Reviews

Sep 9, 2013
Mixed Feelings
The first thing you notice when you begin watching Myself;Yourself is that of the art style. The long faced style of the characters, simple designs and non-distinguished clothing can be a rather large turn off to the viewer. Likewise the passable animation quality can be annoying to a viewer that wants everything to be a work of art. From simply animating more than just the characters hands clapping, or lip sync the show lacks a lot of what one could find beautiful. This is most aptly shown by the opening of the show, which utilizes a concert scene. Similar scenes in other shows use accurate and elegant animation to the music which often astounds the audience. Yet in Myself;Yourself you merely get the energy of the characters movement portrayed, not the actual instruments played. Which as it sounds doesn't make the show hard to watch, it merely does not draw you in as strongly as it could otherwise do.

The music used in the show is pretty forgettable. None of the musical tracks carry any mood badly though, they are just merely there and don't give lasting impressions to the viewer. Despite having small musical sub themes which could lead to disappointment to a viewer that wanted any music the characters themselves play as being truly moving. In a similar fashion the sound assets and voice acting isn't out of place as a whole, but neither is it anything amazing. Overall the production values of animation and sound are completely passable, but nothing amazing, or good.

Luckily, production values aside, the actual characters in this show are quite solidly portrayed. That is, the majority of the main cast act like people, their quirks are understandable and lifelike which makes connecting to these characters, despite the visual lack of typical distinctions, easy. This isn't necessarily true for all the characters in the show, but being as it's a 13 episode series this is to be expected. In fact the brief time they give to some of the lesser characters I would argue is time that would have been better put towards portraying the plot specific characters as this would have strengthened their already well crafted characters and allow the audience a deeper connection to the characters that matter. The characters carry this show, with themes and relationships which are so easy to do wrong either by putting too much or too little emphasis on them, are done wonderfully. Truly drawing the audience in to the main experiences the show has to offer.

The plot of the show is nothing special. That is, there is nothing that happens that is really that surprising outside of maybe a couple of twists. Yet I cannot call this a bad thing as the narrative and characters make sense. They don't tend to do stupid things that a person would not do. The struggles and triumphs shown in the series are fairly realistic and understandable if bordering on fairy tale-like at times. Nothing happens in the show that one wouldn't expect to be possible in real life, no super natural phenomena just people being people. The comedic sides of the show are pretty typical, with gags that one has seen a thousand times before. Yet they centre around one particular supporting character and don't take away from the rich immersion of the actual plot and feeling of the show. The overall tones of the show vary from light-hearted to dark dramatic. This isn't used to it's full potential but it is used well enough that the viewer cares about what happens. This isn't a show that repulses you when you watch some of the gags, but neither is it a show that will make you laugh out loud often. Nor will it send you into crying for hours on end, but it will dabble in both
not dedicating itself to central emotion.

Thus I would have to conclude that Myself;Yourself is a solid drama. Very little in the show is actually done bad, yet very little in the show actually stands out as being amazing outside of it's mature usage of themes and characterization. Whilst it takes about episode three for the show really to get rolling and a lot more feels like it could have been better, in either more time spent on some characters, some plot lines explored in more detail, or even using less obvious foreshadowing to give a more surprising plotline. For a 13 episode romantic comedy drama the show is worth watching if you enjoy that style of show.
Reviewer’s Rating: 6
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