Tower of God

Title:Tower of God
Kami no Tō: Tower of God
神之塔 -Tower of God
Overall:Watch
Keywords: , , , , ,
Notables: Animation - Telecom Animation Film
HAYAMI Saori
ICHIKAWA Taichi
Anyone who can make it to the top of the Tower of God can have whatever they wish: power, fame, wealth, revenge-they can even become a God themselves. But ascending the tower isn't easy, as one must pass a series of deadly tests. After a girl named Rachel disappears within the Tower, her male friend Bam goes looking for her, which means he must pass these tests as well.

13 episodes
OverallArtAnimationCharacter Design MusicSeries StoryEpisode StoryReviewer
Watch 7 7 7 6 6 6 Ggultra2764 [series:3818#1552]
Based on the ongoing popular South Korean manhwa, Tower of God depicts a mysterious tower home to various unique environments on each of its floors and said to allow whoever reaches the top of it to be granted any wish they desire. Twenty-Fifth Bam is a young man trying to locate the whereabouts of his missing friend, Rachel, who chose to venture up the Tower. Choosing to climb the Tower himself to find Rachel, Bam encounters and befriends other participants of the trek up the Tower who have their own hardships faced due to their upbringings within the Tower.

I suppose I’ll get things out of the way and reveal my major issue with Tower of God that comes in the form of the show’s pacing. It does seem like the series is aiming to have a large-scale to its plot involving the world within the Tower itself and how the characters are affected by its power structure with some shown plotting and manipulating others to get an advantage to get further along in the tower’s trials. And there were enough characters introduced throughout the show’s 13-episode run, enough as such where it did make it tricky at points to figure who was who. The brisk pacing of Tower of God’s anime adaptation is more a detriment to this sort of plot because it left me the impression there were things with the manhwa cut out to fit it into a 13-episode series which does affect the flow of how events develop and how much time the series can have to flesh out its characters. Some like Rachel, Khun and Anaak do have enough fleshed out about them to explore their motives and/or pasts, but others left much to be desired either existing to fill a specific role for the series or seemingly would be important for later events within the series if another anime season comes out.

For the anime’s main character, Bam felt kind of generic as there didn’t seem to be much to him beyond being your typical kind-hearted hero able to befriend mostly everyone and seeming to have strong potential for combat within the Tower, which does make him seem kind of bland compared to most of the other characters in the series. I get the impression that the shocking plot twist seen from the final couple episodes will likely affect Bam’s character for later events in the series. But as this left things open-ended for the anime, it remains to be seen if Tower of God will have more seasons to continue its story.

Overall, I can see where there’s potential in Tower of God with what it dabbles into, but this will all depend on what plays out with Tower of God’s later events in its manhwa. But in regards to its anime adaptation, I think the series would have worked better having a two-cour run so it had more time for exploring its world and better developing its plot and characters. As it is, a good deal felt like it was missing with properly fleshing things out with its plot and characters with the large-scale storytelling that Tower of God’s seemingly striving to go for.

Last updated Sunday, December 27 2020. Created Sunday, December 27 2020.
Unevaluated Stretch [series:3818#628]
(Two episodes watched):

This is a mystical, existential tale but with the usual fighting to decide everything. As bizarre as it was (like the 'steel eel' that Bam had to face in his first test), at the end I did not feel particularly excited. Basically, no questions had occurred to me which I absolutely had to have answers for. Would Bam catch up to Rachel? Would he be able to pass every freakish test that lay before him? Would either of the two make it all the way to the top of the tower? I didn't really care. I hadn't really gotten to know either of them (or Princess Yuki or her aide, Evan) well enough to be concerned about what would become of them. Rachel ran off because she couldn't stand this 'black world', but I have no idea what was meant by that. The second test looks like something out of Darwin's Game. The whole concept that courage and skill at killing people will be rewarded with fantastic power is kind of nihilistic and unattractive. At least Bam has a less selfish goal, though it doesn't excite me much either. Perhaps another problem is that it's kind of hard to believe that anyone in their right mind would risk their life in this manner just to find a missing person. Bam doesn't know for sure if Rachel is really in the Tower, and if she is, he doesn't know if she's still alive. Is she some fantastical warrior maiden who might have passed these same tests? The sheer weirdness of the premise kept me watching for another episode. In episode two Bam meets Thun, a knowlegable and skilled fighter, and Rak, a lizard-like giant, and they team up. I remained modestly interested, but felt that this show would need to improve in a hurry in order to keep me watching. As it turned out, I decided not to watch any more.

Last updated Wednesday, July 22 2020. Created Friday, April 03 2020.

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