Fumetsu no Anata e

Spoilers ahead!

So I have to say that this is a pretty unique anime in terms of the fact that it's so popular right now and rated high, because the beginning was quite strong. And I think that has to do with the innate nature of humans to want to evolve by seeking stimul. So the opening episode was great, it set up quite the adventure! And from there it was a slow spiral towards boredom.

The problem is that the main character, Fushi, lacks almost any motivation. I just finished watching episode 13 where the new prison arc begins and he(it?) still feels like a very ... bland character. I guess you can attribute that to the fact that he doesn't know what his purpose in life is, which is fine, but he is so unethusiastic about almost anything or doesn't know what to do at all, that by episode 13 it's just starting to get stale and repetitive.

The side characters also feel a bit shallow and there's just this forever lingering feeling of "who's going to die next?" because we know it will happen. It is constantly reinforced, for example with the middle break where the wall shows the souls that Fushi consumed (or whatever happens). So it's just not worth getting interested in any character, because they will die and who cares, it's all for the purpose of making Fushi something that we have no idea what is suppose to be.

Which brings us to the Nokkers which are also just...boring? They also don't seem to have a motive by this point except for destroying Fushi. So if he weren't there, would they appear? Maybe there's more to it, but the show feels so stale.

It's interesting that for 12 episodes I didn't know if this show was good or not. And I feel like that's what a lot of people have. But in a way, if you can't tell a show will be good from the first few episodes, I think it's safe to say that it probably won't be for the rest of it. I know some shows have a nice turn after some time, but the amount of care I have left for this world is minimal. That is to say, I don't even know what this world is. We travel it with minimal information. And it's not really too exciting when you get to a new place.

I am a bit sorry I am writing such a negative review, but it's honestly for my sanity the ones that are also wonderting if this show is a "masterpiece" or just a show that had some kind of a good idea, but just failed to execute it better. But hey, there's potential to be found in it for something else, if it gripped so many people from the start.

It is fundamental to express emotions in order to make a work of fiction great – that’s something the anime industry knows very well. Sad and depressing emotions are frequently seen in anime works, but the real key to success is to combine them with pleasant and hopeful emotions. Thrill, suspense, compassion, excitement and enjoyment; all of them are important to form a good show. Fumetsu no Anata e has its unique style, which most people like – considering its global appeal and popularity - and others do not. But this style is what really prevents it from standing close to “top tier” anime, and ... that is a fact.

Fumetsu no Anata e started off with an amazing opening episode; full of emotions, beautiful character interactions and plot twists. It felt romantic and succeeded in piquing the watchers’ interest. This episode was the prologue arc, and then a chain of longer character arcs followed. What went so wrong that made this anime’s content controversial? That’s definitely the repetitive use of the pattern Ooida Yoshitoki used in every character arc. And after giving it some thought, I reached the conclusion that this pattern I’m talking about might work in a novel, but not in a TV show. So it is not necessarily the writer’s fault.

The pattern promoted mostly depressing emotions and failed to emit the ones I mentioned before. As the series moved on, everyone was able to make a successful guess on how the story would proceed, which led to the loss of enthusiasm, thrill and enjoyment. The protagonist’s character development made sense, but in the end, that was all that happened in these twenty episodes. What only mattered was how strong (mentally and physically) Fushi would become, after a row of unpleasant and heartbreaking events.

Nevertheless, a character alone cannot make a top tier work of fiction. When it comes to the world build up, what is understood is that it concerns Fushi and only himself. People live in an underdeveloped society, but the mystery revolves around the supernatural element of the series; which is something he has to solve alone. The main villains’ character and motives (Nokkers) are not exactly shown yet, but it seems they are simple and exist to end our protagonist’s journey. As for Kansatsusha, it is not yet known if there are other creatures like him or why he behaves the way he does.

The soundtrack of this anime is mostly atmospheric (“Emotional Suite”, “Pink Blood”, “Mediator”). It is not something special, but it fits well the atmosphere. The animation looks nice and fits the atmosphere as well. The prevailing colours are purple, brown and green. The voice acting is sometimes good and sometimes bad. Tsuda Kenjirou’s narrating is great.

To conclude, Fumetsu no Anata e is a fantasy/supernatural anime whose main purpose seems to be to indicate how people can become stronger by facing hardships and moving on with their lives. To convey this message, it uses many short arcs which include a lot of tragic events and sad human emotions. It also shows human behaviour under difficult circumstances, people’s hope, people’s narrow-mindedness and other characteristics you may find out by watching.

My personal advice is to not expect much even if you love the first episodes. Because I loved them as well, but my final score was 3/10.
Thank you for reading!

“Waste of time” is not a critique I like to give to a piece of fiction, but “To Your Eternity” really pushes it. My view is generally that if you try, you can usually find some redeeming quality to something you otherwise dislike. An optimistic media enjoyer should be able to find something of value to walk away with; be it an exciting plot point, a character you liked, an interesting/well executed setting or premise, good music, or beautiful art/animation. Though there is a second season announced, as a stand-alone product, To Your Eternity S1 unfortunately delivers a general lack of redeeming qualities while also ... feinting a build-up towards something grand and exciting then instead leading to a spectacular letdown. It is possible the eventual second season turns everything on its head, but given the steady decline in quality that constituted the first season I will not be making that bet any time soon.

Minor spoilers below

If there is a correct way to enjoy TYE it is to stop after episode 1. Though it is not the most subtle attempt at grabbing at viewer’s emotions, it is the most soul the show ever has and at least feels like it could be the start of a meaningful story. From there, if you have a decent imagination, the continuation you can think up is probably better than the actual show so my recommendation is that you stop. If you continue watching, you’ll be met with an overall lack of direction or meaning from both our protagonist as well as their adversaries--resulting in mandatory conflict with no purpose but to kill off side character after side character in cheap attempts to evoke an emotional response from the viewer.

Each of these victims is less interesting/endearing than the last but not for lack of time spent attempting to develop them. In fact, a *large* majority of the show is spent developing side characters only for them to be killed off a few episodes later and for new ones to stumble in and take their place. There are some authors who seem to have an unlimited supply of fantastic characters, each with distinct personalities, designs, and quirks that make them feel real and immediately relatable. To Your Eternity’s author is unfortunately not one of them. Even going from one arc to the next, the decline in the quality of the characters is hard to miss. In the early arcs you at least know what drives characters; what their hopes and dreams are; why one might be saddened if they were to die. By the final arc, characters known only for their use of a folding chair as a weapon are being killed off in dramatic fashion. Yet there seems to be an underlying expectation that the viewer be sad anyways despite the lack of development and despite having seen it all before multiple times. Some might find this formula to be in poor taste while others have no problem with it; however, it is this cycle on repeat from start to finish that makes TYE feel like a waste of your time after some number of these iterations despite the potential its premise initially held.

Considering other potential redeeming qualities, you won’t likely find them in the art, animation, or music. The fantasy setting manifests sparsely throughout the 20 episodes. The protagonist, Fushi, as well as his adversary, the knockers, are of course the most obvious fantastical elements but we hardly see anything else. Early on, we have a terrifying, giant bear which is revered as a god and presents itself as an obstacle. It makes for some exciting scenes and raises questions about what other interesting things the viewer will get to see as we explore this setting. Unfortunately, not much else. And, in fact, the bear later becomes comically underwhelming despite how powerful it seems like it should be. The fights between Fushi and the knockers do have a certain weight to them, but the execution is average at best in terms of direction, choreography, and especially animation.

I went into To Your Eternity with high hopes and even remained cautiously optimistic through much of the drag in the middle. Even though I didn’t find anything too impressive or cool, it seemed like there was still hope for the show as long as there was interesting build-up or an apparent plan for an eventual spectacular ending. A couple episodes into the final arc of the first season it became clear we would get no view of such a plan. No vision or spectacular ending. Just a directionless story for the sake of a story. I’d love to hear that they turn it around and the second season is fantastic, but the first season gave me no hope in that regard.

i keep asking myself every episode, what is the point of this? Why are these characters suffering? What is the show trying to convey?
the animation and soundtrack are adequate, but still i cant find anything in to enjoy.
I do hope it gets better as the series goes on ,but with 8 episodes remaining, I'm a little worried about how the pacing will turn out.
and the characters are extremely annoying. it can be watched if you have too much free time, other than that it's a waste of time.


so, if i could say one thing about this anime is i cant watch this shit!!!

PROLOGUE
When the first episode of this anime aired, it was instantly labeled as a masterpiece for making everyone cry with how sad it was. Extra hype came in by mentioning the author being the same as in A Silent Voice. It used all the classic tricks of cryporn, such as a tragic backdrop story, an unfair death, and a blank in personality protagonist that looked like a cute doggie. It did its job perfectly for that one episode, and if it ended there it would be remembered positively.

PROBLEM #1: REPETITION
Unfortunately there were more episodes and more arcs, and in every arc the exact same thing ... was happening. The protagonist met someone with a tragic backdrop story, spent some time with him, and then he died. No matter how good the execution may be, the repetition alone was making each time to be less impactful than the previous one.

PROBLEM #2: LACK OF CONTINUITY AND CLOSURE
Constantly killing the support cast had the issue of not giving catharsis to anyone, since they died without resolving their problems. They tried to make it seem like the protagonist was transforming into them for continuing what they were doing, so there wouldn’t be any actual closure. That never happened, since he was not trying to bring closure to whatever they were suffering from. He only assumed their form, moved to a different place, and assumed the form of the next person who died. Basically there was no continuation to the stories. They were just cryporn that went nowhere.

PROBLEM #3: LACK OF TIME INVESTMENT
Furthermore, latter characters didn’t even spend that much time with the protagonist before dying in order for the audience to care about them. Not even the plot cared about them after awhile which is why it was killing them in a hurry just because it has to.

PROBLEM #4: IDENTITY CRISIS
On top of that, a quest to save the world from monsters was eventually introduced which caused a major identity crisis. What began as a fantasy drama had now become a sort of shonen action adventure. Fight scenes with superpowers became more frequent, it completely changed the tone of what the show was at first and alienated most of the audience.

PROBLEM #5: MESSIAH COMPLEX
Because of that change, the protagonist turned from a powerless wanderer to a super powerful messiah. He was no longer a sad nobody in a harsh world, he was now a special chosen one destined to save it by thinking and feeling more and more like a human being. It didn’t have the same vibe as in the beginning of the show when he was just a powerless nobody.

PROBLEM #6: MESSY CHARACTER DEVELOPMENT
There was also no way to like him for gradually turning from a nobody to a messiah. The transition was either too fast for happening in the span of a few days, or out of screen through lengthy time skips. He gets rewritten into a different character without ever showing you how.

PROBLEM #7: MISERYPORN
Furthermore, some of the characters the protagonist met didn’t even die by something bad that was happening in their lives. They kicked the bucket because they were interacting with the protagonist, so evil monsters and mean people wanted to make him suffer even more by killing his friends. What began as tragic coincidence eventually became deliberate miseryporn. Hey, mister protagonist, you suffer because we want you to suffer! Be miserable all the time. This is after all the only hook of the show.

PROBLEM #8: LACK OF STAKES
If the protagonist could die during all this mess, it would ruin everything he is going through, so at least there could be tension regarding his success or failure regarding the salvation of the world. But the thing was, he couldn’t lose because he was an immortal who always healed instantly no matter how many times they killed him. There was nothing to worry about; you were just waiting to see when he was going to win instead of if he wins.

PROBLEM #9: EMPTY VICTORY
Since everyone else around him was dying, there was also no sense of accomplishment regarding his inevitable victory. What kind of a victory would he achieve if nobody was left alive to enjoy it with him? Can you imagine going through all this suffering for the sake of saving the world, and eventually nobody is left alive at the end? Who thought this was a good idea? It’s just more suffering for the heck of it.

PROBLEM #10: DROP IN PRODUCTION VALUES
As if all these issues weren’t enough, the production values got worse as the show went on, and what began as a polished cryporn through the use of proper cinematics, became a typical to bad looking fantasy action adventure. And as simple as that, the initial hype for the show evaporated and now very few care for another season.

EPILOGUE
Once again it was proven why hype is bullshit and why you should only judge something after it’s finished. To You Eternity belongs to the bulk of anime that don’t use well their good ideas and end up being forgotten as soon as they are over. Which, ironically enough, this was supposed to be what the protagonist was trying to prevent by turning into his dying friends.

This anime is probably the biggest fall-off I have ever seen.

The first few episodes were genuinely some of the most interesting beginnings of a show. The concept and story was very unique and fantastic to watch. An honest 10/10 show from the get-go. Then it fell off. Fell off hard. It managed to go from a 10/10 to a low 4/10 by the end. The story branched off into weird stuff and no longer had what made it so good. It became a boring show with predictable scenes, eye-rolling annoying characters, and bad/lame stories.

Highly disappointing show and very frustrating to see what could've been a ... masterpiece fall off so hard.
I would not recommend wasting your time watching this show except for the first few episodes.

The first episode would have you think this is a unique and great experience. The next few episodes developed some wonderful characters. Unfortunately, things start rolling down a hill which gets steeper as the eps continue. There were some red flags early, but at least the show doesn't include tropes that you might expect.
Yet here I am, 19 out of 20 episodes in, and dropping it. The story feels like Groundhogs day where it basically repeats itself every few episodes. It takes place in one area with some characters, and then it moves to another area but the formula is the same. The animation quality ... drops rapidly and it soon becomes still-frames with sound effects playing over them. The forced-sad parts start getting tiresome and some character motivations are leave you thinking "...really?"
Its a shame. If you see the first ep, you'll fall in love with the show, but it just really falls apart in the last 1/3 of the season.

Animation: 4 because the quality drops to a level that offends me as a viewer.

Sound: 6 acting is ok but no matter where people are, it sounds like an actor in a booth. Not that immersive. Sound effects are basic

Character: 5. If theres something you like about someone, theyll eventually become flat and repeat themselves.

Enjoyment: 5 because i did enjoy the first half immensely; its just a let down at the end.

overall: 4. Dont waste your time unless you only watch shonens


EDIT: After a few weeks, I saw the final episode. It was good. Same quality as the first episode; sad but not undeveloped/forced sadness. Im not changing the score on anything because the series as a whole isnt worth it. It was a good concept, maybe about 4-5 episodes worth, stretched across 20 episodes where the quality dropped and the story repeated itself a few times. Dont bother.

Fumetsu no Anata e's pilot episode is the only good episode of this show, and gave me unnecessary high expectations that got gouged out and shat out into a steaming pile of garbage that is this show. This is a complete waste of my time.
Fumetsu no Anata e makes all the mistakes that Dr. Stone makes. What is that? It takes a limitless potential pilot, setting, and characters and turns it into the most braindead "character driven plot" which really translates to "yeah, author is just gunna do what he wants to do" without any sort of clever buildup, character development, or story structure. These ... two shows have a good protagonist, one that's interesting to watch, and yet the shows surround these two great protagonist with the most boring cast of characters imaginable and suck the life out of the show. Worst of all, the plot is propelled forward by said characters through interactions with our MC. What a joke.
Was there really anyone who gave a single fuck about March or her sister? Jesus, they also had to make March the most ugly looking anime character with horrific torso to head ratio even for anime children standards. Not to mention, she was just a complete nuisance, and the only reason why she was in the story was to serve as a foil and mindless interaction for Fushi. Ah yes, it's really sad that March is put through this ritual, but can we get back to the fun stuff? That's basically what I was hoping the entire time I was watching this first arc. Unfortunately, no respite came. This first arc of the show is a terrible coming of age story for Fushi if that was what it was attempting. It feels like an ungodly abomination of not good character and story telling, but also no cool fight scenes either. See, for a show to be a good coming of age story, the pacing has to be good, characters to be engaging, and stories varied. None of that really happens. Let me again, illustrate with this first arc. How many times does March and her sister try to escape, then get captured, gets escaped again, gets captured, and escape again? How realistic are these scenarios? Is it possible that every single time that they manage to do something like bettering their situation, it's only possible due to fortuitous situations and because somehow, the plot needs to go forward?
What about the characters? Ah yes, March is definitely not an inconsistent piece of garbage, and her sister a one dimensional good Samaritan that wants to get rid of the ritual with an edgy backstory. Think about it for one second. March has many facets to her personality, none which make a lot of sense or form a cohesive entity. She somehow has childlike demeanor, understands despair and fear, understands the idea of responsibility, and stands at precipice of being "selfish" by acting for her own desire to live, and being a "responsible adult" for which she is sacrificed. Yet, she also cries, acts extremely innocent, and doesn't seem like she actually learned anything in the past few traumatic days that she has witnessed.
Want to know where I dropped? when she said to stop desecrating the corpse of the bear. "It's wrong!" She says. Her sister says very clearly "we need to carve a piece of the corpse of the bear to make sure that no innocent girls get sacrificed for an outdated ritual." Yet, she refuses. It's like she didn't just experience the horror of being chosen as a sacrifice and being forsaken, and being so fed up with that responsibility that she risks running away and letting her baby sister take her place. The funny part is that the sister actually doesn't carve a piece of the DEAD bear, mind you, DEAD bear. That's right. She's making a fuss of a dead bear. Want to know who killed the damn bear in the first place, March? It's Fushi. Holy crap.
Anyways, somehow, the sister agrees to not "desecrate" the bear's corpse that by the way, killed many humans and almost killed her, even though it was her mission the entire time to get rid of the ritual and that's her entire backstory.
No, I do not care how good it gets, because I really doubt it would even get good, but even if it did, this is beyond salvageable. This is a horrifying lack of understanding how to structure a story, and how to prop characters up with it.

"It could have been great."

That line summarizes what I think about this anime. To be perfectly honest, I simply do not understand where the hype and the incredibly high score comes from.

To start out with the good: Yes, the art is great and the music & sound is fitting.

However, to me, this is not nearly enough to balance out the sheer awfulness of the pacing, the characters and the story.

Mild / generic spoilers from here on out:

Let's start with the pacing: It's dreadful. It's all over the place. Sometimes, the story goes on for entire episodes without anything really happening, then it jumps ahead weeks ... or even years without warning. Sometimes, a thousand important events happen in one episode, sometimes nothing happens at all.

The same applies to the setting - the story shifts from place to place and from plot thread to plot thread seemingly without any coherence or warning. One time, we are deeply engrossed in one particular story, then, just as it starts getting interesting, the story just randomly makes a turn and goes off somewhere completely differently. It's almost as if whoever made this didn't know where this story should go and just made stuff up as they went along.

Next, the characters. Oh boy. I should say from the outset that I have a particular hatred for stupid characters. I simply loathe it when characters aren't just naive, or simpleminded, but so downright idiotic that nobody, and I mean nobody, with even two braincells to their name, would make such dumb choices.

This anime has this *in spades*. Pretty much all the good guys are so jawdroppingly dumb that it simply became unwatchable after a while. Every single time they would have the option of making a situation better, they do something absolutely moronic and make it ten times worse. Pretty much 90% of all the drama and supposed tragedy in this anime comes from the characters just being complete buffoons all the time.

If you like watching characters repeatedly shoot themselves in the foot by having the mental capacity of a chimpanzee on LSD, then this is just the anime for you. For those of us who want sane characters, however, this anime is just torture.

To come last to the story. It can most simply be described as: Emotional torture porn. One reason why the story keeps flip-flopping all over the place with no real coherence or plot thread is because the story keeps killing off its characters.

The first two, maybe three times, this was still pretty unexpected and interesting, but it got really tiresome after a while, especially because it also became so predictable. After a while, I just started making a game out of it, trying to see if I could predict which characters would die next. And would you know it, I was never wrong once. Basically, the formula is this:
1 - introduce cute, naive but good-hearted character.
2 - main character interacts with this good-hearted character
3 - give good-hearted character one or max two heroic moments, then kill them off in the most obnoxious way possible, in a ridiculous attempt at tragedy and shock value.

And that's it - follow this algorithm and you can correctly predict the fate of every single character you meet. Villains, by the way, get to live at least three times as long as any good character.

All in all, I truly regret watching this all the way to the end. I kept hoping, over and over, that the poor pacing would straighten out, the characters finally grow a brain and the stupid character killing finally stop. But nope. This show is truly a one-trick pony.

What's sad is that the premise of the story was quite intriguing. There would have been so many great directions this story could have gone in. The graphics, voice acting and sound would easily have been enough to sweep me along. But it was all ruined.

As mentioned above: It could have been great.

That is one of the most overrated Animes I have ever known. It is tragically bad to high extent that makes me regretting that a period of 20 episodes could be spent on an extra sleep distributed 5 episodes a day would be far better than this crap that i have just completed. I have rated this anime 4 while i think it does not even deserve it.

Firstly, the characters who are extremely useless and stupid; all these stupid characters have died meaninglessly. They just gave their form of body to that brat Fushi. Indeed, he doesnot deserve to take their bodies because he doesnot ... use them properly. For Fushi’s body, it is just an empty vessel with no use. For March’s body, he is just picking up fruits. For the wolf, he is just wandering and following the scent of the old lady. For the bear, he uses it to fight blindly and gave it away to the enemy. The most useful body which is Parona’ body, he could not event touch Hayase.

These all side characters that are mentioned above do not have a meaningful and useful death. They just die for Fushi who cannot even hurt anyone because it is bad! Who spent 4 years cooking and cleaning up after a drunk old man then in the first fight he was a cry baby that let Gugu die for no reason ( Gugu could contribute more into polishing Fushi’s skills, but unfortunately, he has been chosen to die to save a harmless, useless and pathetic main character). Furthermore, three kids die on the island just because his stupid decision to come back to an island full of criminals to save their lives. Hayase is that bitch who comes up again in the last five episodes to have an intercourse with a dumb immortal. He has chosen to spare her life in more than one instant just because he does not want to kill somebody while she had killed two other characters and is aiming to kill more. MF let her on a boat telling her “i hate you” so pathetic.

The time skips in that anime are so bad; they basically should cover the development and training of the character, but here it is a different story. Within a time skip of 4 years gugu was the only one working out and training to die in the first battle ( that is so hilarious) while Fushi ( humanity protector) was cooking, gossiping and sewing all the time. Fuck!!

The story has a good start that could draw an attraction to that anime. However, it rapidly then starts to be boring, confusing, genre-jumping and stupid. Why i should have to watch a boy that cannot even learn anything, toughen his heart, polish his skills and at least use his brain even once!!!

Finally, the Nokkers (Enemy); who are they? Who is controlling them? How they are coming after him? How they are moving? Even what is the goal of taking his forms? Wtf were they doing during the time skip of 4 years? What about that black floating man!!! He is more stupid than Fushi himself . Rather than teaching his creature to act strong and tough, he left him more useless than a baby.

I really regret that i had watched this anime and i donot recommend anybody to watch it as well. It is overrated.

Big Yikes, i had high hope for this one, turns out this was a big mistakes.

I don't know for the full serie, but the adaptation presented to us is dramatically comical in term of story, as of 18 episode in, there is nothing to talk about, the plot didn't move a centimeters and the main protagonist is still a little b****.

[SPOILER AFTER THIS POINT]

While everything from animation, music, art, are good point that give some merits to this animation, the story depicted is just plain bad, i don't see the point into giving that much load of bs to the main characters - mainly, likeable ... characters deaths - to go through and yet he is still as powerless as the first episode, the only thing that changed is that now he can actually complain about his uselessness in most scenario he find himself in.

Most of the time the protagonists in anime are characters that progress, that evolve into something better ( or worse if we follow a antagonist as the MC ), yet this time around, the author decided it was good entertainment to put the MC through all these dark phase yet he doesn't move an inch into evolving and getting more powerful to protect those he loves, yet cry at every opportunity he gets, looks like another MC in an anime that is airing right now, doesn't it ?

Get this : is it useless to make likeable characters die if it doesn't change anything to the plot, this anime illustrate this point.

And i'll conclude by saying that even tho i'm going to see it through the end because i want to know what the end is like, this is probably the worst anime i have seen in history, mainly for what i stated before, maybe it will get better in future season, but this particular season is a dumpster fire.

I want to like it. I really do. In fact, it was decent until the last 5 episodes.

SPOILERS BELOW:

I get the idea and I like the mystery and emotions that To Your Eternity wants to evoke. We meet a lot of people in this lifetime. And a part of them stays with us even after they left. Finding meaning in life is a continuous learning process.

The story, as told in the eyes of The Beholder (black-hooded guy), is poignant and neutral. It shows us that life is a fragile thing and that's what makes it important.

I dig that. I like that.

But the last 5 ... episodes happened. I can't even tell myself to sympathize with Konari and her little gang. As a viewer, I felt like I was being forced to like them. The writer even gave them horrible deaths just so the viewer can at least shed their weeb tears.

But no, konari's still a shitty character until the end. The hypocrisy of this show gets more and more obvious and frustrating. or maybe it's just not my preference. I've always hated characters who doesn't want to kill for the most absurd reasons. Like Fushi, come on man, they're already zombies. Just get the freaking core bro.

The "I'm gonna save the villain because I'm a good person" trope just gives a bitter taste in my mouth when just a few episodes ago, he blatantly vowed to kill her.

I thought I'll be watching an anime on par with dororo but alas, the time has not yet come.

This had quite the potential.
However if youre starting to wonder by episode three or four if this is worth it, this show is not for you. First the obvious, the opening is comically filled with spoilers reaching until the very last episodes. Huh, so i guess the plot will not be the driving force behind this?

I guess then execution might be. After all this has an 8.5 rating amirite. Well sadly no, the characters and dialogue are poorly written, the pacing makes it hard to watch and there are plot holes and conveniences just a few episodes in..
Wait why is ninja girl wearing a ... swimsuit again? And i why tf do i see every death, plottwist and time skip in the op? Im trying to watch a touching show here.

If youre just as disappointed and think about dropping, please wait another minute. Do yourself a favor and take a look at episode 18 around 12mins. If youre not laughing at the so called 'animation' (which is to say pngs moving in circles and scenes being cut every time some impact would need to be shown) and the shadowless 3d zombie masses dont make you cringe, wait until they reuse the same frame of the zombified girl for the third time, maybe itll get more shocking by that time. Oh and did i mention how those deaths are laughingly lacking of impact? She doesnt even make a sound hitting the ground, am i being stupid?
This has some serious comedic value, albeit by accident.

But on a serious note, did i miss some kinda meme where people go and give this anime a 10 just for the jokes of it? Im starting to feel stupid here.


Would i recommend watching this? Sure, but only episode 1 & 18. Theyre both memorable in very different ways

I feel like this anime could've been 10/10 if they focused more on the boy, Gugu and March. I kind of didn't like the fast phasing especially since this is a drama kind of anime. You can't really connect with others and makes it kind of predictable what would happen to the characters.

I feel like the 3 stories can be a movie/ anime of its own, and still would be phenomenal

**************************** CONTAINS SPOILER******************************************************
To be fair, I would just rate every arc?? or story that is highlighted.

The beginning was amazing. probably a strong 9/10 (the unnamed boy's story)

March's story was probably the best of this anime, ... I'll give it a light 10/10

-It's where I feel a strong potential for this anime to be a great one

Gugu's story (where I realized that the characters that are highlighted will probably die), I'll give it a 5/10

- Because I feel like his death isn't really important, It made me feel like they did that just foe the sake of making everyone emotional, and Imo they kind of made a bad job

The Jananda Island Arc (3/10) *Maybe Im kind of harsh in judging this*

- It's where I didn't care about what happened to the characters anymore, but the second half of 15 and the whole 16, and 17 is kind of cool.

******************************************************************************************************

Maybe Im kind of harsh in my judging, maybe because I saw a lot of potential in the first 10 episodes or maybe because I just finished watching Kimi no na wa and Odd taxi before watching this, maybe I compared those two to this. If you like this, I can totally see why. But I feel like it's either not my taste or It kind of became repetitive to me

To Your Eternity (TYE) is lost,
What do I mean? Well TYE is a show about many things; too many things if you ask me. The show can't decide what they want their watchers to feel. Is this show a comedy? Is this show a drama? Is this show a slice of life? Is the show an action Shounen? It can be made into a way that these themes could work together, but TYE doesn't.

The shifting setting is annoying.
It doesn't give us the time to feel for the characters before they are killed and replaced by a new cast. It's cool to meet new ... characters, especially in the fantasy setting of TYE. However, after the second time of Fushi picking up his life and moving on, it get's old fast.

Fushi never grows.
While the mc learns to speak do things, he continues to act a lot like the wolf he first inherited. He fails to protect almost everyone he meets and it's just so frustrating. Imagine that scene from amazing spiderman 2 where peter fails to save gwen. Although, that's unfair to peters character because he at least tried to save her; Fushi never tries. How can one of the most powerful beings be beaten by mere humans?

Nothing is explained.
Who created Fushi? Who are the knockers? What are their goals? These questions are asked in the series but there is conflicting information about all of it (If it was provided at all).

[TL;DR: A great idea, squandered, again. A novel concept with huge possibilities, that ultimately fumbles and collapses under its own weight. What starts out to be a genuinely interesting and captivating journey into the philosophical and scientific nature of the human condition on the surface, is slowly peeled away to reveal a disappointingly bogstandard, trope-filled mess, full of boring melodrama and cheap emotional manipulation. Points for trying, the art and sound is good, some ideas are straight up great, but the end result is ultimately disappointing.]

To Your Eternity is infuriating. Not so much because it's obvious failings but because it squanders a really great and ... unique concept - again - that could've been otherwise made into a similarly great story. It is not the first time Yoshitoki Ooima - the original creator - did this, as her previous creation Koe no Katachi (A Silent Voice) was a similarly high-concept idea turned into a shamefully exploitative, manipulative, emotional black hole. To Your Eternity takes a similarly interesting, out-of-left-field concept to draw you in, and then holds your emotions hostage while it feeds you meager scraps of world building and some occasional character development.

[Minor spoilers ahead. No specific plot points, just overarching themes and some out-of-context stuff]

Credit where it is due, the core concept is a really interesting one. Our protagonist, as it were, is a device. The Orb, that starts out as a small white ball, is an empty shell that has the ability to take on the form and function of whatever it comes in contact with, and it’s unceremoniously thrown into the world so the rest of the plot can happen. Now, as far as basic premises go, this was incredibly intriguing and filled with a huge amount of possibilities. However, the way how the device works is not made exactly clear, as the story repeatedly breaks its own rules regarding how this replication mechanic functions. Fushi - as the device comes to be referred to - is immortal, can mimic living beings, animals, and even humans. Not only that, but it can also create inanimate objects, seemingly infinitely. However, these awesome godlike powers have a weird plot hole, in the form of intellect, or rather the lack thereof. Apparently Fushi can mimic an animal or human in perfect anatomical detail, but not the brain or even genetic traits or instincts like...eating. Right in the first episode we can see the device has to be taught to eat, even when in the form of a wolf, which by all accounts should instinctively know how to do. Even me, someone with only a layman's level understanding of biology, genetics and behavioral science, this already rubbed me the wrong way. The device can utilize SOME innate traits and instincts of the form it takes immediately, but VERY selectively. Like walking, complex motions (like walking upright on two legs, jumping, etc.), hearing, sight, scents or even the concept of sleep are no problem, but not eating, reacting to danger, or any of the very basic instincts of living creatures, that are in fact not learned behavior, but genetic, evolutionary traits they should instinctively do. Also, as it is immortal, it can immediately heal any injury, but only when it serves the plot.

In fact, all the device's abilities are seemingly only there to serve plot convenience, as they are incredibly inconsistent throughout the series. Sure, I can chalk most of it up to writer's choice and suspension of disbelief, but - try as I might - it's hard to take a story seriously that can't even be trusted not to break its own rules all the time. The writer essentially sidesteps this issue and drops the REAL nature of Fushi the first chance she gets. As soon as it can be imbued with human traits, feelings and behavior, the story throws its entire basic concept out the window, conveniently forgets that the device is, in fact, a device, and starts treating it as a human, albeit with limited mental faculties. At that moment, we lose The Orb - the construct - as the protagonist, and get Fushi, the moderately retarded orphan child with superpowers. That's when the anime goes from a highly intriguing concept piece to a mediocre isekai and loses all it's soul and purpose.

That's also when the shameless emotional manipulation, jarring changes in tone and the trope fest starts. The story regularly shelves Fushi to introduce a slew of new side-characters, build them up, make them cute, relatable, easy to care about for the audience, only to use them for bad jokes or fabricated melodrama. Much like her earlier works, the creator is not above using underhanded tactics to elicit catharsis from the audience. Using various human conditions, like small children, the elderly, mental and physical disabilities, disfigurement, needless cruelty and abuse, that all could be part of a well-written story in the right context, but here, it only serves as cheap emotional manipulation in a sort of “look, how sad that made Fushi” kinda way. And all that, of course, gives way to tropey “I have to save my friends” and “I can’t let them get hurt because of me” type faux-heroic set-pieces that all end as we all already know how they end, killing off the odd side-character for some cheap tugs on the heartstrings and to serve as motivation for a device that shouldn’t need any.

The infuriating thing is, that the writer is fully aware of what she is doing! The Orb’s creator - the weird space wizard dude in the black robe - regularly reminds Fushi of its purpose: “to preserve this world”. The story introduces the laziest, no-effort antagonist I’ve ever seen: a purposely ambiguous “enemy” that comes out of nowhere, and is seemingly tailor-made to fight the device...but only when it’s convenient to the plot, obviously. For most of the time it’s happy to twiddle its proverbial thumbs and let the various storylines and montages unfold, and only strike when Fushi is good and ready to receive its next dose of drama-drenched reality check. Robe Dude often makes it a point to tell Fushi, that it needs to get stronger and learn how to fight the enemy (as it is its singular reason of existence), and to move on, to let go of its human attachments as these only serve to impede this progress. But since Fushi is now fully treated as a human, it defies its creator and starts acting like “Default Good Guy Hero Anime Protagonist”, with impeccable morals and ethics, who blames itself for all the wrong in the world, wants to save absolutely everyone and spirals into a mopey-ragey depression when some of them are killed off for blatant shock-value. And Robe Dude just goes along with it. No, seriously. He feigns some anemic resistance, but eventually just becomes an “enemy radar”, only there to warn Fushi when the enemy conveniently decides to attack at the Worst Possible Moment™.

I think I ranted enough about the failings of this anime. Mentioning the lackluster season finale, the overblown villain character, the way everyone just goes along with Fushi’s superpowers without a thought, turning one of the most intriguing characters (Robe Dude) into a one-dimensional plot device, or any of the rest would just feel like adding insult to injury. In the end, what To Your Eternity is, is a great concept blatantly squandered and turned into just another cliché’d, manipulative melodrama. Would I recommend watching To Your Eternity? No, I would not, unless you like cheap thrills, bad writing, surfing plot holes and watching a great idea devolve into bad soap.

Overrated and boring. I never got around to it during its air time, but I did hear about the hype. With the second season coming I thought now is a good time to watch it. It did not live up to even 1/8th of my expectations, I was expecting to be moved emotionally and intrigued. Alas it was as if I tasted a single cold noodle, sad, bland and not filling. Its not even the lack of action I love Mushishi, someone had the audacity to compare the two. At least Four important things separate the them.
1: Character design, even one episode andys are ... brimming with character in Mushishi, Eternity has no character.
2: Sound design, Mushishi can move you emotionally with the sound alone, Eternity has an underwhelming score
3: Pacing, while both take it slow each episode of Mushishi is like a beautifully well written short story. Narratively quite packed.
Eternity is long and drawn out, its exceptionally boring
4: Visual design, Mushishi looks great and maintains its quality for every episode unlike To Your Eternity which wasn't great to begin with.

Even my Boyfriend who came in with no expectations was unimpressed. For me I feel offended that anyone would give this anime anything over a 6/10, its got terrible characters who I am expected to care about starting episode 1 with no character development, nothing interesting about them. How it got so popular is beyond me.

Never have I seen such disparity between a series quality and its score on MAL (8.34 as of my writing)

Let me open with this. If you want to call the 1st episode as a masterpiece, I would agree without a doubt. The problem lies with the later episodes.

With the recent years of Isekai trend, I've watched and read my fill of stories with OP MCs who bend everything around him to his will. This is the first time I saw an OP MC that mainly bend to the will of side characters. and sadly that's is the CRUX of the plot. With the narrative scheme ... of "MC get stronger with every death of people close to them", I could only care less and less with subsequent main NPCs.

In the violent world of the story, you could argue that MC immortality isn't OP. The MC knows he's weak, he knows he failed so many times protecting people he care, yet what does he do? In this point, one of the side character have even more initiative. That NPC know he's weak normal human, so he trained himself for 4 whole year. He become strong enough to fight and protect the MC since that's one of his main purpose training himself (while MC only bettered his speech, cooking, and sewing). It's really frustrating to see.

Sadly, such cycle continues on even until the last episode.

MC meet NPC -> he got close -> he lose them -> frustrated of his weakness -> do nothing about it -> MC meet NPC and so on

(repeat 3 times for the whole 20 episode).
This had a really great potential, yet the execution feels like a student level project.