Shinsekai yori

There's often a point in one's life to acknowledge the possibility of another worldly phenomenon outside of our collective conscience from where we live that is in contrast with our ideals. This philosophical problem has always been a subject of discussion since Plato's "Allegory of the Cave," which chronicles how our limited understanding of the reality we perceive may not be what it seems since we're so entrenched in our society. Many works of fiction have dabbled this subject matter numerous times, with some succeeding and others failing. Unfortunately for Shinsekai Yori, it falls into the latter, but not entirely.

To start, the basic idea of ... how Shinsekai Yori's story pans out is that it's a coming-of-age story focusing on five different characters. Their journey in discovering the history of human civilization eventually transpired into pure dystopia. It starts exceptionally well with building up these characters that are all very unique and distinguishable from each other. There's never a moment where I couldn't remember who a specific person was, and it's not just their appearances but their well-written personalities and backgrounds. Their childhood arc paces itself nicely in giving an atmosphere for us to take in that's mysterious and puzzling in a minimal understanding of what the world is actually like because that's how the childish mindset would be like in this scenario. However, once that arc was finished and we got our first-time skip, it didn't get too extraordinary as one would hope.

One thing that makes the time skips off-putting is how there's hardly any build-up on how these characters' personalities matured over time. For instance, one of the most controversial things about the show was the relationship between kids of the same sex. It's not so much the relationships themselves that I have a problem with. It's how it comes out of nowhere with hardly any development behind it. In this sense, it feels as though there was more to their relationships, but they had to rush it so it won't feel dragged out for time constraints. Because of this, one might feel inclined to give it a pass. But for me, the time skips cannot forgive. Given the context, this show brings to the table wanting to be this grand epic that ultimately feels lazy from a writing perspective. The best romantic development in the entire show was between Saki and Satoru because of how long we've followed these two together and how strong their bond was in helping each other through the numerous challenging obstacles. Alas, the rest of the relationships thrown out didn't make a massive impression because of how weak and lazy they implemented them into the story; if they had anything of value for us to see how they got to that point, it would've been for the best.

While the story itself isn't something we've seen before, it is still a mysterious and suspenseful drama that manages to pull off some great twists through the narrative. That is until the realization comes to mind when the pacing of it all fails to make it a masterpiece in the writing department. Like I said before about the time skips, they dumb down the pacing because of how they rush some of the arcs that could've been more effective had it been done with better intentions, such as at least showing us a montage of them overtime. That shouldn't mean that time skips are unnecessary in any situation, but it takes a lot of care and precise handling to make them work. Time skips aside. The other pacing issues mostly happen in the middle part of the show, where scenes lack clarity in their exposition, giving us a clear, concise way of what has happened or what will happen to the characters or future events. Too fast to even comprehend the overarching conflicts that arise from the protagonist feeling messy and disorganized for us to piece together what will transpire. This could come into play with the fact that the show skips over essential details in the novel, but for reviewing the show itself, there's no need to go over that aspect.

How Shinsekai Yori handles its world-building through expository dialogue receives a mixed response from me. It works like a pattern where one or all of our heroes are journeying or trying to find answers. Eventually, they'll talk to someone who will explain everything to them in no more than ten minutes, either the dark history of Japan and how it ultimately became a grim dystopia or what the ethics counsel is really like underneath. The narrative is thought-provoking at times that bring into question human nature and how society structures itself into chaos. However, I can't help but feel that it could've been done more better with less redundancy and not feel like a lazy attempt at being profound.

It's not just the writing that feels off, but the technical side of the show feels very limited and looks shoddy in the process. That's not to say all of it looks bad, there are a lot of beautiful set pieces drawn into the backgrounds, and the character designs look unique and fit well with the tone of the show. However, there are a lot of problems with the designs of the monsters that inhabit Shinsekai Yori, where they don't look well-drawn, and their animations look as if the director hired a low-budget studio to animate them. There's even one episode where the animation took a complete nose-dive where the queen of the queerats looks like a giant blob that the animators didn't draw fully of what it was initially supposed to look like. I'm not saying that all shows have to look highly high-budget to be called good art/animation, but it doesn't strike my fancy when there's nothing significant to gaze at.

With all of the negativity I've had for Shinsekai Yori, there are still several good things worth noting. It is without question that the amount of suspense and heart-pounding tension that Shinsekai Yori offers is astonishing. The first three minutes of the first episode alone garners some needed praise for its well-directed atmosphere, right down to the music and editing of all of the events in present-day Tokyo. Its tone is not pretty, and it will nonetheless make a lot of people feel uncomfortable to sit through in some instances, but that should warrant a lot of credit to the show in giving us a very mature tone that comes in full swing. What makes the suspense amazingly good and imposing is the amount of mystery that we are provided through the children's perspective and how we can never see how the adults know the situation in the world. Often you don't see stories handle mystery this way and make for an intense experience. The first-person narrative through Saki gives a distinct feel to how we see her grow into this person who is fully aware in later life that feels undeniably human to me.

As many have told me about the story, the ending makes up for it despite its faults. It provides the level with a satisfying conclusion. There were no predictable outcomes present at the narrative's end. That guarantees Shinsekai Yori some much-needed acclaim for at least not giving us a story that isn't inherently generic in a predictable way. No Hollywood gimmick severely tarnishes the gritty tone. It handles itself in a very realistic fashion that feels very satisfying to see first-hand.

Musically, it mainly consists of really bombastic chanting music that is very haunting and intimidating from the style of tone it tries to set. There are very few questionable choices of songs that Shinsekai Yori has that feel out of place in any scene. Intense orchestration also borrows from some minimalist influence in some ambiance tone it gives with light electronically ambient mixes in-between settings that are inherently quiet and simple.

Ambitious though it may be, Shinsekai Yori just doesn't cut it entirely as a supreme masterpiece that has come out in recent years. The problems it possesses in giving us a poorly-paced story that can't provide a concise narrative that's hard to get around. Character development feels good in some areas, but their relationships felt contrived with inconsistent expository problems due to the poorly put time skips. I wouldn't classify this show as completely bad. The amount of suspenseful tension makes for an intense experience to behold in showing us the one significant development of Saki into a fully realized character. After all, a worthwhile experience with many faults in its technical aspects is at least more tolerable than a show with great technical prowess with no added value to the experience whatsoever.

Grade: B-

Caution: There will be spoilers.

I began watching Shinsekai Yori because of the frequent urging of my friend. I dropped it at 3 episodes (because it failed to instill any sort of interest in me as to the outcome of the plot), then picked it up again a few months later because I saw it recommended by a fairly large amount of people who claimed that it was a "classic" and "the best story ever". I felt that I should at least watch the entire 25 episodes before passing judgement on what was seemingly a masterpiece. I did not make it. At 18/25 episodes, the series ... has so far failed to impress me with any sort of shocking revelation, and I would rather not waste a further 2 hours of my life to watch the rest.

Edit: I have since watched the complete series.

Story [5/10]

Ah, the story. Where to begin with this. The story was quite creative. A dystopian society set in the future with psychokinesis users and subhuman creatures. Cool. However, I consider pacing to be vital to the enjoyment of the overall story, and boy I have a lot of shit to say about it. The pacing was, without a doubt, the most atrociously inconsistent I have encountered so far. I was sorely tempted numerous times to drop this anime at ep. 3, 11, and 16.

The first three minutes of the first episode were probably the highlight of my viewing experience. After that began an inconsistent downward spiral into mediocrity. There is a definite lack of subtlety in the way the anime presents the issues it wishes to discuss. It is forced at the viewer, as if the producers were trying to make us to feel a certain way. Terror, I suppose. Each emotion Saki experiences is overdramatic to the point of absurdity. Certain scenes are revealed, then seemingly discarded or forgotten, leaving the viewer to wonder about the point behind it, or whether it mattered at all. It seems that for each arc (I'm guessing one every timeskip), the protagonists seek the answer to the current arc's mystery:

Arc 1: Civilization
Arc 2: Fiends/Cantus
Arc 3: Queerats

This division would be perfectly fine if not for the way the answers were revealed. The arc drags its dead body slowly and painfully across the storyline for about 4-5 episodes before an all knowing person decides to bestow their wisdom upon them. Examples: false minoshiro, Shun, Head of Ethics, Squealer. It's done in such an obvious and convenient fashion that the few episodes before the end of an arc seem pointless. The producers' failure to create a decently cohesive adaptation of the manga makes the story seem like a dumb animal spasming erratically as it tries to reach the finish line. If you've ever tried to played Clop, this was what watching this anime felt like.

A particular episode I had qualms with was ep. 8. No, it was not because of the homosexuality. I was fine with that. Saki x Maria forever. The problem was with the abrupt development of these relationships as well as the adults' obliviousness to these 14-year olds' overly sexual acts. Added to that was the fact that the anime didn't even attempt to explain it.

Again, I must point out the terrible pacing of the story. I'd venture that the episodes before the last arc were completely unbearable to watch. Sure, things were revealed, but they were revealed in such a vague and disconnected way that it honestly didn't matter until the final arc.


Art [6/10]

The art was nice, with a few absolutely disgusting lapses here and there.

Sound [9/10]

The music was the one redeeming factor of this anime. It was the perfect tone for the solemn and tense mood that dominated the story.

Character [3/10]

The characters were bland and uninteresting, with the exception of perhaps Shun and Squealer. The main character, Saki, was extremely hard to sympathize with. Her overreaction to everything was forced and off-putting. She had moments of revelation and even more moments of terrible stupidity (again, for the convenience of the plot, I suppose). The necessity of some characters other than plot devices is rather dubious.

Overall, Shinsekai Yori is an anime that tries too hard to be something that it's not. The political drama and philosophical issues it tries to bring up are embarassingly and painfully forced. It tries to juggle four different topics at once. Throughout the series, it's hard to tell what it actually wants to focus on. Is it the development of the current utopia? Is it Fiends/Karma Demons and the effects of Cantus? Is it the political factions between Queerats? Is it the weirdly depicted racism towards Queerats?

I judged this anime quite harshly because in my mind, I'd already condemned it as an overrated series. Therefore, I would not recommend this anime to anyone coming in with high expectations.

Shin Sekai Yori is the most tragic tale of wasted potential I have ever seen.

The setting is I think not only the most interesting setting in anime, but the most interesting idea. It has taken one simple concept : 'people can change the world with their psychic powers', and done all sorts of things with it, from the effects it's had on society to balloon dogs to Tokyo.

In the end, though, the setting serves as a backdrop. It's somewhat relevant throughout the first half of the anime, and the parts where they learn about the setting are the best parts of ... the anime despite a heavy reliance on infodumps. After all, it wouldn't have been easy to get the history of humanity across without infodumping.

But from there the story goes off in other directions, focusing on the theme of fantasy racism rather than any of the incredibly interesting questions that arise from the premise. There are some twists, but fundamentally it tells a simple story which uses the fascinating setting's elements as plot devices but does not really explore them, and the 'terrifying villain' is no scarier and has no more impact than a simple 'monster too powerful for anyone to fight' would have in any other series.

None of these problems are helped by the frankly awful cast of characters. Squealer is alright; he's interesting but his status as not-a-viewpoint-character limits how much of his depth can be shown, which would be fine if the rest of the characters held up. But they don't. Shun is competent. Maria is sorta outgoing. Mamoru is shy and weak-willed. If other people hadn't made statements about them, I would not even be able to describe a single trait that either Saki or Satoru had; occasionally someone says that 'Saki is inquisitive' but that is hardly demonstrated in the show.

The art can be interesting sometimes but is very variable in quality. One of the early episodes - I think episode 3, but I'm not sure - had a noticeable dip in overall art quality, and the character designs and art style in which the characters were drawn just weren't great overall. The backgrounds were frequently good, though.

The first ending was awesome, the second was good. I don't exactly recall the OST, but I remember liking it. Music is one of the strong points of Shin Sekai Yori.

Tens, tens all across the boards, I was quite excited to see this anime especially with its popularity on MAL and its popularity in the reviews, aside from this review that I am currently writing, all of them consisted of a positive review. I was impressed, not even one person gave Shinsekai Yori a low score...I guess that I am going to have to be that person.

Shinsekai Yori is an anime adapted from its novel counterpart that released in 2012, after seeing its positive praise I decided to pick it up, so here are my thoughts on the anime.

Story
If you're reading this ... and you've also read the synopsis here my suggestion is to read this or on some wiki because the synopsis IS NO WHERE NEAR THE ACTUAL PLOT, I am serious. From reading it you'd assume it's probably some mystery or something at least I did but nope the anime is doesn't revolve around that 'rumour' that is mentioned.
Shinsekai Yori is set 1000 years into the future where humans have developed psychic abilities known as cantus. Due to this nature society has evolved and would seem perfect at least so it seems but of course there is more than meets the eye. The anime then progresses over the lives of our characters and explore many themes that surround it. Its execution is more arc based as the story progresses in small plot elements that will later progress throughout the show. While I don't think is not a bad idea the general execution is well tiresome. Shinsekai Yori is a heavy exposition anime it requires a lot of attention to every detail so it may not exactly be your cup tea if you're not into heavy talking and while you're reading this thinking that I am incompetent to fully engage, I really did try with this anime. I wanted to love it but it was incredibly difficult. One of the problems was essentially the plot points in the show, a lot of them and I mean a lot are only brought up due to convenience when instead these plot points should've been brought up often. Another reason why I couldn't fully enjoy the story is because it develops on arcs where I just wasn't fully interested mainly because some arcs tend to fall astray from the main synopsis of the show or into characters which I never fully cared for. While the anime does explore themes it's only really the tip of the iceberg for example the ever so popular topic of same-sex relationships is explored and what I mean is essentially that people are just gay. The relationships or the themes is not deepening or explored fully it just happens, not that it's entirely a problem but with people praising it's use of theme-ing I couldn't really see it because what Shinsekai Yori is showing me makes it no different from any other relationship. Also more personally but the plot twists to me in this show were incredibly predictable.

Characters
In terms of characters not many of them are interesting to begin with. The story revolves around a group of characters with Saki Watanabe being the main character, one of the major problems I had with her is essentially how much praise she got...for being normal. Everyone and I mean everyone in the show comments on how much potential she has or how amazing she is but all she does is just stands there, there are times where she is somewhat useful but she doesn't do many things interesting. The rest of the characters aren't exactly gold either, most of them don't hold much interest or exactly deepen the plot. There's very little care for characters in the show not until the later parts of the show but it's only briefly, it's quite the shame because with Shinsekai Yori deepening towards its society you could do some good character building but unfortunately the characters are just there, you could replace the characters with anyone and it wouldn't impact the show in the slightest.

Presentation
The art style is pretty good except for one design of characters that I don't particularly like, that being the queerats. They can die but the rest of the animation and art is pretty good to look at, I didn't mind it. The soundtrack of the anime is pretty good, I quite liked it one of the few anime osts that I have indeed noticed and thought it was pretty good and despite this anime not having an opening the ending theme for it is pretty awesome.

Conclusion
Personally Shinsekai Yori is an overrated anime to me. Its plot is all over the place and is pretentious by attempting to explore many themes present in our society today but it's not a good attempt to me especially with its bland characters. Maybe there's just something wrong with me because a lot of people love this anime but personally I just couldn't enjoy it which leaves me with my final rating of this anime being 6.

let's see. to be completely honest, i was very disappointed in this. although in this animes defense i went into watching it expecting to see something that this anime is not.

a friend recommended this anime to me a while back, and the only thing he told me about it was "its about telekinetics" witch i absolutely love. i adore telekinesis in just about anything, especially anime. now, that is probably why i didn't enjoy this anime as much as other people. i went into it expecting to see what i wanted to see instead of watching the anime for what it is. what made me ... watch the series in the first place was the first episode. as a mater of fact. the first few minutes of the first episode entranced me. it was perfect to say the least. the visuals, the sound, everything about those first few minutes caught my attention, sadly though, that same intro ruined this anime. that intro set my expectations pretty high, making the rest of Shinsekai yori a huge disappointment.

Story: 5/10
in many review of this anime people usually put 10/10 or 9/10 etc... but i just don't see it. like i was talking about the intro set a standard the rest of the anime failed to reach. in the first episode of shinsekai yori, it stars off with very mellow dramatic music and a boy. in the intro this boy is going around the neighborhood absolutely wrecking the place using his TK (telekinesis) killing people left and right, kicking the army's ass without a care in the world. so i assume the rest of this anime will be about TK users VS the world. WRONG! this anime is about TK users VS giant mutant cats and giant mutated naked mole rats. thats right, the main antagonistic force throughout the entirety of this anime, are a bunch of over sized talking giant naked mole rats. i found this, to say the least, horribly disappointing to the point where it was almost laughable. now, this aside, the over all story in itself is pretty "meh" it is hard to descripe without giving away spoilers. so for now the only way i could possibly describe the story of this anime is "meh"

art: 9/10
the art style used in this anime is pretty interesting. they use a mix of very subtle gradients and an interesting blend of color. although there is one odd episode where the art changes to a more "cashern sins" style and then goes back to normal in the next episode.

sound: 9/10
the soundtrack used in this anime caught me off guard. in a good way. although there is no one track i feel like listening to outside of the anime itself. the music used flowed flawlessly with what was going on in the anime and enveloped you into the universe itself.

character: 8/10
characters in this anime are all very unique in their own way. each character has a defining personality, using a similar structure as any other anime but with enough originality that they become their own. there is a slight lack in character development and on occasion some characters will just vanish (pun :D)

enjoyment: 5/10
like i have said. the first episode set a standard the rest of this anime never met. i watched each episode hoping that maybe one of them will have the same feel as the intro did. sadly i finished the anime without once seeing the episode i had been weighting for. i was left disappointed, on top of that the paramount ending made me more upset with this series.

overall: 5/10
although every other aspect of this anime was brilliant, i felt the plot fell short after the first 2 minutes of the first episode and left me horribly disappointed. i would only recommend this to people who enjoy watching people who have TK waste it away snow boarding, boating and fighting giant naked mole rats.

I'm just gonna make this review quick. There is no much things that makes me feel it was a superb series.

Art & Sound, 10 & 8.
Not much I can say, as what you would expected from 2012 films it has an outstanding art, key animation, storyboard & sound.

Characters, 5.
Still, a few section there shown a non-realistic reaction for a 12 years old boys & girls. Lack of emotion & a bit overreact, overreact & well played emotion was two diferrent things. But characters starting a bit better & fit at it's finest when they are grown up.

Story, 5.
It start with a Sci-fi, & build the ... way it is. It was good, the complexity was what you would expected from a Sci-fi. But it start to get bored in the middle of the series. & starting their non-sense plot with lack of transition & so on with mediocre plot. Abselutely, I was seeing a lot of chance that this series is gonna be kicked, but unfortunately they throw away a lot of chance/possible outstanding plot & ending.

Enjoyment, 1.
Yes, it has a beautiful artistic art, good sound, & the director was abselutely doing a great job. But it's not enough to make the whole series enjoyable, honestly I feel disgusting when watch this. Found no enjoyment for me, & thinking about to drop it many times.
But I'm keep going to know "is this series good?", because seeing the rating in here looks like a promising series, & keep digging 'till the last episode. But, I was wrong.

Overall's 5 for the whole series with small detail appraisal, fairly I say this is one of the most overrated series, I ever watched.

Last, english isn’t my first language, so please excuse any mistakes.
Thank you.

This is just my opinion on the series. Before going full butthurt at your favorite animu I suggest to think about my points.

Story - 6
I didn't generally like the setting, however that doesn't mean it's a very unique setting, the story is very simple, and gets explained around episode 4, anyway, the progression is incredibly predictable, it's so easy to understand which character is going to die, there's barely any mystery after a few episodes.

Art - 7: The animation isn't something you can really complain about, if you can overlook the off-models. It's not the best animation I ever watched but neither the worst

Sound - ... 6: How many times did I have to hear the same overused song in almost every episode (I mean the one that plays at the beginning of episode 1)? It's really a drag, and the fact that it's bloody overused makes it even worse. Apart from the first ending song, I can't remember any remarkable song from this anime.

Character - 3:
I detest the main character, she's basically the princess in distress which I hate to death. But why not add some romance to it? I dislike romance, but it's so bad in this show that it didn't give me even enough time to whine about it. Furthermore, even if it's later explained, they act like sluts, they're in love with somebody from their same gender and play hugs and kisses, while later they fall in love with someone from the opposite gender, both male and females. I can't really tell which character is the most irritating for this.

Enjoyment - 2: If you're here to "enjoy" the show, you're just delusional, honestly, there's nothing to enjoy except the slowest development ever and the never ending many dialogues which sometimes take whole episodes to finish, I can explain the enjoyment with one word: BORING, I almost fell asleep while watching this show, it became a real torture to watch it, and I didn't get satisfied in the end either because it was so predictable I might have even saved time by not watching the final episodes.

Overall - 6
I expected a wonderful work of mystery and psychology from this show. It's not the worst anime I have ever saw, but it didn't hold my breath even once as people make it look like. The development is so boring that watching Peppa Pig would honestly be less boring than this show. If you're looking for a fast paced anime, forget about ever watching or enjoying this. If you wish to watch something slow, sluggish, and overly boring or you want to waste your time on a mediocre show, go ahead and watch it, but don't expect anything new from this show. I'm truly glad it sold so poorly. There are plenty of novels/manga which deserve to have an anime adaption, why did they even make this one?

Shin Sekai Yori Review:

MINDSET:
Based on an award winning light novel, which is slightly better than the horrible ones where we were constantly forced fed every season.

SYNOPSIS:
A very few number of humans were able to naturally learn psychic abilities, and then, castastophe happens with mass war breaking lose (like its WWIII) with people being massacared for no reason, and government organizations with no ethics using completely unethical methods to keep things under control. We travel like 500 yeards in the future, when technology downgraded into a more rural Japan-like feel with psychihc powers being the new replacment for computers, because no politician were forced to keep ... all of humanity under forced control because too many of them have psychic powers.

REVIEW:
At first, it does seem to be your run of the mil slice of life with cool super powers in a sci-fi setting. And if that’s what the entire Anime is about, then it should'nt even deserve to be an award-winning light novel in the first place!

However, after just three or four episodes in, this show has very interesting and dark themes, it treats them very maturely, and even though it has Yuri and Yaoi moments, they are rather sparse which dosn't take too much away from the show. (but whoever drops the show because of that, are not total idiots and have every reason to take there course) It presents a very grey morality which barely any shows take that kind of route these days. There is no clear cut villain, all actions whether its by society or not, has a great reason of why they do it without being so obvious. Like all of the bad things the leaders of the town have a reason because of the past.

They kill a student if he/she was not good enough with there powers, because just like the first few psychics that came into existence, had barely any control of their power. And allowing here to live, could potentially make her a mass murderer. This gives the show a lot of depth and intelligence on how it handles the plot. (btw, they also indoctrinate all of the pupils/students to keep things under control)

It's directing does quite a lot of the foreshadowing to keep things a mystery, to keep things very subtle and unpredictable. It takes horrible plot devices, and uses them incredibly well. Like how indoctrination in Code Geas can be used as a plot device to forcfully move the plot. In here, it seemed to be very well fore shadowed, and is revelaed much later on the series. (after the slice of life aspect of course) the show gives You more information around the world and gradually giving us a very good grasp on how this world works, develops and reacts truly giving us immersion.

Overall, the show handles ethics, philosophy and morality with great maturity and understanding of such topics being done in a very clever, and subtle manner. You truly sense the deeper and more inticing subtleties the more You progress further towards the show...
HOWEVER:

While the pacing of the show is pretty good for the most part, its when we have soo much (at times convoluted) plot exposition being forcefully fed deep in out throats as it refuses to be excremented! We had three entire episodes of on just that! Most of time, it shows You gradually on whats the bigger picture, but there are moments when there is a little too much exposition we are forced to accept and is very difficult for it to be lodged into Your brain!

The characters were easily the worst part of the show, don't think they are very deep, and complex, the whole cast in some way shape or form needs tweaking for the rest of the show to really succeed and deserves high scores. They are (unforunatley) archetypes as being governed by one or two major traits, I can only think of one truly great character of the show, but considering the large size of the entire cast, this doesn’t compare. And don't even get me started with that pussy character who was COMPLETLY USELESS THORUGHOUT THE ENTIRE DURATION! They lack other components on what makes greater characters and feel far too straight forward and sometimes alien at moments. There were a few moments when they did'nt act 100% appropiatly towards the situation. However, they do there job in a mediocre manner, which warrants me an average for the cast.

In terms of production values, A-1 Pictures tend to create high school based works (like slice of life and shojou) therefore, they are clearly not used into animating very serious and mature shows, meaning that the impact of the Animation will not be as strong when the shtuff hits the fan. Basically, it dos'nt make as much of an impact as I wanted it to. Also, for an ambitious project, the character designs don't live up compared towards the good stuff with the show, as they are designed with a minimal colour pallet and the designs just look way two dimensional. There were some moments when the scenery just look absolutely beautiful compared towards the designs of the cast. There were moments when it look artsy, which creates further immersion. However, those moments can be few or far between.

In terms of music, only one notable song in the OST, with no opening song which is very rare amongst the countless, with a very great visually and musically ending theme!

LEGACY:
This show will most likely live and pass the test of time, as the countless number of causals will mature. It was badly pandered because it felt different towards everything made in 2013 due to “far too much Subtlety” since shows like SAO, AoT or any fan service piece rubbish. Having a very basic plot, shown in a very basic and obvious manner. The majority would rather look at chickens soup on LSD, rather than a painting by Picasso. It was a show who stands out as being different from everything else, and it will praised for being that after two decades...

SCORES:
9/10 - For an amazingly well crafted and mature story, with extra points for being very wise and almost flawless!

5/10 - Rather weak and completely average cast, but they do the job quite well and because they are well handled for the most part. But hey, an average cast is better than the all of the characters in AoT or Blue Excrement combined!

7/10 - For a fitting soundtrack, but nothing too special except for a few songs.

6/10 - For animation that does the job, has a few great moments, but has moments when the Animation really needs to step up its game. (mediocre character design though)

6/10 – The only true good aspect is the overall story, and some of the art, while everything else is not as enjoyable.

FINALE: 6.5/10 For only the amazing story, but with everything else being mediocre or OK. (quite a shame that it got this score) :/

PERSONAL SCORE:
7/10 – I don't care characters, but overall, it is very interesting and is one of those anime(s) that appear once every blue moon.

Shinsekai Yori, a series widely adored and praised for its twists and turns and the strength of its psychological thrills. I had been looking forward to this series for a while, and I must say that after finally finishing it, I am rather conflicted. I had been warned that this series would be a slow burner and it would ramp up in time. These things are true. But in the end, I just didn’t enjoy this series too much.

At its worst, Shinsekai Yori is dreadfully boring and confounding, and at its best, it is tense and even chilling. It engages with some pretty serious ... political and moral themes and handles them quite nicely. However, I consider the act of judging anime on these themes alone to be one of anime watcher’s most misplaced biases. A show needs to do more than just put themes in writing to make them come alive to the audience. And a show cannot sacrifice too much just to get these themes realized in a certain way. This is where Shinsekai Yori falters. What does this show do to engage the viewers before the final act? It certainly tries, but to me, it certainly falls short.

My personal bias on this show, and shows like these, is that I just don’t love dystopian psychological thrillers. I think they pose a lot of interesting questions and scenarios for the audience to unpack, but so does a book (more concisely and explicitly at that). Whether the topic at hand is best set as a story or as a study is entirely debatable, but I tend to think that there is so much potential content (and biases that must come with any satisfying plot resolution) that it is best to just have it in writing. Though, to be fair, Shinsekai Yori fleshes out its content well and addresses its biases perfectly.



[Pros and Cons]
[+] One of the better ‘villains’ in recent memory.
[+] A strong final act that definitely keeps the audience guessing. Just how deep does the rabbit hole go?
[+] Neat use of time skips. Regardless of the quality of the plot in each interval, the skips themselves are at least functional and effective.
[+] Diverse art style, which can lead to some very inventive presentation.
[+] Sound design is good. Sound tracks initially leave a huge impression, though they begin to get a little repetitive and lose their impact.
[=] When art is ‘standard’, which is most of the time, the presentation is only average.
[-] Voice acting, while maybe more realistic, should definitely be livelier.
[---] Sacrifices far too much enjoyment in the first two acts.
[---] Characters are boring and completely lack distinct personalities.
[---] Character design has so many problems.



[Character Design Matters]

Shinsekai Yori has a problem with its characters, from every angle. But I want to talk about the problems that the characters have from a design perspective. I think that the character design is in fact so poor that it, on its own, makes the characters worse than they ought to be.

Firstly, all the characters look the same. They have the same facial structure, they have the same pale complexion, they have the same style of mouth and eyes, they have the same outfits, they have similar voice acting. Sure, this is maybe more realistic, but that isn’t really the point of anime. One of anime’s greatest strengths as a genre is that it is allowed to do things that normal live-action film cannot – it can more freely design its visual attributes to better fit the challenges that these visual attributes must face. Characters are simply better if they have more distinguishing features. It allows audience members to attach their thoughts to each characters visual presentation. Or they allow our characters to communicate their unique attributes visually, rather than verbally. When the characters are so similar, what can the audience anchor themselves to?

Secondly, the specific design attributes chosen limit the expression that these characters can evoke. Small mouth, small eyes, and neatly contained hair make it difficult for the characters to communicate their ideas visually. This is important. Anime isn’t all about writing, and making the most of anime means putting thought into each channel of communication that it offers. In this series, the range of emotion that the characters can visually evoke is very small. This gives the characters themselves fewer tools to work with, and ultimately gives them less ‘oomph’. We want oomph!

I think it is very telling that my favorite characters of the show, Kiroumaru and Squeera, aren’t human at all. They have unique presentations. Kiroumaru specifically does work with his mouth alone to visually communicate his thoughts. And again, even among the human characters, my favorite is Shisei, who wears a mask.



[A Big Finish, but a Small Ramp]

How much is too much? Shinsekai Yori sacrifices so much just to have a solid ending. The first act is just… so boring. It is very difficult to keep track of where the characters are, why they continue to do what they are doing, and what the point of it all is. Oh, and it just isn’t fun to watch. These episodes are necessary, to some degree, but it would be nice if they weren’t just a whirlwind of locations and poor ‘action’ scenes. The second act is focused more on the characters, which could be good… if the characters were any good. I don’t really care for any of them. At this point, it feels like all the characters are going to have similar fates, and we are just waiting for Saki’s turn. This never comes to fruition, and the audience is left hanging again.

I think that, for the sake of the plot feeling thrilling the final act, it makes sense for the first two acts to be pretty empty. There needs to be enough information and loose ends so that when the pieces are put together, the result is actually unexpected. However, while this period must have some sort of setup involved, it doesn’t mean that it has to be boring. For instance, good humor or action can be applied in these areas to make them much less burdensome yet still low in plot content. Hell, even just having a more engaging, tentative plot line could hold interest too. But I think that sacrificing like 16 episodes of content just to get a strong finish is a pretty poor choice. I guess maybe if the ending were, like, the greatest thing since sliced bread. Then it would be OK. But it isn't. So it's not.


[Rating]
Story: 5
Art: 6
Sound: 7
Character: 2
Enjoyment/Overall: 5

Too much time spent.

A 25 episode series just for that short twist in the very very end is not worth it for me.

Nothing else is noteworthy in the series. Animation, art, development - all meh. It seemed like they wanted to cater it to a gender neutral audience but I don't think they nailed it. Failed to attract me much.

I was only interested in the setting and the premise; how this world came about, what was truly going on and such. At certain point I found the humans and main characters - especailly Saki, so very foolish.

Oh yea and a warning, there is a short ... but somewhat explicit BL kissing scene.

My wife and I started this one because of the high scores it has here.

Then, 10 episodes in, I remembered how most of the people here who leave reviews have their heads up their asses, trying to be deep an introspective towards "artsy" anime that sucks.

This anime is slow, bland, and ugly. It keeps going to this conflict with humanoid races that goes nowhere. Dialogue is airy and tries to be mysterious, but only keeps stacking mysteries without ever solving any.

I love mystery anime, and supernatural, and especially post-apocalyptic. But this is flaming, cheaply animated garbage.

The characters are very poorly done; they're either ... naive kids, secretive and vapid adults, or extremely annoying rat people.

The cinematography keeps shoving the camera in the faces of these characters, which does the anime a disservice since the art is so bland. Honestly, it kept reminding me of Devilman Crybaby. But at least Devilman had real horror as well as action and good characters!

WARNING: SPOILERS AHEAD

I have to admit, I heard a lot about Shinsekai Yori.
I heard that it was a seemingly slow anime with massive plot twists in the last few episodes; given the show's high rating, I was prepared to have my mind blown. But the show's big revelation wasn't really that big, and I came out feeling very underwhelmed.
The "big moment" of the show, learning that the queerats were in fact descendants of the non-Cantus-using humans, was hinted at in the show ever since the capture of the false minoshiro. Ever since we heard about the Cantus users and non-Cantus users, I suspected that the ... queerats were the twisted descendants of non-Cantus users. I figured that the big plot twist at the end had to be something else, because queerats being genetically altered humans was a well-hinted twist that most people should be able to figure out. Up until the last few seconds of Episode 25, I kept waiting for something...more out of this hyped-up anime. But it never delivered.
The twist also matters little; so what if the queerats are descended from humans? This doesn't affect any of the characters, and the only purpose of the twist is to garner sympathy for the queerats and their crimes. It didn't even do that for me; in fact, it did the opposite. If this twist was necessary to make the queerats not solely antagonists, doesn't this mean that the only reason we should feel sympathy for the queerats is because they were once human? This goes against the anti-racist theme the show was trying to create here, showing that hatred against the queerats was horrible as they were the same as humans. Had the queerats been just intelligently evolved naked mole rats, we wouldn't feel sympathy for them; they would just be the creatures who killed everyone.

tl;dr: The show is alright if you don't go into it with very high expectations; the twist isn't that big and the show isn't that deep.

This series is held back severely by poor pacing in its first half, which, although necessary for fully grasping the events that occur in its second half, unnecessarily confuses the watcher, testing their patience for and tolerance of constant barrages of unfiltered and unexplained information. However, Shinsekai Yori shines in its second half, gripping the audience with brutal depictions of rage and fear, building tension in a way I thought it wouldn't be able to. For me, this series is a rewatch, and unfortunately, a sort of disappointing one. I had thought I loved it, but after watching it again, the flaws stand out and ... painfully so, to the point where I only stuck with it due to knowledge of how events would end up unfolding. In other words, rewatching it was worth the 'reveal,' which I only hazily recalled. Other problems with the series include the uninspired dialogue (which is to be expected) and more notably the messy animation direction in the first half, which I hinted at previously. It almost seems like they lost some of their budget halfway through, but maybe they were just trying something new. Regardless of its flaws, Shinsekai Yori remains an intriguing story with important and philosophical (though unfortunately unexplored) themes. It's good (though at times a bit insufferable), but it could've been great.

I only managed to reach episode 4 before dropping this.

The synopsis got me intrigued. This should have been right up my alley but for some reason, it just felt boring. The concept of the show itself is quite interesting, but the pacing is slow at times and even though things started to pick up around episode 5, it was not enough for me to keep watching it. I'm all for slow-burner type of shows but this one didn't work out for me.

The animation, however, is one thing I have to give props too. It's beautiful and gorgeous to look at times. It's not as wonderful/sleek ... as others but it fits the narrative well and that should be what's important.

So this is how the world could be if Psychokinesis had taken over...

Shinsekai Yori takes place in the future - in the very distant future. Interestingly it does not really look like the very distant future; rather than the distant past, before electrcity and that stuff had been invented.

1000 years passed... and people have not changed at all. For instance: they believe in almost the same things as they did back then in 2010. They have not grown over those years or have not made any usages of the modern technology to rebuild their lives after Psychokinesis had almost wiped out humanity (or was on ... its best way to do so). No TV, no superdimensional computers or futuristic architecture appear in the monitor in front of you. To sum up: People in 1000 years would rather go back in the forest and live under trees - using boats in order to cross (or "drive" on) the river and so on - than using the enormous "power" of our modern technology. The basic idea of this distant future story might have been pretty interesting and surely had a lot of potential and freedom to make use of it.

With this being the case, just shows us that there was never much room for an utopian, 24 ep-lasting serie in the distant future. Thus, after the first four episodes, the serie eventually turns into a political, action-packed drama which involves a romantic drama as well with very simple characters.

Having said that, this leads us the next issue: the characters. They were generally likeable, but definitely not memorable. The anime is told from the perspecitve of (almost) Saki only. There are, however, a lot of other characters stumbling through this Anime; therefore, it would have been nice to get some insights of other characters. Or a proper farewell since some of them just disappaer.

The animation was really inconsistent. Also, there was a guest director for some of the episodes, and while one of them was really good, one of them was not. Notably episode 5.

Another notable episode is definitely episode 8. It is not mainly due to its subject matter. It is rather due to the fact that there was no lead-up to what happened. There was simply no explanation, no clarification for what they did; or why a certain person has a certain feeling for someone else. And as suddenly it started, as abruptly it ended.

Besides these problems, there are notable things which serves the anime quite a bit. The sound does deserve indubitably solid praise and the serie has a well used voice cast. Sound effects, however, were rather decent.

The first few episodes need to be praised for its really well-directed, excellently edited and accentuated musically atmosphere. It makes you feel uncomfortable watching it and furthermore shows the seemingly endless power of Psychokinesis in its own true nature.

In conclusion, Shinsekai Yori cannot be classified as bad since the start was very well done; but it is far from being a masterpiece and cannot fully satisfy its more critical viewers.

Shinsekai Yori is a very interesting anime that follows the lives of a group kids as they grow up and learn more about their world.

TL:DR
To me this anime had a ton of potential, but only managed to live up to it in some areas of the plot. The story is really awkwardly paced, and a lot could be done to improve how it was presented. However, the characters and world building are done extremely well, and kept me going to the end of the series.

Story (6)
The story follows a group of friends as they grow up and learn about the world around them. They ... have interesting experiences, suffer losses, and find love. The world these characters live in is set in the future, in which mutant rats roam the country side and humanity has been reduced to small villages. Going off of this alone, you can definitely see that there is a lot of potential! However, to me personally the pacing and presentation of how events unfolded killed a large part of the series for me. For the most part the story flows well, but 2 times in the series it completely gets flipped over by unexpected time skips. They sort of pull you out of the show by advancing the story 12 years between episodes. That's forgivable, but for both cases i wish i had another episode before hand to wrap up the current arc more cleanly. The other major problem i had with the plot was how it presented crucial moments. To avoid spoilers i wont go into specifics, but many things which are incredibly important to the plot are presented subtly and casually, when they absolutely shouldn't be. This led to there being almost 0 suspense for me at the time of the climax, which was rather disappointing because there were many times in the series where i was really eager to watch another episode instead of just waiting for the series to end.

Art (7)
The art was pretty good, nothing too impressive, but definitely pretty at times.

Sound (7)
Definitely an interesting sound track that fits the story well.

Character (9)
This anime does not boast a giant cast, but the characters it focuses on are done incredibly well. This leads to a lot of emotional moments for the viewer, and creates excellent drama between them at parts.

Enjoyment (6)
The first half the series had me on the hook, and because of that momentum i was able to finish the second half.

The only way to describe this anime for me is 'waste.' Specifically, wasted potential. Let me first say that the art and overall acting are excellent throughout the series. The characters are compelling and realistic. The first 15 or so episodes are something truly special, there is such a strong and intriguing dystopian aspect to the series, you can feel the terror of the children as they slowly realize why and how their peers go missing, and whether they'll be next. You're forced to consider hard questions; what exactly is the greater good? what sacrifices would you accept to maintain 'peace'? Would you give up ... freedoms, even your basic rights, for what you perceive as a better chance for your species to survive? Both sides of the issue are presented logically and fairly. In addition, there are rather deep and complex relationships between characters, and you can easily see these interpersonal relationships fueling a very compelling storyline later on. The first 15 or so episodes were pure excitement and the series was incredibly promising. Then came only disappointment.

*SPOILERS BEGIN HERE*
Around episode 17 they completely abandon the dystopian aspect and instead focus on all-out war with monster rats. It's like they took EVERYTHING that showed promise in the beginning, balled it up, and threw it in the garbage. watching the last 6 or so episodes was a pure disappointment. They abandoned the dystopian considerations in the plot. they forget key characters, leaving you to ask why those characters were even in the plot to begin? why did the plot totally abandon shun? why spend over half of the fucking series building this absolutely riveting social scenario and then completely cheapen it just so you can cheesily bring in an ogre into the plot?? WHY? why did shun die, when his death means very little to the overall plot? it was also disappointing that maria and mamoru died off-screen as well. the show should have gone in the direction where the protagonists strive to overthrow or protect the current societal status quo. You could even pit them against each other, some choosing to rebel and others not, and old friends and lovers are forced to fight. That would have been a much more compelling storyline. the latter half of the anime felt like sending your kid who wants to be a doctor off to college and having them flunk out and develop an opiate dependency. I'm truly sad that the story turned out the way it did, it really was on it's way to being one of my favorites before they completely derailed the theme of the anime. In the end, i still enjoyed it overall because of how deep the characters were, but the plot did a disservice to the amazing characters.

Overall: 6/10 (above average)

Shinsekai Yori's story is the primary motivator for watching the anime. The first episodes are somewhat boring, but as the past starts to be revealed (themes of war and human rights), the suspense intensifies. While I was never blown-away by anything in the series, it managed to keep the suspense and mystery through the final episodes, as the darkness of humanity's past (and present) is brought to light.

The visuals are sharp and uniquely surreal with strange creatures and devices. The soundtrack is well themed to the atmosphere of the show.

Shinsekai Yori is an enjoyable anime to watch, just don't ... expect too much from it.

*****things to take note*****
-Seriously this plot is crazy =_=
-I watched this anime about a month ago. ( so it still kind of stay in my mind )

-----STORY 6/10 -----
Like what i had had earlier on this plot is REALLY crazy . Let me give some reasons why i said this. Firstly in the first few episodes everything was peaceful and they had good friends together . HOWEVER this was destroyed . Yea i agree that this is normal to create some conflict BUT seriously what happened later on was some monster rats came out and somehow became the main character which short of pissed ... me off -_- and after that war started. Although the war arc was truly well done XD . Just that it took too long to get what is happening .

-----ART 7/10 ------
Art was not bad even though there's alot of rats coming out later on the rats were rather drawn quite detailed . Nothing much to say about this section.

-----SOUND 7/10 ------
I like the soundtrack " from the new world " even though this was not originally created for this anime . This was originally created by Dvorak for orchestra purpose . I like how it fit into the anime :D Like having some peace then have climax .

-----CHARACTER 6/10 ------
CRAZY characters .... like i said it was crazy to have TALKING RATS as main characters other than that characters are normal . For example in the "peace" they had clever ones , active ones and quite ones .

In my opinion they kind of throw away some of the characters from the "peace" just to develop the plot duh i know this is quite normal in anime XD

------ENJOYMENT 6/10 ------
Start was CRAZY and BORING . Climax was GREAT .

OVERALL : 6/10
This anime was not bad just that it took too long to start the real thing and i kind of get boring during the introduction till the war arc starts. Overall this anime is enjoyable if you survived for the first 10 episode or so .

Recommended if you like dark atmosphere and long winded anime but good climax .

***spoilers galore***

Thought provoking yet heavily flawed and frequently contradictory, Shinsekai Yori attempts to juggle several heavy themes of identity, morality, human vanity, and racism, but fails to answer most of the questions it imposes and contrives too many inconsistencies to feel credible. The slow pace, tryhard edginess, and overbearing, frivolous indulgences in it's art direction and storytelling bog down the experience. It's main characters are nothing but cardboard cutouts with moving mouth flaps in this grand puppet show. The fickle moral disparities in particular lead to a very bad aftertaste and general revulsion.

Let's start with the premise. It's not exactly original, but the mix of ... elements and brooding presentation still manage to create something that feels distinct and unique. We have a group of kids that stumble upon the dark truth of their upbringing and the false society they live in. They aren't being used as human weapons or being fed to aliens so that's good. This post-apocalyptic society has intentionally regressed back to a more antiquated and simpler state. Hundreds of years ago, a radical change in human evolution brought the advent of supernatural psychokinetic abilities, known as cantus, to a small percentage of the human population. Cantus users were feared for their destructive potential, and the ensuing wars and strife solidified that fact as much of existing civilization was destroyed by their hands. Learning from their past mistakes, they developed a new society heavily influenced by ascetic Buddhist teachings in order to suppress their own powers, stifle innate human bloodlust, and avoid unnecessary conflict. But it takes more than religion, good will, or even fear to keep such a society of supernatural yet fragile beings intact, for each member was a ticking timebomb that could, in a fit of rage or subconscious thought, murder thousands in a blink of an eye without ever moving a single muscle. Tougher and tougher measures were needed to avoid disaster. Along with hynoptism, brainwashing, genetic modification, and information manipulation, they eventually resorted to eliminating children who displayed potentially dangerous or violent affinities, snuffing them out while their cantus remained immature.

This premise held a lot of promise, and became more and more intriguing as each layer was peeled off to reveal another truth about the new world. But while the base my have been sound, and the lore fascinating, much of the rest of the anime was infuriatingly throwaway and contemptibly bad in execution, the day to day drama undermining the groundwork that had already been built.

Several techniques are used to try and induce a sense of dread, horror, and emotional weight to each scene, but as someone who isn't a five year old child, they are juvenile and lack subtlely, superfluous and extremely cringe-worthy, and overused to a fault. Probably half the runtime in each episode is nothing more than static, zoomed in tight shots of hands, shoulders, torsos, eyes, the bottom half of faces, and most aggravatingly, the up-chin shot. Then we have the horrible animation loops, all overacted and laughably bad. The quivering eyeball that's about to fly out it's socket. The spasmic lips, contorted faces, and furrowed eyebrows, all twitching at high speed. The wide gaping mouth. There's even one scene where a nurse is gasping so heavily up and down she looks like a silly cartoon panting dog, the opposite of the intended effect. I especially despise the female-centric, meekly closed hands held separately in front, with wrists facing outward to show vulnerability and weakness. Then, to go along with each abysmal slideshow, an equally horrible amount of heavy breathing, gasps, grunts, moans, sighs, utterances, cries, and all manner of exaggerated, overdone vocal noises taken straight out of a bad porno. They even turned up the volume and made them equally as loud if not louder than the actual dialogue. And the eyes. Oh the eyes. Large and repulsive in design while still feeling dead and vacuous. You don't know how many times I've wanted to punch my screen every time they zoomed in too closely to one of these talking puppets, all with the same stomach turning, dimensionless, grotesque eyes.

Aside from these awful aspects, the presentation is generally competent and sometimes beautiful, with fluid animations and great CGI blended in. But it's not always consistent, with many mundane actions getting enough attention but some high action scenes devolving into jerky frames. The explosions in particular, seem to be stylistically designed to run at one frame per second, to give it a sort of crude, eery quality, but it just looks bad regardless.

The characters have very little personality and mostly just exist to convey the plot. The character designs are so simplistic and androgynous, you rely increasingly on their voices to differentiate them. You can frequently just switch their lines around and it will change very little in the scene. They lack any consistency otherwise and juggle around the hot potato that is the narrative, taking turns to dole out questions, to provide insight, to act shocked or dismayed, or to help or harm the situation to create suspense.

The main character is a girl named Saki, who, if you've read the many countless reviews here, is supposedly a kind-hearted, strong-willed, courageous heroine who matures deeply through her experiences to become a wise and understanding leader. Except that's all a lie. Saki has a mentor, the head of the ethics committee, who regularly extols unwarranted praise on her as she considers Saki to be her successor. None of Saki's actions or character development support any of this praise, but many viewers are easily swayed by what the anime tells you to be true instead of what is proven to be true. There's even a quote at the end of the anime, "the power of imagination is what changes everything". What imagination? What change? Nothing fundamentally changes at the end of the anime and yet here we have yet another pretentious aphorism.

This is a common occurrence in Japanese media. Just looking at a trailer for an anime or movie, half of it is nothing but flashing giant letters on a black background trying to make even the dumbest big-boobed cat girl show sound deep and impactful. There's even a Ghost in the Shell movie where the only dialogue from the characters is a laundry list of philosophical quotes from every famous philosopher known to man, with sentences flying in the sky, purpose and necessity be damned. The bigger the words and more abstract the thought, the smarter it sounds. Even as a form of satire it looks incredibly bad, and impossible to understand when taken seriously.

And the pretenses don't end there. For a setting steeped in traditional Japanese buddhist and shinto influences that tries to be affecting, we have hilariously misappropriated idioms like "fox in the henhouse", spoken in gratingly bad engrish, PK for psychokinesis instead of player-killer, and even weapons-grade anthrax known as a "psychobuster". It's all cringe-inducing to an American viewer, but to a Japanese audience, the deliberate use of strange sounding English somehow elevates it to another level. There's a term in Japan that describes all the extremely poor English plastered over basically all packaging on Japanese made products, from cheap toilet paper to luxury goods, that exalts the product's virtues or gives strange inspirational adages. It's kazari eigo, meaning decoration English. And like a decoration, all it does is shroud the product in pure nonsense and excess, attempting to mask any shortcomings and deficiencies. It's my roundabout way of saying all the forced English and foreign western names and terms used in the anime, and there are many, are extremely stupid sounding and unnecessary, especially for an anime set in rural Japan that considers Japan the center of the universe and other civilizations long perished.

And from badass English to blood and guts exploding everywhere, it doesn't just want to be deep, profound, and graphic. It wants to be EDGY. And what better to make something edgy than by throwing in lots of gratuitous gay and lesbian makeout sessions and implied sex? Ostensibly it's a gene programmed in their DNA to mimick a certain type of monkey that solves conflict through sweet lovemaking, because that's way better than setting each other on fire with their minds. The feasibility of such a narrow approach aside, it serves little purpose in the actual story other than giving it that EDGE that makes controversy stand out. There are no straight couples because that's BORING, and no real conflicts are actually resolved through mutual humping. Otherwise, they would be humping Queerats all day instead of going to war with them. Sex as a form of stress relief is nothing new and already intrinsic to humans, so the purported gene actually is very poor justification for the many same sex couplings.

And while we are on the warpath involving inconsistencies and contradictions, lets talk about the many plot points and developments that don't hold up or are completely ignored later on. This is a conservative, religious, highly structured and restrained society of self-discipline and self-denial that preaches nonviolence and compassion, all for the sole purpose of a functioning society that cantus users can live peacfully in. All worldly attachments and material posessions must be cast away. It's literally in the first five minutes of the show. Selfish individuals develop bad karma, turn into karma demons, and destroy themselves and everyone around them.

And yet, why does this still look like yet another Japanese school anime full of cheeky, rambunctious kids, opinionated and emotionally temperamental? What happened to all that forced passivity and obedience? The brainwashing? The quelling of dangerous elements and selfish desires? They are all on full display. Later on, the head of the ethics committee reveals that Saki and her friends are part of an experiment to raise leaders with independent thought and initiative that could overcome a broad array of possible scenarios without succumbing to the weight of the responsibility and having their cantus go out of control. They thus were raised differently from the rest of the kids and not subject to the sort of brainwashing and suppressive techniques the others endured. They need these shepherds to lead the sheep.

Yet, absolutely none of the kids or adults act or behave like sheep. So many display outbursts of cowardice, selfishness, anger, frustration, terror, and many other exaggerated emotions that make a great melodrama, but do not give credence to them being sheep and needing a shepherd to be led or told how to react. Much of the "specialness" of the group Saki is apart of fades away quickly. The events that unfold, the encounters with tainted cats sent by the board of education, the discovery of the evil minoshiro and it's untold truths, the interactions with the Queerats, the realization that their memories have been meddled with, all have nothing to do with any of the "special" qualities within this group and especially not from Saki. Most of it is from sheer coincidence or chance. I wanted to punch her in the face when she was tormenting and mutilating the wild minoshiro that was trying to defend itself from capture. That's leadership material right there. And Saki doesn't grow wiser and more like a leader after each encounter. She flip-flops from acting assertive to acting completely, hopelessly, paralyzingly shocked, then back to assertive, then back to shock. Over and over again. I want to punch her flat eyes in her flat face every five seconds because that's how often the shock switch gets flipped.

Even though each arc in the story centers around Saki as she uncovers yet another truth of this society and loses yet another member in her group, she never gains any sort of resolve, learns from experience, or develops a distinct personality separate from the group. Like I said before, it would make very little difference if Saki and Maria switched roles, or even Satoru and Mamoru. I mentioned before that the narrative was pushed forward by a game of hot potato between the characters. They discover an evil minoshiro. Saki looks surprised. Maria looks surprised. Satoru looks surprised. Mamoru looks surprised. Saki asks a question. Everyone is shocked. Maria asks a question. Everyone is shocked. They each take turns asking questions and are immediately shocked each time. This is true for almost every encounter. The group is running away from pursuers. Each one takes turns acting shocked and takes turns slowing down the pursuers. They take turns needing to be rescued. They take turns acting paralyzingly shocked again, and the cycle continues. They take turns in conversations about tainted cats and the board of education. Insight. Shock. Insight. Shock. Like an infant with no concept of object permanence and is constantly shocked when the keys suddenly "vanish" each time. Even when their small party gets reduced down to two, Saki and Satoru. A typical conversation about Queerats would have Saki be understanding and Satoru showing disgust. Then they switch, bad cop becomes good and good cop becomes bad. Then switch again, and again, and again. Their views unreliable and incongruent. They will even talk about their mutual love for Shun (the odd one of the group that doesn't wholly parrot the rest). It's this giant alternating group think mentality that leaves no individual with any real consistency or personality. It's only purpose is to give each character an equal amount of screentime, an equal chance to display a state of shock to drum up fake suspense, one that heavily sacrifices believability, and an equal chance to provide insight or assertion, from whoever happens to be holding the hot potato, because otherwise it would be so much harder to write if you had to deal with REAL characters with individual personalities. It's very similar to The West Wing, an American political drama, where each cast member takes turns reading the lines of a singular character and using the same canned phrases from that character. It's basically one writer talking to himself, pretending he's multiple people, but failing miserably at it. (It doesn't help that his lines seem to be taken straight out of an encyclopedia.)

The final arc of the show, and the one that pissed me off the most, was the Queerat war. Much of my interest in the anime was in how the cantus wielding society was shaped, how they culled and suppressed their own population to ensure stability, and the justifications for such methods. All the contradictions I mentioned before, I could at least overlook without changing too much of the foundation and the rules created for this fictional society. The kids were just tools to explore the rest of the world building and not a vital part of it. The minor characters mostly inconsequential.

Saki is now 26 and a full 12 years have passed since the last arc. She is just as dumb, useless, and prone to shock as ever. She works for the Exospecies Department that handles affairs with Queerats. There is a skirmish between the only two Queerat colonies left in the area, one that could lead to outright war. All the bigwigs come in to mediate, from the ethics committee to the security council. Mediate is more a euphemism. They are actually passing judgment and pronouncing right and wrong in their divine capacity. Previously, the relationship between the Cantus wielders and the Queerats was never really explored. The Queerats feared the immense power the cantus wielders held and worshipped them as gods. The cantus wielders treated the Queerats as an inferior and lesser species, Saki and co even displaying some haughtiness and entitlement when in their company. Some colonies were even at the beck and call to help eliminate any problem cantus children that ran away.

During the meeting, Saki describes the makeup of the two colonies and their technological capabilities. The bigwigs are SHOCKED, eyes wide open, mouths gaping, at how advanced the Robber Fly colony is. Even the head of the department is clueless. When Saki saw the Queerats 12 years ago, they had already adopted a democratic system and even constructed concrete buildings. Why are they suddenly so shocked by these developments 12 years later? Have they all been living under a rock? Is this a made up and poorly conceived reaction? Of course it is. Why hasn't a single person in charge of dealing with the Queerats known about any of this besides Saki? It was never a hidden secret. The Queerats were using the ancient technologies archived within the monoshiros, technology that the cantus society had shunned and censored in fear, technology that included many types of weapons of mass destruction, yet somehow is perfectly fine for the Queerats to be in posession of? In a later scene, even one of the overseers of a Queerat battle brags about having seen quite a few skirmishes involving guns ahd shields, nonchalantly praising them for their meagre intelligence in the utilization of ancient technology, without even a shred of concern about the possible danger.

One of Saki's duties at the department is handling paperwork and accepting applications if a Queerat colony wants to wage war. Yes, they actually have to fill out a form and get permission by the "gods" or otherwise face extermination. They even send overseers to their battles to make sure they are behaving properly. It's not to regulate any sort of fairness. It's solely for the self-interests of the cantus wielders. Yet, they are so smug about their own position in this power dynamic, they act like they are managing dog fights, and if any dog looks menacingly back at them, they can cut them down in a heartbeat. It's a game to them, a primal need to toy with and control to feel superior, to cull or "exterminate" as they see fit, regardless of the threat. This sentiment is repeated again and again and again. For all the times Satoru and Saki have been saved by Queerats or welcomed into their home, Satoru frequently expresses disdain for these "rabid pests" and Saki is either indifferent or clueless, shocked or speechless, although they will switch roles at the whim of the poor writing. Our innocent protagonists, unable to harm a fly, so prone to grief and shock, won't hesitate to levitate choke the living daylights out of a Queerat savior or chase a fleeing group of Queerats and explode them all into oblivion for even a modicum of assurance.

The gathered council in this meeting to oversee the Queerats are either indifferent or speak very carelessly of extermination, as if it's a trifling matter. There's even a bloodthirsty member who speaks gleefully of mowing them down, with an exaggerated laugh. How did someone like this pass the personality tests and wasn't culled from the herd for violent tendencies is beyond me. Even the supposedly tolerant and open minded chairwoman of the ethics committee acts arrogantly and treats her own words as indisputable fact when questioning the heads of the two opposing colonies. When there is suspicion that the Robber Fly colony is using a Cantus wielder for the war and hiding it from them, the council is extremely quick to push the extermination button. No fact-checking. No interrogations. No determining culpability or scope. The extermination squad is sent out then and there.

While the squad is sent away, the cantus wielder villages are suddenly attacked by the Robber Fly colony, thousands killed by gunfire, poison gas, bombs, and even a cantus wielder child nurtured to hate humans. It felt extremely cathartic to watch these idyllic flower blossoms being levitated into the air and then ripped to shreds. For a people who believed so heavily in karma, yet fancied themselves gods, this was the karmic consequence of their hubris.

The ethics committee chairwoman, in all her 300 years worth of wisdom and worldliness, very quickly succumbs to base emotions and desires, vowing vengeance and retribution, and an ultimate, prolonged suffering for those that perpetrated this attack. The crowds jeer as Queerats are eliminated. They all turn into savage beasts, free from their rose petal facade, demanding eradication of the entire Queerat species, even those that have defended them tooth and claw for hundreds of years and did not play a part here. Even Saki, in a dramatic end to the conflict, shamelessly commands the leader of the Giant Hornet colony, Kiroumaru, to commit suicide to stop the opposing cantus wielder child and to capture the Robber Fly leader. If Kiroumaru had really wanted the salvation of his colony, he would have been better off joining with the Robber Fly colony and killing the two snotty brats behind him. He should not rely on Saki's world that his Queen would be saved. She is unreliable, without a single shred of integrity in her body. The only undeniable traits she possesses is doubt, fear, shock, confusion, and self-preservation.

Even at the very end, we have a mock trial, sneers and jeers abound, with one of the cruelest, most vindictive punishments imaginable given to Squealer, the Robber Fly leader. His body will forever be mutilated, his nerve endings burned off, regrown, and burned off again ad infinitum, to experience this unimaginable pain until the end of time. The anime ends with Saki, smug as can be, as she walks out of her office, littered with Queerat memorabilia, a museum for an endangered or possibly extinct species, after she burns away the remnants of what is now Squealer, locked behind a display case, to finally end his suffering, after who knows how many years being on display. Is this the hero we have been waiting for? Is this the much lauded bridge between two cultures or the great reformist of a twisted society we were promised? No. She has done absolutely nothing, solved absolutely no problems, brought upon absolutely no new revelations, righted no wrongs, and even contributed to several conflicts. Her final act of pity is too little too late and we end up worse off than where we started.

Even in the worst atrocities of modern history, the xenophobia and racism against others have had more justification and more complexity. In Shinsekai Yori, the cantus society contradicts it's very foundation and worldview with it's treatment and eventual decimation of the Queerats. This is a society brought up on Buddhist teachings of nonviolence, to quell anger and bloodlust, to cast away carnal emotions, for these feelings will develop into bad karma and the transformation into a karma demon, a purveyor of misdeeds that the universe punishes unconditionally. Hatred from spite, disdain from superiority, and vindictiveness from anger, all contribute to bad karma, and most importantly, lead to conflict and violence within the cantus society that can easily set off its destruction with the slightest spark. The whole rationale behind the culling of children, the obfuscation of history, the brainwashing, even the alteration of the genome to create a death feedback if one cantus wielder ever harmed another, all seemed justified with an open enough mind. But somehow, as long as they did not look exactly like humans, even if they had an extreme semblance and high intellect to that of humans, all these genetic, dogmatic, and spiritual safeguards and mechanisms somehow become completely void?

Shinsekai Yori pushes moral and ethical questions that it easily discards or forgets. It fleshes out a society, then subsequently knocks it over, revealing how paper-thin and untenable it's own understanding of that society is. It's main characters, which it seeks to glorify and place in dramatic situations, are nothing more than disposable cue cards to usher in the next scene. And the lack of any real substance or meaningful change at the end, or positive progress, leaves me morally repugnant. The horror, the drama, the suspense, all rely on the contrast from a certain moral standard to be effective, and with that moral standard comes an expectation that is never fulfilled.