Saying that Glasslip had a story is laughable. It's as if the writing behind the series just patched together random ideas and put it on the screen. Even upon completion I don't understand what this series was trying to convey. Be shallow and fall for the good-looking, up-and-coming sociopath transfer student? Believe in and follow your delusions, which realistically seem like mental disorders, instead of hauling ass to the nearest doctor? I just don't know.
If you thought my description of the story was bad, and that has somehow not put you off of this series yet (unless you've already suffered like I've suffered, God bless your soul), then this should do the trick. Let's talk characters. There are 6 important (who am I kidding?), main characters in Glasslip. They are: Touko, Kakeru, Yukinari, Sachi, Yanagi, and Hiro. Like most dramas and slice of life shows, the main driving force behind the series are its characters. However, with Glasslip, the only thing that will be driving is you. Off the nearest cliff.
Touko is the main female lead of the series, who honestly seems like she's not all there mentally. Touko constantly spaces out, has little to no awareness of her surroundings, and easily has the lowest IQ out of all of her friends. Half her responses to trivial things is, "EHHHHH!?" and it reeks of such stupidity that it hurts my brain.
Kakeru, or "David", the emotionless transfer student, basically has no understanding of socially acceptable human interaction. Instead of easing his way into joining Touko's group of friends, like any normal person would, he acts like a condescending asshole. Big surprise! All of Touko's friends hate him. It doesn't help that he rarely says anything besides Touko this, Touko that, or it's my fault Touko feels sad. Want to get a restraining order filed on you? Follow Kakeru's detailed step-by-step examples.
Yukinari is an athletic guy that has some real apparent issues with catching hints and simply talking in general. He gets jealous easily, has a real douchebag attitude, and runs a lot. I think I could have gone to the store and bought a pair of Nikes — which would not have only been more enjoyable than Yukinari's character, but also more interesting — and gained more entertainment value. Nikes also won't complain or get angry about their running performance either, so that's another big plus.
Yanagi is an alright character, though still pretty bland and generic. She seems normal enough compared to the others, which isn't saying much, but also still has problems of her own. She's got the hots for her step-brother and is extremely quick to jump to his defense whenever someone even hints at what an imbecile he is. I swear Japan, something is wrong with you and your infatuation with brother-sister relationships.
I don't really understand how Sachi even became friends with the rest of the group. All she does is read books, for the most part. She rarely attends the group activities because she has some sort of unexplained illness and rarely says anything of value. Apparently nobody seems to care that she lies to them and tries to play little, deceitful games to get what she wants either. Solid 10/10 would befriend material.
Hiro, you still haven't figured out that Sachi is a lesbian? You poor bastard.
Out of all the characters in this entire show, there were only a handful that stood out when given their time to shine. They felt like realistic portrayals of what they would be like in real life, which was a big surprise to me. I feel like screen time was lost on all of the 'main' characters when these guys were pushed off to the side and ignored for the majority of the show. Here's some insight as to why they were so great:
☑ Character interaction: As realistic as it gets.
☑ Voice acting: Morgan Freeman-narrating-a-documentary-tier.
☑ Character design: Can't even tell they're 2D.
So, without further ado, let's give a big round of applause to Jonathan, Husserl, Confucius, Roger, and Makuzu, the school chickens.
The only positive thing I have to say about Glasslip is that the OST is decent. I like classical music and most of the OST consisted of it, at least from what I recall. The animation for this series felt pretty lacking in comparison to P.A. Work's last scenery porn project Nagi no Asukara. There was a frequent use of stills, which was strange to me. It's 2014, come on now. The studio barely did any notably good animation for this series. Just how low was the budget?
If you couldn't already tell, I did not enjoy Glasslip. On a positive note, Glasslip does do something right aside from the OST. It gives perspective on what a bad series is. Comparatively, you can now probably say "(insert series name here) was better than that piece of shit Glasslip!" and therefore adjust your ratings accordingly.
