At first I want to say the good things about this anime. The only good thing is the animation and nothing else. The story is typical. The characters are mixed up from different other anime characters. There is no exploration on the characters let alone the story.
The story is super lame. You are always a vagabond with principles and past, and a cute girl just bumps on to you chased by bad guys. You’re not in the mood to rescue but saves the day in the end anyway. The girl sticks to you and she’s got some goddess like power unleashed at the end. What is this!
Only thing that got my attention was the character Yukimura and the other land lords. If the writers wished they could make a good strategic story. Nothing seemed special. I think it was a waste of time, but if you have time to kill and love action may take a ride in. (show less)

There’s shows that are original, created from scratch; there’s those that are game adaptions; there’s the manga adaptions; and then there are anime that feel like a prologue to their respective manga. “Brave 10” belongs to the last category. Its twelve episodes may do a nice job setting up what could be a concept with huge potential; yet when it feels like they got the rubble rollin’, the anime ends on a short note, leaving plot holes, unanswered questions, and probably a few bummed viewers. Or at least I’m not hyped.

I’m a fan of historical anime. “Brave 10” might have had quite a clichéd start-off (ninja and samurai; a priestess with a mysterious kind of power; a feudal lord gathering a bunch of warriors for a reason still unknown; a couple mysteries; friendship and betrayal...), but typical start-offs can work, after all. And with the Sengoku Era as background setting, I thought that it would work--throw in some political intrigue, shadow wars, feudal lords pitted against each other...

“Brave 10” is thin on its background, though, both historical and story-wise. If you don’t know about the era, the entire thing could well be a fantasy universe--a very Japanese-flavoured fantasy universe, that’s a given; but practically none of the political and social chaos from the era is referenced, despite the fact that a lot of its celebrities show up, and none too subtly.

The background of the story itself fares little better. About three quarters of the anime’s time is spent on building a setup. As such, there’s very little time left for the actual story, and the background a.k.a. why those ten warriors are gathered remains not all too clear. It looks like the biggest trouble along with the biggest revelations have yet to come after those twelve episodes; but the anime ended, after all, and it feels like all the time spent on the setup was wasted.

The pacing doesn’t exactly help the story. Most of the time is spent on sidetracks; gathering those so-called Braves, engaging in the fight of the week, etc. It remains uneven all the way through to the end, distracting more than contributing even to those little weekly sub-plots.

That’s not to say “Brave 10” doesn’t have its merits. The story is quite straightforward, and the mixture of genres and themes (action, comedy, bits of romance, the friendship/drama aspect, small mysteries) are probable to entertain a good part of the viewership out there. And I can’t complain about the action or the comedy for that matter. However, I’m out for story mostly; and that part is just... meh. There was potential, huge potential, but “Brave 10” simply took too long to get to the point and then fell flat on its nose in its last couple episodes. It’s entertaining enough for its action and comedy, but story-wise, I find it forgettable. It lacks both depth and closure, its pacing doesn’t help, and the characters...

Granted, those characters add at least a little flavour to the story. They’re easy to distinguish, and the mix is quire amusing. Also, their relationships are quite interesting, and the powers do have some originality. Sadly, that’s it for the characters, too. There’s practically no time to delve into backgrounds or develop any of those characters further than their basic and rather generic personality traits. I personally found myself unable to relate to any of them. They’re entertaining for their individual powers and the comedy they can provide, but there’s not much more to them. And don’t get me started on those cardboard-cut-out villains.

The dialogue is rather so-so. The script itself is rather repetitive, with quite a few lines too much. On the contrary, though, a lot of famous seiyuu (Ono Daisuke, Okiayu Ryotaro, Sakurai Takahiro, and a couple more) were involved in its production, and the voice acting is absolutely awesome.

I can’t complain about the technical merits, either. The animation’s up there; the art, though not always too realistic (I’m surprised some of those guys and gals don’t fall right out of their costumes when fighting ^^"), is colourful and vibrant. The action is fast, flashy, supernatural, and quite entertaining. The music sounds a bit odd (neither really traditional nor really modern), but it’s the least of distractions.

The action is fast, flashy, entertaining; and if you’re in for that mostly, then by all means, “Brave 10” isn’t a bad show. There’s a good dose of comedy, too--a bit stupid here or there, a little repetitive, but nothing that won’t get a laugh or two from most viewers out there. And after all, the show isn’t so long that a joke could get overused along its run.

If you’re in for the nonstop ninja action, for warriors with flashy elemental powers, for colourful art, and for comedy; then by all means, go ahead; “Brave 10” isn’t a bad show in this regard. Me however, I dig story, plot, and character development, and those just don’t deliver. I for myself can’t call “Brave 10” a good show. I don’t find it awful, either; it’s just very much typical. Due to the lacking closure, there’s far too many questions left unanswered; and what is there in setup and characters feels far too generic.

I can understand why people dig it, though. It’s fast, it’s furious, it has its comedic moments, it may be relaxing overall, and if you’re in for mostly that, have fun. If you do care about plot though, and more about plot than about action and comedy, there’s better Sengoku-era shows out there to pick. For me personally, “Brave 10” simply doesn’t do it. Had it spent more time on actual plot or on character development than on the trouble of the week, I might have liked it. As it is, though, I find myself simply not caring about it.


Oh. As a mere FYI, since I’ve been seeing comments on that all over the place; there’s a couple parallels to other shows if you look closely enough (Bleach, Naruto, Rurouni Kenshin, Sengoku Basara, Basilisk, Samurai 7, and probably a few more), and those parallels may be a bit more numerous and more eye-catching than with your usual show, but this is not a ripoff of anything else, as might already be obvious from the mix. ^^"


Cheers.~ (show less)

Even though Brave 10 is a cliché it does have some originality, the powers and abilities of the ninja and warriors have some originality. The story is about a ninja warrior, Saizou Kirigakure, who meets Nanami Isa after he rescues her from an assassination attempt and who later joins the war lord, Sanada Yukimura’s 10 brave warriors. The story is not very focused and was not able to keep my full attention. The animation is really good, but the dialogue was over repetitive and had a lot of unnecessary sentences. The characters seem interesting but there was not a lot of development. The series was entertaining, but only as a distraction, it was not something special. At the end I did enjoy it somewhat and I think others would find it enjoyable but not special. (show less)

the first episode hooked me up then the quality was decreasing continuously with each episode then i was very disappointed in the way things ended, the story got a huge potential for a vicious plot but was misused making the anime about a single event with the life-story of each character of the 10 braves each for each episode and they were even gathered in very inconvenient ways (reason-wise) thus please if you have expectations of a great story like i did don't watch it unless you have nothing else to watch, the hero is the usual badas* cold-hearted guy with the usual carefree warm-hearted heroine that will change his look on life ,,, pretty typical if you ask me ,,, but then again the fights are very nice and intense and were one of the reasons that made me watch the show till the end and so is the animation-style which is no less than any high expectation in quality, opening and ending aren't anything special and overall as sad i am to say but this anime is nothing special just average ... (show less)

At first it seemd very interesting : gathering a bunch of hot guys, priestess with demonic powers, friendship, betrayal, some mysteries behind it... Sounds a bit cliche but with those characters I thought it could work and made me at least like it.

Well, I can't criticize the amination, it's really very very good, the same goes for music; chracters were well-thought and different, relationship between them were interesting... but the whole show lacked a deepth!! As the title says it should be about strong warriors who were gathered for some reason, but in fact they lose their fights, showing nothing more than agility..

I don't want to write a spoiler so I won't go into the details, but the background ( politics, era they live in, behavior and position of Sanada) are not clear, well, this anime looks for me like something as sequel to a one big serie, though I don't think there will be one. Untill the end of the show you don't know WHY braves are gathered and even then it's not so clear.

Maybe this anime would be much much better with more developed storyline, more explanations and more than (what a joke!) 12 episodes... I think characters and action couldn't develop 'cause there wasn't enough time and this is probably the main reason I feel I lost my time on this. But, if for any chance there is a second season, some kind of continuation, then count me in for this, I won't miss it :)

And I still don't know if Kamanosuke is a woman or not xD (show less)