Not only are the characters pretty flat, not only is the story really really bad, not only does the animation of this series become so bad that Studio Deen would have to start blushing, not only is the world building some of the worst in any anime but people also have the nerv to call this anime a good represantion of a gay relationship.
Is this what straight women think what gay men would behave like if they'd be in love?
The relationship of Yuri and Victor is some of the battiest Yaoi shit I've seen in any anime. They don't kiss - They just hug in a way to make it look like they're kissing. They don't get in a relationship between lovers - They are just master & student who really like each other. They don't get engaged - They just buy lucky charms for each other, that look like engagement rings.
And don't come to me claiming that the kiss had to be cencored for the japanese audience. There were plenty of anime where gay characters had kissed each other in a clear way (Sakura Trick, No.6) so please just cut the bullshit.
Every character is flat and cringy and every potential that they might have had is wasted, because every episode had to have at least 3 ice skating scenes instead of actual character building through some relationships. The cringiest and worst character is Christophe and his presence probably describes the best why Yuri on Ice has such garbage writing. Yuri, the main character, is every sports protagonist of every shitty sports anime. He's such a blank slate that new story tools like a second dog dying have to be created to give him some new reactions. Victor is the stereotypical gay character. Every line he says has to be ambivalent and no real strong motivation is given as to how and why he quit his career.
Now on to the story. Most of it is spend in the ice rink and instead of giving the viewer some eye candy through some cool shots of Russia or Japan we mainly get some of the worst sakuga animation you will see in any anime. 90% of the characters could be cut out completely and nothing would change. Motivations are explained through inner dialogue in the ice skating scenes which just is lazy. There is no subtlety to anything in this piece of garbage story. One thing I can give credit to this anime though is, that the humor most of the times works and the first 2 episodes were pretty okay.
Animation like I've said is pretty bad. The first episode had some really beautiful scenes but then the director decided to use this exact animation again...and again...and again...and again but only worse.
We never get an explanation as to how who is better than who. The only visual indication we ever got as to how someone was doing good or bad during their skating scenes is when they tripped. A talented director would have cut out some of the skating scenes to save some of the budget for a few important story scenes.
Yuri on Ice fails in every way. It fails as a sports anime. It fails as a love story. It's fails a character study.
The only enjoyment I got from this anime was how this whole mess of a story crumbled apart near the end.
