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It's a pretty good show. I was initially worried there would be a lot of random nonsensical stuff happening for "muh artistic value" but a lot of the absurd or mysterious stuff in the beginning actually begins to be explained later on. The characters have backstories, motivations, and feelings motivating their actions.

Don't let the MC put you off from watching this. As far as I know, being deaf and mute doesn't make you mentally retarded but the MC very much is. 90% of his personality is "feel sorry for me because I'm a cute dumb disabled baby" (even though his younger brother is reasonably intelligent). ... Yes, sometimes he has moments of normal-human-level cognition, but it's too rare.

Overall it has good art, a well-paced plot that makes sense, and fleshed-out characters. Would recommend.

Extremely disappointing. Could be a good story if you completely turn your brain off though. If you actually try to understand the characters' motivations for almost anything you'll find they make no sense.

The killing and eating of herbivores is downplayed to a huge degree throughout the show. It's like we're supposed to treat them as actual animals, not as intelligent beings. Legosi literally buys whole slabs of meat for his meditation!!! He probably has bought more meat than all his classmates combined!!! But somehow it's ok because he buries them afterwards??? Legosi also wants to "reform" a dude who KILLED AND ATE HIS FRIEND. They ... fight like 5 times but stop to chat and decide to fight some more later like they're scheduling a fucking date night.

Legosi be like "hey dude who brutally murdered my friend, wanna actually have our life and death battle next week? Don't worry I wouldn't ever say anything to the police. I'm not mad at you for killing and eating my friend or anything. I actually just want to fight to prove you can be strong without meat lmao."

The only reason to watch it is the art and the OP. Really sad that such an interesting setting was squandered with a horrible story. I'm shocked that so many people are capable of not only enjoying but loving this slop.

Killer be like "why yes that works really well with my schedule person who knows I committed a murder. I wouldn't want to inconvenience you by continuing to fight now. I know you have places to be. Prepare to be murdered by me on Tuesday :)"

(spoiler free)

If you're the kind or person who loved Paprika or Redline,you'll like this too. Promare is another entry in the class of movies with great visuals at the cost of other aspects. Promare is the most egregious example of this. Its characterization is much worse than what you'll find in the average seasonal anime.

Comparisons to Kill la Kill and Gurren Lagann are an offense to those amazing works of art. The fact that this is rated higher than either is a cosmic injustice. I had a better understanding of the story's context and more connection its characters after a single 20 minute episode of ... Kill la Kill or Gurren Lagann than I do after all 2 hours and 10 minutes of Promare content (I watched the prequels).

Fire Force is a much better comparison (and not just because of the extremely similar story). Fire Force also has great visuals which it doesn't quite live up to. But I don't think Promare comes out on top here either.

In Promare, Galo is a (new?) recruit to the fire fighters. He likes to use a matoi. He was saved from a fire by the Governor, who he idolizes and is proud to be a fire fighter. He is very brave. That's the full extent of his character. We don't know anything else about his past; we don't know of any relationships he has other than with the Governor.

In Fire Force, Shinra is a new recruit to the fire fighters. Shinra is excited to be on the team, but a little nervous. His interactions with other characters match his position and personality. He's self-conscious about his unfortunate quirk of grinning when he's nervous. His mother and brother died in a fire, which some people blamed him for. He is really excited to be a fire fighter because he wants to save people from suffering the same fate as his mother. There's more, but I think you get the point.

It's actually surprising to me how much I can remember about the main character from an anime I finished five months ago which was generally considered a fairly generic shounen. I watched Promare less than an hour ago, and I know far less about its characters.

A few other notes:
- The plot was extremely predictable.
- There are some moments where the animation is incredible, and some (rare) moments where it looks like a slideshow.
- The unique color palette is novel and engaging at first, but became slightly annoying and awkward by the end.
- Some actions sequences occur fast enough that they require significant focus to see what's happening (the colors probably make this worse).
- I must have some odd brand of narcolepsy because this movie (and others filled with action but lacking connection) made me nearly fall asleep several times.
- The music is pretty good.
- I could have still given the movie an 8 with all these problems, but the lack of characterization was insurmountable.


I'm not happy that this movie was so disappointing. I really wanted and expected to like it (I'd been expecting to like it since I heard Trigger was making a movie all the way back in 2017). One the upside, watching this helped me to better understand how important characterization is. Since nearly all fiction at least makes an attempt at characterization, I had somewhat taken it for granted. But since Promare completely eschews characterization, I'm more aware of how all the little, seemingly insignificant, moments with a character are actually fundamental; their removal is disastrous.

This show is a guilty pleasure of mine. It's got a lot of things going on in it that I can personsonally relate to that likely won't appeal to others. That said, it's worth watching at least two episodes to see if it can hook you the same way.

I think the key to what's got me hooked on this show is the MC's passion. I find it easy to project myself onto him because of this, so there isn't really any need to build his character. In fact, it's better that he has such a one-note personality because this makes him easier to project onto. ... All the side characters are pretty unimportant to my enjoyment; honestly the show would do good to cut down on their screen time.

The secondary element which hooks me into the show is it's world. I think it's pretty interesting that magic is like programming, and every episode I look forward to further worldbuilding tidbits. The aspect about the world that I find most interesting is the robots. Every week I look forward to the MC making some new innovation on the robots.

Anyways, that's my opinion. Objectively, the story is rushed and the side characters are alright. The mechs look cool and the fights are nice and dynamic. The MC is OP and takes months to do what a whole country couldn't do in decades.


You will like this anime if you...
just have low standards
are intrigued about the world
can relate to the MC's passion
like MCs who are massively overpowered

This anime was such a dissapointment for me that I feel compelled to write this review. From the description, and others' reviews I expected a thought provoking anime that would explore guilt and redemption. Unfortunately, what I got was not that.

Certainly, the anime wasn't bad, but it does have a lot of flaws. The character developement was pretty weak. Everyone aside from the two main characters, Shoya and Shoko, and possibly Yuzuru, Shoko's sister, are pretty one-note.

The story has problems too. There are some subplots that are never finished, and sometime there's unnecessary scenes which contribute little to the show. There was also a ... certain romance that seemed it would become a big deal, just to be completely forgotten about for the rest of the story. Also, the characters' actions don't seem to have a good reason behind them in many cases. If the content from the manga which explains many of the characters' motivations wasn't cut, I think this anime would be much better.

However, I think this show does an excellent job at crafting really emotional scenes. Even if the logic behind them isn't perfectly sound, the voice acting, animation, and music can come together to make really emotional scenes.

Finally, while I don't think this show did a great job of exploring all its themes, there are some good points. I like how it raises the question of whether Shoya's attempts at rejections are actually to help Shoko, or if they're just for his satisfaction. Also, I like how it shows the lengths people will go to in order to fit in (Shoya bullying Shoko). And how it shows how important it is to have friends who will accept you for who you are. Typically this is kind of a cliche message, that we're more or less supposed to accept, but Koe no Katachi makes a convincing case for it.