Romeo no Aoi Sora

A production by World Masterpiece Theater, a company know producing stories that take place outside of Japan with a classical book/story vibe (often adaptations of said books), this was their last project and, much as I’ve been told they have other great works, this was pretty underwhelming and drastically overrated.

There's a good deal of charm to this anime, not just in its animation but in its almost storybook telling. The plucky protagonist bonding with friends along the way to some potentially dreadful adventure and managing to make the most of a difficult situation is always going to be a good time.

That being said, this series ... seems to be of two minds about how it wants to present itself. Part of that is the relation and departure from the source material. As long as the two are in parallel, the story is decently dark and has some strong plot progression. When they do depart, though, there's a dramatic shift towards something that looks a whole lot more fantastical than its setting should allow. I almost want to imagine much of that portion as the titular Romeo's retelling of the events to the kids in his classroom, sanitized for their benefit. But it's not just about the changes. Tonally, the story is all over the place, and in some cases, it just leaves whole plot threads dangling for no reason.

Long story short, it's a charming mess of a show. Even given no background on the source material or other adaptations, it's a frustrating watch. The early story and some elements of the later story are strong enough to give it a bit of a boost, but it joins a set of anime that just didn't work for me overall, despite having some strong moments.