The most striking aspect is the art, which is just gorgeous. The colors are rich, the palette is broad, and even sad scenes are packed with nuance. The music is great and above all is perfectly suited to the content (ie, no weird guitars or synths for no reason). The Japanese cast is wonderful and acted to perfection. Not even bit-part characters have repeated or annoying voices, which was super surprising.
The characters are full and exciting. The MC follows the typical anime/fantasy arc of powerless naive princess growing into herself, but I always value execution over originality and Akatsuki pulls right through to the end. My only genuine dislike for her came at the overabundance of tears, mainly because a good deal of the crying scenes would have been just as emotional without the waterworks. The MC's companions are--with the obvious exception of the Yellow Dragon--fully incorporated with multi-episode arcs including flashbacks and extensive building of their stories.
Akatsuki's created world is also crammed with life. The cities and villages are stereotypically Asian, but they all have slightly different aesthetics and none of them are rushed or tossed off as pointless backdrops. The landscape is varied and interesting, the fighting scenes are choreographed exquisitely, and with just a few tiny exceptions there's no filler at all.
But...
It was around episode 16 that it hit me square in the brain: this series will be incomplete. I double checked that there was no sequel. I frantically looked at its release year, scanned the wiki, Googled....and then I knew. This was going to be another Densetsu no Yuusha no Densetsu. It will go great all the way up until it ends before anything substantial happens. I struggled to pull through. By episode 20 I knew that the "final battle" was going to be an utter waste of my life with an 11th hour antagonist. By the time the Yellow Dragon literally waltzed into the picture in Episode 24 I knew I'd been bamboozled.
There's not going to be any more Akatsuki no Yona. The series ended five years ago. I spent twenty-four episodes of my time watching the glorious growth of a great main character only to be shit on in the end. This is clearly just the first in a multi-arc epic tale, but for some godforsaken reason the producers chose to waste time and money on the prologue. I don't even have the mental fortitude to check the state of its source material. All I know is it was just another waste of time.
