- Contains a highly suggestive (nay, canon), meaningful, and wonderfully crafted relationship between two men.
-There's no face to the bad side in this story.
- Convoluted storyline that tried to juggle a post apocalyptic false utopia and magical forest shenanigans in 11 episodes.
- Imbalance in character development. Some side characters are more fleshed out than main characters.
Well, that was a nice summation of what I'd like to discuss. Let me start with the bad stuff.
The storyline in this anime is horrendous. As soon as they start weaving in complications into the story, I threw in the towel. No.6 threw crisp, polished, and frightening social views and technological and historical progression at us, only to end this story on a note that contributes nothing to the original premise - Rather it's this glorified idea of unity and status and - goodness - the magic of the earth or some shit like that. It was hard to follow the amount of pure BS that was overflowing on my screen since episode 8/9. If you're someone who doesn't buy easily into sketchy plot twists, you would be turned off rather quickly.
Another BIG BAD THING, is that the anime sends a worrying and highly flawed message. When talked about, No.6 always comes off as this big and evil single entity that sucks from the earth to create a false positive. That, my friends, is wrong. No.6's GOVERNMENT is the one behind the lies and cruelty, not the whole city. The show often talks down to the city's citizens, whose biggest crime is essentially ignorance. They are innocent people who are at best lying to themselves about the state of the city, and at worst are utterly spoiled by its lies. Either way, their crimes are nothing to be vary of. Yet the show, when mentioning No.6 as a single evil entity includes its citizens in that description, essentially creating this philosophical idea about greed, which puts the citizens in an equally bad spot as the people running the city.
What then happens, is that deaths of innocent people are being glorified to support a flawed idea about greed, environment, and industrialization, and leaves a bad taste in your mouth. By giving a face to the city, a Big Bad (which existed in the manga, making it the superior version in more ways than one), I as the viewer would know where to point fingers, and the whole message would make more sense, if only to a certain point. Alas, that doesn't exist.
Final MEH thing, is Safu. Honestly, I don't know what's her point. I mean, she felt like she HAD a point, but it was never made. That was a big problem. Safu was written as an important, front-row character, yet we know more about her grandmother than we do about her. We know more about Inukashi that we know about her. She's left out to play a love interest yet is not a love interest like, at all, and in the end was the most useless scapegoat I have ever seen. Safu was an utter disappointment of a character, and I wish they either gave her a normal storyline, or didn't make a big thing out of her in the first place.
Now to the GOOD STUFF!
First off, no matter what anyone tells you, the relationship between Nezumi and Shion is hardly EVER fan service. I will take that to my grave, people.
Yes, the amount of times Nezumi and Shion share a cutesy moment together is a bit hard to count, since it's the main thing in focus. But, even so, every interaction has a meaning, it's what I love most about their relationship.
Every look and every touch and every moment, essentially, send a big message. It might be hard to see at first, but I assure you, if you watch it again you'll know what I mean. What is weaved between Nezumi and Shion is nothing I have ever seen in an anime. It's a friendship that surpasses all comfort zones and doesn't hold a candle to any generic idea of how they're supposed to be around each other. The amount of pure CARE that they project is heartbreaking, and is never cheap.
I will say this, though. Some scenes are drawn to look more superficially appealing than others. I believe the polishing and dreamy presentation of a certain dancing scene is a big example of that - but even with that 'shippy' feeling, the meaning is not lost. Nezumi and Shion share a complex bond weaved with doubt, love, and twisted dependency - it's a treat to watch.
I will repeat this again, none of this is FAN SERVICE. Fan service is when things are meant to look a certain way for no other reason than to appease the fans. Well made fan service will provide some character development along with it. No.6 provides intimate moments which are our main source of true understanding of the main characters. It couldn't have been done as well in any other way - we wouldn't have gotten such a good read on them have they only ever just... TALKED. So, not fan service.
FINAL WORDS would be... Well, this is worth your time, if only to end up in a weird laugh/sob situation because the finale is a shit-pile of emotions and bad messages. If you're someone who enjoys a fresh take on characters, you should love this. If you love this already, do yourself a favor and go read the manga and the novel. It'll make the experience much better, I promise.
