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A Big Beyblade Analysis - GHero - Apr. 06, 2022
I made a write up about the Beyblade Burst anime, hope you enjoy.
Spoiler (Click to View)
Let's Set the Scene
So after a Generation of Beyblade finishes, Beyblade goes into hibernation for 2-3 years, before revealing their brand spanking new product. The most recent new product is Beyblade Burst. It's seemingly about to end after a 7 year run, doubling the average time for the past 2 Generations (3 Years). Beyblade Burst launched it's manga in 2015, with the anime starting in 2016. Despite this 1 year gap, since the manga serializes once every month, the anime has caught up to the manga by the second season. This caused...problems, to say the least. But first, we must ask:
We Do People Care So Much
The first season of Beyblade Burst (simply titled Beyblade Burst) was a laid back more slice of life season that let you bond with the characters. So, needless to say, people got attached, really attached. Here are 3 note worthy characters. The fun, loud, spunky, and hard working protagonist Valt Aoi, seemingly edgy but nice pro focused on revenge, Shu Kurenai, and edgy mean boy that has hair that turns into fire (for.....reasons), Lui Shirosagijo (simply Shirosagi in the English dub).
People loved these guys, this love sky rocketed with the next season, generally regarding as the best Burst season and very well written with in the fanbase, Beyblade Burst God (known as Evolutions in the English dub). Lui appeared, got some minor growth, but nothing huge. Shu on the other hand failed his revenge plot and wanted any chance at a comeback, so a shady organization "recruited him" under the guise of genetic modification (he didn't actually change, they basically just made him 2 new Beyblades). This dramatic character shift that further examined Shu's character after the fall out at the end of Season 1 is heavily adored, and brought lots of people very close to Shu. Shu's best friend Valt, wanted him back from the evil place, and grew in the process when faced with the fact that he could not win in his primitive "power good, hit hard, win" state.
Not only that, but a new pretty boy dropped, his name is Free De La Hoya. He's the world champion, but is super lazy and edgy because no one is good enough for him...very stand out character traits as you can see, however he has a sweet side with his childhood friend Kris, and his pet deer he just met in the woods, I guess. Also he has a super edgy side when he gets serious (he bites his arm when this happens, he caused serious damage to it hence the weird gauntlet thing so protect his skin), so bonus points for fangirls.
When Beyblade Burst
Everything seems good so far, so what happened? Nowadays some people will say Sparking happened, but at the time, most people would say: Chozetsu happened (known as Turbo in the English dub). Free and Shu did their jobs and looked cool in the process, but the one with the biggest fanbase, Valt, got knocked down a peg. Our new protagonist in Aiga Akaba (known as Aiger Akabane in the English dub). He's an up coming blader, but beating pre established power houses along with new super strong threats is hard, so he gained the power of plot armor. They introduced Resonance in the season. It technically has always existed, but now was given a name and great emphasis. Basically Resonance is when you connect with your Beyblade. If it's super positive, it's True Resonance. If it's negative, you get Dark Resonance.
Aiga got the latter when he forcefully pushed his Beyblade, named Achilles super hard to defeat his opponents. This should give him some extra power, with cracks and eventual breakage as a pay off.....but this was not equivalent exchange. Achilles broke alright, but only after disrespecting the world champion, Valt Aoi (previous protagonist). His Dark Resonance just let him gain an arbitrary amount of power depending on the situation. This isn't tied to skill, just yelling loudly. This yelling loudly, led him to not only destroying Valt in a Beyblade battle, but breaking Valt's Beyblade. Woe is me, funny anime man lost Beyblade battle. Unfortunately, the dedicated fans were not happy. They were even less happy when he beat Valt and became the world champ at the end of the season (post Dark Resonance btw).
So, that sucked, didn't it. A quality drop, but the next season is sure to fix everything, not all of the seasons can be winners. Wait, next season? Beyblade usually goes on for 3 seasons, so a forth, let alone 6th, was unprecedently. Each season just felt more and more soulless, so by the end fans were bored. Speaking of bored, let's introduce the boring problem ™ with Beyblade Burst GT. Remember when I mentioned the anime caught up to the manga? This means either very slow plot progression, or straight up filler. This made the anime boring to watch. I won't go over every instance, but starting from here it got noticeable. This was GT's biggest problem. Most of the time was spent hanging out with characters than advancing the plot. Depending on what you prefer, this is either great or horrible. Not only that, but starting with GT, Beyblade switched to 10 minute episodes that were mainly distributed through YouTube.
Breaking Through the Breaking Point
GT was just okay for most people, but nothing concerning like Chozetsu. The next, however, was at the time thought to be so bad that Beyblade could not get any worse (until the next season of course). Enter: Beyblade Burst Sparking. By GT lots of fans had already quit the series due to boredom, so hearing that fan favorite characters were returning had everyone excited. Was wasn't exciting, was new plot armor. The returning characters were treated pretty well, with almost all of them getting a good moment or 2. The villain, was not a smash hit for most people. Lean Walhalla (known as Lain Valhalla in the English dub) dominated the returning characters one after another. The explanation for this, was that his Beyblade essentially had a forcefield. The problem is that this forcefield was inconsistent. Aiga could break through it randomly, but the world champion Valt (he regained his title between Chozetsu and GT) couldn't at his full power.
Let's look into that for a second. Lots of these losses happened at the mid season tournament are, the Legends Festival. Every returning character, along with the 2 protagonists (Hyuga and Hikaru) and Lean went to a big tournament. Lean dominated the tournament, he even tanked the attacks of 4 returning bladers at once, somehow. People were not happy, however the other dream matchups made up for it...until the end. Valt and Lean, the ultimate battle. Aiga got very close to beating Lean and he was the #3 best Blader worldwide, so Valt should be able to win. He didn't. Chaos ensued. The animation went bonkers, but the overworked, underpaid anime staff could not make up for the writing quality. Every absolutely hated Sparking now. Him beating Shu afterwards did not help at all.
The arcs after this were very controlled compared to the festival, but everyone had their bloodshot hater eyes activated, searching for every single flaw. Dynamite Battle followed as the last anime season (it ended last month). The main character, Bell Daikokuten (known as Bel in the English dub) powered up to defeat strong characters by making upgrades instead of training, and fans disliked the artificial development. The final arcs also felt pretty weird. Ilya, the first female blader with her own unique Beyblade, had a Hasbro Beyblade (they make poor quality Beyblades, so seeing it represented in the anime was not liked). Also, new psycho pretty boy dropped, Phenomeno Payne. Despite appearing super late and disappearing at the end, his arc was pretty well liked, however weakened by the fact hat his motivation was losing a Beyblade battle (not impressive compared to Shu's 2 year revenge plot against Lui for permanently scarring his eye).
Dynamite Battle seems pretty tame compared to other seasons, and it is, but most fans have it as their most hated Beyblade season of all time. I guess it just hit different. Also, I did say Burst went for 7 years, but only went over 6 seasons. The current years' content, Burst Universe, does not have an anime.
In Conclusion
So, the mediocre writing and beloved character disrespect left people very disappointed. Fans quickly trickled out, and now the fanbase is pretty stale. this is actually half the reason why, but I don't feel like fully detailing the Beyblade Burst competitive scene and how it crashed and burned when I barely understand basic meta combos. I tried my best, but the sheer anger cannot be replicated through my text. It was hilarious when I woke up on Friday morning, watched the episode, saw something I knew people wouldn't like, and saw people relentlessly bashing it after. So many people left except the dedicated fans, but the dedicated fans seem hate it the most. This created somewhat of a hivemind mentality, so you'd be hard pressed to find someone that think every single Burst season is just good at the very least. This downward spiral tore the community down to it's bones and just let it drift about in the wind. Looking at how many people were using the WBO compared to know is just depressing. We can only hope the next generation will breath some much needed life into Beyblade.
So after a Generation of Beyblade finishes, Beyblade goes into hibernation for 2-3 years, before revealing their brand spanking new product. The most recent new product is Beyblade Burst. It's seemingly about to end after a 7 year run, doubling the average time for the past 2 Generations (3 Years). Beyblade Burst launched it's manga in 2015, with the anime starting in 2016. Despite this 1 year gap, since the manga serializes once every month, the anime has caught up to the manga by the second season. This caused...problems, to say the least. But first, we must ask:
We Do People Care So Much
The first season of Beyblade Burst (simply titled Beyblade Burst) was a laid back more slice of life season that let you bond with the characters. So, needless to say, people got attached, really attached. Here are 3 note worthy characters. The fun, loud, spunky, and hard working protagonist Valt Aoi, seemingly edgy but nice pro focused on revenge, Shu Kurenai, and edgy mean boy that has hair that turns into fire (for.....reasons), Lui Shirosagijo (simply Shirosagi in the English dub).
People loved these guys, this love sky rocketed with the next season, generally regarding as the best Burst season and very well written with in the fanbase, Beyblade Burst God (known as Evolutions in the English dub). Lui appeared, got some minor growth, but nothing huge. Shu on the other hand failed his revenge plot and wanted any chance at a comeback, so a shady organization "recruited him" under the guise of genetic modification (he didn't actually change, they basically just made him 2 new Beyblades). This dramatic character shift that further examined Shu's character after the fall out at the end of Season 1 is heavily adored, and brought lots of people very close to Shu. Shu's best friend Valt, wanted him back from the evil place, and grew in the process when faced with the fact that he could not win in his primitive "power good, hit hard, win" state.
Not only that, but a new pretty boy dropped, his name is Free De La Hoya. He's the world champion, but is super lazy and edgy because no one is good enough for him...very stand out character traits as you can see, however he has a sweet side with his childhood friend Kris, and his pet deer he just met in the woods, I guess. Also he has a super edgy side when he gets serious (he bites his arm when this happens, he caused serious damage to it hence the weird gauntlet thing so protect his skin), so bonus points for fangirls.
When Beyblade Burst
Everything seems good so far, so what happened? Nowadays some people will say Sparking happened, but at the time, most people would say: Chozetsu happened (known as Turbo in the English dub). Free and Shu did their jobs and looked cool in the process, but the one with the biggest fanbase, Valt, got knocked down a peg. Our new protagonist in Aiga Akaba (known as Aiger Akabane in the English dub). He's an up coming blader, but beating pre established power houses along with new super strong threats is hard, so he gained the power of plot armor. They introduced Resonance in the season. It technically has always existed, but now was given a name and great emphasis. Basically Resonance is when you connect with your Beyblade. If it's super positive, it's True Resonance. If it's negative, you get Dark Resonance.
Aiga got the latter when he forcefully pushed his Beyblade, named Achilles super hard to defeat his opponents. This should give him some extra power, with cracks and eventual breakage as a pay off.....but this was not equivalent exchange. Achilles broke alright, but only after disrespecting the world champion, Valt Aoi (previous protagonist). His Dark Resonance just let him gain an arbitrary amount of power depending on the situation. This isn't tied to skill, just yelling loudly. This yelling loudly, led him to not only destroying Valt in a Beyblade battle, but breaking Valt's Beyblade. Woe is me, funny anime man lost Beyblade battle. Unfortunately, the dedicated fans were not happy. They were even less happy when he beat Valt and became the world champ at the end of the season (post Dark Resonance btw).
So, that sucked, didn't it. A quality drop, but the next season is sure to fix everything, not all of the seasons can be winners. Wait, next season? Beyblade usually goes on for 3 seasons, so a forth, let alone 6th, was unprecedently. Each season just felt more and more soulless, so by the end fans were bored. Speaking of bored, let's introduce the boring problem ™ with Beyblade Burst GT. Remember when I mentioned the anime caught up to the manga? This means either very slow plot progression, or straight up filler. This made the anime boring to watch. I won't go over every instance, but starting from here it got noticeable. This was GT's biggest problem. Most of the time was spent hanging out with characters than advancing the plot. Depending on what you prefer, this is either great or horrible. Not only that, but starting with GT, Beyblade switched to 10 minute episodes that were mainly distributed through YouTube.
Breaking Through the Breaking Point
GT was just okay for most people, but nothing concerning like Chozetsu. The next, however, was at the time thought to be so bad that Beyblade could not get any worse (until the next season of course). Enter: Beyblade Burst Sparking. By GT lots of fans had already quit the series due to boredom, so hearing that fan favorite characters were returning had everyone excited. Was wasn't exciting, was new plot armor. The returning characters were treated pretty well, with almost all of them getting a good moment or 2. The villain, was not a smash hit for most people. Lean Walhalla (known as Lain Valhalla in the English dub) dominated the returning characters one after another. The explanation for this, was that his Beyblade essentially had a forcefield. The problem is that this forcefield was inconsistent. Aiga could break through it randomly, but the world champion Valt (he regained his title between Chozetsu and GT) couldn't at his full power.
Let's look into that for a second. Lots of these losses happened at the mid season tournament are, the Legends Festival. Every returning character, along with the 2 protagonists (Hyuga and Hikaru) and Lean went to a big tournament. Lean dominated the tournament, he even tanked the attacks of 4 returning bladers at once, somehow. People were not happy, however the other dream matchups made up for it...until the end. Valt and Lean, the ultimate battle. Aiga got very close to beating Lean and he was the #3 best Blader worldwide, so Valt should be able to win. He didn't. Chaos ensued. The animation went bonkers, but the overworked, underpaid anime staff could not make up for the writing quality. Every absolutely hated Sparking now. Him beating Shu afterwards did not help at all.
The arcs after this were very controlled compared to the festival, but everyone had their bloodshot hater eyes activated, searching for every single flaw. Dynamite Battle followed as the last anime season (it ended last month). The main character, Bell Daikokuten (known as Bel in the English dub) powered up to defeat strong characters by making upgrades instead of training, and fans disliked the artificial development. The final arcs also felt pretty weird. Ilya, the first female blader with her own unique Beyblade, had a Hasbro Beyblade (they make poor quality Beyblades, so seeing it represented in the anime was not liked). Also, new psycho pretty boy dropped, Phenomeno Payne. Despite appearing super late and disappearing at the end, his arc was pretty well liked, however weakened by the fact hat his motivation was losing a Beyblade battle (not impressive compared to Shu's 2 year revenge plot against Lui for permanently scarring his eye).
Dynamite Battle seems pretty tame compared to other seasons, and it is, but most fans have it as their most hated Beyblade season of all time. I guess it just hit different. Also, I did say Burst went for 7 years, but only went over 6 seasons. The current years' content, Burst Universe, does not have an anime.
In Conclusion
So, the mediocre writing and beloved character disrespect left people very disappointed. Fans quickly trickled out, and now the fanbase is pretty stale. this is actually half the reason why, but I don't feel like fully detailing the Beyblade Burst competitive scene and how it crashed and burned when I barely understand basic meta combos. I tried my best, but the sheer anger cannot be replicated through my text. It was hilarious when I woke up on Friday morning, watched the episode, saw something I knew people wouldn't like, and saw people relentlessly bashing it after. So many people left except the dedicated fans, but the dedicated fans seem hate it the most. This created somewhat of a hivemind mentality, so you'd be hard pressed to find someone that think every single Burst season is just good at the very least. This downward spiral tore the community down to it's bones and just let it drift about in the wind. Looking at how many people were using the WBO compared to know is just depressing. We can only hope the next generation will breath some much needed life into Beyblade.