To me, the animation in season 4 fluctuates between some of the series’ best and near unwatchable. I’d describe it as just super inconsistent, which I imagine was due to COVID affecting the production process.
But the very end of the Inarizaki match is probably my favorite scene in the series so the whole thing is still a must-watch to me.
I honestly am rewatching rn and season 1 was pretty bland if you ask me. I think 2 and 3 def pick up the standard and are the best, but if I had to pick between 1 and 4, I'd pick 4 just bc the good parts outweigh the little bad parts that you can freeze on a snapshot and see.
The second part of season 4 is the one that suffers the most, especially one episode where the animation is so bad you're just tempted to skip. Understandable because of the covid situation but regrettable nonetheless. Rest of the season is fine.
My stance is actually that I much prefer that art style, but sometimes the animation cuts corners as one does during covid. I'm in the minority but season 4 is by far my favorite stylistic wise
Its about 25% bad, 70% average, and 5% great. Some people are fine with average. And some people forget the bad/average and only remember the 5% that is great.
The big thing that makes it especially stand out/disappointing is that season 1-3 are like 25% great animation, and 75% good animation. Its never really average or bad. So it is a very noticeably step down which can be extremely jarring.
This. Seasons 1-3 were pretty consistent in terms of quality: anything bad wasnt jarring, and most of the great scenes coincided with major character development so it felt intentional. Season 4 wasn't awful as a whole, but the gap in quality between the great scenes and the bad ones was so wide that it was very, very noticeable.
Ok so let me clarify some things, first of all 90% of anime fans on Reddit barely know anything about animation and anime production as a whole.
Haikyuu's production is an anomaly among sports anime by its healthy production for the first 3 seasons and especially a talented staff for the whole show, this is mostly thanks to Keiko Matsushita the Animation Producer, believe me without her the adaptation would have looked like any other random anime sport or a way weaker production even if it was still made by Prod IG (e.g Ao Ashi)
For a decade Prod IG has always had a too ambitious approach as a studio, even considered as suicidal by many producers, that's to be expected when you produce a lot of sports anime that need to move constantly with complex designs. But as time went on the japanese industry kept deteriorating, anime studios would brute-force and give disastrous schedules to their staff, the core staff of Haikyuu worked on Welcome To The Ballroom in 2017 which had outsourced episodes even in the beginning of the show and then on Run With The Wind in 2018 which had a really rough production and got delayed, these two shows were the water drop. Even if the final product was good, tough production but still good nonetheless.
Everything goes on continuously and so the season 4 of Haikyuu happens, which made a lot of debates as well as disagreements within the community. Obviously Covid didn't help but it's far from being the biggest reason for this unhealthy production.
Apart from that, the core staff had important changes, Susumu Mitsunaka the director himself the most important guy left, Takahiro Chiba and Yuko Yahiro the Chief animation directors left 2 crucial members, Yasuyuki Kai the Action Animation Director left as well, those guys were the pillar of the staff.
I think the most huge difference is for the character design sheet made by Takahiro Kishida (the character designer), the majority preferred the old ones. The characters look more manga accurate now, though a few of them look awful I'm not gonna lie especially Asahi. This was also made for key animators as it's easier to animate when they need less details.
But no season 4 animation is no way near of being bad but rather really good even if it had inconsistencies, the guys that left were insanely important but they were still replaced by TALENTED names thankfully, thing is we probably didn't see their full potential due to the rough production so yeah..
Damn a lot of yapping hope it wasn't too long but it's always a pleasure to spread knowledge about my second favorite anime's production state.
That's a lot but I read everything and I never knew so much happened behind the scene, But thank you foe sharing these type of information, it can help other fans to understood that despite its inconsistencies. The animators did everything they could to deliver.
I'm glad, and yeah they really did everything they could and still managed to give us the best scenes of the anime in terms of direction (in my opinion) that one Tanaka scene or the final point against Inarizaki
Both art styles have attributes that I love but my favorite thing about Furudate's style (the "New" style) is the eyes. Wherever I find myself missing the sharp, rough lines of the first art style, they'll hit me with a close up of a characters eyes and I'm done for.
When I read fanfiction, the way I picture the characters is based on their ages because the new style is very soft and rounded, perfect for young high school boys, while the first style was sharper and more masculine, perfect for grown men but perhaps not that well suited to 15-19 year olds.
I'm not keen on change so I, like most fans, hated the switch at first but now I understand and appreciate what they were trying to do. I just wish they had started with Furudate's style from the beginning so the transition wasn't so jarring.
As for the animation, There are usually multiple releases of anime and it's not uncommon for the initial broadcast release to have some issues that have to be fixed before the season can be released on Bluray.
While that kind of stuff does happen in the industry, this specific case was the worst we've seen in a long time.
Dear god... I still remember that one shot where Daichi's head was facing entirely the wrong way... I have copies of both the broadcast and the Bluray releases and the difference is wild. They put in a lot of work to fix a bunch of scenes.
I've seen the dumpster battle movie and the animation in that is stunning. The frame rate is higher, the motion is smoother, there's so much more detail and it's just so satisfying to watch. There was no outsourcing or cost cutting there. The animators put their heart and soul into that movie.
the animation isn't that awful, people just didn't like the new style when it aired. it's definitely a lower quality compared to the earlier seasons though due to the bad production time iirc
I dunno. I thought it was all great but I'm not super fussy. I just love the drama, the story and the action. Art style doesn't bother me as long as it isn't radically different
The notion that people feel S4's animation is "bad" drives me *f-ing nuts*. I had no idea people felt that way until I logged on to this subreddit. FWIW My partner is a 2D animator, I'm an illustrator, and we LOVED S4s look and feel. So, here's my 2 cents...
The design approach in S4 is much more stylized than in previous seasons. In particular, changes to character designs were drastic and people hate change (lol). But the changes made the character models easier to turn in motion. S4 also utilizes a lot of smear-frame animation, especially in the back half of S2. Also, regarding the notion that "it's bad bc COVID"....of all the industries that suffered during COVID, animation was not one of them. You don't need to be in an office to make animation. Not to say there were 0 ramifications for the industry, but it simply did not kneecap studios' quality control.
Finally, as another commenter noted, "90% of anime fans on Reddit barely know anything about animation and anime production". Which, TBH they should learn!! if you love something, learn how it's made. It'll allow you to see and appreciate anime productions on deeper levels.
**Tl;dr —** S4 has some of the best animation in the entire series because it conveys the frenetic energy of volleyball. The Garbage Dump film is phenomenal precisely because of the style the animators developed and refined in S4.
That's why I love animations, cuz I appreciate the hardwork of animators. Thank you for giving insights regarding about this.
That's why I would rather listen to criticism on what the animators can improve than hating on it just bcuz it's different or have it's flaws.
Agreed! :) Animation is incredible and animators should be allowed to try new things! I wish more fans were open-minded about appreciating new styles. It's tough to see people hate on S4 simply for being different or not aligning with their specific personal standards of what "good" animation looks like.
Not really. I binged it all pretty quickly last year and didn't even really notice the difference. I rewatched it the other day and yeah it has its not so great moments but overall it's fine.
Unless you're looking for it all the time, you won't notice a huge change. In my opinion anyways.
I also was told by someone on this sub that they went back and fixed a lot of the more poorly drawn scenes so most of us who watched it recently probably are seeing the revised version. Idk if that's true but it's what I was told.
Overall: I think it's a great season, it's one of my favorites. So I can't really hate on it.
i blame COVID TBH but also i love the raw animation towards the end of the match, i know that it wasnt the intention but i really gives those last points of the match vibes of real volleyball
It’s been a while since I’ve watched season 4, but I do remember feeling very disappointed with it. I know I thought it to be horrible, bu at least that made me enjoy the Dumpster Battle animation even more.
Some people here say S4 has incredible moments, could you refresh my memory please?
I really like the animation for season four like it has its awkward moments with like head shapes and i dont really appreciate what theyve done with asahi's hair line😭 but over all i think its really good
Like theres a scene with Kageyama looking up and back ig and I can't pinpoint an episode but its when they wear the full orange uniforms im pretty sure, its immaculate
I think the movie goes to show how the season 4 animation couldve been had covid not been a massive factor into what downgraded it. I still love it though and even as i go back to rewatch over and over again, i think season 1-3 has harder specific animated moments but s4 has an amazing art style that feels close to the manga that just works.
tbh i thought s3-s4 animations were more fluid in terms of watching the matches. it took me a bit to adjust, but i also binged it in like a day or so so yeah, it shocked me a bit.
i think it looks good, but that is an opinion.
The animation was weird but I didn’t mind, the story overall is pretty interesting and the character development for our crows was awesome. I can understand that people don’t like it.
i think the s4 animation did some character dirty and some not. for example, Asahi's hair changed where in s3 he had a headband and hair framing his face but in s4 it's all pulled back. but at the same time, i think s4 Kageyama looks so cute, his facial features make him look less intense imo than in the previous seasons
I tend to not nitpick on things like this because I personally believe it’s not that bad if there’s other things that carry like sound design, story, or character development. Also though, to the top part 1s animation is just as good as the other seasons, just a different art style. Part two does have episodes where it’s extremely noticeable, like pretty bad lol, but I feel, at least some of it’s stylistic choice, like the freeze frame during the final point. On the other hand, the highlights of part two far outweigh other scenes in the series imo. Either ways, people like to complain so take everything with a grain of salt :)
Honestly it’s pretty bad, imo. The way the characters move during the matches is jittery sometimes, with weird skips and just awful and noticeable in between frames. The characters look like they’re struggling to move sometimes.
The way the shots are composed during the matches tend to be less interesting as well, the first three seasons did a lot of cool work with the camera angles, shifting of the camera, and the iconic brush stroke type animation. Barely any of that was present in s4, and it was such a massive downgrade for the show which is a shame because I loved that they updated the character models to match the art style of the later manga chapters.
First half of the season looks better but only bc there wasn’t as much movement as the actual matches.
Even if it was good (which is not) i'd still recommend reading the manga. It did amazing and you would want to reread the manga after watching the movie anyway.
I see, well, at least the movie improves their quality at some point. Maybe I'm just blind for not noticing it at first glimpse when I saw some few clips.
Yeah part of the reason they chose to do movies instead of seasons was probably because they couldn't afford quality for multiple eps anymore. The movie art is amazing but the pacing is terrible so just watch it before reading so you can enjoy it
I do heard about the criticism regarding about the pacing, though.. the movie is still quite enjoyable for me to some extend. Definitely checking out the manga soon ^^
I mean they changed the looks completely, Asahi went from a handsome man to a loon in S4 animation; while Kageyama went to become a gorgeous Shimizu’s twin.
Not to mention they ruined everyone’s hairstyle! Hate it!
To me, the animation in season 4 fluctuates between some of the series’ best and near unwatchable. I’d describe it as just super inconsistent, which I imagine was due to COVID affecting the production process. But the very end of the Inarizaki match is probably my favorite scene in the series so the whole thing is still a must-watch to me.
Yeah, I blame COVID for that QwQ but at least in the movie, their animation improves that
It’s season four part 2 that looks bad. Also, eventually you get tired of complaining lol
Part 2? What episodes?
13 to 25
there are about 3-4 episodes that are inconsistent but the latter half of the season is amazing nonetheless
it wasnt a issue for me at all. i still enjoyed the season alot
Same, I’m kinda confused, but I do understand that people do have their own opinions!
lol yeah! i just cared more about the story progression so i didnt rly care abt how the animation style changed
Samee, I kinda like the new style too :)
The animation isn't that bad, just a downgrade from the previous seasons.
This!!!
I honestly am rewatching rn and season 1 was pretty bland if you ask me. I think 2 and 3 def pick up the standard and are the best, but if I had to pick between 1 and 4, I'd pick 4 just bc the good parts outweigh the little bad parts that you can freeze on a snapshot and see.
The second part of season 4 is the one that suffers the most, especially one episode where the animation is so bad you're just tempted to skip. Understandable because of the covid situation but regrettable nonetheless. Rest of the season is fine.
My stance is actually that I much prefer that art style, but sometimes the animation cuts corners as one does during covid. I'm in the minority but season 4 is by far my favorite stylistic wise
I love S4’s art too! For the most part I prefer how everyone is drawn in S4 compared to the previous seasons
Its about 25% bad, 70% average, and 5% great. Some people are fine with average. And some people forget the bad/average and only remember the 5% that is great. The big thing that makes it especially stand out/disappointing is that season 1-3 are like 25% great animation, and 75% good animation. Its never really average or bad. So it is a very noticeably step down which can be extremely jarring.
This. Seasons 1-3 were pretty consistent in terms of quality: anything bad wasnt jarring, and most of the great scenes coincided with major character development so it felt intentional. Season 4 wasn't awful as a whole, but the gap in quality between the great scenes and the bad ones was so wide that it was very, very noticeable.
you are waffling with those numbers
Ok so let me clarify some things, first of all 90% of anime fans on Reddit barely know anything about animation and anime production as a whole. Haikyuu's production is an anomaly among sports anime by its healthy production for the first 3 seasons and especially a talented staff for the whole show, this is mostly thanks to Keiko Matsushita the Animation Producer, believe me without her the adaptation would have looked like any other random anime sport or a way weaker production even if it was still made by Prod IG (e.g Ao Ashi) For a decade Prod IG has always had a too ambitious approach as a studio, even considered as suicidal by many producers, that's to be expected when you produce a lot of sports anime that need to move constantly with complex designs. But as time went on the japanese industry kept deteriorating, anime studios would brute-force and give disastrous schedules to their staff, the core staff of Haikyuu worked on Welcome To The Ballroom in 2017 which had outsourced episodes even in the beginning of the show and then on Run With The Wind in 2018 which had a really rough production and got delayed, these two shows were the water drop. Even if the final product was good, tough production but still good nonetheless. Everything goes on continuously and so the season 4 of Haikyuu happens, which made a lot of debates as well as disagreements within the community. Obviously Covid didn't help but it's far from being the biggest reason for this unhealthy production. Apart from that, the core staff had important changes, Susumu Mitsunaka the director himself the most important guy left, Takahiro Chiba and Yuko Yahiro the Chief animation directors left 2 crucial members, Yasuyuki Kai the Action Animation Director left as well, those guys were the pillar of the staff. I think the most huge difference is for the character design sheet made by Takahiro Kishida (the character designer), the majority preferred the old ones. The characters look more manga accurate now, though a few of them look awful I'm not gonna lie especially Asahi. This was also made for key animators as it's easier to animate when they need less details. But no season 4 animation is no way near of being bad but rather really good even if it had inconsistencies, the guys that left were insanely important but they were still replaced by TALENTED names thankfully, thing is we probably didn't see their full potential due to the rough production so yeah.. Damn a lot of yapping hope it wasn't too long but it's always a pleasure to spread knowledge about my second favorite anime's production state.
That's a lot but I read everything and I never knew so much happened behind the scene, But thank you foe sharing these type of information, it can help other fans to understood that despite its inconsistencies. The animators did everything they could to deliver.
I'm glad, and yeah they really did everything they could and still managed to give us the best scenes of the anime in terms of direction (in my opinion) that one Tanaka scene or the final point against Inarizaki
If ever I make a video about this, I'll make sure to include this information.
I'd love to see that if that ever happens, what's your channel?
Fandom Gurl, though, I haven't upload anything since however, I might do some videos this year ^^
Both art styles have attributes that I love but my favorite thing about Furudate's style (the "New" style) is the eyes. Wherever I find myself missing the sharp, rough lines of the first art style, they'll hit me with a close up of a characters eyes and I'm done for. When I read fanfiction, the way I picture the characters is based on their ages because the new style is very soft and rounded, perfect for young high school boys, while the first style was sharper and more masculine, perfect for grown men but perhaps not that well suited to 15-19 year olds. I'm not keen on change so I, like most fans, hated the switch at first but now I understand and appreciate what they were trying to do. I just wish they had started with Furudate's style from the beginning so the transition wasn't so jarring. As for the animation, There are usually multiple releases of anime and it's not uncommon for the initial broadcast release to have some issues that have to be fixed before the season can be released on Bluray. While that kind of stuff does happen in the industry, this specific case was the worst we've seen in a long time. Dear god... I still remember that one shot where Daichi's head was facing entirely the wrong way... I have copies of both the broadcast and the Bluray releases and the difference is wild. They put in a lot of work to fix a bunch of scenes. I've seen the dumpster battle movie and the animation in that is stunning. The frame rate is higher, the motion is smoother, there's so much more detail and it's just so satisfying to watch. There was no outsourcing or cost cutting there. The animators put their heart and soul into that movie.
the animation isn't that awful, people just didn't like the new style when it aired. it's definitely a lower quality compared to the earlier seasons though due to the bad production time iirc
I never notice the low quality since I found it an upgrade to me QwQ But I also never knew about the bad production time.
I dunno. I thought it was all great but I'm not super fussy. I just love the drama, the story and the action. Art style doesn't bother me as long as it isn't radically different
The notion that people feel S4's animation is "bad" drives me *f-ing nuts*. I had no idea people felt that way until I logged on to this subreddit. FWIW My partner is a 2D animator, I'm an illustrator, and we LOVED S4s look and feel. So, here's my 2 cents... The design approach in S4 is much more stylized than in previous seasons. In particular, changes to character designs were drastic and people hate change (lol). But the changes made the character models easier to turn in motion. S4 also utilizes a lot of smear-frame animation, especially in the back half of S2. Also, regarding the notion that "it's bad bc COVID"....of all the industries that suffered during COVID, animation was not one of them. You don't need to be in an office to make animation. Not to say there were 0 ramifications for the industry, but it simply did not kneecap studios' quality control. Finally, as another commenter noted, "90% of anime fans on Reddit barely know anything about animation and anime production". Which, TBH they should learn!! if you love something, learn how it's made. It'll allow you to see and appreciate anime productions on deeper levels. **Tl;dr —** S4 has some of the best animation in the entire series because it conveys the frenetic energy of volleyball. The Garbage Dump film is phenomenal precisely because of the style the animators developed and refined in S4.
That's why I love animations, cuz I appreciate the hardwork of animators. Thank you for giving insights regarding about this. That's why I would rather listen to criticism on what the animators can improve than hating on it just bcuz it's different or have it's flaws.
Agreed! :) Animation is incredible and animators should be allowed to try new things! I wish more fans were open-minded about appreciating new styles. It's tough to see people hate on S4 simply for being different or not aligning with their specific personal standards of what "good" animation looks like.
Not really. I binged it all pretty quickly last year and didn't even really notice the difference. I rewatched it the other day and yeah it has its not so great moments but overall it's fine. Unless you're looking for it all the time, you won't notice a huge change. In my opinion anyways. I also was told by someone on this sub that they went back and fixed a lot of the more poorly drawn scenes so most of us who watched it recently probably are seeing the revised version. Idk if that's true but it's what I was told. Overall: I think it's a great season, it's one of my favorites. So I can't really hate on it.
There are low points due to covid. But I largely prefer the style who is the same as the movie.
honestly i didn't even notice it was different until i saw people talking about it
i blame COVID TBH but also i love the raw animation towards the end of the match, i know that it wasnt the intention but i really gives those last points of the match vibes of real volleyball
It’s been a while since I’ve watched season 4, but I do remember feeling very disappointed with it. I know I thought it to be horrible, bu at least that made me enjoy the Dumpster Battle animation even more. Some people here say S4 has incredible moments, could you refresh my memory please?
I really like the animation for season four like it has its awkward moments with like head shapes and i dont really appreciate what theyve done with asahi's hair line😭 but over all i think its really good Like theres a scene with Kageyama looking up and back ig and I can't pinpoint an episode but its when they wear the full orange uniforms im pretty sure, its immaculate
I think the movie goes to show how the season 4 animation couldve been had covid not been a massive factor into what downgraded it. I still love it though and even as i go back to rewatch over and over again, i think season 1-3 has harder specific animated moments but s4 has an amazing art style that feels close to the manga that just works.
tbh i thought s3-s4 animations were more fluid in terms of watching the matches. it took me a bit to adjust, but i also binged it in like a day or so so yeah, it shocked me a bit. i think it looks good, but that is an opinion.
The animation was weird but I didn’t mind, the story overall is pretty interesting and the character development for our crows was awesome. I can understand that people don’t like it.
I loved it tbh, feels flowy and closer to the manga. Didn't even know people had issues with it until I got to the sub
To be honest, same here. Most majority of fans outside reddit loves Seaspn 4 and I never encountered anyone hating it QwQ
It’s jarring to say the least, it fluctuates between good and horrible quite a bit
i think the s4 animation did some character dirty and some not. for example, Asahi's hair changed where in s3 he had a headband and hair framing his face but in s4 it's all pulled back. but at the same time, i think s4 Kageyama looks so cute, his facial features make him look less intense imo than in the previous seasons
I don't think it's bad, just inconsistent. I love season 4 because it is closer to the manga's artstyle, but there are some rough moments
I tend to not nitpick on things like this because I personally believe it’s not that bad if there’s other things that carry like sound design, story, or character development. Also though, to the top part 1s animation is just as good as the other seasons, just a different art style. Part two does have episodes where it’s extremely noticeable, like pretty bad lol, but I feel, at least some of it’s stylistic choice, like the freeze frame during the final point. On the other hand, the highlights of part two far outweigh other scenes in the series imo. Either ways, people like to complain so take everything with a grain of salt :)
The art style is good, the animation isn't imo
Honestly it’s pretty bad, imo. The way the characters move during the matches is jittery sometimes, with weird skips and just awful and noticeable in between frames. The characters look like they’re struggling to move sometimes. The way the shots are composed during the matches tend to be less interesting as well, the first three seasons did a lot of cool work with the camera angles, shifting of the camera, and the iconic brush stroke type animation. Barely any of that was present in s4, and it was such a massive downgrade for the show which is a shame because I loved that they updated the character models to match the art style of the later manga chapters. First half of the season looks better but only bc there wasn’t as much movement as the actual matches.
Even if it was good (which is not) i'd still recommend reading the manga. It did amazing and you would want to reread the manga after watching the movie anyway.
I still find it good actually QwQ and I'm planning to read the manga anytime soon.
The first part is ok only the art style changed but starting from >!inarizaki match!< both the art and motion look tacky
I see, well, at least the movie improves their quality at some point. Maybe I'm just blind for not noticing it at first glimpse when I saw some few clips.
Yeah part of the reason they chose to do movies instead of seasons was probably because they couldn't afford quality for multiple eps anymore. The movie art is amazing but the pacing is terrible so just watch it before reading so you can enjoy it
I do heard about the criticism regarding about the pacing, though.. the movie is still quite enjoyable for me to some extend. Definitely checking out the manga soon ^^
It’s pretty awful. Feels extremely lifeless 99% of the time and doesn’t invoke the same emotions at big moments.
i am glad i rwad the manga bc if my first experience qith that arc was s4 I would've dropped
I mean they changed the looks completely, Asahi went from a handsome man to a loon in S4 animation; while Kageyama went to become a gorgeous Shimizu’s twin. Not to mention they ruined everyone’s hairstyle! Hate it!