Shokugeki no Souma: Gou no Sara

So 13 weeks in and now at the end of Gou no Sara, I never got to a point where I felt this season was as bad as people had hyped it up to be. I waited week after week for it to get awful and it just never came for me. I thoroughly enjoyed every single moment of this final season and saw it as a victory lap of sorts for the series. We saw everyone come full circle this season and show off their development. Of particular importance for me was the growth that Megumi, Erina and Aldini have had. For me, that was enough to really enjoy the final season. I understand that this is an unpopular opinion and that's fine, you can judge for yourself, but if you're a fan of SnS, you should definitely give this last season a try. Production wise, you can definitely tell JC staff started to rely on the established name of SnS instead of actually putting a lot of effort into the show. The panning camera shots, off model characters and other quality control issues are not a huge deal to me, because I personally watch things for the story and how they make me feel rather than as an art critic, but they do exist and are noticeable. I also could feel that pacing was very rushed especially in the final half of the season. It felt like the Shokgeki's were on 2.5x speed and the detail and educational bits that we're accustomed to seeing were just not there anymore. It felt like they instead transitioned to relying on the girls getting naked as our sole source of entertainment during shokugeki's. I was able to overlook this because I'm easy to please, you may not be. Overall, you can definitely see a dip in quality from SnS season 1 to season 5. It's gradual, it's painful and it's pretty sad because of how well done season 1-3 were. But, it is it the sad reality of ongoing shows. You either die the hero or live long enough to see yourself become Food Wars Season 5. The anime original ending wasn't bad to me, but it wasn't great like how I felt at the end of Totsuki Train either. I was still left wanting more. Despite all the flaws, I still love the series and enjoyed this a lot even with its issues. Shokugeki no Soma Gou no Sara gets 7 foodgasms out of 10 from me.

After watching it until last episode, I know how disappointing this is, really. The story begins with the introduction of the arrival of summer, the students of Totsuki Academy must fight the first stage of the exam. After that, some teacher comes to Totsuki Academy, his name is Asahi. He's a ugly bastard who are interested with Nakiri's oppai.... And then the last tournament "BLUE" begins. The story of Souma's mom Now, what really caught the attention of the personal writer was the telling of the figure of Souma's mom. This is very interesting because in the previous seasons, the figure of Souma's mom has never even been shown or even told, her figure seemed to have never even been thought of. So Souma's mom appearance in season 5 is very, very surprising. There are times when we feel hurt. There are times when we want to run from reality. There are times when we don't want to do anything. We can rest, we can stop but we cannot give up. If you can't get up, ask someone else for help. If we are already destroyed by our own mistakes, then wait for the right time to get back up. If you can't invite other people, walk side by side with them. This is the last season, I hope you can watch this final series and don't stop at the middle of the season. I know it is torturing you but an ending is not always tragic. If you already read manga, I beg you to don't miss this one, I know you are bored but to judge an anime before you watch it, isn't that weird?

Top 5 Fastest Runners: #5 — Asafa Powell #4 — Yohan Blake #3 — Tyson Gay #2 — Usain Bolt #1 — Shokugeki no Souma: Gou no Sara It is it, congratulations. The fifth season is very, VERY rushed, differently from the others season, on this one you don't even see they making foods, it looks like as the food magically appears on the table, understanding what and why they are doing is the essential part of a food anime, imagine MasterChef without the making of, just the results, it is a bad idea, isn't it? But it is basically what is happening here. Another very bad stuff that happened here was "superpower", or something like this, I don't even know what it is, it's like "The hidden power from the clan X, it has been passed down this clan for generations, using an axe instead of a knife", if the anime had introduced it since the beginning, there would be no problem, but the anime isn't about it, the author just created a new ability with no context. Imagine an anime like Monogatari, that at some point Araragi can now make Jutsu, it is bizarre, isn't it? Now many of yours could disagree with me, but there's something very annoying in my opinion, Foodgasm, and on this season it got worse, what is the point of this? In the beginning, it was okay, the people liked the food so much, that it was like an orgasm, but at this season, everyone around getting semi-naked... It looks like that the manga was getting less popular, so he put more fanservice, to make the buyers don't leave the manga. Now about the ending of the anime, if you don't want to get spoilers, skip this part [SPOILER] Comparing the final of the anime with the manga one, this one is a little bit better, just a tiny. Yukihira, after travelling around the world returned to Japan, meets Erina, and he makes a disgusting food to her, as always, after this disgusting food he says he'll make the best food in the entire world to her, and... it ends. It was good, bad? No one knows because it ended at this point. No romance, Erina never said she like his food, nothing happened! I'm not Open-End Hater, but this ending was awful. [END OF SPOILERS] This arc is horrible, the previous arc was really good, and the author just ruined it, very rushed, nonsense superpower, exaggerated fanservice and a terrible ending. But there's still something good about this anime, the characters are still wonderful, I like this art, but it is probably the unique good part of this anime.

I've never felt such a strong sadness after finishing a series. I've been sad at ending like Gurren Lagann and Banana Fish but this hits different. I feel dismayed. After 5 seasons of food battles, foodgasms, and ridiculous characters, Food Wars felt empty at the end for multiple reasons. This season felt like it got rid of any goodwill the show had left for me after season 4 and it tried its hardest. Let's start with Asahi because holy shit, this dude was an awful villian. Say what you will about Azami but he at least looked villainous and had the backstory of a villain but Asahi? Fuck this dude. His whole power is insane and one of the dumbest things I've seen in an anime and his overall reasoning of wanting to marry Erina is at first, just corny and then they just throw another twist at the end that just makes his plot seem disgusting in hindsight. He was a bad villian, his reason for being a villian is dumb and he was just the worst. Then we have the worst sin for me and that's the usage of side characters. Listen, I like Soma, Erina, Megumi, and Aldini but that's not the whole fucking cast guys. Seriously, most of the other characters in this show barely showed up at all. It's so frustrating to watch the same characters (no matter how likable they are) when you know that there's more fun characters being wasted, Seriously, aren't Ryo and Akira supposed to be rivals to Souma and they didn't do shit for most of the season. Fuck, I forgot they existed. It's ridiculous and their replacements are garbage. The underworld chef idea was pretty weird to have in a show about teenage cooks trying to be the best chefs ever but it doesn't help when the show decided to add fucking supervillains like a Sargent who uses explosives to heat their food up, a clown that uses fucking juggling to cook and that's not to say their designs are stupid because they are. Finally, there's the animation. By this point, I'm beating a very dead horse but it still stands to reason that the animation in this was sub-par at best. They fucking reused multiple moments from other seasons in the episode so blatantly it was. amazingly shitty. I also realized just how little JC Staff really gave a shit about this season in the final episode when there was no big animation moment that supposed to look and it was just the same sub-par shitty quality. Nice JC. In the end, I'm not angry, I'm just disappointed. After how fantastic the first two seasons were, I was still excited for what the show had going for it. Then the third season happened and while it wasn't great, I still had hope. Even after Season 4, I was hoping that at the very least, it would go out on a high note. Nope. Not even that. It's frustrating, disappointed and just makes me sad. At the very least, I will hold those last two seasons in high regard. Thank you for that at least, JC Staff. Fuck this season though.

NO SPOILER REVIEW Wow. This has to be one of the biggest betrayals. Shokugeki was doing so well until this season through the whole story into the sewer and then pooped on it more. The pacing in this season is horrendous, everything is rushed and you barely see any of the meals being cooked. All you get are rushed reactions, rushed plots, and every previously made notion of characters destroyed. Animation, horrible. Merely a bunch of flashbacks or panning shots. Soundtrack, not bad, it's sad that the OP was wasted on this trash season Characters, the season throws away all but 4 main characters, taking away any development that had previously existed. DO NOT WATCH if you haven't yet. It is a complete waste of time, COMPLETE WASTE OF TIME, and you're better ending the show with the end of Season 4.

In my opinion, this is almost as bad as a concluding anime season can be. It was honestly bad enough for me to look back at all the previous season and wonder if they were actually as good as I remembered them to be. This is because this anime performs all of Shokugeki’s conventions so poorly that it almost comes across as a critique of the series. Let me break down how this season manages to critique by nothing other than poor execution. Let’s start with what Shokugeki is known for first, pornography. Whoops, sorry, I mean “Ecchi”. To be more specific, Shokugeki is most known for its fanserivice during food reactions. I actually believe that this series (up to this season) is the best use of fanservice because it is used as a creative way to express how good the food is. I say “up to this season” because the fanservice in this season is lazy and visually unappealing. The ecchi reactions are typically a single pose of creatively uninteresting artwork. This applies to the entire season, as the animation relies heavily on still frames and the art is undetailed and uninspired. But the fanservice is even worse than that. Towards the end, it achieves something that I’ve never seen before and becomes “Fanservice Fanservice”. “Fanservice Fanservice” is when a show that typically uses fanservice for a creative narrative effect shows fanservice just because the audience expects fanservice. This occurs toward the end when literally every somewhat relevant character in the series shows up to a competition just for the purpose of fanservice. At that point, it quite literally BECOMES a parody of itself. Next, I will discuss he second thing Shokugeki is known for, the actual cooking. As I stated previously, the animation and art are both very lazy and uninspired. The cooking scenes are usually just a static pose of a character with some camera movement and a blurry background. They hardly show the actual cooking too. The cooking is over in about 10 seconds and they just describe how they cooked the dish while the judges eat it. It’s so lazy that I feel loke nobody who worked on this anime actually cared. But similar to the ecchi, these cooking scenes also manage to critique the series in general by making it abundantly clear how the cooking battles work. One chef finishes with a good dish. The second chef finishes with a good dish and makes one for the first chef. The first chef is blown away and the second chef wins. I think this was how every single battle went in this season and it ruins my perception on previous seasons as well. Honestly, I could go on and on about things I disliked about this season. I could write a whole 8 paragraphs about how awful the villain group “Noir” is and how they are a bunch of clowns larping as ninjas. I could write a whole essay about how the characters are so poorly written and how heir actions make no sense. I could dedicate my entire anime watching career analyzing how this season was unnecessary and actually left side characters at worse places than in the previous season. But I don’t have the willpower to do any of these things. I’m not strong enough. This anime has drained me. I suppose I should explain why I rated this anime a 2 instead of a 1. The reason for that is soley because the last three episodes were somewhat competent. The art and animation in episodes 11 and 12 were somewhat decent and had some nice tie-ins to Souma’s past. The final episode had decent breakthrough with Souma and Erina (although I still felt their love was too forced at the end). I also liked the Souma and Takami team up and that Souma’s dad kept a stubble beard after Souma saved him from his bearded depression when his wife died. That is literally all that I liked about this season, but it was just enough to push it to a 2. Yes, I really believe it is this bad. I know the source material was bad, but that does not excuse the lack of effort put in place by the studio. I’m just sad that a well-known and somehwhat respected anime like this was given such a bad ending. It is closer to a 1 than a 3.

i'll write this as a review for the whole anime, not just this season because my overall experiences and feelings are about the same. considering how mediocre the manga was, i wasn't expecting the anime to be any better, if anything my expectations were even lower than what i got so in general, considering how novel the concept is and how boring it sounds, the overall experience of shokugeki no sōma is decent. i was hoping they'd do justice to tadokoro in the anime and give her a bit more focus and make her less subservient and homely but nah, just as annoying and downplayed as she is in the manga. basically the side characters are all an amalgamation of ideas that could be used for the cooking prop, they are hardly seen as humans or anything beyond their cooking skills. the only true characters are sōma and erina, and their relationship gets old real fast. overall the anime lacks impact, doesn't try to fix anything from the manga and follows it to a 't' which is not all that bad if you're into some fun cooking trivia, which was the point of this anime for me.

Itadakimas!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!The 5th Plate has ended and so as the series itself , so Bon appétit as I make my review of this last sequel of Shokugeki no Souma.....: Story: Pros: Given that this has reached it's climax. Despite of the rushed plot, it was still good, given that it finally reached its end and the story itself present a goodbye when thing ends in a very good note, in which I wish not to spoil , so just watch and enjoy the foodgasam that is the very quintessential part of this series' plot. Cons: The problem was that this final sequel has to rely a lot on the quintessential disrobing part of the foodgasam, where we audience are subject to it as its teaser to dampen its story's mediocre plot..... Verdict (6 over 10) Art: Pros: Much more darling than the 1st 3 sequel , cu'z here everyone gets naked one way or the other as the foodgasam gets intense. Cons: They still don't do, up skirting or panchira scene to them girls, oh, and no nipples service around. Verdict (7 over 10) Sound: Pros: ___________________________________ Cons:___________________________________ Verdict (5 over 10) Character: Pros: The introduction of the ff: Saiba Asahi and his Nior lackeys' and Erina's mom cu'z they present as new challenges for the main character Yukihira Souma and Erina Nakiri...... Cons: The misused of the other support characters from Totsuki Academy like Kurokiba, Ryou, Hayama, Akira, Kabutoyama, Tetsuji and other past antagonists from previous sequels , in which IMAO was an injustice. Verdict (7 over 10) Enjoyment: Pros: Those dishes still get to me and so as the more intense ecchi thing. Cons: I'm gonna miss this. Verdict ( 7 over 10) Overall: Verdict (9 over 10) It may be rushed, but when it has an ending this clean, who cares? So Bon Appétit..........................

The fifth and final season of Shokugeki no Souma is arguably the worst season. Even though it has some positives, it has plenty more negatives. The main thing this season has going for it is that it's the final one and that is has a good ending. The story is one where the cast is now in their second year. It starts off with some standard cooking battles/contests that are reasonably enjoyable. However the anime introduces a new antagonist who wants to marry Erina for no discernible reason. I want to stress this point, no reason is given for his obsession with Erina. However from this point on the entire anime revolves around this guy wanting to marry erina. The other characters accept stupid shokugekis that create problems for themselves they could have avoided by simply y'know not accepting them. This creates a false tension created by stupid decisions which is annoying. Most of the anime revolves around the cooking contest BLUE and the underground cooking organisation Noir. The problem is that the cooking battles are very rushed making it feel like the staff just wanted to cram the final season into as few episodes as possible. After BLUE has finished, there is a nice ending that gives some extra information on the characters and why they acted the way they did in previous seasons which does make it nice to watch. The characters are somewhat similar as the previous season with the addition of the new antagonist, members of Noir and a new judge. The cooking styles of Noir seem over the top as in seasoning meat with a chainsaw over the top. It all pales in comparison to the new antagonist though who has Subaru's mimicking power without the effort which feels very scuffed. The animation, voice acting and music are all similar or the same as the previous season. Overall this isn't a great season. The new characters aren't good, the urgency is fake and created by stupid decisions made by the characters themselves, the cooking battles are too rushed and the cooking methods of the new characters are ridiculous even by this series' standards. On the positive side there is some character development/context and the ending is definitely good.

As a chef and anime watcher I am very dissapointed in this last season I'm not gonna talk about what points exactly made this bad for anyone who wants a quick skim through. It could have been so good but they rushed the absolute heck out of it,the power scaling was all out of wack confusing me highly ,they neglected to explain the technicality and methods of the dishes,the noir plot point was kinda just wierd and felt like it didn't fit in too much,A LOT was skipped over and the ending felt like it ended 5 mins too early like C'mon bro at least give us a "Even though ny taste buds hated it,my heart longed for more" or sm.This was the first review I ever wrote but I really felt it necessary to do this to cope with all the lost potential

“I just want to eat food created by all sorts of chefs.. and compete with them. The more people there are who make things completely different from my dish, the more fun it gets. I want to protect that kind of environment.” – Soma Yukihira ► 𝘚𝘵𝘰𝘳𝘺: 5/10 I must say that the BLUE arc is my least favorite season. JC Staff rushed all of the food wars, especially Souma vs Erina's final. It felt like the author converted three seasons into one show. If only they extend it into 24 episodes, the show will be a lot better. ► 𝘊𝘩𝘢𝘳𝘢𝘤𝘵𝘦𝘳: 5/10 I actually had no doubt about the Shokugeki's characters, except Noir. Noir consists of some useless characters that came out suddenly without any background story. My point is they should have explored more about their enemies. Remember Noir's circus characters, they're just like a showoff and knocked out by Saiba. Then, he introduced some loser players to beat the Shokugeki. The funny thing was only about Saiba Aishi. He literally just steal everyone's weapon and combine it with his own power, Cross Blade. I couldn't accept the fact that he beat Tsukasa, the number one chef, so easily but not Souma. It didn't make any sense at all, right? ► 𝘈𝘯𝘪𝘮𝘢𝘵𝘪𝘰𝘯: 8/10 There's nothing new in their animation. It's good and enjoyable. That's it. ► 𝘖𝘷𝘦𝘳𝘢𝘭𝘭 𝘱𝘦𝘳𝘴𝘰𝘯𝘢𝘭 𝘦𝘯𝘫𝘰𝘺𝘮𝘦𝘯𝘵: 7/10 It was quite disappointing when I realized it was their final season at the last episode. I'm glad they close their show with a happy ending. Thank you Souma and friends for your wonderful cooking!

Shokugeki no Souma: Gou no Sara is the fifth and final season of Shokugeki no souma, a quite well-known show among the anime community. As you can see already it has its fifth season whereas many shows can't even get their second, this makes it clear that Shokugeki no souma is one of the popular shows which has seen great success with its previous seasons. Then what about its fifth plate? Being a fan of the show myself I expected the show to end on a good note but this season was a bit disappointing. The first problem was with the pacing. It was rushed as much as possible to adapt the remaining chapters and this made the experience half-assed and incomplete. Comparing to its previous seasons this season's story itself was a problem. The story was not as engaging as it's supposed to be and had a lot of unnecessary additions which made the show go into a different path from being a cooking show. Its previous seasons relied on the characters, their cooking skills, information, and knowledge about ingredients, dishes, and cooking techniques rather than introducing unrealistic and superficial types of cooking techniques that pulled the show into a never-ending abyss. This show completely changed its course from being a cooking that had competitions and a sense of rivalry that made the show interesting. The characters got lost and had no roles to perform and obviously the term called "character development" does not exist here. The Shokugeki no souma I liked dealt with stakes very well and gave a sense of tension whereas this season's stakes are very silly tbh. The animation and art style was average at best and never showed us the best side of cooking that I wanted to see. The soundtracks were not used to its full potential. This season did not feel like the Shogeki no souma that I liked. Even with all these flaws, I cannot forget the previous seasons that brought me to this final last season of Shogeki no souma. I enjoyed the journey and it was such a good ride anyway. Like everything that starts always ends, this show ends with an average season and yet makes me feel nostalgic about the time I started watching it, and that brings a great feel of closure(for me at least). Thank you for reading. Glad You Liked it! - souma

Ok so this season is bad, like real bad ; reasons : - they threw away all the side/mainish characters away, noone really mattered besides Soma and Erina - the pacing is way too fast, almost like recap episode SPOILER!!!!!!!!!!!!! - 2 important mothers, a past cooking son / half brother suddenly pops out in this season, without any mention in the previous seasons - Asashi's superpower, I dont really need to explain why this is bad - Asashi as a villain, his whole evil backstory is like a fanfiction i swear - The fact they revealed Asashi was Nazami's son in 1-2 min, and jumoed to the next topic - Noir, this is was the frst thing that seperates the most from the previous seasons, Chainsaw cooking??? Blood injections???? Claws??? What in the world man...... They needed to one up themselves from the previous seasons, but ended up forcing the sh*t out f it - God togue can taste passion....... yeah sure - Erina and Soma didn't end up together, this is more personal bc ive been waiting from s1, but nothing happened, im not even sure Soma like erina romanticly at all. - The "power scaling", this has been a problem from almost the begining. You couldn't tell who was actually stronger, as was seen even Yukihira and Aldini had continues shokugeki with no consistent winner. Bc most viewers arent actual chefs, we dont know how to cmpare the food, i mean whose to say that the final food at the team shokugeki was beter than Tsukasa's and Rndo"s. All the anime can do to expess which is more delicious is by making making the judges react crazier and from the finale of s4 how many people got naked. It's just hard to do. here are my complaints for the ending : - Soma looked like he didn't like Erina romanticly at all, thats literaly what i was hoping to see from season 1, them finally getting together....... but Soma is like Goku, he doens't really care about love only getting stronger. i cant express how pissed of i am, after everything they've been through??? Soma doesn't care at all - i dont understand what was the timeskip is for, Soma didnt change at all, wel noone did, everything was the same as it was, wish they had a longer timeskip to see an actual change OK so pls dont watch this season i you loved the show, end it with season 4 :)

I honestly believe that this season should not have even been released. I am someone that firmly believes extra seasons or sequels are not always necessary. Often times , it ruins and/or dilutes the originals. This season just felt so watered down and repetitive. Every episode , had no excitement or meaning to me, you almost know what is going to happen so much so that I saw this season on (2x speed), something I often do to anime series that are boring to me. Every episode , you got Souma being cheeky all smiling , all the people/judges' clothes getting ripped off , moaning, non stop every episode. If that happens every now and then , it is funny or so but if it happens almost every 5 minutes in every episode, then it just becomes super annoying. The new addition of the antagonists , really didn't spark excitement either, seemed generic to me. The artwork is stellar as usual , but again , I do not believe this season needed to be released, but I watched it any way because I have watched all the previous seasons. Nothing to rave about here.

I feel like the ending of the last episode was rushed, but it was a great anime for me. The journey was long but still overall I give the anime a 9/10, the story was somewhat lacking especially during the 13th episode, like what happened to soma's friend when he left to go overseas? Does Nakiri Erina finally say that Soma's dish was delicious? What dish did Soma made to serve Erina during the ending? Did Soma finally beat his Father Joichiro in a cooking contest? That all kinds of question popping in my head. I know that some of my questions are found in the Le Dessert Manga, but still its not a bad idea to make an OVA incorporating the Le Dessert Manga. I just feel like there is more to the story that was not included in the anime, it was a fun journey with this anime, it was the start of my otaku life when I first watched this anime. I just wish there was more, cause I feel like it was lacking something. Thank You for the long and fun journey, I will miss watching this anime. This anime is one of my All Time Favorite Anime on my List. Again Thank You, I had fun watching this anime.

Food wars is a great series. It's hilarious, compelling, and has you wondering what Yukihira is planning to do next. Great rivals and a solid cast to support the main characters. However, season 4 started to show the downhill spiral food wars would go on with several inconsistencies and flawed characters. Season 4 was a great way to end off the show. Yukihira finally gets the first seat, the gang is all in the elite 10, and most characters have been well developed and have shown no signs of any other issues. Season 5 does the most unnecessary shit in where they made up some random bullshit in which the "plan" to save Erina from the despair of God's tongue was to gather a bunch of kids with potential to join the school. As if they're not supposed to do that every year. You know when Yukihira makes a dish with the weird-ass combinations, and the whole crowd goes "HUHHHHH???". That's how I felt the entire season. I legit almost cried at the end because of how disappointed I was. First of all, seeing Megumi win the qualifiers shows how inconsistent the show is. Yukihira is the first seat but lost half of his Shokugekis to Takumi, and they both lost this competition to a literal fucking meatball with soup inside it. While that happened, Asahi beat Yukihiras dad, a genius chef, and Yukihira would, later on, win against Asahi. Does this mean Yukihira is one of the greatest chefs in the world? Does that also signify Takumi is on par with Yukihira too? Would that also make Megumi is one of the elites in the world? Erina's mom had elite chefs from all over the world try making food for her, but no one could come close except for Asahi and Yukihira. There is no way in hell they're that good. I just had to get off my chest how illogical the level of cooking the characters are at in this show. The BLUE competition brought up the most pathetic fucking excuse for new characters I've ever seen. The main characters are still good, but these Noir guys piss me off. Asahi's goons are uninteresting and veer from realism into this weird kind of fantasy shit with their knives, from the chainsaw to those claws. Asahi is awful too. His motives were because he was pissed that Joichiro left him to take care of his son because his wife fucking died. Yeah, maybe he was young, but there is no way you're that big of a scumbag to be upset about that. He also wanted to marry Erina because he's the only one who can satisfy her tastebuds. My man, first of all, you're related by blood. Second of all, you don't have to marry her to cook for her. Third of all, she's a teenager while you're over 18. If I were to describe Asahi, it would be an eccentric pedophile with the consistency of Megumi as a character. I hate him. This season acts as if though nothing happened in the last few seasons. Tsukasa and Erina's dad took over the school. At the end of season 4 when Central and the elites lost, they suddenly had a change of heart. I don't understand why. "Oh, we lost? Well, I guess I'll suddenly changed all my views and just carry on with life and completely interact normally with the people who shared different viewpoints from basically everybody". Maybe I just forgot, but I don't remember the characters making up. Like central did some fucked up shit, but all the characters were back to normal with them as if nothing happened. It's also so uninteresting and forgettable. As of right now, I'm struggling to remember what happened. I binged the first four seasons of the series in four days or so. I took three days to watch these 13 episodes because of how uninterested I was. I was also disappointed that there was no romance in this show. If there had been, it would've taken the next step. I was fine with there being nothing in the last four seasons, but they should've done something this season. The ending was not satisfying at all either. It's why I feel it needed romance. The characters had such a strong bond that we want to see them in a relationship, as it only feels right as viewers. Then the boring-ass ending where Yukihira comes back suddenly after a 6-month absence to see the characters say hi. Like give them a better relationship, and don't do this boring-ass bullshit. I want something I can be happy about after watching 73 episodes of this. The animation is a huge step down from the other seasons. Especially in the last few, the CGI looks so shit. But I'll give the animators the benefit of the doubt because I believe it was during the Covid outbreak. The music is nothing special. I don't remember it being good, but it wasn't bad either, so I'm neutral about it. This season was just atrocious. Coming in, I knew it wouldn't be good. The only positive of this show was that Yukiriha was still entertaining and remains one of my favorites MCs. Besides that, it's an absolute shitshow. I Wouldn't recommend starting this season, rather only watch the first 4.

I'm just going to review Shokugeki no Soma as a whole, not just this season. Honestly, I'm a huge fan of Yakitate Japan, so when there's a show that's similar to it in many ways, of course I'm going to like it. A lot of Shokugeki no Soma's charm is how we see Soma and his peers/friends progress through their culinary journey towards the top. There's a large cast of characters, meaning that there's a lot of variety of the types of dishes and specialties that people produce. Despite this large pool of characters, I think the show does a great job at developing and giving personality to these characters for the limited amount of screen time that they usually get. This is in large parts the fact that the unique dishes they make are made with their unique flair and personality, so even just a single cooking match will convey their feelings to a viewer/reader. I think that the cooking matches that the characters go through are an essential part of why the anime is great, and of course, that in part also includes the preparation for the upcoming matches. I definitely enjoyed how Soma and everyone else had to research and come to their own conclusion on what to make when given a theme. There's quite a lot of deliberation that they each have to put in their ideas, and how they come up with their dishes becomes a anticipation: after working through all their ideas, how are they going to execute on them? The fact that a lot of the dishes can be made in real life and how they're quite complicated make for a great cooking show. There's a pleasure in watching how the chefs improve upon themselves with each food challenge they're presented with. Each dish that they prepare are fun to watch because it not only shows their progress, but their character. It's true that this show has a lot of fanservice than say, Yakitate Japan, and I'm not the biggest fan, but what can you do? Of course, everything I just said was good about the show is the reason why the fifth season is so bad. There's just a bunch of random people that show up, in which you have no idea about, just trying to fight against Soma and his limited pool of friends. Not only are there so many new challengers, but you don't even get to see the old characters face off. For such a large cast of characters that have been already introduced, there's only five people you know that compete in the blue competition. This was already a bad move, but the food challenges are rushed. There was always a lot of deliberation when it came to the food challenges and competitions that the characters go through, but there's not any of that present in the fifth season. You don't see any brainstorming, preparation of dishes, and self improvement. You kind of just see random dishes that get briefly explained, if any at all. I don't really feel invested in these dishes because I don't know how these characters came up with it, and I sure as hell don't know many of them. Plus, there's the supernatural aspect where the dishes they make are not able to be done in real life. Animation is noticeably worse, and there's a lot of seconds where it's basically still frames or they lack background. The food presentation also takes a hit, and the reactions as well. Everything is rushed, random characters are introduced, I don't really see the cooking process, animation worsens, etc. Plot is terrible as well. Shokugeki no Soma already had pretty bad plot, with Central arc and all, but this takes it up to another level. I won't talk about it that much, but it follows every cliche possible and doesn't even do it in a satisfying manner. However, overall, it's ok. Taking into factor the good earlier seasons, I still think it's worth a watch. If you like over the top reactions and food, you sure will like this show.

Doesn't even come close to holding up the standard set by the other seasons short review- story: This got real weird. The core of the story that focuses on character growth is good. The details of the story once we get outside of that is not good. The primary conflict for the entire thing is totally contrived and out of character. Art and sound are as good as usual. Character: We've got a new edgy villain that's part of a comically out of place group. Feels like I'm watching a kids battle manga inspired parody of food wars. Erina agrees to something early on that makes no sense for any human much less for her character as it's been established so far. This whole season feels like the author had to write it in a week to hit a deadline. It's forced, rushed, and feels like it was written to wrap the series up as quickly as possible.

I honestly didn't have much expectations for this one, but i totally understand who did. After four reasonably consistent seasons, the show ends on a bittersweet tone, more bitter than sweet, to align with the manga ending. Some elements felt really rushed, especially the whole "mother" concept (both Souma and Erina's), although Erina's mom was a somewhat relevant topic back then, we never had any glimpse of the actual relevance of Souma's mom to the story. Another point that's really disappointing is how the anime builds Jounouchi to be a "Gary Sue"-like creature, and he easily loses to Saiba like it's nothing, leaving Souma without his actual final matchup (the whole concept of Souma's father is one of the worst thing in the series but that's another topic) The ending is fine, but everything feels really out of place.

It's rare I feel strongly enough to actually write out a review, but since my opinion of this show is so fresh and the series as a whole means a lot to me, I felt it important to leave my opinion. The story was certainly the least fulfilling of the series, and it shows. A ton of the more important aspects of the show have shifted from the cooking to outside of it. Suspension of disbelief is very important in shows like these, but that can't make you ignore a villain that was not only shoehorned in, but also provided no real payoff after building up his character in a very short span, albeit not fully enough to satisfy a conclusion to his personal story. An underworld gang of chefs cooking for crime seems silly outside of this show, but the thought is never considered. The only shortcoming of the antagonists is the lack of true build-up beyond "they are bad but we are good, so we must win." The cooking itself still delivered, though in a much faster pace that rushed through the better parts that made earlier seasons truly shine. Many events take place off screen, including the fundamental part of the show; the actual process of cooking. The final product still provided a fulfilling description of the finished dish, but the cooking that led up to it was scarce at best. This wasn't the only thing glossed over during this show. The results and events of many IMPORTANT cooking battles were completely skipped over and mentioned in passing later on. The story drags the season down significantly compared to the earlier seasons, especially considering this is meant to end the series. The ending in particular left a lot to be desired, but my full opinion is full of spoilers and thus will only be posted at the very end of this review (you've been warned). 4/10 The art (excluding the extremely mediocre opening), while some argue dropped in quality, was overall the same. The backdrops may have lost some quality, many accurately comparing them to a PowerPoint presentation (I'm looking at you, opening), but the bread and butter of the show, the animation of the food and characters, didn't noticeably diminish much if at all. It's still the same detailed, satisfying and attractive style I've come to expect from the show. 9/10 The sound doesn't require much discussion. Most is somewhat recycled, which isn't terrible, since it was good to begin with. The OP and ED are forgettable, and the rest of the music remains at the same quality that is near and dear to me and the hearts of many other fans. 7/10 The characters are a mixed bag. Much of the main cast takes quite a backseat for the majority of the season, leaving only Souma, Erina, Megumi, and Takumi being the only ones to receive their share of growth. This growth was unevenly distributed and seemed to vary between situations. This, however, is not very noticeable, as the cast is as endearing as ever, and most if not all fan favorites received their deserved time in the spotlight. before the show wraps up. 6/10 Despite my harsh opinion of the story, I enjoyed the ride up until the end (friendly spoiler reminder that the paragraph following will discuss it with spoilers). The battles were still climactic and I was always eager to load up the next episode. I enjoyed following the characters, laughed and guffawed at the boisterous, quirky, and oddball chefs and styles. Not once until the final episode of the show did I even consider disliking what I was watching. I still highly recommend this show to any fan of Food Wars! despite any shortcomings and will forever consider the series as a whole a personal favorite. 7/10 WARNING: SPOILERS AHEAD :WARNING My initial reaction personal opinion of the final episode is as follows: So is that it? I mean up until halfway through I was hyped for the epic finale, but man, I should've just quit when she tasted Souma's dish. I mean, Erina wins OFFSCREEN, which is some sort of recurring theme in this season, but I'm getting ahead of myself. Everything after Asahi losing feels extremely rushed, like I'm skimming the pages of a book or reading the Sparknotes synopsis right before a test. Nothing really feels resolved. Souma lost to Erina after making a big deal of the fact that his dish actually made history, and they didn't have the decency to say why. Then another time skip for what I can only assume was the epilogue in the manga, but just ended up being a half-hearted wrap-up for a 5 season anime. It's like ending a multi-page essay with "and that's the end." it felt about as abrupt as the end of my little rant.