History YMMV / ZatchBell

* GrowingTheBeard: In the case of the anime, it takes a ''long'' while for the series to really take off and become something epic...until episodes 44 and 45, which features a ''brutal'' battle that Kiyo and Zatch flat-out ''lose.'' Shortly afterwards we're introduced to the stone tablets of 1000 year old demon in episode 48, and it just keeps going from there!

* {{Macekre}}: For the most part avoided except for one infamous element: the radioactive guns. [[note]]The localization did a good job balancing the violence in the shows to appease the censors. The one pesky element they could not work around were all the guns, so instead of making them invisible like in ''Anime/YuGiOh'', the localization team gave them a light green glow.[[/note]]

** Eido and Hyde. By the point they stopped appearing in the series like the filler villains they were, they had been undergoing some serious CharacterDevelopment and had pulled a draw against Kiyomaro and Zatch that is utterly shocking in hindsight. It genuinely seemed that they would do HeelFaceTurn in the future and maybe serve a TheLancer or TheBigGuy in the main cast, or at least as occasional allies. (In fact, to prove how important they seemed to be, the Spanish dub assigned them two of the biggest VA in the entire cast, including one that rarely voices anything other than protagonists and big time villains.) But then the canonical supporting cast was established, and Eido and Hyde disappeared without a trace, most likely because they couldn't be incorporated into the main cast without tons of rewrites if not entire deviations from the story. While Hyde (and Eido presumably) was eventually made canon by way of adding him to the collage of demons in the end of the manga, it pretty much meant that he got his book burned without ever meeting any of the main cast.

** Shion Hibiki and Nyarurato. Similar to the above, they had the potential for more exposure and development were they to play any part in stories later on in the series, but since their story arc was filler, neither of them reappeared after the arc was done. While in Nya's case it's justifiable seeing as his book got burned, Shion could have easily remained in Kiyo's class as a recurring supporting character (also giving Kiyo a classmate confidante who's familiar with Demon and the battle to become king, something he didn't have before), but the arc's ending has her transferring out of the school and leaving town for reasons that didn't seem entirely convincing. There's a reason there are quite a few FanFiction that [[FixFic keeps one or both of them around to be featured throughout the remainder of the story.]]

* LikeYouWouldReallyDoIt:
** A villainous example with Clear Note. After all the build up to him being the final BigBad, it's pretty clear Ashuron was not going to take him out.
** Averted with the PostClimaxConfrontation. [[spoiler:The story makes no real attempt at dramatic tension for the final battle between Zatch and Brago. Zatch and Kiyo are shown to have a clear advantage and the battle is mostly skipped over, with the focus being on Sherry's desperation against them rather than depicting Zatch and Kiyo struggling to win.]]

* WidgetSeries: The premise itself is a straight-forward ThereCanOnlyBeOne setup but what happens between that is weird. Exhibit A: The Very Melon Song.

** Zatch's name, as the word gash refers to a deep cut and is unpleasant to those with a weak stomach. Keeping his name as Gash in the English translation would've scared off a number of people, not to mention that it would be unfitting for such a benevolent character. Zatch meanwhile comes off more friendly and seems fitting because it is reminscent of "zap". [[spoiler: Also matches that of his brother, Zeno.]]

* GeniusBonus: In the WhereAreTheyNowEpilogue in the final chapter, Demolt, perhaps ''the'' single most AxCrazy demon in the fight, is shown working in a quarry with a pickaxe that appears to be made from his weapons. It would seem that the reign of the fight's ultimate victor entailed the near-literal [[Literature/TheBible beating of swords into plowshares]].