Let me introduce to you Arata, 27 years old, no girlfriend, no serious job, no prospects for the future,…To sum it all up he is a neet. One day going home from a bar, where he was with his friends pretending to be successful, he is approached by Ryou Yoake, from the ReLIFE Institute, who offers Arata the possibility of making him young and sending him to high-school again, where he would gain the experience, that would turn him into a functional adult. He agrees and the next day he wakes up as a 17 year old. And so begins his new life as a high-school student.
Ok, first of all the the whole premise of ReLIFE while interesting, is not exactly anything special. The problem with this kind of setup is that there are so many different routes it could take and places it could go wrong, however fortunately for us it avoids all the perils it could encounter. It manages to create a captivating story, based one incredibly likeable characters (more on them in the next paragraph), based around more or less cliche school situations.
As the anime is based around a still ongoing web manga, the main questions for the manga readers were, how faithful of an adaptation was it going to be, and how is it going to end. Well, in my honest opinion this is the best manga adaptation I have seen. There have been no important parts skipped, neither have then been any changes made to the story and this is even more surprising, given the fact that it covers more then a 100 chapters in its 13 episodes, which is impressive by itself. Regarding the ending, it is done exceptionally well, choosing a great moment in the story, that makes the story seem complete, while still urging people on to read the manga, or wait for another season.
One of the high points of the anime has to be its characters. Arata, our main character, could be thought as just another generic hero, as he is generally an all-round good guy, however the as the story progresses, he slowly evolves into one of the best developed characters of the genre. His backstory is also quite interesting and it really does explain why he got in the position he is in now. Only one good character is still not enough to make an anime, and fortunately the others are just as good, if not better. The highlight has to be Hishiro-san, an extremely hardworking and smart student, but with a total lack of any social skills. That in turn results in some extremely fun moments, which are still a step above similar events in your typical school comedy anime. Later on we actually get some great insight in her backstory as well, which might as well be one of the highlights of the anime. Then we have the two ReLIFE operatives, who are definitely a lot of fun, always teasing Arata, giving him a hard time, but at the same time helping him become a better person. As if all these characters were not enough, we also have Oogga and Kairu, the first classmates that Arata befriends, both integral to the story. There is also a whole bunch of side characters, but they do not really stand out. To sum it up the characters are great, well developed and a whole lot of fun.
Given that the manga or to be more precise webtoon is done in full colour, it leaves little to interpretation. Thankfully the art is taken directly from the source material, so the colour pop, the characters are distinctive, so it is easy to know who is who and the backgrounds are nicely drawn. If you have already been reading the manga, seeing the exact same scenes, but now animated, it just takes the story another level.
The soundtrack is probably the weakest point of the anime. It is never better then adequate, while it sometimes even manages to totally miss on some parts, as the sound does not work well with whats going on the screen. The opening and endings on the other hand are great. That is even more surprising, given the fact that every episode has a different ending, and I can’t remember one that would be bad.
Normally I prefer reading manga to watching anime, but given the enjoyment I got from watch this anime, I have actually questioning that, and started thinking that the problem might be just in an unfaithful adaptation. Not to say the manga is worse, just a bit different, and more in depth, however, I have to say that in my opinion watching the anime, and then just reading the manga from where the anime ended should be a valid option here. Given all that has been said this anime deserves a score of 9 out of 10, and so I can easily recommend this to everyone.
