For starters, steampunk environments are underdone in the mainstream anime, and when they are done, they are usually not given appropriate screen time. This is the case here, with a few early establishing shots of the city, we see the world the anime takes place in; but that is the end of it before we are withdrawn into the school setting. Everything else about the environment isn’t that interesting, so nothing else to say on the landscapes. This could’ve been a touchdown worthy feature of the anime, which sadly was not taken advantage of; leaving us with monotone forest and school interiors.
The animation was nothing to write home about, but it wasn’t bothersome either. It made use of CG though. While I’m personally not a fan of CG, I can see where it is useful. In comparison to anime like Knights of Sidonia, where CG is used throughout the entire show to make animation consistent and to make action scenes easier to produce; it ultimately allows the animation to flow together. Here, it transitions between using CG and not, which is really distracting to the eye. It may not bother some people, others may find it infuriating. The CG only gets bad during the faster scenes, and at other times you can’t tell that it’s CG, so your opinion may vary. I’ll include the music here, as it suited the anime well enough, but it was below average on it’s own.
The main characters of Raishin and his automaton Yaya, aka his Doll, enter a new school (wow, how original) in order to avenge Raishin’s family. The main character started out with some promise, as with most harem/ecchi anime protagonist being either perverts or too thick-headed to understand that girls are interested. Here, however, as the main girl is a doll, she is naturally treated as such; usually with her advances being brushed aside. I personally prefer a protagonist who has no interest in the girls opposed to two previously mentioned character types; at least in these settings I find.
But a problem occurs early on with Raishin, in which he states that he respects Yaya’s individual personality; and the individuality of other dolls. In respect to his stance on the treatment of dolls, he has no room to develop; and with the master and slave/doll relationship being a key feature of this anime, this gives us little reason to care. A stronger point could’ve been made by making him a massive asshole to dolls, and then having to learn. Now, it should be said that his respect for the dolls is also made through straight up dialogue, but again leaves the viewer with nothing to interpret.
A last point on this master/slave doll dynamic, is how the supporting characters have explain why Raishin is a good guy. In the first two episodes, after meeting the second girl (Charlotte) who has a dragon doll; the dragon doll has to state to the audience that Raishin asked how asked the dragon doll ‘how he was doing?’ It would’ve been better to have just have Raishin treat the dolls better, and leave it to the audience to pick it up.
It’s not all bad for little, old Raishin though. As he can actually do stuff, again being said rather than shown at first, he isn’t a good doll user and has to compensate by participating in the battles alongside Yaya. It adds a camaraderie element that just seemed refreshing
As for Yaya, the doll. She is a more likable character when next to Raishin. Purely due to a more exaggerated personality, but the constant desire to rip of Raishin’s, even when he walks in bleeding, loses its charm. She, and some other dolls, are “banned”, but are still used? It’s just kind of said, but nothing really happens because of it. Yaya is apparently the best doll in the world, it takes a while to learn what’s so special. She repairs herself through being close to Raishin, explaining why she is really attached. But in the end, she nothing new or good, but adequate. The pair have some interesting dynamics that go insufficiently explored and developed.
There is no point going into detail about the supporting characters, as they are mainly used to state exposition, advance the plot or provide some motivation that is forgotten fairly quickly. Except for the character Frey, she got a chuckle out of me. A main concern was the inconsistency of the characters intentions, one moment they help each other but immediately after re-establish that they’ll have to fight each other. Never mind the moments where they break from task to discuss their boobs. When some extras are added in and then die, their death scene correlates with how much exposition they spouted. The ones who explained how a move worked, get knocked out quicker than the characters who only got 4 minutes of screen time.
The fights are pretty ‘meh’, usually after something happens the characters take turns explaining how and why what they did worked. This followed statements of how invincible the move is, just proceeding its failure. The lore surrounding the magic is phoned in, mainly due to having such a short time to allow for sufficient explanation; a lot can be taken at face value and it feels as though some anime forget this.
The plot is at the very least, different. The characters all want to get into an event called ‘the evening party’, fight club for the students, Raishin also wants to be a thing called a ‘Wiseman’. All of it is tied into some worldly political power struggle that never takes fruit. Also as mentioned before, this is a revenge story, you’d forget if the characters didn’t stop to talk about it. The school has a ranking system that seems to have no relevance, except for explaining character backstory. But then it takes a sudden left turn, and I found myself saying, “Where did this plot come from?” in a good way; it gave me something to think about at least. But this turn happens halfway through the series and I can imagine many a viewer concluding this show as nothing special before then. Even if the you stay till these extra details are introduced, they may fail to interest you. The series would’ve greatly benefited from being 24 episodes, rather than 12, but it seems as though they condensed something much greater into this series.
In Summary
If you know the type of anime you’re getting yourself into, and you like it, then go for it. A little off the rails plot, and somewhat refreshing character dynamics (I use the statement loosely) made this one slightly more enjoyable than the rest out there. In terms of harem/ecchiness, it’s pretty light. The show almost wants to give you a lot, but suffers from not being able to deliver it well enough.
