This is about some girl playing a really old Japanese card game, how can this be interesting?, well, it IS interesting. I got to see this series because of the game, it just caught my attention, that's all, but I didn't think I would've enjoyed it this much, and I don't believe how can it be so unpopular right now, since it exceeds on every aspect any Josei or Shoujo always lack of.
As I'm a boy, I am just not cut to see a Josei or shoujo anime, since I always expect some bishounen dirtbags going around with some submissive girl who is always cute, but damn no, Chihayafuru is just the perfect example of how a josei or shoujo should be.
Story(9/10): So there's Chihaya, a beautiful girl who loves to play karuta, since she wasn't good on anything before playing it, and now she want to create a club, but encounters some difficulties(since it's an old Japanese game, nobody is really interested to join). The Anime explains well how to play the karuta game, with very refreshing scenes and really digestible animations, also the meaning of some of the poems (each card contains a 1 of 100 poems from 100 Japanese poets) so you can actually understand what's going on on each game.
The flashbacks and the rest of the story is pretty interesting, sometimes people can get really bored with this stuff, but on this series each flashback can really get you hooked, the story can get pretty intense sometimes, but naturally of course, that's what I really like about Chihayafuru
Art(15/10) The art is simply beautiful, I give it a 15 because I really can't give less, the character's design are really refreshing, the animation is God-tier and the scenery is simply amazing, can't really write more about it because it's excellent for me.
Sound(11/10) This really captivated me, the main theme is extremely beautiful and the rest of the ost is pretty amazing too, the opening gave me the same warm feeling I got from Ano hana, no more to say.
Character(9/10): It's a pretty special characteristic of the series, each one is Unique, and has it's own problems and cualities, from the extremely active Chihaya(when it comes to Karuta) to Desktomu and Porky, but each one develops well through the series, sometimes I get irritated with Taichi, but it's ok.
Enjoyment(10/10), If you ask me how much I enjoyed it, you should watch my face in front of the Tv, each game it's really, really intense, and really makes you go and try to play sometime.
Overall: I really liked this anime, everything is just from good to perfect and you might not expect much from it, but then it really really kills you.
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