Shaman King (2001)

Shaman King
Spirit! Form! Unity!
Genre: Supernatural adventure Running Time: 23 minutes Country: Japan Release Date: July 4, 2001 – September 25, 2002 Network(s): TV Tokyo Jetix Seasons: 1 Episodes: 64

Shaman King is a Shonen Jump anime animated by Xebec, and based on the manga series by Hiroyuki Takei. A revival of the series was released in 2021, nineteen years after the original series ended in Japan on September 25, 2002.

Summary

The anime revolves around a boy named Yoh Asakura, as he attempts to hone his shaman skills to become the Shaman King by winning the Shaman Fight.

Why It Rocks

1. Its story about spirits and the dead, as well as becoming a king of those elements is very creative.
   • Takei stated he went far with the research for the manga, working in various forms of shamanism unique to different people across the world, resulting in a very ethnically and gender diverse cast that still feels completely natural.
2. Very likable characters like Yoh, Morty, Len, Ryu, Trey, Faust VIII, and Amidamaru.
3. Very great action scenes, especially the battle between Yoh and Faust VIII.
4. The dub by 4Kids Entertainment was not only one of their better and near perfect dubs, but it's also one of their rare dubs to have very light censorship. It also had no episodes skipped.
5. "Spirit Form! Unity!"
6. Given how it's a series that revolves around the dead, it has a lot of cool references to death and religious content. They even kept Buddha at least one time.
7. Very awesome opening theme in both English and Japanese.
8. Recently, the show got a reboot in 2021, and was released onto Netflix in the US.

Bad Qualities

1. The anime skipped some parts of the manga that were originally very important to the story.
   • Indeed, everything after Episode 26 is non canon as the manga was still ongoing at the time and the anime caught up to it. The 2021 anime (which is to be a completely faithful reboot to the manga, see below) is set to change all of this around. Some fans prefer the anime ending however, as the manga version's ending was bittersweet at best and misantrophic at worst.
2. Despite the English dub by 4Kids being a excellent dub, it got excessive backlash from Moral Guardians for its nightmare fuel vibes and intense violent scenes. So much that the dub ended up bombing in the United States.
   • This likely influenced the heavy censorship behind their next dub, the notoriously bad One Piece dub.
3. The one thing that does prevent the 4Kids dub from being perfect is that the Japanese text shown in their dub mostly comes off as either inconsistent or incomplete, mainly how it's barely shown on the signs since the words on the signs are quite easy to translate from Japanese to English.
4. Some of the characters like Anna, Opacho, and Pirika are very flat and dull characters and are not as memorable as the rest of the characters.

Trivia

• The anime has got a reboot in 2021 produced by Bridge. It is currently adapting the 35 volumes of the manga's complete edition, and will provide the canonical ending of the manga, that was originally released after the first adaptation of Shaman King from 2001 had already finished.
  • Speaking of the reboot, it was listed as a Kodansha series and serialized in Weekly Shonen Magazine because the manga was getting a proper re-release with the canonical ending, and Hiroyuki Takei leaving Shueisha due to creative differences.
• The anime was (ironically enough, despite the most active anime fandom being in the West) the most popular in Slavic countries, with Russia deserving a special mention. In fact, a good majority of the comments on the official YouTube channel about the trailer for the reboot are in Russian!
• This show shares a director with the 2003 Fullmetal Alchemist anime and Gundam 00, Seiji Mizushima, and as a result some of the original Japanese cast members appear in two of the shows (and some even appear in all three), the most prominent example being Romi Park (Tao Ren's voice actress).

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