Just personal scratch.
Advised, possible spoilers.
Opinion & Informal
Art: 5/10 I wasn't too impressed by the art. It was fine at times and it was sort of just bad at other times. For example, one of the few instances where I thought the art wasn't up to par was episode 10 with the (I forgot the exact name) with the hazmat suit character (later finding out it's just macrophage). If you want to take a look, during the foot bath/drinking chug by hazmat suit cell, just look at how that was drawn. Almost zero dimensionality and shading. You can even see they dropped frames during the chug animation. The proportions and anatomy of the characters was fine for the most part but there were some questionable instances of quality control such as the episode with the activated killer T cell. The bit where it shows a frontal shot of the newly activated killer T cell has really questionable looking arms; those arms look like they were drawn by an Art 101 student. There weren't any impact shots that really left an impact. None of the instances of art showcase in this show left me with any good impressions. Many shots and expanses were reused multiple times throughout the show. For example, the red blood cell transport junction expanse was used at least 5 times in those 13 episodes.
Animation: 4/10 The animation wasn't good, objectively. Objectively. However, just because a show has bad animation, doesn't mean it's bad. A good story can easily make terrible animation a masterpiece. As a reminder I'm talking about animation here, not story. I'm going explain why the animation in this show was bad. There were was a more than usual amount of shortcuts taken. I'm not impressed when there are unfitting shortcuts in a 13 episode show. Multiple freeze shots, pan shots, repeat shots, and reused animation. Freeze shots were used in place of a lot of the action. For example, the sequence begins with white blood cell charging at the germ and the last frame of the sequence is a still shot of the slash post completion. Freeze shots are okay, but it sort of felt it was used more than other methods of action animation shortcuts such as pan shots. The pan shots were also shortcuts taken for the action. It's the same thing except it pans the frame to simulate some sort of movement. Repeat shots were most noticeable in episode 10: things like animated slashes that are repeated once or twice to extend the sequence and present impact. Finally, why was there a need to use semi-extended flashbacks, multiple times, in a 13 episode show? Episode 10 is also an example of where multiple flashbacks where used. My last gripe is how the exposition was used as a way to save on animation. For example, any introduction (or reintroduction, another shortcut) on a cell or germ was a 10-20 second expositional freeze shot. Overall, the shortcuts that you would normally see in a 100+ episode shounen were used in this 13 episode show. I understand budget limitations, but I would prefer source:translation flexibility such as cutting out the action for more biology class instead of terribly animated action.
Characters: 6/10 The character designs were neat and fitting. None of the designs seemed too off. Other than character designs, it was somewhat stale to make their personalities tied to their cell function. There wasn't too much flavor to the characters other than their outward interactions. In other words, it didn't feel like any of the characters actually thought. They seemed like they were acting because they were their cell. White blood cell was the only slight exception. What I mean is that killer T cell acted like killer T cell. Killer T cell, despite his own backstory episode's contents, he still seemed like a meat-head in all other interactions. I feel like, "because it's my job" was just a cop-out for skimping on the character development.
Plot: 6/10 It was such an interesting idea. I actually wouldn't have minded if the whole show was just a biology class, but I think it tried to hard to humanize or individualize some of the characters. Killer T cell and the commander didn't need their own episode because they were side characters with almost zero appeal and flavor (to me personally).
Development: 4/10 A 13 episode show just so happened to have 2 filler episodes. The first was the killer T cell dedicated episode. The second was the return of Staphylococcus episode. Why does killer T and the commander get their own episode? The premise and plot of that whole episode was just ugh. Macrophage is probably way more popular than those two losers so why didn't she get a dedicated episode? Why couldn't have there just been another informational episode such as showcasing the functions of certain organs, the synthesis of proteins or DNA replication.? Red blood cell never really developed substantially throughout the whole show. She was still prone to getting lost, just a bit less than when she was first introduced. I thought it was interesting to see the state of their world, the body in which they reside, change as a result of things such as heat stroke, cancer cell proliferation, and major blood loss.
Music: 5/10 The OP and ED songs were okay. The bgm was average too. The soundboard was sort of lacking and there was no sound design to note.
Conclusion: 5/10 A more traditional open-ended ending for the future: gives a super short cameo of each of the characters as it builds up to the MC marching onward to the future. There were no questions to be answered and it didn't create any new ones. A pretty uneventful and unmemorable conclusion.
Overall: 5/10 I thought it was okay. The only things I disliked about this show were the animation and direction it took in character development.
Edit: 3/25/19
Small grammar and punctuation fixes
