Honestly, I really loved this movie. It had me immersed from the first minute to the last, and while I can understand why some people dislike it over its "lack of logic," I don't agree. For the first half, or even first 3/4 of the film, it seems rather realistic, almost as if it could be an alternate reality to our own. Undeniably, it takes an unanticipated twist at that point--and one that I felt personally bumped my overall enjoyment of the film from an 8 to a 10--there was no doubt in my mind that the change of pace was, for my taste, a positive. With that said, I'm going to keep this review spoiler free, so that's about as far as my review of the story itself goes--I decided on a 9 for this section, just because the very beginning starts off a bit too slow for me, despite it being the general establishing opening.
Art: 8
I am NOT a fan of CGI, and this movie depends heavily on it. However, for the most part (aside from some of the cringy monsters), I really didn't mind it when applied to the scenes and even the characters. The speed of the action blurred the 3D models almost enough to make the CGI undetectable, if you aren't an enemy of it (like me), and it was certainly better than the usual MMD standard.
Otherwise, the hand drawn artstyle was somewhat generic, but definitely not something that negatively impacted the experience.
Sound: 10
I think that the soundtrack of this movie was picked perfectly. There are times, especially in flashbacks and in the conclusion of the film, that the outside noise is nearly or entirely muted, and the beautiful music has a moment to take over. Is it something most of us would listen to all by itself? Probably not. But it fit the scenes so while that doesn't even matter to me.
Character: 9
While there isn't anything extraordinarily spectacular about the cast, I really appreciated its diversity. At first glance, one might point the seven mains out as archetypes, but as the story progresses we learn that they REALLY aren't. The development is done well, even if it turns pretty entropic towards the end, and I wasn't left feeling like any of the character were familiar cookie cutters I'd seen before. All that having been said, working with seven characters does mean that certain ones were given, if not more screen time in this case, more attention. And THAT having been said, this extra attention was done somewhat subtly and I'd say was rather acceptable given the survivability of each character in the end (lol sorry I'm not trying to sound all weirdly sophisticated, I'm just trying my hardest not to spoil those major plot points).
Enjoyment: 10 (see Story for why...sorry I got lazy and need a snack)
Overall: 10
