Croisee in a Foreign Labyrinth is a Slice of Life series that revolves around Yune - a japanese girl that was given privilenge to live in Paris, France in the late 19th century.
Well this series is definitely right for my cup of tea since I tend to like slow paced series. But Croisee lacks something that the other slice of series has, and unfortunately it lacks a story. Of course I know that most "slice of life" genre doesn't have a particular story rather a collection of everyday instances in the main characters life.
In Croisee though, instead on focusing on Yune's everyday life in Paris we are given an insight on the cultural clash between Japanese & French customs. It's very informative but most of the time it just felt that the series tried too much too be angsty that sometimes its gets irritating. Almost the entire series focuses on such values that you are better of reading a book on Japanese customs.
The series did a pretty good job developing a Parisian backdrop, but as I said, Croisee's main focus is to show you the different perspective of a two different culture. It's nice that we get to be informed but then again sometimes it presents a rather redundant subject.
While the series tried to give Yune, Claude & Camille a deeper story it was a little to late since it was presented in the last couple of episodes. A would like to see a season 2 of this so that we could've a much better resolution behind these characters pasts. But until then this series is lukewarm.
Unlike Natsume Yuujinchou or Mushishi - slice of life series that can have a single episode to be a stand alone story. Or even Yokohama Kaidashi Kikou that gives you the "mono no aware" or nostalgic/sentiment feelings. Croisee chose to focused on the cultural clashes that it forgot to create an actual story. It took almost the entire series to have Yune get accustomed to her new surroundings that by the time the "cultural problems" were settled it was too late to introduced a deeper stories to its characters.
The animation is nice though. It's still a pretty decent anime if you run out of something to watch as 12 episode is just a breeze to devour. It's relaxing but then again don't expect to have a character driven series instead a cultural lessons.
