Yakitate!! Japan

Pros: hilarious; you learn how to make interesting bread without having to watch the Food Network; the second ending theme; you get a whole new appreciation for bread (or food in general)

Cons: relies too much on Japanese puns; becomes predictable; not for those with a bad attention span; inconclusive ending

When I first saw the title, I thought this would be an interesting anime. That is, until I learned that it was a show about making bread. Well, I didn't give it a second thought and didn't watch it. But when I ran out of anime to watch, I finally decided to sit down and view this anime. After all, bread-baking isn't exactly the oddest concept for an anime. Yu-Gi-Oh! is about playing card games, and it has its fair share of fans. Anyway, after watching the entire series, Yakitate!! Japan is similar to Yu-Gi-Oh!: it has a stupid concept that could be a turn-off to its potential fans, but it's one wild ride.

Yakitate!! Japan is about a boy with the silliest name I've ever heard of, Azuma Kazuma, a not-too-bright and up-and-coming bread artisan with the "Solar Hands" who wants to create a bread, cleverly named Japan ("pan" = bread in Japanese), that the nation of Japan can proudly call its own. Along with this plucky Azuma are a cast of colorful characters: his Kansai friend/rival Kawachi, the swordsman Suwabara, the guy-who-I-first-mistook-as-a-girl-because-of-his-pink-hair-and-feminine-voice Kanmuri, the afroed Matsushiro (who dances to the disco tune of the second ending theme... in 3-D!), the kind and beautiful Tsukino (now one of my top 20 of my fave anime girls), and many more.

The main thing that attracts you to this anime is the comedy. The reactions for whenever someone eats or explains about a certain bread are over the top with lots of visual gags, and they're full of useful information to any bread artisans or cooks out there. But the problem with the comedy is that it relies a lot on (sometimes bad) Japanese puns, especially the Monaco Cup arc. Sometimes, the reactions relate the name of the bread to something completely different (e.g. - Thai-shiki ("shiki" = stlye) becomes Taiyaki (fish-shaped cake, which Azuma makes into a bread of his). Not being fluent in the Japanese language, I found myself constantly pausing to read the footnotes that appear in the fansubs so I can understand the joke.

Another problem is that the story becomes really predictable. The fact that the story consists of tournaments practically means that the main character Azuma will win all of them (with a couple of losses and draws sprinkled here and there). Also, since there's a lot of terms related to bread-baking thrown around, unless you actually do have some knowledge of bread-baking beforehand, you'll most likely be lost if you don't pay attention. The last problem is that the last arc of the story, the "Yakitate!! 25" arc, had been cut short to becoming the "Yakitate!! 9" arc in the anime.

Nonetheless, Yakitate!! Japan is a different approach in the shounen category, and a good one at that. It even won the 2004's Shogakukan Manga Prize for best shounen manga (I know. I couldn't believe it either when I first read it on Wikipedia). After viewing the entire series, I now have a whole new appreciation for the bread industry and am interested in learning how to make some of Azuma's Japan. So if you're tired of watching your everyday shounen anime, check out this light-hearted, bread-baking show.moreless

i love this show its so funny! hahhahaah! the version im watching is dubbed in my country's national language and usually i dont like watching those anime execpt if they are really good! and yakitate japan is one of those! i love yakitate japan! and it being dubbed in tagalog makes it even more funny! hhahahhaha... i havent watched the japanese version nor the english version if there is one... but yakitate japan is so great. i watched it like about 2 times already (almost all the episode twice) and im about to watch it for the third time! itssofunny!moreless

I am not a die-hard anime fan or an otaku one might say but I am an avid watcher of anime series. I choose the series I want to watch and the first time I saw Yakitate Japan it was around its 12th episode or so. Here in the Philippines I had the luxury to watch it in our dubbed languange that made it more funnier because of the revised lines but just to check I had to watch it again from youtube for the english subs. Another advantage for me is cable television even though Yakitate is running on one of the local channels its shown also in an anime channel for the complete episodes sometimes the show on the local tv gets cut for time constraints and of course its delayed so I could watch the first episode again.

Azuma Kazuma the main character in the story is a good symbol of how a simple teenage boy determination is. The thought of having a anime series revolving around bread making is absurd the fact that who wants to watch a series about baking anyway. I was wrong about that fact and I often set aside time for watching Yakitate any day of the week. Surrounded by wacky but colorful characters Yakitate would not be the stereotypical anime series without the big teardrops, impossible premise, and of course a relatively good moral story in which a pure hearted boy could win anything because he doesn't desire evil to win.

Overall as the end of its run comes to a near here in our country I'll always relive in youtube or another channel and later on buy the whole season on DVD.moreless

Yakitate!! Japan. Fresh baked bread. For those not in the know, 'pan' is 'bread' in Japanese, therefore 'Japan' is actually 'Ja-pan'; the bread of Japan (bear in mind that 'Japan' is not the Japanese word for their country, that would be 'Nihon'. So "bread of Japan" should be "Nihon no pan")

The show revolves around puns. Yes, puns, not pan. Unfortunately, it also means that the show is never going to make it to the US without heavy changes, since most of the puns won't make sense in English (Don't know how they're doing it with the manga, which is licensed).

It is a shame, though, that the anime had to end so early. I've seen up to episode 64, and I can't see how they can finish the series with only 5 episodes left unwatched. And my boyfriend says that the manga is still coming out, as well.moreless

When I first heard of this show, i was like "woah, a boy making bread! That's sure to be funny!" So, I checked it out. And really, I did like it. The characters have wonderful personalities, and it was a great laugh! I really loved it. This show isn't my favorite, but its one of my better-liked shows.