【Anime Guild】 - Winter 2017 Review Event

Apr 1, 2017 5:03 AM

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Anime Guild - Winter 2017 Review Event

3-gatsu no Lion

Great Anime does not have to be full of exciting happenings that drive you to the end of your seat, nor does it have to be beautifully crafted with extravagant art and music. If one is technical, Sangatsu no Lion can very well hold its own in those areas, the art is drawn in such a way as if it came out of a storybook. The contrasting colours and music tempo to depict a shift in mood is done masterfully. But what blows me away is how the show can convey a story in such a way that it looks more like a first person view of the life of a young man whom all of us can see a part of ourselves in.

Staying faithful to the manga by adapting chapter to chapter (and always reminding us so with a white frame), the pacing of Sangatsu no Lion is never an issue. We slowly but progressively come to know of our Shogi prodigy – Rei Kiriyama who, as much of a genius as he is, is not invulnerable and is basically like us, facing the ups and downs in life. The beginning of the show pictures how Rei came to this present point in life, how he interacts with the Kawamoto sisters, how he fights not just his Shogi battles, but also his inner demons that often plunges him into a dark mood. Though many would argue that the second half side-lines the Kuwamoto sisters and even Rei himself and shows technical, tedious Shogi games, I argue that the second half gives Rei the opportunity to look into the lives of his seniors, who have stayed on the path of competitive Shogi far longer than he has, thus allowing him to basically see what lies before in the future, indirectly letting him understand himself further and develop his character.

The show is a good balance between comedy and drama, giving off a bright, vibrant vibe with people in laughter in joyous scenes while showing the sadness and gloom after. It is an ever-going cycle that allows us the viewers to understand that the joy and happiness that our characters are going through is unfortunately bound to be disrupted; and on the flipside, the horrible phases that they are going through are bound to end with a light at the end of the tunnel. For example, as we see the hardships that Rei faces with his family background, he stumbles upon his eventual solace in the Kuwamoto household. As he enjoys the warmth and company and leaves with a rare grin on his face, he stumbles upon a relative who reminds him of why he was shrouded in dark depression in the first place. It is not the Utopian fantasy that us viewers like to find escape in, nor is it the depressive carnage that makes us reflect on how fortunate we actually are, instead it realistically depicts how life is — a mix between the two.

A resounding theme that this show reminds us of is that the success and joy of one sometimes come at the expense of another. With a show that has a setting based on competitive Shogi, this is bound to be a given. Unlike most typical shounen anime, however, where we feel the joy of our characters upon the finishing move, we see how Rei feels guilt as he sees his opponents drown in sorrow upon defeat. The story masterfully depicts this in one scene — As Rei sees his opponent walk away in defeat, he then looks at his own palms, similar to how people look at their own shaking hands upon harming someone. He breaks down in turmoil of how he himself struggles with his problems, as he understands that relying on his proficiency in shogi to survive has to inevitably bring sadness to others if it means to avoid his own. This reminds us that we do not live in our own bubble and that whatever we do and whatever that happens to us has an alternate effect on others.

With this theme, comes the frequent ‘Light vs Dark' theme that this show utilises. It shows how certain happenings can have both a ‘good' and ‘bad' outcome/ effect. Be it a contrast between the visit of a friend and the visit of a relative, or the contrast between how Rei's Shogi opponents take their defeats with newfound motivation or self-destruction.

Contrastingly, the characters in the story are not just black and white, but a mix of grey. Kyouko, though depicted as the brash sister who takes advantage of Rei's feeble personality, is shown to have a lot more depth to her character as she is actually far closer to Rei than she presumably is, she gives off the ‘you really dislike but can't entirely hate her' kind of feeling. Rei himself isn't just a kind and feeble boy but also breaks down and shouts out his frustrations and his selfish desires to live on. There are no character archetypes, no tropes, and each character acts and thinks like real people with their respective backgrounds and experiences.

Sangatsu no Lion uses simple elements to show symbolism, it follows the basic principle of ‘show, don't tell' faithfully. It does not spoon-feed the viewer, it isn't too cryptic either, it prioritises letting the viewers pick up on the underlying meaning of scenes on their own. Be it the emergence of water that drowns Rei to show the depressing and suffocating stage of life that he is enduring, or the bright colours of the Kuwamoto sisters' home, in contrast to the almost monochromic colours at his own home, to show the warmth that it exudes. Daily life moments that if looked closely has a much more profound meaning – the scene where Rei realizes how cold he is when he is not in the Kuwamoto household can also be a deeper illustration of how he begins to rely on the sisters like an emotional crutch, or even the game of Shogi where each move on the board looks like an emotional attack on Rei's opponents as he defeats them and feels guilt afterwards.

What's so good about Sangatsu no Lion is that it feels natural, watching Rei charge and his goals and embarrassingly stumble at one of his obstacles, him finding the friends and family he needs due to the emotional scars that he received, it sort of reminds us of our own lives doesn't it? Though this is indeed a work of fiction, it could as well be an autobiography and none would be the wiser. It's not a ‘Slice of Life' that shows the typical everyday life of people, but a ‘Slice of Life' showing the life of a person growing up on life's treacherous but meaningful journey.

3-gatsu no Lion! This is an anime of Fall 2016 that I just started on a whim. I really didn't know what to expect but I was pleasantly surprised cause this anime was fuckin brilliant. So good that only 12 episodes in, it made it to my end of the year list for Top 5 anime of 2016, and only went on to solidify that position 10 episodes later.

Being a Huge Slice of life fan, this anime really stood out to me as unique and one of the best in the genre. The story has a lot of substance and progresses very well, the main plot about shogi is very unique and at times feels a lot like an actual sports anime. It's really great and is very well paced but this anime's strongest point are it's characters, who do a great job carrying the plot. There is a lot of range and variety in them, They are extremely realistic and relatable, their designs are very unique and everyone is just written so well, Oh, and there are some parallels too. Especially our MC, Kiriyama Rei. He is really how good an introvert MC can get. He is considered a Prodigy Shogi player but he has a really dark past and he is such a loner. To see things from his perspective is something that's very interesting and this show does it extremely well. You sympathize with him and start to genuinely root for him, watching him grow and develop along the way is such a joy to watch. I love his first person narration too, It feels like having a real conversation with him and he says a lot of deep things, I could just listen to him all day.

There are a lot of cute and lighthearted moments that puts a genuine smile on my face. It's another thing this anime does very well, It does a great job at balancing the dark and light themes. Which is possible through the great quantity and quality side characters. Especially the scenes with Kiriyama and the Kawamoto family. Momo-chan and the Nekos are so cute, they alone make the show worth watching. The other elder sisters and Kiriyama empathize with each other, They provide some much needed hospitality and help Kiriyama overcome his loneliness. Those scenes are really warm and make you go like "Ah..That's such a lovely family" but nah, they've been through some shit too, there is always that lowkey sadness under that bright smile. They've been holding back a lot, but we all want to be happy, we all want to or should at least try to look forward to a bright future no matter how dark our past is or how big of a mark it left on us. This is something the anime conveys really well.

Again, This anime has a fine amount of well written side characters, some of my favorites are Nikaidou, He considers himself as our MC's rival and best friend. He's a very charming and energetic character and it's hard not to love how passionate he is about Shogi. Kyouko is someone who's negatively affected our MC in past, She is that character you'll hate but still feel for. Shimada is one of my favorite characters, He's very calm and mature. But his ambitions and back story are what make you wanna really root for him. Touji Souya is the #1 Shogi player, He has "Loner" written all over him and I really like the mysterious vibes i get from him, also has like parallels to Kiriyama which I mentioned earlier. Can't take my eyes off him during his screen presence. I could talk about them all day, just few of brilliant characters here.

I love the animation and soundtrack. The art style is very unique and refreshing. some of the city and water landscapes are breathtaking as well. It does a great job of making the quiet and lonely atmosphere feel like a quiet and lonely atmosphere.

The Soundtracks are soooo good. Sometimes they come in so well it gives me chills. It's just excellent. I love all the OPs and EDs as well. I watch the second OP at least 5 times before starting the episode. It is Performed by Yuki. Who also performed the OP of "Sakamichi no Apollon". Another one of my favorite OPs. Her voice is kinda weird but brilliant and goes incredibly well with the production. I love the 2nd ED too! It gives me some lonely, nostalgic vibes. Love it.

Overall I really enjoyed this show, I'd give it a 9.25/10. This is an anime I'd highly recommend. Again, one of the best shows of 2016 in my opinion. I'd suggest it to even people who don't normally enjoy Slice of life as well. It has something for everyone so just give it a shot and hopefully you'll enjoy it as much as I did!

ACCA: 13-ku Kansatsu-ka

TL;DR Section at the end of the review. This review may or may not contain minor spoilers.

ACCA: 13-ku Kansatsu-ka is my pick for the most underrated show of Winter 2017. With a different type of story, slow pacing, and fascinating characters, ACCA kept me so intrigued week after week after week.

The story revolves around Jean Otus, the second-in-command of the Inspection Department of ACCA. While starting off very slow, many questioned if ACCA was going to do okay this season or not. However, this slow build is exceptionally well executed for the story and the show, and is what really made the show great. At first, it seems to be just a show of Jean's experiences in the different districts, which in itself is not that exciting. What also made this enjoyable was the diversity and uniqueness to each district, and how they handled whatever the problem might've been at the time. This alone hooked me, as it was so fun and relaxing to watch how someone might go about a problem whilst thinking how you would personally go about it.

The characters as well start off slow, with Jean appearing as an aloof, go-with-the-flow kind of guy. That changes drastically throughout the story as he makes his rounds through all of the districts. Nino, the ever mysterious best friend to Jean makes you want to sincerely know what his backstory is, and how heavily he'll affect Jean and the others. Lotta, Jean's younger sister, is a (cute) young girl who runs the apartment complex they stay at, all the while keeping an upbeat and cheery outlook on everything (including sweets. Lots of sweets). As more and more characters get introduced, you find yourself surrounded in a vast cast of unique and superbly interesting characters. The one drawback to such a wide display is that there are a lot of things to remember and to keep in mind when seeing each character, as well as the fact that ultimately, it's centered around Jean (some characters suffer due to this).

ACCA boasts a visually attractive art style that fits the type of story nicely, along with a great OST (man, that OP is catchy as hell)! Even the main ED of the show was regarded as one of the best this season, and for a good reason. Madhouse does an excellent job of making this look good, sound good, and feel good.

TL;DR: ACCA is a slow political/drama show with lots of emphasis on diversity and character development. While focusing on the main character Jean, ACCA still does a terrific job of keeping you highly interested for what may happen next, regardless of the outcome. Highly recommended if you're okay with the slow pace that the show takes to truly introduce and explain everything.

ACCA is a slow burning political drama centered around a rumored coup d'état and set in the fantastical yet embedded in reality DOWA kingdom. It has a very rich style, a laid back intrigue and a cast of cool characters - that come more into the light as the plot develops in the second half. Through the world building, it made me care about what was happening to DOWA and the possibilities of where it was heading.

The land is segregated into thirteen unique and natural states based upon the history, government infrastructure and resources. The protagonist, Jean, has a job to audit each of these states, to check up on how things are going in this time of assumed peace. The world building is split into roughly one state per episode but there is a multi-layered world building approach; while you only really explore one state at a time, you can see how the characters compare the similarities and differences to each of the other states, which makes the world feel alive and interconnected.

Like with the world, the characters also have a feeling of where you are only seeing the tip of the ice berg, and by piecing new information together, you eventually get a solid understanding of each of the characters. At first Jean appeared as being solely aloof and studious yet as you see how he handles situations and the thought processes he uses to deduct his response, it makes him become warmer and personable. As with his relationship with Crow and his sister, which is quiet fun in a subdued way. Most of the characters feel like they play an important part of DOWA and the side characters have there motivations revealed, although besides from hints they don't all become clear until the final few episodes.

For a show steeped in politics, there is plenty of crushes that inhabit a number of characters, and while it never bore any fruit, it was nice to highlight aspects of there personality of what they are attracted too as well with how they deal with that feeling.

The art style looks mature but with a quirky edge like the abundance of mustaches, hair styles, fashion and fantastical looking food. I'm not sure if it was just a ploy to show a hereditary link between a few of the characters, but there is definitely a bread cult going on. There is a jazzy beat throughout which works well with the other worldly elements, quirky design choices and the cool headed characters. The framing of the landscape in relation to the characters was solid, there were occasionally goofy faceless moments but a lot of the time there was both a detailed background and characters kept on model. Apparently fingers are difficult to animate, so kudos to that.

ACCA relishes in its style and develops its world and characters in a slow but constant pace. While not being particularly exciting to watch, I was always interested in to see what would happen next, what new piece of information would be revealed and what delicious looking food would appear. Like with the bread in the show, their lies a warm, well woven, bite sized meal that satiates in a simple and effective way.

*passes jean a cigarette* /10

Spoiler Free Review
Send feedback if you have any

ACCA: 13-Territory Inspection Dept. What an incredible piece of art. What seems like a simple story, a kingdom separated into 13 districts looked after by the organisation known as ACCA, manages to keep you guessing on how exactly everything is going to turn out. We follow Jean Otus, second-in-command of ACCA's inspection department, who travels to each and every district to make sure that any signs of corruption is discovered and prevented quickly. Starting off slow to introduce characters and some world building, the story steadily opens up to what can only be described, in the most non-spoiler way possible, as a quiet but planned out struggle for peace threatened by a higher power.

What seems predictable at first, (oh a plot twist happens, I can see where this is going) continues to surprise you as you can never guess what is actually happening until the very end. The calm and cool atmosphere that surrounds most of the series lulls you into a sense of knowing more than you actually do, allowing it's unpredictable nature to continuously keep the show interesting. Secrets are revealed, plans are put into motion, multiple opposing views wait their turn to make sure that events are headed towards their favour. It's a perfect example of the phrase "Don't judge a book by its cover."

Jean Otus is a simple but slightly mysterious man. Known by others as the "Cigarette Peddler", he's often seen with a lighter in his hand a smoke in his mouth. Not much is really known about Jean at the start. His only real goal that is revealed to us is that he wants to get a transfer to a different department. What could be seen as a dull and boring personality, this character manages to give off a feeling that he's much more intelligent than he seems. We see glimpses of his unique mind at work as he deals with some problems he faces in a few districts, showing off that he's actually more than meets the eye.

Nino is also pretty mysterious. Reporter by day, he often joins Jean for a drink and a talk about their hard days at work. He could be seen as quite charismatic and a smooth talker, always hanging around our main and his sister Lotta. Not much is known about him at first, but slowly his secrets are also revealed to showcase a truly interesting character with a simple motive. Look out for the Otus family.

It's hard to talk about every character due to the large amount we are introduced to every episode, as Jean travels from district to district, and the fact that many of the main cast's characteristics may lead to accidental spoilers. While character development is usually focused on only a select few of frequently reoccurring faces, every person we meet along the journey is able to feel interesting. Although most fall into the background, each character has their own personality and goals for their own district and for ACCA as a whole. There enough development left over that is scattered to various members of the supporting cast that it feels like everyone Jean meets has a sense of realism that is hard to achieve in most animes.

The animation is oddly unique yet similar to other shows at the same time. With a slight sketchbook like appearance, the art style really matches its relaxing atmosphere. It's not anything eye-popping, but it really adds to the show's mood of peacefulness. Even the hairdo of each character is special, as most districts have their own distinct hair colour. It's a subtle clue as to some important parts of the story, hidden incredibly well so only people that already know how the story progressions will be able to spot it.

It's not often you find a show that has such an amazing story, drawing you in with each episode that passes. This show does take a bit of patience as it doesn't dive into the actual plot right away, but if you don't mind a slow but interesting series, then I highly recommend this.

Ao no Exorcist:Kyoto Fujouou-hen

Demi-chan wa Kataritai

Spoiler Free Review, pls send feedback if you have any

A curious biology teacher, Tetsuo Takahashi, suddenly discovers himself in the presence of four unique individuals in the delightful anime that is Interviews With Monster Girls. Sorting through fact and fiction of what we believe about the supernatural, we watch as Takahashi slowly gets to know more about each Demi's everyday life while helping them with whatever problems they may face with their birth-given attributes.

Storywise, it's quite similar to how harems/reverse harems direct episodes. (Note: this is not a harem, it just shares a few similarities. Teacher x Student would be incredibly inappropriate) The first few episodes are an introduction to each character and a brief description of their "species", and the rest of the episodes each focus on one of the already established characters and continues to explore their characteristics and their effect on their surroundings. Mixed in with the calm and peaceful school life, it provides us with an entertaining yet informative experience about the world of Interviews With Monster Girls. There is a little drama scattered around the series, but luckily it's done well enough so that it doesn't feel like it's trying too hard to make the show more interesting.

There is quite a lot of information dumps on each Demi-human, so the dialogue is an important part of this show. Although it can seem forced and unrealistic at times, such as a few conversations the Demis have with their classmates, most of the time their interactions with others come out quite naturally and allow us to learn about each Monster Girl without it feeling like a lecture. There are many times where serious issues are brought up, such as bullying and disabilities, giving the show a sense of deeper meaning mixed in with it's cute and happy theme. Often they'll also throw in a bit of comedy to prevent the sense of boredom, and they do it quite well so it doesn't negatively impact on the topic being discussed.

I'm sure you've all seen the usual MC that plagues this kind of anime. A group of girls show up in a guy's life, but our poor boy is usually too socially awkward around the opposite sex or too dense when it comes to females. Not Takahashi. An adult with responsibilities, he doesn't have time for that bullshit. No more blushing and nose bleeds, Takahashi is able to interact with everyone around him without looking like a complete idiot. Although still a little dense at times, his kind-hearted and level-headed nature allows him to properly perform his job as a teacher and a second guardian.

Continuing down our list of characters, a group of four Demis are the real focus of the story. These consist of an energetic vampire (Hikari Takanashi), a shy dullahan (Kyouko Machi), a troubled snow-woman (Yuki Kusakabe) and a succubus math teacher. (Sakie Satou) Each one is born with features that separate them from the norm, forced to accommodate these differences into their lives. Throughout the show, we watch as each one learns a little bit about themselves due to their bonds with Takahashi and each other, using their new found knowledge to grow as individuals.

The background characters aren't really elaborated on much until the second half of the anime. They're mostly there to bring up topics about Demi-humans, so they don't really get much character development. This is a huge shame as many of them have interesting views and personalities that would have allowed the show to feel more like an actual school instead of a setting created only to have the main characters move around in. Instead of only becoming relevant in the later eps, some of the focus on the main characters should have been used to explore more interactions between normal students and Demis.

So you're probably all wondering right? Monster Girl Anime without an Ecchi tag? Does this show still have fanservice? Well yeah, but they only come from two characters, Takahashi and Satou. One has an incredibly set of toned muscle, (like holy shit embrace me Tetsuo!) and the other has a beautiful and admittedly erotic body. (I wanna overdose on Sakie's aphrodisiac effect!) We don't see their (AMAZING) bodies much as Sakie usually wears clothes that fully cover her so that she doesn't accidentally sexually stun any men around her, and a biology teacher doesn't get many chances to show off his ripped build in a school setting. What we do things is done well enough so that it doesn't feel like a cheap way of getting more viewers.

Finally, the animation needs to be brought up. There is nothing really breathtaking about this anime, but it's not the type to rely on heavy sakuga to appeal to its viewers. Like the show, it's quite colourful and cheerful, but is still able to properly express any feelings the current scene requires, may it be happy or sad. There are a few times where the animation quality dips a little or looks slightly out of place, but other than that the show is pretty consistent across episodes.

The wonderfully charming show that is Interviews With Monster Girls is a fresh take on the usual School and Supernatural Girls tropes. Well worth the watch if you enjoy Slice of Life animes that are different from the usual "cute girls doing cute things" we see often.

Demi-chan, or interview with monster girls. a series i was initially hooked onto due to it's premise. The first few episodes were actually quite good if i'm gonna be honest, but as it started to continue, it got more mediocre and as a result i also got bored.

Firstly, let's talk about the premise and how the show handled it. The story takes place in an age where "Ajin" (demi-human), more casually known as "Demi," have slowly started to become accepted into human society. Tetsuo Takahashi is a biology teacher who ends up teaching three such Demi, hoping to understand more about them while also managing to catch their attention.

Now from here, the show could have went 1 out of 2 way, it could have been a cute girl doing cute things type of show, where the premise is just a backdrop and most of the show is the girls having fun in school doing cute things for comedy. The other way it could have went was the serious dramatic route, where the Demis would have their own issues and they would realize that their not alone and then they'll break out of their shells. The show opted to take the latter initially with the first 4 episodes, but after that the show starts to diverge and become a regular cute girl show, which would have been fine, but it just went nowhere. Like every episode would have an actual plot point, and most of the episode would just be cute girl stuff until near the end when it realized oh yea we had a plot thing to solve.

Secondly, why are all the Demis in this show female? If your show had something to stand on, it wouldn't need to rely on cute girls as one of it's main selling point. I see no other reason to have made all of it's main cast besides the teacher female. It's only for
1. selling the cute girl doing cute thing like i mentioned earlier.
2.so they can have a cute crush on sensei.
For the first few episodes it was okay as there was ore focus on the drama of their kind and their problems, but after all of that initial stuff, their defined by nothing more than their species and 1 quirk. The show doesn't even try to expand it's cast with interesting side characters, the vice principal would have honestly been a great obstacle for takahashi sensei being too bias and realize the Demis dont really need to rely on takahashi as much as they need to, it could have been a heartwarming moment, but it wasn't it was mediocre.

Thirdly, the show doesn't even have a good appeal to back up it's circular no where plot and empty characters.The soundtracks are average and nothing to back on, the art is nothing special, the girls don't even look remotely waifu material enough to bank on the whole waifu war fandom. Their cute, but their faces dont look all that different, and only machi looks the most varied out of the 3. There's also sato sensei who is the least sexy succubus i have ever seen, who's plot also went nowhere, she doesn't change enough to warrant that much attention to her arc, and neither did a lot of the girls to be honest, the most drastic change was yuki, who's serious arc was kinda a big contrast to the other arcs.

Last point, the show doesn't know what it want to do. It tries to be a cute girl show, yet has a lot of moments that wouldn't really fit in one, like the yuki arc. It tries to be serious, but has alot of generic school comedy moment, like the test arc or the pool arc.As the show went on and on, i didn't know where the show was headed, and i guess neither did the show. Their lives were made slightly better sure, the whole wanting to learn more about Demi aspect of sensei wasn't even remembered by the show, as they stopped caring about it and the girls aren't even that cute, which means that after 2 episode, i stopped caring about them.

Overall, the show loses it's appeal very fast, it doesn't actually know what direction to go, it doesn't take advantage of it's unique setting to do more serious stuff, the characters are boring, and overall i lost interest in it after 4-5 episodes.

Fuuka

Anime original adaptations have always been a heavily debated subject within the anime community.
In some cases it has resulted in a far superior product than its source material, like with Usagi Drop.
In other cases it has downright split the franchise's fan base in half, like with Fullmetal Alchemist 2003.
And yet in other cases still it has been widely considered to have been a simply terrible decision, like with Akame ga Kill.
Whatever your stance on those particular series may be, I think most of us can at least agree on the fact that going heavily anime original instead of faithfully following the source material is very hit-or-miss. Sometimes it works, but most of the time it does not. And in Fuuka's case, I am honestly not sure what to think of it, because its original elements ended up turning an already mediocre manga into an equally mediocre anime... but for totally different reasons.

Before I get into this though, I would just like to mention that Fuuka is actually a next generation sequel to an older series called Suzuka. To get straight to the point, no you do *not* need to watch/read it before watching this anime as they are wholly separate stories. All you really need to know is that the protagonist and main heroine of Suzuka are Fuuka's parents, and that they are both national level athletes. That aside Suzuka is a ten times better romance manga than Fuuka has ever been so I would still definitely recommend it if you have the time (never watched its anime though but as far as I know it was a very incomplete adaptation so you are probably better off with the manga).

In any case, Fuuka is to a large extent a rather old school and cliché romance drama. We begin with the fairly reserved and introverted protagonist Haruna Yuu who prefers to spend his spare time on Twitter over hanging out with friends, who one day moves to a new town. There he runs into a strange yet energetic girl with blue hair called Akatsuki Fuuka; a girl running around wearing a pair of headphones and listening to an old CD-player instead of using a phone. Some misunderstandings ensue, but the two of them eventually sort things out, and in the process end up befriending each other. And so begins the spark of a potential romance in the making. Fuuka is someone living with an uncertain future. Because of her parents she is largely expected to become a professional athlete as well, but that is not something she wants to become. Instead, she spends a lot of time outside hanging out with Yuu in order to try to find what she really wants to do in life. And eventually, the answer she arrives at with Yuu's help, is music, which alongside romance is the central theme of the story as the two of them set out to start a band together with their friends from school.

It all sounds simple enough, but unfortunately, there are some serious problems with Fuuka as an anime. First and foremost, the drama is incredibly forced and unnatural more often than not. Numerous times we have girls just so happening to show up at *just* the right/wrong moment in order to catch Yuu in some interaction with another girl, leading to misunderstanding upon misunderstanding which the story then has to go about an episode or two sorting out only to return to the status quo again. There is even a scene in the first episode where Yuu and Fuuka are supposed to meet up in town and end up missing each other for a ridiculously long time just because they were standing on opposite sides of a statue at their decided meeting location. I mean seriously? Just how stupid is that? Or how about how she just casually breaks his phone in the opening scene of the show just because he (completely unintentionally) caught a glimpse of her panties? I mean people... would not normally do that, not to mention how Yuu actually reacts to the situation as if it somehow *is* normal. The story has a tendency of generating its continuity through quite simply retarded character behavior which in turn results in drama.

The second problem is the characters themselves. While Fuuka is an all-round likable girl with her cheerful and constantly energetic personality, she, just like everyone else in the show, has a tendency to sometimes act incredibly abnormal just for sake of drama as mentioned previously. But you also have to ask just why she would fall in love with Yuu to begin with? Sure, he helped her find a new passion in music by starting a band together, but beyond that Yuu is kind of a doormat. He is cautious and anti-social in nature and generally just follows along wherever Fuuka drags him along, and just feels incredibly bland and uninteresting in general. And do not even get me started on the other band members, they are so forgettable and have so little character development that their sole purpose in the show is effectively to be Yuu's and Fuuka's sidekicks by providing instrumental support. The final character of note is Hinashi Koyuki: an old childhood friend of Yuu who has now become a popular idol. She creates what is a rather unnecessary love triangle by frequently trying to get in-between Fuuka and Yuu, which not only causes drama in-between them but also on a larger scale when her idol otaku fans find out about her feelings after some pictures end up being leaked on the internet. And now we are really getting into the epitome of ridiculous character behavior by seeing how aggressively and violently some of her fans react to the news. Granted I am well aware that there are in fact some really crazy idol fans out there in the real world too, but still come on.

The third and final major issue with Fuuka is the anime original content. This is fairly difficult to talk about without spoiling anything, but basically everything from the middle of episode eight and onwards is all anime original. Now, the manga is quite infamous for having one of the most wtf plot twists ever a couple of volumes in which completely alters the story for all future, and not in a good way. This also happens to be one of the worst kept secrets in the anime community though so if you have somehow avoided being spoiled on this then... congratulations. As stupid as this development was though, it was at least quite unique, and really it is without a doubt the most memorable part of the entire manga. So when the anime then decided to not even adapt this at all and instead to go off do something different altogether, I was left with some rather mixed feelings. Sure, if the original version is bad to begin with then doing something else in the anime is not a bad idea on paper, but replacing it with something equally mediocre is not really an improvement. The manga's version was at least unorthodox and unexpected even if it was dumb, but the anime's version is bad *and* generic on top of it. I do not know about you, but personally I would rather take the former. Furthermore, the reason the manga's development is bad is not because of the twist itself (that was actually kind of cool I thought), but rather that the author seemingly ran out of steam completely because ever since it happened, there has been absolutely nothing good happening in it, and that is now over 100 chapters ago... which is kind of inexcusable. However, since the anime would not have covered very far beyond the twist with merely 12 episodes anyway, that would not really have been a problem so why not just adapt it faithfully for as long as the timespan allows and then stop? That would have made sense to me. At the very least it should have been better than the manga if so, but now... I am not so sure. Because instead, we are left with a bunch of additional forced drama between Yuu, Fuuka and Koyuki for our anime original ending, with a heavily increased emphasis on the latter compared to the manga. And while I guess we at least got a sort of conclusive ending for anime-only viewers this way, it still felt very underwhelming in the end.

According to an interview with the anime staff and the original mangaka uploaded to Animenewsnetwork on March 17th, Seo Kouji said that while he had never regretted taking the manga in the peculiar direction he did, he had always been thinking about the what-if scenario where had decided not to, and thus said that if Fuuka was finally getting an anime adaptation he would like to take the chance to showcase this what-if scenario in the anime instead, and apparently the anime's producer thought the same. I guess that is a simple and understandable reason, but it also feels more like self-satisfaction than trying to come up with the best final product anime-wise to me. Also, if he really felt that way, was there any reason to throw in all these subtle teasers about the twist throughout the anime only to then never adapt it anyway? It literally feels like nothing but an attempt at trolling and baiting those anime viewers who had already read the manga, which would be rather unprofessional if so.

If there is anything positive to mention about this anime though, it would definitely be the music. Of course this might be expected to go hand-in-hand with being an actual music anime, but either way the live performances in Fuuka are actually pretty awesome. Especially the first half of episode eight (right before the original content starts) was really enjoyable to listen to, and by far the best scene of the anime. Granted, this naturally depends on your taste in music as well, but at the very least I think the band performances were really well-made when they actually gave it their all (though it would have been nice if there was a greater song repertoire used throughout the anime). And that is one thing which was most certainly a hell of a lot better than in the manga; there are few things more awkward than reading about a supposedly awesome concert when all you are hearing is the deafening sound of complete and utter silence set to still imagery.

Overall though, the main problems with Fuuka stem from the manga being mediocre to begin with rather than it being anyone at Diomedea's fault, and while the decision to go anime original is questionable and in my mind probably wrong, I can still somewhat understand it, and relatively speaking it still resulted in a final product which is not necessarily too much worse than its source material (which admittedly does not say very much). The music elements of the show also come across a lot better in anime format due to actual presence of audio this time, so overall I would still say this was an okay-ish adaptation relative to the manga all things considered. Unfortunately, that still does not make it a very good anime in this case.

ghostreconspartJul 8, 2017 6:44 AM

Apr 1, 2017 5:03 AM

HaXXspetten

*hug noises*

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May 2013

32066

Gabriel Dropout

Spoiler Free Review
Pls send feedback if you have any

The roles of order and chaos. I'm quite sure you know them. Angels are our saving grace, guiding us towards a life of selflessness and enlightenment. Demons wish to destroy any sign of ethics and morals, dragging us down to temptation and corruption. This knowledge has been passed down for generations, becoming a firm image of how we perceive heaven and hell... well, at least that was the case until Gabriel Dropout came out.

After coming down to Earth to study humans, top-of-her-class heaven honour student/angel Gabriel Tenma White stumbles across an MMO (aka Massive Multiplayer Online) video game in her room and get's utterly addicted. (How it got there is beyond me, it just kinda appeared) Once a dignified being of light, she has now crumbled into nothing but a NEET who cares little about others. We watch as Gabriel desperately tries to retain her newfound shut-in life, and along with a few friends that are also unable to properly act like their roles as angels and demons, their wacky mayhem provides us with a decent amount of entertainment, but ends up kinda lacklustre in the end.

Plot progression? Never heard of it. Gabriel Dropout is an episodic anime, with only the last few eps really having any signs of continuance. (but even then there's this random little timeskip between eps that really confused me for like a minute or two) The little story that is there is incredibly predictable, only really providing some cheap drama and a laugh. So the story isn't that important, most animes like this don't place focus on plot, so what does it have? Comedy!

Most of the comedy comes from the many faults of each character. In addition to our otaku angel, we have a fairly likable roster that consists of Vignette Tsukinose April, the nicest demon you'll ever meet, Raphiel Shiraha Ainsworth, an angel that enjoys the suffering of others, (don't worry she ain't a torturing/killing type, she just enjoys messing with people) and Satanichia Kurumizawa McDowell, future queen of hell! (or at least that's what she tell everyone, she's actually quite the klutz) Each episode revolves around at least one of these four as they try and live a normal school life. It's incredibly hit and miss, some of the comedy making you burst out laughing while others just tend to not really leave a mark. It has a few jokes that are pretty clever, but in terms of comparisons, there are animes that have better humour. This is in no way saying Gabriel Dropout is bad, but it kinda sits in the shadow of other shows from this season like Konosuba: God's Blessing on This Wonderful World! 2, Miss Kobayashi's Dragon Maid and even Interviews with Monster Girls.

There isn't really anything else to talk about when it comes to characters. Besides the main four, we get a few recurring people that are only really there to add to the comedy. Character development is non-existent, which is not that unusual for this kinda show, but when the anime revolves around how someone changed drastically for the worse, you kinda expect to see more talk about how heaven reacts to their top student's mighty fall. You see a glimpse of this happening, but it just ends up as another joke and become nothing more.

The angel/demon theme is only really explored in a few eps, most of the time it's only used to carry a joke. We get a glimpse into how heaven and hell works, but not enough to actually peak any interest. I understand its focus is on comedy but to leave what looked like such an important part of the anime untouched just indicates a show lacking in direction.

I'm unsure whether I really enjoyed this anime as a whole. The comedy was nice but the rest is just mediocre. If all you want is a laugh, then I would recommend this, but for those that want a little more, you should look elsewhere.

Doga Kobo might not be the absolute biggest name in the anime industry but if there is one thing they have truly made a name for themselves for, then it is their aptitude at making moe comedies. With an repertoire including the likes of Himouto Umaru-chan, New Game and of course the legendary Yuru Yuri among others, this is truly the studio's specialty. Adding to this lineup, this season we now have Gabriel DropOut, which once again showcases just how to make this genre shine at its very brightest.

Gabriel DropOut can briefly be described as role-reversed angels and demons turned moe. The story mainly follows two angels and two demons, who all end up moving from Heaven and Hell respectively to the human world upon starting high school. The catch is that the angels in question are a lot less admirable than you might expect, whereas the demons are not particularly evil. It is a simple twist on paper, but it ends up working to great comedic effect more often than not in this rather mean-spirited comedy show.

Given the nature of the anime, it is unsurprisingly largely character-driven. First of all there is the show's supposed main character Gabriel, named after the archangel. She is someone who used to be a picture-perfect angel with the most pristine, beautiful smile whose sole intention was to spread as much happiness as possible in the human world. That is until she one day randomly ends up playing an MMO as a healer in order to help the other players (how the game ended up on her laptop in the first place is never explained but whatever), only to find that people were dying when she ran out of mana, causing her to purchase an exclusive premium healing staff for real money in desperation. And this turns to be the starting point of Gabriel quickly going down a slippery slope until she eventually becomes a self-centered game addict and a hikikomori. In other words, basically a lost cause and in this case a fallen angel. She is rather reminiscent of Doma Umaru from Himouto Umaru-chan in this sense, but Gabriel is even more hopeless since unlike Umaru she 1) does not put in any effort in school or try to keep up appearances either, and 2) fully embraces the NEET lifestyle and does not even try to improve herself whatsoever, much to the dismay of her friends.

Speaking of which, her best friend is Vigne (who I think is supposed to represent the demon Vine but I am not sure), a very diligent and kind-hearted demon who only wants to help people. Her devotion manages to get Gabriel to at least get out of her room and attend school sometimes, but unfortunately that is not the way demons are supposed to behave, and thus she sometimes finds herself in just as much trouble as Gabriel regarding lack of financial support from back home. The poor girl just cannot find it in herself to be evil as much as it is expected from someone in her position.

Someone who most definitely wants to be as evil as possible though is the so-called "future queen of hell" Satanichia—more commonly known as Satania—which is quite obviously a feminized version of Satan. She is perhaps the real star of this show as most of its funniest gags revolve around her... or rather her misfortune. Put simply, Satania is an idiot, and her attempts at being evil always end in complete failure. Also, the other girls are generally pretty mean to her in return for all the nuisances she creates. This is undoubtedly the most mean-spirited part of the show as Satania is most often treated as the butt of everyone else's jokes, but it works out surprisingly well because of the light-hearted nature of it all (and let us be honest here, quite a lot of the abuse she is given is well deserved).

Although pretty much everyone has a piece of Satania every now and then, the main culprit behind Satania's torment however is the fourth and final of our main characters: Raphiel (named after the archangel Raphael). She is a former classmate of Gabriel's from their days up in Heaven, and whilst she may look like a model honor student at a glance, she is actually both a sadist and a huge troll whose favorite pastime is manipulating and toying with Satania in various ways. As she already proved in Prison School, HanaKana is surprisingly adept at voice acting sadistic girls, and the case with Raphiel's character is no different.

There is not much in the way of actual plot progression throughout the show. There are a couple backstory segments showcasing how Gabriel and Vigne first met, and in some of the latter episodes we also get to see some more glimpses of what Heaven and Hell look like when the girls temporarily go back home on vacation, which also lets us meet their families. Beyond that though, the show mostly consists of standalone skits (usually like four segments per episode or so), however that is totally fine because this is purely a comedy show at heart, and quite a lot of the time it is actually legitimately hilarious. I cannot actually label it as the comedy of the season for the simple reason that KonoSuba 2 happened to be airing simultaneously, but during any normal circumstances it certainly would be. Granted, humour is very subjective so I cannot promise anything, but at the very least I can say that I thoroughly enjoyed every single episode of the series.

Gabriel DropOut is not a complicated series, but it executes its own premise excellently and delivers a consistently enjoyable and momentarily hilarious experience. Combined with Doga Kobo's typical clean and shiny moe art style (and a fantastic ED I might add), it all amounts to one of the best moe comedies I have seen in quite some time.

PS: For whatever reason, Crunchyroll's subtitles for this anime are absolutely cringeworthy. In what universe does "Itadakimasu~" translate to "Through the Dark Lord Amen" if I may ask? Keep your 4chan memes away from my subs please, because if you think you are being funny I am sorry to disappoint you. Hopefully some fansub group will pick this show up and retranslate it from scratch sometime in the near future so that it might actually be bearable to read.

Gabriel DropOut is just one of those many shows that are not to be taken too seriously, or rather It doesn't want to be taken seriously. The creators intentions are easy to read. It just wants some commercial appeal and it wants the audience to just lay back and have some fun. But that is where the anime kinda fell flat. When you're not offering much and whatever you're offering is quite underwhelming I don't really have much to take either.

The anime is about angels and demons being sent to Earth to learn about Humans and their life. There isn't a compelling story or anything. It revolves around 4 characters: Gabriel and Raphiel who are the angels, Satanichia and Vignette who are demons. These characters could be a hit or a miss. Their personalities could come off as either cute or annoying, Personally, I have mixed opinions about them. They carry the plot but the way they are written is too lazy and inconsistent, I didn't wanna say that for an anime like this but that's just how bad it is. Normally I would give a pass but this really bugged me. Nothing is very genuine or creative, it's just forced.

The main character Gabriel becomes a fallen angel, Her care free and lazy attitude is exhausting to watch. It doesn't make me laugh, it makes me lazy lol. Similarly for Satanichia who is actually one of the more likable characters. Her narcissistic attitude is funny but she is used as a really dumb person to just convey a joke, her stupidity doesn't make laugh, it makes me sad...and sometimes cringe. There have been shows which have attempted this and I thought did it well like "Himuto! Umaru chan", There was always a charm and Hilarity about Himouto's laziness that I didn't get from this show or something like "Baka to Test to Shoukanjuu" where they made clever use of Idiocy. These are shows that share similar ambitions with Gabriel DropOut but they actually do a pretty good job. It's sad cause Gabriel DropOut could maybe, be put in that category if there was more effort put into it.

The animation is decent. Nothing extraordinary but it has good detail and I appreciate the variety of Colors used. It does well to bring out the lighthearted atmosphere and the urban setting. The character designs are pretty decent too. The soundtrack is nothing special, I guess it does the job but there nothing for me to really appreciate about it. The OP and ED are just alright.

I don't wanna be harsh on this anime but at the same time I can't really give it a pass either. At the end of the day, This is not something I would recommend or not recommend. If you want to watch it, go ahead. If you don't, you're not really missing out on anything. Even with it's glaring flaws, Gabriel DropOut is overall a pretty okayish anime with some good moments here and there. I'd give this a 5/10.

Hand Shakers

*TL;DR Section at the end of the review. This review may or may not contain minor spoilers.*

Hand Shakers was and is the greatest show of Winter 2017... or so I wish I could say with full confidence.

Welcome to Hand Shakers, quite possibly the worst show of Winter 2017 and of the year thus far. In fact, I'd go so far as to say it will most definitely be the worst show this year, by miles. This is how horrendous this show really is.

Hand Shakers entails young Tazuna Takatsuki and Koyori Akutagawa whom are Hand Shakers: receivers of the Revelation of Babel or some shit, and are destined to fight God himself via... holding hands? Well, it couldn't possibly be that bad, right? Wrong. So wrong. Not only is the story itself poorly executed, just about everything else went dreadfully, discounting the art (the one saving grace of this show. Also, Koyori is kinda cute, but I'll talk about the characters more later). Watching this show will absolutely make you want to throw up from motion sickness, as they constantly shake and move the camera during fight scenes. In fact, there are very few instances where there is action going on with a still camera. Not only is the just the cinematography style bad, the animation itself is just so bad it's laughable. So many scenes of the characters running in place whilst moving the background making it look so... gross, and many other things such as poor human movement or bad scene-switching. And the CGI... oh man. I could go on and on for days about how terribly animated this show was (curse you, GoHands), but let's move on to how the characters were.

Bad. That's how they were. MC Tazuna has a catchphrase of "I made it mesh!" or something similar. Now, there's an art to picking a good sounding catchphrase that doesn't tire and sounds good. For example, Naruto Uzumaki from the Naruto series "dattebayo!" This doesn't get boring or overly annoying. Tazuna manages to to make his catchphrase sound so frustratingly annoying within the first three times he uses it, which blows my mind. You then have Koyori, who ***spoiler alert here*** is a mute for just about 9 episodes, then starts talking. And she only talks about being together with Tazuna. That's about it for her lines. ***end spoiler here***

Along with that, the characters and enemies they meet range from a hardworking couple, a sister and a brother (the sister is a brocon), an unpopular idol and her rather unfit manager who moves around like a superhuman (part of being a Hand Shaker, I guess...) and an edgy scientist. There's also Makihara, the "teacher" like figure who constantly contradicts himself and won't stop talking about shumai. This vast character pool would have at least one interesting character, right? Wrong again. None of these characters last more than 2-3 episodes (other than the main cast and some supporting characters) and they aren't touched upon except in the worst ways, like the brocon girl.

TL;DR: Hand Shakers is quite possibly the worst anime in recent years and you will not benefit from watching it whatsoever. Watching it in itself is hardly enjoyable, due to the many animation and character flaws it holds. I will never be able to recommend this show to anybody, even those masochists our there much like myself who can manage to finish this show. Take it from me, and do not watch this show unless you're really into some hardcore handshaking.

Kobayashi-san Chi no Maid Dragon

TL;DR Section at the end of the review. This review may or may not contain minor spoilers.

Ah, Kobayashi-san Chi no Maid Dragon. How you lived up to my expectations. Bless you, KyoAni, for creating something so fun and enjoyable to watch to kick off 2017.

Kobayashi-san Chi no Maid Dragon stars Kobayashi, a hard-working stoic programmer who happens to find a dragon out in the middle of forest while she happened to be drunk from a night of drinking heavily. The next morning when she goes off for work, she's greeted by the same intimidating dragon at her doorstep!? And what's more, the dragon then changes into a girl, who begs to be a maid for Kobayashi herself!? Meet Tohru (Tooru), the energetic maid dragon.

What really sets this show apart from other Slice of Life/Comedy shows is that it's really earnest and just gives off a warm, happy feeling. It doesn't try too hard to make you want to watch and love it, and laugh at some of the comedy it shows. All the characters you meet are entertaining in their own right, some of which coming with their own running joke. Watching Tohru try so hard to be the best maid she can for Kobayashi gives the same feeling of watching anybody learn to do something for the first time and seeing them trying their best at it. It's a good, warm, fluffy feeling on the inside. Kanna is a young but smart dragon who also lives with Kobayashi and Tohru. In the human world, she goes to elementary school and learns like any other student, yet befriends the person who all would say is stuck-up and rude. With an upbeat OP and catchy ED, this show immediately catches the hearts of many. KyoAni even teases us at some point by showing off this brilliant and extremely detailed 30 second fight scene, just to say "We can still do this."

TL;DR: While showing a cute and upbeat setting, Kobayashi-san Chi no Maid Dragon is an endearing and heartwarming show of dragons learning to live in the human world. A world class show in its own right (+1 if you get the in-joke), this show won't fail to make you smile and love it the entire way through.

Kobayashi-san Chi no Maid Dragon Specials

Kono Subarashii Sekai ni Shukufuku wo! 2

Spoilers from the first season, none about the second. Pls send feedback if you have any.

After the hilarious Season 1, many have had high hopes for this one. Our return to our favourite four, KonoSuba: God's Blessing on This Wonderful World! 2 delivers and it delivers hard.

We arrive right after where Season 1 left off, Kazuma Satou is accused of the crime of blowing up a former Nobel Aldarp Alex Barnes' mansion after saving Axel from the Mobile Fortress Destroyer. After that problem is hilariously dealt with, we return to our usual shenanigans with the Perverted NEET Adventurer, the Idiotic Pantyless Goddess Aqua, the Masochistic Noble Crusader Lalatina "Darkness" Dustiness Ford, and the Chuunibyou Loli Arch-Wizard Megumin.

As you probably know from watching Season 1, (at least, I assume you've watched it) KonoSuba is an episodic anime. There is not much plot progression except for a few arcs scattered around. So does that mean we won't ever see the Devil King? Not exactly. We can all tell that he will be the final boss, and Konosuba is nowhere close to ending, but we can still see mentions of him through his Demon Generals. Every so often one pops up for them to either defeat or befriend. But enough about the story, it's not the most important factor of this anime. Let's talk about what really makes this show amazing.

The comedy of Konosuba is what drives the series. I have to warn you, this anime's main focus is its ability to make viewers laugh, so it can either be a hit or miss for most people. It revolves around Kazuma and his party, using their flaws and mistakes to bring out a chuckle. The formula is simple. The gang receive a goal, stumble around and manage to achieve it, but usually not without consequences. It's pretty easy to understand, but the way it executes it is where it shines. What could have become tired and repetitive, Konosuba hits us again and again with fresh outrageous situations that bring out the best and the worst (usually the worst) out of our lovable screw-ups.

The characters are what really make this anime shine. Extremely flawed as they might be, you can't help but fall in love with every single part of the gang. (except for Aqua, you can't help but hate her just a little bit) Every interaction between each party member is hilarious and oddly realistic, like a group of friends happily messing around with each other. Even the background characters feel like they have a genuine personality. Everyone in Konosuba may be the butt of one joke, (Kazuma being called scum, Chris getting her panties stolen) but the execution of all of them provides a fun roster of characters that never cease to make me laugh.

Now, the animation is where a lot of people get turned off. The background and the action are amazing, I think most can agree with that. Where Konosuba gets controversial is the character animation. It may seem lazy at first, but a lot of the characters are animated in a way to make the show funnier than it would be without it. The use of stretch and squash techniques to make the show more visually comedic allow jokes to translate better and give it a better chance of getting us to laugh. But that doesn't make it perfect. Corners are cut, and if you know where to pause, you can see frames that are just not up to standard. Is that a bad thing? I guess, but in my opinion, it's a flaw that can be easily looked over and seen as minuscule.

The second Season of KonoSuba: God's Blessing on This Wonderful World! is a tremendous sequel that must be watched by anyone that enjoyed the first Season. As long as you don't mind the animation flaws, this is quite the enjoyable experiences for fans of the "Transported to Another World" anime trope

P.S Darkness best girl Megumin is second place

Kuzu no Honkai

Have you gotten sick of "romance" anime consisting of nothing but innocent teenagers blushing like tomatoes at the mere thought of holding hands yet? Are you sick of seeing "relationships" implying that there may or may not be a confession in the last minute of the final episode and nothing beyond that? Well then Kuzu no Honkai might be for you, because this anime has more romantic progression in its first five minutes than most romance anime do in their entire runtime, and it manages to break one, two, maybe even three taboos in the process as well.

Kuzu no Honkai at heart represents the ugliness of human emotions and carnal base desires. It looks into the darker side of romance and tackles matters which romance anime basically never does. This is not a story about how to woo your would-be waifu of choice, but rather it deals with issues such as how to emotionally cope with having an impossible unrequited love, reflecting on yourself as a human being and opening your eyes to your own flaws, and considering what it must be like for the target of your unrequited affection if you force your own feelings onto them. It showcases how love truly is blind and that you can end up falling for the wrong person against your better judgement, and you just cannot help but desire them anyway. It is a very depressive and heart-wrenching story throughout, but also psychological and packed to the brim with moral lessons to be learned. And it all culminates in one of the most unique, artistic and legitimately fascinating romance anime I have ever seen.

In many ways, Kuzu no Honkai is effectively the polar opposite of most romance anime. Mind you, that does not mean that it is too much more realistic; in fact Kuzu no Honkai is just as exaggerated except in the opposite direction. While the characters are all (more or less) realistic individually, the fact that they all happen to be such emotionally broken wrecks and that they are somehow all connected in one big messy love polygon at the same time is a bit too implausible. However, realism is ultimately not the main purpose of this story, but rather to provide a significantly less glorified outlook on romance that showcases that love is not always easy and not always as beautiful as anime generally likes to make it out to be.

The first thing I really like about Kuzu no Honkai is how it does not beat around the bush. Whilst most anime characters seem scared to even hold hands with their respective crush, in this anime we have Mugi and Hanabi willingly tongue-wrestling with each other within the first three minutes of the first episode. This then proves to be nothing more than a prelude of what is to come as the anime has a lot of actual sexual interaction between numerous different characters over the course of the story. However, it is also done in a way which makes it seem like it is not really a big deal to have sex, and that it is something merely a natural part of relationships or even done just for the sake of emotional comfort. You are never given the impression that the sex scenes in Kuzu no Honkai are anything perverted or something out of the ordinary enough to freak out about. This is also largely attributed to the very artistic directing of the anime. What might otherwise have been written off as nothing but smut ends up coming across as something poetic and emotional, albeit perhaps not straight-up beautiful due to the anime's rather questionable morals. The visuals make great usage of the original manga's design by actually showcasing a lot of screens with multiple manga style panels instead of normal full screen animation. It is a bit difficult to explain without seeing it with your own eyes, but I personally found it very effectual and artistic, and it greatly helped to set the rather melancholic tone of the anime as a whole.

At heart, the anime is mostly about hopeless affections. The two main characters Mugi and Hanabi are both in love with someone else who they know they can probably never have, and only utilize each other as replacements for their actual crushes. But they are not the only outcasts in this anime as amogst the other people involved in the love polygon we have a homosexual, a man-eating slut, and more. Everyone has some sort of deep-rooted emotional issue as for why their feelings are almost assuredly never going to transcend into mutual love along with their crush, and they all have different ways of trying to deal with it, such as self-denial, clouding of judgement, or just selfishly forcing their feelings upon their beloved regardless of the consequences. This all results in the whole situation becoming increasingly messy and entangled with each passing episode, which makes the story both unpredictable and dramatic, but it also fills you with some sort of sadistic pleasure by watching everyone's worlds continuously come crumbling down, solely to then be able to watch in fascination how the characters somehow try to climb out of the holes they themselves created. It is a pretty typical case of curiosity killed the cat.

The main question you have to ask yourself whilst watching this anime is "what is the right thing to do?" in the characters' respective circumstances. More often than not, the logical answer and the emotional answer stand in direct contradiction to one another. Their heads tell them that they should try to let go of their hopeless feelings of affection, but their hearts say that they have to keep pushing forward, no matter the cost. And really, you cannot say that one option is any more or less "correct" than the other. Is it acceptable to sacrifice someone else's happiness in pursuit of your own, and is it okay to keep feigning ignorance of reality just because the current lie you are living in "feels good"? There is not really a right answer here, as regardless of what you do, someone is guaranteed to end up miserable and unhappy in the end no matter what, and Kuzu no Honkai showcases this dilemma to great effect.

Of course that is not to say that there are not a couple of times where I feel like the writers go a bit too far whilst trying to overplay the misery that Kuzu no Honkai has to offer. Especially Akane--who is arguably the real bad guy in this mess (if you can call her that)--sometimes feels a bit *too* malicious. The way she just casually tries to break Hanabi's heart in the most sickening ways possible time and time again feels like it goes a bit beyond what her own motivations seem to rationally justify that she should want to, and there is also one scene where you can see her sadistically licking her lips the way a second-rate villain from some B movie would do... which seems like they writers are trying to force on the image that "this woman is evil" a bit too directly. That is not to say that Akane does not function as a villain though because she is certainly a character you love to hate, but I cannot help but find the way they reached that goal to have been a bit forced at times.

In the grand scheme of things though, the hiccups of Kuzu no Honkai are rather sparse in comparison to how many good things there are about it. It is an unorthodox and exceptionally well-written show with very interesting characters. It also has some very artistic directing in general and even boasts with having some absolutely superb opening and ending themes. And while the story as a whole might still feel a bit implausible at times, it nonetheless gets its messages across in great fashion. Ultimately, what you are left with is one of the most memorable romance dramas in a very long time, and although it is certainly not an anime for everyone given its controversial themes, I think it is also one of those shows which if you manage to see it for what it truly is, then there really are not very many series quite like it. Overall, Kuzu no Honkai is probably the best romance anime I have seen in the last few years, and one I will eagerly recommend people for a long time to come as well.

The title of the anime speaks volumes about the show itself — Scums, as in deplorable people, wanting to fulfil their desires in love.

How dreadful can they be perhaps? Well, you’re either the one who uses people as sex toys to fantasize about people you can’t have, or you might be the one who forcefully engages in physical intimacy with a friend who treasures you too much as a friend to refuse, or you could also be the one who uses the lust of people to take them away from the ones who desire them, as you yourself has basically nothing to do in life.

Notice that all examples have a thing in common – the manipulation of others, as all the characters in the show have taken down the dark road of fulfilling their own desires by using other people. With no emotional connection to the people you’re using, however, this is easy to do. But things begin to get complicated when it involves their loved ones, which throws our unlikeable heroes into turmoil as they are conflicted about saving either themselves or others. And no, this isn’t the show whereby characters are self-sacrificial martyrs who value their 'nakamas'. Instead, the show like to put their heroes in an emotional battle royale as they destroy one another all for the sake of fulfilling their desires.

The show, however, doesn’t shove in horrible characters for the sake of it. It does take the time to shed light on them by revealing their pasts, outlook of life, and so on. So, no matter how fucked up they are, at least you know what made them that way.

To emphasise my point, I will talk about the sex maniac Akane – She wants people to desire her, and indirectly take them away from others who desire them. Why does she do it? Because she herself is incapable of loving something or someone, and the only way she knows the value of someone is by observing how others value them, and in turn, she then entices the desired individual to see the value he has for herself. Her fucked up personality comes from a horrible background of always being objectified due to her good looks, and that people have always turned to look at her with eyes of a sex-deprived beast, rather than eyes who look deeply into the soul to have an emotional connection. Hence, feeling emotionally connected is an alien and impossible thing for her. A terrible character that you can't help but get mad, yet feel sorry for. And like her, the other characters are of similar ‘wonderfully constructed and understandable scum’.

The show explores themes that are very common in Western Romance drama series like the fine line between lust and love and the concepts of ‘no strings attached’ and ‘friends with benefits’. The fact that we’re having this explored is anime is in a sense, refreshing. It strays from the usual Rom-Coms where MC's are too embarrassed to even witness the undergarments of the opposite sex and instead depicts the characters engaging in physical intimacy, using it as a drug which treats their malnourished soul which lacks warmth, and as they use the drug more and more, their inability to be emotionally connected with others strengthens.

Logical and rational behaviour shows that if one desires emotional connections, one shouldn't engage in activities that try to suppress it. And how the characters are so oblivious to this fact makes them look so pathetic. It is infuriating, the show wants the viewers to sympathize with these people and in the unlikely scenario that they do, it becomes a depressing shitshow as you see characters destroy themselves like how you see people post self-inflicted wounds on social media and there's nothing you could do about it, no matter how you wish for them to get better and move on with life, they don't. It is futile and hopeless.

As depressing as it can be, we are at least given an end of this dark and depressing tunnel with an ending that wraps up everything nicely. With a single episode, it reveals how our scummy friends finally developed a rationale that they no longer need to use others as a crutch to cope with loneliness, but instead face loneliness head on and move forward with life. We also see that as scum-like as these characters are, inside, they are just broken, vulnerable people like all of us who just wants a happy ending that can get them out of the shithole that they are in. And when they finally do have a happy ending, instead of being angry and say that they don’t deserve it, we can all show a bittersweet grin for our despicable scums have become..not as despicable.

It is a huge misconception to call this show a realistic one. Yes, it is different from most rom-coms, and it indeed does show that in love, not all of us can get a happy ending, however, a show where manipulation is in abundance while emotional connections are non-existent isn't an accurate display of what love really is. It is a balance between the good and bad. One can say that the show is done in this way to makes us appreciate that we are not in the hell that these characters are in.

Manipulation, a lack of emotional connections, yes you WILL feel like crap as you watch this as it is basically crappy characters doing crappy things, but there is a likelihood that you can take a thing or two from this show to ponder upon, as the message that the show attempts to convey is a very simple one – One needs to stand strong and take the bitter pill that comes along with love and move on instead of trying to helplessly cling on via destructive acts. Oh and feeling intimacy with someone emotionally >>>>> physical intimacy ( a no brainer that these scums need to realise since episode 1)

"Kuzu no Honkai" is the most fucked up show I've seen since "School days". Honestly, this show could be a Hit or a miss for most people. For me, fortunately or unfortunately it was big miss. Although I do appreciate the boldness to create and put out something like this this, can't say I'm a fan of it.

There really isn't much I can appreciate about the anime. It is a cringe-fest of a show with a few okay moments. There isn't much to the story, it isn't very eventful or progressive, it relies heavily on the discovery and the development of the characters, which in my opinion is it's biggest flaw. There is not a single character I like in this show, Everyone is annoying as fuck and in no way relatable, they're so bland and poorly written, they all just seem like they are different versions of themselves. They are all so fucked up and their actions are so forced and predictable. Their dialogues are so corny and wannabe-deep. When their thoughts are narrated in a first person narrative it is sooo exhausting to even listen to them. Their designs are however not bad and there are a few comic moments that stood out and made them likeable, even if it was for just a moment.

Another huge flaw are the sex scenes, I don't have any problems with sex scenes but here it's just so forced and over-saturated, like there is a mandatory sex scene in every episode which kinda halts whatever this show is going for and gives us a few minutes of just pure cringe. it is just so uncomfortable to watch their movements and listen to their dialogues. They don't even really have sex, it's just boring to watch. If you're reading this and want to watch this show for this kinda content, I would suggest putting your dick back inside and look for something else lol.

One thing I've seen this show being praised for is it's "maturity". Which I strongly disagree, although this anime does seem to have that kind of ambitions, it's stray far away from it or rather comes off as very pseudo-mature. Really, how does a bunch of junior high kids who try to compensate their desires and insecurities through such fucked up pretentious acts come off as mature? It's doesn't, Oh! and don't get me started on the slutty teacher character who does a bunch of crazy things too. It's not mature at all.

The three things that I do like very much about this show are the Animation, Soundtrack and Voice acting. I appreciate Lerche studio's effort to tell this mess of a story as cohesive as possible. There is good detail and clarity in the animation which truly deserves praise.

The soundtrack is really great too. I really like the OP and ED, the BGM switches up at times and can come off as very unpredictable, which played a major role in helping me sit through this mess. One of the BGMs has like a Piano tune kinda similar to Kanye West's "Runaway". That was really good, overall, great job with the soundtrack. The voice acting was noticeably great as well. Like I mentioned before, the anime is dark but it does have some comic moments, the voice actors transition so well at times like these, it's so genuine. Props to the voice actors.

Overall, to me it's a frustrating watch and I wouldn't seriously recommend this to anyone. But there is some hype around this show at the moment, and some people do seem to like it for whatever reason so maybe you will too. If you're confused whether to watch it or not, just check out the first episode and maybe the second one too, if it intrigues you then continue, if you feel like I how I did, then just drop it.

My rating for this show 3/10.

HaXXspettenApr 5, 2017 2:00 PM

Apr 1, 2017 5:03 AM

HaXXspetten

*hug noises*

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May 2013

32066

Masamune-kun no Revenge

TL;DR Section at the end of the review. Please note that this review may contain minor spoilers. Enjoy!

Story: Masamune-kun no Revenge entails the story of young Masamune Makabe and Aki Adagaki. What makes this stand out from standard romcoms is that Masamune aims to break her heart as she did to him long ago, instead of aiming to be a true couple. However, Aki’s pristine looks and ice cold nature of turning down any who dare ask her out while also giving them a humiliating nickname has earned her the moniker “Cruel Princess.” Will Masamune have his revenge, or will Aki crush him like everyone prior to him?

Characters: Overall, the characters in this show each have their own charm and quirks to make them likeable and possibly relatable in a way. While our grand MC is sometimes as dumb as a brick and can’t take a hint, he still works earnestly towards his goal. Aki’s tsundere-type actions and thoughts are surprisingly not boring and can still be entertaining to see how she reacts to his advances. Fujinomiya Neko plays the girl that loves Masamune since the moment the met, and acts extremely flirty, forward, amongst other things whilst keeping her reason for her love a secret. The supporting characters in the show add some spice and variety (specifically Koiwai Yoshino aka “Master”), but are limited in how much they participate at times.

Main Point: Masamune-kun no Revenge was a fairly well received show this season, landing in the 7.5 and up zone (as of writing this review) and for the most part, this is a fairly above how I felt the show should be rated overall as well (with my score being a 6 out of 10). What makes this show enjoyable from a viewer’s standpoint is that while it is from the romcom / harem genre, it doesn’t overdo it like *some* shows. Granted, the story isn’t too original and is quite honestly bland at some points (i.e. the test of courage scene). Other than cute girls, some fanservice, and a rather mediocre soundtrack, Masamune-kun no Revenge relies more so on keeping it a lighthearted-fun show while trying to keep you interested with how Masamune learns to make Aki fall in love with him. You can easily drop in and out of watching with full attention just to catch the main points per episode and still understand what’s going on.

TL;DR – All in all, Masamune-kun no Revenge is a fairly standard romcom / harem show that you can easily jump in and out of, but you shouldn’t expect any insane twists or huge character developments. This show isn’t a bad place to start if you’re looking to get into this type of genre, and just as easily enjoyable if you’re a veteran watcher. Good for lighthearted fun and discussing “best girl” of the show, though it's not for everyone.

No spoilers in this review, pls send feedback if you have any.

Masamune-kun's Revenge is about one fat boy's dream to make his childhood crush, who rejected his feelings, fall in love with him so he can shut her down faster than you can say "What the fuck am I watching?"

So what does he do to make his dream a reality? He works out, eats healthy, reads a shit tonne of romance manga. After years of "training", he becomes the narcissistic sex machine that we know as Masamune Makabe. (Note: no one in this anime has or will have sex throughout the show. Don't get your hopes up ecchi fans)

But what has become of the childhood crush? Aki Adagaki has made herself an infamous name at her high school. Dubbed "The Cruel Princess", (or as I like to call her "Mega Bitch") she has had many men follow after Masamune's footsteps, hoping to score a date with the beautiful Adagaki. Instead of accepting any of them, she rejects each and everyone one by giving them all a cruel nickname, ruining their fragile reputation.

And that's the show. An interesting premise and two interesting main characters. So where did this all go so wrong? Let's start with the title of the show. When someone's love confession gets rejected, they usually give up. Maybe they'll try again, but if it proves futile then they will give up eventually. Not Masamune. How dare a girl say she doesn't like him. Sure, she could have said it in a nicer way, but a rejection is a rejection. Instead of letting it go like a certain snow queen, he dedicates his life to his revenge. And for what? If he manages to pull it off, the only person really getting hurt is him. His hard earned reputation as the popular ladykiller crumbles as his classmates will only see him as the new school heartbreaker. Adagaki would, in fact, benefit from this revenge, as it would most probably snap her out of her #HateAllMen phase and allow her to actually get herself a good boyfriend. The consequences are so one sided that you wonder if Masamune accidentally lost more than just his belly fat.

The rest of the show is so cliche and predictable, you could remove the revenge theme and turn it into your every day generic harem anime. There is no surprise, no suspense to actually keep you interested. Almost every plot twist does absolutely nothing to change how the anime is progressing. We get a new character, they try and mess up Masamune-kun's Revenge, they fail and become dust in the wind, never to be relevant again.

So, how can I describe the main character? Well, he's an idiot. Masamune's only way of getting Adagaki to swoon is to repeat what he has seen done in manga. A cliche pick up line and a wall slam is what he believes are appropriate ways of getting women to fall for him. And when a girl actually does like him and tries to ask him out, he rejects them. Why? Cause he's already in a commitment with his revenge. Fuck meaningful relationships and a normal high school life, he'd rather try and break one girl's heart then spend the rest of his life happy with virtually anyone else in the freaking school.

Adagaki ain't any better. I cannot for the life of me figure out why such an obvious asshole is so popular and has so many people continuously try asking her out. After the first few guys, you would think the school would take a hint and avoid her, but instead, they put her on a high horse and make her the centre of the universe.

None of the other characters have anything to offer to the show. Shallow and stereotypical, they rely on overreactions to fool viewers into thinking that they have a decent personality. Even the character development is teased at best. All the focus is on the narcissist and the bitch, (even though they stay virtually the same throughout the whole series) every other character could be thrown away and replaced and no one would care. Sometimes you see a glimpse of something more than just a background character, but it never gets expanded on and ends up forgotten.

The only thing I enjoyed from this dreadful experience is the comedy. I'm a sucker for overreactions, and it's the only thing keeping it from being a 1. Instead of the comedy being a plus, it becomes the single thread that this show hangs on, desperately trying to convince you that it has more to offer, even though it never delivers.

What started off as a great first episode filled with potential, crashed and burned harder than Masamune whenever he hears the name "Pig's foot". Watch it if you are a masochist, avoid if you have good taste.

Masamune-kun no Revenge is another one of those anime which sounds quite interesting on paper, but never comes anywhere close to reaching up to its own potential. What could have been an intriguing story about a man's almost lifelong quest for vengeance through devoted self-improvement and utilization of deceit against the girl who made his childhood a living hell instead ended up being nothing more than a cliché, predictable and rather generic romcom. Ultimately, it only leaves you thinking about what it could have been.

In the distant past, Makabe Masamune was a fat kid who found himself being a victim of bullying from numerous other people his age, but especially bad was the abuse from the spoiled rich girl Adagaki Aki, who among other things gave him the nickname "Pig's Foot" for his chubby appearance. This experience seemingly traumatized Masamune growing up, and he started working hard at improving himself through excessive body training and studying shoujo manga to learn what girls are into when it comes to boys. Many years down the road, Masamune has become a handsome narcissistic asshole by the time he starts high school, where he once again meets Aki. She fails to recognize Masamune due to his drastic change in appearance but he identifies her immediately, and vows to finally have his revenge on her by making her fall in love with him only to cruelly dump her on the spot once she confesses to him. Perfect.

Honestly, if that was all the anime was about, I think I would have liked it quite a lot. Having a smartass MC trying to seduce a cold-hearted bitch, only to then promptly enact his revenge upon her by breaking her heart... I mean it sounds like something really amusing and unique on paper, albeit in a somewhat sadistic way. But unfortunately, that is not how the story plays out at all. In the first four episodes, the story mostly consists of Masamune trying to get closer and closer to Aki with the help of his newfound insider accomplice in Aki's maid Yoshino. We get to learn more about Aki's habits and what she's like as a person, and although he has some difficulties with it, the revenge plan still feels like it is slowly moving forwards. However, with the start of episode five, things quickly start to stagnate as a love rival (Neko) is suddenly brought into the picture and the story turns into a more typical romcom all of a sudden. If this had been a series with a premise designed to be nothing more than that from the start then this would have been fine, but really this story did not need to slowly become a harem. The main plot concept revolves around solely Masamune and Aki, so bringing in outsiders merely results in them coming across as obstacles to the story's progression. More importantly though, at this point the revenge concept is all but gone because since this an anime, our MC and main heroine *obviously* have to end up falling in love with each other. Gone was the interesting original premise, and instead we are left with a narcissist and a bitch crushing on each other, but of course they're both far too dense to realize it, especially Aki. How incredibly original.

Another problem with this is that Aki as a character does not really function very well outside the revenge concept. No matter how you look at it, she is just a terrible person through and through. Even discounting the childhood trauma that she inflicted upon Masamune, in her current high school life she is known as the Cruel Princess: a girl totally abusing every single male person she comes across, giving them offensive nicknames, insulting them, rejecting everyone who tries to be nice to her, and just plain treats them like crap. Why? Well supposedly because some guys had been mean to her in her own childhood as well, but what right does that give her to treat completely unrelated people in such a discriminating way? Her entire character is perfectly suited for the villain role of the original revenge plot, but when she is suddenly forced to become a tsundere love interest romcom-style... it just does not fit her at all. And even more mindboggling, what the hell does Masamune of all people see in her to make him fall in love with her despite everything? What happened to your resolve? Even discounting her current terrible personality, did you also somehow forget about everything she put you through as a kid? You know, the reason you sought revenge in the first place? Just how mentally weak can you be?

On the other hand, while his romantic feelings may be questionable, Masamune can at least be somewhat manly about them at times, as he showcases to great effect in episode eight, which is by far and wide the best episode of the anime. But what does that all amount to? Nothing. Absolutely nothing. Whatever strong impact one would have thought that seemingly game-changing episode would have, the anime completely throws it away immediately in the very next episode for seemingly no apparent reason. It felt like the author finally hit the right note for the story without even realizing it himself, and ended up backing on it too quickly. So not only did he first throw away the anime's original potential as a revenge story, but just as it seemed he might actually have successfully converted it into a promising romance story... he throws away that too? Goodness, why? Just what are you trying to do here exactly?

But as if that was not enough, the story then does not just return to the status quo, but it also gets much, much worse. The final three episodes of Masamune-kun no Revenge are simply horrible. I will not spoil any details, but basically at the start of episode 10, a new character called Gasou is introduced whose backstory and mere appearance are so far-fetched it made me twitch my eyebrows. Has the author ever heard of something known as suspension of disbelief? The whole story suddenly starts feeling incredibly implausible, but the way everyone reacts to the situation is even more ridiculous. To begin with Gasou himself is rather tedious to watch in general, but how Aki reacts to his presence is just absurd. It feels like her entire character changes in a split second as if she had some bizarre personality split, and while I technically understand why it happens, that is only a direct consequence of her being unbelievably dense and stupid. How can she possibly not realize the truth? I thought she was supposed to be a pretty smart girl? Again, it all just feels like too much of a plot convenience. And do not even get me started on Aki's so-called "personal guard" and how they decide to interfere with the whole situation for their own absolutely ridiculous reasons, they are just plain annoying and their actions are honestly borderline criminal yet the show treats them as if they are somehow okay or excusable. Furthermore, it is also painfully obvious that the entire story arc (if you can call it that) is just designed to be a roundabout way for Masamune and Aki to eventually get closer to each other, but really... we did not need this. If that was all you wanted, why did you not just continue from the plot development in episode eight instead?? The end result would probably have been the same, but the journey there would have been ten times better. It just baffles me.

Overall, Masamune-kun no Revenge feels like a story written without much initial thought put into it by the author, almost like if he changed his mind every few weeks while writing about what direction he wanted to take the story in. As a result, it just ends up all over the place but ultimately going almost nowhere. It leaves behind an uncomfortable feeling of wasted potential on multiple levels, and a story which could and perhaps should have been a lot better than what it actually turned out to be. However, if we look past whatever potential the series may have had for a second and just look at the final product instead, then at the very least it passes as an average generic romcom. That is certainly not what I wanted it to be, but it is what we got, and looking at it that way it is at least rarely straight-up boring. Yes, it is packed to the brim with clichés, but really what romcom is not nowadays? Masamune-kun no Revenge could have been a great anime. It did not become a great anime however, but it is still at least a tolerable one. I just wish premises like this could be left for authors who actually plan on doing something interesting with them rather than just going back to what has already been done in a hundred different other anime already.

Oh and Masamune's mother is also a loli who looks to be about five years younger than her own daughter. Why? I have no idea.

Nyanko Days

One Room

One Room is like the anime equivalent of having an abortion: a perfect representation of why there is a birth rate problem in Japan. The mere fact that this anime even exists is legitimately disturbing.

On paper, One Room sounds decent and simple enough. It is a short series (4-minute episodes) about an ordinary guy interacting with a few different girls in everyday situations, pretty much like any other slice of life short. If that was really all there was to it then One Room would probably have been just fine, however unfortunately that is not the case, because this is quite frankly one of the creepiest anime I have ever watched.

One Room takes place from a first-person perspective, more specifically a *silent* first-person perspective. You essentially take the role of the main character directly, where the camera's focus represents where his eyes are looking, and on top of that he never speaks out loud. So what ends up happening is that a girl starts up a conversation with the guy, and then "you" are expected to reply back. There is a brief moment of silence where you as the viewer are supposed to reply to the girl in front of your own monitor in real life, and then the girl continues talking based on your supposed response. But obviously, different people would reply differently, and there is no canonical establishment of what "you" in the show supposedly said. Thus, the dialogue makes no sense at all. This is the core difference between this and your average visual novel: in a game you would at least know what the MC says since it is written out in text even if he is unvoiced. But here I have no idea what "I" just said to the girl or what she is reacting to as a result. Most of the time I can probably guess it just based on how simplistic the conversation topics are, combined with the fact that the girls tend to seemingly repeat part of what "you" supposedly said in the form of a question at the start of their sentences in a desperate attempt at informing the viewer. But even so, it is still unbearably awkward to watch. Despite only having episodes a few minutes long, the amount of cringeworthy moments in One Room is unbelievable. I do not even want to think about what this would have been like as a full-length TV-series. When self-inserting is taken so far that an anime's protagonist cannot even hold a natural conversation with the other main characters, then it has gone too far. Way too far.

The idea of having a silent first-person perspective in an anime is not unheard of though. For example there is another short called Anitore XX which does a similar thing. However, that anime was basically a fitness show with a bunch of girls doing exercises and giving you instructions for them in real life. There you were not expected to reply back, and it actually felt natural because that is basically what fitness instructors do on real TV as well. But when you have a completely one-sided dialogue where you actually are expected to reply but without establishing what like One Room does, it just fails miserably.

Another thing that kind of bothers me is how One Room essentially forces the viewer to become a total pervert. On the surface, the level of fanservice in this show is rather tame, with nothing but suggestive camera angles and some cliché ecchi dialogue. But again, the first-person perspective makes things very different. Since the camera represents the protagonist's eyes whom you are supposed to self-insert onto, the show basically forces you as the viewer to constantly be undressing all the girls with your eyes. It is not the anime's MC who is being a perv, it is *you*. Do not get me wrong, I am a pervert too so I do not really have a problem with this personally, but the fact of the matter is that I am sure that a lot of this anime's viewers are not, and thus essentially forcing them to feel this way against their will is not something I can approve of on principle. It is kind of like forcing someone to read an ero-doujin about their pure and innocent waifu. Also in the first place this is even ignoring the unexplained fact that these girls seemingly invite themselves into your house for no apparent reason and start acting like your cohabitating lovers from the very first minute (I guess I can somewhat understand the imouto doing it but not the other two).

Now if there is anything good about this anime it would be the visuals. One Room has the honor of having the well-known artist Kantoku himself being responsible for the character designs, and as a result all the girls look as cute as can be. But unfortunately that does not really resolve the anime's core problem.

Overall, One Room is an anime made for very lonely otaku that do not seem to have any female friends in real life but want to have someone to talk to on Valentine's Day, and thus they are presented with an option to live the 2D dream on a level a bit above the norm. If you can relate to that situation then I guess this anime might have some merit, however in that case I would rather recommend you to go play just about any half-assed dating sim instead because they sure as hell have a million times better interactivity than this.

Onihei

Schoolgirl Strikers: Animation Channel

Schoolgirl Strikers is kinda fun at times.

Its inherent appeal lies in just how typically "anime" it is: its all female cast of highschoolers who fight depth-less monsters from other worlds in their skin-tight and revealing uniforms and different weapons. Yui Ogura taking her usual high-pitched voice and elevating it even further is somewhat symbolic of what kind of feeling this show is going for.

The rest of the main cast also deliver performances with the same kind of idea behind them, especially the standout ones: Miyuki Sawashiro talks in her normal mature sounding voice that just happens to feel very iconic of what anime voice acting is, Kana Hanazawa's performance will probably be one of the most energetic ones this year, especially during the parts where she describes food or gushes about things that gets her excited and Saito Chiwa who feels like is improvising different silly voices as Odile so her true identity wouldn't be found out. The relaxed and energetic feeling the voice acting gives off seems like it's because of loose standards asked from the recording staff which resulted in more entertaining character.

Another big positive about Schoolgirl Strikers would be its decent fight scenes. Although its CGI backgrounds during these sequences, having the characters occupy the majority of the screen makes it very less noticeable, coupled with how dynamic the camera moment is makes the action focused and impactful. It doesn't feature any heavy sakuga or flashy effects but the smoothness provided by the decent in-between frames make these some of the best parts of the anime.
Its story is what you can expect from mobile game adaptations: standard "stop this one evil threat" that carries the show while sol shenanigans happens meanwhile. Although having mentioned how its appeal lies in how "anime" it is, its a kind that is pretty common amongst all-girls mobage like Ange Vierge and Ragnastrike Angels, even down to the how it has shower scenes every episode. So in that sense, the viewer probably won't be getting anything new out of it.

It has enjoyable parts spread out its run thanks to its lively voice acting and decent battle but seeing as how it has no other note-worthy aspects it's not something easy to recommend to people unless they're certain to like it

Seiren

Shouwa Genroku Rakugo Shinjuu: Sukeroku Futatabi-hen

Coming off the highly acclaimed and one of the best anime of 2016, Shouwa Genroku Rakugo Shinjuu, comes it's second season and it's... I don't really know to describe how good this is, but that's just how good it is..If that makes sense. It's light, It's beautiful, It's haunting, It's deep, It's dramatic. It's one of the most masterfully made anime there is.

One of the things this show does so well is that it presents itself in the form a Rakugo. It's leisurely paced but the genuine and detailed storytelling and flawless performances combined with just the necessary amount of soundtrack certainly makes it seem so. This anime is not just a love letter to the art form and it's celebrated history but also serves as a medium to revitalize the art form for it's future and introduce it to new audiences from different places and cultures. I read an article about this show, the writer brings up something about western audiences asking a Rakugoka to perform classics from this anime. It's goes to show no matter how unpopular this is in the mainstream, it has made quite a significant Impact.

Another thing this anime does very well is that it brings out the cinematic elements of an anime that one would normally take for granted, such as Screenplay, Dialogue, Cinematography, Editing, Performances, Direction and makes it stand out incredibly well. The screenplay and dialogue especially are unbeatable, whoever wrote these scripts deserves a fucking award. The Rakugo scenes are the part of the anime that really highlight these things. Giving us that theatrical experience and helping the audience understand the story being told.

The characters in the show are fantastic, they're brilliantly written and almost everyone plays a very important role in the storytelling. The anime mainly shows 3 different generation of characters. So yeah, there are a lot of different range of characters. It's interesting to see how they view Rakugo and the different approaches that they take. Yakumo for example wants to take Rakugo with him to the grave, Yotarou wants to continue Yakumo's legacy and continue the art of Rakugo, You would think Yakumo is wrong but he has some pretty valid points that made me go like, "yeah bro, you know what? just take it with you". Yakumo is my favorite character, He is probably the MVP of the year honestly, It's very interesting how the flashback events of season 1 and the progression of time play a part in his character development. The relationships these characters have are very well written and how it all dramatically plays into effect is such a joy to watch. The character design is great too, it's very unique and appealing and there is a lot of detail in their actions that really tells who they are and gives them a real identity. I love it.

Coming to the animation and soundtrack, The animation is just amazing and consistent from start to finish. Hats off to the animators and also the production studio, studio Deen, they are restating themselves with this show. I haven't seen them do anything this good honestly, Great use of colors and like I mentioned before, there is a lot of detail and effort put into the characters and setting that I truly appreciate.

The soundtrack is refreshing. Very dramatic, theatrical and sometimes very unpredictable, A lot of times it's just traditional Japanese sounds. It's minimal and used only when necessary. It plays very well into the quiet atmosphere and genuine storytelling of this anime, making it seem like a Rakugo itself.

Overall I really enjoyed this anime, it truly is one of the few shows that are near perfect in the way that it is executed and presented to you, There isn't any major flaw or anything, even things like leisurely pacing and the fact that some people might find that boring is something the anime embraces itself. It is true that this anime is not for everyone, People who usually are into the more energetic and fast paced genres might not enjoy this but I would still recommend it to you, cause this anime really is just THAT GOOD, If you're someone who is into the craft and enjoys some great storytelling, there is a really good chance you will be blown away and enjoy it as much as I did.

I would give this anime a 9.5-10/10. I am extremely satisfied with what I got, Definitely a contender for Anime of the year and easily the anime of the current winter 2017 season. Highly recommend everyone to check this out!

HaXXspettenApr 5, 2017 2:01 PM

Apr 1, 2017 5:05 AM

HaXXspetten

*hug noises*

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May 2013

32066

Aaaand think that's about it. Here's to another season done~

Or well, almost; there's still 2-3 shows that are ending a bit late but feel free to send them in whenever they finish and I'll edit them into the thread retroactively (should probably get a couple for Kobayashi at least I reckon though a certain someone was cheeky enough to send it in prior to finishing already)

As always, if you spot any errors, please let me know and I'll try to correct it if possible

Apr 1, 2017 5:09 AM

Mei-o_Scarlett

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Oct 2015

17283

everyone like my ao reivew ;_; gotta get the top review status and maintain it

It's good that Slop leveling won the CR awards with such a power gap, Gaijin Weebs don't deserve good anime.
Not after what they did to frieren, kusuriya, and many others

Apr 1, 2017 5:17 AM

HaXXspetten

*hug noises*

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May 2013

32066

Scarlett_ryuken said:
everyone like my ao reivew ;_; gotta get the top review status and maintain it

I mean if people just want to upvote each other to be nice that's cute and all but that's kinda against the point of it and pretty shameless

Oh and compared to last season we're currently down about 5% in total word count but post-editing it'll probably be more or less the same. So we're still going steady, daijobu~

Apr 1, 2017 5:21 AM

lovelyangel666

Offline

Sep 2007

136

Think this thread is rather to get criticism and tips for writing reviews, not "post your stuff to get click-points" ^.~

I used to be a 3D lover like you... But then I took an arrow to the heart.

Apr 1, 2017 5:24 AM

Mei-o_Scarlett

Offline

Oct 2015

17283

:/ well i tried, now give me your best criticism :///

It's good that Slop leveling won the CR awards with such a power gap, Gaijin Weebs don't deserve good anime.
Not after what they did to frieren, kusuriya, and many others

Apr 1, 2017 5:26 AM

jyuushi

Offline

Aug 2016

3865

I looked through everything, and the lengthy ones quite freaked me out, but I've regained my confidence thanks to the shorter ones lol. Will hopefully be able to send in one or two soon if I've got the time.

Apr 1, 2017 8:27 AM

#10

EnZanity

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Jan 2017

2335

Hope people read my reviews and send feedback, this is the first time I have written reviews so it would be nice to get some advice on them

Thanks for holding this event @HaXXspetten

Apr 1, 2017 9:39 AM

#11

tigermaskshinobi

Offline

Nov 2015

Great event! It was good to be a part of this, Looking forward to doing the same for next season. Good job everyone!

Apr 5, 2017 2:02 PM

#12

HaXXspetten

*hug noises*

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May 2013

32066

Updated some of the late finishers (Onihei, Kobayashi) to the thread now too*
(still potentially more to come)

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