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Dec 7, 2020
I watched this to humor a friend. Don't do that.
If you are not taken in by the music or the character designs then there is absolutely nothing for you here. Even those two elements, which seem the most important aspects of the show, are woefully underdeveloped. Songs are roughly a minute and a half long and display no synergy whatsoever with the emotional beats of the story (of which there are few to none). The lyrics have no flow or literary value and are flat descriptions of the actions occurring on screen. I have already forgotten what any of it sounds like.
The main character is
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a cardboard airhead who is the most standard peace loving and hopelessly clueless shojo protagionist with self esteem issues you can imagine, and three of the five harem boys are deplorable rapey psychopaths. Nobody is given any notable development and each character just repeats the same interactions over and over. They are extremely by the numbers one note archetypes.
The plot revolves around the most basic, predictable, and vague twilight-esque nonsense and is dispensed to the viewer entirely via dialogue exposition. For some reason this takes up a large portion of the show, to the point where it overshadows character interactions, which I thought was supposed to be the main draw of this kind of show. There is not a single moment of the show that manages to surprise the viewer or subvert expectations in any way.
On top of everything the show seems to struggle to overcome a tight budget and suffers from a great deal of animation short cuts and a lack of transitionary sequences.
I hated my experience with this show and it was an absolute slog to get through. There was very little enjoyment to be had even in critically ripping it apart by the second half, since it reveals the only hand it has quite early on. It wasn't even fun to watch as a joke for a friend.
If you are not drawn in by the sexual allure of edgy anime boys then run far, far away from this show and don't look back.
Reviewer’s Rating: 2
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Nov 21, 2020
This is a fucking excellent drama.
And that means a lot coming from me, since dramas are not usually my genre of choice. However, it's so good because it's not *just* a drama. While I haven't read the book, I know just enough about it to say that this show is probably the most batshit and creative book adaptation I have ever seen, and the choices it makes to that end add so many layers on top of what's going on with the plot alone.
The insane blend of visual experimentation, 1800s aristocratic debauchery, and off the wall yet astoundingly sensible science-fantasy world-building is perfectly unique and
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expertly woven into the themes, characters, and the narrative core taken from the original book. The directing is excellent, and there is so much care and detail crammed into each scene regarding these elements that there is never not something interesting happening.
The pacing is well balanced, and each development is not only suspenseful, but also thematically meaningful and actively develops the characters. The show is dense and no time is wasted.
The visual style makes such an intelligent use of textures, colors, and photo manipulation to blend its 3d and 2d elements into something that is not only cohesive, but actually striking and pleasant to look at, which is a feat that the show shares with very few peers.
Honestly, the only reason I'm not giving it a 10/10 mostly comes down to personal taste. There are some elements of characterization that I find a bit too well-worn, but many of these instances are necessary results of its unique adaptive nature.
In its overall effect and film-making technique, Gankutsuou should by all means be considered a masterpiece.
Reviewer’s Rating: 9
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Nov 7, 2020
Clumsy is the word I would use to best describe Occult Academy. I'm not going to lie, it hooked me decently well with the first episode. The setup isn't bad, as there's a a good driving force for the plot and already several threads to explore. I took a pretty good liking to some of the setting and character design too. However, it then goes on to fumble the execution at almost every turn.
Character writing, jokes, story beats, and world building are all wonky. I have never before seen a show where it feels so clear as to what they're going for, and yet where
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the execution feels so incomplete. Nothing is so bad as to be obnoxious, as is the case with most bad anime, and yet it feels almost like it's literally missing scenes at many points. It's the oddest thing, the pacing is so jarring when it comes to these areas. Characters are treated as if they've been well established when we've barely met them, and wild concepts are introduced out of left field while characters show almost no reaction to the life-changing implications. Central aspects of the setting and characters are either never set up properly at all, or are set up more than halfway through the show, which ends up leaving a massive black mark throughout the viewing experience.
So what we're left with in practice is a show that sets up a main hook real fast before spending 10 episodes on frivolous bullshit that in hindsight forms a complete picture, but in the moment is terribly bland, poorly directed, and not very entertaining to watch. There's a lot of wasted screen-time with repetitive character moments that advance nothing and are grossly predictable and transparent. I called one of the main twists of the entire show in the second episode, and all the episodic storylines in-between the main plot are no better. The world's mechanics are pretty terrible too, as most of the supernatural aspects of the show display wildly inconsistent behavior and illicit head-scratching non-reactions from the main cast.
It's hard to even structure a sensible explanation for just how much the show is lacking, because every facet of the pacing and directing is tripping over something at every turn. I'm talking fundamental screw-ups, down to even basic failures at establishing the space the characters inhabit or how they enter and exit a scene. There's some pretty lame fight choreography to that effect as well. To convey the disorganization in my thoughts here, I think it's fair to say that the show is just overall poorly directed, and it affects absolutely everything negatively, in ways both big and small.
All that said, the finale is a fairly entertaining watch, at least relative to the rest of the show. It quickly wraps up the main story threads and reincorporates the few character developments that were covered in a fairly standard but at least correct and satisfying way. Mechanical errors notwithstanding, although I had already given up on the show putting any effort into that by this point.
On paper, this show has a decent setup, setting, and story beats, but the pacing and execution is just grueling at times. If not for the positive impression left on me by the ending, I would've landed it closer to a 3 than a 4. As such, I really don't recommend anyone watch this. Most of the runtime is spent waffling around not delivering on the main premises implied by an either an apocalypse prevention scenario or an occult academy, and the things it does spend its time on are done pretty poorly at that. I only kept watching it because the more unconventional and slightly baffling moments in the show intrigued me enough to want to know where else it was going to end up, but most of it came up thoroughly disappointing.
Reviewer’s Rating: 4
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Jul 8, 2020
Man, this show was a pretty disappointing experience. It's definitely not Trigger's next big hit, that's for sure.
This show is just about the most basic story ever told. The character archetypes and narrative cliches are played so straight that you can predict just about every single thing that will happen throughout the entire duration before it happens. Not just plot points, but character moments, jokes, fights, basically everything. It is so absolutely surface level that it's almost impressive how little the show manages to say about anything at all. There's effectively no meaningful character development or narrative themes.
It's directed in a pretty bland way too.
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Every single piece of world building, none of which is very believably constructed or novel, is rattled off in exposition dumps from a handful of VIP characters. Nothing in the plot is told organically through creative cinematography, it's entirely hand fed through character dialogue. There is zero subtext or subtlety to any given moment.
If the show didn't look and animate like a Trigger show, then it would practically have nothing else going for it. Despite how little value there is to be found in the story, it does still manage to go down easy and entertain well enough by virtue of how nicely polished it is. I just wish all that quality work hadn't gone towards material that was so damn forgettable.
Reviewer’s Rating: 6
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