TL;DR: Decent animation and sound. Story is paced slower than the usual shounen, but not boring. Premise is easy to understand and accept. World building is done well enough to not leave questions as the story progresses. Would have been better if is a full 24 episode season instead of a half season. adding 1 more point for my rating as this is my kind of story (Rate 9/10, overall review 8/10), and it got me excited for the next season. Recommended if the fast paced, adrenaline pumping, noisy shounen is not the only kind of shounen you can accept. But fight scenes are less than desirable, so will have to tolerate that.
Just going to split the review into a few basic categories.
Story
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Background: There are spirits(supernaturals) in the land of living, and like humans, there are good and bad ones. But unlike the average normie humans in this world, the average spirits have (you guess it), super natural powers. So like any civilized world, there needs to be order and sanctions involved. Of course land of living belongs to the living humans, so they have more authority in the rules etc.
The premise of the show is that the MCs are living people who are very connected to the supernaturals due to their family. They both have very high/ unusual importance among the community of people involved with supernaturals, and the supernaturals. So the show starts them off with their connections in the community, and also their stance/pov on this community.
Story includes understanding of the characters, and their circumstances through both action(fight) scenes, and daily (very) normal interactions. Slight use of comedy to diffuse non- critical tension, which gives the character an added depth, and a more realistic(?)/humane/ personal touch (Just makes the characters more dimensional like how real people are)
Pros:
- World building is great, no nonsense, they even used narration to help speed up the understanding of the world
- Story starts of with a few characters and their importance, then progress naturally to include more characters. In most story-telling, the introduction of each character means more information about the world and the general direction of the story. But I think the author handles the new character introductions well to not overwhelm the story with a lot of information, even if the characters may be of complicated background, they managed to only bring in information that is concerning to the situation at hand. So there's no long winded back story for each character if the current situation have no need for them, the information that each character brings will be revealed throughout the show slowly.
- Premise is clean and simple, easy to understand and accept (probably fall on the side of cliche, but I like this formula)
- (Subjective) Pacing is smooth (or slow). I like the way each critical character or information slowly gets revealed. Anime is only 12 episodes long, so honestly is not the best pacing to make an impression on people(might be better with a full 24 ep season). Pacing falls closer to a slice of life story-telling than of a shounen style story. is not exactly slow-burned, but is not exciting enough for they typical shounen expectation. I would actually say the pacing is similar to Attack of the Titan first season, ofcourse this story is less dynamic as AOT has a more complex world and more characters involved from the get go. But is similar as in there's so many things you learnt by the end of the anime but then nothing essentially happens. Such story pacing and story telling really gets me to crave more. Also knowing the next 12 episodes is planned for this year kind of calmed my nerves(unlike AOT S1 where I was pretty annoyed and bewildered by it ending where it did). Everything that happened in these 12 episodes is a build up to the main event. So there is no win/lose yet as you see in typical shounen (like Onepiece have a clear villain to defeat that impacts the development of both story and character)
Cons:
- Is only 12 episodes!
- Fight scenes are not very exciting. There's little tension in the fights though the characters' expressions and monologues all indicate how serious the fights should have been. Pretty sure animation plays a part in the lack of tension, but also the focus on the fights are pretty shallow. Other than the monologues/dialogues saying out what the exact key technique or tools being used, there's very little going on to show strategies or even critical thinking of the fight itself. (if there is more emphasis on the fight scenes, there will be more excitement to the show, like how in My hero Academia, Deku was able to strategize his first 'fight" scene to save Bakugo from a random slug villain on the streets, and then each action was well animated and focused for us to see his strategy playing out)
Story points: 8/10 (if fights were more thought out it would be 10/10, I do like my action scenes exciting where it mattered)
Characters
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Background: There are 3 main group of characters in the show. We have the enforcers to keep law and order between the world of the living and the spirits, aka Saenome. We have the Tsukumogami who are the focused supernaturals in this show, they are beings who don't belong in this living world, but yet able to exists, thus there's law and order necessary to keep the peace. Then there is average humans who by right should have no involvement with the Tsukumogamis and the Saenomes in normal circumstances.
So we have a Male MC being a Saenome, Female MC being a normal human who have deep involvement with Tsukumogamis (not out of her own will), and we have many important side characters who are Tsukumogamis.
Pros:
- Characters in all these 12 episodes are all very distinct. (I do love a wide variety of personalities even for non-essential characters)
- Most characters that plays a role in developing the story are multi dimensional (they are not just cardboard standees there acting like a NPC)
- Male MC character is endearing (Slightly), and also not overly dumb/naive like typical shounen MC, AND most importantly not noisy like typical shounen MC. MC is also more grounded and realistic as compared to (yeap, you guess it) the typical shounen MC. Smart, serious, straightforward, pure (not ignorant) boy with a sad and traumatizing past. (first impression of male MC is that he is a Sasuke from Naruto)
- Male MC's past defined his actions, but not his personality. This really gave the author a lot of room to grow the character, and create a multi dimensional MC
- Female MC is cute but not annoying (this is a plus point because somehow many authors think annoying cute girls are the only cute girls in the world). Female MC is draped in a layer of mystery because she is the key to the climax of the story anyway. But not overly mysterious to the point that we don't see her as just a piece in the puzzle, but also a player. there's a good balance in trying to bring out the personality traits and the backstory of the Female MC without exposing too much of the core pieces of the story.
- Side Characters are fun, and each plays their role really well. In 12 episodes, we are able to understand most of their back stories, and also get a grasp of their core personalities, as well as a hint of how they will be developing the story together with the MCs.
- Redundant characters are appropriately involved in small drama without strong focus or long-winded "redemption" story
- Characters are generally what they are, if you are bad, you are bad. No weird redemption/sob story.
Cons:
- Is ONLY 12 episodes!
- Honestly though, because of the slower than usual pacing, I do find myself wanting abit more backstory on some obscure characters, and also more interactions from the important side characters. Since is not fights after fights, but there are proper day to day interactions, it would be good to see more of the side characters to build more feelings towards them
- MCs growth are well written as compared to side characters. If the side characters weren't written so endearing, I wouldn't have noticed the lack of focus on their growth.
- Lack of technical growth, even in main fighting character. Male MC does not grow in terms of his fighting skills or fight related critical thinking. Only grow mentally and emotionally and spiritually (those intangible stuff). At the end of the anime, it does show the Male MC trying to train himself to be stronger for fights, but details of training are glossed over. Somehow, doesn't seem like there will be a sort of "training" arc to level up the Male MC.
Characters points: 8/10 (would be a 10/10 if there's more technical growth, I like training arcs is my shounen anime, hahah)
Visuals
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I like the art style, I like the watercoloured, blurred background. Basically , decent art quality to me. Aesthetics is also my cup of tea. easy on the eyes. Characters are physically distinct.
Pros for art:
- Everything. From character designs to colour scheme to background works, I like all.
Cons for art:
- Nothing
Animation is decent quality, up to par with 2020s quality. No glaring ugly CGIs that I absolutely hate, like the choreograph sequence of Bakuten!!. Animation quality is consistent in all 12 episodes, so no wonky looking characters appearing out of nowhere, like Haikyuu!! season 4 onwards. Though there's also no amazing animation happening like how in onepiece Wano arc, audience gets treated to very good animation for crucial fight scenes.
Pros for animation:
- Consistent, easy on the eyes
- foreground characters are well animated. Detailed facial animation
- Nothing ugly lol
Cons for animation:
- Lack of effort of background activities and characters.
- Fight scenes are too boring. There's not enough oomph! No tension, no dynamic panning, no speed . I might as well have read the fight as a paragraph of texts. Even the animation in a running (sports) anime, kaze ga tsuyoku fuiteriru, got my heart thumping. Think there's only 1 fight scene at the end of the show that got me slightly excited.
Visuals points: 8/10 (and same as above, if the fight scenes were better animated this would have been 10/10. I really like my fight scenes hahah)
Sound
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Sound points: 8/10
Because nothing awful stood out. By default, sound is usually 8/10 for me if there's nothing unusually awful, like a super noisy main character (like in Black clover) hahaha. But VAs are decent here for the characters. sound effects are not overwhelming. OP, ED are nice (their OP, ED visuals are also very pretty and enjoyable to watch). Not above an 8 because there are even more exceptional OPs and EDs out there, and higher points are ofcourse reserved for them. No noticeable flaws. but maybe they can up their fight scenes if they employ better bg music and create tension for it.
Overall is 8/10
