Yuri!!! on Ice is Fall 2016's most popular anime, with an interesting take on the rarely touched field of professional figure skating. Originally I passed on starting this show as I figured it would be a fairly average sports anime with a fair amount of yaoi bating for all the fujoshi's out there. However after hearing positive opinions on the show I figured I'd give it a shot, alas it was about what I expected: alright.
Story: ~5
A five according the grading criteria on this site is described as "mediocre" or "average", and I found this to be a fitting way to describe the writing of Yuri!!! on Ice. I'll avoid summarizing the show here in an effort to avoid spoilers, as well as avoid repeating information that finished viewers are already aware of. To be straightforward, the writing wasn't particularly impressive, and ended up falling into a more predictable sports anime type of plot. Main character loses his passion for the sport -> In getting a new coach his spirit is revitalized and he struggles to reach the top and win 1st place. Through Yuri and Victor's little adventure towards the 1st place in finals, we find ourselves subject to many story telling issues.
1. Weak characters that last an episode and then just make cameos that serve as a time filler or attempt at comedic relief
2. Forced romance (if you even want to call it that)
3. Mild melodrama to make things seem like plot points
4. A story that is crammed into twelve episodes and finds itself struggling to keep up with and develop all of the main characters.
5. A final episode that felt extremely cramped and rush as they tried to fit too much info to properly end the show. (And I can't agree the show was properly ended either. Sure there might be a second season coming, but it still felt rushed and we barely saw any of the performances compared to usual, and saw basically nothing in terms of conclusive material)
Although many of my points seem like complaints, the story itself was still follow-able, and served as a fine background for people to indulge in the animation and sports drama.
Art: 7
A seven is likely low enough to get me punched by plenty of people, but I still think it to be a fair assessment. The animation was good, but there are two main reasons this score isn't higher for me. One reason would be that there often seemed to be a severe contrast in animation between different scenes. For example, it was obvious most of the budget was poured into the skating scenes, but in turn the scenes outside of the skating rink oftentimes were comparatively weaker. My second complaint is that I found it obvious that this show did not have enough time every week to produce the art they wished for. By this I mean that because the artists are restricted so heavily by time restraints and deadlines, it often seemed like the art felt choppy even in the skating scenes. To further illustrate this, in the earlier episodes I often found myself annoyed with some of the skating scenes because it was obvious they were drawn apart from the backgrounds on which they were drawn for. The skaters themselves were drawn to show disparities in depth from the camera, but they still seemed out of place compared to the constant picture of the rink behind them. I can't really fault the artists for this though, as drawing every single frame of an ice skater and their respective rink would take immense amount of time and budget. And here's where we end with my rating of 7.
The art was good, but it was obvious that the art could have been better if the show had more time and money behind it. Alas it was a single season show with an episode weakly, so it's hard to ask for much more. Thus we end with a good rating of 7.
Sound: 7
I plan on keeping the sound section on the shorter side because I don't have a ton to say about it. The music across the whole series was good. Oftentimes it felt like the staff chose good songs for the respective performances. Apart from just the music, the voice acting was good as well. The VA's did perfectly well for most of the characters, and the voices were cast well for each individual character. Another positive note here is that the foreign voice acting were better than most anime. A good example of this would be the French reporter seen in the last episode, who was voice acted by someone who obviously spoke fluent French, whereas in anime it is very common for companies to just have a Japanese individual attempt speaking a language in which they are not comfortable in.
Overall, good sound in general. Nothing absolutely amazing, but nothing I can really hate on either, so the safe rating of 7 was given.
Character(s): 5
To be abrupt, many characters were very simple and one-dimensional, and as discussed before in the story section, were undeveloped and under-utilized. The rating 5 means average, and I found that very accurate in describing the characters of a show. No characters stood out as very interesting, but instead fell into very common tropes. The main character, Yuri, was the average wimpy MC who has to change who he is to reach the top. Victor was a fairly average bubbly flamboyant male. Yurio was an angry teenager. And most other characters could be described in one or two words.
One more thing to comment on would be the awkward forced romance between Yuri and Victor, but I won't complain too much about that because if I do I'll likely just be called a homophobe.
For a short summary : The characters were average. Not much else to say there.
Enjoyment: 5
In terms of enjoyment I found this show pretty average. I didn't particularly enjoy or not enjoy the show, so an average score of 5 would likely be the best option here. It's worth noting however that I did tend to enjoy the skating scenes themselves because I found them interesting as a person who has never been into figure skating, but this enjoyment was counteracted a bit by the fact that many performances were just repeated. To be conclusive, in terms of enjoyment, I found this show to be average.
Final Thoughts. Overall Rating is a 6.
The show wasn't awful. It was alright. Generally a 6 or above on my list means I consider the show recommendable. Objectively I don't think this is a great show by any means, but I can understand it's appeal to specific people or audiences.
Was "Yuri!!! on Ice" overhyped? Yeah, I think that's perfectly fair to say. Is it an awful show? By no means. It's just alright.
This concludes the review. If you'd like to further discuss anything, or have any questions, you are always free to add or message me. Thanks for reading the review guys and gals.
