I liked watching this anime. Although the show introduces an anticlimactic conclusion, I was able to follow, enjoy, and leave this show with content.
Character(6/10)-- Most of the cast isn't developed properly and is shoved to the side for the plot, and only a few of them stand out.
Hajime Hinata: His character was well-written, reasonable, and understandable. He wasn't overly polite, he stood up for what he believed in, and had motives. He was solemn and dejected because he didn't have a talent. He strove to get a talent so that he could feel worthy. His character is immensely relatable because many people in life feel like they are not good enough and that they have to strive to be better. I've had this feeling multiple times. He willingly signed up for a human experiment so that he could feel worthy of himself, and his new friend Chiaki. So that he could hang around the talented people without feeling any shame of not belonging. I applaud whoever wrote Hajime in the anime.
Junko Enoshima: I like her character the least, and it's not because of some surface-level bias towards her being a villain. It's because she is not entertaining at all and does her job horribly as a villain. She is reckless and yet her plans go off seamlessly. She does all of this out in the open with cameras and alarms, yet Future Foundation, which has the highest technology, can't find out whether she is the villain or not. You can't find evidence? Her fingerprints and cloth fibers are all over the scene. The writers try to make her manipulative and cunning by making the other characters slow-witted. I can't see how a simpleminded girl like her can throw the whole world into despair. Her motives are generic. When she was born, she felt bored, and started to throw the whole world in despair just because. Her motives aren't interesting and her character isn't interesting. (she's evil just to be evil. That is one of the many worst tropes you should not include in your writing)
Chiaki Nanami: Her character is heavily relatable. An introvert who is absorbed in games and can't talk to others because most of the time they wouldn't have the same interests as her. I've felt like this before. Most of my friends aren't into anime as I am, and I don't know/watched enough anime to talk about it with other weebs. I like her character development when she became more open towards others and made new friends.
Natsumi Kuzuryu: She was also like Hajime. She felt dejected because she didn't live up to the family image by not having a talent. That's where the similarities stop. She hides behind this cruel persona and belittles others to make her herself seem better. She gives herself the fake title of "Super High School Level Sister." She will do anything in her power to get a talent. But it's impossible. No matter how much money you give. She knows this, but she is persistent. Despite her attitude, I love the stubborn side of her character. She was even planning to remove one of the talented students from the class. This made her character very interesting.
The other characters are secondary and we don't really interact with them, so I won't make a paragraph about them.
Story(7/10): The story was zany, then naturally started to get more dark over the span of the arc. The only reason it's not rated a ten is because it failed to serve as a good backstory for the mainline games.
Premise--I had liked what they tried with the show. Hajime gets into human experiment and the information about this experiment gets leaked towards the public. The public starts a riot because instead of their money helping the Reserve Course, it was helping the experiment. The class has to sit there as their once-perfect school is turning into mayhem. The setting is so realistic and interesting. But this is supposed to serve as the backstory before the students became Remnants of Despair. And they needed to come up with something somehow. So they introduced this: brainwashing. That's it. No interesting motives. No moral dilemmas. This arc went from the best to being subpar.
The art is a 9/10. The characters and the setting looked aesthetically pleasing.
The sound was outstanding, 10/10. Although I am not fluent in Japanese, I was singing gleefully with the opening song. The intro is a bop.
You should watch the series if you're looking for a fun time. I enjoyed the story and characters despite it's flaws.
