- Titles: World Trigger 3rd Season
- Genre: Action, sci fi, shonen
- Episodes: 14
- Studio: Toei Animation
Osamu and all of team Tamakoma are getting closer to being part of the away team but their hardest challenges are yet to come. The last leg of the rank wars is now underway and Osamu, Yuma, and Chika are going up against seasoned veterans with years of experience and stockpiles of trion. This is not going to get on a completely different level and the strategies they’ve used up until now will not work against opponents of this caliber. But they also have a secret weapon. Hyuse is now officially part of the team. But will this powerhouse prove to be more trouble than he’s worth? Especially once rumors start spreading about him and where this mysterious newcomer actually came from.
It’s Canada! He came from Canada! I want a t-shirt that says I’m From Canada like his. It’s so very inconspicuous. I guess if I wanted to really properly mirror the show, I would really need a t-shirt that says I’m a Neighbor but for some reason, I feel like that could get me in trouble.
Production
What can I say that I haven’t already? A couple of times. Season 3 of World Trigger has a lot more budget than season 1 and it shows in the animation. That’s a very good thing as the season is pretty much nonstop action. The payoff is a show that is very fun to just watch because of all the bouncing around on screen.
However, not much else has changed. The character designs are those distinctive ones we have come to know from past seasons. I will say I continue to really like the character designs in this show and I love the cartoonish eyes. But I do wish they were a bit more detailed. The settings and backgrounds are also reused from the previous season with no noticeable visual adjustment. That’s not a bad thing. I’m just saying that as far as production goes, season 3 is more steady than anything else.
Story & Characters
It’s difficult to explain the appeal of World Trigger in general to someone that has not watched it. It is, by any faithful description, a relatively standard action shonen with an old-school science fiction veneer. The premise is not particularly unusual and although you can definitely craft an interesting story from that starting point, it is not all that interesting in and of itself. In fact, there is nothing all that particularly notable about the plot or even the characters.
The characters are pretty well-rounded and fleshed out despite the fact that the series features a huge ensemble cast. They are likable and have fun traits. But they’re not all that striking. I have rarely seen any of them listed as anyone’s all-time favourite character. Which is a travesty since Raijinmaru is in this show.
Similarly, the story is good. I’m sure if I was to just start spelling it all out for you, you would probably read at least a couple of paragraphs. There’s some intrigue, a bit of tension some decent escalation, and even a few surprises. It’s good, but that’s it. There’s nothing here to really set World Trigger apart from the ocean of action shonen out there. And the first season was notoriously underfunded and rushed on top of it all.
Yet, in my experience, people who enjoy World Trigger, myself included LOVE World Trigger. The fans following may not be very large, but it is very loyal. I mean just look at the aggregators. This season that I’m reviewing right now currently sits at 8.3/10 on MAL and it is functionally just a repeat of season 2. Heck, the big emotional resolution was that a young girl learned how to murder people. I’m not kidding.
But just like all those other fans, as soon as I started watching this season, I quickly for wrapped up in it. The competitions bring out that fan mentality and I found myself cheering for my team and earnestly wanting to find out the outcome as if it wasn’t obvious. I could go through 3 or 4 episodes in a row and hardly notice it.
However, I can’t tell you why that is. I suspect the pacing is really well done. So well done in fact that I didn’t even notice it which is what good pacing tends to do. But that feels like too easy an explanation. Surely there’s more to it than it’s a normal story told at a really good pace. I‘m one of those people that thinks pacing has a huge impact and all, but I still don’t feel like it’s a complete explanation.
So here we are. At an impasse. You want to know the reasons you should watch World Trigger and all I can say is you’ll find out if you watch World Trigger. Not a very convincing argument, is it? Especially since the first season is a rather impressive 73 episodes and two more seasons after that, I still don’t think the main story has started. But it’s a good show. I can’t put it any other way. Especially if you enjoy action shonen and science fiction. It has all that classic world-building and complex rule stuff that made the golden age so fun.
I might not have convinced anyone but at least those of you who have watched the show know what I’m talking about, right? …right?
You might like this anime if:
I think you’ll like it, most people seem to
My favourite character:
there’s a right answer here and it’s Raijinmaru
Suggested drink:
- Every time Yuma gets cocky – take a sip
- Every time anyone does the “3” mouth – take a sip
- if it’s not Yuma – take another
- Every time anyone does the 3 line eyes – you’ll know it when you see it
- Every time anyone uses bagworm – get a blanket
- Every time anyone says “trion” – take a breath, they say it all the time
- Every time Osamu and Hyuse disagree – take a sip
- Every time Raijinmaru shows up – raise your glass
- Every time Jin shows up – put your glass back down
- Every time anyone says “neighbor” – take a sip
- Every time anyone is from Canada – cheer
- Every time Konami gets mad – duck
- Every time the fact that Chika can’t shoot people comes up – take a sip
I save all my screencaps on my Pinterest and you can find more there if you are interested. But I still like to show you a few in the post. If you’re like me, screencaps are something that really helps you decide to watch an anime or not.
You’re right about the pacing in this series. It’s fantastic. Also, I’m amazed by how much thought goes into the fights.
I tend to like most battle shounen. But the level of craft you see in World Trigger’s fights is exceptional. It’s not easy to build a power system with so many defined limitations, and still come up with so many surprising twists & turns. It’s not easy to juggle so many different characters in the same fight, while always holding true to their fighting profile or strategic goals, their skill level or mental state, their personal biases or team dynamics. It’s not easy to put so much emphasis on the fighter’s logical decision-making, yet still manage to justify every single move they make, while maintaining total mastery over the fight’s momentum.
Over time, you’d expect the internal consistency to give way, as the author boxes himself in & runs out of ideas. At some point, he feels the need to break his own rules, and damages the internal logic he’d spent so much effort maintaining. This has happened to nearly every shounen I enjoy. But it’s never happened to World Trigger. On the contrary, the longer this show goes on, the more layered the fights seem to become – always building off on what came before, without ever threatening the existing structure.
They started off juggling a couple balls in the air. They’re juggling 10 bowling pins right now, as they ride a monocycle on a tightrope, while doing 360° spins back & forth. And they’re still perfectly in balance.
Other than that, I think the show’s way too nice. But I’ll allow it!
Too nice. I hadn’t thought of that. It is a children’s show so maybe I’m giving it a pass for lack of bite
I really enjoyed the series. Not sure why. They spend so much time in their mock battles it feels like a sports anime.
It does! That’s part of what I enjoyed
Season 3 of World Trigger really felt like just season 2 of World Trigger being longer now. I really like the series, and I think the appeal for me is that all the characters are, when it comes down to it, lovalbe dorks. If they’re not, you probably didn’t get to know them yet, or they’re forced to be the straightman to the roomful of dorks (or they’re the leadership, though I’m not convinced they’re not just hiding their dorkiness – especially Scarface).
It’s true!!! There’s a general affable dorkiness permeating the whole thing
I was a really big fan of the first season! This was such a good anime, I loved binge watching it on the weekends a few years ago. And then 2020 happened and (like so many things) I just kind of forgot about it in the chaos. I really liked that Osamu wasn’t a “has all the power in the world and just needs some skills to control it” type character, but rather he is actually kind of weak and has to think out his actions to win a battle or competition. It’s kind of unique for a shonen main character. I should totally pick this series up again! Thank you for the reminder!
You really should. It gets better