Anime Review: Flame of Recca

Review Flame of ReccaWritten by WarpshadowRating good

Perhaps the most damming problem many shows in a genre is that there is a show just like it but just a bit better. Such is the problem with Flame of Recca.

Recca Hanabishi always wanted to be a ninja and practiced every day at an attempt to become one. The meeting with two women allowed his dream to become a reality. They are Yanagi a woman with a strange power to protect and Kagehosi a stranger who tells Recca of the power of fire lying dormant inside of him. Kagehosi is not the most pleasant of mysterious women and sends enemies after Recca who will have to master his newly found fire power if he is to survive and protect Yanagi.

Flame of Recca is a fairly good example of what most people mean by shonen fighting anime. Most of the tropes that the genre is famous for including a team of ex-enemies and a martial arts tournament that in this case dominates the the second half of the show are all present. That being said it doesn't do anything that really sets this show apart from it's brethren in terms of originality or quality. This is complicated by the facts that the animation is a bit dated and the story ends a couple of arcs before the manga does. This is not to say that Flame of Recca is a bad show it is just that other shows fill the genre's shoes far effectively. Thus I can not really recommend it to anybody other than the odd person who, have already seen Naruto and Bleach wants to watch more of the same.