Sekai ga Horobiru Mae ni Kimi ni Aitai

I simply don’t understand how this got a 4.88/10 rating.

As someone who does NOT judge based on animation at all (it never factors into my overall scoring, and is at least partially a studio budget competition in my view), I thought an input solely based on narrative factors would be in order here.

Story: 8/10

At this movie’s core is a simple (not the most unique, yet not blatantly uninspired either) dimensional travel story done with marked competency - it doesn’t try to implement too much for its short runtime, ultimately leading to a satisfying conclusion which obeys its own laws with stunning elegancy. My only criticism ... would be that some of the specifics regarding alternate forms of oneself could have been elaborated on just a little bit towards the end, but it’s certainly nothing story-ruining.

Characters: 7/10

While there wasn’t a lot of room for development in such a short period of time, I’d say that the character motivations were just about as fleshed out as they could have been given the restraints. In addition to that, the core romance was compelling, if a tad exaggerated towards the end.

Sound: 7.5/10

The ending song was lovely, and the voice acting was consistently decent throughout the film’s runtime. It certainly has an indie feel to it, but that doesn’t detract from its overall charm.

Animation: 3/10

Yes, we know - The whole film looks like the work of a first-year animation student. I don’t think I can really contribute anything valuable to this existing conversation.

Overall: 7.5(rounded to 8)/10

In all, this film seems to be in the same tragic category as “Sleep tight my baby, cradled in the sky” - Works with competent stories that are sadly overlooked or shamed thanks to their awful animation. Meanwhile, I could rip the pathetic ‘plot’ of something like Tenki no Ko into a million pieces with ease, but nobody would care because it looks so visually beautiful. As is the nature of the anime reviewing space, I suppose.

In all, if you can stomach the *interesting* artwork, and are in search of a quick yet compelling sci-fi romance story, I would absolutely recommend checking this film out!

Brief overview:

Story: 6/10. Multiple parallel worlds setting. Plot was a little confusing at times.
Art: 6/10. Indie.
Sound: 6/10. Mic noise present for certain characters and basic sound design.
Character: 5/10. Cast has different personalities, but little development.
Enjoyment: 5/10. Felt a little rushed.
Overall: 5/10. A little too short for what it's trying to be.

More in-depth overview:
...
Story: 6/10. This is one of those space-time romance dramas that had a lot of potential. The story takes place during an apocalyptic future in Japan. Everyone is forced to quarantine to survive and a boy and a girl start talking online in hopes of having any kind of human contact. Without going into too much detail about the story, there are multiple parallel worlds that can somehow be crossed into. The method of doing so was skimmed over and felt like it existed just to push the plot forward. In some cases, the story was moving too quickly. Some events would have been better in a slower setting where characters can steadily interact with each other and grow, but there's only so much 30 minutes can provide. This project would have benefited greatly from an extended runtime as the story seemed rushed at points. The conclusion is also one of those abstract open-ended “choose it yourself” kind of situations, which I didn’t find too odd and actually felt like it belonged. However, despite having such a distinct setting, a lot of its potential went untapped. This is a unique original story that had a lot going for it, but the limited runtime cut down on that potential.

Art: 6/10. I came across "Sekai ga Horobiru Mae ni Kimi ni Aitai" purely by chance. The cover visual caught my eye and I decided to give it a watch. Right away, I noticed that the style was very distinct. It almost has this indie feel to it. There's sparse information regarding the staff that worked on this, so chances are that this was made by a small studio. Personally, I think the crude style worked in their favor. With all of the generic styles I've seen, this was actually refreshing. It's by no means eye candy and it definitely caught me off guard at first, but I wouldn't mind seeing this style again.

Sound: 6/10. The sound design was passable. Ambience is basically non-existent, which makes for a much more somber and detached atmosphere, but also makes mic noise more apparent. When sounds were used, it was as if they were pulled from a royalty-free sound library. As for the VA’s, they were pretty decent. Comparing their performance to other VA’s and considering the scarce information regarding them, I assume they’re just trying to get into the business. You can tell that the main VA’s are trying to put personality into the characters they’re voicing and it shows. Each character in the main cast has a unique air to them and you can piece together what kind of person they are despite some lines not hitting the mark. Sound design alone, this section would be a 5/10, but the VA’s bring it to a 6/10.

Character: 5/10. As I said in the previous section, the main character’s have their own personalities. And while it isn’t necessary, there isn’t much character growth throughout the film. Although, to be fair, 30 minutes isn’t enough time to have any meaningful growth. However, it’s important for characters to make the most out of that limited runtime. Unfortunately, "Sekai ga Horobiru Mae ni Kimi ni Aitai" falls a little flat in this area. Some character details that were revealed didn’t feel natural and felt as though it happened just to push the plot along. This also applies to some character interactions and decisions as well. Despite my 5/10 rating, I actually feel that the characters were pretty solid (even more so than characters in some 12 episode anime…) The primary reason for my low rating here is the fact that in the 30 minutes that I was watching, I wasn’t invested in the characters. Rather than the characters writing the story and paving the way, it was as if the story was writing the characters just so the plot could unfold.

Enjoyment: 5/10. At this point it feels like a cop-out, but the 30 minute runtime didn’t allow the events that unfolded to sink in and help me empathize with the characters. The organization was a little confusing at times and I only started to understand it once I finished the whole thing. I liked the concept of multiple parallel worlds, but the means of jumping to different worlds left me perplexed. I sat there thinking about why or how the method would work. Watching to the end didn’t answer those questions. Maybe these kinds of developments are to your liking, but for me, it was a little off. As for the ending, I’m not used to them being open-ended, so I found it a little entertaining. Everything else, though, was pretty basic. There wasn’t much bad, but there wasn’t a lot that was notable.

Overall: 5/10. In the end, it primarily comes down to runtime. 30 minutes isn’t a bad runtime for standalone one-shots in general, but for a story like this, 30 minutes just isn’t enough. Either cut down the amount of characters or have the runtime increased for better world and story building. Unfortunately, "Sekai ga Horobiru Mae ni Kimi ni Aitai" bit off more than it could chew with what it was trying to accomplish in half an hour. Yet, despite this, I consider "Sekai ga Horobiru Mae ni Kimi ni Aitai" to be a relatively successful story. I didn’t find myself waiting for it to end, but rather, I wanted more. If it had more runtime, even by just another half hour, that would allow for a much more natural and well paced story. Some unexplained character details could be explored and the existence of multiple parallel worlds could be introduced more naturally. There wouldn’t be the need of rushing through certain events just to get them out of the way either. This would help me grow attached to the characters and get me to actually care about the choices they make. But, that isn’t the case. The experience I got out of this was a 5/10. The story and art were unique, but that’s about it. For what it’s worth, this is a good story and I truly hope a reboot with adequate runtime will be made sometime in the future.

I stumbled across this one on Hidive. When I came to check out its ratings and whatnot on here and realized that apparently no one else has said anything about it yet... I figured, what the hell? It's easily accessible and only 30 minutes long. Might as well check it out.

But I can't lie. It's pretty rough. I feel like it would be pretty impressive as, like, an amateur Youtube project or something. But it just can't stand alongside anything worked on professionally. Its visuals went from passable-- even sort of beautiful in certain places-- to butt ugly anytime a person had to be ... animated on-screen.

The song at the end was also pretty, but some of the voice recordings for the dialogue sounded like it was done over Skype or something. (Or whatever the 2021 equivalent is.)

And 30 minutes is just not enough time to build up the emotions they were going for with this premise.

It set up the start of something that could have been really poignant and relatable in today's day and age. The aftermath of Mt. Fuji erupting with another, more deadly eruption expected has recreated the pandemic conditions of the real world. All schooling's been moved online, only "essential" jobs are staying open, and the main character makes a new online friend who he falls in love with. One who seems to be suffering from depression caused by the newfound isolation. It felt like it was setting up something that could have been really meaningful. But then it kind of just went off the rails.