Anime 34933 Kakegurui Reviews Filter Check 3

“Part of it went on gambling, and part of it went on women. The rest I spent foolishly.” – George Raft.

To those of you who have watched Kakegurui I ask: Why did you watch this anime? Were you intrigued by the aesthetic look of the show? Or maybe what drew you to Kakegurui was the concept; gambling! The latter was what caught my eye, as past experiences with gambling anime have proven that they hold some of the most entertaining and exhilarating moments I have ever seen. These shows have given me goose bumps from sheer awe and admiration while watching psychological battles of wits ... and strategy between people willing to risk their very lives on even the simplest of games. Unfortunately, these kinds of anime are extremely rare to come by, as nearly all of them are practically unknown to most of the anime community and nearly impossible to watch any of them legally. So when I saw that Kakegurui was airing this season and also happened to be the most popular show of Summer 2017, I was pretty excited. I had heard good things about the manga and it was being produced by Studio MAPPA, a studio that I have high hopes for despite not being impressed with any of their previous works. All that was left for me to do was watch it, and this is where the hype for this show died for me. I was disappointed with Kakegurui from episode 1, because even after just one episode, it is obvious to see that Kakegurui is a terrible gambling anime.

Kakegurui takes place in Hyakkaou Private Academy, a prestigious school where the student are the most wealthy and privileged students in all of Japan. I use the term school lightly because there seems to be no actual classes or learning happening, instead the school is more like a gambling den, where every student partakes in gambling. They bet their fortunes against one another regularly, and those who become in debt are practically slaves to the holders of their wealth. The show focuses of Yumeko Jabami, a new student who gambles for the fun of it and is really good at it; too good, in fact. Her actions end up disrupting the student hierarchy of Hyakkaou Academy, causing the Student Council to come up with ways to stop her. Throughout the show, Yumeko befriends beta cuck bitch-boy Ryouta Suzui and fellow gambling gal Meari Saotome who help her as she gambles to her heart’s content. Ironically, Yumeko’s first gamble at the academy is against Meari, and it is here where the first major problem of the show lies.

The game Yumeko and Meari play is a card-game variation of rock-paper-scissors where the crowd of people watching them write the symbol of “rock”, “paper” or “scissors” on cards, where they are collected and put into a box for both players to draw three cards and play the game. Meari manipulates the majority of the class’ votes to her advantage, however Yumeko still wins decisively and reveals exactly how Meari cheated. Throughout the entire game, the audience is given no insight into what Yumeko is thinking or even a hint as to how she was able to figure out Meari’s scheme until it is given through exposition after she has already won. As such, viewers are forced to believe Yumeko was able to piece everything together without fault. Doing this is lazy of the writers as it solely relies on having to tell the audience what happened, rather than show it as it is happening. This problem is apparent in every gamble in the show and kills the opportunity for viewers to engage with the gambling games and the characters playing said games. The games themselves are also poorly constructed; some come off as unnecessarily complex, others are just too simple and easy to beat. Being marketed as a gambling anime makes the show look incredibly dumb and stupid, taking away the chance to get excited for how these games play out. And that leads to what I feel is the 2nd biggest issue with this anime: no thrills.

As you watch Kakagurui, you begin to notice a couple patterns with each gamble: High-stakes are never fully realised, every female character is bat-shit insane and “Yumeko wins LOL”. Seriously, even when Yumeko loses like in episode 3, she has no repercussions from losing. Because the audience is always watching from the perspective of either a mere onlooker or one of Yumeko’s opponents, she always comes across as too good for every situation she is placed in. Because of this she rids the show of any tension it could have had. And when you figure out that most of the time Yumeko gambles, she barely even uses a complete strategy, relying on pure luck to win at random times, which feels like a slap in the face to anyone expecting consistency and/or intelligence from this show. The fact that there are no actual punishments fulfilled from losing a high-stakes gamble also hinders the joy and excitement viewers get from watching. Now while there are consequences for being in an extreme amount of debt (e.g. house pet, Meari’s “Life Schedule”), you never actually see the show go through with these consequences and even then, the punishment for losing rarely ever matches the reward for winning. And in Yumeko’s case, the money she wins never really matters to her at all. She is the kind of sadomasochist that would throw countless amounts of money away to feel satisfied with how high the risk of losing a gamble is. Yet the show never goes through with these risks. So I’m left here after watching each gamble asking myself “What’s the point?”. A lot of fans of the show have been saying that Kakegurui is not a gambling anime, but a great thriller, and I just cannot agree with that statement at all. It is a mediocre thriller at best and that is only if you turn your brain off.

Speaking of which, this show stretches one’s suspension of disbelief so much that you would think this has the quality of fanfiction-level writing. Not just with the gambling aspect of it, but the entire setting is fucking stupid. From the very start I was always curious why there were so many students at Hyakkaou Academy and why they would all gamble. But as I continued watching, the curiosity turned into frustration because it became apparent that there is no proper reason why so many students would stay there or continue to engage in gambling than to make Yumeko even more perfect than what she already is. Yumeko exposes a lot of the games played in gambles as cheat ways to get other in debt, yet that never changes the amount of gambling that takes place within the academy, and that is because most of the students in the background are ignorant buffoons. I would also like to know why only one adult to my memory has appeared in the entire 12 episodes. ONE! I cannot imagine such a prestigious academy to only have one adult working at the academy, but it makes sense with the amount of betting that takes place so regularly. And how in the world are guns and kidnapping allowed? And why does being in extreme debt eventually lead to a life sentence that dictates you to a wealthy future? So many questions that are never explained because this show is not about logic. It tries to look smart but just comes off as a dumb piece of shit. Calling this show psychological is pure lunacy; if anything, it is psycho-sexual because any real sense of logic got thrown out the fucking window!

Nearly every character in this show pissed me off. I have already stated how Yumeko is convoluted out her own ass and is like a vacuum sucking all the excitement away from the show, but she seems like God’s gift to this show when compared to every other character. Meari, who seemed like she had potential, starting off as a cocky bitch that is humbled by Yumeko before being humiliated by the student council. Sadly, she turned out to be a weaker clone of Yumeko by episode 4 and is only used as a way to explain other games Yumeko plays as the story goes on. Literal waste of potential. Ryouta is their other friend, but honestly he does nothing in this show. He just reacts to shit happening around him and nods in response and is a waste of space. Fuck him. The only other characters that matter are the one-note members of the student council that only matter for the one episode they are in before getting pushed to the side. Dishonourable mention to eyepatch-girl with the revolver fetish and a chronic masturbation habit, edgy bitch. And I would love to talk about the one guy whose sole purpose here is to sexually assault the protagonist, but I won't bother trying to match the show when it comes to edge. All you need to know is that these characters are terrible, both in their construction and as people, making the show even more of a pain while watching.

Regarding the production, from a company like Studio MAPPA I was really disappointed. The art style is not impressive, most of the female character designs are generic, backgrounds are fairly basic and visual effect are for the most part impressive. The most controversial feature of the animation has to be the facial expressions and I have mixed feelings about them. On one hand, they showcase how broken and mentally unstable these characters get at times, but these faces just do not fit the visual look of the show and come off as cringe-inducing to me. The fan-service used is also off-putting to me, seemingly thrown in at random intervals in each episode. Yumeko pretending to be a cat was a definite low point for my enjoyment and did more to prove to me that it cares more about sex appeal than anything of substance. The music used was fine to me, with the OP being perhaps the best part of the entire show, which is not a hard feat. The ED however, was nice to listen to once but afterwards was always skipped, as I don’t see how Yumeko walking for 90 seconds as her breasts bounce constantly is worth seeing more than once. The voice acting was fine until characters went into their crazy stage and felt artificial and forced, but I suppose that fits the show unintentionally.

In conclusion, Kakegurui was pretty awful, filled with formulaic, villain-of-the-week gambling matches that felt like a waste of time once it was all over. In the end it was only trying to entertaining on a superficial level; it was never attempting to have a real identity, besides being yuri fapbait. Now I have no problem with anyone who liked the show; you are free to like and enjoy whatever anime you want to, but if someone were to ask me if I enjoyed it? HELL NAW. Lemme put it this way: If you liked Mirai Nikki and Akame ga Kill, you’ll probably enjoy this. But if you are anything like myself and thought those two shows were terrible, Kakegurui ain’t gonna be worth your time. Now if you’ll excuse me, I’m off to watch something that is actually worth my time.

I’m not a fan of using buzzwords but it’s hard to ignore the edginess when watching Kakegurui. Based on the manga of the same name, this adaptation translates to a gambling story. I can’t help but think of a wicked thriller when watching this show. It basically takes the idea of gambling and transform it into madness with its characters, setting, and ideas. However, does it live up its hype and worth watching? The answer is quite the opposite.

Getting into this show for some people will likely not be easy. It’s not a recommendable show for anyone unless you really fancy a psychological thriller that ... deals with a crazy cast of characters. The show itself takes place at Hyakkaou Academy. It’s a peculiar school that prepares students for proficiency related to strategizing, mental strength, and of course gambling. To survive, you have to outsmart your opponents and become part of the hierarchy. In other words, it’s survival of the fittest.

The first episode definitely will get you into the mood as we meet Yumeko Jabami, the main protagonist and new transfer student. While Jabami may seem like an ordinary girl at first glance, it’s easy to notice how far she is from normal once she gets herself involved in gambling games. The show chronicles her school days as she takes on opponents with high risk. I mean, it’s gambling. There’s always risk but what’s peculiar about Jabami is that she gambles for the thrill of it rather than for fame or money. In addition, the show makes it clear that Jabami is intelligent as she quickly learns the inside and outside of the school’s gambling games. In fact, there are episodes where Jabami beats her opponents at their own game. However, I can’t firmly say that Jabami’s personality is one that people can appreciate. She is highly unpredictable and truly enjoys the thrill of gambling. From every episode, she has orgasmic reactions when she thinks about gambling. To a certain extent, the show truly wants us to accept Jabami for who she is but I find it difficult to do so. The reason she gambles is irrational and I can hardly find her relatable to anyone. Not to mention, this show doesn’t do an adequate job of getting viewers to understand her better. Her morality regarding gambling is absurd and really lacks reason. She just wants to gamble and treats it as the most exciting thing in the world. I also have to confess that Jabami’s character change from an elegant beauty to a psychotic freak to be difficult to watch at times. In retrospect, Jabami has a lot of flaws in her character and this show doesn’t do a decent job at repairing them.

Beyond Jabami, the majority of the cast isn’t far off from their psychotic characteristics. Mary Saotome, the first gambling opponent of Jabami at the school shows her own crazy antics. The majority of the student council has various characters ranging from the mysterious president Kirari Momobami, the violent head of Beautification Committee Midari Ikishima, the calculating Kaede Manyuda, part-time idol Yumemi Yumemite, nail loving Itsuki Sumeragi, and among others. The show tries to make them appealing by injecting their personalities in the most devious way possible. What we get as a result are weak background stories, generic characteristics, and abominable morals. To me, these characters are pretty much all the same and serve as an obstacle to Jabami. The show has Jabami fighting against some of the key members of the student council but the result usually ends up being extremely predictable. To be quite honest, the anime itself is nothing short but predictable from the start. Even though Jabami isn’t invulnerable to losing, it doesn’t make us feel anything about her situation when she does. Jabami herself doesn’t even seem to care and in many ways, the show tries to express offbeat ideas that come out as uninspiring.

Character relationships in this anime is also very questionable. The most normal character at the school would probably be Ryouta Suzui, one of Jabami’s very few allies. He has a very lack-luster personality and I honestly feel like this show would be much better if he didn’t exist. His relationship with Jabami is easily forgettable as the two are very polar opposites. Others also make him look like a fool and to be quite honest, it’s pretty much what he is. That being said, the show makes it clear that the society has many fools. Thanks to the hierarchy that the student council president has made, there are those that are labeled as “house pets”. Essentially, house pets are those that sink into large debts and are mistreated by the public. Why? It’s the simplicity of social status. Unfortunately, we never really get a full understanding on why this system exists as the show focuses way too much on Jabami’s gambling adventures than anything else. It’s one of the major weakness of the show as everything seems to be about Jabami. The show is like a loop with the same formula. Jabami faces off against an opponent, plays against them at their own game, and gets the orgasmic thrills of it. It becomes tedious fast and lacks substance because of Jabami’s morals. I also don’t really find the games themselves to be thrilling as most are predictable. The games puts emphasis on psychology rather than strategy so don’t expect this show to be smart in any way. I mean, a good majority of the gamblers cheat, manipulate, and do anything to win. Then, there’s Jabami who just wants to enjoy the ecstasy of gambling. On the plus side, adaptation standards remain mostly faithful as the show captures the expressive faces of the characters. Each chapter is adapted carefully with panel by panel storytelling. However, it’s still an incomplete adaptation because manga itself is ongoing. A 1-cour adaptation like this really leaves open a lot of questions and doesn’t tie any loose ends in the end. There’s also original content added in for this adaptation.

Adapted by Studio MAPPA, the producers apparently went all out to bring out the sheer entertainment value as much as possible. First, there’s the character expressions that really borderlines inhuman insanity. The art shift is pretty noticeable for almost every gambler in this anime. One minute, they look normal but as soon as gambling business picks up, they go full facial with highly stylized features. Jabami is the guiltiest of this with her psychotic eyes, intense blushing, and body language. The show decorates itself with fan service although this sometimes looks like a satire. Also, it seems this show can’t sometimes hold back on the violence so don’t be surprised if you see blood, vomiting, etc. It’s a crazy world after all.

By technical elements, Kakegurui’s soundtrack, music, and voice acting is impressive. The theme songs are very stylistic with piano chords, eerie beats, and haunting lyrics. Both theme songs also have a clever tempo that matches the momentum of its creativity. Plus, it’s also hard to ignore the show’s OST during any gambling match when it’s at its highest point. Finally, I have to admit that a good amount of character personality comes from the voices. This could likely be Saori Hayami’s best role to date as Jabami. She had a lot of different voice acting roles in the past before but to me, her character in this show stood out the most. If there’s anything to take away from this anime, it’s to remember the talents of the voices.

In the end, Kakegurui turned out to be a cheap cash grab that serves as a giant advertisement of the manga. It’s hard to forgive this show when the storytelling is so blend and the characters are brutally depressing to watch. The anime tried far too hard to sell whatever it intended to and ended up delivering a nakedly dumb adaptation. Some of the visual elements, music, and voice acting saved this show from total catastrophe. However, it still makes this show look like a crude joke.

As the players take their seats, excitement fills the air. Cards, gathered up in one quick swoop, become the weapons of this match, as each fighter tries to gather their wits under the intense stress and tension at play. Pulse quickens, the heart accelerates, at the sight of their weapons, as each fighter stares at their enemy in silent anticipation, awaiting any indication into the contents of their hand. As time passes the air grows all the more incredibly heavy and thick, sweat adorning both of these brave warriors, as, suddenly, the signal to throw down their cards to determine the victor is called. Who ... will receive Lady Luck's blessing this time?

Gambling! High octane stakes and tension! Narratives surrounding the use of gambling are supposed to be exciting, tense, give us a sense of utmost euphoria, and, most of all, be entertaining as hell! Kaiji is a series that excels in this department, and, while I haven't seen every episode of the show yet, the first eight episodes that I have seen have been everything I look for in a gambling-centric narrative. The stakes are high, being that each game involves the consequence of death if someone were to lose, it's easy to care for our main character after the huge debt that has been left to him and each game is insanely interesting since it becomes a huge psychological battle with players trying to deceive and outwit each with other, with the great animation and soundtrack enhancing each element. Watching the show is essentially like having one giant adrenaline rush, which makes you want to keep watching episode after episode, which is a sign of well-crafted and written thriller around the use gambling. However, Kakegurui (or, if you prefer, Bukkakegurui, which is what I'll be referring to the show as for the rest of the review) is one of the most downright boring shows I've ever had the displeasure of watching, despite having similar ideas and premise to that of Kaiji. But, why is that? Why does Kaiji succeed where Bukkakegurui does not? Well, let's find out! Let's grab a chair, bet some insane amount of money, and remember to have about twenty orgasms as we play, since gambling, for some reason, gets us completely wet!

Bukkakegurui's narrative is set inside a prestigious academy which is a tad bit different than conventional schools. While, during the day the school adopts the typical lessons that any student from any school undergoes, at night the school becomes a gambling den, where those who are seeking power and money go to gamble. The series sees our protagonist, Yumeko, an obsessive and insane gambler who experiences an orgasm every time she plays, gamble her way through the student council until the climatic game with the student council president at the very end of the series. In terms of narrative structure, the series is incredibly linear and straightforward, and adopts a "monster of the week formula", whereby Yumeko will play off against a new member of the student council of increasing difficulty before coming to the big finale. This structure of storytelling is not inherently bad, and since the focus of the show, and the appeal is based around the games itself, I don't mind the narrative being rather simple. However, there is one problem I have with this formulaic structure, and that is, that Yumeko never grows or learns throughout the duration of the series or in her matches. She never acquires any new tactics or skills during the games that could be applied in later scenarios, and she wins more so because the script tells her to win rather than putting any actual effort into her character winning through clever manipulation, strategy, or anything else that would be remotely interesting. For the sake of argument, let's compare Bukkakegurui to the 1995 series, Neon Genesis Evangelion, which also adopted a "monster of the week" formula for much of its duration. The reason why Evangelion succeeds is because during every Angel encounter and fight in the series, we are learning as an audience, both about the nature of the world, and of the characters, in their mental state and emotions. Shinji, Rei and Askua grow, not only in their physical abilities against the Angels, but also as people as well, as they begin to grow to like themselves as the series progresses, and work together as a team. By doing so, it grounds the characters in a more realistic way, and makes them feel far more like actual people, which Yumeko fails at completely, as she is more akin to an over powered Mary Sue who wins just because. While her personality suggests that she gambles so much for the thrill and excitement it brings, which is a fine motivation for her character, it also makes her feel rather boring and one dimensional as we never learn anything about her beyond what is presented at surface level. While there is a mini flashback that suggests that Yumeko is gambling in order to raise money for her sister's operation, or something along those lines, we're never given any more information regarding that aspect, and this idea should have been introduced at the very start of the show, to give Yumeko's matches some actual emotional weight and narrative stakes, but they didn't do that so each match feels incredibly inconsequential. Speaking of narrative stakes, let's dive into that next!

In Bukkakegurui, the school is divided into sub sections dependent on how much money you have, with those losing money and being in debt at the bottom, being treated as house pets, while those with money get to rule at the top. If, at some point, you get into enough debt while at the school, the student council will write you out a life plan which determines every element in your life in the future, all planned out for you, from who you will marry, how many children you will bear, among other things. So, there are elements that are at stake here, such as your entire life being ruined forever by this life plan or crippling debt, but the stakes presented in the matches don't work because the characters are all completely one dimensional and it's hard to care for anyone at all. Who cares if Yumeko becomes a house pet or gets a life plan written up for her, when she'll pay back her debts anyway through her gambling? Who cares that someone like Meari ends up with a life plan when she has been nothing but a horrible bitch throughout the show and gets what she deserves? WHO CARES? It's one thing to have narrative stakes, but another thing to have characters who we care about having those stakes inflicted upon them.

In order to better convey what I mean, imagine a scenario in which I have two rocks. The first rock, rock A, represents the characters presented in Bukkakegurui; they're all horribly one dimensional, lack personality and are hard to care for in the slightest. We don't learn anything about them as actual people, despite the fact that they're all hungry for power or vast amounts of wealth, nor do we feel any connection to them on any personal level since there is no time devoted for fleshing them out. The other rock, Rock B, represents a character that we have had time to care for. They're here not, because they find thrill for gambling, but because they have no other choice. Perhaps they have a large debt to pay off, or have to gamble for money for an operation to save a love one or something, but what's important is that we learn about this character in order to feel some kind of connection, and the fact that they're an underdog will make the audience root for them more, and will make the games more exciting as the character will have to come up with new strategies constantly, driving more investment in the narrative. The audience should experience the world through this character's eyes, so not only do we become more attached to them as an actual person but also so that we can see how they grow and think. Now, with both rocks categorised, let's say I bring in a sledgehammer, thus introducing the concept of death and smash them both. Now, which rock do you care for? Obviously the rock with more of a personality, back-story, and have had time to care for. And this is why I find no excitement whilst watching the show and why I don't care about anything that is happening.

Now, people may argue against me by suggesting I am taking the anime too seriously and should just shut my brain off and enjoy the series as a rule of cool, dumb show, since there are plenty of pretty silly elements, and the games in the anime are the reason why I should be watching it since that is the main appeal of the show. Now, this isn't necessarily a bad stance to take, and I want to clarify now that I don't begrudge anyone who has actually managed to derive entertainment from this show, but I can't see the show in this light since I found most of the elements to pretty boring, especially all the games, which, for a show that is focused completely around this idea, is a pretty bad sign on the quality of the work!

Each game in Bukkakegurui is boring, lifeless and we don't learn anything during the match about either participant involved, other than, sometimes, very short back stories consisting of only thirty seconds or so. Most of the games are essentially just Yumeko winning by either complete luck, or figuring out how her opponent is cheating in some way and the way she determines this and discovers how they are doing so feels so contrived and stupid that I want to slam my face into a wall. Now, luck is a HUGE aspect of gambling, so therefore her wins through luck are not necessarily that bad (even though it really pushes it in plenty of places) but there's no attempt at creating anything interesting. Aside from the games being incredibly simple anyway, there is no psychological battles taking part, none of the characters are attempting to outwit one another and there is hardly anything present that made Kaiji's games interesting. You never really get that cathartic feeling when you witness an intense match go on for ages when a character outsmarts another in some creative way as you say to yourself, "Ah! How clever!" The few times they do try and throw a curveball into the games or when Yumeko tries to outwit her opponent it feel so weak and dry since the in-the-moment logic is incredibly shallow and the way the story tries to awkwardly implement in these elements is so insulting to the intelligence of the audience as the show thinks that by throwing some random curveball at the final moment is a plot-twist or a smart way to deceive the audience since they didn't see it coming, because it appeared out of thin air. The only time the anime ever comes close to being somewhat entertaining during a match is in episodes six and seven where Yumeko gambles against someone who, believe it or not, is even more insane than she is, by the name of Midari Ikishima, a girl who finds pleasure in harming herself through the use of gambling. During her match with Yumeko, they both decide to play Russian roulette, which raises the narrative stakes and tension since it introduces the consequence of death into the game, although it is hard to care for anything that is going on, because, as I've said, the characters are dry and boring, and also because it's pretty obvious that nobody will actually die during the match anyway, but still the scene comes the closest out of any to actually entertain me, and, even then, the scene is still incredibly weak.

The characters, as I've previously mentioned, are all incredibly hard to care for, and are pretty much all absolutely insane! Most of the characters take the utmost pleasure in laughing hysterically at their enemies, smiling and looking down upon them during a game if it is going in their favour, which makes everyone feel like an unlikeable, one dimensional asshole. The show often utilises cheap victimisation in a pathetic attempt to manipulate us into feeling sorry for these cardboard cut-outs, and nowhere is this more evident than in episode nine, where, a student council member who also happens to be an idol with a huge following, has her secret revealed to all of them, in which, recorded on a tape, she proclaims that she finds all of her fans to be absolutely disgusting and she hates the fact that she has to even shake their hands since it makes her puke. Despite that already sounding incredibly horrible anyway, she as a person is a complete and utter twat, with no redeemable qualities, hiding behind the facade of being a wonderful idol. During the episode, when the secret is revealed, she breaks down crying, as she comes to the realization that her dream is now ruined. I expect that the creators of the show wanted the audience to sympathise with her, but how can we when she is such a horrible twat who got everything she deserved? And, if that's not already bad enough, the audience gets a direct kick to the nuts straight after when all of her fans forgive her! That's right! If you're a horrible person with no likeable traits who gets what they deserve, all is forgiven if you simply have a dream you want to uphold!

I could go on more and more about each one of the other characters, but at that point I'd be beating a dead horse since they all suffer from the exact same problems I've talked about before. Perhaps the only character who doesn't fit into this mould is one of our main protagonists, who offers so little to the narrative that you could omit him from the plot entirely and it wouldn't make a single difference! Now THAT'S a good main character! I suppose his main purpose is to act as the voice of reason and rationality in the story since he is the only sane character, and the one the audience can relate to the most, but if that's what they were attempting to do with his character, then they failed horribly since I honestly forget this guy is even here half the time. They try and make it out that he and Yumeko have this deep friendship, since she helped him recover from his debt in the beginning of the series, but their relationship feels superficial, as if the only reason they're even friends in the first place is just because the script dictates as such. His main purpose in the show is to deliver random expository dialogue and that's pretty much it.

If there's one thing that Bukkakegurui gets right, then that's in the animation and art department. The show is very visually appealing, with pretty attractive and striking character designs, that blend well with the rather unique school uniform designs too. Not only that, but the show has plenty of super detailed close-up shots of character's faces to convey, not only the insanity of each one, but to also represent the sexual euphoria each character attains whilst in the games, and Bukkakegurui does a good job in that area. It's clear that the animators put a lot of work into making the show as visually interesting as they possibly could, but it's not without its inconsistencies however. CGI is sometimes used during close-up shots of the player's hands when dealing with cards, and it not only looks terrible, but is so jarring as well. Luckily CGI isn't used all too much aside from this one instance for some odd reason, so I can let it slide for the most part. The music is overall fine, and pretty forgettable, mostly consisting of free-from jazz that is way too suave and sophisticated for a show at this level of trashiness. The opening and ending tracks however are both damn great! The opening especially I love, with its use of stylish visuals and fantastic music, which almost tricks you into thinking that the actual show will carry the same energy and charisma. The voice actors as well all do a pretty stellar job in their respective roles, perfectly capturing the voice of someone who is insane!

In conclusion, Bukkakegurui was a massive disappointment, and I think that's what makes the show ultimately more aggravating for me. While I dislike using the word to describe anything, I feel it is pretty appropriate when talking about this one, and that word is cringey! The show reeks of desperation, and tries way too hard to be edgy, and ends up just being embarrassing instead since many of the scenarios presented in the show, such as a scene in which Yumeko acts like a cat on all fours, feel as if they were written by a twelve-year-old. It fails as an intense thriller, it fails as a character study, it fails as a gambling show, but most importantly it fails at the most basic level to achieve any emotional connection with the audience. Bukkakegurui is a show more interested in over blown theatrics than it is in characters and the actual games itself, and the reason why this show is so bad. I can't even recommend this to be people on the grounds that it is "so bad that it's good". Just watch Kaiji instead...

Bukkakegurui is a word trademarked by the great NFMaster! All credit goes to that sexy bastard!

Kakegurui- The Great Value Brand of Kaiji: Now with Chicks!

The dim, incandescent can light burns the back of your head from above. Your mouth is a desert, lips parched as you struggle to even swallow your own saliva. An irregular heart beat increases its oscillations, and your vision blurs as you attempt to read your own cards. You're a house pet, a term coined only for those drowning in the debt of the student council and this one hand of poker could either seal your fate for the rest of your life, or set you free of the shackles of your dues. Anger, guilt, nervousness ... and tension well up inside your brain, clouding any sense of strategy once present in your arsenal. The remaining cards are dealt, each one like a subsequent dagger being driven into the heart. Your fingers dig into the cheap felt table lining and begin to burn from the friction. As the last card approaches, thousands of scenarios race through your mind, and your opponents stoic appearance does nothing to ease the pressure. Will you survive? Will your reputation and existence be dismantled, succumbing to the hands of the tyrannical council?

The final card slams down with a thunderous echo…

Gambling is a subject rare to take center stage in the realm of anime. Kaiji, Death Parade and Liar Game are some of the only examples I can think of in the medium, until studio MAPPA’s (Zankyou no Terror, Yuri!! On Ice) Kakegurui landed this season. From a viewer’s perspective, for the gambling to really have an impact on our senses the scenes must comprise a balance of suspense, mind games and creativity. Kaiji the Gambler, arguably the best example I can think of features a main character literally gambling for his life, in games that are either very intricate or require a large degree of mental fortitude to participate in. The result is white-knuckle tension that has your finger hovering over the skip button, ready to binge through the entire anime in one sitting. Kakegurui attempts to mimic Kaiji’s critical success with a different target audience by introducing better animation and a more familiar setting, high school. Because, you know, that makes sense.

There is a “well visioned” setup, with taboo setting of school in which students engage in lavish betting and gambling once the last bell rings for the day. We witness firsthand the daunting effects of losing in this school: you're deemed a “house pet” and everyone treats you accordingly. This wouldn't be quite as ridiculous if it weren't for the fact that kids are ridiculed and treated like shit in high school to begin with. In essence, this significantly dilutes any ounce of realism with regards to the stakes these students are playing for, and ultimately the entire premise from the beginning. The “upside” is that IF you are successful at gambling and start raking in the dough, your family is already rich as fuck so…. none of this betting really even matters to begin with. See my point? From its inception, Kakegurui’s narrative is faulted. The whole premise of the anime seems pointless in that if you win, you'll be rich and if you lose, you'll still be rich but get treated like that awkward kid who frequently gets stuffed into lockers. The student council seeks to rule the school with an iron fist, but I'm not sure what they actually do; except cheat to win, fly in fancy helicopters and wear terrifying androgynous masks.

Unassuming transfer student Yumeko Jabami looks to shake things up at this school by winning any and every gambling match she's in. Countless opponents fall victim to her innate ability to see through tricks and deftly play each person for a fool. This can be frustratingly similar to the No Game no Life effect, in which Sora and Shiro’s victory was assumed prior to them even starting the game. To top it off, Jabami seems to get off on the thought of risking “everything” on each of her matches. Each of her mental orgasms is brought to our attention in exhausting detail, as her eyes leer red and her legs tremble with excitement. The anime progresses almost episodically with a “rinse, repeat” effect. New characters are introduced, Jabami challenges them, a new game is played and Jabami emerges victorious yet again. This process repeats over and over and over again in a due loop merry-go-round. There’s no sense of doubt, no uncertainty built into the script. It’s a perpetual nightmare from a scripting perspective.

With Jabami at the helm, we as viewers never really experience her thoughts about anything. Neither her strategy, intuition or objective ever becomes clear and the games themselves often end up narrated by her foes. Long, overthought monologues about what they “think” she is planning through each and every move, which began to take a toll on my attention span since I knew the eventual outcome prior to each match taking place. And since a majority of the anime is spent “in game” and we don’t catch a glimpse of what Jabami is thinking, her characterization is thrown out the window. The rare occurrence of a line of dialogue from our “heroine” is spent devilishly coercing another one of her pawns to help her with a bet in the game. The main protagonist in the anime doesn’t even have fucking character development… it’s embarrassing.

Did I mention how edgy Kakegurui is? I was legitimately interested to see where the plot would unfold when I started the series, but my supposition quickly dissolved when I uncovered the anime’s true nature. It’s 2017, so I’m not sure what I expected, but the initial consensus was that I was at least intrigued. So a girl gets her jollies by gambling, who cares? But, when EVERY character acts as if they’re on the verge of insanity? Now we have an inherent problem. Not to mention the horrifically unattractive adrenaline slut who gets wet thinking about having her head blown off from a game of Russian Roulette. It’s a sex scene away from being a dumpster fire Sundance film about how fucking “raw and gritty” some teenager’s life is. Again, it’s the tactical diversion producers craft to steer the audience away from how dreadfully written a show can be, simply because it’s dark or shocking. I don’t always mind this level of scheming when the veil is at least entertaining. But in Kakegurui, you get the worst of both worlds: badly written and boring.

It would be a disservice to anime fans everywhere if I didn’t at least attempt to address the comparisons between Kaiji and Kakegurui. Kaiji as a protagonist is someone you can really root for. His awful luck is inviting, in a sympathetic manner. He basically starts from nothing, and risks his actual life for a chance at redemption. Jabami comes from out of nowhere, with no clear motive and little to no relatability. Kaiji’s gambling games are fewer, but are better explained and have a more intricate explanation. Kakegurui falters, partially due to a shorter run time, and that the games are changed so quickly that less attention is given to their development. It feels like the writers are more focused on getting through everything vice making an impact on what they introduce. Kaiji is primarily a male cast, making it harder to attract female viewers but ideal for a seinen genre. Kakegurui has more females than you can shake a stick at: loli’s, tsunderes and yanderes to boot. Hence my opening statement in the review. Lastly, as I mentioned previously, most of Kakegurui’s dialogue comes from the opposition, creating a wall between the viewer and the character appearing to be the main protagonist (Jabami). In Kaiji, this internalizing is shared between he and his adversaries. It creates an equilibrium that helps the viewer rationalize either end of the gamble.

I think it’d come off as redundant if I expounded any more about the characters in Kakegurui. Despite having significantly less screen time, Ryouta and Meari receive significantly more development than Jabami, inflating my unpopular opinion of her ten-fold. We do get some back story on a few minor characters, but nothing short of a plot device in order to propel the story forward. Possibly the most interesting character from the entire cast is Manyuda, who actually has a clearly defined motive, is cutthroat and calculating and doesn’t seem to break character as much to partake in edgy escapades. Oh yeah, and he’s the only member of the student council who actually gambled fairly, at least in his own game. If you’re looking for relatable or enticing characters, Kakegurui may not be the anime for you.

If there’s anything I learned from watching Kakegurui, it’s that facial expressions are apparently everything. In an environment where maintaining a “poker face” is often sought after, the animators in this anime decided to do the exact opposite and emblazon a crazy face on almost every character in the cast. It’s brilliant in some respects because it helps distract the viewer from the rest of the anime’s inadequacies by giving them a fresh dose of ADHD, but is entirely unnecessary. It does helps manifest some false suspense, only it ends up making some of the scenes more irritating. The rest of the animation is quite good, and the overall tone it sets for the show works well for the subject matter. The character models are attractive and proportional, and the flashier scenes with dialogue-heavy moments please the eye. One major blemish on the art side would be the complete lack of animation with the Jabami idol karaoke scene. It came across as complete laziness, with the still image of Jabami fading out into the completion of her song. I’m not sure if this was intentional, but it was jarring to say the least. To help make up for it, they at least added a completely random duet between her and Yumemi to close the episode.

I’ll be honest, I absolutely love the OP for the show. It’s a psychedelic, sexy acid trip with a risque’ jazz track narrating the visuals. If you look closely, it even tells a small story relating to the story progression of the anime itself. The ED on the other hand, leaves a lot to be desired, sans the mystery of what’s underneath Jabami’s outer layer of clothing. The song isn’t even catchy, a quality I can at least cling to in an ED. The rest of the soundtrack existed to create false tension and accentuate the mood of its corresponding scenes, and I can’t recall it being necessarily bad. Voice acting in Kakegurui is one of its strong points, and I can only imagine how much fun the seiyuus had considering how edgy the series can be. The actors actually had a chance to break character and have a good time.

From an entertainment perspective, Kakegurui hits all the wickets. It has hot girls, great animation and an almost avant-garde approach to storytelling that could be incredibly appealing to young, impressionable audiences (aka, most of the anime community). This being said, I can’t be baffled by how well the show was received, even if I didn’t agree with it. This is the main purpose of a reviewer or critic, to point out enjoyment as well as flaws. I’d be lying to you if I said I didn’t enjoy Kakegurui. But is it a good gambling anime? Hardly. It suffers from a severe lack of character development/relatability and has an edgy stigma about it I can’t shake. The previous negatives coupled with the unrealistic premise can create some harsh criticisms and overall disappointment. I’d recommend this to fans of shows like Re:Zero, No Game No Life or any other similar series, due in part to it being edgy and appealing to a certain audience. Thank you to all for reading this review, and be sure to check out the rest of my Summer 17 ones!

Story-2
Art-7
Sound-7.5
Character-3
Enjoyment-5
Overall-4.45

The past 5 or 6 years there was a trend called "best girl" anime. The whole thing revolves around pushing the main waifu front and center for the purpose of selling the manga. This gets exaggerated with the anime because now she needs to sell the manga AND merch.

Enter Yumeko Jabami, her character intro in the theme song AND the show is boobs first. I'm not joking, We first get a shot of her bouncing chest with the theme song saying her name over and over THEN her face. That's not a good start.

Because everything revolves around her the rest of the "story" and ... plot suffers. The school is called Hyakkaou Academy. An elite school for the rich to.... ummmmm... Gamble?

No seriously where are the teachers in this? Why are there no classes? All you ever see is students gambling or bullying each other to where it seems more like a prison than anything. That's what I mean, it's not important for this to even feel like a school. Jabami is a gambler so that's all there needs to be in this school.

The sad part is, for how much they make this revolve around this one character, they failed at making her look good. Seriously the way she "gambles" is so stupid it would only work because the plot said so, I mean really really REALLY stupid to where it's boring to watch because the only way for her to win is "because plot" each and every time. There are no mind games, no deception or clever maneuvering like the show advertised. It's just Jabami is awesome, she wins the world! Bow before your ultimate waifu!

The other characters in the show are there to make her look good. Mary is the lancer/rival type who exists to lose to the awesome Mary Sue. Ryouta is the damsel in distress that needs to be saved...etc.

Made by Studio Mappa the art and animation here is beautiful, the crazy and edgy expressions look good. Even the voice acting and music are great. However the writing, story and plot are so bad nothing can really save it.

All it is a Mary Sue waifu with extra edginess to it. The show has nothing more to offer.

You know, a bad show, to me, is not simply a matter of the quantity or size of the flaws you can find in it, however it is that you decide to measure such an arbitrary idea, but what kind of flaws it has. I can deal with some plot holes, for once (I mean, even the almighty FMA has 2 big ones at the end) as long as the work can properly contextualize them and not make me care. Members of the cast being inconsistent, though, make it tougher to stomach. I’m also not someone who asks for absolute realism, but simply verisimilitude and ... consistency. Disregard all of those and the work starts to go sour for me. The worst offenses, though, are when the work becomes morally bankrupt, when it asks me to sympathize and side with people who are clearly contemptible. Kakegurui is one of those shows.

Story and Characters

Well come to Hyakkao Academy, the land of insane teenage gambling, horrendous abuses of power and blatantly criminal acts of bodily harm. The school is supposed to be a place for the children of the filthy rich, but most definitely the filthy, where the future elite of Japan is meant to be prepared for a future where they’d lead the business of their families. In this institution, gambling is not simply a pass-time students can engage for their own enjoyment, but a core part of the social-structure of the school. Since the current student council president took over, she instituted a system where students who stack too much debt become “cattle”, considered second class among their classmates and have to remain subservient to the students with more money. Obviously, they also become primary target for bullying. For the viewer who shares that pesky desire to have the elements in the story making sense, this plot point will immediately raise a number of eyebrows, so let’s go bit by bit.

First, how is this system even allowed existing? None of the students here are of legal age, so they should never be allowed to gamble outrageous amounts of money from their parents net worth. Is this a version or Japan where legal restrictions for underage gambling don’t exist? If that’s the case, what about the restrictions for underage driving, drinking and sex? None of these are even mentioned, so I suppose the gambling premise is entirely based on “don’t think about it, bro”. Now, you might at this point throw at me my previous statement about realism vs. verisimilitude, but let make it clear: that goes for simple stuff, like my tsunderes being a bit more violent than what the real world would tolerate or children being a bit more mature than normal, it doesn’t apply for a universe where an entire legal system seems to operate backwards.

Following the fact that the existence of this scenario is a contradiction in itself, why would anyone enroll their children in a school like this one? These students are supposed to be future business leaders, people with enormous responsibilities in their hands, so a cast system that allows them to be bullied, humiliated and sometimes even physically harmed by their classmates goes completely opposite to the goal their education is supposed to provide, that of shaping them into capable, resolute and strong-willed adults. I’m not sure any parent would allow their children to frequent a place like this if such practices are not only allowed, but incentivized. Then there’s the money issue: the students make their bets with money from their families, which means that they are stocking up on massive debts their parents will have to pay. At long-term, this set up would make the cost of such education extremely expensive, making this school a lot more trouble than is worth. The list of absurdities doesn’t stop there, but let’s get to know the cast before we can dive head first into more nonsense!
Jabami Yumeko is the main culprit of the story. She generally keeps a playful and polite demeanor, but shifts to intense obsession when it’s time to gamble. I’m pretty sure she is supposed to be a sociopath! Not a realistic depiction of a sociopath, though, but what fiction believes a sociopath to be like. Truth be told, Yumeko is no more than a Mary Sue. It may seem like a stretch to claim this, since general misconception is that this kind of character is also supposed to be virtuous (or at least framed as such by the narrative, even when the audience can clearly see that the opposite is truth), but she does have the basic traits of a Mary Sue: she clearly has complete disregard for how much money she bets, the supply of money or her disposal is not even hinted at in the anime, so in how much danger she’s is unclear, at no point displays any signs of being the least bit worried, constantly displaying the face of someone who’s always on top, even though her behavior is so needlessly risky. Ironically, at one point she even drops this gem: “To realize one’s ambitions, risks must be taken”. Funny, since she seems to have no ambition besides having a gambling playground for herself.

Besides being nice to the already shitty-characters from the main cast and keeping a constant sweety-kitty-diabetes façade when not gambling, is there any reason for Yumeko to be seem as an actual force for good in this narrative? When it comes to motivations and general personality, she’s no less psychotic, abusive, deceiving, manipulative and sadistic than the members of the student council (or any other scumbag in this school), so what are the guaranties that once her main source of entertainment in the school is gone, or at least significantly diminished, she’ll bring any positive change to the status quo? And even if she does, do any of these characters actually deserve it? They’re all simplistic, poorly realized figures and most often just despicable people, despite the laughable attempts from the show on making them sympathetic by introducing last minute backstory.

Suzui Ryouta, the closest friend to Yumeko, is an inconsistent pussy. He strangely seems to have no problem talking to multiple attractive girls at school, but from the first moment Yumeko enters the scene, becomes strangely flustered when first interacting with her. Besides that, his role is essentially to tell the audience how risky her situation is when she makes a crazy bet and to be mesmerized when she pulls off a victory out of some strategy the audience has no knowledge off.

Momobami Kirari is the student council president, or Seitokaichou in Japanese, responsible for the creation of the cast system in place in Hyakkao Academy. She sees her fellow schoolmates as pets she can control and play with, as well as manipulate to gain power, although the goals she wants to achieve with such power are not explained in the story. Through an outrageous ass-pull in episode 11 (not a Deus ex Machina, stop using this term wrong) she proves to also be willing to backstab her own fellow student council members, which leads me to question how would anyone ever trust and help this bitch again, when she can betray them on a whim.

Other members of the student council that matter are:

- Ikishima Midari, who’s completely insane for life-threatening thrills and CARRIES A GUN TO THE SCHOOL! Seriously, how is this ever allowed? Why would anyone accept be put into a school that looks more like an asylum for demented shitbags?
- Yomozuki Runa, the loli dressed in a bunny hoodie who helps Seitokaichou on her schemes, gleefully plotting against the other members;
- Kaede Manyuda, the treasurer of the student council, very ambitious and arrogant, quick to dismiss the students he doesn’t consider worthy enough of battling him. By all accounts, he’s the least awful creature in the cast;
- Sumeragi Itsuki, another crazy bitch, who likes to collect nails from other students, which she rips off whenever they lose to her in gamble;

So, besides allowing its students to be bullied and made into servants, potentially putting them in emotional distress that can severely affect their learning, this schools also allows bodily harm to be inflicted on them, as well as bets that involve possible death. Not crazy enough for you? The institution is also equipped with special sealed rooms, for when Ikishima feels the need to “arrest other students” for her games. Let me spell this out again: this crazy cunt KIDNAPS people and locks them into special cells where she can bet on deadly games with them, using a FIREARM! Do you see why this setting is so hard to buy into?

As soon as Yumeko arrives at the institution, her one and only goal is to gamble with every strong opponent she can find, climbing the ladder until she can get the opportunity to challenge Seitokaichou, so the bulk of the narrative is focused on the multiple games she engages in with other members, occasionally crushing their spirit by revealing the manner they cheat, before beating them. Not always successful, though, as early on she manages to lose a serious bet, although it’s implied that was only possible through cheating, and becomes a pet. Interestingly enough, as soon as a previously successful character suddenly becomes a pet, it seems their winning record is instantly forgotten by the scumbag token extras, who immediately shift to bully mode. If you’re like me and has near zero suspension of disbelief for stories where everyone is an asshole, you’ll have a hard time with this one.

As Yumeko uses her status as a pet to attract and challenge other student council members, she finally reaches the top members, challenging first Manyuda and ultimately the president. This is the point where the anime turns simply from rage-inducing bad to morally bankrupt filth! Through a seriously logically questionable trick played with the help of Sumeragi, who has an old grudge with Manyuda, they lead him into betting such a high amount of money, that the loss of that game would put him indefinitely subservient to the student council president and destroy his influence in the council, as well as potentially compromising his future and relationship with his father. Yes, it’s that serious! So, of course, he loses and the defeat is followed by Yumeko and Sumeragi gleefully explaining how they manage to reach their ridiculously contrived victory, with the final blow being delivered by the president, by telling him “You’re fired”, making him snap and pass out. In the follow up, Yumeko and Sumeragi discuss what just happens and the way their dialogue is frame tries to imply they had the moral high-ground, somehow. That last bit, to me, is the most infuriating part.

Seriously, what exactly was Manyuda’s crime that was apparently so much more despicable in relation to the other students? Seitokaichou introduced a cast system that locks students into the role of cattle, where they remain subservient and bullied by other students, Sumeragi, who now we’re supposed to root for, used to rip people’s nails off, which basically amounts to torture, and Midari makes bets with people’s lives; Am I really supposed to believe that this guy is so much more deserving of having his livelihood and future sadistically crushed because he underestimates his fellow students? When did arrogance become the worst of crimes? I call this idea bullshit and this anime a hypocritical piece of toxic waste.

By the way, the ending is a complete cop-out too.

Presentation

So, do you like variety of facial expression for your characters to help flesh them out as credible, or at least likeable human beings? Tough luck, baby, here it’s ahegao up the ass for you!

For those not aware of what I mean, “ahegao” is the term in Japanese for the orgasm face, which despite the definition is not relegated exclusively for porn, but also used in comedic fashion to convey when the character goes through emotional ecstasy. You might have noticed by now that Kakegurui is quite the fan of quantity over quality, and it’ll sure run that trope into the ground whenever it’s needed to convey that the fuck-sticks it passes for humans in the story are going through anything that might be classified as excitement. IT’L ALL THE BLOODY TIME! Whenever someone pull off some maneuver to outsmart or cheat their opponent in a gamble or even when it’s simply to explain the “genius” plan, they will pull off insane orgasm faces and laugh like maniacs. Of course, the biggest offender here has to be Yumeko, because someone up in Valhalla hates me.

When it’s not ahegao, it’s contorted maniacal expressions every antagonist feels the need to break into when they feel superior and about to win on a game, or when they try to be threatening. It’s quite laughable, actually, when bunny-loli tries to pull one of these off, as if the show seriously thinks she is in any way the slightest bit scary. Seriously, any of the girls in the main cast can break her in half and this attempt from the show is just pathetic! Characters seem to break into such expressions almost to the same degree as the ahegao, as if to painfully remind you to not ever expect anyone here to have personality any deeper than a spit puddle, and that subtlety died and we buried its corpse when we allowed this disgrace to be written, published and animated. Along with the stupid story, the presentation here is another big problem for the anime, due exactly to the habits just mentioned.

Is the voice acting of any help? Not really, although not as egregious as the horrendous faces, no character really demands anything more than two different modes of acting, so it’s nothing to write home either.

Personal Ramblings

It genuinely felt like this anime was specifically crafted with the perfect combination of traits that can make my blood boil. From the sickening emphasis on the disgusting faces, to Yumeko’s insufferable “kind and innocent girl” demeanor, along with the inconsistent, impossible to buy into setting and the fact everyone here is a douchebag, this whole show was intensively infuriating to watch.

I swear, I’m not really that hard of a person to please, and it’s not like I can’t enjoy a story where characters are also morally bankrupt or just outright evil. I mean, two of my favorites are Shiki and Black Lagoon, and I don’t think you can say the main characters in those shows are safely good people, what I ask is simply that the show frames that exactly as it is, not as if the horrible people on screen are supposed to be likeable or admired in any way. I am fascinated and genuinely find likability in well written morally ambiguous or evil characters, and I admire characters who display the responsibility and strength of morals I wish I had in my personality, but when the moral center of your story is a selfish, manipulative sociopath who can’t be trusted to have anyone’s well-being in mind, I say you got your priorities kind of backwards!

Now, if you excuse me, I’ll look for something trashy to wash away this memory.

fuck an actual review, this shit garbage, ass doo doo, don't watch it, id rather watch paint dry
this is stanky
horrible
fuck an actual review, this shit garbage, ass doo doo, don't watch it, id rather watch paint dry
this is stanky
horrible
fuck an actual review, this shit garbage, ass doo doo, don't watch it, id rather watch paint dry
this is stanky
horrible
fuck an actual review, this shit garbage, ass doo doo, don't watch it, id rather watch paint dry
... this is stanky
horrible
fuck an actual review, this shit garbage, ass doo doo, don't watch it, id rather watch paint dry
this is stanky
horrible
fuck an actual review, this shit garbage, ass doo doo, don't watch it, id rather watch paint dry
this is stanky
horrible
fuck an actual review, this shit garbage, ass doo doo, don't watch it, id rather watch paint dry
this is stanky
horrible

I've never reviewed something that has yet to finish. Although I'm seeing a lot of premature high scores given by other users. I feel those reviews are based off enjoyment as there is no substance in Kakegurui. I'm going to explain why this anime is not worth any of your time.

This is an in depth spoiler free (as much as I can be spoiler free) analysis of Kakegurui episodes 1-7.

I wanna start off in a weird place

Sound/Voice Acting: 4/10

All of the voice actors feel amateurish and don't have that much flair. Characters like Yameko and Ryouta are passable but there are two ... really bad voices for characters I want to address. I can tell Ms. Udono is trying but her voice for her character is just very unfitting and irritating. Now Udono doesn't have a lot of experience under her belt so I can't judge her too harshly but when making a big budget adaptation you should TRY not to get inexperienced voice actresses. Personally I blame the direction and irresponsibility of the studio over the low experienced actress.

And one other voice that is just so fake and atrocious is borderline unbelievable. Like I was legitimately disappointed when I saw the voice actress for Midari Ikishima. It was none other than Mariya Ise herself. The VA for Stocking Anarchy and Killua in 2011's HxH. She is incapable of voicing this character. Her crazy voice is just as fake and poor as her crazy laugh. I find her performance in this work to be incredibly bad. Her tone and acting is so forced. Every scene hearing her is tedious. Now she's not working with a good script and the direction probably sucks but she's so much better than this.

The music is good I guess. It's not perfect for every situation or memorable. The Op is good but it wouldn't find itself on any Top 100 openings. The low score on the sound is prominently due to the lack of solid actors.

Story: 1/10

They are in a school that allows gambling and that can decide your life for you if you get in too much debt. It's insane and there's been no good explanation. Midari is capable of carrying a weapon on campus and bullies try to rape other students in this high class school. The Student Body also are capable of inflicting bodily harm against the students without any repercussions. ( SPOILER example: Midari, who was threatened to have her eye taken out and took it out herself to prevent the shame and to get it over with. ) This show isn't like Prison School though. It wants us to take it seriously and adds no comic relief to the atmosphere. The author probably just didn't get the memo, that Prison School was a psychological comedy that didn't try to make you take its bizarre concept seriously but the dilemmas and punishments in Prison School gave a real sense of stakes and urgency. Prison School also had great characters, a lot of psychological elements, and was hilarious.

Why it fails as a gambling anime:

It stretches suspension of disbelief and doesn't give us insight on the reasoning behind the characters deductions. Yameko just tends to magically call out the cheating of her opponent with a contrived explanation that we never even get to see. Seeing Yameko's dissection of the cheat would actually add more depth to her character. Give you a sense of humanity and urgency in her. The thrills are also non existent. Every situation and stake is extremely low and since Yameko is the love child of a Gambling Mary Sue and Yuno Gasai (What an amazing combination) she will never lose that great of something. The most she'll lose is money but she throws that around so who cares? Even when she has a gun in her face we still know shes gonna be okay. She's perfect in every single way. Right? She never has really any human reaction. So we can't relate to her and put ourselves in her situation. Remember this.

Every episode is VERY formulaic. Like same thing every time with almost no difference. This makes the thrills and stakes nonexistent. The show is extremely unentertaining unless you have underdeveloped taste or have turned your brain off. After thorough dissection there is nothing necessarily redeemable or well executed about this story. Which is extremely unfortunate because I like gambling and cute girls.

Characters: 1/10

Dear god. No character in this anime is anything more than one dimensional. Yameko is a perfect gambler who wins without even having to work for it. We don't feel any humanity in her. And because of this we cannot relate to her whatsoever. As she is completely emotionless until she starts shit talking. She has no depth or layers as a character. She is so perfect. She finds out the villains way of cheating without us even hearing or seeing it. And the anime isn't smart enough to where we are given the opportunity to figure it out ourselves. The opponent who is cheating gives a nonsensical, not-foreshadowed scheme in their head like any bland shounen villain. It's so convoluted. Yameko's only character traits are she's crazy but acts like she's not and she's a sore winner when she magically finds out how the opponent is cheating.

A character I believed I would like's name was Meiri. As she is a cocky ass who contorts her face to bizarre, funny expressions in the first episode and acts like a boring shounen mustache twiddler until she is humbled by Yameko in that episode. I expected that by destroying Meiri in the first episode they were gonna build her character up through the entire season. Honestly, that's how you can make a cocky character like Meiri likable. Give them a taste of their own medicine. There is even a scene where Meiri is forced to clean up a mess, after being laughed at and left in the lunch room alone. I felt genuine sympathy because I felt like that would be a pivotal moment for her character. Then we see her accumulate EVEN MORE DEBT by the culture club representative and see that her pride is shattered and she is completely humiliated. But I clearly gave this show way too much credit. Now I thought this would lead to an arc where Meiri realizes she relies too much on cheating to gamble and gets too cocky before the cards are shown. And she'd blossom into this great, smart, analytic gambler. NOPE, SHES YAMEKO 2 BY EPISODE FUCKIN 4. She stays bland, stagnant and becomes another boring character.

The final lead is Ryouta Suzui. He just... reacts and sometimes helps Yameko. Literally could be written out so easily. He's one dimensional too. He feels like a side character. I actually forget he's there sometimes.

Everyone is one dimensional.

All the antagonists and side characters are JUST crazy. Some are a lil crazier than the others. Like some will cum while playing. And I guess you're supposed to get intimated or aroused when the crazy girl cums when she's winning or thrilled. That's it. The insanity is so over saturated in the anime it stops being unique, entertaining, or unexpected.

Which makes how everything plays out very boring and predictable.

Art: 7/10

The art is very reminiscent of Prison School but it doesn't go to the extent of Prison School or do it frequently enough. All the crude facial contortions happen on almost every character in the same situation with the same face so it's not well executed or unpredictable or entertaining or funny or intimidating, etc. The budget is very clear though and I can't say its not at least a 7/10 through aesthetic alone. As you kinda get the tone through the art even though the tone is super ridiculous in the story and scenario.

Enjoyment: 1/10

Now I don't mind anyone enjoying this but lets be real; this anime is horrible. Everyone is just enticed by the attractive character designs.

And I tend to repeat myself but often the most serious criticism of a show is usually the kind you hear and throw around the most.

It is a predictable, overly formulaic, shallow, boring, low thrills, poorly written, poorly executed, complete mess of an thriller anime with terrible characters who don't develop or evolve.

Right now this is without a doubt one of the worst anime of 2017. Up there with Berserk and World End. I really did wish I could like this show but almost everything it tries and does fails miserably.

I have been watching anime for a long time. Hell I’ve just been on this planet for a long time.
Throughout that time I do not remember a situation where I was so fixated on one certain aspect that completely capitulated everything else.
That is where I am with the faces in Kakugurui.
These issues with obnoxious faces is nothing new for me and can be seen in my Daily Lives of High School Boys review as well as my opinions on Drifters.
But Kakegurui has achieved a level of obnoxious faces into a territory that has not been explored that I shall deem as egregious ... faces.

The show’s art style is presented in a way that resembles sadistic hentai with these faces.
I for one am not a masochist nor a sadist that will get enjoyment from an entertainment medium that way.
I also am not a hentai fan so when add the sweat and the lips/drool helps take it to that egregious level.

This shows theme is based on a school where gambling gets you to the top of the totem pole.
I for one am someone who likes the game of poker. I watch the World Series of Poker every year. I even had a favorite poker player in Phil Hellmuth.
So I was optimistic that at least like the action in Drifters I can find satisfaction in the gambling of the show.
Unfortunately the gambling we got was a mix of redundant themes and girls over-powering on masochism.
But even if the gambling was more satisfactory it is hard to enjoy any battle of strategy when your bombarded by egregious faces left and right.

Now by this point I already had all these negative feelings towards Yumeko. This is more than just "compulsive gambling".
So enter stage left a Yumeko on steroids named Midari Ikishima.
During her dedicated episodes is where I just lost all hope for this show because when you put the theme of death into the show that changes everything.
This isn’t about riding the economic train to the top of a gambling school.
Your bringing in the theme that you can actually die in this school. That put that stake in the heart for the setting.

Midari is apart of the student council that are the main villains of the show.
They are a conglomerate of individuals that have come together to hold a monopoly on the school.
The basis of the show is for Yumeko to take them down one by one.
The entirety of the show continues to try and make the student council even more sadistic than Yumeko herself.
They try to establish a higher-level sadism that is not accepted to make you not like these characters.
But if you already have Yumeko pass that level the effect is just completely negated.

When considering my rating for the show I need to remember that the bottom score is not a 0 but a 1.
So to not give this show a 1 out of 10 are there enough aspects to push something up to a 2 and so forth.
Basically every character was doing these gambling orgasms. It is the same issue the entire show.
Even when they gave me an architype that I tend to enjoy in a villain in glasses.
The enthusiasm dwindled away quite quickly thanks to once again from Yumeko’s gambling orgasms.
So I can confidently say that the Characters, Enjoyment, and Art are all a 1 out of 10.

I’ve already covered how the setting is disseminated. But we do have progression. There is an end game to the show.
They do not waste much time with frivolous OVA content. That is something I can put up as a 2 out of 10.
Now bringing it up to a 3 out of 10 is another story. There was a lot of empty transition from going to the next student council member.
There also was never a proper hierarchy build out so I can understand the level of difficulty increasing.
They don’t really have much time to build up to it though. Their goal seemed to be to have the main event match-up in this entry.
I can settle on a borderline 3 out of 10 with the story.

So what it comes down to is music. I tend not to deviate my music score much from the rest of the show.
I tend not to value it that highly. The ending song is okay but I do have major issues with the performance from Tia in the OP.
There was a real turn-off for me listening to this nasally running on voice she used in the song.
I’ve skipped the OP every time since episode 2. So with that I’d have to give another 1 out of 10.

I haven’t given a show a 1 out of 10 since 2015 and if I was going to pull the trigger to change that. Right now feels like the right time.
I’ve never experienced something so off-putting in anime like Kakegurui and it is going to be a benchmark for me when it comes to off-putting themes.
If anything is as off-putting as the egregious faces and gambling orgasms then it will be a contender for a 1 out of 10 on my rating scale.
Some people are complaining about having an original ending but for me this was far gone before that. This is an abomination of the highest order!

So, there’s this gambling den where people risk their future. Money is power in capitalism and the more you have the more powerful you become. Ok, it makes sense so far… And then it stops making sense because the gambling den is a freaking high school, where the only thing that is not going on in there is learning. Everybody is acting like a horny lunatic and the author wants us to believe the educational system is fine with letting its young people to become unstable gambling addicts.

And yes, I know it’s not supposed to be a serious anime. It’s trash entertainment for immature people, ... but I have seen many who tried to defend the show as a psychological thriller and a character study, by making it sound like it’s all about the effects of gambling on rich people, as well as how the whole thing is a social experiment aiming to create a new breed of super humans. All that are overshadowed by the constant ahegao faces everyone is making. It’s not a serious show, don’t believe the pretentious overthinkers. It’s a shitty ecchi series about people getting orgasms while gambling and the animation makes sure to point that out every 10 seconds. It’s sleazy fetishism with little to no substance, and those claiming it’s more than that, do it for the sole purpose of making it sound like the deviant crap they are watching are intellectual masterpieces.

Back to the… plot if one can call it that, the status quo is broken by a transfer student. Of course. That is the only reason you need for having high schools in modern anime. Instead of having to be creative, you just let the plot write itself, by following the exact same formula, every single time.

So, they gamble and the first game they play is a rehash from Kaiji. Only with no strategy since there is no way to know how many cards of each type there are. Which means it’s all random bullshit. They try to make it sound like there are tactics, but it comes down to dumb luck and how well someone is cheating at the games. Plus, the horny protagonist will always find a way to win, just because. As much as the theme tries to be an allegory for materialism, it fails to prove it by having it all coming down to a lucky draw. It’s not a smart show either.

Furthermore, for a gambling series, there is no actual tension, since the only thing that is at stake is money. Fortunes come and go in every episode, and although that seems to be ruining the lives of those who become broke, we never see the effects of it, besides becoming errand boys for horny bitches in a high school. Woah, what a dreadful life it is to not have money, yet still going to a prestige school and doing a few chores for horny bitches, who are most likely having sex with you for the heck of it.

If that wasn’t enough, the main girl in the show is so ridiculously rich to the point she doesn’t care how much money she wins or loses, therefore she is not really risking anything. Her objective has nothing to do with making money or making sure you are not going to lose them. The premise is betrayed almost immediately, since everybody gambles because they are addicted to gambling, and not because they risk everything for a better life, like in Kaiji.

Down to it, the series is fairly one-note. There is no variety in personalities, since everybody is the same closet psychopath. The games differ but play out in the exact same way and don’t connect with one another, thus there is not much of a plot. There is not even much of a worthwhile objective. Every character is self-destructive, and has no long-term plans other than cumming in his underwear while gambling. It gets tiresome and cringy very fast. Rewatch Kaiji and don’t even bother with this one.

I've watched a few episodes of this, and I have to say I'm not impressed in the least. This is one of the most boring anime series I've watched, with the cast being filled with boring cliches and each episode following an extremely predictable path. The art is otherwise good but the overdone facial expressions (that have appeared multiple times in every single episode so far, rather than being saved for special occasions) really makes it look quite ugly at times. As a big fan of thriller/"dangerous gambling" sorts of anime I feel very disappointed in Kakegurui, and sincerely wish that nobody wastes their time ... watching this.

I won't be comparing this anime to Kaiji, because that would be an insult to kaiji.

*spoilers*

The best way to summarise kakegurui's problems is this: it's trying too fucking hard

The premise is this: the very top of the wealthy and powerful instead of sending their kids to the best school money can buy, send them to a ghetto tier school where seemingly no lessons happen and everyone just sits around playing games, in fact I don't think I've even seen a teacher.

Lets ignore how pants-on-head retarded this concept is for a moment though at the risk of getting off track, our protagonist is a mary ... sue superhuman gambler female who frees our limp wristed neutered male protagonist from debt slavery, after which he follows her around like a lost puppy never saying or doing anything interesting up until the very last episode, I would call him a self insert but if you're pathetic enough to relate to this guy you're probably reading the manga instead of watching the anime.

Anyway they only go half way with the super human mary sue thing, and she does lose sometimes and goes into debt slavery but fortunately for her she is an over-endowed special needs child who can't seem to comprehend her situation in the slightest, also she's a mashochist so that helps.

The anime depicts her taking on the student council until eventually playing the president which ends literally as predictably as possible as soon as the premise of the game is revealed, but the main problem with this isn't the awful characters, the stupidity of the protagonist or even the idiotic premise.

No, it's the STUPID FUCKING FACES THEY MAKE.

I don't know if this was carried over from the style of the manga artist or something but they try so hard to make the women of this show look menacing by making them show all their teeth and suddenly become wrinkly 40 year olds whenever they get the upper hand, it doesn't work and honestly just breaks all the tension of every game.

Do not watch this, kakegurui needs to kakegrow the fuck up

Short explanation of the show it's an anime about a school that entirely revolved around gambling, this leads to adventures with the main characters (one being really bad at gambling and the other having god-like luck)going around the school gambling because the female enjoys the rush.

I didn't like it because that's it she's the main character so you know she wins and that's all she does and theirs no strategy to gambling games they choose so theirs no explanation as to her godlike luck its just HA I WON BECAUSE I'M LUCKY! SO overall theirs no real story aNd no real climax just more gambling ... going *gasp will she win?!?!* oh she did...again.

This anime got my attention for its animation and the gambling theme, and obviously all the hype that got when it was aired. I was hoping to see intellectual fights and feel the risk of the gamble itself. But my hopes died the more I watched Kakegurui. Actually, there wasn't any sensation of risk! Not because they weren't gambling, but because the main character didn't mind loosing money or any other consequences that may cause.

Story. There is this private school, where students gamble, and there are consequences if you lose and benefits if you win, simple. But everything moves in benefit of Yumeko, our main ... character. Following a Villain-of -the-week model, it's repetitive and predictable, and that makes this a boring story. 2/10.

Art. It's decent, as I say before, it's one of the main reasons why I watched this show, but it's really rude the way it uses exaggerations unnecessarily, making the characters look crazy and sadist just to "impact" us. Also, have a few proportions mistakes and the CGI looks kinda weird. 4/10.

Sound. The opening is good, the ending is decent. The OST in the show it's generic, simple. Fits the theme and the atmosphere but just that, doesn't stand out. 4/10.

Characters. Yumeko, the main character of this anime, it's just absurd. Doesn't have any motivation more than gamble for the emotion of the risk. Oversexualized, gets turn on when she's gambling. The side characters are more of the same, super hyped when gambling and have sadist, sexualized or violent behaviour. 1/10.

Enjoyment. After the first episode, I already knew what was gonna happen in the rest of the anime. The other games were not even interesting. It's really offensive that a show tried to capture my attention with only crazy characters overacting, and using the animation to make them look interesting and sadistic. 1/10.

Overall. Simple, boring, predictable. 2/10.

Short and to the point, for a show about gambling there is no payoff. At all.

The games are contrived and convoluted. With the large number of real world games to draw from why they felt the need to make up games is beyond me.

The story goes nowhere. At the end of the show little has changed in the world, contrary to the final monologue.

The characters don't progress and do not change.

Even the hinted at fan service has no payoff. The ending credits are the best you're going to get.

About the only good thing I can say is that the art is ... excellent and the music/sound is great. Too bad those talented artists were tapped to service such a drab and uninspired story.

FIRST REVIEW: Read at your own risk


Kakegurui, or Compulsive Gambler, is an anime about the effects of gambling. Adrenaline, excitement and many other feelings are what we should apparently feel while we play for money and for even more important things, according to this anime. However, this one absolutely fails to deliver these emotions to its viewers due to its numerous flaws and its terrible execution.

One of the main problems resides in the setting in which the story takes place. What do we really know about it? Students are gambling in a school to be ready to enter the real world, described as a terrible ... place made of money as well as ambitious, greedy and selfish people. Yeah, interesting, but how does it work? People will tell you: “Uh, they gamble a lot of money, and when they have no money left, they become “pets”, which means they have to do what other students tell them to do. Their future even gets planned by the council student when they are really dried up! Talking about it, the council student is reserved to the elite, its members are la crème de la crème of this school, that’s why they can decide on everything.” I don’t mind having a surrealistic setting, if it has a purpose and it is well established. Unfortunately, that’s not the case. Everything, I mean, EVERYTHING is exaggerated: the sum of money the students are able to gamble, their reactions, their faces, and so on. The only goal it has, and, honestly, it is a goal the anime isn’t even able to achieve due to an important issue I will mention in the next paragraph, is to “shock” the viewer, such as jump scares in horror movies. It tries to make him care for what’s happening on the screen, to enforce him to feel what the characters are supposedly feeling themselves.

It fails because the setting lacks of consistency. Indeed, watching Kakegurui is the same as watching only the action scenes from an action movie, what happens before and after the games is not exhibited. Then, how are we supposed to empathize with the characters if we don’t know what are the real consequences of their gambles? Here’s the main problem of the anime: there’s no information about the outside world, apart from the “pet” and “planned life” system. The show doesn’t answer an enormous quantity of questions, and there’s particularly one that would have been great to answer: What are the consequences? Apparently, you can lose tons of money and then win it back. It seems that, eventually, these gambles don’t really matter. This prevented me to get into the anime and to enjoy it, because I couldn’t feel what it wanted me to feel at first: the power of gambling. The only episodes I was partially able to enjoy were those in which the students wager something else (I won’t tell what it is to avoid spoilers), since the consequences of the “game” were straight. However, these episodes heavily rely on shock factor, and that’s why I won’t praise them as well.

Moreover, this lack of concern I had for the show is also a result of the terrible characters it offers. Even Kirito from Sword Art Online is less generic than the male MC, Suzui Ryouta, whose only purpose is to introduce our dear Jabami Yumeko, the female lead, (obviously one-sided, as expected) who is here to turn on the traditional otaku. Don’t expect any development, her only character trait (except she is smart) is that she gets excited (sexually) while gambling. What? They all are excited by gambling? NEXT! There’s another main female that no one cares about: Saotome Meari, who is nearly as useless as Suzui. She is “Jabami number two”, their only difference (except the hair color and breast size, lol) is that she is selfish and greedy, while Jabami is “exemplar”. Shade doesn’t belong to this world as well.

To be honest, some supporting characters get more development than the main ones. We learn a little bit about their past and their motivations, which makes the show a bit more enjoyable when Jabami encounters them. However, the supporting cast still is strongly unidimensional and is not particularly interesting. I won’t even tell you how omnipresent fanservice is and how much the characters serve it.

Let’s give credit where credit is due. The OP is catchy, the ED is… uh… cancel that, let’s assume it doesn’t exist, the music and the voice acting are somehow fine, as well as the art and animation, even if their purpose is to exaggerate everything. Some of the games are engaging, despite the lack of characterization and worldbuilding.

To make it short, Kakegurui is your typical bad seasonal anime. Overdose of fanservice, lack of characterization, terrible worldbuilding, but decent music and visuals. Although this show was the most popular of summer 2017, it won’t be remembered for a long time before disappearing in the pile of mediocrity which is delivered to the anime community each season. You should rather gamble in real life to feel adrenaline, it is certainly more entertaining and rewarding than watching this anime. By contrast, don’t expect too much of it, because there probably won’t be a hot girl touching herself in front of you in the real world.


- Be careful, gambling can lead to debt, dependence, and so on. :)

Slight Spoiler about Episode 11 and a "Major" Spoiler about Episode 7

Kakegurui is more of an experimental anime than a gambling one. How much plot armour can you use in a single story before the viewers started to get annoyed? Apparently, the answer is a lot. As you can see from the MAL score, people seem to love this anime. It's crazy characters and intense drama was able to create a fanbase that loved every single part of Kakegurui. However, with every show, especially the popular ones, comes a significant number of people that just weren't able to enjoy what this show had to offer, ... and I guess I fall into the latter of Kakegurui's watchers.

Looking at the cast of Kakegurui, most of the characters are pretty messed up in the head. We have one that collects human nails, another that loves playing Russian Roulette with herself and our main Yumeko Jabami, who literally gets off by taking risks in gambles. In fact, the only one without an eccentric personality is Ryouta Suzui, although he's only really there to occasionally comment on how the game's going and serves no other purpose but to worry over Yumeko as she throws herself into another gamble. Back to the nutcases, it's perfectly fine to have insane characters to spice up your cast, but when you have this many to this extent, you start to forget they're supposed to be actual people within their world. Their personalities are so exaggerated that it's hard to take any of them seriously, and when you factor in the anime's formula of moving from one big game to another, most of the characters just become another crazy face for Yumeko to defeat, only popping back up a few more times to remind us that they still exist within this school.

Now the other important side of Kakegurui is the drama. Each gamble usually has the same set of steps, Yumeko faces off against someone, the opponent makes it look like they have the upper hand with either a cheating method or their intellectual superiority, but Yumeko soon turns the tables on them and mind breaks them harder than a hentai heroine. Now for the first few games, it might have been entertaining to watch, but after a while, you start to get tired of seeing it happen over and over. A number of issues also pop up, further bringing down my enjoyment of the show.

First of all, plot armour and convenience. Yumeko will never lose an important match, the story won't allow her. With stakes like massive debt, slavery and sometimes even death, it would be problematic if Yumeko lost too many times as she would no longer be able to participate as our main character. So the obvious solution is to make her incredibly lucky. Sure you could try to make each game a battle of wits, allowing our MC to come up with ingenious strategies while crushing her opponent's plans in the process, but who wants to see something like that? Mind games are boring, I'd rather just watch Yumeko shine her shinigami eyes and win over and over. Games that hold no dramatical impact are much better than an intense showdown between two people, ain't that right everyone?

Secondly, shock factor. No, I'm not talking about the twisted and contorted faces each character makes, I'm fine how messed up each cast member looks during the show. I'm more focused on the actions that some of the characters make during an episode. For example, Yumeko asks Itsuki Sumeragi for a loan so that she could defeat Kaede Manyuda, but Manyuda taunts Sumeragi by saying she has no chance of reaching the top. In an act to show off how determined she is to become the best of the best, Sumeragi bites down on her nails and rips them out with her teeth. Now, why the fuck would you do that? Just give Yumeko the money and make a speech about how you do have the guts to take a risk, you didn't need to physically injure yourself. There is only one reason why you'd do this, and it's to create shock factor. The show wants to make you feel squeamish, so they pull off these ridiculous scenes to make you squeal while covering your eyes in fear. It doesn't work that way, guys. You need a reason behind gore and other messed up scenes, just mindlessly showing off stuff like this all the time causes it to feel forced and lessen the amount of impact the scene would have originally had.

Thirdly and finally, plot developments that make no sense. Now granted, this doesn't happen as often as the first two issues I mentioned, but it's something that needs to be addressed. In episode 7 where Yumeko is facing off against Midari Ikishima, playing a game called ESP Roulette. Someone in a separate room creates a pattern by placing a set of cards face down, each marked with different symbols, and a live feed is broadcasted to the room where the players are. The two opponents must then place their cards face down, each with the same set of symbols to try and guess the order. Of course, once all the cards are revealed, the person who guesses the most wins that round, and the chance to shoot their opponent with a revolver filled with a varied amount of bullets, hence the roulette part of ESP Roulette. (Again shock factor and plot armour wow so intense) Now, Yumeko figures out that Midari is cheating by occasionally inverting the video feed, changing the order shown on the screen. However, this provides neither an advantage or disadvantage for any of the players. Midari still has no idea what order the cards are set up until they're revealed, and her partners on the other side have no idea how well Midari guessed the cards, she's just changing the order up for no reason. It makes no sense to have her do this when it makes no difference to whether she has a better chance of winning or losing.

Kakegurui has nothing to offer to us but its characters and drama, but these two factors end up feeling more bland then exciting. There were still times where I thought the show did things well, as I consider the debt replacement game in episodes 4 and 5 to be the only good gamble in the anime, but overall I just feel like taking my chances with another gambling anime and see how much better that fairs. I hear Kaiji is really good, should probably watch that.

Thanks for Reading, Send Feeback if You Have Any!

Kakegurui tried very hard to be another Kaiji. But, it failed miserably, because it also tried to be another Shokugeki No Souma. And by trying to mix these two incompatible anime together, it failed to live up to either one of them, and became a disjointed and poorly executed letdown. One moment you're watching Jabami playing an insane version of Russian Roulette in a dingy basement with a complete psychopath, the next moment, she's singing pop songs on stage as an idol contestant. The anime completely lacked congruence and kept vacillating between mature and childish.

The biggest problem ... with the anime is that it wanted to be so much like Kaiji, but placed the story in a school, which is the worst possible setting. Kaiji is one of the all time great animes because Kaiji was dealing with the Mafia and real life or death stakes. Kakegurui couldn't realistically achieve those stakes in a school with a bunch of children. So, it had them gambling with ridiculous sums of money that parents would never even make available to their children no matter how rich they were. No parent is going to let their kid gamble with billions of yen. When they tried to up the ante to "Betting your life" it was the ridiculous notion that the Student Council could direct your entire life from start to finish at their whim. It was just silly. As silly as the idea that the financial and political leaders of Japan would let their children sit around school gambling all day with their money, and not ever actually attend a single class to learn anything.

The second major flaw with this anime was the characters. Jabami was the only likeable one. Every single character was completely warped and sociopathic (including Jabami) with the exception of Suzui, who was so weak as a character, you might as well classify him as Jabami's personal eunuch. It was very difficult to get behind the cast, because all of them were pretty much disreputable psychos, none of which were actually good gamblers. And even though Jubami was a likeable character and interesting, she had no depth to her. She was pretty much just a very perceptive girl with a crippling gambling addiction. They spent literally no more than 7-8 lines of dialog explaining anything about her past before arriving to the school. That's not an exaggeration.

And the worst part of it all, is that the ending was completely inconclusive, but I won't say more than that so as not to spoil it for those who decide to waste their time with this, anyway.

The only thing I can really walk away from saying positive about this anime is that the art and soundtrack was outstanding. The facial expressions on the characters were great, especially when they felt they had someone cornered. The intro and outro for the episodes were also fantastic. The soundtrack was very good. But, good animation and a soundtrack can't save a poorly constructed anime. At the end of the day this was nothing more than a B-rated "Shokugeki No Kaiji".

If you haven't seen Kaiji, I would highly recommend you skip this anime and go watch that instead. It is truly one of the best anime ever made, and this one is wholly forgettable. I will probably not even remember anything about it by this time next year.

Story: 3
Art: 10
Sound: 10
Character: 4
Enjoyment: 5
Overall: 4

In writing this review, it's all too easy to forget to write a proper review of this show, and instead just "Why Kaiji is better than Kakegurui", and there's nothing inherently wrong with that, people will always compare one show to other similar shows, if it were a mecha anime with existentialist themes, comparisons to Evangelion would be inescapable. But still, Kaiji is a good example of a well-made gambling anime, so while I'll try to avoid making comparisons too often (largely for the sake of those who haven't actually seen Kaiji), some will undoubtedly appear.

To start off, a basic overview of the plot: Kakegurui ... takes place in an elite school wherein people's ability to gamble properly is what gives them their status, from the student council at the top, and house pets at the bottom, with the story taking place upon the transfer of Yumeko Jabami, who is addicted to gambling, and cannot resist a good gamble.
Now, one thing I can commend the show for is it goes for a nice aesthetic. The lighting in particular helping to focus, and Yumeko's eyes going red, or characters being animated in grotesque amounts of detail when shocked/excited (the best parallel I can think of would be the "I need it!" scene from Spongebob). Additionally, the voice acting for the eyepatch girl with the gun was quite good as well, and this is where my praise for the show ends, with considerably more complaints to come.

The first gamble happens in the first episode, which is a rock-paper-scissors based card game (just like Kaiji), wherein Yumeko spots that her opponent is cheating, but still finds a way to circumvent it and win, through single-digit percentage levels of luck, which is hard to suspend your disbelief for when you know it's not actual luck, just plot convenience. For some brilliant gambler, a plan so reliant on luck certainly is questionable, but I'm partially convinced I put more thought into writing this review than the author did the manga. Additionally, she gives a little speech about how "In a capitalistic society, money and life are the same", which isn't too dissimilar to a speech made by Tonegawa in Kaiji, the only difference being that not only did Kaiji wait about 8 episodes before giving this speech, but in Kakegurui it just feels completely artificial, and I think this is embedded by the fact that in Kaiji, Tonegawa does make a good point. We do see Kaiji, and many other characters risk life and limb for the sake of money, meaning that his statement is quite impactful. Yumeko bets 10 million yen in the first 10 minutes like it's all Monopoly money, and at the end of the day, it is. It's also worth noting that as a very rich Yakuza boss, for Tonegawa to say it actually makes sense, but Yumeko's saying it in front of a woman she's just met, in a school she's only just been to for the first time, and doesn't even know how things properly work yet. She has such a high amount of money that no gambles are impactful, it's like playing a video game with cheat codes. If she wins, ok she had a fun time, but that money doesn't matter to her, nor the viewer. If she loses, it doesn't matter either, because she can not only pay that money off easily, but if she gets a "Life Plan", and is forced to marry some rich bloke, well that's in ten years, it doesn't impact the story right now. It's like the shonen cliche of using a special power that takes off a tiny amount of life, which the viewer never sees the impact of, so it might as well not even happen. It seems like something really basic, if you're making a gambling anime, make the gambles impactful to the viewer. Imagine if John Rambo was completely incapable of being killed. The action wouldn't be engaging at all, and it's the same here. In fact, given that she is the daughter of a CEO or politician or something else, maybe we could see her getting disowned, or at least ostracised for a huge failure as well as her addiction? Doesn't happen. There's little point it even being a school other than because girls with big asses in schoolgirl outfits is where the money is. Speaking of which, I really didn't appreciate the very heavy and blatant BDSM overtones in the show, and I liked Prison School, for crying out loud. It was just really poorly handled, and a bit of a disappointment all things considered. In fact, sexual imagery as a whole is poorly handled, I really don't know why Yumeko or any of the other girls were so sexually excited by gambling, sometimes even having to touch themselves, it's just absurd. It's not even trying to be funny, and I really don't think anyone could've appreciated it.
So I should probably also speak about the sound design. With the aforementioned eyepatch girl with the gun, who I will not give the respect to look up the actual name of, the voice acting was very poor. Yumeko's the main character, but she's disappointingly average with her voice acting. With the adrenaline rush from gambling that's meant to be tantamount to cocaine, when she's shouting in her opponent's face, she should at least speak at a bit louder in volume, and with a more enthusiastic tone of voice. Not to mention most the time she just sounds like, for a lack of a better term, a fake bitch. Perhaps I'm just too used to anime characters who make their emotions clear as day, but she just sounds so distant from everything, and just about every instance during the gambles in which she spoke, I could just tell that she was speaking in such a manner to aggravate their opponent. This isn't because I'm brilliant at detecting fake personas during gambling matches, nor because I'm an expert on emotions. Rather, it was just poorly done, and I'm half convinced this show was programmed by a computer. Schoolgirls, fanservice, and a poorly implemented gimmick, but no human actually checked to make sure everything works.

So to conclude, Kakegurui is exceptionally poor. On its own merits, it is an utter failure. The characters are uncompelling, the omnipresent fanservice does no favours in actually making the show any easier to stomach, the gambles are about as poorly written as I can imagine, just having the formula of Yumeko wins at first, then she starts to lose and says something along the lines "Oh, now things are getting interesting", then the villain taunts her and gets overconfident, then she makes a comeback and explains how it was all according to keikaku and exploited something that the viewer had no actual way of seeing or knowing, and then walks off triumphantly. Even as just a SOL, it's got nothing going for it, and as a gambling anime, and thereby contender to head honcho Kaiji, it is an embarrassing failure. The only reason I got as far as episode 4 was to see how the arc would end, but it got so unbearable I couldn't even manage that. That it was popular enough to receive a second season is a mystery I'm just waiting for Yumeko to laugh in my face and explain the reason behind, because it's well beyond me.
Genuinely and utterly contemptuous in all regards, and one last note, what the fuck are wrong with the school uniform trousers/skirts, most bizarre pattern I've ever seen.

Art had an interesting aesthetic, and while I appreciate doing something different, I didn't care for it personally, especially the hideous exaggerated facial expressions. The dub had some oddities, definite liberties taken but I didn't notice anything too extreme.

They try way to hard to make everyone, especially the girls, batshit insane. There's nothing wrong with insane characters, I like insane characters personally, but when everyone has the same brand of insanity it gets dull. There's also a lack of justification for the insanity. The crazy giddy angle was overdone and loses its edge as a result, like a pastry that's way too rich.

The setting isn't ... fleshed out, but neither are the characters or anything else for that matter. The consequences of losing lack weight as debts are ignored and numbers lose meaning as they get bigger. From the beginning it becomes clear that the moment the protagonist gets involved there will be no consequences, which kills the suspense and emotional investment in a show about gambling. In the end, the show falls short of its goals, it's not terrible, its just kind of bad.