LogFAQs > #968967795

64. Noragami
https://myanimelist.net/anime/20507/Noragami
Winter 2014 (12 episodes), Fall 2015 (13 episodes)
My Score: 7/10, MAL Score: 7.96/10 S1, 8.17/10 S2
Best Character: Iki Hiyori

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gWCnKoEgfP0

Premise: Yato is a god, but he doesn't have a shrine or any followers. He barely makes a living doing odd jobs for five yen apiece, at least until he meets Iki Hiyori, a girl whose spirit often slips out of her body.

The Good: Noragami is a supernatural action comedy. I like the setting quite a bit. It has lots of layers, and it was neat seeing the rules and balance between them. Gods have the most power, but it's directly tied to how much worship they receive from humans. They also need to use good spirits as weapons against the evil spirits that are always popping up. Yato is an incredibly minor god, but he has big dreams of having his own shrine someday and to get there he'll do any job, no matter how small. I liked Yato. He was basically a homeless drifter, but he also had a really high opinion of himself and it led to a lot of great jokes. Yukine, his spirit weapon, was a compelling character too. A lot of people hated on him in the Crunchyroll comments, but it made sense to me that the spirit of a dead teenager would have some angst. Hiyori was still easily my favorite. Her spirit sometimes leaves her body behind, and I laughed every time they used that as a joke like cutting away to show her physical body passed out at school. She also had a great dynamic with Yato and Yukine, which I'll talk about more in her character write-up.

The Bad: Noragami usually maintained a nice balance between comedy and drama. Yato would act haughty and goofy, and then there would be a relatively serious battle against an evil spirit or rival god. I enjoyed the comedy bits the most, and it was nice when it had a good balance too. Sadly, there were a few arcs that became too dramatic for my tastes. Basically anything to do with Nora was too dark for me, and she never brought anything fun to counterbalance it.

Overall: Noragami was a solid comedy with a supernatural twist. One scenario had Yato trying to stop a guy from killing himself, and they had a long conversation complete with flashbacks in the time between jumping from a building and hitting the ground, with a terrified Hiyori tagging along to point out the absurdity of it. I liked the stuff like that a lot. A few arcs were too dark or melodramatic, but even then the battle animation was still great. The dynamic between Hiyori, Yato, and Yukine was also always amazing.

https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/a/user_image/4/0/5/AAcDcBAAD0PV.jpg

CHARACTER: Iki Hiyori (Noragami)
https://myanimelist.net/character/84679/Hiyori_Iki
Voiced by: Uchida Maaya
Top 100 Rank: 37th

SPOILERS FOR NORAGAMI

VIDEO LINK: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oWS7Zpxvb4M

Hiyori starts as someone with just enough spiritual power to notice Yato. It nearly gets her killed when she gets hit by a truck while trying to push him out of the way, not realizing he couldn't be hurt by it. After that, Hiyori's spirit form often leaves her body behind. She has an ethereal weightlessness as a spirit, which allows her to do things like leap between buildings. She's worried about what's happening to her, and she hires Yato to find a way to fix it, but I still really liked how Hiyori reacted to her newfound freedom. She had fun with it, doing things like jumping around town and tagging along with her new god friends.

As a half-spirit, she draws attention from from evil creatures but has no defense against them. Hiyori is a tough girl, and the video I linked for her has her doing wrestling kicks on a weird frog thing. Sadly, she can't do much due to the rules of the world. That often puts her in danger, as does her connection to Yato since she's an easy target for anyone trying to hurt him. Still, I appreciated how proactive and fearless Hiyori could be. She'd been warned that a powerful war god hated Yato and would not hesitate to kill Hiyori if they knew her connection to him. When Yato and Yukine were in trouble, though, Hiyori marched straight to that war god's shrine to call in a favor from one of its spirit weapons. I really liked that moment from her. She refused to just stand by being helpless.

Her relationship with Yato and Yukine was really sweet overall, too. There are multiple times where the only real threat to her is that someone might erase her memories of them, but they've formed such close bonds that it's still treated as a serious danger. Hiyori insists on helping Yukine have normal things in life, like schooling and homework. As much as her and Yato playfully clash, it's also obvious how much they care about each other. After hearing Yato's dream of getting his own shrine, Hiyori makes him one. It's the size of a birdhouse made with scrap wood, but it still makes Yato cry tears of joy. He's a literal god, which puts him above things like human morality, but he tries to be a better person for Hiyori's sake. Whenever she's in danger, those are the few times where his god of calamity side rises to the surface. Otherwise, Hiyori is just a fun character. In her spirit form she has a cat tail and various other catlike mannerisms, which I found fun.