From the very start, the style of the series strikes true for the dystopian society of a post apocalyptic future it shows, both with the stunning art that is combined with excellent animation, and chilling music. There's just something strangely alluring about the contrast of light and dark present everywhere in the art, even as it never shows a hint of simplicity. And of course, I personally absolutely love the design of Re-l (which is showed by my avatar, as usual), one of the main characters.
As contrast to the explosive start, the series progressed at a very calm pace at many points, and even seemingly went off the rails at times. On one hand, I feel the pacing is perhaps the biggest weakness of the entire show, but on the other hand I never felt bored for a long amount of time. In fact, it was very much welcome when I had a moment to calm down, because even at its slower points the series kept me very tense most of the time. The feeling of a completely uncertain world was very impressively depicted by the story, and I was afraid to feel affection towards any single character in the show with the knowledge that the world really didn't care much about what happened to them.
At the same time, I appreciated every single character in the show for what they provided. Perhaps it managed to go even deeper than that. Despite the chaotic setting, the story itself was in truth quite straightforward and meticulously constructed. The pre-planned purpose of every character in the story was not just a matter of their parts in the story, but also dealt with as a theme throughout the series. In fact, the series showed wonderful self awareness in dealing with this, rather than the usual the curious contradiction of praising human free will while ignoring the fact that every expression of the was in truth constructed by the creator of the story.
Such self awareness and introspection from the view point of the creator of the story was present throughout the series, in many different ways. This lead to another aspect of the show that could be considered a weakness. Aside the pacing being strange, the story also wasn't presented in as straightforward fashion as it seemingly travelled. At times there was seemingly huge differences between where the last episode left off and where the new one started, in a couple of cases completely jarring. The couple of the more extreme cases I do believe were poorly handled, but the way the series was structured in itself wasn't necessarily bad. In most cases, every episode dealt with a different theme, most of which were both very philosophical and deeply psychological, and they did so very well. What was really jarring was that the writer seemingly saw it purposeful to interject the view points of both themselves and the watchers directly into the story. While I understand the purpose of this, especially in such an experimental show, I do think it wasn't worth it in every case.
Speaking of philosophical and psychological... I think this is a prime example of what a lot of people would call pretentious. I personally disagree on that. When I originally watched the series years ago, neither my brain nor my understanding of philosophy were nearly enough developed to really grasp most of it, but even then I don't think I ever dismissed it as just being nonsense. I'm glad about that, because on this rewatch I feel like I was actually able to keep up very well, even through the less elegant twists of the story. There each case there was some real thought put into it, but the really impressive part was that all of these ideas were able to be delivered without the attempt to insert conclusions into them. One of the key things in succesfully writing something like this is the ability to keep in mind one's own fallibility, which I think was achieved in this case.
In the end the story and the characters managed to enthrall me quite well. Even as it dealt with complex themes, the story managed to keep a certain necessary simplicity to it. For the most part, actual unnecessary elements were eliminated, thus keeping the story well on its track until the very end. Where it sadly stumbled a little bit, as often is. The conclusion was satisfactory in a manner, so I feel there is no need to harp on it too much, but it didn't reach quite the potential such a show had. Perhaps it was because there was actually in the end a certain unnecessary element, brought into it in an attempt to reach the excellence the ending deserved, but departing from the solid progression of the story in a harmful way. It's also entirely possible that there really actually just wasn't enough to the story in its simplicity, though I personally do find that complications added for the sake of it aren't necessary for a grand conclusion.
In conclusion, I think this anime is possibly one of the best things ever. It's also entirely possible that I'm just a pretentious prick that enjoyed it simply because I felt I understood something complicated that perhaps wasn't fully there in the first place.
