Kemono Jihen

Series Overview

Kemono Jihen (怪物事変) is a supernatural, action shounen series about kemono, human-spirit hybrids. The series focuses on a group of kemono children who work at a kemono detective agency that specializes in all things kemono.

Basically, when kemono do bad things, the Inugami Detective Agency gets called up to investigate and bring the perpetrators to justice. What this ends up looking like is a fairly episodic battle shounen series that follows a “monster of the week” format.

Of course, there is still an overarching plot. It’s just that the plot isn’t very interesting. The protagonist, Kabane Kusaka, wants to find his parents, whom he’s never met. All he has to remember them by is some kind of magic stone that makes him more powerful.

In fact, all of the child characters have family issues. That’s a major part of the series. Akira has brother issues, Shiki has mommy issues, Kon has abandonment issues, etc. I don’t know about you, but those kinds of plot points usually aren’t very interesting to me.

But, as an action-shounen series, you’d think that I’d be interested in the various abilities of the characters. After all, that’s why I enjoy writing about things like Boruto and My Hero Academia. There are always new abilities to dissect and theorize about.

Unfortunately, even the abilities the characters have in this series are rather boring. Of the main trio, one is just immortal, one can freeze things, and one is Spider-man. They don’t have particularly unique abilities or even arsenals of varied abilities.

I’m honestly getting bored just writing about this series. That’s how uninspired it is. But, as I’ll discuss later on in this review, there’s apparently a decently sized audience for this kind of series.

Main Characters

Kabane is the protagonist, but also somehow the most boring character of the entire series. Don’t get me wrong, I think Deku is an extremely boring shounen battle series protagonist as well. But at least there are other characters in My Hero Academia more boring than Deku.

Kabane literally has no personality. That’s his whole thing. He shows no emotion and just exists as an immortal kemono who punches things. I don’t think I’ve ever been so disinterested in a protagonist before.

Akira is the obligatory “girl” of the main trio. Have you noticed that shounen battle series always seem to have two boys and a girl as the initial trio? Well, Kemono Jihen kind of sticks to that. The only difference is that Akira is actually just a femboy.

There are a few major problems with Akira as a character. First of all, he’s the ice-based kemono, but he’s so weak that he can’t really use his ability. And second of all, he literally pees in his pants because he’s such a scaredy-cat. I don’t see how someone could like his character.

Shiki is the third and final member of the main trio — the spider one. His ability is just that he can shoot webs out of his fingertips (at least I think that’s where they come from). That’s not the worst ability, but his personality is also just the same as Bakugo’s from My Hero Academia.

I get that some people actually like Bakugo, but I just find him annoying. The same applies to Shiki. He’s just the belligerent brat of the group. And, also like Bakugo, Shiki is actually a bit of a tsundere. He acts like he doesn’t care about anyone else, but we know he does.

Underrated or Boring?

Kemono Jihen has a fairly decent overall score on MyAnimeList right now. But what’s more strange than that is that all of the reviews I’ve seen of the series say it’s an 8/10 or higher. I have no idea why anyone would think this?

The consensus I’ve seen from people who like this series is that it’s underrated and that it has some deeper meaning that most people don’t understand. I can assure you that neither of these are the case. I’d even go so far as to say it’s overrated.

There’s no deep meaning behind this series. As I mentioned before, it’s just about some kids with family issues who also happen to be kemono. It’s really not that hard to understand. There’s no secret meaning about the state of the world or whatever some people think.

Beyond all of that, the character designs in Kemono Jihen are pretty bland. It really doesn’t help when the characters are boring both inside and out. How am I supposed to get attached to any of them? Kon probably has the best character design, but she would be pretty low-tier in any other series.

Also, considering that this is an action series, it doesn’t really have good action. There are fights. But it’s not like you’re going to get any fights from this series as you would from something like Naruto. The fights don’t have crazy choreography; they’re pretty bare bones.

I don’t know what else to say. There’s nothing good about Kemono Jihen. Just like the characters in it, the whole series just exists. Everything about it is forgettable. I don’t remember what the soundtrack was like or what the OP and ED were.

Conclusion

Kemono Jihen is a 5/10 for me. I don’t really want to say that it’s bad. But everything about it is so average and boring that I can’t place it any higher. Aside from the boring characters, I wouldn’t say it does anything wrong. It just doesn’t do anything right.

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