Audience reviews
20 · Sample from the first available page, separate from the total number of ratings.
Sara_Isayama
Really cool anime that may have slipped under the radar of some. Basically it's about a prima ballerina who has to stop doing ballet because of an injury. But while in college she stumbles upon this college club of people who ride this motorcycle-mechs called RideBacks. She finds that her ballet skills make her a natural rider, and falls in love with the sport. However things quickly deteriorate because the political situation in country is ruled by a global military regime which begins to implement martial law. And she finds herself unwittingly falling in with some terrorists who oppose the regime, and finds herself reluctantly forced into making tough decisions about who she wants to be and what kind of life she wants to live, and how dance for her, is integrated in all of that.
It's a…
Read at the sourceephemerry
I am astonished at how commonly this series is skimmed over! Typically, sci-fi series with political intrigue seem to be voraciously consumed by fans in the West and so, why wasn't "RideBack" given more recognition? With the heated political climate and a dissatisfied populace at the hands of our current world crisis, now seems the best time, if ever, to discuss this series that is both tantalizing (with its action-packed, stimulation of mecha scenes) and a thought-provoking gander towards the world's societal structure!
⚠️ This review will be spoiler-free ⚠️
—Story/Characters
Even before the GGF (the "Global Government Force") became the pivotal antithesis to the free-spirited group of robotics-loving rebels, this series caught me. I have always been fascinated with the limber performa…
Read at the sourceYuiHirasawa-
SPOILERS BELOW
Rideback is one of those shows that evokes an odd sense of nostalgia, but perhaps for the wrong reasons. As I write this review I think back to what about this show causes this sensation – is it the animation? No – as a kid I saw perhaps part of one episode. Is it the plot? Couldn’t be, as it wasn’t until last year that even realized this show wasn’t a typical sports flick. My best explanation is that this show is nostalgic for me due to its music, with a good OP and excellent ED that has a plethora of plays on my old iPod. However, looking back now after seeing the entire show over the course of several months as part of my college anime club, I’m disappointed that it fails to live up to my admittedly unrealistic nostalgic expectations. Rideback is a show of lackluster plo…
Read at the sourceRecynon
I'm being VERY generous with a 7 because the concept was just THAT good. So you're telling me there's a ballet girl making art in motion with a transforming motorcycle while recapturing the fire of a dancer? Hell yeah! Not since Speed Racer (the film) has a motor vehicle been able to capture the simultaneous grace and exhilaration of a performer in the zone, using the visual poetry to channel a culmination of pure passion and raw emotional energy. This all owes to the mechanic of the Rideback itself rather than the crafting of the story. The Rideback's design allows it to partake in adrenaline pumping races while showing off the flexibility, dynamicism, and elegance of a ballet dancer. It has the same balance of power and grace that is in the best fight choreography and best action set pie…
Read at the sourcemouthpiece
Ride Back had all the qualifications for becoming a great show. Amazing production values (Madhouse is the king of tv anime shows), lively characters, well directed racing choreographies, political intrigues, and a pilot episode that promised a dozen different side stories. And it made a complete mess with them because of lack of proper duration and naive storytelling.
The story begins with the heroine Rin being considered a mediocre ballet dancer compared to her mother. In an almost stroke of luck, she finds a racing club in her university and drops ballet in order to delve into racing by using a new form of motorcycling called Ride-Backs. At the same time public unrest leads to various terrorist attacks happening around the world and the army plans to use Ride-Backs as a new form of wea…
Read at the sourceB-MAP-000
"RideBack" tells the story of a young girl and her friends struggle against a somewhat evil government using cool transforming motorcycles with arms. This anime falls into the "so bad it's laughably good" category, so I'd only recommend this if you like to chuckle at trashy television or if you're a diehard Madhouse fan. Full review follows. It does contain minor spoilers.
Anime that use heavy CG animation tend to be easy targets, but let me start this review by saying the animation quality in this show is fantastic. During my time watching this show, I don't really remember any scenes where I thought "god I hate CG" like I usually do. The RideBacks are all shiny, with varying textures and intricate parts that make them interesting to look at and even more satisfying when they are fightin…
Read at the sourceKlownArt
RideBack is boring. There are people that love this show, but I just cannot get behind any of it. I initially found the premise of the show interesting. Racing, terrorism, mech-bikes with arms, and so forth. Unfortunately RideBack is never interesting enough where I would suggest anyone watch it before a myriad of other anime.
The characters just never go anywhere until the very end. Sure we learn more about them along the way, but most of them don't round out until the end of the anime if at all. The protagonist in particular just stays in this annoying depressed state for most of the anime. Blaming herself for things that are clearly not her fault. I found myself saying "can we just get over this already" to the very unnatural reactions.
The dancing motif can also get old. We get the m…
Read at the sourcephazer11
Meant to write this review earlier. Good show. It's major problem was it's pacing. I suspect it didn't do as well viewership wise during the season and so got rushed. I really enjoyed the development and stories behind the first 4 episodes or so. The races were nice and you got to learn more about the characters. The problem I feel is the plot got a bit contrived (maybe it was before hand and I just didn't realize it) and instead of more character development with asides to the battles in the background with gradual immersion into the fighting; you go from an interesting nicely paced racing show into a fairly serious show about an armed conflict. It gets an 8 simply because MAL doesn't allow incremental scores.
Read at the sourceBucket2A
TL;DR REVIEW: A really fun and original show with a focus on character. CGI and quirky character design may be a turn-off to some, but its worth a try for those who desire a grounded and unconventional story.
Hey! Just a few quick things before I begin. Surely you know by now that its difficult to reliably put numbers to anime, so take my ratings with a grain of salt. They should give you a general idea though. Also, I have no experience with the source material, so I can't judge this as an adaptation. Lets dive right in.
STORY 8/10: The first and most important thing to note about RideBack is that it is a blend of several genres which, though strange, are integrated pretty seamlessly. A story about a ballerina riding robot motorcycles in a distopian near-future may sound silly on paper,…
Read at the sourceSolid_Cow
Rideback has perhaps the greatest drop in overall quality that I've ever seen. It starts out on the highest highs with a masterfully crafted first episode, then it slides down on the next two, still a great show with a great premise but not quite living up to the opening. Then the fourth episode drops, and the whole series falls off a cliff. From then on we get to watch our promising mech-racing show drown under all the needless drama and shoehorned war stories that nobody wanted to see. Rideback draws you in with the promise of an engaging, introspective sports series full of potentially great characters, then leaves you with a half-assed Gundam story and bitterness.
The first episode of Rideback is a masterpiece. If that was the only episode ever made, I'd give it a 10/10 and lament the…
Read at the source12thKnight
Some spoilers up to episode 3, but they’re minor at the most.
“And the world…… changed.”
- Rin Ogata
Soft. In a word, that’s how I would describe the first episode. Not as a disparage, but rather as a positive opinion on the human way the story introduces Rin and world of Ridebacks. The first episode set high expectations, and the for the most part, Rideback managed to follow through.
In a time much like our own, Rideback follows the story of former dance prodigy Rin Ogata as she interacts with a new type of mechanical motorcycle, called Ridebacks. Her skill lands her in the middle of a war between a worldwide government called the GGP and a terrorist cell called the BMA.
Rin herself is one of the best parts of the series. An extremely strong main character, her development is fantasti…
Read at the sourcefido73
This is a Anime that when I first saw it, I was completely absorbs by the story and the characters, I rated it 10 without hesitation. A year later, October 2013, I watch it again, I wanted to make sure it really deserve a 10 and also, since I liked it a lot, I had to watch it again. The story might be a little incomplete, not enough dept. Like another reviewer wrote, the story would have been more complete if it were a 26 episode instead of 13. There is a lot of stuff that remain clouded, lot of unanswered question. But, the Art, Sound/Music and great characters make up for it. Being a musician, I relate a lot with the main character, her connection with Fuego, the rideback she he using during the show, is the same feeling I have when I play the guitar, it's a extension of myself, and when…
Read at the sourcedro73
This is an interesting anime, to say the least. An ex-Prima Ballerina, turned humaniod- motorcycle driver? Yep. Thow in a corrupt faction, intense drama, vivid animation, and some character growth, and you get "Rideback". I liked the MC and the supporting cast of this series from the beginning, they were liikable or atleast understandable in their reasons for taking action or not to take certain actions.
The freindships are felt deeply and the characters are worth investing in even in this shorter series.
8/10 all around.
Read at the sourceExtendedRenegade
On paper, RideBack has all the pieces in hand that make up an excellent show. The RideBacks themselves are a rather intriguing take on mechs, the premise seems as though it should be epic, the art and animation are impressive, and the soundtrack is one of the best around. Unfortunately though, the success that the show could have attained is never reached. Don't take that to mean it's a bad show however, it is good. It's just that it could have been a true masterpiece if they didn't falter in a few crucial areas.
The biggest issue in my opinion lies in the shows lack of explaining the central plot. Basically, the story takes place in the future, where a military organization called the Global Government Plan, or GGP, is rapidly obtaining power, seemingly with a goal of ruling over the ent…
Read at the sourcegwern
Finally dragged my way through _RideBack_. I just didn't like it. It was well-produced and visually good, but it never made the whole rideback concept even as plausible as a random Gundam, it gestured at something more to ridebacks which never cashed out, the world was poorly constructed so the politics at the end come as nonsensical, and so on.
Read at the sourceirish5ive
I am very skeptical when it comes to "new" anime. I will be the first to admit that I believe animes glory days were found in the late 90's and early 2000's. But once in a while I'll break from my skeptisism and venture outside my comfort zone. Rideback was my break from the usual.
Immediatly with the opening credits I was hooked. A somewhat techo-pop song rips through my body, shattering all other introductions, and with its stunning visuals and perfectly blended 3D graphics, grabs my attention like it hasn't been grabbed in a while. The main lead, Rin, tears through Tokyo on an altered motorbike that now looks like a robot. The music pumps on. Now she's dancing, ballet it looks like, in front of thousands. Who is this Rin? What's Rideback all about? I needed answers.
As the credits end…
Read at the sourcesacora
This series in it self similar to a rideback-easy to get on, hard to control, powerful and hard to get off.
I was very excited when I first started to watch this series because the art looked amazing and I had heard good things about the series and in many ways Rideback met my expectations.
Story-6
This is where the series fails to satisfy. The series is only 12 episodes and the series needed more like 24 episodes to tell its story properly. I suspect that the story's short comes were a result of the anime directors blunders and not the person who wrote the manga since the manga was a fair length. The viewer spends the first few episodes being introduced to the main characters, ridebacks and the wonderful society which the people seem to like in. A few hints of the main story are put in b…
Read at the sourceGlacier_Silver
I liked most things about this anime. I love that never give up attitude. I loved the characters for the most part or at least the main ones; BUT with the story the main characters aren't really that important to the arc there aiming for. Maybe they where like we got this story lets some how shove it into 12 episodes. Well that was a big fail. Even with the very almost mech feel here, which if you knew me you would know that's why I watched this. The story made me go RAWRRRRRR yep, you pissed me! Wheres the justice, where is it. There is none I tell you. With another 12 or maybe 5 more episodes even, they could of given this anime some closure.
Read at the sourceggultra2764
This series could have worked better if it was entirely focused on how Ridebacks influenced Rin's character instead of the focus on corruption from a military-driven government and terrorist activity. For the most part, Rideback does do a decent job in exploring the development of Rin's character as she finds herself taking an interest in the vehicle as a replacement for her lost interest in ballet. As she becomes entangled in the military-terrorist conflict and realizes the original use of Ridebacks, Rin becomes disillusioned in the show's second half as she comes to grips over what would make her happy in spite of the hardships she has come to deal with.
On the other end of the coin though, the military/ terrorist conflict comes across as rather flat. Both the GGP and BMA factions don't…
Read at the sourcektulu007
Just about any idea has the potential to be good. It all depends on the execution. Rideback is proof of this because the story of an armed conflict between a corrupt militant group and a resistance group is nothing new. Isabel Allende likes to do it in her novels and we've also seen the idea in quite a few anime/movies/television shows and it's usually absolute garbage.
Rideback proves that this concept can be written well. How does it do this? It uses a few tactics. It puts the focus on a small group that's only connected to the conflict as a result of a misunderstanding and even then remains largely outside of it. It also keeps the focus on this group without connecting them to the larger conflict for about half the series which allows the audience to acclimate to them. It also avoids d…
Read at the source
