Alice to Zouroku

Sana is not an ordinary little girl; she possesses a special ability known as "Alice's Dream." Due to her power, which allows her to create anything from her imagination, all that she knows is the laboratory where she is a test subject. Wishing to experience the outside world, she escapes and meets a stubborn old florist named Zouroku Kashimura in a convenience store. All too soon, her pursuers catch up and Zouroku is roped into Sana's troubles.

However, far from trying to distance himself, Zouroku extends a hand to help Sana. Following his values and sense of justice, he even gives the pursuers a piece of his mind! Zouroku then offers Sana a place to stay, beginning the daily life and struggles of the unlikely duo.

[Written by MAL Rewrite]

Kashimura, Sana Main

Oowada, Hitomi Japanese

Kashimura, Zouroku Main

Ootsuka, Akio Japanese

Kashimura, Sanae Supporting

Toyosaki, Aki Japanese

Ichijou, Shizuku Supporting

Koshimizu, Ami Japanese

Hinagiri, Yonaga Supporting

Kitou, Akari Japanese

Hinagiri, Asahi Supporting

Fujiwara, Natsumi Japanese

Shikishima, Hatori Supporting

Uchida, Shuu Japanese

Miho, Ayumu Supporting

Takahashi, Minami Japanese

Yamada, Noriko Supporting

Hirose, Yuuki Japanese

Nakanishi, Chinatsu Supporting

Takakura, Yuka Japanese

Cook, Justin Producer

Kaneko, Hirotaka Producer

Matsukura, Yuuji Producer

Makimoto, Yuki Producer

Reviews

Apr 21, 2020

Gandeloft

Recommended

To me, this anime is beautiful in the simple meaning of that word. After all the stories that I've gone through, this is what's turned out to be my breath of fresh air. A story in which exclusively everything is good and nothing is bad.
Happy.. Not just happy, but wonderfully happy developments happening all over the place.
...
In a lot of stories there are characters that are the enemies in their given circumstances, but if those circumstances were to be different they'd be friends, or even lovers. To realize our dreams of those characters, at least I turn to fan artworks in which those characters are drawn together. There isn't even many artworks of this story to find and I assume that it's because this story is a whole cake, not just a piece of it, if you understand my analogy. :)
Regardless of that, this story is its own fan-fiction in that sense. Characters which start as enemies, but end up hugging each other in tears and becoming best friends. It's as if that is the essence of this story. I'd even say that no one in this story is ever an enemy of anyone. Even the government is not a bad guy, that ever-present trope.

Almost all of the characters are all bright and positive. At the very least, the conviction is understandable in positive light, but that is an eternal trope and won't be a surprise to anyone I think.

I like all of the characters, but the young girls are especially noteworthy for me. They are good and kind people that are easy to love for me. If only the world was full of kids like that. I wish the world was full of people like the people in this anime in general.
But, I'll just touch on what my feelings are regarding Sana.
Sana, the main character, is almost perfect. The "almost" is there because she is so near-flawless, that a tiny thing like this is the only flaw making her less-than-perfect for me. For me, it matters that a younger character has an appropriately younger voice actor. He voice actor not being that is that single minute flaw.
None the less, the voice actress of Sana performed better than flawlessly, to put it that way... She actually has the intonation, the rhythm, the.. I don't know how to describe it exactly. Her voice sounds like that of a little kid. The way she speaks, the way she stutters, the way the tone of her voice loses confidence, the excitement at times, the voice of an angry child.. Everything about her voice acting for Sana is childlike. Her voice contributed tremendously to me perceiving Sana as a genuine child and liking her as much as I do. It's not even right to say I like her, I'm just happy to know that she is in the hands of two wonderful people, Sanae and Zouroku.
Beyond just her voice, Sana as a character is such an amazing feat. She is very well characterized for a child character. The way she speaks, thinks, behaves and acts, it's all childlike. Not just that, but it's all also how a child that's never seen the outside world would be. My overall point is that Sana is a wonderful character that easily could've carried the show by herself for me, but it wasn't necessary!

While this is a fantasy story, it's not over-the-top. Once you're into the story, the story will not change until its end, so to say. There is a final event, but it's not a plot twist, or something to be described as an arc, it's just how the story goes, proceeds, and departs from you. The story will be just what it has been since the start. Because I am so loving of the topic of beautiful (honest, filled-with-good-intentions) human relationships, this anime has had my eyes in tears for what honestly felt like half of the entire duration of the show.

I liked what the story was presented to me as, and I only liked it more and more with each episode.
Having ended up loving this story, I am glad to have given it a chance.. I'm going to read this manga.
Did I mention that the ending of this anime, the very last scene, is something so beautiful it brought tears to my eyes yet again..

Only thing left to add is that I loved the OST, having searched for one particular piece during the first occasion that it's played in the anime, because of how much and instantly I liked it, and, the art is cute and beautiful. The characters are expressive and especially in the last few episodes, the environment is beautifully drawn.

Reviewer’s Rating: 10

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Aug 30, 2020

anime_watcher151

Mixed Feelings

I usually don’t write reviews but this time I wanted to share my thoughts
*May Contain Spoilers*

Story 5/10
This was definitely one of the weak points of this anime.
We first see Sana (the main character) running away from the research facility. So the people working there are trying to find her. As the episodes go by we meet the twins and some white haired kid Who also have similar powers. Eventually things happen, she gets caught, she gets freed and that’s it. After that the research facility no longer follows her, and besides the twins, we never see those characters ever again in the anime.
... This is my problem, after that she’s just living a normal life. What happened To the facility? Why didn’t they pursue her anymore? None of these questions Are answered to my knowledge. After that she does normal stuff, then she gets into a conflict, then gets out of it, then the anime ends. Nothing else. I was hoping they would give us more flashbacks and context, but it rarely happened.

Art: 6/10
Standard anime art

Sound: 7/10
Good op and Ed

Characters: 7/10
Nice characters but Pretty standard characters

Enjoyment: 6/10
It was fine

Overall: 6/10
Not bad but not particularly amazing.

Reviewer’s Rating: 6

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May 13, 2019

Crisu92

Not Recommended

I really did not enjoy Alice to Zouroku. The plot of this anime had me completely lost and after the third episode I could already see I was not going to enjoy the rest of the series. But... ofc I powered through it and I just feel really disappointed after completing it.

The story changed halfway. This is not even a long series! So either they wanted it to seem super eventful or they just gave up on the initial idea? The story itself is very confusing... Why was there an antagonist type character that seems to vanish mid series without much explanation? I would have ... enjoyed it more if they focused on one idea and went with it till the end. It also jumps from one event to another without proper explanation and you're left to imagine what happened in between. :/

I enjoyed the artstyle but that's about it. Not my cup of tea.

Reviewer’s Rating: 3

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	Poll: Alice to Zouroku Episode 12 Discussion ( 1 2 3 ) Stark700 - Jun 25, 2017	114 replies	by ImNotAnOtaku1 »» Dec 21, 2023 11:02 PM
	Poll: Alice to Zouroku Episode 6 Discussion ( 1 2 ) Stark700 - May 14, 2017	60 replies	by ImNotAnOtaku1 »» Dec 20, 2023 10:42 PM
	Poll: Alice to Zouroku Episode 1 Discussion ( 1 2 3 4 5 ) Stark700 - Apr 2, 2017	203 replies	by ImNotAnOtaku1 »» Dec 19, 2023 10:32 PM
	Deserves a second season. Botan-Chan45 - May 3, 2018	2 replies	by Hofner1962 »» Aug 31, 2023 10:11 PM
	Poll: Alice to Zouroku Episode 8 Discussion ( 1 2 ) Stark700 - May 28, 2017	50 replies	by cat_of_hell »» Oct 8, 2022 11:05 AM