First of all, I don't care about the source material of a show. A problem is a problem. My review is on the anime, and therefore the review is supposed to talk about the positive and negative aspects of the show. It doesn't matter whether the problem originates from the source material. It's still a problem. Secondly, I don't think I criticized the show for its gore or its edgy environment. I criticized the show for shallow characters, misplaced comedy, and that the show focuses too much on shock value rather than quality. Now obviously these are also problems that could also come from the manga, but like I said before. I don't care about problems that originate from the source material. I'm focusing on the problems with the anime. Sorry if I sound a bit cold but this is just how I write. Anyways thanks for the comment :) (And its always nice to know a person who loves Ping Pong The Animation :D)
Sorry, I am a bit too tired at the moment to give a personal response detailing why, but I can offer two posts that I made in regards to what I think of think of Clannad: AS. In short, AS offered even more melodrama than I could bare coming from Clannad season 1, and while I would more likely give AS a higher score of a 4 (or even 5) if I took my intense hatred for the show out of the picture, I also rate partly based on my enjoyment, and by the time I got to season 2, I was just getting sick and tired of every element in the story.
nil- said:
If someone could post a well-supported opinion for what makes this show one of the greatest of all time, I'd be all ears for it. But like most useless Key shit, it panders to the common medium using cheap tricks and overly melodramatic stunts to bring out any characterization. E.g., for consistency's sake, if you think Kokoro Connect was bad but this show was good, then you're a hypocrite. And if you think both are good, then you just have really awful tastes.
It also seems that most people magically forget about how terrible (and different) the first half of the series is, in light of the second half. And while I also think both halves are equally awful, objectively, it doesn't make sense for anyone to rate purely on how much they enjoyed the second half while practically ignoring the similar Clannad S01 problems still in effect with the first half.
And like a lot of biases coming from adaptations, a lot of people seem to rate this series highly coming from their prior knowledge with the visual novel. But this makes no sense as an anime should be considered stand-alone; relying on visual novel characterization to know about the characters here doesn't change how objectively different an anime adaptation is. I also like to think this is a problem with other VN/LN adaptations like many of ufotable's works (e.g. KnK and Fate/ series both being terribly overrated despite a massive amount of pretentiousness in their writing). But I'm just digressing on this point because I never really liked such supposedly 'deep and edgy' series.
nil- said:
Definitely agreed that on an objective standpoint, the Tomoya and Ushio development was a better aspect of the series. But one of the main reasons I think the show is terrible (rather than plain mediocre) is in light of the first half of the season (~E1-10). It pushed out some of the worst melodrama seen in the series, and I would say that every one of the arcs is an inferior experience to even ones done in Clannad season 1.
I don't recall too many specifics aside from egregiously bad drama moments like Sunohara's angst or that ridiculously stupid gang fight, but I think the dorm mother's arc was the closest to reaching mediocrity. But it failed to make a remarkable point, falling short of anything decent as it felt like a sloppily done Natsume Yuujinchou episode.
It was probably by episode 10 that I literally gave up on caring about the show, and so I'm heavily biased against any potentially better qualities seen in the second half. But trying to be as objective as possible, the second half certainly took a more realistic direction and only played along the shallower waters of shitty melodrama. It pulled some decent slice of life scenes with Tomoya trying to find work and support himself but it still left far too many loose ends. And jesus are all those
death scenes
terribly done, both in their direction and their execution. I don't even think Urobuchi's works - all of which are famous for such cheap tricks - could ever get that bad.
All Comments (20) Comments