Sword for Truth Anime Review

Quick Review

• Reviewer: Marc
• Review Date: 2003-08-03 (updated 2010-11-02)
• 0 stars out of 5 (?)

Sword for Truth is bad. If you want a breakdown, here: The art is ugly, the plot is mostly random, it's totally inconclusive, and the whole mess is almost completely devoid of originality. The closest things it has to saving graces are heaps of poorly drawn gore and pointless sex. Yes, that's the good stuff.

Perhaps there are those who will enjoy parts of it, but unless you're a very big fan of ninja mayhem, you probably won't care enough to even sit through it.

Read the full-length review...

Full Review

• Reviewer: Marc
• Review Date: 2003-08-03 (updated 2010-11-02)
• 0 stars out of 5 (?)

Sword for Truth bills itself as the best ninja action since Ninja Scroll. This may be true, but only if it's the only ninja action movie since Ninja Scroll. In fact, despite logic dictating otherwise, even that may be a questionable claim because of the implication that anything about this mess is worth watching. Although all the elements are there, this ninja hack-and-slash flick is, at absolute best, a miserable ripoff of Ninja Scroll.

In fact, its so bad I can't even really bring myself to spend much time insulting it. Here's your short-form laundry list: The animation is generally weak, the art is downright bad (the main character is particularly ugly), the plot is mostly random, and the whole mess is almost completely devoid of originality. As if all that weren't bad enough by itself, the story is full of loose ends and is apparently the first part of a series (or is so badly written it feels like it)... but this is it. So, if it wasn't bad enough alone, it has no conclusion, either.

The characters consist of a wandering block of wood that passes for a hero, a generic princess, a big group of female ninjas who seem to be really good at getting cut to pieces, and a tragic assassin, who would probably be interesting if the series ever continued. Don't even ask about personality or character development--the only thing that could make me like the cast more is if they'd die faster so it would be over.

The only memorable features are the large volume of completely pointless sex and the extremely large number of severed body parts. If you're a splatterfest fan, don't get your hopes up--the violence has a surprising lack of blood and gory artistic detail that might've sparked some interest.

Overall, Sword for Truth is uniformly awful, both artistically and in plot, and unless you can't get enough of violence and ninjas, it's definitely in the must-avoid category.

Have something to say about this anime? Join our newly-resurrected forums and speak your mind.

Related Recommendations

Ninja Scroll is very similar, and much, much better. Those glutton for punishment might be interested in such anti-gems as Cybernetics Guardian and MD Geist.