not.

Saying the characters are "flat" is an understatement. They are pathetic. Monokuma in particular. I'll talk about him later. Their talents? The reason they are considered "high class students"? Justified in two or three of them. The rest of their "special traits"  are not worthy of the name.

Seriously, I can not stress this enough: THIS CHARACTERS ARE PATHETICALLY DESIGN. Visually and psychologically. They are the poorest excuse of a character. Maybe with one or two exceptions.

Now, let's talk about the fucking bear. He is not the cinical mastermind that should be running the whole thing. Some of his actions make no sense. One minute he is bored and wants something interesting to happen, the next he is getting bored WHILE the "interesting" thing IS happening. He is obnoxious, annoying, predictable as hell. Also, because of his design, there's no way of telling what the fuck his blushes, o his sweat beads, or anything that happens with his face means. Seriously, LEARN HOW TO FUCKING DESIGN A CHARACTER.

The visuals are bad the whole time, but they become plainly HORRIBLE in the execution scenes. Sure, it's fun the first time, maybe the second one too. After that, you just realize they are the cheapest attempt at doing something interesting but without spending too much money on it. Actually, the amount of still drawings used in the series makes me wonder if the producers where part of a "who can make an anime spending the less possible money on it" bet. 

As far as the mystery solving goes: While some of the murders are solved in an interesting way, there are some cases that have a, here I go again, PATHETIC resolution. And when I say pathetic, I mean that the clue to solving them is overly used... and in kids shows. Seriously, I don't want to be specific, but NO ONE with a television could make mistakes like those after murdering someone and trying to play innocent. All of the murderers go crazy and start rambling and shouting nonsense when they are discovered. It gets old really fast. And some of the cases have strings that are never tied up. Clues that make no sense once the mystery is solved.
Another thing to say about the mystery solving, is that it is not possible to tag along as a viewer. Why? Because when a characters says something that will give the killer away, it is shown as text on the screen. So, non of that fun for us. 

Also, the "emotional" moments lack emotion, and the comedy is bizarre and sick. I guess some like that kind of comedy. What can I say, killing someone by turning them into a sauce and eat them is very, very far away from my definition of comedy. Also, the bear being annoying or the characters being overly ridiculous and overly stereotyped are the most used "comedy moments" in the series. Might I say, those are even more pathetic attempts at comedy. 

And the last episode. Oh god, the last episode.
The biggest plot twist? Not only doesn't make sense, but also has a ton of mistakes. The last death? Well, there's actually like five of them. And it's only one person dying. Only, they don't die, even if they clearly should. They just keep being alive and getting killed in different ways.
The main character of the episode? Triple, if not tetra personality. Seriously, it changes back and forth between Psyco, Basic-stupid-hamsterlike-anime girl, Fetish-boobs-teacher, Serious, Traumatized and Normal. ALL THE FUCKING TIME. For no reason whatsoever, not adding anything to the atmosphere of the scene, and making the whole thing just plainly annoying.

After the last episode, there was a little something that makes me think there will be a sequel to this anime. Needless to say, I will stay the hell away from it.

Some ideas work only in their original medium, and just shouldn't be adapted. 

(disclaimer most subjective things in this review are my opinion, if you disagree you disagree, it's my first review and i know I'm just rambling on after a certain point. Sorry in advance)

Around a year ago i played the first danganronpa game. The game this anime is based on. It was a great experience and i enjoyed playing trough it and trying to get the maximum friendship with everyone. Wich sadly was not in the anime.

As i watched the first episode i felt like i was watching a silent playthrough, except for the backstory of the school there was not much left out in the anime. 

The anime takes over the trigger mechanic from the game but in a lazy way without much explanation. They could have done something special or adapt it differently so it would make the anime feel les like the game but with a different art style.

Going into the anime after finishing the game just made it boring for me. There is nothing new or special just the same story, less backstory and lore. Most death scenes where the same as in the game with some extra panels. 

Some might say people should watch the anime first but that's not true. Going back to the bullet mechanism, if you watch the anime first you just see a bullet fly at a false statement. No real explanation or such. 

A small disappointment in the subs (alright it might not be the same for everyone) is the translation of monokuma. A name so important to the plot almost as important to the series ad the word despair was translated as "monobear". Even in the english version of the game the mascots name is monokuma, so it's disappointing to constantly read "monobear".

Another thing is the comics that display how it happened instead of showing a flashback/animation of how it happened we get a part of the comic instead.

If danganronpa would be like persona4 and add some extra scene making this look less then a cheap adaption of a popular game it would not be such a disappointing mediocre show. The anime is what it says an adaptation of a game. If you want to watch the series i recommend playing the game first or instead. There is not much extra this show brings to the table i would say it's even less then the game. 

In the end i would say you can watch it first if you are looking for something to just spend time. But if you really want more, backstory or a more detailed explanation play the game and leave the anime for after or for when you are bored and just watch something to watch. 

These are my thoughts about the show, ofcourse donut girl and Chihiro and the detective are my favorite and i hope to say till soon when i have a more positive review based on better notes. 

Greetings gothicpurple

__(This review contains minor spoilers! Read at your own risk!)__

The anime itself was amazing. While I am no longer a fan of danganronpa, I did watch the anime when I was and I truly was interested, I’d love to rewatch it.
However character development was slow, and not all of the characters really got to show their personality.

Also, the finale felt rushed and just wasn't that interesting. I rewatched it a few times and I still cannot understand it. I would also suggest watching/playing the game before watching this. I don’t think a new watcher would completely understand everything.

There are also a few more issues with the game and the anime itself.
One, Junko was a poor choice for the villain. Yes, she is a quirky cool character, however it was easy to tell she was the villain right off the bat. She looked strange and she was also killed off too quickly. It just didn’t go out well.

Two, this anime had too much filler. Some of the conversations were useless, and some romance felt like it was just thrown in there. It didn’t seem like the producers really cared if it made sense or not, they just needed something. Which didn’t help.

Three, the “adaptation” part was strange. As user 0215MADman said, “The idea of adaptation is to translate a property from one medium to another.” Danganronpa: The Animation did that, but… it felt like they just animated the main story of the game, then reused everything from the game. They even included those “Objection!” bullets.

The execution animations look good in the game, but they look so tacky in the anime. The game's style is sort of different from the anime, and the execution animations fit the game's style (makes sense because it was made for the game), but not the anime’s style. They literally just took the game animations and threw them in the anime.

There's also just a lot of missing things from the anime that could have easily been put in. For example, there were no investigations (or at least not many) so when they did the trials, they would pull out random information and clues that the viewer had not seen.

Some story plots however were very good, and were interesting such as the Alter Ego plot. I enjoyed that a lot, honestly. The character backstories were also quite interesting and it left me begging for more (in a positive way.)

Overall, this feels a bit lazy for a danganronpa anime, and it was a bit disappointing. However, it was still a decent anime that I enjoyed, and I would watch it again.

My apologies if this review was just me rambling, this is all my opinion, please keep that in mind. If you are a fan of danganronpa, I would suggest you watch this and write a review yourself.

Overall rating: 7.5/10

It’s a decent anime, not a great adaptation of the game though.

NOTE:
Major spoilers are in this review. 

Danganronpa: The Animation is an adaption of Danganronpa: Trigger Happy Havoc which was made in 2010 for the PS Vita but was later ported to PC in English in 2016. The studio which made this anime is called "Lerche" who made Classroom Of The Elite, everyone says the adaption of Classroom Of The Elite sucked, and it also does for Danganronpa: The Animation.


Pros:
There's some decent animation and it seems cool to have some stuff from the game animated.

Great voice acting, it felt like a remastered version of the voice acting from the game.

It has Danganronpas great story telling, although not adapting it too well but it's still kind of good.

Final Class Trial was really well done


Cons:
Class Trials suck except for the last one
They skipped through 4 hours of gameplay in a twenty minute episode
Pacing is really horrible
Anime should have been 2 Cours as the Danganronpa: Trigger Happy Havoc video game is about ~35 hours long.
They really pissed me off in the Sakura Ogami suicide Class Trial Investigation, in the game there wasn't a lock on the door but in the anime there was and that played a key role in the Class Trial
Monokuma's design looks so awful compared to the game
Lots of Makoto Naegi's monologuing was removed in the anime


-----
Now I'll be talking about each Class Trial and what was bad and what was good

1. Sayaka's Death. (Sayaka's dead body looked so goofy in the anime LOL, you should check a comparison.) Sayaka's Class Trial was overall rushed, they skipped through a lot of talking and came to the conclusion that Leon was the killer way too fast. Trying to fit a Class Trial in a whole twenty minute episode is not a good idea and the Class Trials should have been at minimum, one and a half episodes. It felt really rushed compared to the game.

2. Chihiro's Death
Chihiro's Death was really good in the game, one of the few deaths that sent chills down my spine, and this Class Trial, was actually pretty good. Except for the reveal of Toko Fukawa being Genocide Jack/Sho happening too quick, it was overall pretty nice. 

3. Sakura Ogami's Suicide
Sakura Ogami's suicide was really well done in the game, and when I found out that Sakura had commited suicide instead of being killed, my jaw dropped to the floor. Although they completely f**king ruined this Class Trial in the anime. It was so rushed for a trial that took me about an hour and twenty minutes to complete. They came to the conclusion that Sakura commited suicide way too quickly as they had to squeeze the class trial into a twenty minute episode. They skipped a few pieces of evidence and overall changed the structure of the class trial which sucked.

4. Hifumi and Kiyotaka's Death
This was a sort of boring class trial in the game for me. But the anime made it even worse, they came to the conclusion that Celeste murdered them both really quickly and skipped through quite a bit of evidence.

5. Mukuro Ikusaba Death
This class trial was f*cking awesome, I loved it. They actually took time to make sure the Class Trial didn't suck and made the class trial about forty minutes, which still made it kind of rushed but I honestly think they did it better in the anime than the game.

----

Conclusion: Danganronpa: The Animation is a horrible adaption of my favourite game but it is sort of good. If you can't afford the games, I guess you can watch the anime but it just makes you feel less emotionally connected to all the characters as you spend less time with them in the anime, whereas in the game you have a whole thirty plus hours to talk to them.

Danganronpa: The Animation, a horrible adaption of my favourite game. (MAJOR SPOILERS)

# ~~~__<a>Introduction</a>__~~~

~~~img100%(https://i0.wp.com/drunkenanimeblog.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/07/danganronpa-celestia-gif-2.gif?fit=500%2C260&ssl=1)~~~

Danganronpa has to be one one of my favourite game series of all time, up there with the likes of Left 4 Dead 1 and 2 and FIFA (yes I know its bad now but the old games were amazing). It has great characters, good plot and its not only engaging but fun too.

You might now be wondering "Satonee, why are you talking about a game when this is a anime review?". Well the Danganronpa anime is an adaptation of this series I love so much, and to say it doesn't live up to the game is an understatement. Its missing some of the biggest elements that make the game so endearing, mainly because it just can't be done in a anime. I want to explore why exactly why this adaptation is kinda shit and if it was just doomed to fail, so lets jump into it.

Also I'm going to be writing this under the assumption you have some basic knowledge on at least the first game and what happens, so if you don't you're welcomed to leave if you want to watch this anime spoiler free.

img(https://media.tenor.com/-wVU_M45YDsAAAAC/clannad-thumbs-up.gif)

____

# ~~~__<a>It Feels Rushed</a>__~~~

The anime generally feels too rushed especially compared to the pace of the actual game. We have one episode of no killing or class trials and thats about it, no chances to really get to know the characters especially after the second class trial where we literally just focus on either alter ego (for 2 arcs) or class trials for basically the rest of the show. It just feels rushed and the unlike the game you never have a chance to get attached to characters, so if one dies you feel nothing. Theres this certain execution in the third game that had me bawling my eyes out but here I doubt anyone felt even sad for any execution or death or anything. It lacks that X-factor that Danganronpa has, which I put down to 13 episodes not being enough. Maybe 3 more would of probably given us time to develop some attachment to characters, although I can see how that could also just be boring I think it would of given it more emotional impact if it did.

____

# ~~~__<a> Major Elements Are Missing From The Games</a>__~~~

This is to no fault of the anime honestly, but some of the key elements from the games are just not here. The biggest of these (and my favourite part of the game) is free time events which honestly makes Danganronpa, well, Danganronpa. This is where you can choose which characters you want to hang out with and if you give them a gift they like you can learn even more about them, progressing your bond with them.

img100%(https://i.ytimg.com/vi/v9Wf7g8QmLM/maxresdefault.jpg)

The great characters the game have are made great because we learn about their past, it not only is character development but makes us more emotional invested in the game as a whole. Its like we are actually there and know these people, so when they die it hits different. This anime lacks the emotional impact of the game and major things like the free time events not existing or the lack of choice you get shows a lot while watching and when it tries to throw these curveballs at you it ends up just falling flat every time. This basically shows me that this adaptation was doomed to fail, if you can't put in some of the most important elements of the source material without anything to compensate for it then how can you expect it to be a success?

____

# ~~~__<a>Feels Incredibly Low Budget</a>__~~~

Everything about Danganronpa: The Adaptation screams low budget to me. I don't know if they were trying to make this with the same budget Spike Chunsoft had with the first game (apparently at the time the director Seiji Kishi and his team could relate to the games low budget at the time) but oh my it makes this anime a lot worse. You aren't going to find this in a quality higher than 480p which for todays standards is like (for example) spy family being 720p at best. The animation is awful, it feels extremely hazy and is on the same level of quality as 2004 anime. The plot being more drawn out, interrupted by free time events so you can actually engage yourself in it is completely thrown out the window and is rushed as fuck. The writing is boring to say the least and by the end you just feel like you've wasted your time honestly.

___

# ~~~__<a>It At Least Makes Sure It Isn't As Edgy As It Could Be</a>__~~~

I think one of the parts this anime actually gets right is that it prevents "edgyness" where it can. The concept of a game in a school where 15 people kill each other to leave seems like it mainly appeals to the 14 year old emo edgelords that listen to MCR like its the bible (which honestly it does a good job of doing that). However for people who aren't like that it doesn't really feel like its purpose made for people 12-14 in the way it actually plays out. I think the pink blood really helps with this:

img49%(https://i.stack.imgur.com/4ciyx.jpg) img49%(https://i.redd.it/mrx5i6pbxfc51.jpg)

I think if Danganronpa used real blood then it would tip it over the edge of being edgy. You can see how the red blood makes it more gory and horrific which is a theme in most edgy anime. Shows like Another and Tokyo Ghoul are hindered because of their excessive use of gore, and Danganronpa being a game about people literally killing each other means minimising how horrific the gore is (by making gore pink) makes it a lot more palatable to a wider audience. I think more generally the game feeling a lot more bubbly with its iconic soundtrack and character design also helps with this.

____

# ~~~__<a>Conclusion</a>__~~~

After all we've talked about can we actually say Danganronpa: The Animation was doomed from the start? Yes. With important content from the game missing, how constricted they had to make the story to fit it into 13 episodes and the low budget it was seemingly given, this adaptation clearly stood no chance from the start. Honestly though, it still could of been a lot better.

img100%(https://i.pinimg.com/originals/a5/fe/12/a5fe12be478ebfcd5e6ffe5a813df46b.gif)

An Adaptation Doomed To Fail? - A Review Of Danganronpa: The Animation By Satonee

__DANGANRONPA__

___Danganronpa the animation___ is an adaptation of a popular visual novel game called __"Danganronpa: Trigger Happy Havoc" __from Spike Chunsoft. img220(https://farm8.staticflickr.com/7329/12219350804_a5f40ce07c.jpg)
After __"Trigger Happy Havoc" __Spike Chunsoft has released sequels __Danganronpa 2 : Goodbye Despair, Danganronpa Another Episode: Ultra Despair Sisters and Danganronpa V3: Killing Harmony.__



__New to Danganronpa?__

If you have no knowledge of Danganronpa, watching the anime without seeing or playing the games, the animation might be too confusing. There are many things left out, since it's an anime adaptation focused on only the main parts of the story. I highly suggest watching or playing the games beforehand to be able to enjoy Danganronpa the animation. I would like to give a warning to sensitive people, Danganronpa has very disturbing elements and it discusses very heavy topics. In the games there will be "fanservice" (especially Danganronpa 2: Goodbye Despair) and when i was new to Danganronpa, i was shocked by the first execution. And the sequels to _Danganronpa the animation_  will have disturbing contents (for example brain washing.)
__
The Plot:__
_Hope's Peak Highschool_ is a prestigious school known for their talented students. Every student is _"an Ultimate"_ at what they do. No less will do. The story follows _Naegi Makoto_, a normal high school student who got in due to a raffle and now carries the title of _"The Ultimate Lucky Student"._

16 Students that possess an "Ultimate" skill or profession is enrolled and as Naegi Makoto steps through the gates, he loses his consciousness. He later on wakes up in a classroom but notices that all the windows have been covered by steel plates. He finds a note that tells him to go to the gym and there he and other students are welcomed to the school by the headmaster, remote controlled bear _Monokuma._ 

Monokuma informs the students that they will be staying in the school for the rest of their lives, never going outside again, the only exception to this is to graduate by killing another student. Later on it is revealed that after killing a student, there will be a class trial. Class trial is their chance to find out who the killer is, if an innocent one is voted as guilty, all the students will be executed and only the "blackened" aka the killer will be able to live and leave the school. If the killer is voted as guilty, they will be executed. 

Knowing their reluctance to kill, Monokuma gives every student a motive to kill by giving each one of them a personalized dvd containing a threat. Makoto's dvd contains a video of his family being kidnapped, suggesting that they will be harmed. This is how the killing game begins. 
As the story progresses, the students try to find out the mastermind behind it all.

__
Personal Opinion:__
The animation does well in portaying the main plot of the game. Since it's an anime they clearly left out many important details and scenes and due to this, some characters do seem dull when compared to the game. It is also very fast paced and due to this you cannot fully get a clear view of the cruelty of the situation as you do in the games. In the games, when a student is killed, the investigation is a very important part since you get to go into the mindset of the killer, knowing that most of them would have never done it without a reason. You cannot grasp the "Despair and Hope" part that you do in the games, due to the animation being so fast paced and the episodes being so short. 
I have seen the games being played by my "Ultimate Danganronpa Fan" little sister and as a fan of the games, i cannot help but to compare the anime to the games. The atmosphere of the anime and the games are so different and it leaves the anime looking very flat. 
Maybe if i had seen the anime first, i would have a different opinion.
I'm giving it a 7/10.

Danganronpa adaptation that leaves me in despair.

I'd like to start this by saying I love the Danganronpa series. Trigger Happy Havoc (what this anime is based on) is my favorite game out of all of them.

And while I loved this anime, it definitely didn't do the game justice.

So, if you had to pick between watching this or playing the game, I'd heavily suggest playing the game. But, if you have the time to do both, then please watch this anime!

---

I'll admit I was a little disappointed my first time watching it. The game was so good and I expected the anime to have that same thrilling impact on me, but it didn't. It fell short, very short. It left out many parts of the game that I thought were very important. I knew they couldn't include everything, but I still felt like a part of the magic was missing because of this.

I played the game once more a year or two later and I decided to rewatch the anime. I was still a little disappointed, of course, but I realized that it was actually pretty good. I was thoroughly entertained while watching it and appreciated it a lot.

It still contained the funny dialogue that Danganronpa games always have, it had that messed up vibe to it, and it honestly did do the game some amount of justice.

The big problem with many adaptions is how they ruin the characters. However, I don't think any characters were really ruined in this. Of course some story lines were rushed, but it didn't affect anyone too greatly. From the game to the anime, my opinions on the characters all stayed the same.

Another change is the art style. The Danganronpa art style is iconic, and it was obviously changed in the anime. This didn't bother me, but I've heard others complain about it. I personally thought the anime's art style was cute and very fitting.

One thing that did bother me a little was the voice changes. (I played and watched in English, so this may be different in the Japanese ver. and different dubs.) I know it would be hard to get every voice actor back, so I understand why this had to happen. It's just that some voices were so different, and honestly, some were pretty annoying. Two I can think of are Monokuma's and Genocide Jack's. (Yeah, why did they change her name in the anime?) Anyway, they were both really irritating to me and I much preferred both of their voices in the game. I got over it pretty fast though and it wasn't too much of an issue for me. After all, you get used to annoying voices after watching anime for a while-- it's just a part of it.

---
I know this review sounds pretty negative, but I actually thought this anime was pretty good. If the game didn't exist, I probably would have had a better opinion. The only reason I thought any of it was bad was simply because of how good the source material was. I just had very high expectations and they were clearly not met. Taking the game out of the picture, this anime had a great plot, enjoyable characters, and really pulls you in.

So, if you want to watch this anime, I say go for it! I've already rewatched it multiple times and I've never gotten bored.

Thank you for reading!! <3

A failed adaption, but still worth the watch

This show is so incredibly bad. The lack of quality is mind boggling. Each character manages to be completely different in design, personality and skill and yet completely bland and uninteresting. I couldn't root for any of them because I was hoping all of them would die. The 'mysteries' are either the most basic solvable shit even a child could probably conclude or completely deranged in their execution. Speaking of the executions, I hate those too. They're not even fun or interesting, just bizarre and unpleasant. Some of the characters (not naming any names) are denser than concrete which makes it even worse when the show tries to act as if it makes any sense whatsoever. The whole thing butchered the already mid game it was based off and turned into total bullshit. I genuinely thought I could watch this and enjoy just a cool murder mystery deathgame anime but no, you can't even turn your brain off to avoid the cringe because doing so would require you to literally fall asleep while watching. I haven't played the game myself but I'd honestly rather do that because at least I could skip the dialogue that way.

Something about the show's sense of humour, characterisation and message is like it was made to cater to Tumblr in 2014 and tiktok girls in 2020. It's incredibly unintelligent and immature, which would be fine if it didn't then raise itself to like a 16+ with the equally immature gore and sexual references. Also some more than questionable depictions of gender nonconformity (Chihiiro) and multiple personality disorder (Junko and Toko).

The saves they use to justify their crackhead decisions and MC's plot armour are completely ridiculous, the villain is laughably unscary and uninteresting, the premise is so poorly explained I had to go google all the context and even with context it's fucking mid. They straight up introduce the villain with no buildup to her character, have her give an incomprehensible 'look at me I'm so evil' speech and then she proceeds to do nothing relevant at all. It's edgy trash at best and straight up unwatchable in parts. I hope everyone involved with the production of this product stops making anime.

Good(?) parts: the animation is decent. Nothing noticeably awful except the artstyle and the colours look fine. VA work is average but I couldn't listen to the english dub because of the girls. Some of the murder ideas are creative, they just utterly fucked up the actual solving process. Only good character is Sakura and they had her die for a completely shit reason. The humour got a weak chuckle out of me here and there.

Please please do not waste your time on the Danganronpa franchise. If you want a good death game anime, just go watch Deadman Wonderland.

(Originally Reviewed on Serializd)

About, I wanna say, around a year ago at this point, I decided to do a playthrough of the first game in the Danganronpa series known as Danganronpa: Trigger Happy Havoc, and I would say that I ended up having a pretty great time with it as a whole. There were definitely elements of the game I couldn't get into, such as me not giving a shit about most of the characters, some of the plot elements being somewhat stupid, as well as some... other stuff I found out after playing the game, but the game was able to win me over nonetheless with its simple, yet effective premise, wonderful visual style and attitude, fantastic soundtrack, and enough addicting gameplay aspects that made me wanna see it all the way to the end just to see where it was all going. Oh yeah, and there's also Monokuma, who is without a doubt my favorite character of the bunch. What can I say, he's a psychotic killer, and those guys are usually very entertaining over all others. But anyways, it has been a year since I did play that game, and I was planning on checking out the second game in the series, Goodbye Despair, sometime this year, but of course, since life is a bitch, that probably won't be happening for a good while. Until then though, I figured I would go ahead and fill the void lack Danganronpa content by checking out one of the spin-off pieces of media that was made shortly after the original game's success, and I figured the most appropriate thing to start with would be the anime based on the original game, known simply as Danganronpa: The Animation.

Before watching the entire series over the course of a day or two, I remember actually checking out the first episode of the show shortly after I had finished the original game last year, just to see what it was all about. Based on that first episode, however, my initial thoughts of it was that... it was bad. There were some aspects of it that I could certainly admire, since I was a big fan of the first game, but there were one or two elements that kept getting under my skin, making me not wanna see how the rest of the series played out at that point. It has been a while though, and I didn't think it would be fair to judge a show just based on one episode alone, so I figured I would go ahead and check out the full series to see how it was, and........... yeah, it's bad, I was right all along. Like the original game, there are definitely elements present here that I was a big fan of, but a lot of that is outshined by the bad, making for a very half-assed adaptation that doesn't do the original game justice whatsoever. Also, yes, I am counting this as its own separate show. I know Serializd likes to pair it alongside the other Danganronpa shows, but they are separate from this, so I will treat it like that accordingly. Fuck you.

The story is pretty much one-to-one with the original game, detailing all of the major plot points, dramatic events, and reveals that the original game had, although, for those that are familiar with the original game, you will come to notice quickly that something is very off, but we will get to that later, the characters are also one-to-one with the original game, with each one acting pretty much exactly the same, except they are obviously given way less personality and development here, so that's kind of a problem for newcomers to experience, the voice acting is a mixed bag, with some voice actors doing a great job with the roles that they are given, but then some voice actors are either trying way too hard, or they do not fit with the character they are meant to play at all, such as with Hiro and Monokuma, the animation is very standard, with it all looking very accurate to the original game, but the movements are very basic, there is little life to be seen thoughout, and whenever it does pull in movements and sequences from the original game, it feels more weird and out-of-place then anything, and the dialogue is SO BAD, with most of it being the typical cut-'n-dry shit that you would expect to hear from something like this, but then there will be plenty of moments where a character will make a stupid joke for the sake of it, or even some random pop culture reference that doesn't fit with everything else whatsoever, and it caused eye-rolls and groans a plenty to come out of me.

Without a doubt though, the worst aspect of this entire show, even when you ignore everything else, is the fact that this is a very half-baked adaptation of the original game. The show only managed to get 13 episodes, each one being around 22 minutes each, with the exception of the final episode, and let me tell you, that is NOT enough time to fully adapt the original game. Tons of different sequences and plot details from the original game were completely omitted from this adaptation, such as most of the investigation sequences and a lot of the characters' interactions, and most of it just sticks to showing the main story beats through and through, which may work in covering all the things that people need to know, but at the same time, not only does it fail to make me care about whatever is going on even more, but it also leaves very important details out that are necessary for some other sequences that play out. For every single trail portion of the show, they go over what happened to all the victims fairly quickly, and they will bring up many different pieces of evidence that were either not shown at all previously, or were just barely glanced over as if the people making this were like "Yeah, we all know what this is? Ok, good, moving on." And look, I get it, you know. Adapting a game like this into a 13-episode anime must've been a very hard task, and I guarantee that the people making the show had no way to extend the series' length or to get more episodes out of it, so they just had to work with what they got. Nevertheless, that doesn't excuse it from criticism, and I had quite a lot I needed to say and then some.

With all of that out of the way though, I wouldn't say that this adaptation is flat-out terrible, as there were several elements of it I did manage to like. The style, attitude, and look of the show is very close to that of the original game, making it very appealing to look at as a result, and not to mention, pretty much all of the music is taken from the game as well, and that was definitely the best choice they could've made, as I LOVE the original game's soundtrack........... even though I thought the opening theme is kinda ass, but the point still stands! All of these things did make watching the show a lot more bearable (wow, great joke, Mega), but none of that can save this from being basically an abridged version of the original game for those who don't wanna play through the whole thing. If only it managed to get maybe, I dunno, 5-7 more episodes, with more focus given to the investigations, character interactions, and expanding on the trails, then we could've had a pretty great adaptation of an already great game, but sadly, that is not what we ended up getting at all. I guess you could say that, at the end of the day, this show ended up making me feel....... despair............. ah, I can hear the crickets from a mile away.

Overall, despite the fantastic music and original visual style of the game being very much intact here, this is still a very poor adaptation of the original Danganronpa and a bad show as a whole, having very basic and lackluster animation, little to nothing to add to the source material, and leaving out very important details from the original game all throughout the show, making for a very confused and sloppy mess that I don't think I will ever come back to revisit. I would recommend it to those who are huge Danganronpa fans, but for everyone else, especially for those who have never played the original Danganronpa, then there is no need to check this out, as it does nothing for you that the original game can't already do, but in a much better way. But anyway, I guess now that I have covered this show, I suppose that I will have to get to the other Danganronpa adaptations at some point soon, right? Well, I mean, both of those are based on V3, which I haven't played yet, so I guess I will have to wait until I play that game in order to watch it........... you know, in like, five years from now.

Guess You Could Say I Felt Despair Watching This, HA HA-

Nobuyo Ooyama

Seiji Kishi

Makoto Uezu

Kazuaki Morita

Sachiko Kobayashi

Spike Chunsoft

Suzumu

Rui Komatsuzaki

Soraru

Touko Machida

Akihiko Oka

Mayuka Itou

Chisato Kawaguchi

Momoka Komatsu

Masafumi Takada

Kazutaka Kodaka

Christopher Bevins

Michael Harcourt

Jackie McClure

Gen Fukunaga

Justin Cook

Episode 1 - PROLOGUE: Welcome to Despair High School

Episode 2 - (Not) Normal Arc: Kill and Live

Episode 3 - Not Normal Arc: Kill and Live

Episode 4 - (Not) Normal Arc: Weekly Shonen Despair Magazine

Episode 5 - Not Normal Arc: Weekly Shonen Despair Magazine

Episode 6 - (Not) Normal Arc: Return of the New Century Galaxy Legend! O Armored Hero, Stand upon the Earth!

Episode 7 - Not Normal Arc: Return of the New Century Galaxy Legend! O Armored Hero, Stand upon the Earth!

Episode 8 - (Not) Normal Arc: All All Apologies

Episode 9 - All All Apologies II

Episode 10 - (Not) Normal Arc: The Junk Food of Despair for Racing through Youth

Episode 11 - Not Normal Arc: The Junk Food of Despair for Racing through Youth

Episode 12 - The Reason Super High School-Level Bad Luck Attracted Super High School-Level Murder, Super High School-Level Execution and Super High School-Level Despair

Danganronpa Series Watch Order

Danganronpa: Trigger Happy Havoc (Game)

Danganronpa: The Animation

Super Danganronpa 2: Goodbye Despair (Game)

Danganronpa Another Episode: Ultra Despair Girls (Game)

Danganronpa 3: The End of Hope’s Peak – Future Arc

Danganronpa 3: The End of Hope’s Peak – Despair Arc

Danganronpa 3: The End of Hope’s Peak – Hope Arc

Super Danganronpa 2.5: Nagito Komaeda and the Destroyer of the World

Danganronpa V3: Killing Harmony (Game)