There is one word for the feeling of watching throughout the beginning to the end of this show: disappointment.
And there are many reasons, to the point that I am here writing my first review.
Bokutachi no Remake had one of the best first episodes I've watched, period. It elaborated on a story so relatable for all of us, touching many feelings and decisions we have on our teenager/young adult life, while at the end having a great cliffhanger leading to great excitement on the many possibilities this show might have had at that point. It stood out from the other seasonal shows, bringing similarities with great shows like Sakurasou, one which actually shows struggles we have in our teenager life - I'll get through that later -, or even Erased, with the possibility of changing the past. "This is going to be a great", is what I thought.
We had the second episode. Which, although it wasn't as good as the first one, it established what could be a great slice of life with fun characters. And as many anime do nowadays, it brought some knowledge about a particular topic expanding on it. In this case, it was the art college experience and some of the techniques involved around the field. I think this was a nice move that made for a more interesting watching experience. So we had a show about art school, somewhat likeable characters with different sets of skills and a protagonist which had some future knowledge and would try his best with this second chance he had gotten. Done. That alone is a great sinopse and there could’ve been a good anime about it. But unfortunately after that little arc, the show TRIED following through many different paths which I think were all bad decisions that made it for an overall ok anime with a not-so-great-anymore concept.
First, it chose romance… with ALLthe girls. Which wasn't that bad, as Sakurasou also got some of it, but in what could be an informative slife of life it all happened pretty fast, switching the whole show and focus to this part instead. And also Nanako trying to get his attentiion even though Kyouya and Aki had already announced they were dating made some pretty out of context scenes (at least for an anime with many potential interesting plot points to follow). There was also Kawasegawa, which wasn't an important character at all, even though they tried to make her appear as one. She was there all the time and liked him too. She kinda worked as a rival or antagonist at the beggining, but swiftly changed had her purpose changed in the show. He asked for advice to her, but honestly she didn't say anything special (probably because he wasn't in the wrong to begin with, but we'll get on this).
Then there was the proably most important part of the show, the game making arc. The one the protagonist makes the so MALEFICENT and DESTRUCTIVE - which the show clearly points and ratifies - mistakes. I consider this to be already a somewhat bad move. To confirm an course of action or philosophy to be right or wrong, specially on a broad topic which brings many ideas and reasons for both sides makes for a less interesting story. Makes for a rather more predictable story and less involvment with the viewer overall with less theories going on. Great shows will usually show both sides of the story without saying who's in the right and who's in the wrong, letting it for viewer to think and decide on (shiki, code geass, attack on titan, death note). Now the message this show wanted to show was very clear: "Helping people can make them dependent on always needing your help, so they WILL NOT improve on their own. Don't help people". Now, while I do think this is a possibility, it is NOT up to the guy who helps to be blamed for this, and this turned to be my biggest problem with this show. In any situation, this is a decision up to the one being adviced on to think and struggle by yourself or not, specially on an art's course, where you are supposed to learn and improve your creative skills., can't you just learn with someone experienced and improve yourself? Instead you choose to turn off your brain and stop creating by thinking you are not good enough (even though Kyouya wasn't even in their areas AND those were only uni assignments WHICH HAD DEADLINES SO THERE WERE CHANGES TO BE MADE OTHERWISE NOTHING WOULD EVEN BE PRESENTED). And this all happened so fast, like that was the natural course of events and by him giving them criticism they'd simply loose their creativity, specially with Tsurayuki. In his case, after some reviewal on his writing in order for them to publish a whole commercial product because he was LATE on his job he just left, like are you dumb?? Do you rather submit an unfinished project instead of curtting off some parts for something actually completed? Like, it doesn't even make sense to blame yourself at this point. This is literally some kind of pride with a jealousy involved of these people that instead of making them learn from the experience this guy has present, they preffer to think they are not good enough and thus not progressing and creating.
And at this point we may also already connect this great experience the protagonist has with his social skills and even success with girls, bringing back to the beggining to think "This protagonist isn't even relatable anymore" lol. And it also affects how the story moves as usually when a protagonist struggles, he'll learn through it and develop, but in this case was the opposite: the protagonist basically already had everything. We can even question how didn't he have a successful career even though although not having an arts degree he still managed to be a great on what he did.
And finally the last and over drama exxagerated arc. Which basically kept showing how him helping them in the past brought only disgrace to the world and then demonstrated that exhibiting an art to someone who doesn't want to draw will make them want to draw again. Couldn't have gone more boring and uninteresting.
