English Dub Review: Cardfight!! Vanguard overDress: “That’s CardFight Pro-Wrestling!!”

Overview: After agreeing to become a pro-wrestler in the hopes of saving his town’s wrestling club, Danji (Josh Meredith), with the help of Yu-yu (James Higuchi), trains in order to be his physical best in the ring. Although, he soon realizes that he gets more than he bargained for when he must take on famed wrestler, Hiroshi Tanahashi (Griffin Cork), challenges him to both a wrestling match and a cardfight battle. 

Our Take: Ever find yourself watching Cardfight!! Vanguard and think to yourself, “Pro-wrestling would definitely make this a lot better?” No? Neither did I. 

Quite frankly I was ready to write off this episode as the strangest peanut butter and pickles combination anomaly among the season. However, the decent comical value along with the twist ending made it well worth it though. 

The mere simple setup of Danji trying to keep the local wrestling club alive by joining it and taking on a new challenger is plot enough to. It is odd however, how Danji seemingly becomes a completely new person overnight in how arrogant he becomes and is a noticeably jarring inconsistency with his character thus far. Although, what is not inconsistent is the constant need to put Yu-yu in a dress and have him be uncomfortable because of it, not to mention him and Megumi basically being Danji’s fan girls 24/7. In fact, Yu-yu’s overtly feminium nature is becoming a bit eye rolling in how plainly conventional it is. 

Of course, whenever a character becomes overconfident and makes a grand statement in how he will win it all, it’s an anime law that it rarely comes to pass. And that’s exactly what happened. After running out the clock in a cardfight, Danji gets embarrassingly tossed around like a ragdoll in the most goofy and painful ways possible. That in and of itself made this episode at least somewhat enjoyable. But to make it even better, was how it was all to Tomari’s overzealous and utterly charming enjoyment and the fact that it was all meant for her in the end, considering how big of a Hiroshi fan she is. With the whole shenanigan being schemed by Zakusa in the background. I’ll give this episode props for that twist as even though it is quite evident it was Zakusa behind it, his true motives completely threw me for a loop in how he likes Tomari. The episode even went as far to tease it earlier in the episode even more so with. Tomari states how plotting Zakusa is, but in a completely different way that throws the audience off the exact scent. One other big reason this twist works as well as it does is how there was no indication earlier of Zakusa being that interested in Tomari (but truthfully who can blame him) with it truly being a curveball thrown out of left field.

“That’s CardFight Pro-Wrestling” , while featuring a lot of annoying character traits and inconsistencies, is an enjoyable romp with the pure comedic value of Danji’s over the top wrestling debut and the hilarious twist ending.