Visual Wit

⚠️ Series warnings (not discussed in detail in this entry): Chickens boinking (with humans voice acting this in an exaggerated, humorous way); non-sexual nudity (though the demons don’t have genitalia); blood

Personal rating 8/10

Niwatori Fighter first crossed my radar when I spotted the manga a couple of years ago as I idly browsed through the shelves of Fully Booked. I was immediately intrigued because it reminded me of a conversation I had with some of my college animanga orgmates way back when about local games and/or sports that we thought would make for good animanga (in this case, sabong/cockfights).

(Disclaimer: None of us are into sabong; it just came up because it’s very much a part of life here. Like, it’s very normal to see vacant lots in residential areas with little individual coops for gamecocks.

A quick peek at the blurb on the back of the manga revealed that the story wasn’t about anything as mundane as a rooster fighting other roosters; it was about a rooster fighting against demons and saving humanity. V01 was instantly added to my TBR pile because it sounded like the exact combination of silliness and action that I enjoy.

Imagine my surprise when I saw a trailer for an anime adaptation earlier this year. I didn’t know if the manga was any good or not—because my TBR pile is eternal and unmovable—but the premise seemed to me like the kind of thing that the general public wouldn’t be into enough to gain momentum for an anime. (As of writing, I haven’t really seen any posts about the series aside from a couple of mentions on anime_manga.)

I’ve completed S01 and my verdict is: I enjoyed this much more than I thought I would, and I’m glad I managed to convince a couple of officemates to give this a shot so I have someone to talk to with about it 😂

Niwatori Fighter, in a nutshell, is about Keiji the rooster’s quest for revenge on the demon that killed his sister, Sara. Demons in this world are closer to kaiju than the demons in Kimetsu no Yaiba and are born from humans’ extreme negative emotions.

( Cut for length and spoilers. )

All that to say, I hope this gets a S02 and the manga has moved up my TBR pile.

Random stuff:

• I like that people randomly turning into demons seems to be par for the course. Authorities have even got pre-recorded emergency broadcasts that they play when a new demon pops ups.
• Endlessly amused by that episode where Elizabeth outed Keiji as a “manwhore” and all the pigeons that thought he was cool were immediately turned off 😂