It follows a protagonist who is only ever referred to as "me" and "senpai" through his first 2 years of college, repeated over and over again. The formula for each episode is quite simple: the path of the story is dictated by what co-curricular circle he chooses on his first day, the (mis)adventures he partakes in said circle is then chronicled with very obvious ties to the other alternate realities peppered here and there, and it ends with him feeling dissatisfied with his campus life, deciding that if he had done so-and-so instead, he would not have wasted it. Then the clock rewinds.
A lot of anime which follow a set routine like this often have trouble making every single episode worth sitting through (yes, Jigoku Shoujo S1, I'm looking at you). However, Tatami Galaxy makes every story unique enough, with just enough connections and surface-level symbolism to make it enjoyable, and perhaps more importantly, interesting. Watching an episode, or even a repeated segment, never feels like a chore, and the captivating minimalistic but vibrant art style has a lot to do with it as well. The visuals do an amazing job capturing the essence of what needed to be delivered while keeping it simple enough not to distract from the narrative story going on.
Even if you find any of it boring, to whatever extent for whatever reason, the finale makes everything worth it. When the message the series hammers at for 9 episodes builds itself up to suspenseful levels and finally expels itself in an flurry (of moths), there is an unmatched feeling of satisfaction. Now, some wonder if the central motif was all they were trying to deliver or there is some deeper message, but I think that's the best thing about this series – it doesn't matter. Because this is one of the very rare anime that you can analyse into the bloody ground, or just enjoy for what it is and still have a great time anyway. Personally, I feel its main point was to send the central message but it can branch out into many smaller motifs represented to visual symbols here and there.
Either way it is a fantastic and entertaining watch, there is little reason not to. After all if there's anything to take away from the series, it's that you regret what you don't do more than what you do.
