I loved the first few volumes of this light novel. The world building, the characters, the slow buildup of the mysteries of how the world works, the strategies of the fights, they're all great. However, at some point the later volumes just start to feel tedious and filled with filler, and this gets worse as you get closer to the end.
And then perhaps because the author wasted so much time on meaningless filler, the end feels incredibly rushed, anti-climactic, and pulled out of the author's ass. Nothing in volume 16 makes any kind of sense in terms of logical actions that real people would take,
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Jul 4, 2022
I was drawn to the series because of its unique premise. Although it utilizes tropes common to the Isekai genre, and on its surface seems somewhat similar to That Time I Was Reincarnated as a Slime, it has a good amount of concepts that I haven't seen before.
In particular, I really enjoyed the concept of Dungeon Cores and how they earn Dungeon Points and build dungeons while hiding their true nature from adventures. But therein lies the main problem I had with this series. The whole time, I've been waiting for the other shoe to drop. For some adventurers to find out the hidden secret ... 
May 12, 2020
THIS REVIEW CONTAINS SPOILERS ABOUT THE ENDING
The ending was dumb as hell. If Maquia loved Ariel so much, and vice versa, and they made up at the end of the battle, why did she leave him for ~60 years? It doesn't make sense that she wouldn't want to spend time with her family. Plus, why did Leilia just leave her daughter and say she'll forget about her, if she so desperately wanted a connection with her? The ending was obviously contrived in order to make it a tearjerker. Which is a puzzling choice, because they still could have had the exact same ending with Ariel's ... 
Mar 9, 2020
Rozen Maiden: Träumend
(Anime)
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SPOILERS for both seasons:
Another contrived sad ending just to get a cheap emotional response out of the watcher. In the first season it was established that Jun had some special magical ability to "bring back what was lost" as demonstrated with the clown doll and with fixing Shinku's arm during her battle with Suigintou. The ending would have worked a lot better if this power was built upon / explained and then he used that power to restore all of the dolls after he found out they had been tricked - including Hina-Ichigo and Souseiseki, instead of having a Deus Ex Machina moment with the ... 
Jul 9, 2018
Darling in the FranXX
(Anime)
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One of the best romance and mecha anime out there IMO, with world building and character development done right. However, I had a few problems with the ending.
SPOILERS After the final battle, Klaxosaurs just disappear into the Earth and die when there were tens of thousands of them left. It is strongly implied that these battle forms are sentient, so why would they just decide to commit mass suicide? It would make more sense if the Klaxosaurs and humans began to coexist on Earth. Zero Two and Hiro didn't have an escape plan and just sacrificed themselves to destroy the enemy homeworld. They always had a way ... 
May 23, 2018
A unique concept within the anime sphere, with great world building and interesting three dimensional characters with believable development. I really enjoyed watching the series, especially due to the characters, but the ending left something to be desired.
SPOILERS FOR THE ENDING I think making Chaika lose all her memories was simply done to make the audience feel sad and make the anime more memorable because of those sad feelings. The first season also had feels at the ending, but mostly of victory and happiness, with a mix of pity for Blue Chaika. I think a similar bittersweet ending would've been a better route to go with ... |
