The first thing I'll mention is what the show got right, which has got to undoubtedly be the little musical jingles they play before and after commercial breaks (just looked it up and they are called "commercial bumpers"). The little bit of music they play just screams the 60's. It meshes perfectly with the setting and I find it pretty neat. Other than the bumper and ED though, the music was pretty much average, barring a nice insert song they used once.
I also think there was definitely a good idea behind this project. A space race oriented anime is a pretty unique idea, and one I would have loved to see more realized. Vampires don't necessarily have to be a part of it, but I'm sure you could work them in somehow. Despite my praises of the concept, I think it really suffered in its execution, which I'll elaborate further later on in my review.
The art was honestly a mixed bag, I think the colors were pretty fine (the orange they used for the space suit really popped and was quite nice), and the characters didn't look horrendous, and the animation was fine. Nothing really wowed me all that much, and I feel they really missed an opportunity, because I'm sure you could do some cool aesthetics with a Soviet setting. There were a few details I noticed in the design of some elements being clearly based off of Soviet designs, such as the busses and rockets, but I don't think it went that deep.
The main thing I'd have to say about the characters is that they are just kind of cliché, which is a common theme throughout most of this show. Lev, the main character, is your average nice-guy protagonist, and other than being Russian and an astronaut has little actual backstory or character elements. He also doesn't really get any development, making him even more boring. Irina is slightly better, but only because she gets some development, because otherwise she just fits the "tsundere" archetype to a T. She also is given way more of a backstory, but none of it's really explored, so it doesn't add much to the show as a whole.
The next thing on my list of things is the story. It really wasn't that impressive, it's a storyline that has been told 1000x before, albeit in different circumstances. 2 people love each other but some force doesn't want them to be together. This plotline is pretty average, and only feels even remotely unique because of the backdrop of the Soviet Space Race. The romance itself isn't even that good, with it feeling kind of underdeveloped and rushed. Furthermore, they don't even kiss once in the whole show, so the relationship never really gets farther than the "I love you" stage.
Now on to my final point, which is both critique and speculation on what could have been. I feel one of my most prevalent feelings with Tsuki to Laika to Nosferatu was how cliché everything felt. Their depiction of the Soviet Union is just really generic, and this setting never really ties into the story other than to say, "We are the evil government and we kill people we don't like." It really just feels like the most boring and surface level setting ever, barring a few specific details they include in a small number of scenes. I think this show would have been way better if they focused more on the unique setting and made a more historically-accurate show, that is more about exploring the USSR during this fascinating time. You could keep the vampire if you want to (she was cute after-all), but I think a more informational focus could have really made this show stand out as not just unique, but good too.
This show was disappointing, while I never really hated it, it was certainly far from being good. There were still some good ideas at play, but they we're outnumbered by the number of less good aspects, leading to an overall pretty mediocre experience.
