Gantz 5: Deathwatch

O how I've waited for this day! It's been two whole months since I watched Gantz 4 (although in the meantime I did discover another excellent series, Fullmetal Alchemist) but after work today the wait was over.
Well, I just finished watching Gantz 5 (episodes 17-20), and, sad to report, it was a disappointment (right up until the extraordinary, heartbreaking ending, that is).
When Gantz 4 finished, our heroes were about to battle the gigantic temple guardians, so Gantz 5 begins with that. But what happens is far from riveting. The battle was actually quite boring. Nothing much happened, and it took a long time for it to happen. Also, the profanity in these episodes was through the roof. What the fuck? Everybody was swearing their heads off, seemingly in an attempt to inject some drama into the whole thing, but it didn't work at all, it only sounded stupid. And it was as though the animators got lazy, or the budget was slashed, because suddenly there were all these static shots of the characters, with only some wavy speed lines. Maybe it was for effect, or as a tribute to some old school anime, but to me it just looked cheap.
And yet it was definitely worth persevering through the boring bits, and of course I had no choice anyway - I'm hooked, you see. I have to find out what happens to Kurono and Kato and Kishimoto. So this big ending was easily the most emotional, eye-popping series of events yet, mainly because one of our heroes got killed. I'm not gonna say which one here, but if you really want to know, ask me in a Comment. And if you don't want to know, don't read the Comments... if there are any, that is, but there probably won't be. Ha ha.
But the ending was very emotional and shocking, and not only did one of our heroes die, but another may be about to die!
I'll admit now that this series has its flaws, no doubt about it, but as I mentioned before, I'm hooked so I'll be in great suspense until Gantz 6, which I think is the final one, so we get to find out if anybody makes it back from this crazy Gantz world. And whatever happens, and despite the series' flaws, it will always have the distinction of igniting (or re-igniting) my obsession with anime.
And I'll still always, at the oddest times, find myself singing (or trying to sing - it's in Japanese) the ending theme song.