My issues with the romance angle that Plastic Memories attempts to milk has to do with my lack of interest in the two as a possible couple. Tsukasa is a bit bland for the series male lead with his idealistic and milquetoast character and while I didn't mind some aspects to Isla's character involving the Giftia retrieval premise, being clumsy and just as milquetoast as Tsukasa played more into traditional romantic comedy titles that I've grown to despise in recent years due to their superficial attempts to force comedy into the romance played out between the lead couple in question. Many of the retrieval workers are also rather bland with their characters as they mostly exist for comedic gags and to push along the relationship between our two leads.
The elements of Giftia retrieval explored within Plastic Memories were my main draw to the series and saved it from complete mediocrity for me. The series explores a number of the cases that the retrieval agency get into as the human owners have varying reactions and situations to dealing with parting with their Giftia with some having to learn to cope with moving on from the loss of a companion and others having come to come to terms with the developments. One episode also explores what would happen if Giftias are not retrieved before their operation time is up, making for the most suspenseful moment within the series. This element ties into Isla's character as the years she has been tasked with retrieving Giftia and her operational time running low have taken their toll on her mentally as such where she tries distancing herself from others and questions if her job is only to sever bonds with others. The series would have had plenty of potential at exploring the moral implications of the retrieval service and how one could believably cope with bonding with someone you know has more limited time than a human's natural life span to bond with. Instead though, the series opted to devote more of its time toward Isla and Tsukasa's developing relationship as it would get prominent focus by later in the show's second half, whom aren't exactly the best couple I could care for.
As it is, Plastic Memories was a series that had a premise with a good number of directions it could have gone with the Giftia retrieval service. Instead, the series opted to become yet another typical rom-com title with a milquetoast pairing that I couldn't find myself getting behind due to how cliched both members of the pair were. Your mileage may vary on how well you warm up to it with the differing premises it offers up.
