Story

Preparing for the battles to come, tournaments and to fight against new opponents from over the world, Hakufu is working to have enough money to make her dream true. But she doesn't consider that old and new allies and enemies will come to scene, and also being a weak leader to the eyes of her companions. A sister also appears. She doesn't even know her mom's past so better to star from the local stuff before attempting to go worldwide.

Review

The Ikkitousen series is known for it's heavy-hitting fighting and slightly complicated story that delves into different fighter factions. Okay, who am I kidding... Yeah, the series real main highlights are panty shots, tongue-in-cheek humor, and mucho fanservice! This puts it as a niche series that you'll either love or hate. The first season opened up with a light story that centered on opposing schools fighting for the top spot, it featured kick ass fight scenes with clothes tearing at just the right area, and gratuitous panty shots in almost every scene possible. Then, the second season scaled back on the fighting, humor, and even fanservice (WHAT?!) to try to show a more serious side to the series. It didn't pay off since all they added was a lot of extra, uninteresting dialog to the story that took up too much of the episode. It wasn't until the last few episodes that the action and humor (still, not much fanservice though) ramped up but it all felt too late by the end of the season. To make up for the lack of fanservice, they added a series of OVA's that centered on boobies and a fluffy story. So hows does season three stack up?

The first scene starts off with the fists comin' out!

Taking the best and worst from season one and two, the third season mixes the humor and fanservice from the first with a deep story from the second. The main set up for the story focuses on Ryofu [from season one], Saaji, a new mysterious girl, and Chuubo, Hafuku's new little sister. All the new and current characters are a lot more interesting this time around. Kanu now has a thing for Ryuubi (girl on girl action!), Hafuku's as lovably dumb as ever but is still a good leader, the new mysterious girl has some serious issues, and Ryofu is still a bitch like from the first season. And then, there's Chuubo, Hafuku's little sister, who seemed to have no type of character development at all and turned out to be a total bore. Seeing as how she wears a Toushi [fighter] earring, I was expecting her to kick some ass out of no where eventually. But, throughout the entire season, all she does is play the sweet girl role, get captured, throw out quotes from Sun Tzu, and yell “HAFUKU ONEESAMA!” any time she's in trouble.

Chuubo not yelling, "HAFUKU ONEESAMA!" for a change

The fun and light atmosphere from season one is back in the first few episodes. The first episode has Nanyo and Seito meeting up by accident. Hafuku and Kanu get into a brawl when Kanu thinks Hafuku is making a move on Ryuubi. Then the fists start flyin' and the clothes start tearin'! After a few light episodes like this, the season ramps up in the story. This is where the aspects of season two come around. A new mysterious girl with manipulative powers and Saaji show up causing all sorts of questions and trouble to come up. The problem here is that, again, they took too long in settling the story and did not have enough action. There are a few good fight scenes mixed in between episodes 6-10, but there way too short. It's not until episode 11-12 that the real fighting starts to happen, but even that is a little lackluster. They just didn't add enough scenes that were as cool and detailed like what is shown in the first episodes opening between the fight with Kanu and Ryofu.

Oh, Hafuku... you were only trying to help!

Overall, Great Guardians was fun and enjoyable. It's not meant to be taken too seriously (c'mon, the series is known for it's fanservice; panty shots, and clothes tearing), but it has it's moments where it comes off awesome in both humor and action. If you like anime with plenty of fanservice, tonge-in-cheek humor, and fist fighting, then Ikkitousen: Great Guardians is worth checking out! A fourth season hasn't been announced yet, but with two new video games and the hot selling PVC figures, it's a possibility. Especially, after the interesting preview they showed at the end of the series (check out the screenshot below) which might be a clue to where their taking the series next.

This is what the next season of Ikkitousen might look like. This would make a sweet Soul Calibur IV spin off game! The engine is perfect for it.


Overall Score - 8/10