Actually, it's half an hour in one episode, but you'll get the joke soon.
Amagi Brilliant Park is just spectacular. Some of the audience loved it, and I think it's a chance that Kyoto Animation (KyoAni) has actually redeemed themselves over the troubles they had over the past year. Watching the first episode got me hooked since it has an interesting setting to look forward. You surely have seen amusement parks in a lot of anime, but that's just depicting the characters' enjoyment. But, I'm sure you have yet to see behind the scenes of the park's operation.
The story starts with Sento inviting Kanie to go with her to an unknown location which is Amagi Brilliant Park. Kanie wasn't pleased with the tour from Sento of the amusement park which is bad in shape and unsatisfactory. Later on, Sento introduced Latifa who then wants Kanie to become the next manager of the park and save it from being taken away. Also, this amusement park isn't just any ordinary park. Kanie learnt that it is occupied by 'fairies' from Maple Land, a magical place far from reality.
Before you are worried about KyoAni's antics, don't worry. To spoil a bit about the story, it wasn't written in a way which later it is plagued with problematic tropes. Basically throughout the whole anime, you see how Kanie is able to handle the park as the manager. He gets to learn more about the park, its attractions and the workers along the way and from there, he finds ways to improve the well-being. The anime is mostly comedic, meaning lots of moments to laugh at from episode to episode. I would say that it wasn't repetitive, making those moments unique in a sense. There are some dramatic moments which honestly, I feel that they are a bit forced and out of place from the prominent hilarious comedy. But not to fret, they don't really mess up the story much, since then the characters involved got back to their feet. There are also undeveloped romance in some relationships, but it's sweet to see some hints coming about.
What I absolutely love about the story is how the park manages to develop, thanks to Kanie's direction as a manager. The workers might be negative over his choices of attracting visitors to the park, and you may be astonished too, but he managed them. The story may also not show this result, but it also drop hints too. Overall, I think the story was almost original and doesn't not have a lot of faults. Of course, many more topics in the story can be expanded, but out of thirteen episodes, I think it's a job well done for the script-writers. There is also some fan-service included that doesn't exceed too much, but you know, it's quite astonishing for KyoAni to add some. Sure, Free! is another anime with a lot of fan-service, but ignoring that anime, it is still a nice shock.
The anime has a huge cast which is quite diverse in terms of personality. How the story introduces the characters one by one is fine, since Kanie meets a few workers in the park from episode to episode. Some of the characters have a small story behind them. But what is really good about the cast is that they are never forgotten. Once they are introduced, they will eventually pop up in the next episodes. So if you have your favourite character inside, don't feel left out.
Of course, the story do focus on some of the characters. While Kanie manages the park, Sento assists him in some ways. There is some development between the two, but not very much to the point it gets romantic. Indeed, both of them have their own faults which can cause hilarity or not, given the situation they face. They are definitely different on each other in attitude-wise, but they understand each other. However, Latifah doesn't feel like as a main character but more of a plot device to make the story more dramatic. Not much interaction is seen from her, even many of the characters that don't have a larger role get more air time than her. Also, there's the three mascots, Moffle, Macaron and Tiramie, and the four Elementario fairies, Muse, Sylphy, Kobori and Salama. While the mascots serve more as a comedy piece of the story, the Elementario fairies get more development and story. It isn't really consistent but there's one episode that show more about themselves and it's great.
Overall, the development is okay but not too great. More can be shown not only to Kanie and Sento alone, but also to Latifah and the rest. But given the thirteen-episode limit, it couldn't be helped anyway.
Knowing KyoAni's anime already, I shouldn't be disappointed by its pleasing art style for this anime. The sceneries were definitely eye-grabbing, along with the details in them, the vibrant colours chosen and the lively atmosphere portrayed by the background characters. There are a lot of visual effects shown which are great, such as magical sparkles or the rustling of leaves. You've already seen it quite a lot if you watched a lot of KyoAni anime, so it shouldn't really be a surprise, yet it is so awesome. The character designs were not really original, given that the face styles are similar to other characters from KyoAni's anime. But they are detailed and nice-looking. Some of the non-human designs are definitely cool for some, wacky for the rest. The facial expressions are well-done, and I definitely love the cartoon-ish ones to express hilarity.
The opening song, sang by AKINO with her band, has won the hearts of many with the catchy beats and groovy tunes. It's easily one of the best songs heard in this season, since it attracted a lot of attention. See that starting quote? That's the first quote in the lyrics. It's too famous indeed. I actually looped the song many times. It has a nice feel that relates to the context of the story, giving the hype for the story and the lively feel in it. The ending song is different-sounding. Sang by the voice actresses of the Elementario fairies, it is supposed to have a more calm approach. You may feel that it doesn't really match the context, but you'll get used to it. If I put it aside, it's not a bad song and it's nice. The background music is not really noticeable, but I quite like the style of it. The OST album has been released, and a quick run-through has got me interested. The voice acting is great too. Some voice actors are well-known, the rest are either new or does not have many roles.
Overall, I really loved the anime so much. Ignoring what has been giving the negative impressions of the anime, it's pretty much one of the best anime I've watched this season. A seemingly-interesting story and a diverse cast will not disappoint you definitely. To summarise this anime, it has great comedy from the characters and a good development of the park, thanks to a narcissist manager and an emotionless assistant. Of course, the thirteen episode feels more like an OVA than an actual episode. It still continues from the previous episode indeed, but honestly they can just stop airing at the twelfth episode.
