Introduction
Having reached professional status in middle school, Rei Kiriyama is one of the few elite in the world of shogi. Due to this, he faces an enormous amount of pressure, both from the shogi community and his adoptive family. Seeking independence from his tense home life, he moves into an apartment in Tokyo. As a 17-year-old living on his own, Rei tends to take poor care of himself, and his reclusive personality ostracizes him from his peers in school and at the shogi hall.
However, not long after his arrival in Tokyo, Rei meets Akari, Hinata, and Momo Kawamoto, a trio of sisters living with their grandfather who owns a traditional wagashi shop. Akari, the oldest of the three girls, is determined to combat Rei's loneliness and poorly sustained lifestyle with motherly hospitality. The Kawamoto sisters, coping with past tragedies, also share with Rei a unique familial bond that he has lacked for most of his life. As he struggles to maintain himself physically and mentally through his shogi career, Rei must learn how to interact with others and understand his own complex emotions.
[Written by MAL Rewrite]
Audience reviews
20 · Sample from the first available page, separate from the total number of ratings.
ibernard
The show feels like it doesn't really go anywhere until the very end. It's not that things aren't happening, but to me at least, they didn't seem all that interesting. At first I got the impression that the main character was a dark and broody character, which he sort of is, but he's also just a lame loser who half heartedly plays shogi and ignores the generosity of his friends. He's not super off putting, just not very entertaining to follow. The animation is very nice, but that pacing just feels off, like it's trying to hard to appear interesting without providing and substance. Like the constant water scenes which seem like they're supposed to be philosophical but end up being more whimsical and nothing more than eye candy or word vomit. It's not as bad as something like Vagabond, where…
Read at the sourceperennial_suit
Loved "Honey and Clover", Hated This!
I simply did not enjoy 3-gatsu no Lion. It had a great premise and a great potential. There are some nice moments and arcs, I really enjoyed a couple of episodes. But I had to really force myself to push through the rest of them. I would say there are 5 major reasons why this show fails for me:
1) The story has a nice premise, but major themes and characters remain somewhat underdeveloped and unexplored. The pacing is weird and I didn't find it enjoyable.
2) Too much obnoxious humor and gags that I did not find funny at all. And when I say too much I mean TOO MUCH.
3) The Shogi aspect of the show made it totally boring and unrelatable to me. It's simply hard to pay attention to characters obsessing over something you simply do not care about in the sl…
Read at the sourceSlime_Shady
I sadly watched the entire 1st season of March Comes in at 1.25x speed due to a friend's recommendation and truly I could not tell you one remotely interesting aspect the whole way through... I've seen some tedious ass shows I can get through with maximum binging efficiency, but that genuinely felt like maybe the most excruciatingly painful slog a singular piece of media outside of Evangelion has ever put me through. What is the incentive everyone is drawn in by please do tell me? It's literally a whiny ahh dude moving Shogi pieces for mf 22 eps in between 20 second long drawn out shots that feel like they are meant to be deep or something. It doesn't even go into Shogi, the one thing that sets it apart from other shows. Like whatsoever! They just play the game. You can go watch two senile…
Read at the sourceTangoSauce
This anime is a very slow-paced story revolving around a spineless kid with no personality or heart. It's incredibly frustrating when the protag is constantly being pushed around by other unlikeable characters, and submitting to their abuse and nonsense. There was ONE redeeming quality of the story which involves a family who displayed a great deal of support for the protag and showed a great example of how friends should have your back with no expectation of anything in return. I WILL be continuing onto the next season, in hopes that it'll get better, but this one was pretty dreadful.
Read at the sourcemeowzhere
'3-gatsu no Lion' had a promising start but then lost it at the end of Season 1.
*please note that this is only a review of season 1, i gave season 2 a 5/10*
Story: 3 (Poor)
I have to say that the beginning was very engaging. The idea of shogi and the struggles you could face mentally was a new concept to me. However, as the show continued, it became quite boring and repetitive, and that very quickly. Dialogues between the characters were becoming bland and it seemed like the creators focused on the gameplay dialogues "move pawn to etc.", rather than the dialogues in crucial moments. I feel like the lack of enthusiasm shown really made the show seem repetitive. A lot more could have been done with 22 episodes. It had such a good start but it didn't reach my expectations.
Art: 7 (Good)
A…
Read at the sourceNarumi01
Story 5/10
Since the show has a good rate I forced my self to watch it but I didnt feel anything from the show but a little motivation that shimada and rei may give me. The progression of the story was slow alot of characters r presented but they didnt do much or play a real role for the show and aswell their developpement was poorly made (like misumi, takahashi, tsujii, hanaoka...) Animals speech are pretty not necessary since they speak for nothing... Mostly jokes r really really bad i never laughed after watching those 22 epsiodes but i guess comedy isnt the aim of the show. However the story about a young adolescent who has lost their parent in a accident but thanks to shogi and his relatives managed to find a reason to live and to change his life is decent.
Art 3/10
I hate the art a…
Read at the sourceTakaCode
This review will cover both seasons of March Comes in Like a Lion.
Well here we are my 100th review.
It has been long and emotional road of great and awful animes but somehow I made it to 100 reviews. I personally wouldn't made it so far without your helpful and constructive feedback that you have given me over the years.
Naturally I decided to do something special to make this occasion and So I decided up a anime that I truly loved and that anime in question is 3 Gatsu no Lion or March Comes in like a Lion in English. First aired in 2016 the series has gained a strong following over the years for it's strong characterisation, masterfully handling of serious topics and fantastic art-style.
I previously watched the series when it was airing and I loved it. When Aniplex announced and re…
Read at the sourceJupiter2213
This review is for people who don't like Slice Of Life anime and find them boring and unbearable to watch but want to venture into the world of Slice Of Life anime.....This is NOT the anime to start!!
I ventured into this anime hearing good things about it from all sources such as people recommending it online ,the fact that it won at the cruchyroll awards and also that fucker The Anime Man praising it
Plot/Story
When it comes to anime , im all about the action and higher meaning even sprinkle a little symbolism... But the story, for me, was too dull. I mean its slice of life and i did not have any high expections to start with but the plot here was all dull. It fails to grab the watchers attention in my case,Kiriyama who is an expert shogi player has the attitude of someone who has just…
Read at the sourceHikari-Kuro
Dear MAL members, do not be fooled like I did by the high score that this series obtained.
Spoilers ahead
I came across this anime which not only obtained an overall high score, but also received plenty of high scores by other reviewers. Hence I was excited to watch this series. However after finishing all 22 episodes, I was left disappointed and wondered what did this anime have that deserved the high scores it obtained?
Unlike run with the wind, whereby they made running interesting, this anime made shogi look difficult and boring to someone who does not know about the game. The rules and how the game is played is never really explained other than a brief introductory in the form of using cats to make it look cute. The creators of the anime seems to be talking down to the audience as…
Read at the sourceGippy
It's difficult to review slice-of-life shows through a critical lens. It's the one genre that is seemingly immune to poor reviews, simply because as long as the show is comforting, then it'll get a good score. I particularly like it when slice-of-life intersects with progress. Last year's Comic Girls did that, as well as Barakamon a few years back.
One of my first favorites when I became an anime junkie was Hikaru no Go, which also centered around a competitive board game. With 75 eps and a controversial ending, it has largely faded from memory today. But it was enjoyable, and Hikaru had significant growth throughout its run.
March Comes in Like a Lion explores much of Rei's past. But I felt empty when the show didn't use this past to really affect the person he is now. And at the end, I…
Read at the sourceLockensocke
“Sangatsu no lion” is an anime with a focus all over the place. It isn’t really a good “drama” anime neither is it a good “seinen” anime, its shogi aspects is also sometimes rather forgotten and taken aside to have lots of slice of life comedy moments. Especially at the beginning there is probably 20% drama and 80% comedy. So if you came to see a mature take on a sports anime with drama and a lot of maturity, in the fashion of something like “Ping pong the animation”, “sangatsu no lion” isn’t really the show you were looking for. However it does create a very light hearted atmosphere and was easy to watch even for someone who didn’t really like the comedy all too much. And it gets progressively better.
The story focuses around a young high school student who became a professional shogi pl…
Read at the sourceSteekHutzee
Sangatsu no Lion is a completely pointless series, revolving around a few more than flat characters.
I'll try to be as spoiler free as possible while pointing out what I think worked and what not.
Story: 3
In a few words, the story in Sangatsu no Lion is "playing shogi". For as much as I would like to say that it talks about a kid growing, fighting his fears, learning how to relate to other people, eventually understanding how to live one's life, all of this is just barely touched, focusing more on "what if I moved the pawn in A7 instead of B2?". In 22 episodes, absolutely nothing relevant happens. No epiphanies, no events, no change, or if something happens, it's brushed off in an incredibly simplistic way.
We could think that since this is a Slice of Life, it reflects reality as it is…
Read at the sourceephemerry
SHAFT previously installed a pretentious series that suffers from a massive diagnosis of what I like to call dialogue schizophrenia, making a guy with ahoge hair look cool while he continually sexually assaults lolis; it reined in unlimited amounts of money, yatta yatta (muting the preface point with that because this studio is the bane of my existence).
Still riding on the Bakemonogatari cash cow, I'm sure that they realized that adapting one of Chika Umeno's works (the mangka behind Honey & Clover), along with adding the overzealous, overly angular, dialogue heavy monologuing with a sexually ambiguous, teenage misfit boy that this would be a self-defining hit among narcissistic, Tumblr normies. I'm 100% sure that they weren't blind to their potential viewers.
I mean, they surely didn't…
Read at the sourceMelody
3-gatsu no Lion is adapted from Umino Chika’s (also known for Hachimitsu to Clover) award winning manga of the same name. Some people tend to be worried when they hear that studio Shaft is going to be adapting anything, but Shaft perfectly adapted the already great manga of 3-gatsu no Lion in a very creative way, as they usually do.
3-gatsu no Lion tells a story about a boy that tries to find a place where he belongs and is accepted, a story that consists of many different parts, each of which can stir up many different kinds of emotions, and when all of them come together, they make this amazing series.
The story that 3-gatsu no Lion tells is that of Rei Kiriyama, a 17-year-old boy who has faced many troubles and sadness despite his young age. His losing his family when he was still a c…
Read at the sourceokaytran
Beautiful art and colorful characters can't save a bland story. 3-gatsu no Lion tries to make an anime about shogi interesting but falls short in its lack of focus and resolve. Some anime are able to mix drama, comedy, and moe, but this anime doesn't seem to have any synergy. It just jumps around between them while keeping the main narrative about shogi. Other anime are able to capture their audience into an uninteresting sport such as Chihayafuru but 3-gatsu doesn't delve into shogi enough for the audience to care, but focuses so much of the show around it where the audience must sit through it. The show has no overarching narrative and no reason to root for any of the characters. It's a garbled mess that looks pretty on the surface.
Read at the sourceNopon
Overall rating [9.2]
Story [9.1]
This show starts extremely slow. It looks like it is going to go nowhere and the description saying that this show is about shogi doesn't help it one bit. But then comes the actual story which is great. It blends the shogi with the drama in a way that doesn't seem forced and fits into the story. It honestly made me think about the characters as persons but we will get to that later.
Art and Animation [8.8]
The art of the source material got adapted great into animation. It leads into an almost perfect mix if not being for some hiccups in the quality in some later episodes. The art is great but the problem is that still shots get used too often. Don´t get me wrong still shots can greatly improve some scenes but it just gets used too much to the point that…
Read at the sourceBlueKite
Once upon a time, I fell in love with a show named Honey and Clover. Because of that love, I decided to check out other works by the author behind it (Umino Chica). This led me to discover 3gatsu no Lion. A story about shogi didn’t seem really appealing, but I dove right into it nevertheless. Then bam, the feels train struck again and I loved it. I said to myself “I wonder if this will get an anime adaptation just like the author’s previous work.” I waited patiently for a long time with the hope of the manga being turned into an animated masterpiece. And it did happen, I felt really happy about it. However, the adaptation managed to surprise me in so many ways despite having an initial idea what to expect from it, especially since Shaft was going to be the studio to adapt it. It was not th…
Read at the sourceVeronin
Sangatsu no Lion's first five minutes contain a scene I might characterise as one of the best in animation. A boy listlessly wakens, drinking out of necessity, dressing out of obligation, and leaving his sterile apartment out of confusion, an existence so fragile it could perish with the wind. He doesn't say anything. He doesn't tell people about his problems. He just moves on with his life.
At first I did not understand why this scene had such an impact on me. I thought it could have been the beautiful music, or perhaps the captivating artwork so characteristic of Shaft. That wasn't it. What overwhelmed me was how illustrative it was of human life.
People often describe their favourite pieces of fiction with vague terms such as "brilliant" or "life-changing". Sangatsu no Lion is not l…
Read at the sourceStark700
The way 3-gatsu no Lion (March comes like a lion) is written is like a poetic adventure. Only thing is, the main protagonist is in his own story and we (the audience) gets to see what they experience. From that experience, the main protagonist Rei tackles through obstacles in his life, building relationships, and growing as a person. Adapted by the manga of the same name, this is a show that really takes slice of life to a unique perspective.
The creator of the series is Chica Umino. Some people may recognize her work such as Honey and Clover. As such, character designs represented in this show may feel familiar. However, 3-gatsu no Lion stands out on its own as we are introduced to Rei Kiriyama, a young man known for his professional shogi talent. Rei may seem like a successful person at…
Read at the sourceSterps
3-Gatsu was originally an anime I started watching because I love Shaft's other animes, but a few episodes in I started watching to follow along on Rei's journey.
8/10 Story:
The story resonates with me a lot. It's like a combination of figuring out life in the present and how to deal with your past at the same time. The story is more than just about shogi, it's more about the player. How he decides what pieces to use, what pieces to move, and try and overcome his next opponent/obstacle. It also applies to his life. He has his new family which currently guards him and his past (pieces he lost) which keep coming back to attack him.
9/10 Art:
This is pretty self explanatory. The art is unique and defines each situation perfectly. You can properly see how everyone is feeling in each scene…
Read at the source