BlackRock Shooter TV is a high budget arthouse mashup of MadokaMagica Kill la Kill and Persona created with passion by top talents of the industry only to be misunderstood and forgotten by its contemporaries. If for some reason you arent convinced to watch it yet here is a review for this masterpiece completely spoilerless the only spoiler it has is for MadokaMagica hidden in the creative background chapter. This review contains absolutely no information about the plot of this anime but you will understand upon reading whether you will enjoy it or not. So what makes BlackRock Shooter TV brilliant? IT REQUIRES A SMART AND DEMANDING VIEWER WITH RICH WATCHING EXPERIENCE TO TRULY APPRECIATE IT BlackRock Shooter TV flopped when it aired and its quality has nothing to do with its marketing failure. While not flawless there are way worse works that are legendary cult classics even among other works by the people who created BlackRock Shooter TV. BlackRock Shooter TV was a marketing failure because... nobody understood it Well knowing how Ordet were comfortable with creating anime that nobody liked which doesnt necessarily mean they are bad okay there? it wouldnt be too surprising if they simply did not even care if someone wouldnt understand some of their works. Thats it. The most voted negative reviews all complain how their authors either did not understand something or how nothing in this anime makes sense which is a less honest way to say that a given work is beyond their comprehension quantum physics does not makes sense to many as well but it actually works okay there?. It is not just some immature teenagers who complain how they cant understand something even adult viewers often have problems understanding this anime... and it did not even attract adults. This avantgarde masterpiece attracted an audience of teenage vocaloid fans who were simply not mature enough to enjoy it. If you find a person who knows about this gem it is going to be someone who was a teenager when it has been airing in 99 of these cases and in 90 of even these rare cases they would tell you that they did not like it because they did not understand anything or wanted more action instead of drama. Curiously two years later SHAFT made the very same mistake with their vocaloidbased Mekakucity Actors but this is not a review of Mekakucity Actors... The sideeffect of this mismarketing was it also didnt reward the show with creative reputation of avantgarde anime that would allow it to attract the audience of snobs who watch avant garde anime to distance themselves from the mainstream. Thus BlackRock Shooter TV only allows really demanding and experienced viewers to truly appreciate it and there arent many such viewers around which is good for finding experienced viewers with good taste to follow and not good for the popularity of the anime. Now the reason why all this review was written to make you understand whether you are going to like the show or not. Most people cant really appreciate it enough including those who like it because these are different things to just like something and to get so impressed that you will find yourself thinking about it months later. You will most likely not enjoy BlackRock Shooter TV if: You cant relate to young female characters with typical struggles of young female and/or you cant empathize with people who are unlike you You are disappointed that there is not enough action and too much drama in this anime you will be better off watching Kill la Kill another work by Hiroyuki Imaishi a coauthor of BlackRock Shooter TV instead until you are mature enough to enjoy drama You are a victim of expectation bias and the reputation looks ratings reviews critical reception of a work and its creators influences your impressions more than the contents of the work itself. If you praise Neon Genesis Evangelion for its symbolism just because it is Neon Genesis Evangelion despite its creators directly stating that there is no meaning to its symbols you have to be very careful to not fall victim to the same bias while watching this You only enjoy art house anime and think that arthouse means profound topics with bad animation in this case you also probably did not like Monogatari series because you thought that it is nothing more than a lolicon bait You feel uncomfortable with the confusing magical feeling it gives off remember Monogatari series? You feel that in order to enjoy it you have to force yourself to understand it instead of just getting the key points intuitively while watching it You cant feel a work more than you can understand it and you cant let yourself get absolutely flummoxed out and lose yourself in your feelings as if it is not some anime but a 3hourlong classical concert. Now you will most likely enjoy BlackRock Shooter TV if nothing above describes you. The odds are higher if: You have accumulated enough watching experience and you will get absolutely blown away by this gem and by the fact that some noname studios could create something that holds up more than 12 years after its release written at 23 April 2024 while generic seasonal garbage gets produced consumed and disposed like Durex condoms You are a fan of MadokaMagica and find its successors to be of unacceptable quality and/or its predecessors to not have the same vibes you love MadokaMagica for. BlackRock Shooter TV is the only show that does justice to MadokaMagica even doing some things better than its predecessor. Trust me I saw many pathetic attempts to emulate the great classic and so far BlackRock Shooter TV is among the only two anime that even can be described as a successor reference tribute or homage instead of a plagiarism or ripoff. The second one is called Selector Infected WIXOSS but this is not a review of Selector Infected WIXOSS You can and you want to get an absolutely unique experience of getting shocked terrified emotionally demolished and literally shaking while understanding almost nothing You think that you would not enjoy it because you now know that this work is most likely beyond you but you still want to see what a work of art should be to be above your level You were successfully convinced by me that it is a brilliant work and youll love it because the expectation bias introduced by me right into your brain will trick you into thinking that it is great which wouldnt have happened if you havent read this review before You are just smart enough to enjoy it. Lets face it some art really requires the consumer to be bright enough to appreciate it. IT LEAVES NOTHING BUT IMPRESSIONS ALLOWING YOU TO WATCH IT AGAIN AND AGAIN LIKE FOR THE FIRST TIME UNTIL YOU COMPLETELY MILK IT OUT This is the part which most viewers of this anime fail or maybe it is the part that fails the most viewers?. BlackRock Shooter TV is deliberately created confusing and inaccessible to be felt instead of understood. This anime is all about feelings. It is not just about story it is not just about characters it is not even just about aheadofitstime production. It is about feelings. You have to suspend your understanding and only feel it to appreciate it. If you cant know how you can just feel cinema... has a song in a language you dont speak ever made you feel something? This is how you should watch this masterpiece as if you were listening to a song. Shut up your rational being and let this work talk right to your heart and you will experience its magic. Nobody who watched this masterpiece remembers anything about it but how they felt about it be their feelings positive or negative. I even heard from some people how they couldnt remember anything about it except how scary it was. And you too will not remember and most importantly you must not remember anything but your feelings about it. In fact this review says nothing about the plot of this anime because considering that it is a show you feel instead of understanding it telling any more about it would be considered a spoiler. If you feel comfortable with its magic and let it surround you it will make your limbs tremble it will crush your soul it will absolutely demolish you it will make you cry out of despair at its climax and out of happiness in the very end it may even make you laugh hysterically and in the end it will relieve you. If you watch it with your heart open you will experience the entire palette of human emotions with BlackRock Shooter TV. ITS AHEAD OF ITS TIME PRODUCTION VALUE STILL HAS NO DIRECT COMPETITORS BlackRock Shooter TVs production the visuals animations and sound design is at the forefront of the technology that was available back in the day. The animators behind this show utilized every technology they worked with to its full potential. No matter what the current year is BlackRock Shooter TV always looks and sounds better than at least 99 of anime made that year. BlackRock Shooter TV aired in 2012 just compare how it looks to the most popular anime of that time and you simply will not believe that it was made the same year with Sword Art Online The key feature of this anime the CGI animation is executed so well that many people cant even notice that it was used. It is not the Ufotablestyle CGI made to look like traditional handdrawn animation but the artistic CGI finegrained to give an impression of a psychedelic trip. Considering that Hiroyuki Imaishi himself Gurren Lagann Kill La Kill was responsible for these CGI shenanigans he definitely couldve made it Ufotablestyle but his creative choice was not to and for a good reason. If you think that Beastars and Land of the Lustrous have the best CGI BlackRock Shooter TV will make you doubt it. Beastars this Land of the Lustrous that... Meanwhile some forgotten avantgarde anime from 2012: https://www..com/watch?v=fuMnHItjNEs IT HAS UNIQUE CREATIVE BACKGROUND CREATED BY TOP TALENTS INSPIRING AND REFERENCING PUELLA MAGI MADOKAMAGICA AND FORESHADOWING KILL LA KILL BlackRock Shooter TV is a product of ultimate creative freedom of some of the top talents of the anime industry associated with Kyoto Animation and Trigger. If you ever wanted to see what a group of really talented artists is capable of when they are completely creatively independent of their employers and are allowed to create anything they want you should definitely watch BlackRock Shooter TV. Many people notice how BlackRock Shooter TV is similar to another fantasy psychological thriller Puella Magi MadokaMagica but not many realize its relationship with this legendary genredefining anime is way more complex. They both were in production in the end of 2000sstart of 2010s and influenced and referenced each other. BlackRock Shooter TV is essentially an older twin sister of Puella Magi MadokaMagica. BlackRock Shooter TV was actually inspired by Puella Magi MadokaMagica. It is the only anime that emulates MadokaMagica that good while having its own unique style. Character designs and archetypes plot points visuals and animations themes and ideas... they complement each other so well that even the music in both anime sounds so similar you can replace the entire soundtrack of MadokaMagica with the soundtrack of BlackRock Shooter TV or vice versa and they would fit just perfectly. It is obvious that these Madokaesque vibes are not accidental. 220https://i.ur.com/nb4dUda.png 220https://i.ur.com/9W0iy4g.png 220https://i.ur.com/ddnnWGl.png 220https://i.ur.com/QvJECIT.png Of course these are just coincidences 220https://i.ur.com/4MmUgju.png This must be a coincidence too 120https://static.wikia.nocookie.net/blackrockshooter/images/a/af/YomiTakanashi.png 220https://static.wikia.nocookie.net/blackrockshooter/images/3/37/YomiTakanashi2012.png huke changing the character designs is also a coincidence Stop gaslighting me Moreover MadokaMagica apparently has some references to the BlackRock Shooter franchise too. ClariS the singers of Puella Magi MadokaMagicas OP song Connect have even made a cover of a song that later became the opening of the BlackRock Shooter TV you can find it on Youtube and Nicovideo. There are even some AMVs for MadokaMagica with their cover. https://www..com/watch?v=BLYm1aS329E https://www..com/watch?v=h05Zt9rC0 From back in the day when they called themselves AliceClara. Ah these days when I did not even need to care about anything... 220https://64.media.tumblr.com/e732a917767f85aea9ddf50a1639a88f/tumblro5qkdcxvzM1spe9ruo7r1400.jpg 220https://64.media.tumblr.com/af01491e0e88a284c101c829a8e9ffa4/tumblro5qkdcxvzM1spe9ruo8r1400.pnj Do not open the spoiler below if you did not see that Luminous scene in MadokaMagica BlackRock Shooter MadokaMagica crossover episode when??? It is not just barely believable at this point that Puella Magi MadokaMagica a show of a grade that appear only once a decade if not less often can have such an amazing counterpart that was created just a year after. Considering awkward production processes at Ordet and difficult personality of its founder Yutaka Yamamoto its existence is almost an actual miracle. Maybe some lonely girl wished for it to happen and contracted Kyuubey?.. After BlackRock Shooter TV flopped because nobody wanted to watch a school drama with action elements Hiroyuki Imaishi the director for its fight choreography responded by creating Kill la Kill a reverse of BlackRock Shooter TV an action anime with elements of school drama. Then he apparently learnt the general public would happily enjoy anything easy to digest with lots of flashy fights going on and then Trigger has never produced anything as great as BlackRock Shooter TV but thats a whole another story... ITS FLAWS ARE NEGLIGIBLE BlackRock Shooter TV is imperfect but given how brilliant it is for the aforementioned reasons its flaws are easy to overlook and forgive. Its problems are not worse in both quantity and quality than the problems in most of the cult classic anime in fact many legendary anime have even worse flaws. We had rushed drama and limited character development in Neon Genesis Evangelion too yknow. Heck I cant even say anything bad about it except for rushed drama and limited character development these five god damn words mean nothing compared to my entire rant about how brilliant this anime is and why you should watch it these problems are really nothing compared to how great it is. Actually watching it for the first time if you watch it the right way with your heart open and let the feeling of magical confusion consume you it may shock you so much that you will not even notice that something is wrong. If this show is made for you these flaws are not going to be something you will pay attention to. IT IS STILL A CULT CLASSIC PROBABLY THE MOST CULT CLASSIC AMONG LEAST POPULAR ANIME BlackRock Shooter TV enjoys cult following despite not being very popular. There are still people talking about it. There are still people suggesting each other to watch it like me. There are entire communities in Discord and other social media dedicated to the BlackRock Shooter TV and the franchise around it that maintain interest to its existence. This is the most cult anime among all unpopular anime I know and probably the most cult one among all unpopular anime ever. IT GIVES IMPORTANT AND PAINFUL LESSONS TO BOTH ARTISTS AND THEIR AUDIENCES Aside from the main moral message of the show BlackRock Shooter TV and the story of this masterpiece the story of its creation release reception and fall into oblivion has enough to teach artists and their audiences and everyone who values art. Im talking not just about anime right now Im talking about art in general. So what can the case study of of BlackRock Shooter TV teach us? It teaches us that your work may be absolutely brilliant and years ahead of its time but if it fails to meet the audience that would enjoy it it will never attract enough attention and will never produce any impact. Not only the general public does not talk about this masterpiece the entire anime industry has absolutely ignored it despite there are enough things to learn from in BlackRock Shooter TV especially its advanced CGI animation. But since this masterpiece hasnt found the right audience and was forgotten no one ever will think of BlackRock Shooter TV when asked for something similar to MadokaMagica no one will ever compare its music written by Hideharu Mori to the works of Yuki Kajiura no one will suggest BlackRock Shooter TV when asked about good CGI anime no one has even tried to replicate BlackRock Shooter TVs CGI because the industry itself is not aware of the existence of this gem too. To fall into oblivion is the fate of a work that cant gather enough attention. BlackRock Shooter TV is not the only brilliant work that was undeservedly forgotten there must be many more are out there which I dont even know anything about. It teaches us that if you cant even convince the audience that your work is great by advertising it as something only for the chosen ones it will never gain enough attention. It is not necessarily quality that makes luxury things luxury it is also the reputation of the brands that produce these things google expectation bias and Supreme clay brick if you dont believe me. There are thousands of people who enjoy certain works of art just because these works have reputation of being prestigious or trendy. Such people probably the majority of their audience would not love them otherwise even if they were the very same works but without the flashy attentiongrabbing sticker that says for cool kids only. It teaches us that the absolute most of people doesnt care much about the art they consume as long as it is something accessible and easy to digest and you dont even need to create something brilliant to satisfy the needs of the general public. Kill la Kill is a prime example of such work created by a director of BlackRock Shooter TV it simply catered to the popular demand for flashy action with minimum drama. It banged despite not having brilliant CGI sequences not being extremely visual and graphic not brilliantly referencing a cult classic show... Why even bother when you can create just another safe work of mediocre quality? I can speak here as an artist too when I was a hobbyist writer I was shocked to learn that my most popular works were wish fulfillment fantasies that were simply found relatable by my audience and soon stopped writing at all. It teaches us that unfortunately sometimes artists should learn to suppress their morals and create more accessible and popular works to earn enough money and attention to create something theyd really want to create. Even Ordet despite its founder Yutaka Yamamoto claiming how they would be creating something better than moe soon started to produce moe stuff despite they still were doing it with passion and it was probably really better than the regular moe it was still moe. Finally it teaches us that some art may simply be above us and we should always ponder if it is really bad or is just beyond our comprehension. Sadly we still dont have an objective measure of goodness or badness of art despite having objective measures in hard sciences and it is unlikely that someone would even want to develop it. Having such a measure would definitely help to determine whether a work is bad or is just beyond its audience and to discover a vast amount of brilliant works unjustly overlooked by the general public. Maybe BlackRock Shooter TV is really not great and its flaws are unforgivable and are just beyond me? I cant tell. BlackRock Shooter TV definitely suggests even more to learn from but I guess Ive already said everything in this review that really matters. Watch BlackRock Shooter TV see my tragic mahou shoujo interest stack on MyAnimeList for shows similar to BlackRock Shooter TV and MadokaMagica and dont forget to donate to Yutaka Yamamoto. Thank you for your attention.