Mar 25, 2024
I don't normally write reviews, but I honestly think it's awful that this anime has such a low rating and a majority not recommended reviews. This isn't a perfect anime by any means, it's a bit clunky, and probably too rushed to give the characters any real room to breathe, but it's an interesting story and a nice romance. Don't let the score fool you, if the title and poster drew you in, you'll probably enjoy this anime. I'm beginning to realize that MAL underrates shoujo in general. An equivalently decent shonen would not be sitting at a 6.4, so keep that in mind.
I've seen
...
a lot of people comparing this to Kamisama Kiss, but worse. I've never seen that anime, so I can't really make a comparison. But I can say it does feel Fruits Basket adjacent, but with much less focus on the characters and more focus on the mystery. Much of the anime centers around the main character's fish-out-of-water situation, how weird it is to finally go to your family home and find it inhabited with weird spirits who won't fully accept you or tell you exactly what's going on. Most episodes waver between hints at an overarching plot and a monster of the week kinda thing. Things would feel much more fleshed out and less rushed if this was a two cour show, but in this day and age just getting shoujo adapted is a big enough accomplishment so ya get what ya get I guess.
The strong suit of this anime is definitely the mystery and the romance. Teasing out character's motivations and backstories every episode is honestly pretty engaging, though this only centers on the main characters, side characters are left to the wayside, again, seemingly because they tried to cram so much into twelve episodes. The romance is very cute, grows believably, and doesn't progress like you would expect from the typical shoujo/romcom cliches. The art style is great, the patterned flourishes to clothing and wallpaper are gorgeous, though the animation quality is lacking sometimes (quite a few slideshow scenes that could have been fully animated but weren't). This is probably a personal issue, but if you aren't very familiar with the terminology associated with Japanese spirits and demons you might have a problem following some of the introductions and very brief explanations of the inhabitants of the house. Lots of new names and terms get thrown out with little to no set up or explanations, presumably because the target audience already understands the differences between an ayakashi and a youkai. It doesn't diminish the enjoyability of the plot, but it can be a bit annoying so keep that in mind.
Overall, if you enjoy believable romances, mysteries that are slowly solved over a season, and interesting world building, you'll enjoy this show. If you're in it for dramatic, intricate, character growth and lots of well animated action then you will probably not have the patience for this show. 7.5/10
Reviewer’s Rating: 7
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