Nanatsu no Taizai Review

Review:

Nanatsu no Taizai, honestly I think this is one of the great action shows of the past few seasons. This was a manga adaptation that had a goal in mind as to where it wanted to finish in the source material and it did everything it had to in order to get there. Normally this can lead to some questionable adaptations (like say Deadman Wonderland), but in this case it worked out fine. Any changes made compared to the source material in my view were minor while they still managed to hit the key points in spectacular fashion. In terms of adaptations I’d consider this a pretty strong one.

At its core Nanatsu no Taizai is an action show. But an interesting twist is that instead of the main cast starting out as wimps and having to spend a whole show training or something….the cast starts out pretty awesome. In some ways they gain strength, but in others they really don’t and it’s more dealing with the situations they are presented with. With this show it’s not as simple as saying one side is stronger because they have more energy or something. There is a mix of physical strength, special abilities and magics that really decide who might come out on top in a confrontation. The first episodes start off showing how damn strong the main cast are and giving some context for when the stronger characters for their opposition start to crop up. I just found it rather refreshing that we didn’t have to wait 20 episodes to start seeing characters do something impressive.

Action wise I’d say Nanatsu was quite good. It manages to get a bit bloody which sometimes can be rare in action shows these days. Shows being a bit hesitant and just having minor scratches if anything on characters. That somewhat comes into play because of the special property of one of the main cast in which they can show a lot of extreme damage without it actually killing the person. The fights can actually feel pretty impactful with some weight behind the strikes. A fair amount of movement and dodging. You could feel that these characters are actually pretty powerful and are able to do serious harm.

The show has a lot of interesting visual abilities. Because the cast members are all pretty powerful they can do some impressive things and make the action scenes rather intense. All the main characters have different kinds of abilities and some fairly creative. Seeing how those abilities clash with the special properties of their foes makes for some interesting encounters and even at times when the main cast has their own internal conflicts. As the show went on the battles got more hectic and some rather brutal situations started to come up. The last few episodes started creating threats that even a cast as tough as this one ran into trouble against.

The cast itself was a pretty good strength in my mind. Meliodas isn’t my favorite character, but he’s a good lead. He mixes things up between being a rather perverted character and a serious one. A guy that certainly doesn’t mind having fun with the lead female character, but also carries his own burden. Underneath the silliness he does have a lot weighing down on him and that slowly gets revealed as the show goes along. All the main characters (the Sins) have their own burdens and difficult pasts. That’s part of why they ended up in a group called the Seven Deadly Sins in the first place. Meliodas carries a darker and more mysterious side to himself than most and is a major part of the group’s fighting force, he’s a guy all those powerful people acknowledge as their Captain.

Elizabeth….is a nice girl. Honestly she’s not the strongest of characters, but she’s not annoying either. She’s a fairly normal person with her own mystery, but someone who’s going from princess to dealing with super powered people. In a normal situation she’d be the weak link, but in this situation she’s surrounded by very capable people. It’s hard not to stand out for not having great combat abilities. But in the end she’s the catalyst for the show, nothing starts if she doesn’t begin the effort to assemble the Sins. And really she does tough out some situations where her life was on the line and I can respect her for that.

Ban is easily my favorite member of the Sins. Normally I probably wouldn’t be so hyped about that kind of character. He gets into a great deal of trouble has a thieving element to him and frankly is not the most polite XD. But he’s also got one of the more compelling backstories that gets revealed in the show. A guy living a tough life with a Sin he’ll never be able to let go of. His behavior actually makes sense by the end, why he has that kind of personality and takes those kinds of actions. He’s also got some of the more interesting combination of abilities and powers which makes him interesting to follow in a fight. While Ban may do stupid things, he’ll come through when needed. He’s also got some of the best emotional and dramatic scenes in the show at least in my view. One of the Sins you’ll get a good understanding of.

In a sense King and Diane are pretty well linked with King having a hard to hide romantic interest in the girl. A strange combo to say the least with the giant (literally) girl and the fairy. Both are very powerful members of the Sins with their abilities. King has a ton of weight on his shoulders with what has happened in his past. It makes him really sympathetic since he’s gone through a lot and had to give up a lot along the way. An extremely kind person, but also one that really will blame himself heavily for things. Plus combat wise he’s not a brawler, but his abilities are devastating and make him one of the most dangerous when upset. Diane’s Sin isn’t really all that strong, but she fits in with this group of misfits being a Giant and having her own reasons to fight. Someone very dedicated to the people she cares about and will throw herself into dangerous situations and take the harm that comes from that. She really grew on me as the series continued and had good scenes throughout the show. She’s a very passionate person. Once she’s your friend she’ll be on your side no matter what. Her power is actually pretty amazing to see in action. All the Sins are pretty spectacular in their own right, but Diane still is up there in having one strong magical ability.

There are a ton of good characters in the show. The non-Sin characters are pretty interesting to some degree. It’s not just the Sins who are powerful which makes the conflicts spectacular. The villains are good threats as well and by the end you will be enjoying seeing all the forces just clash in a big way.

The story itself is pretty straight forward in a sense. It’s one of those big journey kind of situations. The Sins have got to reassemble to take on a threat and that takes time. With a group as odd as this the tricky thing is just tracking them down. But the more Sins they get the more entertaining it gets just because they are all really weird. This is a group fairly low on normal humans, but that just adds to the fun. There are a few surprises in terms of what is really going on, but at the core of it this is an adventure. And for me that’s not a negative and rather a fun aspect. Watching this weird group of people travel, run into trouble and assemble their group once again. There isn’t a lot to say on the story other than that. The ending arc is really quite fun and full of action. They manage to make the struggle one the Sins are very emotionally invested in.

The biggest deviation in the show is just in the last episode. They didn’t make huge changes, more like just accelerating the events so the episode would end on a good note. Unfortunately they are only 20 chapters or so behind the source material so it’s unlikely we see a second season for a good while. The end itself was still really good though, an excellent last battle as you’d expect from a show like this. Honestly, in terms of a last battle for this anime it was pretty darn fun to watch all the craziness going on.

In terms of the audio side of things the show held up pretty well. I was hesitant on Diane’s voice casting initially, but the choice turned out pretty well. The rest of the cast seemed spot on casting wise which made for a good listening experience. The soundtrack was good with the music fitting for the scenes they were placed in. I did like the tracks they used for the action scenes which I’m glad to say since those are some of the most important for a show like this with quite a few fights. They didn’t just have one song for a fight, but a fair amount of options. I really enjoyed the soundtrack and thought they added to the scenes nicely. You knew whether this was going to be an awesome scene or a tense one from how things were sounding. The two openings and endings fit pretty well and were good ways to start and end the episodes. I wouldn’t say they’d be my favorites for the whole year on those fronts, but they were good.

Really the show didn’t seem to slack off in terms of visuals. They made sure that when someone got killed or really injured that it left some kind of impact. Though I will say there wasn’t an obscene amount of death. The abilities actually looked pretty good from explosions, to electricity, to abilities that would be spoilers to talk about XD. The cast all looked good from the small King to the giant Diane. It’s a group that definitely stood out in terms of their appearance. There wasn’t that much CG in there, but what was done fit well for the specific situations. As a whole I would say it was a solid looking show. They made sure the action looked good and there wasn’t any major incidents of butchering the quality. That’s a pretty solid result for me.

In the end Nanatsu no Taizai was quite the good adaptation. Sadly the manga really isn’t that far ahead of where it ends so there’s little chance we’ll see a second season in the immediate future. But at least we got to enjoy a good show in the present. The cast was a fun one to watch, the action was good, and it was just an enjoyable ride. The only downside to the show was that it got so little attention. It struggled at times to get quick and reliable subbing which might have dropped it off people’s radars in a time when most of the new shows end up on Crunchyroll or somewhere else. But I will say this is a show worth watching. If the idea of a good fantasy adventure sounds like a fun one, then I’d give the show a few episodes to see how it looks. It’s a really good show and one of the more enjoyable fantasy action shows we’ve gotten in a while. A great cast, some fun battles, and just worth checking out if you enjoy those types of shows.