Forum - View topicEP. REVIEW: Black Clover
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Gem-Bug
 Posts: 1218 |
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You know, I was curious, so I went back and looked over the original airdates, and since the first episode on October 3, 2017, there haven't been any real breaks in production at all. They've just been cranking this out for years nonstop. |
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dragon695
 Posts: 1377 Location: Clemson, SC |
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I really don’t understand what the mangaka was thinking in how Asta and Yuno are handled. Their whole relationship is sterile bordering on artificial. I understand that rivalry is the main theme, but the execution falls flat. Especially with Yuno, who feels more like a plot device than a character. I wish (I don’t think it will happen, but I am anime only) the mangaka would disband Golden Dawn and reassign Yuno and the other two to the Bulls. I think Yuno needs to be humbled a little and maybe learn to open up more. Being forced to work with the unorthodox misfits would help, too. I am hoping beyond hope they don’t do some asspull where Yuno is made a captain. |
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jr240483
 Posts: 4385 Location: New York City,New York,USA |
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TOO LITTLE TO LATE!!! in the demon invasion arc, spoiler[ Yuno is revealed to not only be an exiled prince of the spade kingdom, but he replace finral's brother as vice captain of the golden dawn. and with a majority of them dead when the dark triad invaded (which from the looks of things include vangance) its more likely he will become the next golden dawn captain!] |
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dragon695
Posts: 1377 Location: Clemson, SC |
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Well that sucks. spoiler[I was hoping for some flaws, missteps, or setbacks to bring Yuno down a peg or two, but I get the gist of where this is going. Truly disappointing. Is Asta’s origin revealed? Please tell me megane sempai lives, r-right?] |
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aaa1e2r3
Posts: 102 |
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Major props have to be given to Charlotte's VA for this episode.
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SAG4
Posts: 37 |
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The undewater temple is a dungeon, or rather, a region of strong mana just like the volcano.
https://2.bp.blogspot.com/-GsWG4xyEHu0/W03h45qJfUI/AAAAAAAAA8w/TpcMJnBclEUheu3ANQALsikVmfZYIYgHACHMYCw/s0/0056-009.png About the episode, is good to see Leo wanting to reach & surpass Asta, because the character claiming to be a rival but is far behind and I really like his personality. The cliffhanger will make this episode more exciting than it would be if we had an episode next week. Waiting to see the conclusion will be ... |
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jr240483
Posts: 4385 Location: New York City,New York,USA |
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if the series really wanted character development for leo, he should have gotten salamander, NOT HIS BROTHER! |
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SAG4
Posts: 37 |
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jr240483
Posts: 4385 Location: New York City,New York,USA |
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that i can buy. it would be better than having magna with it. otherwise the bills would be STUPIDLY OVERPOWERED!!!!
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Top Gun
 Posts: 4596 |
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I'm only as far as the Toonami broadcast, and admittedly I'm only really watching the series because it's on the block and not because I'm taking any great enjoyment out of it, but dear lord, the last couple of episodes (114-115) have been one of the most egregious examples of complete ass-pull that I've ever seen in shounen. I was pretty much left laughing when this Big Bad Evil Demon shows up out of nowhere and proclaims that he's the reason everything bad in the series has happened. (Aizen Junior, maybe?) Really the whole progression of events with the elves has bordered on the absurd:
--Oh hey, there's a group of foreign magic users trying to take over the Clover Kingdom. --Wait, no, they're the reincarnations of elves who were wiped out by humans centuries ago and are now inhabiting new bodies that for some reason look exactly like them (and in Fana's case have the same exact name, but let's not even explain that one). --Wait, no, the lead elf isn't who he said he was, he's actually some other random elf who looks exactly like the lead elf and we had no idea existed until this moment. --Wait, no, what REALLY happened is that this evil demon influenced the ancient humans to massacre the elves, AND he resurrected the elves, AND he convinced the not-really-head elf to do all this other awful stuff! It's one long sequence of pulling these twists out of thin air without establishing them in the least beforehand, or doing anything at all to get the audience invested in caring about them. It's just...bad writing. I mean I'm used to Black Clover being a mostly-mediocre series with occasional moments of shockingly-good fight animation, but even by its own standards this is ridiculous. Hell, even take Charmy (who is a fantastic thirsty fangirl glutton that deserves to be in a far better series), and this sudden revelation that she's "half-dwarf." Y'know, despite the fact that the existence of dwarves has never once come up. How is one supposed to react to that, other that "...oooookay?" |
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Key
Moderator
 Posts: 18220 Location: Indianapolis, IN (formerly Mimiho Valley) |
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^
Uhhh, not sure what you've been watching, but very little of what Black Clover does qualifies as an "ass-pull." I had the impression that something was behind everything dozens of episodes before the reveal in episode 115. There were concrete hints at least as far back as the battle against Vetto in the Underwater Temple that something dark and possibly demonic was at work, and that dark power was brought up a few times after that. In retrospect, there were also clues that the person claiming to be Licht wasn't really Licht, as the characterization between current day and the flashbacks didn't match up. In fact, now that I think about it, current-time Licht was always much more similar in characterization to flashback Patry. No, Black Clover has generally been remarkably good about setting up later revelation. Even the huge ones that are coming for you in the mind-blowing episode 116 will make sense if you think about them a bit. |
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Top Gun
Posts: 4596 |
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My issue wasn't nearly so much that there was some sort of demonic entity introduced into the series, but the way in which it was handled. There's a pretty massive gulf between "there's been an undercurrent of darkness/demonic allusions throughout the series" and "a Ryuk cosplayer shows up out of nowhere and proclaims that he's the reason behind every single bad thing that's happened thus far." I mean, how am I as a viewer meant to react to this other than with indifference? I don't have any feelings toward this new character, because he literally appeared out of thin air an episode ago. It's like the author was intending for the audience's negative feelings toward the elves to automatically transfer onto this brand-new antagonist...except that's not how this works. It's the equivalent of the hoary gaming trope of pulling out a secret final boss immediately after you've beaten what you thought was the final boss, oh and they're the ones who were secretly controlling the previous bad guy, but they're even more powerful than he was. As far as I'm concerned it works about as well in a game as it does here, i.e. not at all. And like I said, this has happened repeatedly since the Eye of the Midnight Sun was first introduced, and at every stage, we knew even less about the new antagonist and had even less of a reason to feel a true emotional reaction toward them.
Let's actually look at Patry more closely, because until this past episode he was the prime offender in my book. We get introduced to the Eye of the Midnight Sun as the primary antagonist group, and later learn that their leader was an elf betrayed by humans who wants revenge for his slaughtered comrades. Okay, pretty standard, makes sense. But then after a few dozen episodes and immediately following a big fight against Licht, we learn that he was never whom he claimed to be, but was instead...some other guy named Patry? Who looks and sounds exactly like Licht, for reasons that are not adequately explained at all? You mentioned Patry's "personality," but what personality is that? We don't even know who he is until the very same episode when this reveal happens, and even then Patry is only portrayed as a clingy kid who idolizes Licht. I mean, just what is meant to be gained by this from a narrative standpoint? Why randomly swap out a superior character for an inferior near-clone? What purpose does it serve, other than being a random twist for the sheer sake of being so? It feels for all the world like the author was trying to get too cute, but didn't remotely have the writing chops to pull it off. If you're a writer, and you're trying to pull a Shyamalan-level move, there's two ways it can go. You can wind up with The Sixth Sense, a huge twist that upon rewatch was carefully and meticulously hinted at and alluded to in a hundred brilliant ways. Or, well...you can get The Happening. I know which category Black Clover fits in for me. I'm legitimately looking forward to this next episode, because I fully expect it to be hilarious for all of the wrong reasons. Since the beginning, Black Clover has felt like the work of an author who's aping other, far superior shounen works without fully understanding what makes them tick. The events of these episodes have finally cemented that impression. |
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DuskyPredator
 Posts: 15495 Location: Brisbane, Australia |
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I am really getting sick of Black Clover, and over a 130 episodes I am starting to think that I want off. A stupid birthday episode to a random side character, which for some reason required kidnapping main characters for, just feels like a final straw against my goodwill in thinking that it might turn around at some point and be something I would consider half decent.
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Zhou-BR
Posts: 1426 |
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Since I have zero faith in this show's writers' ability to generate entertaining filler, I simply dropped the show after episode 129 and won't pick it back up until it starts covering manga chapters again, which probably won't happen until sometime next year. |
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Blood-
 Bargain Hunter Posts: 23833 |
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I had been feeling the need for a Black Clover break around the time The Eye of the Midnight Sun arc climax (just before we found out a Devil was behind it all, after that, I got a second wind). Then of course there was an enforced covid-19 break. I actually don't mind the filler. I find the non-battle stuff kind of relaxing.
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