Subete ga F ni Naru

It’s not easy to watch a show like “The Perfect Insider”. Generally speaking, the show is about mystery and in this case involves murder. It’s something that can be a sensitive topic as we learn more about the circumstances. And given the mystery aspect of the show, it’s the narratives that captures the essence of story. Really though, what is The Perfect Insider?

Subete ga F ni Naru (also more commonly known as The Perfect Insider) is based on a Japanese mystery novel written in 1996 by Hiroshi Mori. Produced by A-1 Pictures, the show is symbolic for how mystery can be so…mysterious. The setting ... takes place on a remote island and begins when Souhei Saikawa, an associate professor of National Nagono University, goes on a vacation there. During his vacation, he is also accompanied by 1st year student, Moe Nishinosono. What started out as an ordinary trip turns bizarre when a mysterious corpse shows up at the lab. At the same time, it also became well known that a woman named Shiki Magata lives there. As one of the most mysterious characters in the show, she has literally lived in a laboratory for the past 15 years. Can you imagine that? Trapping themselves like a rat in a box hardly sounds like a paradise. For someone like Magata, there’s also a dark past that involves the parricide of her parents. It’s the establishment of these three characters that makes The Perfect Insider a dark and grimy tale.

It’s a very talky show. The first episode has an immense amount of philosophical vibe that follows with its heavy dialogues. The character interactions between Moe/Magata and Moe/Souhei can be described as cryptic. There’s some lighthearted humor as well but mostly follow a suit of dark comedy. When they reach the island, there’s also more of an experimental feeling as if there’s something that’s hidden there. It’s not long before they discover the grim truth there. What the show also concentrates a bit on is the background story of Shiki Magata. Obviously, she isn’t a normal woman by the way she talks or behaves. The bits of past we see implies that she is an unstable child although her actions are difficult to decipher because of her personality. [spoiler]This includes her involvement with the death of her parents as well as the perverse relationship she forges with her uncle.[/spoiler] I think at some point, viewers may find it unsettling with what they witness. And that’s no surprise either considering how much we learn that Magata is far from normal.

Throughout the series, there are many clues that has connections with the murder case. It’s also apparent that some of the clues are presented through intentional means. One of the most prominent is a message called ‘Everything Becomes F’, which is also synonymous with the series’ alternate title. What’s more about the clues is that they are all seems to be related to Shiki Magata. What I find the show intriguing is how each episode’s performance triggers events that correlates with one another. Even the episode titles has some sort of meaning or is symbolic with the storytelling. Some sensitive topics are used as plot devices and while can be unsettling is important to establish Magata’s character. On a weaker note, the show has a slow pacing, one that I think can really test the patience of viewers. Furthermore, the story is structured in a way that explores both Moe and Magata in almost parallel ways. As the story progresses, we also learn a bit more about Moe as well. While her personality is not similar to Magata or Souhei, something suggests that her past isn’t as bright as some people have hoped.

The main character interactions of the show is expressed by the building tension and relations one draws from another. Moe’s conversation with Souhei can be interpreted from many angles but it’s obvious that he shows a great deal of bizarre interest in Magata. Moe’s interest with Souhei also crafts a bizarre relationship angle as Magata shows unusual interest in Moe. It’s a really weird way of presenting the story and I’d have to advise to watch the show with an open mind. Not just because of the main characters but also for some of the more mature and sensitive topics. Otherwise, this is probably a show that is not worth the investment especially considering how talkative it is. There’s still also some minor comedy although mostly is far eclipsed by the thrilling feeling of its mystery.

For a mystery show, it also invests a decent amount of time with its unusual artwork. There’s a hollow feeling that anyone can draw from its backgrounds. Most characters are also designed to look simple without unusual features. Well, that is until you see Makata Shiki. Additionally, the show portrays its mystery with symbolism and disorder. The clues translates into a more detailed form of analysis such as the message Magata left behind or more prominent features Moe herself discovers later on in the show. To put it simply, artwork is unorthodox but also stylistically fitting for a show like this.

I have to admit a bit, the soundtrack is surprisingly impressive. From the unusual execution of the OP song (that features rotoscope done effectively) to the thrilling atmosphere, each episode offers what mystery should be. More intensified scenes are also adapted with quietness to add on more to the thrilling suspense. In addition, character voice mannerisms has a profound tone of philosophy behind them. In particular, Souhei speaks with intelligence and purpose and that’s something I find quite compelling. Unfortunately, this doesn’t seem to apply to Moe as she can be legitimately frustrating to watch with someone of her personality. And of course, there’s Magata. Her conversation portrayed in the show through that near-sinister like voice really can feel mysterious.

The Perfect Insider is a show with some unique dynamics even in the mystery genre. From disturbing plot devices to insightful conversations, it’s a series that goes beyond just a simple murder case. It becomes complex with its dark themes, the riveting style of the storytelling, and heavy characterization. The first three episodes will probably be a make or break for most viewers. But if you manage to stay, it’ll be a thrilling ride that is not short of perfect.

The Perfect Insider is what I would like to call the first 'proper' mystery anime I've seen in quite some time. By 'proper' I don't mean to say that it's amazing per se, but that it actually follows the best story design for the genre. That is to say, it takes its time to give the viewers all the details you could ever ask for as well as plenty of red herrings, it doesn't blatantly break the rules of detective fiction like certain other recent works, and it is also not episodic in any way. It gives you a fair chance to reflect on the ... case at hand and try to figure out the problem on your own, and it doesn't try to include any needless supernatural elements in the process. It's just 11 episodes of content all dedicated to a single in-depth mystery, and as a result it actually feels like a traditional detective story. It's simple, but very effective.

Based on a mystery novel of the same name from 1996, The Perfect Insider follows the cryptic death of a genius computer scientist named Magata Shiki, who has been locked up in an isolated research facility on an island for the last 15 years after having been accused of murdering her own parents as a teenager. Nishinosono Moe, a rich young lady, and the university professor Saikawa Souhei travel together to the island with the hopes of meeting Shiki in person, only to find her dead inside her room upon arriving, with her arms and legs cut off. Based on the guards' testimony as well as the security camera footage, it is clear that no one else ever entered or left Shiki's quarters. So who killed her, how and why? Those are the main questions which the story revolves around. In other words, at heart it's a classic 'locked room' problem. Though that's not all there is to it since as you'll find out, the case only escalates even further from that point onwards...

Now since mysteries are very spoiler-sensitive I don't really want to say anything more than that about the story, but I can at least say that while the overall plotline didn't exactly blow my mind... I still found it very satisfying. The most important part of a good mystery is to give the viewers a fair chance at figuring out the problem before the truth is revealed, and The Perfect Insider does a good job at that. Part of the solution is actually not that difficult to figure out on your own, but the whole thing? Yeah I don't think very many people were able to do that, but it all made sense when I finally heard the explanation, and that's all I can really ever ask for.

Shiki herself is unquestionably the most interesting character of the anime as is made evident when the others slowly but surely come to realize who she used to be whilst investigating the case. She's crazy, but unbelievably intelligent. As far as Saikawa-sensei and Moe goes though... I can't help but feel like they're utilized more as plot mechanics than actual persons. Saikawa-sensei quite simply fulfills the role of the detective of the case. To quote one of the 20 rules of detective fiction: "The detective novel must have a detective in it; and a detective is not a detective unless he detects. His function is to gather clues that will eventually lead to the person who did the dirty work in the first chapter; and if the detective does not reach his conclusions through an analysis of those clues, he has no more solved his problem than the schoolboy who gets his answer out of the back of the arithmetic." And that is effectively all he does: logically solving the problem, one step at a time. Beyond that he's honestly a quite bland and uninspiring character, but at least he fulfills the role that the story has given him very well. Moe on the other hand is the intermediary character who is there to ensure that the viewers are able to follow along and don't get confused, by not being quite as sharp as Saikawa-sensei is, and thus making him have to explain most of his discoveries vocally to her, thus indirectly informing the audience in the process as well. And all the other side characters... well they're mostly just 'there', not a whole lot more to say about them.

The Perfect Insider is produced by A-1 Pictures of all studios, which is pretty unexpected in and of itself since this is hardly the kind of series they usually adapt. They pretty much always make shounen anime, but this time they're tackling a philosophical seinen mystery instead. But either way, they do a surprisingly good job at it, and the animation is as top notch as ever as well. Something that might be worth mentioning here as well is that the character designs are actually made by Asano Inio, the mangaka of Oyasumi Punpun and Solanin among other things. And although The Perfect Insider perhaps doesn't look *that* crazy relatively speaking, you can still really see who the artist is. It's just too characteristic to be unnoticeable.

In the end, The Perfect Insider might be very dialogue-heavy and slow-paced, but I still found significantly more consistent enjoyment value in this anime than almost anything else from this season, mostly because it actually feels like a real mystery for once. Like a legitimately interesting one which teases your imagination and makes you think for yourself. It's surprising just how rare that is to see in anime, but it means quite a lot to me. So even though the mystery in this case might not have been completely flawless, it's still a hell of a lot better than getting nothing at all. I'll just take what I can get.

So here we are. The final noitamina show of 2015. Can’t say I’ve been a big fan of the time slot’s constant deaths and revivals to the point that Jean Grey is thinking there’s something wrong with it, and considering that nobody likes The Perfect Insider but people who seem to think that good dialogue automatically equals quality, I don’t think I’m going to be breaking many hearts when I say that I’m not exactly enthusiastic about having to review the show. But hey, regardless of quality, I think most of us can agree it’s still worth talking about. Not to mention, I get to ... slap those “novel adaptations are always good” heathens around, so win/win.

Based on the third or fourth novel in the S&M (Sohei and Moe) series - which I haven’t read, but The Perfect Insider seems to assume its audience has because it doesn’t even bother to tell us who our two leads are - the anime stars our two title characters as they head to an island retreat for a university vacation where thanks to the almighty god that is the mystery writer, a murder happens Detective Conan-style and the two must figure out what’s going on. The series also has a live-action drama that was criticized for being slow-paced, but upon further research, I discovered it actually adapts five novels worth of material within its ten-episode run, which makes me wonder just what the fuck is in these novels that makes them such a tedious chore even when you only have an hour or so to tell the story. Yes it should come to no surprise considering it’s A-1, but for an 11-episode series The Perfect Insider is ridiculously long. And it doesn’t even have any uninspired world-building to fall back on as an excuse. It’s just long for no good reason whatsoever.

The thing about mysteries is that once you know the truth behind ‘em, they cease to be “mysteries” and instead become uninteresting. As such, the bad ones generally rely on the brain-teasing to entice the audience whilst the good ones tie the mystery into other things in order to stay relevant in the long run. Maybe explore the personalities of our main characters. Rope the mystery into some larger plot. Have the villain be a well-respected figure who was turned into a bad guy for no good reason. Basically do everything Paranoia Agent did. You’ll be pleased to hear that not only does Perfect Insider not do any of these things, but the mystery itself doesn’t even make sense. It’s like the guy who was adapting the source material realized he ordered too many timeslots, but rather than actually add anything to the adaptation like, say, telling us who the fuck Sohei and Moe are, he just turned on an episode of Monogatari, became engaged in what he was seeing, and yelled “brilliant!” And then he saw the mystery made no sense in the novel and went “oh who the fuck cares?”

There’s so much boring redundant dialogue in this show that it takes three episodes for the mystery to even fucking start. And even with the long stretches of time spent on talking me to sleep, the show is incredibly lacking in detail. The characters react to deaths the same way a normal person would react to a mosquito bite, and everyone gets free rein of the place like they don’t care that there’s a murderer among them to the point that it felt like they were reading the script. Not to mention that what little we see of the victim’s history does a pretty good job at making me glad that she’s dead because she’s fucking psychotic. Maybe it’s just me, but I find it hard to sympathize with someone who’d kill their family out of nowhere whilst looking like she inhaled two bags of coke. And explain to me where all that AI stuff came from and what it added to the story besides a load of bananas.

With that said, the show’s total commitment to treating fucked-up relationships and psychic programs as a normal thing was entertaining at points, mainly because it kept making me laugh. Well, not “laugh” persay. More like snicker at the idea that someone can say that children grow to kill their parents at the age of fifteen like it’s a normal thing to happen. I guess now we know what happened to all the parents in every single highschool anime ever, amirite? Unfortunately, the amount of unintentionally hilarious dialogue is in a vast minority compared to the ones that are either spouting exposition or talking about Moe’s desires to bone her teacher silly. Which is also kind of unintentionally hilarious in a way. I guess spouting out quantum physics when someone asks you where the rewind button on the Xbone controller is located is considered sexy to some people.

My point is this: shows that try to get by on dialogue alone are shit. Because animation is a visual medium and not using the visuals to tell the story is like not having gameplay in your video game. That’s right, The Perfect Insider is the anime version of those walking simulator games. The ones where you play as some nameless being trying to find the plot without any challenge in-between the exposition dumps to the point that it feels like you’re reading a book that was chopped into pieces and scattered across the world so that it takes an awfully long time and money to figure out how the story ends. Forgive me for being old-fashioned, but when I buy a book, I prefer to have the entire thing at my disposal and not have to buy a new chapter every time I go to a new book store. If I had to do that, Huckleberry Finn would have taken three years to finish reading.

Plus, why should I care about the dialogue when it’s being spoken by a bunch of dull drama stereotypes with no personal story or stakes in the mystery whatsoever? Did anyone ever watch LA Confidential and thought it would have been improved if you replaced Guy Pearce with some random kid genius who has no connection with the police force and just said what the audience was thinking whilst discovering the dead body underneath the house? Of course not. Because that kid would have been really fucking boring! I don’t watch anime to see people react to things. I watch anime to see people doing things. And I can’t remember one thing Sohei and Moe ever did besides wonder what was going on and then eventually figure out the truth in one long info-dump before going about their lives.

I mean did this experience change them? Did they go through any character growth throughout the series? Did they have any personal connection with the victim? I remember Moe talking with her once and that was it. Why exactly are Sohei and Moe the main characters if they’re not going to affect the story? Even Benedict Cumberbatch had to match personal wits with the otherwise-unconnected criminals he faces at the end of each episode of Sherlock.

Fair warning to all my readers. I’m going to spoil the plot of this show now, because I can’t get deep into its silliness otherwise. After more than eight episodes of exposition-dumping along with one really bad Engrish scene that grated my ears harder than the voice-acting in a post-90s Sonic game, the show decides to reveal through several overly long and tensionless exposition scenes that absolutely none of the characters we met along the way was the culprit and that the person they thought was the victim was actually a look-alike who killed herself because fifteen years of planning couldn’t stand up to the words that came out of Moe’s mouth. The original plan was to have both the intended victim and her husband killed because they lived fucked up lives and apparently this is their way of seeking redemption rather than - oh, I don’t know - turning themselves in. Instead, the intended murderer killed herself, the intended victim escapes the island, she shows up one last time to tell Sohei that she won’t get caught, we get a final episode consisting of nothing but tying up loose ends rather than giving me some actual payoff, and then the show ends with a scene consisting of the intended victim and the actual victim talking about the meaning of life.

So in other words, assuming that load of boring plot dump doesn’t put you to sleep, the only character who gets any sort of resolution out of this ridiculously long mystery is the unlikeable and uninteresting murderer we barely got to know, and it’s an incredibly anticlimactic one as well. Somewhere in Hell, Albert Wesker from Resident Evil is watching this show (and I have it on good authority that Satan allows his followers to watch anime in Hell) and going “dude, I was treated with more dignity than this. And I was killed by a muscleman and his incredibly stupid black sidekick who’d waste valuable health sprays on you if you so much as got a paper cut.”

So, it seems that this anime was a hit more miss with most, who watched. I personally enjoyed the show thoroughly from beginning to end. What seems to be the "problem" that most people point out is that the characters are unrealistic or that they are just idiots trying to act smart but I didn't see it that way at all. Agree or disagree I will give you my 2 cents about this series.

I will start with first with the [b]Characters[/b].

If you don't like 'different/perfect' characters, you won't enjoy the show.

Our lead protagonist Saikawa is a professor at a college but his personality is anything ... but normal, he is very anti social and spends his time thinking about the way humans think and why they think that way. He is curious why people do many things for no reason.
His mentality is detached from society's typical way of thinking, the way he questions anything and everything would make most people in society look at him like he was crazy. I personally saw his statements as realistic questions to be asked.

"Every morning I wake up and think am I the same Saikawa I was yesterday? Or am I just trying to play the role of Saikawa?".

"In here it feels like we've been abandoned by time."
"Isn't 'released from' a better phrase as opposed to 'abandoned by'"

"Seeing nature and thinking its beautiful is what is unnatural"

"In the end, everybody is tied down to their one body, don't you find that terribly restrictive?"

I enjoyed his character because he would say things no other main character would say. Which was something great to me.

Female lead protagonist Moe, a math genius who can answer any math question immediately, she is also an unusual character, she isn't quite as curious as Saikawa when it comes humans but she tags along with him. Her above average intellect helps conversations with this unusual male lead to make some sense. Saikawa can't talk to somebody who refuses to share the same train of though.

Lastly the main focus of the series, is a woman who is a super genius named Magata. She is world famous for being super smart at the age of 11 and thus they locked her in a room so that she can work alone, for 15 years. Her character is similar to that of Saikawa in that she questions the human train of thought and emotions. Her train of thought is similar to Saikawa as well.

If you can't stand 'different/perfect' characters with drastic world views then do not watch this show.

[b]Story[/b]

The two leads go to the island where the famous Dr. Magata works, and the fact that Moe's family is well known, they are let in upon arriving. When they enter a murder is committed where the limbs of the body are missing. Although Saikawa prefers to leave Moe convinces him to stay and help figure out this murder mystery.
Not much to say about it in general except, I felt that the revelation of the murder and how they get there is enjoyable. The reasoning behind the murder might be acceptable for you depending on what kind of person are you. Like I said before the characters mainly determine how your enjoyment of this series will go.

[b]Sound[/b]

Great fantastic awesome whatever. The music was great in this series OP and ED. One of the best of this season. If a great ost is enough to get you to watch a series then this is your show.

[b]Art[/b]
The art wasn't bad. The only thing that bothered me is the way they drew everybody's eyebrowss, and occasionally how some of the characters eyes looked. Other than that the art was good.

[b]Enjoyment[/b]
Enjoyment was great, probably my favorite show of the season. If you think that OPM is the anime of the season, then I recommend you to avoid this show like the plague.

[b]In Conclusion[/b]
Subete ga F ni Naru is a show that requires your undivided attention, missing the smallest of details can change how you view it. I don’t blame you for not liking it. It is a metaphysical journey that’s more about exploring its concepts than anything. It isn’t meant to be taken at face value and demands you to pay attention to understand it. It’s a show that touches upon the human condition and finding one’s purpose in life. I suggest watching lesser complicated shows before trying to tackleSubete again. Subete is an anime made for people who understand philosophy and also have a keen understanding on how to properly analyze content.

"The natural state of things is death, so life itself is a sort of illness. When the illness is cured, life vanishes." Shiki Magata
(This is just a brief touch of the pretense contained in this show)

- The Perfect Insider -

Story: 5

The biggest issue with Perfect Insider's story isn't the mystery itself, no- the biggest issue plaguing this show is the Anime Logic™. Apparently Hiroshi Mori didn't even bother to do a cursory search for any kind of legal books, case law, or anything regarding the legality of murder and subsequent judicial proceedings of someone accused and convicted of such.

In his stead, I ... did my own research, which turned up some very strange findings. Case law for Japan is very difficult to find, and even more rare in English; however, the cases that are involved are typically public information, excepting those involving minors- similarly to the US.

In Japan, they do not follow the M'naghten rule- that is, in an insanity plea, where the distinction must be made of a person who is accused of a crime as to whether they were insane at the time of the CRIME, or insane at the time of the TRIAL. The goal is to determine whether temporary insanity or claims of insanity to try and get off are valid. If someone is determined insane at the time of the trial, the trial is then postponed and they are involuntarily committed to a mental institution until such a time that they are deemed competent to stand trial, if ever. Time spent in said asylum counts as time served in the event that they are convicted after being found competent.

In 2001, a man in Osaka went into an elementary school and stabbed 8 children to death, and injured another 13 children and two teachers. He was diagnosed with antisocial personality disorder, BPD, and PPD. He was sentenced to death by hanging, and it was carried out in 2004.

In 2007, a 16 year old girl murdered her father with an axe in Kyoto. Because the case involved a minor, few details are available, but it's almost certain that she walked free. "I didn't like my father so I killed him," Kyodo news agency quoted the girl as saying.
-Japan allows this kind of thing.

In 2008, a man drove a truck into a crowd in Akihabara and killed three people, got out, stabbed and killed four more, injuring an additional 10 people before being apprehended. He was then RELEASED FROM POLICE CUSTODY after two days, and rearrested 10 DAYS LATER. He was sentenced to death in 2011, upheld in 2015.

What Japan does (because of deep seated cultural norms and customs, along with having no actual laws pertaining to the matter of mentally ill committing violent crime), as evidenced in the aforementioned cases, is seemingly either A) put them to death, or B) let them walk free.

Apparently Hiroshi Mori was aware of B) and kept that in mind when writing Perfect Insider, with a healthy dose of Anime Logic™ to keep it firmly on the side of "That's some crap". Dr. Shiki Magata manages to not only get away with the double murder of her parents (be declared not competent to stand trial and 'released to the care of her family' {as per Japanese law}), but then be allowed to walk free and live inside of a laboratory for 15 years. Never mind that this lab is not monitored by the police and government, a total lack of oversight over a dangerous, mentally ill AND unstable criminal, but that she's also able to open the door HERSELF and leave, were it to come to that.

About 200 years ago, a guy named Ed Allan wrote a story about how to imprison someone you don't want leaving... it involved some bricks and a little bit of wine. Bottom line is, if they didn't want Shiki to escape, why the hell would they build a door to her "cell" that SHE can open? That's just plain stupid. You don't give prisoners a key to their cell when they go to jail.

The next bit of ridiculous anime logic is how, once Dr. Magata escapes, she's instantaneously wanted by the police. Oh, now that she's not in her little laboratory that she ran herself, she's now wanted? What are they going to do when they arrest her this time? Slap on the wrist, walk free again? What purpose does this serve?
There was a tiny scene showing her arraignment in court, and the apparent release implied thereafter. I don't know what's more insane, Japan's laws on mentally ill persons committing violent crimes like murder, or Dr. Magata.

The detective characters also overlook so many obvious clues that I nearly smashed my frontal bone completely in two with my palm. They also take everything that the workers at the lab say at face value, including ridiculous absolutes like "it's IMPOSSIBLE for anything to be wrong with the computer system", or "this door can NEVER be opened", or "NO ONE EVER has come or gone from here", and others. There wouldn't be a mystery if these absolutes were true, so why they continue to stick to them and the protagonists believe them is beyond me.


Characters: 4

Onto our characters, Saikawa is one of the edgiest level 98 Glorious Edgemaster of Balrons ever. He's edgier than stepping on a Lego, barefoot (which also feature prominently in this show- product placement, hah!). This guy is the ultimate form of cool. He's got the look- long shaggy mop hair that hangs over one eye like a 15 year old scene kid, the only thing that he's missing is the dyed edge of his hair and eye makeup, which he makes up for by having two black eyes because he's too edgy to sleep, because sleeping might take away time from his infinitely deep philosophical musings. He wears shirts with sarcastic phrases or esoteric images on them that only further deepen this mystique he's trying to build. Which really just means that he doesn't care about his appearance because such things are beneath him. Saikawa also smokes incessantly, because smoking just further increases your cool points.

Saikawa exists in the show mostly to spout off pseudo intellectual BS that can be found any day of the week on the hot list of r/iam14andthisisdeep. In fact, this page was probably inspired by the original 1996 Perfect Insider novel. His musings include, but are not limited to: the meaning of life, the meaning of death, the meaning of love, and many other answerless questions. His powers include: a deep and unexplained understanding of programming languages, BS skills like no other, and being a tough guy who resists cute girls for no other reason than that he's just too far advanced in knowledge and understanding to be trifled with such foolish things.


Nishinosono:

She exists in the show to attempt to give a more human feel to the robotic Saikawa, and to have someone in the show that's stupid and doesn't get it, and so in having it explained to them, the audience also gets the developments going on in Saikawa's head. Other than that, Nishinosono's presence is to blush anytime someone mentions Saikawa's name, and generally fawn over him and how edgy he is.

These characters in Perfect Insider are the dumbest smart people I've ever seen. Mr. Mori seemingly was never told "show, not tell"- which is rule #1 in characterization. I don't care how many times you beat me over the head with Nishinosono telling Saikawa how smart he is, or how observant or technologically proficient he is, or the same apparent attributes of Dr. Magata. I don't have any idea why Saikawa or Nishinosono are supposedly such brilliant people, as I've no indication of their backgrounds or lives outside of what little we're shown in flashbacks. I know that Saikawa is an educated man because he's a professor of architecture, but that does not explain his seemingly boundless knowledge of the various technologies and workings of a so called "genius"- Dr. Magata.

For the icing on the stupid cake, the mystery is finally solved with a really bad deus ex machina, whereas the rest of the tale was unraveled using semi-to-realistic logic and things that can actually happen. Suffice to say that some characters get into some Tranquility Lane style virtual reality loungers and manage to find what they were looking for. A real cop out of a way to "solve" the mystery.


Enjoyment and Overall: 4, 5

It makes me sad to learn that Kenji Kawai did the soundtrack for this pile, because it was utterly forgettable. Honestly, this isn't the worst series of the season, but as far as being a mystery, it's far too reliant on conveniences and longshots in an shallow attempt at appearing deep. I had figured out about 80% of the mystery by the 5th or 6th episode, and it was all downhill from there, with a really forgettable cast of characters and a hokey ending.

The Perfect Insider is a great example of how fast an interesting premise can turn into a bad story. If you came to this anime looking for an interesting and intellectual show, then I would advise you to look somewhere else.

STORY

This show started out with an interesting premise. The premise being that a genius programmer Shiki Magata is murdered within a locked room on an isolated island. This becomes a game of cat and mouse, as our two main characters (or protagonists) search around for clues to the mystery. While I hyped the premise initially, the actual progression/execution of the show was lackluster to ... say the least. The answer to the mystery was rather predictable, but I was hoping that the execution would be better. The themes were simply not explored enough and most of dialogue seem unneeded or unnatural. In fact most of the show consists of poorly written dialogue, with very slow pacing and annoying plot holes/plot conveniences. This show tries to bombard you with pseudo-intellectualism, rather than actual facts, logic or interesting logistical questions.

Even when a noteworthy question is asked, it is quickly overshadowed by other non-sense within the show. In some cases, the question is not even related to the problem at hand. In other situations, the answers are very left field or do not even answer the question. However, the final episode was very well written. Unlike previous episodes many interesting questions were proposed and answered. We gain a bit more understanding of Shiki Magata; however, one episode does not make up for the entirety of the show. The plot just contains a lot of lazy writing, pseudo-intellectualism and moments of huge info dumping.

"Every human starts as a genius. And as they age, they become average."- Shiki Magata


CHARACTERS

All of the characters are surprisingly flat, which is shocking coming from a dialogue heavy show. Many of their motivations, fears, or dreams are stripped away. We are left with dull 2-dimensional characters, with no additional interesting information or talents about them. There are three main characters:
Souhei Saikawa:
Angsty, pseudo-intellectual main character, who solves the mystery with almost little to no insight. Most of his rants have nothing to do with the actual plot, and his moments of “genius” are ass-pulls.

Shiki Magata:
Genius, yet psychotic programmer, with the foresight of a time wizard. There’s almost no motivation for this character and no personality either. She’s merely a plot device, nothing more or less.

Moe Nishinosono:
Young side kick who obsesses over Souhei. She’s just a hollow placeholder for the audience to project their views and feelings through, while they watch the show.

ART/ANIMATION

The art is typical, nothing new in this department; however, the animation can be a bit sloppy at some points. For anime built around dialogue, many of the scenes were often animated badly. There were many jump cuts and some seriously awkward camera angles.


SOUND/OST

This is where Subete redeems itself. The OST was rather fitting for the type of narrative created. It added to the atmosphere and overall progression of the show. The opening and ending songs were very well done. The opening was very catchy. The ending song keeps and maintains this upbeat feeling, unlike most ending songs of today. The voice acting was spot on, I have no complaint in this section.

OVERALL

The Perfect Insider is a mediocre at best. No matter how interesting a premise is, if the execution and characters cannot match, then the show simply fails. Subete unfortunately bit off more than it could chew, which caused it to resort to pseudo-intellectualism blurs rather than creating logic/interesting dialogue and characters. I would say to try another show before you watch Subete ga F ni Naru: The Perfect Insider.

FINAL GRADE
D

It's been about a month and a half since I finished this show, and yet, I'm still pissed at how bad it was. As such, it's time for my first non-seasonal review in like half a year.

What are the key components of a good murder mystery? First, and quite obviously, is the mystery itself. The mystery has to be clever, in such a way that the solution is unexpected, yet logical. The viewer also has to have adequate engagement with the story and be able to figure out the mystery for himself. Secondly, and also quite obviously, there is the investigation. The detective looks for ... clues, talks to witnesses, and pieces together the final picture, all while providing the same information to the viewer. And lastly, there has to be suspense. The viewer has to be invested in the story. If there is no suspense, the viewer simply doesn't give a shit and the solution to the mystery falls completely flat. Common sense, right?

Well, The Perfect Insider (right up there with KADO: The Right Answer for most cringy/edgy anime title) has none of those elements.

The mystery itself is pathetic, and literally anybody should be able to figure it out in the first five episodes of the show. As I want to spoil as little as possible, I can't really explain why, but I'll try anyway. The key to the mystery is given to you nearly instantly. When the corpse first rolls out (literally, it rolls out), there is an immediately noticeable age difference between the corpse and the supposed victim. The corpse looks about 14 years old, but the supposed victim is around 30. Hm, I wonder what could possibly explain that! I've got no clue! (By the way, the show explains this away as "she doesn't age". Uh, what?) Secondly, the door to the room the corpse rolls out from hasn't been opened in like 15 years or something, so the supposed victim, the *woman* inside, is the only possible victim! But who could've killed her! Hmmmmmmm. Take a moment and try to piece the two strings of information together. Besides suicide, how could a woman be murdered in a room that has undoubtedly not been entered by anyone in 15 years, and why would the corpse look like a 15-year-old instead of a 30-year-old? Gee, I just have no clue.

Moving on to the second aspect: The Perfect Insider must be the first murder mystery ever where the characters legitimately do not investigate (besides for like one episode of them walking around the victim's room and looking at her PC). Although this is reasonable, considering how absurdly simple the mystery is, it doesn't make for good entertainment. The entirety of the show is dialogue, and most of the dialogue is infodumps. For like eight episodes, the two main characters just talk to each other until one of them goes "haha! I've figured it out!", and that's it.

And, if it's not yet obvious, there's no suspense. My experience of watching The Perfect Insider went something like this:
Episodes 1-3: "why the fuck are they talking for 3/11 episodes of a murder mystery before the murder ever happens?"
End of episode 3: "ah looks like the murder finally happened. why is the corpse limbless, wearing a wedding dress, and rolling out on a sci-fi robot trolley? did sakae esuno write this?"
Episodes 4-11: "zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz"

Like, the show somehow managed to get more boring AFTER the murder occurred. That's really impressive tbh. I guess the only thing more boring than the buildup to a murder mystery is a murder mystery that you've already solved.

Another important aspect that needs to be noted is the sheer amount of edge. (Just as a reference, since "edgy" constantly gets thrown around as a meaningless criticism, my definition is "excessively dark to the point of being comical or difficult to take seriously"). Now, I'm usually a fan of edgy shows. I enjoyed Mirai Nikki, Akame ga Kill, and even Arifureta a fair amount. But holy shit this is just too much. Here are just a few of the hyper-edgy aspects of the show:

1. The state of the corpse as previously mentioned
2. The supposed victim stabbed her parents to death for virtually no reason when she was 15. The show and the main character, by the way, treat this as a normal thing, because "it's natural for a child to want to kill their parents" or some retarded shit like that.
3. One of the characters has an extremely fucked up, incestuous relationship
4. Not a single character cares about the murders, or that they are trapped with a murderer in a facility that you can't enter or exit. They just treat it as an everyday occurrence and move on with their lives.
5. The whole conclusion to the show (about the last four episodes or so) is asininely edgy, to the point that it's unbelievable. As I'm trying to keep this review spoiler-free, I'd refer you to the second-to-last paragraph of Flawfinder's review (4th top one), if you want to spoil yourself.

As for characters, the 2/10 rating of "dreadful" is quite accurate. Besides the three main characters, no other characters exist in the show. The most favorited side character has 7 favorites, and he has about four minutes of screentime before never again appearing in the show.

Main character 1: Psycho Bitch. She mainly appears in flashbacks, and she's really smart. She's also insane, as she killed her parents. That's literally it.

Main character 2: Emo Genius. This guy, just like main character 3, isn't a character. He is a plot device. He is the detective in the case, and that's it. He also often says depressed, pseudo-philosophical things that pretend to be deep. My favorite one of these is as follows:

"Whenever I get up in the morning, I always think to myself, 'Am I really the same person I was yesterday?' For example, just as a computer loads its OS into memory and boots up each time it restarts, is it possible I'm just booting up the person called 'Saikawa Souhei' each morning and trying to play that role?"

What the fuck does that mean? Nothing. It means nothing. It's pretentious, faux-intellectual garbage masquerading as philosophy.

Main character 3: Horny Sounding Board. My favorite one of the three, as she is neither obnoxious nor insane. She exists so that Emo Genius has someone to tell his bullshit and expository dialogue to. She also wants to fuck him.

Sound: Why is every show with a KANA-BOON opening always shit? Seriously, why is one of the best Japanese bands relegated to dogshit like this, Sarazanmai, and Boruto? The OST is pretty good tbh. I'd have given the sound an 8 if not for a ten-minute-long conversation that was entirely in Engrish. Literal ear rape.

Art: The best part of this is that the original character designs are done by Asano Inio, the king of faux-intellectualism. That's just incredibly ironic. Other than that, the art is ok. This being a 2015 A-1 Pictures show pretty much says everything.

In conclusion, this is by far the worst mystery I've encountered not only in anime but in any type of literature whatsoever. It would perhaps be passable as a novel, but it fails as a work of an audiovisual medium. The whole show consists of infodumps, the mystery is easily solvable, and not even the characters give a shit about the case.

Synopsis on Crunchyroll: Based on the award-winning novel Subete ga F ni Naru by Hiroshi Mori, The Perfect Insider finds Sohei Saikawa, a member of the Saikawa Research Lab, and Moe Nishinosono, the daughter of his mentor, on vacation when they discover a corpse. The two then work together to solve the mysteries of what becomes a serial murder case.

I don't normally write reviews, but I had to make an exception for this show since I'm not too sure that many people are quite getting its meaning. For people who are currently on the fence trying to decide whether or not to watch Perfect ... Insider, please do not take the current aggregate score on MyAnimeList as an indicative measurement of the overall quality. The anime is simply different, not bad; and, to be quite frank, it takes an open mind and different kind of thinking towards plot progression to appreciate what is being done here.

The first and foremost aspect of the plot that must be addressed is that it does NOT primarily belong to the mystery genre. I can not stress this enough. If you start watching this anime thinking that it will have a conventional mystery plotline, such as Sherlock Holmes, then you will be severely disappointed by the outcome. For instance, the "mystery" aspect of the anime doesn't actually begin until the very end of episode 2 going into episode 3. Furthermore, the progression (i.e. the deductive and inductive analysis) is very slow and does not build up to "edge-of-your-seat" climatic moments. Quite simply, you won't find a clever detective snooping around with a magnifying glass and quirky methodologies to solve the mystery. What you get, instead, is Sohei Saikawa and a lot of philosophical dialogue; and this is the main point that I wanted to get to.

Perfect Insider is more of a kind of documentary than anything else. It "documents" the character's and their personalities to make a commentary on the human condition. The mystery aspect is, quite honestly, a side-note that adds a little bit of spunk to the overall narrative. However, it is still completely necessary as the mystery genre, in general, offers some of the best opportunities for internal reflection and inquiry. The exception in Perfect Insider is that, instead of asking solely HOW the killer committed the crime, a good portion of time is spend also asking WHY the killer committed the crime; and this all ties in with the philosophical dialogues that are persistent throughout the anime.

So, what type of viewer would enjoy this show? An intellectual. And by intellectual, I do not mean someone who is "smart" or "intelligent." I mean someone who likes to inquire about nature and ponder the meaning that their life holds. There is a particular quote by Saikawa in episode 1 that stuck out to me, and it is something like this: Whenever I get up in the morning, I always think to myself, "Am I really the same person I was yesterday"? If you're someone that truly thinks about questions like these, then the meaning of Perfect Insider may make a lot more sense to you than the average person.

Overall, I can not say that Perfect Insider is perfect in itself. It could focus a bit more on the plot progression and character development, of which there exists none, in my opinion. I do not wish to get into a generic review discussing the music and animation, as both are of average to good quality, so there isn't really anything left to discuss. In addition, the score that I provide for this anime is not indicative of my overall impression; it is just something that is, of course, required. One last thing that I do want to mention is that this anime is based off of a novel of a similar name, and, as a result, it holds a particular degree of "unity."
In other words, the ending ties in and complements the beginning, and vice versa. So, remember this if you become confused by some of the scenes.

In conclusion, I think that Perfect Insider is a great anime with a good story and interesting character personalities. Please do not simply let the opinions of others, including myself, carry the significant weight in your overall decision-making. After all, we are all free to make our own choices as long as we first define "ourselves."

The Perfect Insider is a mystery anime that came out in October 2015 and is an adaptation of a light novel by the same name, which was released in 1996. That should be enough to set expectations really low, and that is really the only way to enjoy this show. Either that or you only care about visuals, superficial characters and ignore plot holes.

So I'll start by saying what's good about this show. It was animated by A-1 Pictures, the same studio that adapted Sword Art Online, Shigatsu Wa Kimi No Uso and Fairy Tail ... (2009-2013), among others, into an anime. If you have watched any of the previously mentioned shows, you will know that A-1 Pictures makes some of the best lookin visuals and animation out there. The Perfect Insider is not an exception. The color palette used is bright and colorful, the backgrounds are beautiful, character figures move in a very fluid way, face expressions are detailed and there are no significant quality drops. Audio wise, the sound effects are pretty good, and the soundtrack, although forgettable, fits the show's ambience.

And so looking pretty is all that this show does well, and since every anime nowdays looks pretty, this isn't much to write home about. It does nothing to distinguish itself from every other mystery story out there.

And speaking of mystery, the whole purpose of having one in a story is to serve as a hook to keep people interested. It is a very good way to gradually reveal things about the world, plot or characters if they are not meant to be explained all at once. But it should never overshadow said world, plot or characters, and the Perfect Insider does exactly that. Everyone except the main characters are simply there to make the plot move forward. They get no characterization, no development, and feel very one dimensional. Some are not even given a name!

The main characters are not much better too. One of the protagonists is the typical "genius that hates the world he lives in" edgelord stereotype, randomly spewing out filosophical thoughts that sometimes don't even have anything to do with the story at all, in a poor attempt at making the show look "deep" and "a commentary on the human condition". The only thing that defines him is his love for cigarettes. The other protagonist is a girl that is in love with edgelord 420 (for no apparent reason), and is just as boring and bland as him.

The main villain is easily the most interesting character in the whole show, because unlike others she has motives and objectives, and is given a backstory and reasons to act like she does. Still, she is above average at best, since she also suffers from many of the same problems the other two main characters do.

Back to the mystery aspect, for a mystery to be done well, it needs to foreshadow future evens by giving hints and clues. The idea is that the viewer should have enough information to predict said future events. For example, in Death Note, the author makes sure to let us know everything we need to know to make the mind games feel plausible. Things like Light getting out of a difficult situation because he knew one crucial detail that was never hinted at before about the rules of the death note doesn't happen. The Perfect Insider does the exact opposite. To exemplify, there is a scene where the protagonist looks at a bookshelf (never shown before, by the way) and notices an important detail, a pattern in the books' volume numbers. There was no way anyone could have seen that coming, since this was never hinted at, thus making it a half-assed, poorly written way to make the story continue to unfold.

The mystery finally comes to an end when the main character has an epiphany and suddenly figures everything out, out of nowhere. Again, impossible for anyone to have thought of what he did.

To sum up, forgettable cardboard characters, plot that barely makes sense, slow pacing, pretentious and sometimes unnecessary filosophical reflections, poorly executed mystery, but beautiful visuals, very good animation and decent sound. The Perfect Insider is boring, forgettable, and badly written.

*Contains Little Spoilers*

First, if you love mystery animes, go watch this show. Second, if you don't like mystery animes and you're an easily-bored person, don't watch this show; and if you watch, please do not write a review about how boring it is and give it 1/10. You're just misleading people.

Story: 10/10

YES, IT'S SLOW AND YES, IT'S BORING BUT JUST DEAL WITH IT. OK. So this story is about some genius people. First one, Magata Shiki. She is a very intelligent girl who killed her parents. Because of that she has to live in a room in an island. She stayed so many years. Then ... here comes our other geniuses, Saikawa sensei and Nishinosono moe. Some day Nishinosono decides to talk to Magata Shiki because she is curious, then Saikawa and Nishinosono end up that island because they want to talk to Magata face to face. Then the mystery begins... Magata Shiki goes out of that room after years, but in a wedding dress and dead and no arms and legs. They were like what the hell is going on here. Then an other crime happened and our 2 geniuses decide to solve that mystery. This was like a summary of the first 2 episodes. And I'm not going to tell what happens but I can say, it'll blow your mind.

Art: 9/10

The art is actually really good but some character's designs are really bad and it annoys me. So I gave it 9/10

Sound: 10/10

Awesome opening, good ending and nice OSTs. It deserves a 10/10

Character: 8/10

Well, I don't like Saikawa. He knows everything and smokes every fucking minute. Magata Shiki is a really interesting character and Nishinosono is funny but a little stupid,too.

Enjoyment: 7/10

The story is really interesting and makes you feel curious but some episodes were so boring. But you have to be patient and keep watching.

Overall: 9/10

*Some context:* I have been seriously watching anime for over 4 years now, and I have never found the need to actually write a review. This would be my first one, so I hope you guys bare with it.

I'll explain my plight with a humorous short story - trust me, it's much more interesting that this anime:
==
In an art competition, an artist stands in front of his painting, and the judges walk up to him and ask him to explain the concept before opening and revealing the painting on canvas. The artist says that he has drawn the situation where: "Buddha lets fly a ... white dove to symbolize peace and walks away. Unfortunately, a hunter who was hidden shoots this dove. The dove falls to the ground and dies."
The judges were mesmerized with the concept and were yearning to see the painting. The artist reveals the canvas and it's absolutely white and plain. They ask him:
Where is Buddha? - I told you that he let the dove fly and left!
Where is the hunter? - I told you that he was hidden!
Where is the dove? - I told you that it fell to the ground and died!
I think this anime is much like that. There is quite frankly a stupid hype around an absolutely plain and bland anime. If you are capable of just looking at a white canvas and imagining a concept as deep as above, maybe you'll enjoy this one. For mere mortals like myself, this anime is mediocre at best, and absolute shit if you are in a bad mood.
==

=== My thoughts (mild spoilers) ====

-- I think the Perfect Insider is at best a mediocre series, and your disappointment with it will likely increase the more you think about it.

-- I feel that the author got hold of one idea: a person is locked in a room for 15 years with minimal observation inside the cell; this person must have a child inside which no one knows about; and a glorious plan is set into motion which lasts the entire 15 years.

-- In order to make this implausible and frankly ridiculous idea a reality, the creators perform one ass-pull after the other. In order to disguise these ass-pulls, they pepper it up with copious amount of philosophical rants, which after a point becomes absolutely silly.

-- There are some scenes, dialogues, and actions which wanted to portray a high-brow attitude and show that some of these characters are really smart. These absolutely bombed. I am working towards a PhD in Math/CS at a top university, and I haven't come across a single professor or student who acts this way. Some of the CS ideas are plain wrong too.

-- Character motivations are not explained at all. Things happen a particular way because the author wanted it to happen that way. The events don't seem to evolve organically and feel almost forced. There are no reasons given for *why* a character does something other than the fact that doing so furthers a plot. There appear to be numerous alternative actions some characters could have done (including Dr. Shiki) which would have been quicker, neater, and led to the same final conclusion. People claimed to be as smart as these characters would certainly see such alternatives.

TL;DR: Everything Becomes F: The Perfect Insider has what you might call the Prometheus problem. It looks good, seems interesting & at first you're totally along for the ride. Then, at some point, you start noticing that nothing makes sense & the more information it gives you, more questions you have.

Fall 2015 started out looking like such a strong season for detective dramas. Alongside the Return of Kindaichi Case Files, there were two new titles that looked set to fill a void for non-fantasy murder mysteries, with Beautiful Bones: Sakurako's Investigation & Everything Becomes F: The Perfect Insider (EBF) adding some new blood into a ... genre that has relatively slim pickings for animé fans.

1. Story

At first, EBF seemed likely to be the best of all three. While Kindaichi began with what was the weakest case file of the series thus far, & Beautiful Bones seemed more interested in being Pet Pathologist of Sakurako than solving crimes, EBF's first few episodes provided a slow build up to its murder mystery, with a noticeably different art style, much darker tone & a more complex & intriguing story with a greater focus on the thoughts & philosophies of the main characters than in the other shows. While certainly slow, these early episodes laid a pretty solid looking foundation for a darker, smarter story than one can usually expect from TV animé

EBF's story unfolds through three plot lines that take place at different times & from the perspective of different characters. In the main story, Moe Nishinosono & her teacher/guardian/crush Souhei Saikawa all but blag their way into an island facility that houses Shiki Magata, the infamous as she is mysterious woman who murdered her parents fifteen years ago & has since lived in total isolation underground. No sooner do they manage this, then they find themselves caught up in a gruesome & seemingly impossible double murder. Concurrent to this, there are flashbacks to a previous interview between Moe & Shiki, in which Shiki takes a strange interest in Moe's past; & each episode also ends with another flashback, apparently from the perspective of Shiki's uncle writing his memories of a very dark & twisted relationship between Shiki & himself.

For the first few episodes of EBF, its slow pacing teeters on but doesn't completely cross the line between methodical & boring. EBF is a very dialogue driven series, & a large portion of the runtime is taken up by two characters talking about the mystery, which is even more impenetrable to them than the audience because they lack the benefit of those flashbacks giving context to Shiki's past & thus why she might have ended up how she did. While quite dry & dense, not to mention some laughably clunky lines like "red...red is a colour" the plot slowly builds momentum towards solving the cryptic riddle, apparently left by the killer, of what everything becomes F means, & thus the who, how & why of this seemingly impossible closed room murder mystery (incidentally, what's with animé & having characters use that literary term to refer to cases? Is it meant to be meta?)

However, for all the potential of EBF, it ultimately falls apart once the characters & setting have been established. The deliberately slow pacing of the show increasingly seems less about methodically building up to a resolution than it is padding out an overly long runtime. The conversations between Moe & Souhei, which can be hard enough to sit through to begin with, start repeating themselves as they pretty much have nothing to do between episode six, when they first solve the meaning of F, & episode 10 when the plot finally decides it's time to close the case. Indeed, in what I can only assume was a rather glaring error that slipped through the script drafting process, they forget that they've solved the meaning of F (one meaning, anyway) so they can have another overly long exchange on what it might mean. This dialogue problem reaches it's most excruciating during an exchange between Souhei & a woman who's supposedly Shiki's sister which lasts ten minutes, is entirely in English & the VA's are clearly exerting all their effort into just getting the words right.

2. Characters

It doesn't help that EBF's characters are, frankly, not able to carry such a slow story. Moe, can seem at times like she stumbled out of a high school animé. Her character is meant to act as the emotional counterbalance to Souhei's cold rationalism, even though she is a maths genius which would suggest a character more suited to cool logic. Unfortunately, she mostly expresses this side of her by being petulant & sulky, especially when Souhei doesn't notice her. She seems to get jealous whenever other women talk to or even about him, & quickly seems to start measuring herself against Shiki when she sees the interest Souhei has in trying to figure out her strange ways. The plot has an habit of taking a break from solving the mystery to focus on Moe & Souhei's relationship, which is annoying at best - not least because the author has all but said he added a slow burning relationship between the two just to keep people reading his books (of which EBF is the first of nine volumes & various short stories).

Souhei himself is the aloof, introverted type who speaks in monologues even when talking to other people. VA Yasuyuki Kase also gives to Souhei a low, monotone voice that is suitable to the character, but means that a large portion of every episode is listening to his monotonous monologues. That Souhei is a self-important, get on my level type of character just makes it worse to listen to.

His interest in the mystery seems purely intellectual. Indeed, it's arguably a flaw of the show that there is actually no reason for Souhei & Moe to be there or be allowed to investigate. They first go to the facility because Moe claims to have an interview with Shiki, but that's soon revealed to be a lie, merely a devise to get them on the island (not the last time the story will rely on such a convenient contrivance to keep moving). Once the corpses appear, it's like they're solving the case just out of intellectual curiosity, which is fine & all but it doesn't explain why the staff are so cooperative, nor does it make for a compelling murder mystery in which he seems increasingly less interested in solving the mystery than in waxing lyrically about the philosophy that's apparently behind Shiki's & his own character.

Shiki is a difficult character to talk about in a spoiler free manner, given that everything in EBF revolves around her. She has a detached, otherworldly manner to her that is not entirely unlike the aloofness of Souhei, but whereas he generally comes across as a bit self-loathing because he too normal for his liking, Shiki does operate in a completely different way to “regular” people. From the way she interacts with people in the flashbacks to the clues found by Moe & Souhei during their investigation, she comes across not unlike Hannibal Lecter, someone as fascinating as they are impenetrable.

That impenetrableness, however, is also one of her flaws. Shiki is a character you want to understand, to decipher, but it's not possible to do so because, while I won't go into specifics, the reason for her being the enigma she is is ultimately that she was just born that way. That might not be an issue for some viewers, but for me personally saying a character was just born that way is like ending a story with it was all just a dream; even if the author intended it to be that way, it still feels like a cop out. This might be more of a problem in EBF's case because whereas Lecter's character is there to serve as a window into the mind of a different serial killer, Shiki is front & centre the focus of the story.

Quite what her world view is also comes across in a rather jumbled manner. Themes of antinatalism, the nature of self & existentialism, nihilism & any other school of philosophy you fancy bringing up can be found somewhere, & it's clear some viewers have got a lot out of identifying & reading up on these. But be that as it may, Shiki herself is a character that makes less sense the more you're told about her, as do her motivations & actions. Souhei towards the end seems to view her as some sort of perfect human, but why that is seems to boil down to that she seems as complex as he wishes he was.

If this seems like too much focus to be putting on the main characters, it's simply because there is almost nothing worth saying about any of the support. The university students that accompany Souhei & Moe are really only there so Moe can talk to someone other than Souhei about the case in one episode. Likewise the staff at the facility just seem to wait around to be interviewed or push the plot button on a relevant keyboard. Shiki's uncle, who is nominally one of the characters whose point of view we're supposed to be viewing part of the story from, is completely eclipsed by his nieces presence & doesn't really have anything to him worth mentioning. Indeed, if EBF had just been Moe, Souhei & Shiki in a room together, it wouldn't have changed much.

3. Production

On the production side of things, there are some rather odd directorial decisions that have been made during EBF. A couple of scenes, most notably the final one, seem to cut off abruptly & awkwardly. One scene where Souhei is talking to an employee of the facility has what looks like a rather amusing continuity error, where Souhei is meant to be cooking breakfast but whenever it cuts from showing the food to him talking, he's standing in the office with his hand apparently holding an invisible pan. Perhaps finally realising that watching two people sitting down, talking in shot, reverse-shot is rather boring, towards the end there are a couple of dialogue scenes where the location repeatedly changes during unbroken conversation; which is disorientating as much as it is attention keeping.

That's not to say EBF looks bad, by any means. Indeed it is a visually enjoyable experience, which is fortunate given how little movement or action occurs. The colour is sufficiently desaturated to suit the tone of the story, & the character designs are likewise realistic enough to not feel out of place as more stylised face designs would have. But, if I'm being honest, this is like complimenting a grey blur for picking the right shade of grey. The OP & ED are both enjoyable, with the OP being a rather fun to interpret dance routine between stencil outlines of Souhei, Moe & Shiki. So that's three minutes of this nearly four hour show worth watching, at least. There is a rather contrived reason to get Moe into a two piece swimsuit in one episode, but other than that the director resists the temptation to add the usual anime visual clichés.

This review has been harsher on EBF than it perhaps was intended to be, but then again it's the type of show that the more I think about it, the less it holds up. That the main characters are rather flawed could have made them interesting, but they're so boring & full of themselves that it it doesn't take long to be sick of seeing them. You only have to look at the Sodachi arc of Owarimonogatari, which aired at the same time, to see how a dialogue driven dark mystery anime can be done better.

There are some clever sounding twists that initially make you think "oooh that's interesting" till you pause to think about how they just complicate & confuse an already difficult to comprehend story. In fact clever sounding twists that complicate everything pretty much sums up EBF, especially with regards to Shiki. It's a real shame that it is this way, because buried in there, somewhere, was a murder mystery I really wanted to like. Indeed, if I were to rewatch the series again, knowing what depths it sinks to, I'd probably have an even more negative opinion of it.

Maybe it's because they're only adapting the first in a series of novels, which means nothing is really concluded & indeed gives the whole series the sense of just being the first act or prologue to a bigger story. Indeed, in a perfect world I'd like to imagine they would have adapted the entire series, making each one a feature length episode in the way ITV did their best detective dramas in the 90s & early 2000's. But whatever EBF could have been, it's hard to recommend what it is.

STORY: 7/10

To be honest I started watching this anime because is a mystery and I'm a sucker for those. At the very beginning the mystery seems pretty interesting and each chapter you have different clues so you can make your own theory along with the characters. The main problem for me was that the plot has giant holes that do not explain the whole thing. There are some questions that are pretty obvious and there's no answer for any of them so you're left with the assumption that every single person in that laboratory are idiots for it to make sense.

ART: 7/10

The drawing style ... of the characters was pretty plain. The animation is not that bad but it has nothing remarkable about it.

SOUND: 8/10

I loved the ending and the opening. The rest of the soundtrack is quite fine.

CHARACTER: 7/10

I'm assuming that since this anime is based on a novel, the book will give more insight about the characters. As with the plot there are many things left unanswered and you kind of want to know more about the characters and understand them better.

In my opinion the only character fully developed is Shiki Magata and if it wasn't for her this series wouldn't be worth the time.

ENJOYMENT: 7/10

It is quite entertaining and interesting, but if you have seen more mysteries there some situations that are gonna make you feel disappointed.

OVERALL: 7/10

It is a nice series if you do not know what to watch, but as a mystery is quite poor and disappointing. The only worthwhile thing about it is the character of Shiki Magata.

(No spoilers)
This anime is not for everyone, firstly you have to enjoy a more classic slow-paced mystery detective plot but mostly you have to enjoy "clever" conversations which might throw a lot of people off especially because it sometimes seems that the anime is trying to be too intelligent.
For me I watched the series to the end because of the relationship and interactions between the two main characters, I must say that the mystery part was until the last episodes a bit boring or just average but it was very enjoyable because of those two main characters.

All the rainbow faeces of the Unicorn - the ... good things
- The art style for the 3 main characters was different and serious/realistic for the tone of the anime.
- The opening was quite entertaining and artistic :)
- The plot was average but the interaction between the 2-3 main characters made this anime great. I see this series as more of an romantic anime than mystery/thriller anime :3
- For me I liked the pace of the story, yes it is slow but only for developing the main characters, so I think that it was quite fitting.

All the hurtful.... cringe! - The cons
- The mystery was itself good but it could have been better and the anime could have paced a little bit quicker with the mystery plot.
- For me the soundtrack was just average, nothing to complain nor embrace.
- The conversations between the characters are very "smart"/philosophical which is understandable not for everyone´s taste and you really need to pay attention for all the small hints hidden in the conversations.

So yeah if you want to see a really good mystery detective series then this anime might not be for you, you really have to love the relationship and interaction between the two main characters because they are the factor which makes up the series. The mystery plot seems more like a catalyst for their relationship, the mystery plot isn´t the main focus I think ^^

If you're one for mysteries, I'd definitely give this one a try. I normally don't watch a lot of mystery or thriller anime, but so far I've enjoyed The Perfect Insider more than I honestly thought I would. Obviously, the animation and character designs are nothing impressive, which is why I scored it so low in the art department, and Shikawa is really the only character I've found interesting and solid in his development; however, the opening and ending theme songs are great, and the soundtrack for the overall show has some pretty good, fitting tracks as well.

Others have said the show moves fairly slow, ... and in my opinion they're right. This doesn't detract from the show's pacing though; for The Perfect Insider, it works well, and I like how you're provided with information - both in the present and from the past - at varying intervals. Everything slowly falls into place, and it's certainly not chronological but I think it's more enjoyable to learn different things that are all over the place, and piece them together yourself as you follow the show and the character's own thoughts and insights. It's definitely a show you have to stick with; noticeably, those who gave the show lower ratings didn't watch that much of it, but if you're willing to endure slow pacing and average side characters that are somewhat lacking in the personality department, then you're honestly in for a treat plot-wise; Subeta ga F ni Naru: The Perfect Insider is a hidden gem of twists, revelations and a seemingly impossible mystery.

WARNING: IF YOU DON'T LIKE MIND F***S THEN PLEASE DON'T READ ANY FURTHER.

With a banter that centered around the loneliness of the Number '7' and asking the question "What is the meaning of life?" to the point of showing Nihilism in a good light, this show caught me right off the bat.

As the show progressed, however, I found that the plot became increasingly difficult to follow, with key elements being embedded in the understanding the various permutation and combination of numbers. The story soon transformed from a murder mystery to a math/computer geek's wet dream come true. Even with all of that, given that ... the pursuit of the truth was done with an emphasis on 'logic' the final revelation was so far out there that you'd need the Hubble telescope to find it.

While the show is enjoyable in its build-up, the events immediately prior to the final revelation along with the revelation itself fail to keep the plot tight and focused. In the end, too much time is spent on abstract philosophy and less on the actual crimes committed. If the first few episodes were not thoroughly enjoyable for their MIND F**K moments, I wouldn't have enjoyed this show at all.

The Perfect Insider is hard to review objectively because it is one of those shows that people will defend as being "deep" and "nuanced". I'm not going to argue against that, maybe there is some deeper truth that I missed, but I didn't enjoy it and my review will reflect that.

First of all, the good: This show is visually appealing, especially the opening theme animation. I also found the animation pretty solid throughout and the sound never really distracted me from the story.

The problems I've had with the show was the story. The show does a good job of setting up the sense that ... there's going to be a grand denouement where the truth is found out and the guilty part is pointed out, or that everything will come to be clear.

To a certain extend this is accomplished. You know who did what at the end, but it felt unsatisfactory, probably because there was so much going on that I just started getting lost halfway through the story. There's a romance, child sexual abuse by a relative (though maybe not in the strictest legal sense in Japan, certainly for America/most countries since age of concent is different), a murder, a ghost in a computer, a doll that killed someone else years ago then ran away, multiple personalities, two sets of dead parents unrequited love, sisters showing up out of the blue and then going away only to reappear at a later time after which you find something you didn't know.

The show suffered from the fact that too much was going on and you didn't get to see the character's motivations. You're also severely limited in the facts you are given and it's hardly fair to the viewer who wants to try and solve the murder along with the main character. Something that most mysteries do is to give you clues or hints along the way that you can reflect on later on and go "Oooh, I should have SEEN that!" and kick yourself. Sure they don't share the conclusions drawn by the detective, but you had at least some of the major building blocks and were there when the scene was set and you could figure it out.

I didn't feel that in this show, though I might have missed it because I was too busy feeling too squeamish throughout most of the show to notice, but I felt like they kept more than the fair share of facts, important facts away from us, just to keep the suspense going. Characters who I feel should know more about things mysteriously don't because that would be inconvenient to the plot.

Another thing that annoyed me was how they kept giving some philosophy lectures. "What is the meaning to be human? What is murder? What is a person? What is love?" To an extent this did help flavour the show, but it was just one more thing that was distracting from the main focus. I also didn't like a lot of the answers they came up with, which might explain my distaste for this show.

The relationships and connections were rather vague until nearing the end because that would have possibly tipped us off to what was going on.

In conclusion, I would say skip this anime unless you really like the mystery genre and philosophy. I felt awkward watching the scenes concerning underage sexual activity with a grown relative, the more "traditional" romances were weak and I didn't feel they did fair play with the mystery. The reasons why the main character decides to solve the mystery also are somewhat opaque as well.

Hello reader! You're in luck. If you're reading this, chances are you're interested in watching this show. This is one of the shows that are better as a binge watch than as a show that you pace yourself with or follow week per week. That's why you're lucky you get to watch this in one or two sittings! I was not so lucky and let me tell you why (just to brace yourself for what's in store for you).

The main reason had to be the story's pacing. It's horrible. There are lots of arguments saying that this is the kind of show that doesn't ... spoon-feed you the answers to the mystery and that it expects you or allows you to solve the mystery with them. So definitely expect to have more and more questions instead of answers at the end of each episode (yes, up until the last one, too!) It can be frustrating, but once the reveal is there, it makes you want to rewatch earlier episodes to see what you have missed or if they have been building up for it all along.

Subete ga F ni Naru's 1-cour season can actually be summed up in around 4 episodes, I feel like. Just in case you're not familiar with the source material, our main characters, Moe and Saikawa are kind of a Sherlock & Watson pair who deal with strange cases. There's also a Japanese live-action dorama already out where it chronicles their adventures. In it, what they have gone through in 12 episodes in this show is told in 2 episodes tops. So that's not to say that there's more tighter and more concise way of telling it.

There's really not too much action as most of the time is spent on discussions and dialogue. If that's your thing, then do check out this show! By any means, it's not a bad show per se. I find it hard-pressed to just write it off as bad, but it is indeed flawed. Without dragging this review on for too long, I do find its dialogue to be its best. We get to learn how the characters think, how they feel, and what they believe in without getting too on the nose. (Actual philosophy majors might actually be turned off from this though. The show can get pretentious at times and over-reaching to portray the characters as oh-so smart and deep.) However that alone couldn't save the whole storytelling of the series in my opinion. (If that's your thing then be my guest! Have at it!) There's only so much discussion and over-wrought ideas to be thrown around until it gets tedious and you're just left going "Okay, we GET IT! So what now?"

Overall, would I recommend this show to anyone? Perhaps not. It's a polarizing show and I find myself in the 'No thanks, skip this one!' camp. Based on my experiences so far (after finishing the finale) I find myself telling my anime friends not to watch this show. But like I said, if you're into "modern" locked room mysteries with a dash of philosophical ideas on the side and wouldn't mind like 8 episodes of basically filler and talking, then you should give this a shot!

So I first decided to watch this show based off a recommendation from a Youtuber and I'm really glad I decided to give it a go. If you're looking for a true mystery anime this is the one to try.

Story: (9/10) The story was one of the things that impressed me the most about this anime. It starts out with Nishinosono Moe and her professor Saikawa Souhei who are both fans of the work of Dr. Magata Shiki, a scientist who has been living in complete isolation on an island for 15 years. Not only is she all alone but she ultimately hasn't left ... her room let alone the laboratory she's been living in. Moe and Souhei decide that they want to go to meet Dr. Shiki in person but when they arrive they encounter more than one murder.

At first when watching this show, I was actually pretty bored. You would think, "Wow they walk into a murder scene, must be pretty intense!" But the first few episodes are super talky, for lack of a better turn and I found myself fighting to keep my attention on it. I actually briefly considered dropping the show, but something told me I should stick it out, and boy am I glad I did.

One of the best things about this show is its pacing. Of the mystery anime I've seen, many of them take you on a wild goose chase of crazy outlandish mysteries that really don't even have anything to do with the main plot. Not Perfect Insider. Even though the show starts out slow the build up to the resolution of the mystery is handled excellently. It reveals little pieces of information episode by episode and avoids the all too common flood of information squeezed into the last few episodes, which I absolutely loved. Other than the pacing the story itself is just darn good. Just when you think you know what's going on, it twists in ways that you weren't expecting. Once the ball gets rolling, Perfect Insider keeps the viewer on their toes and makes them think throughout the whole series. The only thing that keeps me from giving the story a 10/10 is the fact that it got a little confusing in parts and I wished for a little bit more explanation. But overall an excellent story.

Art 9/10 The art and animation style in Perfect Insider was very unique! The character designs weren't you're typical kawaii, big eyed stereotypical anime characters. The people were designed more realistically than a lot that I've seen. The colors in this show were sometimes a bit bland but it fit the overall serious tone of the show, so I don't feel that it took away from anything.

Sound: 10/10 I'm giving this a perfect 10 because I really liked the opening and ending songs, especially the opening. As far as the soundtrack, it really fit the serious and dark tone that was woven throughout the story.

Characters: 8/10 The characters in Perfect Insider were fairly well developed. But I wished for a little more on the two lead characters that I just didn't get. I wanted to know more about what made them tick, how they got to where they were. That being said we do get a bit of background on them towards the end which is great. As far as how likable they are it's 50/50. I sometimes liked them and sometimes they got on my nerves. I guess it just depends on what they were doing at the time. The reason I gave this category an 8 instead of a bit lower though was because of one character and that was Dr. Magata Shiki. She is probably one of the most brilliant characters I've seen written. You go into this series knowing that she's a genius but genius doesn't even being to cover it. I can't say much more than that without giving away major plot points, but you'll have to take my word on it. She's a well thought out character and the reason the plot is so great.

Overall Enjoyment: 8/10 I've pretty much covered in the other sections why I enjoyed this anime. I love something that keeps me guessing what's going to happen next. Not only guess but actually care about the ending. As also previously stated, the only reason that this isn't ranked a little higher is because this show could be really confusing at times especially if you aren't paying super close attention.

Overall 7/10 Even though my individual category scores are higher, I still give Perfect Insider a 7. This is only simply because while every thing I said above is true, it's probably not a show that I would buy on DVD or watch again other than maybe to get some clarification. That being said, I believe that Perfect Insider is very impressive for its mystery genre which can sometimes fall flat. Definitely give this one a shot.

I would just like to add as a disclaimer that I am in no way any sort of anime expert. I just like to add my opinion on shows I've watched :)

Story (10/10): This mystery anime is a breath of fresh air. The story is unique, cutting, interesting and very deep. The ending was not something that you figure out by EP 4 and then think that all the characters are stupid.

Art (9/10): The art for the OP and ED was excellent but the character design, although really good, it wasn't to the same level as the OP and ED.

Sound (9/10): The OP was incredible (one of my favorites) and the ED was great as well. The voice acting was also great.

Character (7/10): I liked all of the characters but there wasn't anything too special ... about them.

Enjoyment (10/10): I loved the show a lot.

Overall (10/10): This show is an excellent mystery anime with a great OP and ED and if you are thinking about watching it, I highly suggest doing so!