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I started Noein back in 2015, don't remember why I picked it up, the artstyle looked boring and there was no big shot involved, no one was talking about it on MAL, I heard it was about time travel or different dimensions, some random SF wannabe anime with children as main characters. I dislike shows with kids, I was 25 back then, sure Digimon was cool but why waste time on Noein. And for some reason I downloaded and watched one episode a week, in those days I had no internet at my disposal so anime was a cool past time, I consumed Noein slowly but surely.

No surprises in the beginning, just a show about a 13 year old girl, not even 14 like Asuka, and the design didn't help at all, well, maybe because of that I payed attention to the plot (compared to Eva where I payed attention to Asuka's chest), but that didn't help at all. So there's a dude coming from another dimension and he looks very weird from an art style POV compared the the other characters, maybe to differentiate them but who even cares for that and he's not even that good looking, I swear, all characters look so ugly it's annoying but from an anime perspective because they aren't bland looking and they would look awesome in real life. This is one of the first weird things about this anime and that's why I was so attracted to it, it closed the distance between me and it by being so weird.

Every week I watched it and watched it and except for the OST with those amazing battle songs, everything was very hard to understand (not RahXephon level but close). I found it so mediocre, the plot is very easy but the characters are making it complicated, Karasu and the dragon soldiers came to this dimension (let's call it Earth) from Lacrima to capture the Dragon Torque which was inside Haruka, then they fight between themselves because why not, we need that in a story. And now Haruka will keep for the next 20 episodes Karasu as her bodyguard/love slave, and yeas, Karasu was Yuu from the future. Interesting concepts here though, Karasu is coming from a future when Haruka died, I think he was in his late 20s, damn! it was weird to look at them in the same picture, she also knew he was her cute emo Yuu and she really showed signs. But that's just my imagination talking, Noein was smart enough not to show sexual tension between Haruka and Karasu but it surely made the viewers horny.

At this moment I only payed attention to the randomness of life, incredible how the anime made a normal day look so interesting, I felt like I was there, I was in the room with the kids talking about SF stuff and planning things about quantum computers, why the hell are they talking about that, who the hell understands that gibberish, what was the plot? The dragon soldiers come again to kidnap Haruka, sometimes they manage but Karasu saves her, is this a rescue the princess story?

The the anime attacks me personally, imagine the weirdest coincidence, exactly like Haruka and Ai, I had a childhood friend and I got in an argument and so on and exactly like in real life, they too remain friends and make out in the most absurd and random chain of events. What did they do? they just talked. 99% of drama anime don't do that because it's boring but Noein isn't afraid of that, they talk and you can really see how human they look, the relationships were supposed to be realistic and they nailed it, I don't wanna bash SteinsGate but that anime is too over the top with the relationships, why would Kurisu continue to spend time with those losers, anyway, it doesn't matter, maybe I should've picked on a slice of life romance anime like Toradora but still, that was a romcom, it was supposed to make you laugh at the shenanigans that can't happen in real life. In conclusion, I'm bashing all anime in existence because of some random, unimportant and boring scenes in Noein, but why not, I was tired of the whole cliches on top of cliches and all that shit, they're good too, makes me enjoy it but I quickly forget about it but that's just my taste in anime and Noein tickled my fancy I din't know I had till then.

Even after the whole plot was resolved, it didn't really impress me, I was happy that Yuu defeated Noein in a manner that we all saw it coming, no one understood why or how was Yuu more "powerful", but in the end we got our happy ending, time to forget about it. The I made the mistake of rewatching it...

I was bored of my watching list so I said what the fvck, let's rewatch this to understand it better, it was a decent anime and I always felt it had more to offer and there were still mysteries in the show, did Haruka survive? did Karasu die, what happened with Lacrima and Shangri-La? what was that experiment? how come Kuriyama appeared out of nowhere after his dead body disappeared? who the hell was that old man if Haruka was supposed to be Dragon Torque?
I like SF shows and this time it provided, now I'll transform this post into a grand explanation of the plot and story elements because I like it so much.

- Karasu appeared in a random universe created by Lacrima as a control for their time experiments
- Haruka was the Dragon Torque unintentionally but it doesn't really matter

- Dragon Torque has the power of the multiverse, but it's just from an observational POV, Haruka can travel through different dimensions but only her essence, even if she changes the past/future she can't live in that time and she can only affect it from a natural POV (like when she stopped the flooding), she as a person can't do shit. How many iterations did she spend on that scene with her parents? the events changed but insignificantly.

- Lacrima wanted the power to erase Shangli-La and Noein who could manipulate the other dimensions, Noein was the singularity that affected the universes and destroyed them because he wanted to fin one with Haruka, but because it was a given that she would die all the time, he went mad and bored and simply erased them. How come he had that power? because he was basically the Dragon Torque in his timeline and Haruka wasn't, but in this timeline created by Lacrima, it was Haruka who was the Dragon Torque and not Yuu and let's go to the end of the anime, Haruka didn't die so there was no need for Yuu to become Noein

- And that's why Yuu could refuse to become Noein at the last episode, it's a story when the end is the beginning and the beginning is the end, cool concepts but hard to understand and it's also hard to like that but I loved it for some reason, I loved how it put me to think, how it made me follow the characters and search for sings of their personalities that might lead to something

- The old man was the literal representation of Dragon Torque and my theory stands because Yuu saw him too

In the end, what were Noein's themes? Why did I love it so much, the simple answer is that it's a story of people fighting adversity and changing themselves to survive in this cruel world. And yes, the world is cruel, we all saw that episode from Noein's memories with Haruka dead and we all saw Yuu's suicidal tendencies from the first normal episodes. I am not saying "oh it's so deep because Yuu was so emo or Ai's leg injury or Isami's delinquent future". It is good and deep because it makes the viewer (me) understand the meaning of the change from a psychological POV.

It made me think about my past, my friends (it also had that "horrible" scene when Haruka is forgotten by her best friend from kindergarten), my choices in life, did I do the right thing? is my present self worse than it could have been? is the meaning of life just living? living and understanding why your present is like this and what do you have to do to make it brighter. In this aspect, Noein is like an exercise in thinking about life strategies. To give an example: in order to walk, you first crawl and fall and all that, in order to build stamina for playing football, you need to run/workout, in order to be a good kisser, you have to kiss a lot and so on.
I will be arrogant and say that Noein is an exercise like that, but for understanding life.
I mean it doesn't teach you values like friendship or respect your elders, they never say "oh this is good and this is bad", it's not in-your-face, it teaches you to think, do not abandon thinking about your life, you will make bad choices and you will do horrible things, the most important thing is to understand why did you do that and what is your life plan.
Keep in mind that it's a show about dimensions but our characters have to live in the Earth Dimension in order to progress as individuals. All of the others who played the different dimensional game, suffered and Haruka's death was the deterrent.
- Karasu was obsessed about Haruka and became a dragon knight, a failed human
- Noein obsession destroyed the multiverse and him as a human, he only wanted a present with Haruka
- Fukuro died and he never got the love of his life Ai
- Future Isami became a punk and probably in jail because he couldn't get over his parents' death
- Future Ai was a shell
- Ai Amamiku Hasebe was a "doll" of Lacrima
- Future Miho committed suicide
- Lacrima Miho had a child though but she was like Ai, good for nothing individual
- Atori was a revenge obsessed freak

Haruka survived, they "went" into a future when she won't die but she will still be the dragon torque because of that phone call, we know an adult Haruka exists but even Noein couldn't reach that, infinite possibilities (like Gurren Lagann). The future will be bright but they have to work for it, sure, she won't die in that crash but she may have a fight with Ai or break up with Yuu, it all depends on the choices and experiences.

And that's the story put it shortly, I was all over the place but the general message is written clearly, it is an anime which I learned something from and I respect that. My writing abilities could explain about 50% of why I loved it so much, the other half went to my brain and affected me subconsciously, it's a feeling and I am not smart enough to write so much feelings in english.

You may argue and say that [insert skeptic voice] oh, you just inserted your views and values on this random anime because it looks cool, the creator never thought of that, you can apply this type of thinking on almost any anime, you just have to write it in a cool way and over exaggerate the events in order to fit your theory.
Of course I thought of that, I also watched it in a period of my life when I had problems and doubts in regards to my life, but still, how come I never encountered an anime like this before to apply my views? (because of the doubts specified above but it's not like I didn't have problems before). Then, why didn't I encountered an anime like that or a better anime after I watched it? It's been 6 years (now in 2021) and 700 more completed anime and Noein remains in my heart. I never encountered an anime where I could apply these elements to their entirely. I don't think the creator thought of this but my experience is way more important.