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Sep 16, 2023
Atelier Ryza: The Tutorial: The Anime
Yeah, that's about what this series covers. The tutorial of the game. Where this anime ends is where the story should begin. Watching this anime is a bit like Watching Star Wars: A New Hope, and turning the movie off when the Millennium Falcon departs Tatooine.
It doesn't help that a significant portion of the anime is dedicated to literal side quests from the game. This is really unfortunate. By my calculation, there should have been enough time in 12, maybe 14 episodes to adapt the entire game, if only the side quests were ignored.
Of course, not adapting the second half
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does leave open the possibility of a second season. I'm hoping that is the case, as I expect it to be much better than the first. But this season was ended in a way that seems to indicate a lack of any firm plan to do so, so I must evaluate it on the assumption that no sequel is forthcoming.
What this anime does accomplishment is to put a beloved character on a screen, animate and voice her well, and give fans of the game a it of eye candy. This isn't an impressive feat, but it will be appreciated by those crowds.
5/10, needs to focus more on big monsters, and less on old women's feet
Reviewer’s Rating: 5
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Sep 9, 2023
More of the same from the first season. There is a plot in this show. Probably. But, as with the first season, you'll be far too busy watching the spectacle of Anos BSing his way out of every situation either using some OP ancient artifact, making up new shit on the spot, or just by overmatching his enemy using only 10% of his power. Nothing makes sense. The magic system seems to only follow one rule – that it does whatever would be most convenient for Anos at that moment.
Anos can not be defeated in battle. Anos can not be outwitted. None of the other
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characters are ever in serious danger because they can just be resurrected. Every single battle is a foregone conclusion, and every attempt by the show to trick you into thinking Anos might for once be in some trouble is immediately punctuated by the latest variation of "did you really think killing me would be enough to make me die?"
The only saving grace for this show, and indeed the only reason it's probably watched at all, is that the plot moves so fast, and the sequences are so confusing, that viewers never have a chance to think about how dumb it all is. This show is a collection of of almost everything that would make up a stereotypically trashy isekai, to the point that it wraps around and manages to be more entertaining than it has any right to be.
If you're looking for something that can turn off your brain but don't like slice of life shows, this might do the trick. If you're looking for plot, character development, world building, artwork, or any other positive qualities you might look for in a show, pick anything else.
Reviewer’s Rating: 6
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Dec 6, 2020
Skippable. This story really has nothing to do with the main plot. Naraku's name doesn't even appear once. Nothing important happens in this movie.
With that out of the way, this movie came off to me as a bland side story that went on too long. The villain is one dimensional, and his defeat was basically a love-conquers-all trope, but with some romantic drama. The pacing is slow with a rushed conclusion. It could have used the time to explore the villain a bit more, and make him more than an old, power hungry guy with a vendetta. Instead we got a sesshoumaru cameo. He got
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a whole 5 or 6 minutes of screentime, and all he did was squash some bugs. Now any scene with Rin in it is good, but he did literally nothing to advance the story. You can take him out, and nothing would change.
In short, I walked away from this feeling like I wasted an hour and a half
Reviewer’s Rating: 5
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May 23, 2020
Some minor spoilers from the first few episodes
This show is about as middling in every category as you can possibly get. Every aspect of this show has been done better and with more imagination by other shows, even recent or currently airing ones.
For starters, why is this even an Isekai? I assume this is an adaptation from a LN or manga, so this criticism extends to that too. This show could be written without it being an Isekai, and it would change only one or two scenes after the first episode. So far,the only effect his past life had on his life is when
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he made miso soup. He also converts gold coins to Yen for some reason whenever handling money. Take the stereotype of Americans not understanding the metric system, apply that to foreign currency, and you have Wendelin when making a purchase. Luckily, he's rich beyond reason.
The show starts out with a somewhat interesting premise. He's the 8th son of an extremely poor, noble only in name family. He has no succession rights, no prospects in life, and is expected to ditch his family name for some wort of settlement like his older brothers did. This is immediately thrown out the window when he becomes a magician, and uses his magic to become extremely wealthy and become an adventurer. Everything after that is just him flexing his OP magic while trying to act as normal as possible. In other words, there is no plot. Wendelin has no goals. His only driving motivation is to have fun
Characters. This is an interesting one. The characters of this show all have a familiar feel to them, to the point of becoming fairly forgettable. But after 8 episodes, it finally hit me. This is the Avatar gang. Wendelin's starter crew is just Team Avatar. Louise, the blue haired girl, is Toph with eyes. If she wore green and threw rocks, you wouldn't notice the difference, except that Toph is awesome, and Louise is just meh. Erwin is the only member of the party who can't use magic at all. This fact bothers him (despite the fact that magic is supposedly incredibly rare), so he's basically a pettier and less funny Sokka. Too bad, because he's also supposed to be the comic relief. Lina is the only one who isn't an Avatar: The Last Airbender character ripoff, and is also the most forgettable of the group. I would write about her character, but it is so undeveloped that there is literally nothing to write about. Well, both girls fawn over Wendelin, because of course they do, but that was really to be expected at this point.
Regarding Wendelin's character, as I said earlier, he has no goals. His character is only superficially interesting. He's a simple, straight faced guy who has no desire for glory and chooses his friends based on how fun they are. He's Kazuma fro Konosuba, but with no ambition and none of the struggles.
Art is middling. It's nothing to write home about. Animation is on the lower end. It works well for characters, and the magic is animated decently well, but it falls into the same trap of crummy CGI monsters that look way out of place that Overlord falls into. It works just well enough to be inoffensive, but it doesn't often go above that.
Despite my having railed on it for a few paragraphs, I do have a few good things to say. Elize, who I won't talk about in much detail to avoid spoiling anything, is a warm fuzzy character type that I never get tired of seeing. cheap way of attracting me? Yes. Effective? Also yes. Brantack is also a genuinely interesting character. He has some scars of his past that often show up. If the show would explore them more in the next few episodes, there'd be at least one compelling character in this show. Beyond that, Wendelin is at least a genuine character. Simple as he may be, he is easy to identify with by most people. Identifiable main character are rarely a bad thing.
In conclusion, this show is a slice of life comedy pretending to be an isekai adventure. It's konosuba, but with boring characters that copy Avatar's paper and still manage only a C-. Entertainment wise, this show is decent enough. It keeps me looking at pixels for 22 minutes, so that's at least something. This anime season was lined up to have some real butt kickers, but extenuating circumstances have left us with 8th son and Tower of God. The only reason anyone might want to watch this show is because it's better than staring at walls, and right now, there are a lot of people with a lot of walls to stare at.
Reviewer’s Rating: 5
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Dec 14, 2019
Full disclosure: his show is 100% fan service. I don't mean the flying-titty/panty shot kind, but the more literal sense of the word; this is a show made for people who are already fans of the Azur Lane game. If you do not like the game or have never played it, stay away; YOU WILL NOT LIKE THIS SHOW. This show should only be viewed as a supplement for people who want to look at something other than stage 3-4. (Don't worry; if you don't get that reference, then you're probably in the "will not like" category anyway)
That aside, on to the review. This anime
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is made on a fairly low budget and paid for by a game studio. Granted, Azur Lane is one of the most profitable mobile games on the market, but it' still an offshoot of a mobile game. As expected, most aspects of this show are mediocre at best.
Art: passable. It does everything well enough, but doesn't push any boundries. 6/10
Sound: See above. worth noting that the English dub tries to give the characters accents based on where they're supposed to be from. Sometimes it works, sometimes it sucks. mostly it sucks. HMS Prinz Eugen ver exampluh zaks like zis. It's not fun. there was no reason to include it. Japanese version thankfully doesn't have that. 5/10
Characters: Straight forward and generally fall within preset archetypes. There's a super positive one, a conflicted one, a strong-but-actually-broken-inside one, list goes on and on. keeping in mind that there are over 300 ships in the game, most of them don't make it to the anime, but by my estimates, at least 50 have had at least some screen time. It tries to give equal screen time to all of the important ones, but I found myself only caring about about a couple. 5/10
Story: This is where shit hits the fan. The story doesn't make sense. Aliens invade earth to specifically and exclusively conquer the ocean using anthropomorphic ships, so humans create their own anthropomorphic ships. The concept works well enough as a mobile game about building a fleet of cute girls, but as an anime, it is confusing. 3/10
With that all being said, this is where I wrap back to the opening disclaimer. This is a show for fans. Fans of Azur Lane do not play it for its riveting story. It is a game about building a fleet of cute girls and using them to expand your fleet of cute girls.
Enjoyment: If this were a stand alone show, i would not enjoy it in the slightest. 2/10. As a fan of the game however, this show is a fun addition to the game. 8/10
Overall: Again, if this was a standalone show, I could not in good conscience give it anything above 5. However, this show is not. When paired with the game by its target audience, it gets bumped up a few points. 8/10
Reviewer’s Rating: 8
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Dec 14, 2019
I tried. I really tried to like this anime, but I just could not bring myself to care the slightest bit about any of the characters. It's generic, uninspired, and at times just lazy. There are few twists or surprises. Anyone could write a story based off of the synopsis alone, and it would be so similar to what you got that either could be used to predict the other. I doubt this show will ever get a second season, and the world is better for it.
Don't waste your time on this; 2019 has been chalk full of incredible shows you could be watching instead.
Reviewer’s Rating: 4
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