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Uta no Prince-sama: Maji Love Legend Star is the fourth season of the long continued UtaPri anime series. When it was first announced in the end of the third season I already was scared how bad this season was going to get as the third season was the biggest disappointment for me. For my surprise I actually liked this season a lot more than the previous one.

Story 8/10
The story starts where the third season was left off but immediately I noticed how much I enjoyed the first episode a lot more than the whole plot line of the third season. There isn't anything new, but ... it felt like the corny writing from the second season was back what I had missed since the third season just felt boring and lacking in story telling.

Even though it's still having the same formula of being one boy/one episode (or in this case 2 boys while counting Heavens members in) the writing isn't bad at all for series such as this: it is not in any case even trying to be a master piece.

I'm really glad they took plot points from the games; I'm especially happy how they handled Otoya and Natsuki, but what I am still missing is the whole deal with Syo's condition from the games. I know the anime version is supposed to be a lot more light hearted than its game equivalents, but seeing how they handled the episodes with Otoya in it quite well makes me want to see all that angst from Syo's, and other character's routes, to be animated too.

Despite this I consider this season's story rather good.

Art 6/10
I have always liked UtaPri's art style, but since season 3 I have noticed a slight drop in quality. It's not that distracting as in some other series and there is once again lots of improvement from the previous season, but in some episodes it can get quite bad. Also the cgi in the performances can take time to get used to at first. While not being the worst, the cgi modules look rather clean and are only used in shots far away, it's still quite noticeable.

There are a lot of positives too. Like mentioned, I have always liked the art style and there isn't any changes in it from season one which is a good thing. The colors and backgrounds are nice especially during the songs. The character designs still look good and I quite also like the designs of the new Heavens members. The animation is also solid, nothing spectacular but I don't really have anything to complain about it either.

Sound 9/10
As it being mostly a music based anime, the songs play a big part in the whole enjoyment. While not being my favorite season music wise, all the songs are really good and I always looked forward to them in every single episode.

The opening and ending are both really high quality and especially the ending is proven to be an earworm as its predecessors from previous seasons.

The voice acting is on point once again with all the old cast returning. I really liked the voice acting for the new Heavens characters as well.


Character 7/10
The Starish members are all given more time to improve their own plots though some having purely filler based, but still enjoyable, respective episodes. The ones that stood out the most from the old characters were Otoya and Natsuki, them having the most development in their characters than others. The Heavens members also got nicely development in their character arcs though the show still mainly focuses on Starish.

The ones that felt lacking were Quartet Night, them leaving mainly in the background, and the so-called main character of the series Haruka Nanami. I'm hoping the future anime adaptation(s) will fix this since there is lots of depth to the Quartet Night characters that hasn't been shown yet and now that the anime series is starting to take plot points from the games I'm hoping they do the same with QN.

Enjoyment 7/10
This season made me have hope for the future of UtaPri's anime adaptation (as in the new anime project has been announced) as it was in my opinion quite enjoyable and an improvement from the previous season.

There were still some episodes that felt dragging from others and some felt just purely rushed, but in the end it was a good season. The finale wasn't anything amazing, but it made me realize how much I actually care about this series and I am happy that it will still continue, be it another season or an ova.

Overall 7/10
As for someone who has been with this franchise since the first game I'm happy I watched this. After the third season I was actually quite reluctant to even start this season, but it surprised be in a good way and was actually one of the only series this cour that I never even considered dropping.

It's not anything great and still has lots to improve, but if you have seen all the previous seasons I'm sure you'll like this one too as it continues with the same pattern and you'll get to know the guys' backgrounds more.

I'm looking forward of seeing more UtaPri in the future.