I really like the Gantz manga, I've been reading it for some time and it's become one of my favorites, but the anime in my opinion is kind of bad.
I know what you're thinking, I'm probably being unfair comparing the two. But here's the thing, I watched the anime BEFORE I started reading the manga and still didn't like it. Now that I've read the manga, I'm glad I didn't watch it all the way through (and that I gave the manga a chance).
For one, the animation, to me at least seems lazy and kind of ugly, and that's without comparing it to the gorgeous art of the manga. It also constantly zooms in and out, making the world seem more artificial. I've seriously seen better animation in Neon Genesis Evangelion and Cowboy Bebop. You know you've done something wrong when animation from almost 10 years ago is better than yours. But even that is only a minor problem.
The story for Gantz is intense and violent for good reason, but with the anime, it felt kind of flat at times. And the pacing was all over the place, it didn't seem to know when to be intense and when not to be, not helped by the fact that it's got almost no music throughout and focuses on things that DIDN'T HAPPEN IN THE MANGA. We start the series off with the main character being a total jackass to everyone he meets and everyone KNOWING HIM FOR IT. Sure, in the manga, he was kind of a jerk, but very subtle and even pretty likeable, the anime just seemed to forget about all of that and make him like an unfunny Peter Griffin. That aside, each of the story arcs are so dragged out, the first story arc probably could've taken 2-3 episodes to complete, not FIVE. Not to mention that the endings to each episode are so sudden and nonsensical and each episode is full of random stuff that slows the plot down drastically, I can literally name at least 10 things in the first episode alone that didn't happen in the manga (for good reason) and screw up the continuity of the entire story.
Also, the ending was complete time filler crap that was VERY similar to the aforementioned Cowboy Bebop at the very end. There's also a lot of random new characters who have little depth or substance by comparison to the ones in the manga or earlier in the show. I know that some anime like Black Butler do that if there isn't any more source material at the time, but that's not the case for Gantz. By the first episode, there was a lot more story than they've got in the entire anime, in fact I'd say they only adapted a third of the existing source material at the time. All that time, I was just asking "did they blow their whole budget on how many unnecessary monologues and scenes there are?" Apparently so, cause I can't think of any other way they wouldn't include more of it.
On the plus side, though, the English voice acting is surprisingly good, Christopher Ayres in particular does a pretty good job as Kei Kurono, even if he kind of makes him sound older than he actually is. So is this a horrible show? That's kind of a strong word, but I personally didn't like it even BEFORE I read the manga. I think this series could use a reboot with a better, more competent production team because Gantz deserves a good anime adaptation. But if you're looking for good English dubs, check it out (I don't blame Funimation in any way, I just blame the original team). Also, I know I'm in the minority, but still, this is my two cents on the show, I enjoyed Gantz: 0 a lot more
I know what you're thinking, I'm probably being unfair comparing the two. But here's the thing, I watched the anime BEFORE I started reading the manga and still didn't like it. Now that I've read the manga, I'm glad I didn't watch it all the way through (and that I gave the manga a chance).
For one, the animation, to me at least seems lazy and kind of ugly, and that's without comparing it to the gorgeous art of the manga. It also constantly zooms in and out, making the world seem more artificial. I've seriously seen better animation in Neon Genesis Evangelion and Cowboy Bebop. You know you've done something wrong when animation from almost 10 years ago is better than yours. But even that is only a minor problem.
The story for Gantz is intense and violent for good reason, but with the anime, it felt kind of flat at times. And the pacing was all over the place, it didn't seem to know when to be intense and when not to be, not helped by the fact that it's got almost no music throughout and focuses on things that DIDN'T HAPPEN IN THE MANGA. We start the series off with the main character being a total jackass to everyone he meets and everyone KNOWING HIM FOR IT. Sure, in the manga, he was kind of a jerk, but very subtle and even pretty likeable, the anime just seemed to forget about all of that and make him like an unfunny Peter Griffin. That aside, each of the story arcs are so dragged out, the first story arc probably could've taken 2-3 episodes to complete, not FIVE. Not to mention that the endings to each episode are so sudden and nonsensical and each episode is full of random stuff that slows the plot down drastically, I can literally name at least 10 things in the first episode alone that didn't happen in the manga (for good reason) and screw up the continuity of the entire story.
Also, the ending was complete time filler crap that was VERY similar to the aforementioned Cowboy Bebop at the very end. There's also a lot of random new characters who have little depth or substance by comparison to the ones in the manga or earlier in the show. I know that some anime like Black Butler do that if there isn't any more source material at the time, but that's not the case for Gantz. By the first episode, there was a lot more story than they've got in the entire anime, in fact I'd say they only adapted a third of the existing source material at the time. All that time, I was just asking "did they blow their whole budget on how many unnecessary monologues and scenes there are?" Apparently so, cause I can't think of any other way they wouldn't include more of it.
On the plus side, though, the English voice acting is surprisingly good, Christopher Ayres in particular does a pretty good job as Kei Kurono, even if he kind of makes him sound older than he actually is. So is this a horrible show? That's kind of a strong word, but I personally didn't like it even BEFORE I read the manga. I think this series could use a reboot with a better, more competent production team because Gantz deserves a good anime adaptation. But if you're looking for good English dubs, check it out (I don't blame Funimation in any way, I just blame the original team). Also, I know I'm in the minority, but still, this is my two cents on the show, I enjoyed Gantz: 0 a lot more