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Ah, this show had so much potential: Unique and beautiful animation, interesting concept, a very cool vibe, the main character Kei is intriguing. He keeps track of his "friends" in his phone as "Friend 1," "Friend 2," etc., lol, because he is quite the sociopath. He has only one friend, to whom he no longer speaks because it would be a detriment to his social standing at school to do so, but when the shit hits the fan, that friend is the only person who's there for him, and Kei ends up making an incredible sacrifice inspired by him. Is Kei managing to break through ... his sociopathy and grow as a person?? wonders the viewer.

Kei is making his way back to his friend when he gets very temporarily waylaid ... and then he and the show both completely forget about this friend and he is literally NEVER MENTIONED AGAIN, I guess because the show has gotten more interested in the (admittedly pretty awesome) villain. Aaand ... this is pretty much how the show proceeds. There is absolutely no consistency of character, especially in the main character. No consistent motivation -- it becomes clear the sacrifice he made supposedly for his friend was actually just some random reason the show tossed out for him not to have just used his power to get himself right out of a horrific situation as he easily could have.

Nothing he (or really, anyone) does makes any sense. You could say there's no one to root for because they're all equally horrible people, but since the show doesn't even try to have any kind of consistent characterization, it's just that there aren't really any characters at all, just a bunch of people who look different but all act kind of the same, with little logic to anything they do.

I've started season two and it's even worse -- worse issues with characterization, plus considerably lower quality animation, and the writing is loose and lazy. For example, Kei ends season one with a grand declaration regarding his plans. Then in the first episode of season two, he dismisses those same plans, saying they would be "impossible." Whoever wrote this seems to have a short attention span.

It can be quite violent. There's a very high body count. But because pretty much everyone on the show is a terrible person, it's hard to be too troubled by the body count, and the show does have lines it won't cross, which was a relief, because it's extremely brutal.

As I mentioned, the bad guy, Hat, is pretty great. There's a fantastic episode in which Hat breaks into a well defended facility to rescue Kei. In this one episode, the fight scenes are awesome, the unique relationship between Hat and Kei is awesome, all the other interactions with people are interesting and real and unexpected .... If the show had maintained the excellence of that episode, it would have been easily one of the greatest shows of all time. Or if it had developed the relationship between Kei and his one friend. Or if anything about ajins and their powers was particularly interesting. Or even if it had bothered to have any sort of realism or continuity or characters. But it didn't. So I'll give it some stars for the things it did well, but it's just not very good. Pretty entertaining, though, if you don't care about character or story.

All right, look, the animation is amazing. I love watching Hyouka AMVs because they make it LOOK like it's a great show ... but it isn't. I saw all the glowing reviews so I tried it and had to give up 9 episodes in because the story was so half-assed and boring. Then I saw some AMVs and they made it look so good that I finished it and nope! It definitely never got good. Not even close.

Because for starters, there are no actual characters in this show other than the main character, Oreki. I've got to assume the creators saw themselves in him, ... because they treat this cowardly, self - impressed little jerk like he's the coolest guy to ever breeze into school. In reality, he makes no impression whatsoever on almost anyone at their school and accomplishes very little, given his dedication to putting as little effort into anything as possible (something else the show treats him like a hero for, instead of the rather pathetic copout it is).

Also, he is depressed, and for good reason: too scared to put himself out there, which he covers over by pretending he's just too cool to care, he has isolated himself (which the second cour credits acknowledge), dug himself into a hole he'll never get out of. Seriously, I know this guy in real life. My friend is so much like Oreki that if the show had come out before he was in high school, I'd have thought he modeled himself on this character. Now, decades later, surprise surprise, my buddy has never had a girlfriend, doesn't have friends really, no hobbies or accomplishments in decades. But he still has his precious "cool," which no one ever actually thought was cool but him. There is a way the show wants you to see Oreki, but it is a far cry from what he really is.

Then along comes his manic pixie dream girl. She's nice to him, as she's nice to everyone, but in HIS mind, she's tempting and controlling him with the overpowering desire HE suddenly felt from the moment he laid eyes on the first pretty girl who would give him the time of day. I guess it's good that this sickening phenomenon of some loser too cowardly to actually engage with his reality developing delusions about himself and some love object has been thus so accurately animated, only the complete lack of self awareness of Oreki and his creators lets his pathetic delusions stand, preferring, of course, to pretend he really WAS that cool and all things he didn't have the courage to take responsibility for really WERE all her doing. Obnoxious.

Like all such guys, to him, her feelings, desires, and personality are irrelevant. As far as the show is concerned, she exists only to help define our hero and create motivation for him ... which I suppose helps explain, along with the bad writing, why she doesn't have a consistent character. The other two members of their club are simply "Good Anime Boy A" and "Ordinary Anime Girl B." I'll grant that these two are consistent in that they're consistently boring and irrelevant -- so boring and predictable and contributing so little that there's no reason for them to be there.

Chitanda, the object of Oreki's obsession, however, has a character so inconsistent that she may as well have been portrayed by four different characters, each the cliched embodiment of the usual archetypes applied to women: the ingenue, the temptress, the ditz, and the matriarch. In one episode, she's first incapable of getting from point A to point B because she's distracted by every shiny thing she sees along the way, and then is all but incapable of engaging in some very basic negotiation once she finally makes her way there because she's (dumb and) shy and awkward. A couple of episodes later, she coolly solves a complex, longstanding feud in a community no one else can make any headway on, including adult community leaders, thanks to her brilliance and charisma, and it's implied she does this kind of thing all the time with grace and ease. Like, could you put some effort into making her character remotely believable or realistic? Nah, because she is only whatever Oreki or the plot need her to be at that moment.

Okay, and their "club." One of the show's few strengths is its simple slice of life - ness. Nothing bad ever happens ... but this is because nothing ever happens, period. A club that solves mysteries has to be interesting, right?? I thought so too, but turns out not! These are the most tepid, half-assed mysteries imaginable. Trying to figure out who left a glass of water on a table would be absolutely within the general level of challenge and importance of mystery they might investigate. Now imagine what they end up discovering has no relevance to anything else that has ever or will ever happen on the show. Assume that the person who did it is someone you've never met before and will never see again. Rest assured their reason for doing it will be nothing out of the ordinary, and nothing will come of either the glass being on the table or the investigation, except that our hero will once again get to pat himself on the back for his brilliance (since everyone around him is far too dumb to contribute much to such sleuthing), while pretending he's too cool to care whether anyone's impressed.

With a wildly disappointing, albeit realistic, ending, it's hard to understand why anyone would want to watch this irritating trifle. Basically, it's the incel's idealized self portrait.

Season two is pretty good but a far cry from the perfection of season one. Since season one ended on a cliff - hanger, of course one wants to go straight to season two, which is different in structure, tone, and style than season one. Was I disappointed? Yeah, because I know the greatness this creator is capable of. It does not live up to the genius of season one. Worse, however, though both seasons are heart-rending, season two is heavy - handed about it. It less touches your heart than rips it out of your chest, and not in a good way like season ... one. Also, though season one wasn't afraid to delve into some very dark topics and it had a body count, season two is straight up brutal, the body count mounting among characters you really love, and for no good reason.

The story structure is frustrating, inasmuch as it's continually telling and retelling the same events from different perspectives, adding a little information each time. I was willing to give the creator the benefit of the doubt and see if this experimental storytelling approach amounted to anything in the end, and it ... didn't. Maybe the genius of season one didn't get the kind of reception the creator expected so he got discouraged and/or thought he had to resort to such brutality, but in the end, he does tell an interesting (but kinda predictable, given the premise of the show) story with great voice actors and fantastic animation and an incredible opening credits sequence, and really, nothing more. All the retelling of events, by the end of the season, just seems like a waste of time.

On the plus side, more is revealed about how exactly their powers work. We also learn more about other people with powers. Still, there is a huge, unmined vein to do with the two main characters' past, how they came together, and what they might owe each other that may never be revealed if the creator doesn't get on it, since I don't think this comes from a manga or anything; I think its only story is told here, so if it's not renewed, we're out of luck. ... And that's the main problem with season two: it just kind of feels like a place - holder, like it's mostly filler. Really disappointing, given all the promise of season one, but on its own merits, not bad.

It is very, very rare that I would ever declare a show perfect or give it 10 stars, but here we are. I would also give Darker Than Black season one 10 stars, 86, maybe Spy x Family season one, probably My Hero, a few others, but of truly great shows that illustrate the full potential of the medium, Link Click season one is among the very best.

The animation is spectacular, opening themes are fantastic for both seasons, characters are deep and real and intriguing. Like Darker Than Black, most of season one tells stories in pairs of episodes. Unlike Darker Than Black, or any ... show I've ever seen, these seemingly unrelated smaller stories build upon one another, finally coming around full circle ouroboros style to brilliantly reconnect the final episode with the first.

Our heroes, Lu Guang and Cheng Xiaoshi, each have powers that make it possible to, working together, dive into the body of the person who took a photo. In addition to a regular photomat,they run a side business diving into photos for the customer. Maybe a customer wishes they said something they didn't in the past. Maybe they're trying to solve a mystery, or find their child. Each of the stories is deeply moving, as is how profoundly living in these other bodies and taking on their lives affects the impulsive Cheng. He thinks it'll be no big deal to just get in there, do the job, and get out, but he always gets drawn in, and struggles to follow the far more serious Lu's instructions on what he mustn't change - since, as all the time travel stories say, the butterfly effect could change their present catastrophically. Lu seems to speak from painful experience. There are hints of some great sacrifice Lu made for Cheng in the past that led to their present situation, maybe even forced Cheng into almost an indentured servant role working this way with Lu, but even by the end of season two, there is almost no concrete information about it; it remains a tantalizing mystery.

Heck, if you just want to watch a couple of hot guys have an unusually ~entwined~ relationship, you could use this show that way. In addition to being all about modern technology (people continually taking selfies definitely makes their jobs easier) and hip to modern life, the show is well aware of what many people are looking for in their anime, and it delivers: Lu and Cheng's relationship is (subtly) ripe for fanfic. Also, as an aside, I've gotta give the show kudos for being The. Only. Show. that doesn't hand - wave implausible stuff. This is the only show where you won't have to ever say, "Why didn't he just do this or that?" or, "That's what cell phones are for," or, "What about that one thing?" The show is aware of all these things and will address them, so you never have to suspend disbelief extensively; for a show about something so fantastical, it's highly realistic.

There are things that may make it harder for someone to get into than most anime. This is a Chinese show, and though season two is well translated, season one ... isn't. Some of it seems very much like the original dialogue was entered into Google translate and they just used whatever came out, but with a little effort to try to figure out what's being said, it can be done, and it's so, so worth it. Similarly (though all too commonly), anything written is not translated, and sometimes it's quite important, but you can nearly always get it from context, or if you're desperate, you can look it up online. Hopefully a better translation will be given to this season; I feel surely that would have to help it be more successful among English speakers.

I literally can't recommend this show enough; it's one of the greatest things I've ever seen. I'm so glad it was made.

For starters, this is NOT a sports anime. This is an abused - kid anime masquerading as a sports anime. I'm not sure why the sports aspect is even in it unless its creator threw that in in hopes of getting more viewers due to how popular sports animes are, because the sports aspect is cursory at best. They cover forehand and backhand strokes and follow - through and ... that's pretty much it?? And though a couple of the characters make the expected declaration about how they love "soft tennis" (regular tennis except played with a soft, squishy ball) more than anything, the amount ... of time spent on actual games is far less than most sports animes.

But the lazily covered sports stuff takes time away from fully exploring the abused - kid aspect of the show, which seems to be what the creator really wanted to cover. Aside from the 2 main characters, each member of the team's abusive family situation is introduced sufficient to get the gist and that's it; nothing is ever resolved ... and it ends on a quite shocking related cliff - hanger. There will be no more of the show; it didn't get a second season, although the creator said he would like to put online what he planned to have happen in season two. So if you do decide to watch, be aware there will be no resolution whatsoever for any of the upsetting abusive situations any of the characters find themselves in.

The creator of this show also made Noein, of which I am a huge fan, and though Noein has lots going for it, the main descriptor I've always used for it is "deep." It's metaphorical, it works on multiple levels, it beautifully and thoroughly explores many themes. And ... the same cannot be said for Stars Align. It is not deep. What you see is what you get. There is no deeper meaning to anything that happens; they play tennis, they hang out together, and they get abused. That's it.

Yet despite all of that, I kept watching, and I missed getting to watch it when it was over. It's not a show I would recommend to anyone since nothing happens and nothing is resolved, so what was it that kept me coming back?

The main thing is the characters, particularly the main character, Maki. He seems like a jerk when you first meet him, and then when you see what his home life is like, he suddenly makes perfect sense. I still take inspiration from the main character in Noein, Haruka, who - faced with an impossible situation and almost certain death - nevertheless bravely does what can be done, keeps on going, and never lets her heart grow cold; she feels fully and loves freely. Well, Maki is pretty inspiring, too. Despite his own impossible situation, he pours energy into everything he can affect. He thinks outside the box. He has many skills, which he fully utilizes. He is undeterred by rejection and hatred. He is not susceptible to the kind of us vs them thinking that limits others. It is always interesting watching him interact with others. Most of the other characters are fairly one - dimensional, but he is fascinating and unexpected. There are a few other interesting characters, too, especially a rival from another team whom Maki befriends, and their only fan, a tsundere girl.

The animation is ugly and uninspiring. The games played are unrealistic and predictable, such as a new player miraculously winning every point right up until the final point of the game; it feels like it was taken right out of the boilerplate sports anime playbook. This is no Haikyuu, making you vitally interested in the minutiae of a sport you don't care about through its creators' obvious passion for the sport; even the characters that make up the soft tennis team hardly seem to care about soft tennis. (The initial premise is that they're an embarrassingly bad team who don't seem to care at all about improving.) The whole show seems to be a clumsy mishmash of vague concepts tossed together randomly, like a bad fanfic by someone who romanticizes child abuse and just keeps adding abused characters without any plot or resolution. (There is definitely a LOT of shipping baked in.) But you know, I kinda enjoyed watching it, so I'll give it 6 stars.

I need to start by saying Makoto Shinkai has been my favorite anime director since I first started watching his movies in the mid aughts. The beauty of the animation, particularly the skies, is beyond compare. I've eagerly watched every movie of his I could access, and I've seen all of them except for Weathering with You. (I'll see that one as soon as I can.) I've watched Your Name many times. I loved them all. Needless to say, I was very excited to see Suzume, excitement which faded increasingly over its runtime. It's not a bad movie; it's just not a good one.

I'm ... not gonna say even in Your Name that his characterization was anything to write home about; Mitsuha was just "the girl," distinguishable from "the boy" by shyness and sweetness (unless, of course, it serves the plot to do something else), where "the boy" is brash and self - centered. So Shinkai's characters serve his plots and not the other way around, but in Suzume, what "plot" there is is a mess, thin, and never really ends up leading anywhere. Is it a road trip movie? An isekai? A journey of self - discovery, and if so, for whom? Is it spiritual, supernatural, or is it a commentary on climate change and depopulation? (If so, it's the depopulation that's causing climate disasters based on a single line in the film that declares this outright, which has nothing to do with anything else in the movie and is certainly not addressed as a solution at the end.)

It ends up being one of my least favorite kinds of movies: the kind where lots of stuff just happens and none of it means or connects back to anything, but at least most movies like that focus on a few characters going on a single journey. Suzume throws a million random characters at you and abandons them any old time - even important characters. Various things are hinted at (such as two potential love interests for a relatively minor character and absolutely nothing happens with either of them; indeed, though he gets a lot of screen time, there's no reason for one of them to be in the movie at all ... but alas, that's true of almost every character in it) and never followed up on. It would have lots of themes if any of them were developed into anything, and since they're not, it ends up having none.

Much to my dismay, it feels more than anything like he whose movies were always oozing with passion and a need to express something vital has lost his passion and is out of things to say. It's still pretty to look at and it was a reasonably entertaining way to spend a couple of hours. It doesn't go anywhere good, but neither does it go anywhere bad. My friend I watched it with was mad about wasting the time on it, but though I'm prone to feeling that way more than she is, I didn't feel that way about this movie. It was okay, a perfect 5 out of 10. It certainly won't change your life... but it won't do you any harm.

Needing a Gundam fix but wishing it were more harem-y? Would a human - sized penis make for an adorable addition to that harem? Have you always thought it would improve a military mecha show if just one character was inexplicably a bear? Then this is the show for you!

Season one was edge - of - your - seat, grade - A scifi. Both seasons are extremely well animated, with incredible, believable world - building, even if that animation has some limitations, namely that there is no shading on anyone's face, just eyes nose and mouth, which are usually close to the same ... colors on everyone. This would make it hard to differentiate one character from another in any show, but in this show, several characters are literal clones, and/or the same person at different ages, making it downright arduous. (Your best bet is to look at their hairstyles.) Moreover, some concepts were introduced in season one that had the potential to be fascinating and truly original. This show was on track to be one of the greatest scifi series of all time. And then ... season two happened.

Our hero, Tanikaze, had a quasi girlfriend who died in season one. Bummer! Lucky for him, soon his mansion is populated with much of the rest of his burgeoning harem. In all, there's: a) his bitchy commanding officer, b) his friend who at one time was neither gender but morphed into totally female (with very large breasts, of course) because deep down she's chosen him as her mate, and c) the aforementioned penis. The penis is actually a speaking, human - sized appendage attached to the actual girlfriend, who is a pink, mecha - sized science experiment: a hideous mass of the enemy's alien flesh with a mostly human personality. Beskirted and sweetly charming, nevertheless this thing is undeniably grotesque in every imaginable way: in how it looks, how it was created, and what it fundamentally is.

But all that's forgotten by everyone amid the hilarity and ... charm? ... of the mildly entertaining but pointless shenanigans involved in living with so many girlfriends at once, which is what season two soon devolves into, abandoning the brilliance and potential of season one. Sure, there are still sometimes space battles. In the *ahem* climactic battle, his final girlfriend appears! The vicious enemy, which evidently can't communicate or be reasoned with, has several times taken on the appearance of his dead girlfriend as it tries to kill him in battle. On this final occasion, it oozes into his cockpit and has its way with him. There are tentacles! (Don't worry; he seems disinterested in resistance, apparently more or less enjoying it, surrendering as he always does to whatever his girlfriends want to do to him.) The political intrigue that will affect every facet of their lives is brushed aside. The concepts from season one that had such promise prove to be unoriginal (mostly scientific experiments of the sort that created the girlfriend with the penis) and though they are horrific and were earlier poised to be central to the plot, they are more or less forgotten about by the end of the season, except for how handy they are for creating new weapons and ... girlfriends.

To sum up: overall the show has a lot going for it, but season two does little that couldn't have just as easily been done in some throwaway high school anime set on good ol Earth. Mostly, it seems a terrible waste of potential. But season one is excellent, and I would recommend that one to anyone as long as you're content to leave things unresolved, because season two is a great disappointment that you'd probably be better off skipping entirely. I give this season 6 stars for the excellent animation and world building, but 10 stars for season one.

This show is not even worth reviewing, but I'd have liked to be spared wasting my time on it with more accurate reviews, so here I am. Plus, I need the catharsis.

I was enjoying it a lot. It reminded me of Laid - Back Camp, which I really liked. And who doesn't love a main character who has no friends or family? One of my favorite kinds of characters - automatically so sympathetic!

Episode 5 came along and was bafflingly stupid - did Reiko completely forget how to ride or something?? But at least Koguma said it was stupid, and that Reiko was stupid.

... And ... here is where it starts becoming clear why Koguma has no friends. Once she loosens up enough to start being herself, she's a massive bitch. All those previous social encounters where she seemed so stiff and unfriendly, which I chalked up to shyness and social awkwardness - nope, turns out she's just cold and unfriendly, kinda mean. Other reviewers have suggested she's on the spectrum - nah, she's just a bitch: superior, condescending. A teacher repeatedly offers her tea and she always demurs, which in any other anime would be due simply to shyness or a desire not to impose - deep down they would really want to say yes! Not Koguma. She finally does have to say yes once but seems indifferent to the teacher who offered it, if not straight up contemptuous.

She and Reiko, who previously seemed like good, nice girls (which was a huge part of the charm; it was adorable to see these good girls riding around on motorcycles), start acting like smug, rude biker chicks. They snicker while being scolded by teachers and instantly disobey the one rule they were given. There's a strong whiff of contempt in the whole way they regard the cultural festival and their peers' excitement about it. When asked for help, they blow it off unless they can use it to try to rub in how superior they are just because they ride motorbikes.

In the final minutes I watched before giving up in disgust, they basically bullied the other girl who appears in the credits (as if she's their friend, which other reviews indicate is misleading) for being "uncool" enough to ride an ordinary bike (you know, just like Koguma rode at the start of the show, and would have been undone to be bullied over).

There's just nothing to like about these characters at all, and still less the longer the show goes on. I looked up reviews at this point to see if others were seeing what I was seeing and whether it was likely to get better. What I saw in the few reviews that acknowledged the show's weaknesses convinced me I'd be better off stopping there, that if anything, it only gets worse.

Then there's the whole advertising aspect. I was beginning to gather in the final episode I watched (as they also bullied this girl into buying a motorbike too - even as they insist to this person they don't know at all yet that she couldn't handle it, anyway, because of course only they are cool enough to be able to handle it) that maybe it really was simply a long - form advertisement, paid for by Honda. If so, it would explain the inconsistency of the characterization and the way literally everything good that ever happens for anyone in the show and the only thing that makes them happy revolves around their Super Cubs. Pretty gross if so. It occurred to me in the first episode that it could simply be an advertisement, but then they said Koguma's Super Cub is no longer even in production so I dismissed the possibility, then the longer I watched, the more it once again seemed like that, as every character somehow was required to own one.

I love a slow, gentle, charming show like Laid Back Camp featuring nice people doing things that interest them, and until Koguma's character started becoming clear once she started interacting with other people, it seemed like this show could be that, but by the time I stopped watching, it was quite clear it was not. It's slow, all right, but far from charming. I'm not even sure what the point of it was, except advertising. It's a real shame, because despite the excessive focus on Super Cub! Super Cub! Super Cub!, it could have been cool.

Did you enjoy season 2? Want to watch it again? Then watch season 5! Oh sure, some things might have slightly different names (such as "piranhas" instead of a snake). Some things might be said by a different person. There are even moments when something that was only implied in season 2 is made explicit. But basically, plot point for plot point, season 5 is identical to season 2.

You even still get to keep all your favorite characters from before, not only because some of them return to watch the inter-high, but because many characters are carbon copies of characters who have graduated, only ... with different hair and/or eye color.

Oh, and they are trying so hard to make Midousuji his old terrifying self, but suddenly he could hardly be less scary. He even seems rather ... reasonable?!? Just leading his team in the Machiavellian manner that is his wont, and doing it rationally and - dare I say it? - politely.

I really had hope that they might be able to find new stories to tell for this once-awesome show. I suppose all the reminders even in season 2 of how "the rider who wins is the one who crosses the finish line first" and how the best way to speed up is to ... go faster *probably* indicated that they were already running out of ideas and I should have picked up on that then, but the first two seasons were full of such great characters and such obvious passion for the sport, I really, really hoped there would be more great Yowamushi after season 2. Alas, no.

It is not good. All it has going for it is beautiful visuals and initially intriguing, if nonsensical, world building. The main problem facing humanity is lack of water, though the world is almost entirely covered with ... water -- the titular "snow sea," which is fluffy on the top and simply water underneath .... The longer you watch, the less sense it makes, though it initially seems very interesting. The plot, such as it is, is one you've seen a million times, and there are basically 2 characters: bad guys are simply misguided except for the ridiculously over - the - top main villain. ... Good guys are bland, sweet, occasionally "cutely" obnoxious, "quirky," and dumb as dirt.

All this said, I nevertheless enjoyed watching it until the final 3 or 4 episodes as it ground exhaustingly to its inevitable conclusion, yet once it was finally over, I was disgusted at the time wasted. I can't rate it one star because of the beautiful visuals and how the cliched story was adequately executed, but I can't recommend it to anyone.