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Shingo Natsume is an okay director and a nice animator but a weak writer, at least for his debute as one in Sonny Boy.
Due to the targeted demographic, there are two recurrent themes in most of anime that aspire to be artistic : coming of age and escapism ; as we can see this in the works of studio Gainax, Satoshi Kon and as far as modern anime is concerned, Gurren Lagann and The Tatami Galaxy, besides other works of shounen, shoujo and so on.

Sonny Boy is about a bunch of teenangers on the verge of entering the young adult life of having a job ... and paying taxes, with all the worrying and anxieties that come with it, illustrated in a highschool isolated by an endless black void for the protagonists and their absence of understanding or even seeing what's beyound their bubble. Resulting to them shutting down and exploring the possibilities of the future paths, in an identity-journey of self-reflection across alternative worlds, until finding the right way for each through this mess that renders your most recognized talents irrelevant, by one effective compass that is the Heart. Time is static, and Space is fragmented. Before your heart enters into action, you have to adjust your perspective by rewinding back the film of your memory.
Shingo Natsume created a good concept with a classic message and executed the whole thing in a surreal freestyle riffing, which resulted in a fine tone and some handicaps sadly. The pace is well managed, we are in a mundane "life" with some super powers, and almost no soundtrack. We can clearly see the influence of previous works he worked on ; mainly The Tatami Galaxy and Acca. I think this is Natsume training for his next project that is The Tatami Galaxy's Sequel.
The cast are not compelling, their dialogues are redundant, they lack chemistry, they are self insert and most of the time is spent on vagueness, irrelevant mystery bait that won't matter by the next episode because the setting is changing constantly. Of course it is stated from the beginning that their "this world" is ruled by the absurd, but it's a double edged sword especially when you grasp the message and it becomes clear by the first few episodes, rendering it just a "plot"-device to "relativistically" do whatever he wants since "nothing matters and everything matters" as they said.
Another thing that weighted this anime down is the finale...in my opinion at least despite me thinking i understood Shingo Natsume's aim...it made it like the whole thing was inside of the MC's mind and all that experimantal animation was to portray the confusion and deliver a simple anti-escapist coming of age message. The "cute girl that saves you" is just imaginary and something that will never happen just let go, keep the memories and follow your heart... Good Natsume you are reality-checking the otakus and their power fantasy isekais ! Eventhough the mc made the breakthrough with a girl and he happened to connect with her in the real "boring" world..?? You can see how Natsume is trying to play with us over here.

In this current era stagnated with isekais, this was a refreshing one and a brave move from Natsume, despite the fact that he couldn't fully achieve what he aspired to ; a new Tatami Galaxy, a new FLCL, a new Paranoia Agent maybe ! with a mundane tone and average "relatable" characters. The aforementionned titles succeed in every departement ; characters organic chemistry, surreal animation and last but not least : a satisfying powerful catharsis.

Imma break a dimension too and suggest few works relevant to Sonny Boy more or less ;
-The Tatami Galaxy, FLCL,Paranoia Agent : eccentric characters, escapism,surreal animation, other worlds/possibilities, choice or l'embarras du choix.

-if you want to know more about the Soufi way of the heart and the intuition, the works of these gentleman are the true compass : Al-Ghazzali, Ibn-Arabi,Henri Bergson, René Guénon.