Note: This is my very first review, as such, I will not be surprised if it is seen as garbage, or if I come to that conclusion in the future.
Peoples' tastes in anime vary greatly--some enjoythought-provoking themes, some like their good-old ecchi harem light novel garbage, etc. Regardless, I am very sure there are times when we want to sit down, and watch something simple, fun, short, and maybe even a little unique in its own right.
Gabriel Dropout is one of those anime. While it may not have the brilliant comedic scenarios, visuals, and creativity like Konosuba, Gabriel Dropout has a level of charm to
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it--one where you will feel like you're hanging out with a bunch of friends and chilling--which is practically the whole anime.
Story & Characters:
In heaven, Gabriel White Tenma (better get used to the long names ASAP) graduates angel school at the top of her class. She is the ideal girl: short, cute, long haired, blonde, adorable, kind to an outrageously ridiculous degree. Basically, the average otaku's wet dream.
Her next job is to live in the human world, more specifically Japan, to study human society...which she would, if the anime's title wasn't Gabriel DROPOUT. Once Gabriel discovers the world of games online, she becomes the complete opposite of how she was initially presented as: Lazy, cynical, and sloppy, becoming an angel in race only. Now Gabriel wants nothing more than to sit around in her room all day playing games, eating potato chips, not take out the trash, and be an asshole to anyone whom she can't get any benefit from. And thus, the story follows her and her friends basically chilling out together in each ep, playing off of each others' quirky personalities, helping each other, or just being straight-up assholes.
Fucking. Brilliant.
I am a massive sucker for cute anime girls and assholes in comedies, and Gabriel fits both bills perfectly. The way she only is active if it involves something of benefit to her (food, games, or even getting to be an asshole), her bored cynical attitude towards life, makes her perfect as a loveable asshole who never comes off as too mean, as she still shows care towards her friends, and isn't an asshole 24/7. Unfortunately, however, despite Gabriel being
Next up are Gabriel's other friends in this group of loveable idiots and assholes:
Vignette April Tsukinose: a demon who is, ironically, the nicest character in the entire anime. The literal opposite of Gabriel. Kind, earnest, the loveable straight man (technically girl, but whatever) of the group.
Satanichia McDowell Kurumizawa (what the hell was the writer on when coming up with these names?): a demon who wants to become queen of hell, but whose only idea of evil are minor things like keeping a pencil cap on. The most outgoing and egotistic of the whole group. Despite this, she is the 2nd kindest of the entire group.
And lastly, my favorite of the 4, Raphiel Ainsworth Shiraha, an angel who appears more reserved on the outside, but in fact, loves tease and prank others for her own amusement, taking advantage of Satanichia's ego and stupidity for all sorts of entertaining scenarios, like having a dog steal her food literally on a daily basis.
You most likely have noticed a pattern among the characters by now: the angels are assholes, while the demons are pretty nice. The anime also notes this contrast, as several times whenever a character would do something bad to another, they would yell, "you demon!" and be replied with, "I'm an angel", or, "of course I'm a demon!". The anime could've easily explored the psychological states of angels and demons and question whether one is inherently evil or not, but this contrast is used purely for comedic effect.
In every ep, the characters try to do something ordinary, whether it be going to the beach, celebrating Christmas, and so on. The comedy comes from, again, how every character bounces off each other and complicate matters, whether it's the entire cast trying to get Gabriel to come to the beach by allowing her to hit Satanichia's head, or trying to make Satanichia forget that Christmas celebrates the birth of Christ, just so they can properly party. Despite their misfits, the cast never comes off as mean spirited, as they still help and care for each other in the end, whether it be Vignette allowing Gabriel to look at her homework because the latter is too lazy, or everyone trying to help Satanichia be able to keep a dog. Regardless, every ep plays out extremely simple. This results in a feeling of genuine friendship and chill-backness that even a hardcore fan of dark and thought-provoking anime like I crave for once in a while.
Unfortunately, the formula's execution is nothing to really write home about. Every ep is basically just the characters kinda messing around and playing off of each other, but there are more than one of these kinds of scenarios, in a single ep, meaning that one ep would have, say, Vignette trying to learn to act like a demon, and then a scenario where the characters are trying to study for exams. Which sounds great on paper, but the execution is lackluster. Because these multiple scenarios fail to establish any connection with each other during the 1st ep, and sometimes are even quickly forgotten, like the one where Vignette tries to become more demon-like that I had mentioned. This way, there are almost no build-up jokes, or cause-and-effect for a bigger joke like you'd find in Konosuba, where almost every ep starts off relatively small before bombarding with wide-scale hilarity by the end.
And that's all there is to really say about the writing of Gabriel Dropout. The characters, while entertaining and fun, never really show any unexpected traits beyond how they are initially introduced. Sure, Gabriel shows from time to time to NOT be an asshole, Raphiel even has moments where she is the LEAST controlling of the group, but those are only tiny moments--nothing really more. Maybe the cast would be entertaining if there were more major characters beyond the main 4 to help keep things more fresh and unpredictable, but there aren't. Like I said earlier, this anime is like being with a bunch of dumb friends and chilling out.
Visuals:
The visuals are actually noteworthy. The character designs are fantastic--Gabriel's long messy hair when she becomes, "fallen" creates a great contrast towards her former pure self, the fact that she barely wears pants at her apartment helps sell the fact that she's a slob, and her short height is stereotypical of more cynical characters. As a result, Gabriel certainly looks cute and slobbish at the same time, the conrast making her design the most memorable.
Vignette's short blue-purple-ish hair shows her to be a youthful but calm girl, and the small bun sticking from the back of her head is a detail that is very rare in anime.
Satanichia reddish-brown hair, which has a bat-like bow on her forehead, along with her hair loops on both sides of her head make her look like a girl trying to look, "cool"--which is exactly who she is.
Raphiel's is definitely the 2nd most interesting design. Her long white hair, along with the crosses hanging on her forehead make her appear extremely pure, when she's the opposite.
During the comedic scenes, the characters' exaggerated facial expressions are nothing to write write home about--the same old comedic faces you see in almost any comedy anime.
Unfortunately, the background setting may be what truly bogs down Gabriel Dropout from truly succeeding as a memorable slice-of-life-esque comedy. The main location used in the anime is the high school the characters go to, which looks completely generic and cookie-cutter. If you've seen almost ANY high school anime, it looks like a copy and paste of that one. Thankfully though, the background characters are actually very detailed, having distinct hairstyles to make them stand out and give more life to the setting. The other settings used throughout the anime are the girls' apartments that they live in. None of these settings are used as a way for characters to truly interact with, making many of the scenarios a lot less entertaining than they actually are. Thankfully though, the setting does switch up and is actually used in certain episodes, such as the Christmas ep where the cast walks to a shrine, or hang out to celebrate Christmas by making a cake, and of course, the beach episode.
Even so, however, there is barely any variation. Take Miss Kobayashi's Maid Dragon, another slice-of-life, chill-back series: Every ep almost always takes place in different location where characters really interact with their environment--whether it be Kobayashi's apartment where the cast makes food, the market, the office where Kobayashi has trouble with her boss. In comparison, Gabriel Dropout's use of setting comes off as incredibly lackluster.
Conclusion:
Gabriel Dropout is definitely worth watching, if you simply want to have a nice time where you don't have to think hard about anything. Though, I doubt it will be earn the title "anime of the season/year" by anyone.
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Apr 12, 2017
Gabriel DropOut
(Anime)
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Note: This is my very first review, as such, I will not be surprised if it is seen as garbage, or if I come to that conclusion in the future.
Peoples' tastes in anime vary greatly--some enjoythought-provoking themes, some like their good-old ecchi harem light novel garbage, etc. Regardless, I am very sure there are times when we want to sit down, and watch something simple, fun, short, and maybe even a little unique in its own right. Gabriel Dropout is one of those anime. While it may not have the brilliant comedic scenarios, visuals, and creativity like Konosuba, Gabriel Dropout has a level of charm to ... |
