English Dub Season Review: Scar on the Praeter Season One

Overview (Spoilers Below):

In an alternate reality of a world not unlike our own, there’s been a rebellion in the Akatsuki Special Ward of Tokyo. Because of this uprising, the government in the city collapses and civilians are forced to fend for themselves. Since there’s no more government presence in the area, it becomes a hotbed for criminal activity.

But just because there’s no official government agents around doesn’t mean people can cause whatever chaos they want. Vigilante superheroes known as the Scard work to protect the distract from outsiders and unwanted violence. The have special powers granted by their so-called ‘Divine Tattoos’—and Yamato Kai is one of them. He received his tattoo from the former Hero of Akatsuki who he almost died defending.

He teams up with the hero’s friends and together they do battle to try and extend the lifespan of the fallen ward. But will they be able to use their powers for the right purpose when there are so many shadowy figures who want to gain power in Akatsuki for themselves?

Our Take:

Scar on the Praeter isn’t exactly your average anime. Coming from the minds behind Hand Shakers and K, it’s a story about strife and struggle between generic superhero’s with special powers and weird tattoos. In other words, it’s pretty much exactly what you’d expect from Studio GoHands. The overall consensus seems to be that this show actually is a bit of an improvement over Hand Shakers—but that still doesn’t mean it’s a good show.

The thing that stands out the most about Scar on the Praeter is the animation. (It certainly isn’t the characters or the story or the music or the… you get my point.) GoHands has become known for this specific look over the last decade or so, and the best way to describe it is that’s it’s very loud visually: off-putting designs, funky effects, and lots of 3D.

While Hand Shakers was decried as being one of the worst looking shows ever animated, I wouldn’t quite go that far for Scar on the Praeter. I was actually never a huge critic of this kind of style. I would much rather a show go big and crazy than merely phoning it in with bland, forgettable animation. This might not be good, but at least it leaves an impression!

What doesn’t leave an impression is the rest of the show. From the boring storyline to the bland and forgettable characters, there’s just nothing worthwhile. The entire show you’ll be thinking, ‘why am I wasting my time when there’s nothing here to be invested in?’. The main character does generic main character things, like heroically sacrificing himself for a guy he just met. The annoyed sidekicks do annoyed sidekick things like grumbling about their hero being late but making them breakfast anyway. And meanwhile, the show adds lots of clunky twists and competing organizations that just muddies the plot and leaves it all feeling too much but also too little at the same time.

Funimation’s English dub is servicable. There are some solid performances throughout, like Ryan Colt Levy’s upbeat delivery as our lead hero. Where it gets less good is the writing, although that’s probably just a consequence of the original Japanese scripts. This is the kind of show where characters say things to pump each other up like “show me your fangs!”. Poetry, this ain’t.

Scar on the Praeter may be a fun watch for those really into urban action anime or those who have history with some of the studio’s prior work. But for the rest of us, Scar on the Praeter is unlikely to leave any lasting mark.