Tekken: Bloodline is based on a video game. That’s OK. I have seen other anime based on video games, and most were pretty good. As for Tekken: Bloodline? Well, let’s see.

It is a short six episode series with an international mixture of creators. The writer, Gavin Hignight, is American, with a background which includes working for Disney. Three Japanese studios share responsibility for this series – Banda, Larx, and Studio Hibari. The director, Katsuhiro Hasada, is obviously Japanese. His previous credits are all for video games, so this is his first directorial effort for an anime series. Looking at the end credits, I see several Vietnamese names listed among the animators, artists, and technicians.

So what’s Tekken: Bloodline all about? Martial arts fighter Jin Kazama is being trained by his mother. When mom is killed fighting the Ogre, Jim swears revenge. He goes to his grandfather, Heihachi Mishima, who is not just a powerful fighter, but also a powerful businessman. Granddad agrees to train Jin so that Jin may someday take his revenge. The trap is laid for Ogre in the form of a tournament. Hopefully, all that fighting power will draw Ogre out. If only Jin can trust granddad.

That’s the plot. The problem is that less time is spent on developing this plotline than I took to describe it. The entire series seems to be just an excuse to show animated violence. The action scenes are well done, but without a storyline to develop, without developing the characters, without taking time to build up to the climax, all we get is a redundant series of fights. Having more episodes, so that the story and characters could be better defined, would certainly have helped. Instead all we have is an anime with a plotline so thin it would dissolve in water.

There is only one season of Tekken: Bloodline. The ending does set things up for a possible second season. There is no word yet on any additional episodes being put into production. But that’s OK. I really don’t care if there is a season 2. I won’t be watching it.