tl;dr: I know I'm missing out. I just can't watch anymore. The show is probably very good later on, but I shouldn't have to slog through the terrible characterization of the first 10 episodes to get to that point.
Second, I am well aware of how generally well liked this show is, and how high scores it usually receives. I can see why, if I squint. The art is amazing, the music is on-point, and the show has several factors going for it, like dealing with themes of motivation, goals, child abuse, and more.
This wasn't enough, not by a long shot. The hints of actual plot were there, and I probably missed their culmination by stopping so early, but I just wasn't in a mood to slog through something I didn't enjoy.
That is to say, I enjoyed it at first. The first two, three episodes were kinda fun, but then I kept expecting the characters to grow a bit, for something at all to change their circumstances after they got to know each other, but nothing of the sort happened, to the point where I couldn't watch anymore.
And I really wanted to like this. I did. I was really interested in the music tag and setting. The premise was very interesting, a retired master pianist with issues is forced to resurface by a violinist girl, etc etc.
I'm not even gonna touch the dramatics or the pacing. Those have already been beaten to death by others, Instead, I'll talk about the characters.
The problem, to me, was the characters. I couldn't get behind them at all. The two main characters, at least. Out of a grand total of four that appeared by episode six. Kosei, Watari, Tsubaki and Kaori. Watari was okay when he showed up, which wasn't often.
Tsubaki was my favorite in this show, but not because she was amazing or anything. She was good, but the others were just worse.
Kosei is the typical doormat protagonist, who doesn't know anything, has almost zero backbone (unless he's been worked over by his 'friends'), accomplishes nothing by himself, and constantly needs the support of others in order to stand. None of his supposed friends respect him, but I can't blame then, because I couldn't respect him at all either, and I really wanted to, because I liked the idea of him.
Kaori, on the other hand, is is about 80% of the reason I had to stop watching. She's the most classic of classic examples of Mary-Sue. Incredibly skilled, amazingly beautiful, always (ALWAYS) right, has a somewhat mysterious/interesting(supposedly) backstory, everybody likes her and when she speaks everyone is hanging on her every word, even if she waxes poetic about stuff that rarely make sense or is getting repeated for the third time. Her dragging Kosei by the nose got old very, very fast, I saw no sign of this stopping by episode six, and I was thoroughly sick of it.
I don't know. Maybe I can pick it up again when I'm in a more tolerant mood. For now, I think a 6/10 overall is more than generous enough.
