Unfortunately, unlike its superior brethren above, Assault Lily does not do anything to differentiate itself from the pack. It spends the first four episodes hanging worn tropes like teasing a "secretly" overpowered-protagonist, showing fanservice bathtowel scenes, and not fleshing out its protagonist outside of her interactions with her idol Yuyu. Riri is obsessed with Yuyu to the point her interactions with other characters feel more like stepping stones to get closer to Yuyu rather than actual supporting characters to help her bring out more personality.
That's not to say Riri is apathetic, she cares about Yuyu's wellbeing, but she's just so narrowmindedly naive to the core, she essentially denies herself of any characterization, to the point she's just a walking trope of a naive female protagonist (e.g. Yoshika of Strike Witches season 1).
her pursuit of her heroine foil.
But other than her unnatural Yuyu obsession (which other characters also point out once, but is overshadowed), Riri has no redeeming traits to her naiviety that borders on ego (that is pointed out once in the anime and then ignored after), and like most other naive protagonists, she finds a way to justify her want to help Yuyu even if it means prying into old wounds.
Riri's initial relationship with the quiet, cynical and brooding Yuyu has her naivety challenged by Yuyu herself, who wants to "teach" the naive Riri about how cruel the world really is, but by episode 4, this foreshadowing loses its chance to appear as Riri is quickly established as the calming Beauty to Yuyu's inner revenge-filled Beast, but the buildup to that moment is neither emotionally investing for the viewer, nor is it memorable.
This anime would be a great modern day military retelling of the whole Yuri genre's Onee-sama trope if it wasn't for the lack of depth in anyone except Yuyu herself, whose personality has turned from kind to cool girl from past trauma,in a Akemi Homura style of events.
A weekly TV show needs to be interesting in its first half to have people care about it as much as its director(s) does, but if the director doesn't flesh out the characters properly, no one will care what happens to them next week. To be fair, dramatic twists are typically executed in the latter half of an anime, but in order to keep an audience interested in watching a TV show on a weekly basis, even a anime like Assault Lily must have something that an audience can get invested in at the beginning. Like yuri-baiting or the cleavage fanservice for example, which the first half of this show has plenty of, though it isn't anything more than casual fanservice.
Sound and Art are rated high because the chara design is beautiful, and the opening song memorable (it's played by Raise a Suilen of Bang Dream). The rest of the soundtrack however is forgettable.
Overall, I disliked the protagonist's naiviety bordering on ego, and the lack of any characterization for anyone except her foil Yuyu. Assault Lily has the potential to be a bishojo-with-weapons interpretation of the classic onee-sama Yuri school genre (Maria sama ga Miteru, Strawberry Panic), but its lack of characterization and story hooks in the early half of the episodes wastes said story opportunities in favor of fanservice, fight scenes, and too many characters to remember or care about.
Even hardcore fans of the genre might be hard-pressed to find a reason to watch Assault Lily for its characterization OR plot, as there is very little of it in the first four episodes. Overall, Assault Lily has potential to shine on paper, but in execution it's inferior to its fellow bishojo anime.
