Episode 7 – Thunder 3

Suffering through this dreadful series week after week feels like injecting pure disappointment straight into my bloodstream. Having genuinely loved the original manga, my sheer disbelief at how completely botched this anime adaptation turned out leaves me deeply frustrated. How on earth do you take such a wildly imaginative manga premise and transform it into something this agonizingly dull? At this point, I honestly wish this adaptation had never seen the light of day and that Thunder 3 had stayed purely in manga form. It easily ranks as the worst CG anime since EX-ARM, and the most disappointing manga adaptation since the disaster that was Übel Blatt. Even my daughter’s boyfriend—a university student studying digital art and animation—happened to be in the room while I subjected myself to this visual disaster, and his immediate reaction was, “What on earth is this? It looks awful.” So I know I’m far from alone in this sentiment. Between its sluggish pacing and its unyielding, unapologetic ugliness, Thunder 3 is a painful chore to sit through. The show even tries to poke fun at its own shortcomings when a background character watches battle footage on a phone and notes that it “looks worse than a PS2 cutscene.” They aren’t wrong, but the production staff openly calling out their own failures doesn’t come across as clever meta-humor; it feels tragic, like an actual cry for help. Someone really needs to pull the plug on this mess and put both the animators and the audience out of their misery.

Once again, the quirky little cartoon boys are practically missing in action. The few disconnected moments featuring Pyontaro accomplish absolutely nothing, while poor little Futaba remains trapped in the exact same room as the previous episode with zero narrative progress. The spotlight stays firmly fixed on the blank slate of Segami and his female companion, whose name escapes me—and frankly, it doesn’t matter, because none of this matters. The entire purpose of the episode is simply to introduce the effects of some alien nasal spray gimmick. Sure, it grants Segami’s ally a neat (though temporary) power to teleport solid objects directly inside the bodies of the alien invaders, but it’s far too little, far too late.

Leading up to that, the bulk of the episode consists of some of the most lifeless action sequences ever put to screen. You’d think choosing a CG production style would be a deliberate choice to pull off things traditional 2D animation struggles with, like dynamic, fluid camera work. Instead, the camera in Thunder 3 stays frustratingly fixed, save for the occasional lazy side pan or mild zoom. There’s zero energy, zero flair, and no effort made to spice up the action. The human characters’ facial expressions remain completely stagnant throughout. To borrow a fitting Scottish expression, they always look utterly “glaikit.” Even the aliens display completely rigid faces as they get gunmed down and slaughtered.

It certainly doesn’t help that the character models feature such poor lighting that they always look clumsily cut and pasted onto the backgrounds rather than naturally inhabiting the environment. The walk cycles are stiff, and even the fight choreography is poorly put together. Segami almost manages to look somewhat cool when he delivers a punch with his powered gauntlets, but the harsh fiery lighting just makes him look even more like a generic PS2 cutscene.

This installment was supposed to be the dramatic high point of the arc—a triumphant, fist-pumping moment where humanity finally fights back against its conquerors. Instead, it lands with all the enthusiasm of a wet paper towel, matching the lifelessness of its cast. You could easily condense the last three episodes into a single one without losing anything of actual value. I can barely stomach watching such a fun manga get dragged through the dirt any longer. Please, someone just make it stop.

Rating:

Thunder 3 is currently streaming on
Netflix.