Blue Lock vs. U-20 Japan

As someone who's reading Blue Lock weekly, I've had mixed feelings on Blue Lock season 2 as I've been watching it, but these feelings slowly started to organize themselves as we approached the finish line. In contrast to the common reaction and very logical conclusion that Blue Lock season 2 animation is... lackluster, I find that if anything it's brutally minimalistic, rather than lazy. This season still manages to flow with the dramatic moments just as well as before, and the action, while presented through a lot of stills, still has the pacing that makes each offensive exciting to watch unravel. And, putting the animation topic aside, all the drawings and illustrations of the characters in the season look incredible, it's absolutely spot-on and fully realized visually, it's the characters I know and love from the manga. One big improvement I find from season 1 is that now they've spliced in split-second shots of much better CGi movement to properly visualize the dribbles and tricks that players do to get past each other, compared to season 1's either pathetic or shoddily presented attempts. As a dedicated Blue Lock fan, I've gone from lamenting this season, to finding a mutual understanding with it instead. It's still Blue Lock to me, and I feel like it can still be Blue Lock to a lot of people if you give it a chance. There's still love in this adaption, which can be seen in the effort put into the most exciting parts of the arc.

This is certainly one of the worst anime I have ever seen. 10% Animation 90% Powerpoint Presentation combined with hours of cringeworthy dialogues. Imagine watching this after watching JJK S2. As a sports anime, the lack of action and movement is baffling. Matches are overly focused on protagonist Isagi's internal analysis, making them unrealistic and static. Characters are one-dimensional, with a childish focus on "selfishness." The soundtrack is repetitive. Every episode would make you feel like the "My Disappointment Is Immeasurable And My Day Is Ruined" meme. This anime is enough to make you hate football. Overall, you would have more fun watching a blank motionless wall than this abomination.

Blue Lock season 2 was a complete disappointment. It's not just that the animation quality was garbage, or that the whole season is dedicated to pretty much only one match (though these points do make it worse), but, for me, the series has stopped working in season 2. Season 1 introduced great characters, the concept of ego, and a competition dynamic. But season 2 feels a little like the series doesn't know where to go from here. The formula is starting to be the same: Isagi starts as the underdog and ends of doing something awesome. The supporting characters are interesting, but I don't think they carry the series anymore. For example, I like Reo and Nagi, but their appearances in this season were kind of minimal, so I didn't feel as invested in them. I've decided to stop watching this show because I think that, after this season, it's going to crash and burn. The plot doesn't have an interesting direction to evolve, from what I can see. Add this to the fact that Eight Bit's animation is too stilted and relies too much on bad CGI and what do we have? A series where you have to watch hours of cringe dialogue just for couple of cool moments per season. Yeah, no, thanks.

Blue Lock season 2 started on the wrong foot and kept getting better throughout the season. Animation 6/10: if you have watched the first few episodes you would normally ask why is the rating so high, well that is because there were wonderful animations at the end of the season, especially the last episode, so naturally I had to give it a 6 because it contained 3/10 animations as well as 10/10 animations, the reason for the bad animation is not so clear, it is either the studio rushed the anime or according to internet info only one person animated the season which is not possible. Story 8/10: The hype of the story is still there and has not faded. I don't have anything to comment on other than the fact that the season delivered on crucial moments, and I was not let down in the slightest—well, just a little bit—because of some bad animation moments. Characters 8/10: with the introduction of new characters the season dived into some of their backstory not leaving us wondering what are they doing in Blue Lock, and already established characters have been made into a better version of themselves with redemption stories and such. overall if you have watched season 1 and wondering why the first few episodes look so bad don't, because the more you progress through the season the better the quality gets, but that is not an excuse for the horrendous job that the animators did with this season, I even had a hard time watching the first couple of episodes having to wait each week to just watch a PowerPoint presentation of the manga, I hope that they stop rushing animations and take their time with the 3rd season because it has a lot more crucial moments, and I don't mind waiting two or three years for it. overall 6.5/10

Blue Lock is a football insult I don't know what the author taking drugs This is a football insult Initially the project was looking for a striker but the midfield was forced to create a team, especially since the players agreed to play a position other than a striker, even though from the start they were told to be selfish strikers Football is a sport that prioritizes teamwork, but in this blue lock it doesn't show that, even though there are times when they work together, but after that they become selfish As a football fanatic, I felt amused watching this, especially the metaphorical dialogues like kill or destroy blah blah This is an edgy fiction that contains insult football The author BL doesn't care about the football elements, only shows that this edgy fiction prioritizes scoring goals that pubescent kids like Moreover, Ego Jinpachi doesn't explain tactics in detail, only basic tactics that everyone knows, the rest on the field is done by the players themselves Because their basic skills or techniques are above average And what's funnier or more embarrassing is that the Japanese U20 national team lost to a group of selfish striker kids who have only been playing positions other than strikers for 15 days lmao This is the U20 national team dude, not a bunch of selfish kids That’s author means to show that the national team or future players who carry the name of their country and nation are more trashy than a bunch of selfish kids who are all strikers lmao? If I were Japanese, I would definitely be angry because of this insult even though this is fiction Moreover, this anime S2 adaptation is very bad, almost all PPT or CGI in the football scene Only 1 good scene in episode 14, doesn't show that this adaptation is good, overall it's bad What’s good in blue lock is just the character design If you want to find fiction about players playing football, follow fiction Ao Ashi or about discussing football tactics in fiction Giant Killing

fun premise/story, shit animation, the last episode was the best one ig but didnt save it, chungus low taper fade is massive, very predictable but thats ok to me, blatant capitalist propaganda lol. 4/10, might be a 5 later on. Slideshow animation, my lego movie maker app movies had more frames. Isagi is a pretty good mc though relative to other mc's in other animes. Rin was whatever, not rly invested in his conflict. Aiku was pretty hot too ig. Shidou is weird, was not a fan personally. music was ok at times, but the edm was a bit too much sometimes, and it was funny because it felt like it got boosted mostly on peak slideshow moments.

if you are wondering whether to watch it or not, its amazing, it starts off bad and most of the bad reviews came at that time, after 6th ep it gets better and better if you liked 1st season then definitely give it a try, specially last ep was excellent Storytelling: vs U-20 was the first big milestone for the team and this match was pretty well written for sports animes, you could feel the pressure and excitement during this whole match, backstories were good but few Characters: every character was written wonderfully, they showed their emotions very well and it was quite motivating for viewers Animation: first 5 ep was bad, from 6 to 9 it got decent(not amazing but bad either), later ep were animated good, last one way too better than expected overall: At the end i loved it, it just got hated abit too much because of first few episodes which isnt fair

From the comments I wrote, you can see how much I hated this anime's season 1—it was really bad and completely not my style, but here I am anyway. Story: Again the same thing but this time even worse. The first season at least felt a bit like the start of a new series, but this is a disaster. Why do they drag the same match out for so long? I'm asking the fans one question: Is ego really that great? How great is ego exactly? Ego is disgusting and it will stay that way. A lot of people overhype this anime. This is not an anime that can enter the top 10 or be called the best sports anime. Ratings: Story: 2/10 Animation: 3/10 (how much more do you plan to ruin it?) Art/Character design: 7/10 not terrible Sound: 5/10 Enjoyment: 3.5/10 Still, I'll give this anime 4/10 overall. Conclusion: If you watched the first season and didn't like it, don't give it any more chances because it's bad. Even if you love football, the animation is genuinely terrible—it's no different from a PowerPoint presentation, this shouldn't even be called animation. You're probably going to reply to this comment saying it's confusing and funny, and try to brigade me, but I don't care. This anime built only on ego, football, and competition doesn't deserve these scores. It's overhyped and doesn't deserve to rank this high on MyAnimeList.

MYYYYYYY EEEYYYYYYEEEESSSSSSS Story: 8/10 B+ Animation/Art: 1/10 F Music: 5/10 C- Acting (Subbed): 8/10 B+ Enjoyment: -17/10 F— Overall: 2/10 F TLDR: FUCK!!! FUCKING FUCK FUCK FUCK!!! GOD FUCKING DAMNIT MY EYES AW FUCK! AAAAAAAAAAAARRRRRRRRRRRGGGGGGGHHHHHHHH!!! Why? Why god? Why do you allow such beautiful works of art to be decimated? Why do you allow those of greed to place their hands on a masterpiece and turn it to shit? (curls up in a ball). It hurts. It hurts so much. My soul is in pain. Ow. Story: The Blue Lock U-20 Arc in the manga is widely regarded as the best arc in the entire manga as of writing. It’s one of the most hype, intense, and rewarding arcs in not just sports animanga history, but of the entire industry as a whole. A beautiful battle of soccer, each team attacking, defending, and retaliating to form a story of 2 brothers fighting over their past, and a team of soccer players in a hunt for glory and survival. The pacing is feels lightning fast and yet it lasts for such a long time, giving you plenty of enjoyment over the period you spend gazing over the masterpiece of an arc. The show adapts it well, although I criticize the pacing a bit. As a result, I’ve knocked it down just a little bit, but it has not done nearly enough to completely ruin this aspect of the show. The tension, intensity, stress-making, sweat-inducing story is still just as present as ever, and in the best moments of the manga, the show even sometimes exceeds its source material. Animation/Art: By this point, we all know of the controversy surrounding the show. Blue Lock Season 2 was one of the most anticipated anime of the year. Blue Lock was the best-selling manga of 2023, setting up for what seemed to be a guaranteed spot in the sports anime wall of fame. Instead, it got put on the wall of shame for the absolute DOGSHIT animation. HOLY SHIT! IT’S THE WORST I’VE EVER SEEN!!! FUCK FUCK FUCK! WHY!?!?!?!? The animation isn’t just bad. It’s an abomination. An affront to art and creativity itself. A tragedy that befell the entire industry of animation. Allow me to elaborate: The animation is bad enough to actively detract from the viewing experience and make it difficult to follow. For example, when Shidou does a cool kickshot, the ruined sense of scale and lack of movement result in a hilarious panel in which the characters behind Shidou are disproportionately large and you can’t tell what the hell Shidou is doing. His leg seems to be broken, and the angle at which he is trying to hit the ball is difficult to interpret. This isn’t the only issue with Shidou, though. Shidou is undeniably the biggest victim of the change to a more detailed artstyle for Blue Lock. Likely due to a lack of time, Shidou, whose face is the most detailed of all the characters, ends up having his face completely change to a children's cartoon art style every 30 seconds in the early episodes. And even in the later episodes, where the animation improves significantly, the lack of detail is often noticeable. It’s to the point where Shidou has more in common with Caillou and his art style than the rest of Blue Lock sometimes. But I’m not done yet, oh goodness no. The lack of any movement in the show results in laughably bad panels, with minimal detail, staying on screen for several seconds. This gives plenty of time for the eyes and brain to realize in unison, “hey, why do they look like wet cardboard cutouts?”. This results in being instantly drawn out of the immersion of the show and losing all sense of sweat-inducing tension that the manga and season 1 had in abundance. This happens continually, throughout the entirety of the show until the very final few episodes, but by then it’s already far too little and too late, and even then, the animation is noticeably less fluid than any part of season 1. The first season's animation was dynamic, fluid. You saw their feet kick the ball, their bodies push and interact with one another. It created stories of fighting without words and just visuals. Something so completely impossible with season 2 that it hurts. A direct result of a complete lack of movement is a following, lack of impact. When someone collides with something, both the collision and the movement towards the collision are vitally important to show the force and effort exerted. Whether that be feet slamming on the ground in a desperate sprint or kicking the soccer ball so hard it bends, that movement which conveys force and emotion is absent. Animation can even characterize an individual. Take the two brothers, Sae and Rin, for example. The animation undergoes a tremendous improvement in the final episode, resulting in us finally being able to see the unique playstyles between Rin and Sae. Rin is in the flow, he moves looselye, chaotically, and instinctually. It’s clear from his actions that his mind is totally and completely obsessed with a singular idea: the domination of his brother. It makes up his world, and soccer is his weapon to kill. Sae, on the other hand, is smooth, controlled, almost effortless. His actions show how much Sae believes he outclasses, not only Blue Lock, but the very soccer match itself. He is in a league of his own here, and that much is made clear entirely through his soccer playstyle. This type of characterization through animation isn’t possible for most of the season because THERE’S A COMPLETE FUCKING LACK OF ANY MOVEMENT!!! Now, the elephant in the room, episode 14 of Blue Lock Season 2 does indeed have the best animation of any episode in the series. In fact, it so completely outclasses any other episode, you would think it came from a high-budget movie instead. An unparalleled level of dynamic viewpoint movement, fluidity, and art style. The moment the movie bars came down from the top and bottom I knew I was in for ABSOLUTE CINEMA!!! It was such a huge improvement that even the NFL, YES, THE NATIONAL AMERICAN FOOTBALL LEAGUE, COMMENTED, “Imagine a whole season of this”. The loss of shading and detail, a technique popular nowadays called Kagenashi, gave the animators an incredible chance to prioritize fluidity and motion with never-before-seen quality in Blue Lock. And then, right after that, all the detail returns to the climax of the entire match, with an even more detailed art style than the rest of Blue Lock, with a more cinematic lighting, yet keeping that same fluidity from before. It’s a true masterpiece of an episode, and my personal favorite episode of that entire year. But… one episode can not save the season from a whole season of SHIT!!! Music: Now, Blue Lock does have some pretty great music. During the latter episodes of the season, the music was used to great effect when the animation received a boost for some particularly well-animated scenes. The usage of the main theme in the final episode, especially, was beyond hype and completely sent me into a fan-crazed frenzy. The problem is that for most of the season, I feel the soundtrack was horribly mistreated by the animation quality. Oftentimes, you’ll receive some genuinely banger soundtracks, but it get associated with a hilariously bad frame. The mixture of the two results in one moment is so horrendously bad, I feel like puking. It genuinely makes the entire scene laughable. And truth be told, there are a few standout tracks, but there are also some tracks that I genuinely can’t understand. During one of the most intense moments in the show, this almost calming, quiet soundtrack is played… what? Why? I feel like there was a complete disconnect between the director and the composer on the intentions of this scene, or one of them was an idiot. It doesn’t match the required intensity or tension at all. There’s just stuff that drags it down. Acting (subbed): Not much to say here besides the fact that the voice actors did an excellent job. Each one of them really worked hard for this, and you can feel it. Isagi and Rin’s VAs in particular did exceptional jobs, completely b…

I've just dicovered Blue Lock and binged it. I loved it! It was very fun to watch..... at least, the first season. Everybody knows the animation in season 2 is atrocious, but the worst part of it, in my opinion, is how dull the characters and story felt. This is one of the biggest wastes of potential I've ever seen. Not just because of the disastrous animation, but because the plot and characters became boring. STORY: Since the entire season is a normal football match, it basically lost the goal (pun intended) of the story. Blue Lock was all about a twisted selection where the only applying rule is "survival of the fittest". It was more about "adapting the concept of survival games to football" than it was about football. And yet, season 2 is..... a very classic football match. Well, technically, the match starts at episode 6, but even the episodes before that are focused on training for that match. CHARACTERS: And that would be fine if the characters were fun. Don't get me wrong, some of them are awesome (loved Aiku!). But they aren't psychotic. And I don't know about you, but what drove me through season 1, what appealed to me the most, was how freaking psychotic this whole season was, lol. Season 2 does have its few moments (Rin's "flow", Shidou's "ovulation goal"). But it's only once in a while, whereas Season 1 was like that from beginning to end. I mean, it starts with a freaking nation-wide kidnapping, lol! Season 2 has nothing like Kuon's backstab, or Isagi's "I shattered all these people's dreams.... if feels good!", or Kira's apparently murderous intents. Even Aiku, which I love as a character, is just not very fun to follow. He's charismatic and strong, sure. But he doesn't have that spark that even some minor characters had in season 1 (like the twins, or Kuon). VISUALS: I'd rather not talk about it... but hey, it's a review. While season 1 was pretty strong in that regard (despite a few bad 3D shots here and there), season 2 is miles below it. It often looks like a slideshow. I'll be a bit positive though : the visual effects were good! The puzzle pieces, like we often see in season 1, are back. The brothers' scenes under the snow look fantastic somehow. The colors are vivid so several shots are pretty cool. SOUND: The OST was good, although a bit lackluster compared to season 1 in my opinion. CONCLUSION: The new characters are boring, the overall match was boring, following a single team was boring (after season 1 kept spicing things up by switching teams regularly). I wouldn't say it was a pain to watch ; but it definitely didn't entertain me as much as season 1. I'm sorry, I'm in Team "Season 2 sucks". I honestly don't know what to expect from season 3 and onwards.

This is an implusive review, but I cant sit here and let the haters convince people not to watch this season Firstly, Animation was fine, it was actually great infact. If you arent hyper analysing each frame of the anime in the begining episodes the "poor" and "powerpoint" will go by quickly. Very soon it picks up and becomes something incredible and unquie. People had issues with dialouge, but i didn't at all. This is a shounen sports manga, and one of the most if not the most intense one out there right now. The dialouge serves it purpose to muster up hype and makes clench your buttcheaks in anticipation. Don't expect shakespere dialouge. That's just stupid and you aren't watching this show for the right reason Now what the anime did right: And its the chracters. Very well written, fantastic backstories that aren't dragged out at all. Amazing dyanamics between some of the characters that surprisingly aren't with the main character, Isagi. If you have to love this show for something, its the characters for sure. And that's all, don't be sheep and judge to quickly, because if you give Blue Lock Season 2 a chance, you will be very happy.

Honestly they've messed up the animation all season except for the last episode the story's still really fun I was just going to give it a 7/10 but that last episode is so good that I literally have it an 8/10 for just that one moment anything anime that can make you scream like the character is is pretty solid. I will say that despite the fact that the animation made the pacing kind of clunky the actual story pacing was really good I'm so used to sports anime having these really long drawn out moments but the majority of the show felt like meaningful moments well paced if only the animation had made it more fluid I am still a little confused at why some of the characters are still around but I am excited for some of the hints that they gave for the next season

In this season the animation was very bad and the main reason why the anime didn't do well. The art style and story was amazing. Personally I would say that the story carried the anime other wise many people would have dropped it.They only animated the goals well other part were slideshow basically Most of the characters had good character and backstory as mostly focus on Rin's backstory and the hate towards his brother.I would they were able to show it well in the anime.There are times in anime that character do crazy shit which makes the anime more immersing. (Conclusion) But the animators despite have terrible management someone managed to animate few scene which made every episode watchable. All the goals scored had good animation and last episode of the anime was peak cinema.If and only if the animation was better this would have been the best anime released this year

Let’s get the obvious out of the way: the animation for this season is absolute garbage for 90% of the show. There’s no getting around it, it’s bad. But putting that aside, this season of Blue Lock is the same as all the others. If you’re wanting an edgelord, Dragon Ball Z - esque battle shonen sports anime, this is still that. The animation is bad but the plot is still interesting, and at the end of the day that’s preferable to a garbage plot with good animation imo. The people who are acting like the entire story is ruined because of the animation are being dramatic.

Many will say that the animation that the show needed was bad for the entire season but actually that is not possible even if you give them more time. Blue Lock's manga has a lot of text (thinking and dialogues) between player movements which is almost 3 times as compared to other dynamic sports mangas like volleyball(Haikyu) or basketball(slam dunk, kuroko). So you actually cannot bring in any animation until its like filler which will break the movements or slow motion (which they added to the ball for saving budget and not the players). The writer actually has written with the manga only in mind and not an animation. This much text is good for static games like baseball (ace of diamond) or golf which has pauses but for football with very few stops it becomes an issue to animators. You can see this in the last episode which actually has a lot less text in the manga so Blue Lock entered into its FLOW. The animators also broke the chains like Chigiri and jumped up from a pool of dead corpses like Rin and Barou. CHILLLS. The problem is not just the studio but also the manga which is very text heavy for anyone to properly animate especially for this U20 arc. Only way is to change the narration that takes place which will be completely different from the manga then but many will oppose that too. So I don't think anything else could be done for this season actually. It was frankly a good effort by the studio

Early viral reviews have led to Acolyte levels of blind hate towards Blue Lock, and it is definitely unwarranted. The biggest gripe people have with the season is the animation on early episodes. Were they laughable and bad? Sort of? I didn’t really mind it that much because 1) these are low stakes, predicrable episodes. Why waste budget animating these scenes? 2) i honestly didn’t notice it that much, 3) a bunch of cool new characters were introduced which was more noticeable, and 4) I forgot all about that stuff when the U20 match started The anime score is slowly self-correcting itself, and I am glad people have some common sense. If you liked season 1, season 2 has a huge payoff in the final 2 episodes that is absolutely worth watching. I would give it more of a 7.5/10 but will round down because the esrly episodes are just not good enough to warrant a 8.

I was genuinely hesitant to watch this season of Blue Lock after seeing all the memes about the 'PPT animation.' However, I finally gave it a chance, and to my surprise, it turned out to be pretty decent. While the animation, especially the 3D segments and the leg shots, left a lot to be desired (the CGI in those scenes was downright awful), the story itself managed to shine through. The animation quality was wildly inconsistent. Some scenes were visually stunning, while others had goofy CGI characters running around, which could be quite distracting. That said, if you’re able to overlook these moments and come to terms/cope with the animation, it’s a great watch overall. The hype moments genuinely delivered, and the last few episodes felt like the entire season’s budget had been poured into them. If you’re hesitant about continuing Blue Lock, I’d personally recommend giving it a shot. I found myself adjusting to the animation quirks after about 4-5 episodes. Overall, I’d rate this season a 7/10. The last two episodes, especially the flashbacks, were a standout—those deserve a solid 9/10!

if you are wondering whether to watch it or not, its amazing, it starts off bad and most of the bad reviews came at that time, after 6th ep it gets better and better if you liked 1st season then definitely give it a try, specially last ep was excellent Storytelling: vs U-20 was the first big milestone for the team and this match was pretty well written for sports animes, you could feel the pressure and excitement during this whole match, backstories were good but few Characters: every character was written wonderfully, they showed their emotions very well and it was quite motivating for viewers Animation: first 5 ep was bad, from 6 to 9 it got decent(not amazing but bad either), later ep were animated good, last one way too better than expected overall: At the end i loved it, it just got hated abit too much because of first few episodes which isnt fair

I don't want to write too much cause I'm lost for words. Yes the animation might now have been that good at the start but this is genuinely one of the best pieces of media and Anime ever. The last two episodes just made me have the biggest orgasm ever. I love Bachira, Isagi and Nagi the most (as well as Kaiser but thats Manga stuff) they are just so well written in my opinion, I just love Bachira since his playstyle is so damn awesome and so enjoyable. Nagi cause he has such a good skill And Isagi since he has such epic scenes which made me stand up I just love Blue Lock and I cant wait for the Neo Egoist League

THIS SEASON WAS WOAH! To be honest, I had only really heard negative reviews about it, so I put off watching it for the longest time even though I really enjoyed season 1. THIS SEASON DID NOT DISSAPOINT! It did start off a little slow with the tryouts, and I felt like Isagi didn't shine as much during the first couple episodes. The rest of the show, however, completely makes up for this fact. The U20's match was just incredible. It constantly had me on my toes, I was so anxious that at times I felt like I was actually part of the match. You watch all the characters bounce off each other, getting stronger with each second. The match does a wonderful job at giving each characters their moment to shine, while not taking away from Isagi. THE ENDING JUST HAD ME IN AWE. PLEASE just watch it and don't let the poor-ish MAL score take away from the enjoyment this show can bring. Personally, I feel that people are too harsh on it, and can't look past some poor animation choices. It was incredible, and makes you feel like you are literally there in person watching the match.