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Mar 24, 2016
**SPOILER FREE REVIEW**
Erased is a grippingly cinematic, but ultimately childish and half-baked attempt at an anime mystery drama that makes a mockery out of the serious themes it chooses to incorporate. However, that didn’t seem to stop it from taking the anime world by storm and soaring into the top FIVE on the all time MAL rankings while it was still airing. Yikes. This show is clumsy, saturated in over-convenience, and excruciatingly awkward at times, but it’s obvious that something about Erased really resonated with a lot of people. Let’s find exactly what makes this show popular and, more importantly, where it all went wrong.
Synopsis:
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Satoru Fujinuma, our protagonist, is a detached 29 year old Manga artist who possesses a special ability that he refers to as “Revival”, which causes him to be sent back in time several minutes before tragic accidents that occur in his general vicinity, whether he wants to or not. He will continue to be sent back in time until he stops the event in question from occurring. One day, tragedy strikes, but this time, Satoru is sent 18 whole years in the past. Soon, he realizes that the event he has to prevent is the abduction and killing of one of his classmates, the solitary and mysterious Kayo Hinazuki, which took place when he was a child.
If you couldn’t tell right of the bat after reading the synopsis, Erased was playing with fire from the very beginning. The use of time resets as a plot device carries great power in the context of a story, and with great power comes great responsibility. The problem with time resets is that if you don’t establish strict and appropriate rules and restrictions from the very beginning, it becomes nothing more than a transparently lazy deus ex machina whose properties bend and shape to the convenience of the plot. Nothing breaks immersion like some mystical superpower with no established boundaries that seamlessly drifts in and out of the plot for no discernible reason, only reappearing to solve otherwise unsolvable problems. This is a problem that Erased has, and it’s one of the main things that make the story so impossible to take seriously. Satoru’s “Revival” ability has absolutely no rules. It shows up for no logical reason, doesn’t show up in situations where it did before, contradicts the very short and insufficient explanation we were given of it, and the story can’t seem to decide if he has the ability to consciously trigger it or if he does not. It’s madness. Utter chaos. The foundation of this anime’s premise was so badly botched that it causes the world of Erased to come off as one that doesn’t have any rules, and that is far and away its biggest failure as a mystery drama. I don’t mean to suggest that Revival is the only aspect of this show that is overly convenient and lazy though; the anime is riddled with poor planning and lack of explanation. For example, people show up for no reason and out of nowhere at the best/worst possible moment on a consistent basis, like this is some sort of battle shounen. Erased’s writing is a disaster, plain and simple.
I could talk for a long time about the technical problems of Erased’s storyline, but it commits a sin that is perhaps even more egregious: The bastardization of a mature theme. Namely, child abuse. If you are going to incorporate such a serious and heart-wrenching topic into your story, fine; just make sure that you treat it with the respect that it deserves. Unfortunately, Erased utterly fails to do that. Instead, it merely shoehorns it in as a cheap, lowest-common-denominator way of tugging at our heartstrings. Erased chooses to make us feel bad for its characters not by fleshing them out with personality, but by having them be graphically beaten on camera for reasons that are completely unnecessary to the plot. This edgy, shock-factor bullshit is what cemented my dislike of this show. This is the kind of thing that doesn’t just impede my enjoyment of the anime, but makes me genuinely angry that the writers thought they could manipulate the emotions of the viewers so underhandedly. It’s completely shameless, and they should be embarrassed.
There’s one more aspect of this show’s plot that I can’t resist mentioning... *Sigh… Hear me out on this one. Maybe this is just me, but the entire premise of this show is fucking CREEPY. Seriously. There are some shockingly blatant pedophilic undertones in Erased. There are multiple instances where the protagonist, WHO IS 29 YEARS OLD, gets obviously aroused by the thought of a relationship (or more…) with Hinazuki, who is a child. If you think I’m joking, there is scene in the latter half of the show where Hinazuki is taking a bath and Satoru overhears her from the other room. He then gets a flustered/uncomfortable, flushed look on his face and thinks to himself, and I quote, “Get a hold of yourself. You’re 29.” WHAT THE FUCK IS THAT SHIT MAN??? That’s not a one-time thing either! That is a reoccurring gag throughout the show! Who the HELL thought that would be a good idea?! Is this some sort of underground fetish show or something? Was it made for people who fantasize about fucking children while they are also in the body of a child? Nobody is ever going to convince me that Satoru’s reoccurring and vague attraction to Hinazuki is not disturbing as hell. It makes my skin crawl, and more importantly, it makes the show even more impossible to take seriously. This is incorporating humor into your show GONE WRONG.
As bad as Erased’s plot is, even shows with bad plots can often be redeemed if they have a strong cast of characters. Well, Erased doesn’t have that. Not even close, in fact. Our protagonist, Satoru, is your standard white-knight archetype. If you don’t know what that is, it’s when a character is defined entirely by his desire to be morally righteous and help others. There is literally no other defining trait to this character whatsoever! The first episode makes it seem like they would make him deadpan or detached or, hell, SOMETHING in order to differentiate him, but no. Any individuality Satoru may have possessed in the first episode completely evaporates and is nowhere to be found from episode 2 and onwards. He’s just a walking, talking robot who spurns the plot forward with his soulless, mechanically predictable actions. At no point, except maybe in the first episode, did I care about this character, and that is a certain way for a show to fail.
Now let’s talk about Satoru’s love interest (Yes, I’m calling her that. This show knows what it did), Kayo Hinazuki. Kayo is a character that is able to single-handedly exemplify so much of what is wrong with this show, in the sense that she is not a real character at all; she is a plot device, just like the rest of the cast. Her sole purpose is to be used as a literal whipping post just so that justice-kun can swoop in to be her knight in shining armor and pretend he doesn’t want to get into those prepubescent pants. She is nothing more than an object the show utilizes to manipulate the emotions of the viewers; an artificially created victim who exists only to suffer some one-dimensional, interchangeable hardship rather than an actual character with a personality and interesting outlooks, dreams, or crises. Erased is lazy, deceiving character writing at its finest.
So at this point, if you haven’t watched Erased, you may be wondering that if everything I wrote in the above paragraphs is true, what is the appeal of this show? The answer, quite simply, is that the cinematography is very well executed and the directing is very engaging. The environments are always crisp and detailed, plus the shot composition is absolutely spot-on in most instances. There are notable exceptions, but I won’t get into that. As for the directing, Erased presents information to the viewer in a very streamlined, matter of fact manner. Scenes intended to be connected are always spelled out to the viewer through the use of flashbacks, and lots of creative transition sequences are used with narrative accompaniment between scenes. I prefer when shows leave it up to the viewer to deduce certain things rather than being spoon-fed, but for what they were going for, they did a good job. Erased looks good, is animated dramatically, and is easy to digest. Those are the factors that lead to its massive popularity, and frankly, those are the only aspects of the show that can’t be harshly criticized justifiably.
At the end of the day, Erased is just another overhyped anime written for edgy teens that uses cheap, manipulative tactics to emotionally affect the audience, fooling them into thinking it’s a well-written show when it obviously isn’t. It’s immature, terribly inconsistent, the characters are soulless plot devices, and its laughable use of the ultimate anime cliché “time resets” is just the icing on the cake. Erased is a bad show with good animation, and sometimes, that’s all a show needs to get popular.
Reviewer’s Rating: 4
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Sep 26, 2015
Mod Edit: This review may contain spoilers.
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Tell me if this description sounds familiar: “A group of ‘special’ highschoolers defined almost exclusively by archetypes and/or tragic pasts form an organization together. They don’t really get along at first, but they get to know each other extremely intimately over time, eventually culminating in a romance. Many tragic events take place as the innocent and sympathizable highschoolers are victimized by the cruel, cruel world. Eventually, they must accept sacrifice to fulfill their lives and destinies.” Some of you are probably thinking “That’s Angel Beats!”, while the rest of you are probably thinking “That’s Charlotte!” Well, good news: You’re
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both right, because for all intents and purposes, they are exactly the same show.
Now don’t get me wrong, I’m not going to criticize this anime on the sole basis that it isn’t even pretending to differentiate itself from another show; I’m going to criticize this show because not only does it contain all the same errors that the show it plagiarized (yes, I know they had the same writer, so it’s not technically stealing) also contained, but it managed to magnify those errors significantly. Horrible plotholes, absurd amounts of over-convenience, awful world-building, identity confused characters, my god; Charlotte is nothing but a fucking mess.
Let’s start with what is, in my opinion, the biggest problem the show has, the characters. They are completely shallow, completely one-dimensional, and more often than not, completely devoid of personality. Let’s take our protagonist, Yuu, for example: The first episode introduces him as a character brimming with personality. He’s intelligent, arrogant, devilish, etc. These are traits that at the very least gave him a personality and the potential for development. However, as soon as the ED played at the end of episode one, everything about him that was established in that first episode is COMPLETELY forgotten. Never again does he exhibit any of traits that supposedly define him. He instantaneously turns into literally Otanashi; A boring bland, personality-less nobody which is pretty much the worst thing a character can be. Did they really think that we wouldn’t notice if they stopped giving him individuality after a single episode? It’s either a laughable oversight or an attempt to trick the audience.
There really isn’t much to say about the rest of the cast; they are either completely indistinguishable or defined entirely by traits/quirks. There is one in particular I will go over though just so I can talk about how terrible the romance in this anime is: Nao. Nao is Yuu’s love interest which is a big problem for one simple reason: They fail to demonstrate so much as a single iota of chemistry or personal connection with each other at all. Rather than gradually growing together, we are instantaneously told that they are in love! No no no writers: that’s cheating. You can’t just skip all the necessary steps of a good romance and expect us to buy it. Seriously, what intimate moments did they ever share together? I can even recall a scene where Yuu watched Nao get brutally beaten by a mob with complete indifference, as he did nothing to even attempt to assist her. What a pair. This romance is so laughable that when a love confession is finally made, the other character remarks in a surprised/confused fashion “I don’t think there was ever a time for you to think favorably of me.” I mean… That pretty much hits the nail on the head. I don’t think there was either.
I haven’t even gotten to how shitty the plot of this show is and the reasons why it didn’t even remotely work. First of all, it doesn’t make sense. Being a show about superpowers, it’s obvious that plotholes are going to emerge from characters not using certain powers at certain times or in certain ways, but to THIS extent? You will pull your hair out trying to count how many times a situation that could have been easily resolved through superpowers is treated as a legitimate conflict. Every cardinal sin of story telling is present in Charlotte: Dues ex machine, plotholes, asspulls, you name it. It’s some of the worst melodrama to ever be animated.
The second big issue with the plot is the remarkably inconsistent tone and its total inability to incorporate elements of both comedy and tragedy without being clumsy and awkward. This is a problem that is seriously pervasive in anime as a whole; if you want your dramatic scene to be taken seriously, DON’T IMMEDIATELY PRECEED IT WITH CHILDISH COMEDY! Every time something that is supposed to be taken seriously happens, you better believe a heaping dosage of comic relief is right around the corner. Even scenes involving death can’t keep comedy out of the picture. This form of writing demonstrates an inherent immaturity and lack of understanding of said medium; it’s completely embarrassing and there is no excuse for it. This disturbing pattern NEEDS to disappear from anime.
The last thing I feel the need to especially stress is the god-awful pacing and stupendously rushed nature of Charlotte. If you want an example of how to rush your show so badly that even the most naïve audience members become alienated, watch episode 13 of Charlotte. Seriously; the world needs to see that miserable atrocity and learn from it so that history does not repeat itself. When you could literally turn the events of single episode into a series of its own, maybe spread your material out a little better? I’ve somehow gone multiple paragraphs without mentioning Angel Beats yet again, but this anime has the exact same issue with pacing; it’s very evident that these two shows had the same writer.
In conclusion, Charlotte is one of the worst anime dramas you will ever see. Even Angel Beats with all its flaws is noticeably superior. This rushed, childish, shallow emotion porn cannot be believed by a thinking person; you will literally be taken aback by how many obvious mistakes have been made. The animation and music may be nice, but I do not recommend this anime to anybody unless you want to see how NOT to write a good anime drama.
Reviewer’s Rating: 3
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Jul 5, 2015
**SPOILER FREE REVIEW**
Like most sequels to beloved classics, expectations were quite high for Little Witch Academia 2. Considering that it was practically funded out-of-pocket by fans of the original short film via Kickstarter, anime fans really had every right to demand their money’s worth on this one. With the quality of the original and the hype that was created thereafter in mind, my inner cynicism led me to believe that LWA 2 was set up for failure. However, much to my delight, it can be said without hesitation that LWA 2 recaptures the magic of its predecessor and yet again contains more energy and charm
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in its little finger than the entirety of the modern anime comedy genre has in its whole body.
Synopsis: Akko and her friends are tasked with organizing the annual “witch parade” for their town. As you might have guessed, not everything goes according to their plan.
If ever there was a difficult characteristic to describe, it would be “charm”, and yet it is just that which makes LWA 2 such an entertaining and heartwarming film. It captures that innocent, child-like sense of imagination and wonder that never fails to pry your lips upwards into a smile, and does so with the utmost perfection. Despite being an adult male, this movie made me giggle like a little girl from beginning to end. It’s not just heartwarming; it’s hilarious. The comedy is spot on and it hits every note that it needs to hit. Something about this anime brings back that Disney-esque feeling of seeing your wildest dreams brought to life by the power of animation; like seeing Fantasia for the first time. In an industry that many feel lacks the soul that it once had, LWA 2 has soul in spades. It reminded me why I like anime to begin with.
Another masterful aspect of this film was the fact that its pacing was flawless. Every scene has a purpose, not a single one of them drags on for too long, and no scene is a boring one. The fast, energetic pace of LWA carries on into its sequel, and it fits the spirit of the show to a T. Despite being less than an hour long, this movie goes through a full, satisfying story arc, several character dynamics, and effectively expands upon its cast of colorful characters. There’s something beautiful about the simplicity of a well-executed children’s tale; the premise isn’t anything remarkably original, but it doesn’t have to be because the execution is all that matters. The characters don’t have remarkable amounts of depth, but they don’t need to; all that matters is that they have personality, they are entertaining, and they are likable. Disregarding a recap scene or two, which you could potentially argue were unnecessary, I wouldn’t change a thing about the story direction.
One of the most important aspects of an anime in this style is the animation. When you write a quirky, upbeat script, it is absolutely imperative that your animation is equally quirky and upbeat, otherwise the show is doomed to fail. Needless to say, Studio Trigger totally nailed it, just as they did in the original. Comedic timing is something so nuanced that it comes down to fractions of seconds, and while many lighthearted anime (even the good ones) can sometimes find themselves a bit off on their timing or not executing jokes as well as they could have, LWA 2 has no such issue. It is no exaggeration to say this movie makes the most of each and every scene. The visuals are like eye candy, everything is polished and crisp, the character designs continue to be brilliant, and every movement is about as fluent as you’ll ever see. Simply put, it’s animation done right.
To sum it all up, LWA 2 is a brilliantly executed anime movie that appeals to everyone. All ages, all genders, and all cultures won’t be able to resist cracking a smile at a movie that is simply so much fun. It’s a fast-paced, heartwarming adventure that will bring out your inner child, and I highly recommend that everyone take the time to watch it. If you ever need a pick-me-up, I can’t think of another anime that will cheer you up more than this one.
Reviewer’s Rating: 9
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Jun 28, 2015
**SPOILER FREE REVIEW**
While Plastic Memories had the potential to be a unique and intelligent show, it instead managed to encompass all of the things that ruin dramas and cause them to fail every time. Forced plot devices that make no sense? Check. Inopportune comedy that ruins the show’s tone? Check. Shallow characters defined entirely by their archetypes or tragic backstories? Check. While this anime showed flashes of good ideas and has its moments, its poor execution dooms it to be lost among the sea of poorly written, mediocre emotion porn.
Synopsis: In the near future, technology has allowed for the invention humanoid-like robots known as “giftias”,
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who look, talk, feel, and emote exactly like actual humans do. The catch is that they can only operate for a little over a decade before they must be shut down, resulting in the loss of all their memories. The story follows Tsukasa, a human, and his relationship with Isla, a giftia.
The biggest and most obvious problems with this anime stem from its forced and melodramatic plot devices that range from just plain stupid to cringeworthy. For example, when Tsukasa and Isla first become partners at work, we are suddenly told that this means they have no choice but to live together! Because that makes total sense and is definitely not a lazy plot device to provide a setup for bonding and slice of life shenanigans! The other one that sticks out is the big “reveal” they make about what happens to giftias if they aren’t properly retrieved, which defies all notions of common sense and even basic science. That’s especially bad given that this show has a science-fiction setting for some reason. In fact… was there ANY reason for there to be robots in the first place? Literally the only difference between a human and a giftia is that giftias lose their memories after a certain period of time, so now that I think about it, that makes the entire sci-fi setting and concept of giftias in general completely pointless and nothing more than yet another contrived plot device for drama’s sake. They certainly didn’t explore any sort of difference between the two life forms; it’s very much an accepted fact that giftias are equal to humans, so why was everyone not just regular people to begin with? Was there no other scenario they could come with that incorporated death-like elements, like, y’know, DEATH? It’s this kind of thing that makes the show very difficult to take seriously.
There are other major issues with the show’s plot, namely how laughably predictable it is. You can LITERALLY guess every major plot point of the entire show by the end of the first episode, and I’m not exaggerating, because I literally did. I just kept waiting and waiting for something that I didn’t see coming a mile away to happen, and with the exception of a single contrived plot device which I already mentioned (a plot device that doesn’t even lead to anything…), it simply never does. Now, one thing that I will give the show credit for is that is has some genuinely sweet moments. The final stretch of the show made me feel something, at least. However, then it just sort of… ends. And it ends, like, EXACTLY how you would expect it to. I guess what I’m trying to get at here is that it left me with a feeling of “So what?” I mean, you told one of the most obvious and straightforward stories I’ve ever seen, so much so that I could have stopped watching after a single episode and gotten the gist of it, so what did you put into your show that justified the time it took to watch another 12 episodes? Were there any meaningful themes? No. Did the characters learn anything or change in any meaningful way? No. So why would anyone EVER want to watch the entirety of this show? *Sigh, I don’t know if this is making sense. Let’s just move on:
The last aspect of the plot that really bothered me was the random comedy that completely ruined the show’s tone by being interspersed throughout parts that are supposed to be serious. To give an example, the first episode of this show really hooked me. At the very end of the episode, there was a well-executed and genuinely emotional scene that was actually getting to me. I’m the kind of person who almost never gets legitimately emotional when watching a TV show, but this one scene was just hitting all the right notes for me. By the time it was over, I thought we had an extremely promising show on our hands. Now, guess what this beautiful, emotional scenario was immediately followed by: …A BATHROOM JOKE. That’s right. No relevance, no context. They just decided to throw in a random bathroom joke and ended the episode on a ridiculous note instead of a serious and powerful one. That, to me, is a decent microcosm of the entire show. Every time you might be about to get invested in a serious scene, WHAM! Random, generic, slice-of-life comedy comes out of nowhere and blindsides the plot. It’s just a disastrous display of a lack of tonal understanding and, ergo, bad writing.
I think the real thing that would have saved Plastic Memories for me was if the characters were given any form of depth whatsoever. Tsukasa, our protagonist, is a cardboard cutout straight from the generic, beta, male protagonists factory. My god, there was, nothing, NOTHING unique about him. I don’t think I’m alone in the sediment that I don’t care about other people’s relationships if I don’t know them, and I certainly didn’t feel like I knew Tsukasa, so how am I supposed to give a damn about him and Isla’s relationship? Speaking of Isla, talk about yet another shallow character. I put her squarely in the mary-sue category, given that she is an idealization of a pure, innocent, kawaii waifu with no real flaws whatsoever. Can she be funny at times? Sure. Does that mean I at all cared about her? No. As for the side characters? Boring. Bland. Generic. They are all basic stereotypes with nothing to distinguish them. I know they attempt to give a few of the side characters a backstory, but the backstories don’t actually accomplish anything other than just being sad. They do absolutely nothing to add a dimension to the character they are attached to and none of them are given any form of a story arc. I’ve seen casts like this a million times. The characters, to me, might be the biggest reason the show failed. I might have been able to overlook all the previously mentioned problems with the plot if this show actually gave me a reason to care about the couple of Tsukasa and Isla, but they simply don’t.
Pretty much the only thing I can definitively say I liked about Plastic Memories was the animation. It’s pretty fluid, but what really got me was the cinematography and shot composition. Besides the number of Evangelion references they threw in, there were a lot of well thought out and extremely well directed scenes that actually succeeded in conveying information and emotion without words. That’s VERY difficult for a show to do, so kudos for that. The settings were always detailed and full of bright colors as well. The world looked really cool, which is part of the reason I wanted them to actually tell me something about it. Like, literally anything would have been nice. Instead, the writing is so barebones that it could have taken place pretty much anywhere else, and that brings us full circle, doesn’t it?
I wanted to like Plastic Memories. Really, I did. It didn’t have to be some complex, philosophical inquiry into the definition of humanity and how it differs from artificial intelligence (which is the kind of show that many expected it to be); I would have been totally content with it just being a drama if they actually gave me a reason to care about its characters. If they didn’t ruin every moment they ever created with inopportune comedy. If they didn’t make the plot so damn predictable. If their plot devices weren’t so incredibly contrived. There were simply too many major problems to overlook, and that forces me to make the sad conclusion that Plastic Memories is a massive missed opportunity for what could have been a really enjoyable original anime. It lacked direction and coherent writing on all fronts, and I cannot recommend it to anybody.
Reviewer’s Rating: 4
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Jun 27, 2015
**SPOILER FREE REVIEW OF BOTH SEASONS**
If anime history has taught us anything, it’s that visual novels are an incredibly difficult medium to adapt into anime form. Whereas a VN can contain hours upon hours of dialogue in order to establish characters, the story, the setting, and the lore, anime do not have such a luxury. In addition, VN’s offer the player the ability of interaction; they allow you to choose what path to go down and ultimately what “ending” you will receive. Choosing a poor option can actually result in death, thus shattering the concept of plot armor and keeping the reader on edge. Enter
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Fate/Stay Night; one of the most popular VNs of all time. Its story and characters are absolutely iconic as a result of its widespread fame. Would studio ufotable be able the capture the magic the source material is so widely praised for possessing? Unfortunately, the difficulties of transcending two very different mediums have never been more apparent than in this iteration to the Fate series. While I haven’t read the original work myself, I can wholeheartedly say that Fate/Stay Night UBW is a mediocre at best anime and good for virtually nothing outside of its flashy animation.
Synopsis: Seven “masters”, who are powerful magic users, summon seven “servants”, who are iconic figures from throughout history and fiction, in order to fight it out for possession of the holy grail; a magical item that will grant the recipient’s greatest wish. The story follows Shirou Emiya; a teenager with weak magical abilities who gets himself involved in the fray.
UBW’s story line has a plethora of issues, and a great deal of them stem from the fact that visual novels just don’t work as anime more often than not. First of all, this show’s amount of info-dumping and pacing in general is absolutely atrocious. Watching this show feels like watching Dragonball Z all over again; the characters just talk and talk and talk and repeat and repeat and repeat. Shut up and fight! Even when there is no fighting going on, all the characters know how to do is talk about the plot. There is So. Much. Explaining. I understand that the lore of Fate/Stay Night is important to the story, but have you ever heard of “show don’t tell”? Constant paragraphs of exposition may work in a visual novel, but not in an anime.
Even worse than info-dumping is the direct consequence of it: The characters are all shallow. Because ufotable is trying so hard to cram as much of the backstory and dialogue as they possibly can into every episode, something is very clearly missing: characterization. Every side character in this show might as well be a cardboard cutout. You’ve got Rin “most generic tsundere I’ve ever seen” Tohsaka, Illya “I only exist to make you sad and serve no actual purpose” Einzbern, Sakura “They completely forgot I existed” Matou, Shinji “immersion-breakingly hammy” Matou, and who could forget Saber, also known as “My route already happened, so I don’t matter anymore”. I can’t stress enough how big of a problem this is. Many of the major characters who receive a significant portion of screen time don’t even reach the 2nd dimension; a task that even completely incompetent writers can accomplish. They also fail to have even a slight amount of chemistry with each other, as every character relationship feels contrived and artificial. The only character this show seems interested in fleshing out is Shirou, and boy does that bring up a few issues…
First of all, how on Earth is anyone supposed to take Shirou Emiya seriously? Calling him an idiot would be an insult to idiots. This kid either has a death wish or the reasoning capabilities of an infant baboon. Or both. Before I even go into the number of times over he should have been killed and simply isn’t for the convenience of the plot, let’s talk about his “I have to save everybody” ideal system. Shirou: You realize that nearly 2 people die every second, right? You understand that it is not physically possible to LITERALLY save EVERYONE, right Shirou? You are a random teenager with absolutely no power, so surly you understand that you can only so much? No. No he doesn’t understand that. Shirou’s childish at best and completely insane at worst delusions are immersion breaking on the sole grounds of how mind-blowingly stupid they are. He unnecessarily endangers his own life and lives of countless others on a frequent basis even when there is absolutely nothing to gain from it (making him a hypocrite), he is unfathomably dense, and the very little personality he has is entirely unlikable. Shirou Emiya is one of the worst anime characters I’ve ever encountered.
And let’s mention plot armor for a second: We’ve established that in the VN, it is possible for Shirou to die if the player makes the wrong choice. This means there is no plot armor in the VN, which I’m sure works very much to its benefit. In the anime, however, there is no outlet or excuse for the obviously fatal situations that Shirou and the others manage to walk away from every other episode. There is NO logical reason whatsoever that people with every incentive to kill Shirou NEVER do when they have the opportunity. Yet again, it’s like watching Dragon Ball Z. We all know the hero is going to win, but can you at least put a little effort into creating logical reasons for WHY he is able to win rather than just having him miraculously surviving an encounter that should be fatal by the show’s own assertion EVERY time? It’s painful to watch.
To top off the disastrous writing and execution of this show, I feel the need to mention how downright edgy it is. That’s right; “edgy”. Since that term has become a bit of a buzzword, here’s what I mean by that: Something is edgy when it is dark, gritty, or shocking without any legitimate reason to be; it’s just thrown in there for the sake of shocking the audience or attempting to appear more mature than it actually is. Giving specific examples would delve into spoiler territory, but it reached “Craaaawling iiiiin my Skiiiiiin” levels of bad. When you consider that this is a show clearly under the impression that it is intelligent and philosophical, these moments are absolutely cringe-worthy.
I’ve said before that the fight scenes are the best part about this show, but even those become hard to take seriously when the writing behind them is unbelievably childish. Every fight, and I do mean essentially EVERY fight gets resolved with a total asspull. Be it a last second save or a deus ex machina, this is some truly disgraceful writing. Is watching the protagonist getting predictably saved at the last second over and over and over and over again, as if he was ever in any real danger, REALLY fun for you guys? Seriously, is it? Does that honestly not suck every bit of suspense out of the entire plotline and make it impossible to take seriously? Because it certainly does for me. To make this comparison for a third time, it’s like watching Dragonball Z.
Regardless of how badly the plot and characters managed to fail in my opinion, it can’t be denied that UBW has some pretty astonishing animation. The art style is nothing to write home about, but the fluidity of the actual motions as well as the choreography is nearly flawless. The action scenes will absolutely take your breath away, and the show really needed a lot more of them (and a lot less info-dumping). The settings and backdrops leave a bit to be desired, but the use of colorful gradients as magical attacks fly across the screen really gives the show a unique flair and keeps your eyes glued to screen. The music and voice acting is also good. Notice the emphasis on “good”. Not “great”. There are no tracks that really blew me away and the sound design wasn’t anything particularly impressive either, so while the overall use of sound is above average, it’s not legendary or anything.
I didn’t really delve into how pretentious the show is, I could have been more harsh about EVERY fight ending with a god machine, and there are several plotholes I can’t mention due to spoilers, but at this point, I think you get the idea. Fate/Stay Night UBW is a very, very flawed anime. The budget and cinematography is really the only thing that separates it from the rest of the crappy shounens, and I truly wish that wasn’t the case. I was a fan of Fate/Zero and I wanted to believe that DEEN’s 2006 disaster was just a fluke, but UBW has led me to believe that it was not. Fate/Stay Night is simply not going to work as an anime adaption, and this show’s abject failures in spite of its massive budget provide more than enough proof of that.
Reviewer’s Rating: 4
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Jun 26, 2015
**SPOILER FREE REVIEW**
The easiest way to sum up Is it Wrong to Pick up Girls in a Dungeon, or Danmachi for short, was eloquently put by Youtuber Demolition-D as “Sword Art Online: Fat-Fucking-Titties edition”. Who am I to argue with such a flawless summation? There is no question about what Danmachi is; it’s an otaku-pandering, self-insertion, video-game-inspired LN adaptation. The real question lies in whether you will love it for what it is, or hate it for what it is. In case you haven’t guessed it by now, I fall into the latter category. This shallow, ridiculous, and remarkably unoriginal work is a good example
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of everything wrong with anime today.
Synopsis: Bell Cranel is an adventurer; someone who explores dangerous dungeons and fights monsters for a living. He and his “goddess”, which is basically a glorified manager, Hestia, make up the smallest “familia” in all the land. This is the story of Bell winning every fight he’s ever been involved in one way or another, making every girl he comes into contact with fall in love with him despite his obvious lack of any charisma whatsoever, and gaining special abilities that nobody else can use for no discernable reason. In other words, it’s your standard LN adaptation.
Danmachi’s plot is what you get when you take SAO’s plot and crank it up a notch on the pandering scale. MORE fanservice. MORE blood. LARGER harems. MORE white-knighting from the protagonist. DOUCHIER side characters to make the protagonist look good by comparison. And, of course, LESS actual substance. It’s seriously like someone looked at the already stupid LN video game formula and said “Hmmm, how do we make this even harder to take seriously?” But I’m getting ahead of myself. Let’s start with the first reason Danmachi’s plot is bad: plot armor and melodrama. Much like a battle shounen, it is painfully obvious in any video game LN adaptation that the MC is never actually in any danger. However, the show spares no expense in convincing you that he is using the cheapest tactics possible. Last second saves? Check. Asspulled power ups? Check. Deus ex machina? Check-aruney. The entirety of the plot consists of Bell and the other main characters being put it perilous situations that even the most naïve of viewers can recognize will be resolved smoothly at the last second. Over and over and over again. It’s bad writing, it’s repetitive, and it’s not entertaining.
It’s at this point in the review that I realize there were so many things wrong with the show that I don’t even know what to talk about next. This may be a bizarre order of doing things, but now let’s talk about Bell Cranel; the protagonist. Dear. God. What an annoying, insufferable, shallow, clichéd, gary-stu, self-insert, AWFUL character. When you talk about characters who might as well be literally Gandhi, you can go ahead and put this saint at the top of the list. Nothing, and I mean NOTHING would ever cause this guy to do something wrong or immoral. People can betray him, steal from him, assault him, whatever; he just takes the abuse like a proverbial Jesus Christ and instantly forgives all wrongdoings. After all, they wouldn’t want to give off the impression that he is human or anything! Real people don’t have flaws or negative emotions, right? It’s SO much more interesting to have an idealized concept of all that is good in the world without an ounce of moral ambiguity so that otakus can fap to fantasies of the hundreds of sex objects that flock to his holy cock! Oh, and you better believe that he has special abilities that nobody else in the entire world has! It’s not enough that he’s the most righteous organism on planet Earth, but he also has a super special power that enables all of his skills to be as high as they possibly can AND enables him to level up faster than anyone else who has ever lived! Now, I want you to guess the explanation they give for why this makes sense; this is their GENIUS explanation for why Bell has this one-of-a-kind ability that makes him the most special person in all the land: BECAUSE HE’S IN LOVE. …OHHHHH! WELL THAT MAKES PERFECT SENSE! FUCK. I mean... just… fuck. I won’t even question it. In conclusion, Bell sucks. Moving on.
Unfortunately, the trend of shallow, awful characters continues with the rest of the cast. Let’s start by addressing the elephant in the room; Hestia. Fucking. Hestia. *Sigh… Just… why? I must be the ten-billionth person to ask this, but what the hell is the obsession with her? She is no different than any other 1 dimensional, big-boobed, harem-fodder nobody in a slutty outfit that allows us to instantly identify her as a sex-object, as if we wouldn’t have figured it out anyway. The absolute best description you can give about Hestia is that she functions as comic relief, and I don’t even think she’s very funny. That brings us to Lili, the other 1-dimmensional sex object who occupies the loli, furry, and tortured fetishes all at the same time. Impressive writers. Very impressive. Fetish writers around the world will have to come up with an answer to that. Maybe if she was also a robot-childhood-friend? Anyway, I’m not even going to mention the rest of the harem since they are completely one-dimensional and indistinguishable. Let’s also go over the nameless side-characters; I feel the need to bring attention to the fact that Bell is the ONLY adventurer in the entire world who is not a tremendous asshole. The “villain” adventurers have no depth at all, of course, but they are still made out as such blatantly awful people in order to FURTHER drive home the fact that Bell is Jesus. Not only is this lazy characterization, it’s also blatantly black-and-white morality, which makes the show require even less thought. This is one of the worst character casts since, well, Sword Art Online.
Let’s also take a moment to discuss how incredibly creative the monsters in this show are. Danmachi brings us such breathtaking and original monster designs such as, a bunny. A wolf. A minotaur. Oh, and who could forget the floor boss, “literally a titan from Attack on Titan”? Truly masterful creativity from these animators. It’s clear that a lot of work went into this show.
This is the paragraph where I planned on talking about how misogynistic this show is and how distracting the constant fan service is, but do I really need to give you that whole spiel? I already briefly talked about this stuff, and I feel like it’s so obvious why these aspects of a show are flaws that I shouldn’t need to explain it. Women with the obedience and dedication of slaves and no complexity whatsoever? It’s every otaku’s dream! And that’s precisely why this show is going to make a ton of money.
I could keep going. Really, I could. I could talk all day about what an awful betrayal of the basic fundamentals of writing this show is, but I think you get the idea. The reality is, a lot of people are going to like this show. A large percentage of anime fans are not at all bothered by anything I just mentioned, because for them, a self-insertion work is all they need. That’s fine and dandy for them, but from my point of view, this show and all shows like it are cancer. Danmachi is the antithesis of the clever and intelligent shows that made me become a fan of the medium in first place; it’s a brain-dead, effortless advertisement for the LN that ends incomplete. If you liked SAO or any other similar LN video game adaptation, you’ll love Danmachi. Everyone else? STAY. AWAY. Far, FAR away.
Reviewer’s Rating: 2
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Jun 25, 2015
**SPOILER FREE REVIEW**
Punchline is a fascinating and ambitious, but ultimately failed experiment by Studio MAPPA to tell unique, non-chronological, wacky, plot-twist filled story much in the same vain as Haruhi Suzumiya. What went wrong? To make a long story short: incompetent writing. This anime introduces a plethora of confusing and poorly explained plot devices that turn out to be completely pointless, totally nonsensical, and/or dead ends, making the show a ridiculous comedy at best and an incomprehensible mess at worse. But let’s talk about that:
Synopsis: Whenever out protagonist, Yuuta Iradatsu, sees a girl’s underwear, the world explodes. How? I don’t know. Why? Not important apparently.
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Does this ever become a necessary plot point? No. Just roll with it. Anyway, Yuuta’s soul has become separated from his body, and his goal is to save the world, his friends, and himself by observing a particular series of events over and over again in spirit-form, with each iteration ending in a time reset.
Explaining exactly why a show doesn’t make any sense is not an easy thing to do to somebody who hasn’t seen it, especially without spoilers, but I’ll do my best. If I had to sum up the reason Punchline’s plot is absolutely awful in a single sentence, it would be this: Everything is pulled out of their ass. There is NO logical consistency or flow to the events of the show. Things that have no good explanations behind them just appear out of nowhere at random intervals as if the viewer is supposed to understand what is going on when nothing is being explained. I guess they were hoping that people would overlook the lack of explanation in favor of the fun factor, but that did not end up being the case because it’s TOO vague and TOO “out-there”. Most anime fans are willing to overlook minor or even major discrepancies if the rest of the show makes sense, but very few were willing to tolerate the sheer amount of incompetence that Punchline vomited onto our screens. If ever there was an example of throwing shit to the wall to see what sticks, this anime is now the quintessential case. To reiterate once more, since I can’t stress it enough, this show makes NO sense, and the very limited amount of mindless fun that it occasionally provides is not nearly enough to compensate for that.
Perhaps the main reason Puchline fails to connect with the audience is because its characters are so flat and one-dimensional. Any semblance of a backstory or motivations that a character receives are always the barest of barebones, not to mention that they don’t even make sense more often than not (have you spotted a pattern?). In fact, every time this show attempts to answer a question about one of its characters, it just raises three more. The show really banks on the fact that the viewers get attached to these basic archetypes and feel the chemistry/friendship that they have with each other, but they simply never give us a reason to. I didn’t care about these characters because I had no idea who any of them were, and that includes the protagonist, who is on screen over 90% of the time. That’s a major, MAJOR issue. Oh, and the pointless plot devices that have no reason to exist that I mentioned earlier? The characters have a ton of those. All I can guess is that they are an attempt to make the show seem more “crazy” and “fun”, when really they just serve to make it even more incomprehensible. I don’t remember any of their names; that’s how truly unmemorable and uninteresting they are. Oh, and I’m still pretty confused about who the villain was supposed to be and what his motivations were. This show is just one big giant clusterfuck of disorientation.
Being animated by Studio MAPPA, Punchline is not totally without its strong points. The art, art direction, cinematography, and animation in general are easily the highlights of the show. Actions scenes are made more fun with unique and experimental angles as well as over-the top choreography that can be pretty entertaining at times. MAPPA continues distinguish themselves with their stellar visuals. As for the use of sound, it’s pretty standard. The OP and ED themes are catchy, but I’ll forget them in a month. The OST is also pretty run of the mill and sound design was pretty hit or miss for me. To sum it up, Punchline has above average animation and average sound.
If you’re looking for an over-the-top, mindless-fun sort of show, Punchline tries too hard to have a plot. If you are looking for a complex, Suzumiya-eque, intertwining story, Punchline is too confusing and nonsensical. As a result, this anime gets caught somewhere in the middle to these two target audiences, satisfies neither of them, and fails to establish any positive identity of its own. All things considered though, I must applaud the attempt at creating an original, multifaceted show. I truly hate the fact that I have to bash this anime because I really wanted to like it, but writing was simply too awful to tolerate. I do not recommend Punchline to anyone.
Reviewer’s Rating: 3
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Jun 23, 2015
**SPOILER FREE REVIEW**
Let’s face it: There are a LOT of bad anime out there. Despite that fact, 99% of anime created over the course human history have at least some sort of redeeming quality. It doesn’t matter how incoherent the plot is, how god-awful the characters are, how piss poor the animation is, or how maddeningly awful the sound effects are; there is almost always SOMETHING that you can take away from a show. Maybe the art style is pleasant. Maybe that comedic relief character was actually funny occasionally. Or maybe the show just provided some mindless fun at times. However, once in a blue
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moon, you may stumble across a special show that falls into that remaining 1%. A show that quite literally could not be worse than it already is. A show that lacks so much as a single redeeming quality. A show that is so awful, it feels like an accomplishment. Ladies and Gentleman; we have been gifted this season with one of those remarkable anomalies that defy all human comprehension. I present to you: Gunslinger Stratos. One of the worst anime of all time.
Synopsis: I have absolutely no idea. There are two parallel universes with completely arbitrary differences, the inhabitants fight each other for no reason whatsoever, and people turn into sand sometimes. I just don’t know.
So in case that synopsis didn’t clue you in, the biggest and most glaring problem that Gunslinger Stratos has is the fact that it makes NO sense. Usually anime that don’t make sense have a passable script that was poorly executed or an awful script that was executed averagely. Not good ole’ Gunslinger Stratos though! Everything, and I mean EVERYTHING about this show’s writing and directing is an absolute disgrace. The plot, setting, and characters are all an absolute muddle of incompetence that leave you awestruck out of sheer incomprehensibility. It’s actually hard to believe that people who clearly don’t have the foggiest sense of even the most basic elements of storytelling were getting paid to animate this trash. Clearly there was some sort of conceptual story in place, but they could not have gone about conveying it to the viewers in a worse fashion. This show will info-dump and info-dump and info-dump and info-dump, yet you never actually learn anything. Each and every plot device introduced raises questions that demand answers, are extremely confusing and need far more fleshing out, and/or connect to nothing at all in the rest of the story. From beginning to end, it is entirely unclear to the viewer what is going on. I won’t go on so this doesn’t start to sound too much like a rant, but for all of these reasons, Gunslinger Stratos’ plot is among the worst of the worst. You would have to put forth a conscious effort to make something worse than this show’s story.
Continuing on with this anime’s theme of incompetence, the cast of characters are as boring as they come. Even some of the worst anime ever made have at least one character that qualifies as two dimensional, but Gunslinger Stratos can’t even muster as much as that. You could replace any given character of this show with a cardboard cutout and I probably wouldn’t notice the difference. Seriously, I can’t even go over what archetypes the cast members fill because they aren’t even archetypes! They are NOTHING! I’m struggling to find so much as an ounce of personality in a single character to talk about here, and that should tell you all you need to know about the personas of Gunslinger Stratos.
That brings us to the presentation aspects of the show, which, while not quite as bad as the writing, are still not nearly up to scratch. Gunslinger Stratos will have one, maybe two well-composed scenes per episodes, and about five or six mind-bogglingly stupid shots that have no direction to them whatsoever. From beginning to end, the animation is incredibly inconsistent; the animation has so few frames that it looks like a flipbook at certain times, and those times far overshadow the very little good that this show has to offer. Overall, very poor animation. The music is equally as forgettable as the rest of the show. At least it fits the tone of the anime more often than not, but I counted one and only one song throughout the entirety of the show that I would consider to be good, and it only played during a single scene. It was hard to pay attention to the nuances of sound design when the rest of the show is so mind-numbingly awful, I suppose. Factoring in the below-average voice acting, I can say that the sound design is just plain bad.
There are only three possible explanations for the existence of a show like this: Incompetence, greed, or a combination of the two. I do not believe for a single, solitary second that anybody cared about the quality of this show. Not the animators, not the directors, not the writers. Strike that; I CANNOT believe that anybody cared about the quality of this show. There are simply too many glaring, immersion-breaking problems to be able to say that Gunslinger Stratos was put through even the slightest form of quality assurance. This anime is an advertisement. A 12 episode advertisement that even the most easily entertained of anime fans will be unable to follow. This is one of the worst anime of all time.
Reviewer’s Rating: 1
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Apr 25, 2015
**SPOILER FREE REVIEW**
“What is Mawaru Penguindrum?“ If ever there was a more loaded question in the realm of anime, I’m not sure I’ve heard of it, because this show is an absolute enigma. Adequately reviewing this show is a daunting task for reasons that will soon be clear, but let’s give it a shot: First of all, what is this show? Well, it’s a lot of things. A moving story about the importance of love. A detailed commentary on the way society treats children. A unique perspective on mental health issues. An insightful interpretation about the concepts of fate and destiny. Etcetera etcetera etcetera. While
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the vast majority of anime are driven by their plot or by their characters, Penguindrum is instead driven by its themes, style, and the artistic messages that lurk in the 2nd, 3rd, and 4th layers of the show. It is extremely complex and jam-packed with more symbolism, motifs, and allusions than you can shake a stick at, but it’s simultaneously intriguing and investing enough that you could miss all of them and still enjoy the show. For that reason, Penguindrum is on the remarkably short list of shows that manage to have vast and flawlessly executed themes while simultaneously managing to have an engaging story and fleshed out characters. It’s one of my all time favorite shows and, as far as I’m concerned, a masterpiece.
Synopsis: Twins Kanba and Shouma Takakura lost their parents long ago, and now live alone with their younger sister Himari. They lead relatively normal lives until Himari is diagnosed with a terminal illness that could cause her to drop dead at any moment. Distraught, the twins attempt to make the best of the time they have left with their beloved sister, until she finally collapses during a family trip to the aquarium. Himari dies. However, when the souvenir penguin hat that Shouma bought for her finds its way onto her head, she miraculously comes back to life with her illness cured. The only condition to keep her alive? Find the Penguindrum.
The plot of Penguindrum has always been intriguing to me because, in theory, it should be a total disaster. You’ve got this unbelievably absurd concept of a penguin hat that grants immortality, an evil mastermind who controls your destiny with the help of two of his rabbit sidekicks, and comedic relief penguins who serve no immediately apparent purpose, yet you’re going to try to tell a heart-wrenching story of love and betrayal that delves deep into philosophy, ethics, and social commentary? I mean, does that sound for a second like it’s going to even remotely work? In any other circumstance, it probably wouldn’t have. Luckily, this anime was directed by Kunihiko Ikuhara, who is also known for Revolutionary Girl Utena and, more recently, Yuri Kuma Arashi. Ikuhara, if I may be so bias for a second, is a complete and total artistic genius. I’ve said before that his style is not for everyone; the repetition of sequences, the abstract environments, the use of vibrant color dissonance, etc. It all serves to provide this show with a remarkable artistic flair that will dazzle you and ensure that there is never a dull moment.
Getting back to the plot, the reason that Ikuhara is so widely praised is for his ability to convey information without words; to connect the events of the show to the real world and make the viewer question what the meaning of it all is. Of course, the storyline of Penguindrum can be taken at face value by all means. It is complete with exciting plot twists, intense moments, and general excitement. The thing is, there are LOTS of anime that can give you those things. However, there are virtually NO anime who can give you those things on top of the sheer depth and artistic passion that went towards conveying a refined, emotional message to the viewers. This serves to make the humble story of the Takakura family all the more memorable, as it can only be described as a rollercoaster of emotions. Penguindrum will make you feel every emotion that you have over its duration, and I think that is saying something.
The character cast of Penguindrum adheres to the writing technique known as “The Mystery Box”. For those unaware, this is when the characters are presented to the audience, but the show has no intention of letting you get to know them at first. No real backstory is given; all you know about them is what you see. Then, slowly and steadily, you begin the learn more and more about them. Their pasts. Their motivations. And finally, their deepest darkest secrets. Every time you think you know everything there is to know about the large cast of Penguindrum, wham! Another twist! This is a remarkably impressive accomplishment because it is only through the viewers’ sheer exasperation after their perceptions of the characters get turned on their heads again and again and again do they begin to realize just how much depth that all of them have. Note the emphasis on the word “all”, because no character in Penguindrum is left behind. All of them, no matter how seemingly minor, are fleshed out and manage to feel real. The icing on the cake is that this anime manages to accomplish all of this without ever feeling contrived; these are not twists “just of the sake of twists”. They are all thematically coherent and well thought out. For that reason, I can’t see anything to complain about with this cast. They are likable, relatable, well written, dynamic, and they have depth. What more could you possibly want?
Discussing the presentation aspects of an Ikuhara anime is never easy simply because of how unique and simultaneously profound it manages to be. As I mentioned earlier, Ikuhara is a master of visual storytelling. He frequently conveys more information with animation and shot composition than he does with dialogue/monologue, and that’s something you just don’t see often. I won’t even try to describe the myriad of techniques used in this anime, because I don’t think I could do it well without writing a separate essay. Speaking purely in terms of aesthetic appeal, the art style of Peguindrum is extremely pretty. The colors are immensely bright and everything pops right off the screen. The animation itself is also very fluid, and even memorizing at times. In short, it’s one of the most visually impressive anime I’ve ever seen for reasons that are hard to describe without demonstrating specific examples. As for the sound design, I struggle to find legitimate complaints yet again. The OPs and EDs are both unique and worthy of listening to in your spare time. I can’t tell you how long I had OP 1, “Nornir”, on repeat when I first finished this show. What really makes the OST work is the directing; Penguindrum’s mood and tone fluctuate a lot, and the soundtrack never fails to provide the proper accompaniment. Songs always end right when they need to and begin right when they need to. By the way, the voice acting is spot-on. There’s not a single VA who didn’t totally nail the character they are attached to. Penguindrum’s story and themes may be its main talking point, but by no means whatsoever does the presentation lag behind; it is just as superb as the rest of the show.
What more is there to say about Mawaru Penguindrum? Well, a lot actually. I could quite literally gush over this show all day; it has turned me into a hopeless Ikuhara fanboy. However, fanboying aside, I think this show is an absolute must watch. Not everyone is into the whole symbolism thing, and I get that, but it’s an enjoyable show even without paying mind to the themes. For people who ARE into critical analysis, this is your dream come true. Penguindrum is a show that means a lot to me and has genuinely made me reassess several of my worldviews. The effort, passion, and sheer emotion poured into this anime is palpable, and rivaled only (in my opinion) by Neon Genesis Evangelion in terms of how well you can feel the creator’s pain. It is one of my absolute favorites and it is one of the few anime that I can say without hesitation is indeed a masterpiece.
Reviewer’s Rating: 10
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Apr 1, 2015
**SPOILER FREE REVIEW**
Rolling Girls is what happens when you sell out. It’s the embodiment of relinquishing your own vision and creativity to ensure that your product sells rather than ensuring its actual quality. This anime is a great exemplification of the profit-over-quality mindset that has plagued the anime industry with its indistinguishable moe garbage for nearly a decade. Now, I’m not being so hard on this show because it’s the worst offender of lazy moe-blob entertainment, but because it has the structure and budget to be something that’s actually good, yet consciously chooses to be something stupid and generic instead. That, to me, is the
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ultimate offense. You Rolling Girls fans probably want me to elaborate after that seething intro, so let’s jump into this:
Synopsis: In an alternate reality, Japan is split into a multitude of factions, each of which is controlled by one or many moe-blobs. Hijinks ensue.
After watching the first episode or two of Rolling Girls, you might be fooled into thinking that this show has an actual plot, actual characters, and a fleshed out setting. Well, don’t be, because this anime has none of those things. The only imaginable reason that you could enjoy watching this show is for the flashy animation with no rhyme or reason behind it and the copious amounts of moe. It’s the epitome of mindless entertainment. Now, that’s all fine and dandy if the show was honest about what it is, but it isn’t. Rolling Girls tries to convince you that it develops a coherent story and legitimate, multi-dimensional characters when it so obviously is not.
The whole idea of Japan being split into factions seems like a cool and imaginative idea, until you realize they are merely using it as an excuse to change the show’s setting and supporting characters every episode or two. Following a largely episodic style, characters come and go before you’ve even committed their names to memory, much less their personality or motivations. Every single subplot is incredibly shallow and pointless, and ends in the same place that it began. To reiterate, NOTHING of significance happens in this show; there is no coherent plot, no matter how hard it tries to convince you that there is. The only reason to watch it is for comedic, moe hijinks, which you can get in so many other shows without the deception.
The characters, as you might expect from a moe-blob show, are completely one-dimensional, boring, and indistinguishable. They all have the exact same sense of humor (which, again, is moe) and even the exact same face. They are completely uninteresting, unoriginal, and zero-effort. However, yet again, the show will try to trick you into thinking they are more than that. The first two episodes strongly indicate the backstories, motivations, and personalities of the girls will actually come into play at some point. Needless to say, they don’t; this is a plotless comedy show and nothing more.
The one and only thing that Rolling Girls deserves praise for is its bright, colorful animation. When they actually decide to animate something of note, this show is absolutely beautiful. Fantastic (though seldom utilized) choreography combines with vibrant colors to really pop off the screen and make you want to never look away. This is really the only reason to watch the anime, as it goes quite well with the whole theme of mindless entertainment that the show has. The soundtrack is pretty unremarkable, as the opening is a pandering idol-girl sequence and the OST is bland. The voiceacting is your standard series of moe quirks and not memorable either.
In short, is Rolling Girls a bad show? Not necessarily, but it certainly is an uninspired one. It can be actually funny at times and the colors are pretty, but when it comes down to it, there is no reason to recommend this show over any other moe-blob comedy; especially when many other shows do the comedy part far better and don’t pretend to have depth to their plot and characters when they actually don’t. I do not recommend Rolling Girls, though I can see how people would enjoy watching it.
Reviewer’s Rating: 4
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