Chaos;Head is a visual novel inspired series about the delusions of NEET-otaku Takumi as he uncovers the conspiracy of a series of mysterious murders and meets a variety of hot girls along the way. Given such an inane premise, the only reason to watch this show is its thick atmosphere largely created by Takumi’s delusions. Takumi is a hardcore, anti-social nut who will probably put on the white strait-jacket himself just to get away from the overwhelming pressure of the judgments of others. He spends his time watching anime, playing online video games, and (literally) conversing with his imaginary wife who serves as his personal cheerleader. Perhaps its the voyeur in me, but Takumi’s paranoia is downright fascinating, and his perspective makes the whole experience feel far more unique.
Though the protagonist is interesting, absolutely nothing else about Chaos;Head is quite as interesting. With few exceptions, all the girls of Chaos;Head are one dimensional, visual novel tropes with back-stories so overused that it pained me to even watch their flashbacks. I have come to the opinion that the only reason Takumi can interact with these individuals is because they remind him of all the girls he usually meets in his ren’ai games.
As for the story, the show starts out as a mystery-thriller, but a few episodes in, it decides to be a shounen action series with Takumi having a personal army of chicks with magical swords who fights an evil man who claims his actions are for the greater good of humanity. While ambitious story-lines are commendable, the show should have stuck to its murder-mystery roots instead of expanding to a convoluted doomsday scenario driven by “scientific” babble.
Chaos;Head probably could have been a better series if it had more time to lay down its ideas and let some of its concepts sink in, but the greater part of me tells me that this would have only dragged out the pain. Unless you absolutely need cute, ren’ai girls with your paranoia driven thriller, stay far away from this series.
