I'm not quite sure how to start this review, I guess I have been on a dizzy joyride of emotions like a teacup that won't stop spinning on a theme park ride, but I digress.
Shuffle! is a classic anime of romance, comedy, drama, and for the first time ever, for me personally, a harem. I have never watched a harem anime and I'm glad I started with Shuffle! I don't actually know what harem means but I guess it's essentially 1 guy, 5 beautiful girls that would equal a variety of romantic outcomes. Forgive me if I got that wrong but I guess that's what it could have been.
Anyway, enough of me rambling on, let's get into the main brunt of the review and why I have given this anime a high score of 10/10
Story - 9/10 (Spoilers Ahead)
The story of this anime I was unsure of, it didn't sound like something I would be interested in, but how I was wrong, god damn. To begin with, we are introduced to 2 main characters, Rin Tsuchimi and Kaede Fuyou. Rin is a simple young high school student attending Verbena Academy. He lives alongside his childhood friend Kaede who goes above and beyond in looking after Rin.
She literally does everything, from cooking, cleaning, clothes washing, food shopping, you name it, if it's a daily task, Kaede is on the job. I truly felt sorry for her, waking up so early to cook breakfast, waking up Rin, and getting him ready for school when Kaede is only a childhood friend. In some episodes, Rin was taking advantage of Kaede and that was truly pissing me off, almost to the point I had to stop watching, as I couldn't stand Rin's selfishness anymore.
Rin and Kaede both attend the same school and on the first day back, they are introduced along with myself, to 2 new transfer students, called Sia and Nerine. These 2 girls share a personality between them, Sia is a daughter of a god, and Nerine is a daughter of a demon. They both have supernatural powers but mainly Sia just hit's her father with a chair when she gets embarrassed and Nerine goes explosive mad with magical energy, I guess that's where the comedy part lies.
After school, Kaede attends a cooking club with the smart cook Asa who is teaching Kaede everything she knows about cooking so that Kaede can continue producing great-tasting food for Rin. Rin then walks home by himself that day and stops by the supermarket only to bump into Sia who is struggling to decide on what meat packet to buy, Rin helps her out and thanks Rin for the help by calling out his first name.
As Rin is walking home, he hears a girl singing on a park swing and listens in, only to disturb her and that girl turns out to be Nerine. Rin compliments her on her singing voice and Nerine thanks him in return by calling Rin by his first name, but how did both Sia and Nerine know Rin's first name when he only just met them?
Rin continues to walk home and stops by the video arcade to put his mind off the bizarreness of that day. While in the arcade he sees a girl trying to win a claw machine game and offer's her some money to pay for a go, however, Rin doesn't have enough cash on him and apologizes, Rin continues to walk home. Her name, by the way, is Primula, a young girl who is part of the demon world but you would need to watch the anime to learn about her backstory, not going to spoil it here.
As the story goes on, the anime branches out with a variety of romantic backstories with all the characters, and each backstory is truly well written and detailed. It just makes you want to watch more and more.
The number of emotions that went through me while watching this anime was truly inspiring and I just didn't want to stop watching it.
There are times I just wanted to choke the fuck out of Rin as in some episodes he treated the only girl who showed respect, love and cares towards him, Kaede. Rin treated her with a disgusting attitude and I just wanted to fucking.... you get it.
If I had to rate the girls, this would be my take;
Kaede - Lovable girl with a bubbly personality and would be there for my every need. I would treasure her, respect her, help out as much as I can and she is definitely waifu material. Guess you could say I'm simping for her, xd.
Primula - A adorable young girl with a loving presence about her but she needs to learn the major things about love and romance first, she's far too young to be having a boyfriend let alone the thing that revolves around love and how you can show that to the other sex, you know what I'm talking about
Sia - There are 2 sides with Sia, the shy, unconfident girl then the other side, the slutty, in-your-face type who puts you into embarrassing and almost regrettable situations, but hot damn, is she cute when she's on that side. :wink:
Nerine - Not much I can say about her, I think she is the same as Sia's first side and I would say she is a lovely person to talk to if you are down in the dumps but other than that, not much else to say.
The hell? I've gone way off topic here, I guess I just tend to waver in a random direction, I didn't really talk much about the story. I guess since there are 24 episodes, there is a lot to talk about so all I can say, is to watch the anime and find out for yourself. The story was great, truly something different and I would recommend this anime to anyone who likes the same sort of thing as I do.
Now, lemme stop this section and move on.
Art - 10/10
Without question, the art in this anime is truly well done. It's almost as good as Kyoto and I won't be saying that if I didn't mean it. The art and animation were truly well done and it deserves to be 10/10.
Change my mind.
Sound - 10/10
The music and sounds in an anime is a key aspect on what makes a scene the way it is, a happy scene, a cheerful soundtrack, a sad scene, a slow mellow soundtrack. Shuffle! is certainly up there with the soundtracks, each scene no matter how sad or happy the scene was, the soundtrack complemented the scene well if only I knew what they were called so I could listen to them on a daily basis, hmmm.
Character - 10/10
What can I say about the character, after all, they were drawn beautifully and I only wish I had at least one of those girls in my life but I keep forgetting, this is a fictional story and it's not real, but how I wish it was. I would love to live my life forevermore with Kaede or Sia, my heart just sings for those two. The character design was fabulous and every change of clothes the girls had to wear was certainly not a letdown.
Enjoyment - 10/10
Can't you tell with the rating, of course, I enjoy it, I would recommend this anime to anyone and everyone to loves anime just as much as I do. Yes, I'm only just starting my journey, but I have fallen deeper into the fucking rabbit hole that anyone else has when they first started watching anime and you would need a fucking 200 ft long rope to haul me out of it. Anime will and is now part of my life and it will never disappear nor will I grow out of it. I'll introduce my children to it, and they'll hopefully introduce their children's children into and anime will live on in my life and future.
Overall 9.8-10/10
I kinda went off-topic slightly with the enjoyment section and I hope you don't mind but overall Shuffle! was almost masterpiece-like, not truly up there with the other romantic animes I have watched but is certainly in the mix. If I had to give my end all score for Shuffle! it would have to be 9.8/10.
End Comments
Fabulous anime, really enjoyable, I need to start watching more of these but the only time I have to watch anime is either during the day when I feel tired after working the breakfast shift at the hotel, or when I feel wide awake at the end of the dinner shift but need to go to sleep for the breakfast shift in the morning.
So for me right now it's kinda difficult, but that's my problem, not yours.
Anyway, brilliant anime, really enjoyed it and can't wait to watch my next series, hoping it doesn't disappoint.
Thank you very much for sticking around and reading this long review, I hope you enjoy the rest of your day.
cryyptt_ <3
