WARNING: The following contains major spoilers for Black Clover, available now on Crunchyroll.
Though the anime made a bad first impression on some viewers thanks to Asta's grating personality and a formulaic setup, those who've stuck with Black Clover have grown to love it. By now, it's often considered a contender for a spot among Shonen Jump's "Big Three." Let's look at how Black Clover recovered from its rough start to win audiences over.
Black Clover began in Fall 2017. The first few episodes featured Asta, a loud and simple peasant without any magical capabilities, making do in a society that depends entirely on magic for everyday life. In this world, magic even determines social class ranking. His determination to become the Wizard King despite his status was admirable, but the first few episodes left some viewers with a bad impression of the show.
Asta is an obnoxiously loud and not very intelligent character, who in the first episode only stood out from the standard shonen protagonist by virtue of how obnoxiously he screamed. In addition to the screaming, Yuno’s presence, the magical world and the underdog storyline of both Asta and the Black Bulls made the themes of Black Clover a bit familiar to the majority of shonen fans in a divisive way.
As audiences become ever more accustomed to action shonen formulas, overly-formulaic shonen series often get criticized as unoriginal and difficult to watch. If shows like One Piece, Naruto and Bleach have already done everything Black Clover does, there is an argument that such a formulaic shonen anime is unnecessary. However, just like Asta disproved those who doubted him, these criticisms have ultimately been disproved. Black Clover ultimately made its own spin on the shonen formula, which has helped the show’s growth in popularity.
As it became available in more and more countries, Black Clover has appealed to many more viewers and has become one of the most streamed anime worldwide. In Crunchyroll's "Decade in Review: The Most Watched Anime of the Decade by Country," Black Clover was found to be definitively the most popular anime of the decade in both Europe and Africa. In Crunchyroll's "Most Popular Anime of Winter 2020 By Country" article, it was included in the overall top 20 most popular titles and top 10 most popular anime ranking for the United Kingdom, Canada, Oceania, Mexico, Brazil, Moldova, Russia, France and Germany.
The show’s popularity grew in large part thanks to its tight and consistent schedule, constant character development, fight scenes, storyline and theme of "Never giving up is my magic." With so many magic knights squads out there, everyone can pick a favorite character, even from the ragtag crew of misfits and rebels like the Black Bulls. Their appeal as a squad provides a sense of camaraderie for fans that might not feel they always fit in in the real world.
The different magical attributes, humor and heartwarming moments have helped build the reputation of Black Clover being a shonen heavyweight. The opening and ending songs for the show have also never let viewers down. Black Clover fans showed their love for "Grandeur" the series' new opening song and "Treasure" the series' new ending song, last week by making it the #1 worldwide trending topic on Twitter.
The show itself isn’t perfect. The animation can be lacking and inconsistent. However, this can be justified due to budgetary issues and making episodes weekly for almost three years. The only break in the schedule throughout the life of this show up until now has been due to the global pandemic. Unlike other long-running anime, Black Clover has only had a handful of filler episodes.
The episode that truly cemented Black Clover’s placement in the higher placement of shonen was Episode 63, "Not in the Slightest" featured Asta’s power-up, the episode's animation was unlike anything previously shown in the series. Every animator who’d ever worked on the show got a chance to shine in their own unique styles, resulting in an episode reminiscent of the Naruto vs. Pain fight.
Episode 63 wasn’t just a fluke or a one-off special episode -- it is what the future of the show looks like. The most masterful series of episodes came with the ultimate dealings with the Eye of the Midnight Sun and the reincarnation of the elves. The fight scenes truly did the arc justice, seeing as it was the issue at hand for almost the entire series up until this point. Snippets of high-quality animation have been shown recently in the team battle of the Magic Knights captains, in Yuno’s and Langris’ battle for the position of Vice-Captain of the Golden Dawn, and in Yami’s and Mereleona’s training fight. The battle with the Spade Kingdom will surely be one to compare to the sequences of those during the Eye of the Midnight Sun arc.
Black Clover's popularity has grown so much that it is close to impossible for an anime fan to not encounter it. Word-of-mouth reviews from fans can make or break a show, and the word of mouth has changed from negative to positive. Black Clover is now largely considered a good show by fans and critics alike. It's inescapably popular, which helps qualify it for Shonen Jump's Big Three. As long as the show never gives up, then neither will the fans.