It's utterly and completely a satire. It's making fun of people who look at pretentious pieces of work by creating a character, Eire, who is absolutely infatuated with Cossette who has no depth, value, or substance. The only thing she has to offer is death, and for some ungodly reason, he still pursues her.
For instance, those who look at this work and see it as a work of art beyond itself are merely playing into the folly of its beauty. This statement is incredibly ironic due to the fact that Cossette no Shouzou in itself is filled with depth and meaning but not in the sense that most people may pick up on right away.
This is exactly what we do as an audience when we fall in love with something that is not worthy of its praise. We kill it, replace it with our own image, and then from then on out it's forever this new thing that isn't anything close to the original. It's something we do with all forms of media we love, but worst of all we do it with people.
The ending helps solidify this notion by mentioning the fact that people cannot unite. This further iterates the notion mentioned above that we kill the things we love based solely on their outward expression and not on what they actually are. We've separated our ability to truly unite with that individual because we've already killed who they are from our perspective.
I could get into detail further about how this story repeats these themes, but I'll stop myself here. Now that you're aware of them, the excitement is looking around for these themes throughout the work.
Art:
Overcrowded yet sufficient. Since the art is trying to convey the above message by showing how our infatuation with visuals is far beyond what a work actually offers, it makes a lot of sense for it to be overly abundant. However, this is ironic due to the nature that it itself has grabbed hold of so many people due to visuals alone. I find this unfortunate, but also to be expected. There's a point in which I must wonder whether the work is self-aware of this or not. There are many points where I can say yes, but there are a few in which I can also say it is not.
There is an offensively high amount of repeated animations. This is ridiculous. With a work that puts so much effort into essentially bastardizing overly constructed visuals, I wonder why it couldn't create, you know, another overly abundant visual in place of these repeat animations. Perhaps there's something to be said about this in relation to the theme, but I'm coming up short on this end.
Some proportions are way off. Characters look pretty bad in a few scenes. It's laughable.
Sound:
The levels on this are atrocious. Sounds are sometimes WAY to loud and others WAY to quiet. I am 100% it is not due to something on my end, so whoever was in control of the Sound Production totally screwed up on this part.
Yuki Kajiura has no ability to write unique music. All of her soundtracks sound unbelievably similar. I could take this OST and place it in any of her other works (that have the same tone) and it wouldn't sound out of place at all. This is incredibly unfortunate. She has an ability to create pretty intricate orchestrations, but her music shouldn't sound similar to the point of identical in each work. I'm not buying Yuki Kajiura albums. If this were a Yuki Kajiura album, then yes I'd want relatively similar songs. I am watching an anime, however, and a visual art needs to have unique themes and melodies that cannot be swapped out with another productions music. I almost want to avoid any films or anime she's written music for.
Character:
Considering Eire is just a placeholder to represent the audience, I can't really say much of him. I can, however, explain a very early reason for why he is the audience. Within the first half of the first episode, you seldom see him when he talks. The characters around him are the main focus while his voice is off camera. The way the angle is set up is almost as if you are him. There's this sense that you are supposed to be him. I feel this is the first of many signs that imply what this entire project is about.
Cossette's character is a bitch. I don't understand why Eire loved her. There was no chemistry. I know I said this is a commentary and they are all placeholders but the truth still stands that characters need to be believable to create a solid story, and there are definitely ways these characters could have been believable.
There's a host of side characters that get very little screen time. I'm sure they each represent something but I felt they were nothing more than plot devices. A character should not feel like a plot device to the degree that I recognize it instantly.
Enjoyment:
Honestly, hated watching it. I found every character to be unlikeable and there was no urgency to save Cossette from limbo considering the only reason was Eire loved her. And that reason was unbelievable to me because I found his love to be superficial and ridiculous. This made it very difficult to watch and the only reason I continued is because I refuse to drop an anime. I will, at some point, watch all of the anime I have started.
However, as I wrote this review, I got to thinking about what I'd actually watched, the possible message that was told, and the themes mentioned over and over and I came to realize that the story is quite brilliant. I feel as though the execution is filled with flaws that could have easily been fixed, but all in all, I am not disappointed that I watched this anime. Despite the low score I gave it, I'm sure to suggest this to my friends.
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