Kenichi: the mightiest disciple
7/10
A fairly decent, if flawed, fighting series unfortunately brought down by the crappy first 26 episodes
Ever since i saw Baki The Grappler two years ago, I've been wanting to see animes that are fairly similar. one that kept coming up was Kenichi The Mightiest Disciple. So i thought i would give the show a try. If i'm going to be perfectly honest, The first 26 episodes were pretty awful. The story wasn't that interesting, the characters had very little personality, the fights were just slightly above average and the humor was extremely lame. Almost all the episodes consisted of Kenichi training, which the show was trying VERY hard to make funny. How many god damn episodes do you need to show him training?! Fair enough you need to develop the character up to show that he's becoming stronger, but CHRIST! The only redeeming factors about the first 26 episodes were two of the fights: kenichi vs Takeda and Kenichi vs Hermit (on the bus). They were pretty decent fights.
The rest of the series was MUCH better! There was an actual more interesting story, With the Shinpaku alliance against Ragnarok, Kenichi was more likeable, It introduced more intriguing characters and the fights were more fun and aplenty! It was like watching a completely different show! The only bad thing was Odins reason for wanting to fight Kenichi. All because Kenichi beat him in a fight for a badge when they were young? Really? That's his reason? Over a feckin badge? That is hilariously stupid
Overall, While Kenichi does have a much better second half, it isn't worth watching the first half to get to the good parts. If you want a good fighting/Martial arts anime, go watch Baki The Grappler, Shoot fighter Tekken or Hajime No Ippo.