I might be a little soft giving the story, art , sound ,character, enjoyment all a 10, but this anime deserves it. Shinsekai Yori was like no other anime I had watched in the years I have been watching anime. In all honesty I didn't think I was going to like it, but somehow this show made me fall so deeply in love with the characters and story line. SSY made me feel like you were apart of the family of friends and everything that happened in the anime was as if it was happening to me as well (and I can't name a show I have watched that made me feel like that in a long time).
Furthermore, the character development is realistic and the pace/events add up to make sense even if there is some time skipping (like they skip a few years ahead). Though with the whole time skipping comes a lot of age/character development. Throughout the anime it felt like I growing up with the characters and developed a sense of maturity (like they did) by the end of this show. It was amazing to see that something so involved with fantasy and unnatural powers could capture the essence of great character development of a 12 year old growing into an adult. The characters are the jackpot in the show, no other characters out there like the amazing group one in Shinsekai Yori.
Going back to the age skipping, well in all honesty it was a little confusing at first because you want to badly to know what happened in the middle of the time you last saw them and now, but as I went on it started to make more sense and it gives you a better connection to the characters in the way that you can easily see the difference between their younger self and their older self. But, the anime doesn't really leave at such a big cliff hanger on what happened in that lost time we didn't get to see.
All in all you will fall in love with this anime. But, here are a few warnings...
1) You need to really pay attention to this anime and all its eps. It is not one of those anime that gives every answer to you (that would be boring) you will figure your questions out the moment the character figures out the question as well.
2) The narration is from Saki (one of the main characters). So the events will always be from her perspective so don't freak out if someone isn't seen for one episode that just means she wasn't with them to actually show what is happening to them. But, 10 out 10 times you will know what happens to the characters that we didn't see for a few eps because Saki always finds out. SPOLIER:except for two characters, with those two characters you have to use context clues to figure what happened since no one really knows in the anime exactly what happened to them.
3) Shinsekai Yori isn't a soft hearted anime. There is a lot of bloodshed and a big handful of gory killing/screaming scenes.
4) If you don't like gay couples then you most likely shouldn't be watching this anime because SSY is a no one cares about gender you love who you love type of anime.
5) On the note of love there is talk about sex and sex does happen in this anime, but I don't think it's anything to obsess over.
6)The story line here is no joke as well as the elements of sound and art. So if you are used to light hearted and comedy type of music/anime/characters then you might want to prepare yourself for this new territory you are stepping into.
7) Be sure to give this anime time. You need to let all the events and conversation to sink in, if you start skipping or run through it quickly you will get none of it and will hate the anime because you don't understand whats happening.
Other than that I don't really know what else to say except that this anime is amazing, heart wrenching, beautiful, award worthy, and absolutely worth watching all 25 eps. And trust me by the end of it you will get so attached that when it is over you will feel like your child just went off to college (lol).
