Television Tekken: Bloodline (Coming August 18, 2022 to Netflix)

[Keyser_Soze]

 

[Dre801]

Sure, I'll watch.

[GameDadGrant]

Yeah I'll give a chance. 

[Jason]

[Keyser_Soze]

 

[Keyser_Soze]

 

[skillzdadirecta]

Just saw this trailer... I'm all in. Been waiting for a good Tekken anime for DECADES 

[Greatoneshere]

After the surprisingly well done Mortal Kombat and Street Fighter live-action webseries, it'd be nice to finally get some good Tekken as well.

[Keyser_Soze]

 

[skillzdadirecta]

This is pretty good.

[Keyser_Soze]

I started watching this and something bothered me off the bat. Netflix labeled English as the primary language and while a good handful of the cast are Asians voicing the English voices something didn't sit right with me. I go through the first episode in English but then switched to Japanese and re-watched the first episode and it was so much better. The Japanese voices have a lot more mileage under their belt and the voices not only are acted better feel more fitting. The English voices aren't that bad but if you listen to them back to back you can really tell a difference imo.

 

Another thing that I keep wavering on is the style of the show. I didn't mind at first and then it kind of bothered me, then I went back to liking how it looked. It certainly has a unique look to it. However, once you understand a lot of the show is actually CG I think the look really becomes convincing as a 3d show that looks 2D. I also enjoy the authentic looking Tekken hit sparks

 

But so far it's pretty good, I think it does a lot better job of explaining the background of the characters and establishing the purpose of the Iron Fist Tournament (at least as far as Tekken 3 is concerned)

[skillzdadirecta]

I finished it over the weekend... it was solid and enjoyable before it goes bat-shit insane at the end lol! The show DOES make you feel like it's the second season of an existing series and that you missed some important events but if you know the games, I played the first three Tekkens a LOT back in the day, then you're familiar with the story.

[Keyser_Soze]

I thought it was interesting how the used Julia's Tekken 7 costume instead of her Tekken 3 but then I remembered the T3 costume is literally a Native American stereotype including the headresss

And adding Leroy Smith in there for some reason as well. Maybe for the sake of diversity but why not Eddy? I think Tekken hates that guy after that joke ending they gave him. (I'm only on episode 3 so maybe he will show up)

[Greatoneshere]

I finally went back and watched this, I'd been intending to for awhile now. It was good! Not amazing or anything but a pretty rock solid adaptation of Tekken 3. It respected the prior history and stories of Tekken 1 and 2 (with some nice flashbacks to key moments from those games) whilst doing a pretty good job incorporating the characters and in certain cases their backstories correctly into the show. To properly adapt King 1 and King 2, Kuma 1 and Kuma 2, both Ancient Ogre and True Ogre, including Jin's Devil form, etc. is a pretty tall order and the show did it pretty well. It was short and sweet, and about the best you can expect from an animated adaptation of a fighting game series' story.

 

I actually thought the animation was good enough, with bold lines and solid artwork. They bothered to actually show and animate the different grapples and reversals the different characters can do in the games as well as including a couple of each characters' special moves. The sound effects were also pretty strong, an important factor with the fight scenes, where you could feel the hits ala the Tekken games, with the hits showing bounces of electricity and the colors going white. It was well directed. I also thought the dub was good enough with only Heihachi being an issue, it seemed mostly because they forced him to stick to Heihachi's animated lip flaps and the voice actor's primary language didn't seem to be English (perhaps intentionally so). 

 

Overall, I think anyone who is a fan of Tekken should check this out. It's easily better than the animated Tekken: The Motion Picture and way better than the two American live-action Tekken film adaptations. The show ends on a pretty big cliffhanger (the ending was the one weak point, it felt rushed) and the show hasn't been cancelled or renewed yet by Netflix - hoping for a season 2 since they laid a strong foundation here for more Tekken (somehow including 27 fighters from the games smoothly was also pretty impressive (including references and cameos)). I'd give this a 6.5/10 ultimately leaning towards a 7/10 but not quite there. It was fun to watch this after binging the three Mortal Kombat Legends animated films. Street Fighter and Soul Caliber be slacking.

 

Edit: @Keyser_Soze, I think they included Leroy Smith since he's such a new character that he has no backstory or anything yet in the games so this was an opportunity for the show to create one which they can retroactively add to him for the games. It was weird that every other character (even the references and cameos) in the show were all characters from Tekkens 1-3, making things consistent, and then for some reason Leroy Smith is there (and Craig Marduk is also shown, who was also not in Tekken 1, 2, or 3).