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Kuzu no Honkai isn't an anime for everyone. It touches on the taboo, and stays true to its unique narrative. However, this was the first "drama/romance" anime to truly catch my eye with its synopsis, and the end product lived up to and exceeded my expectations.

This is a story filled with disgust, angst, and suffering. The way the story is told makes it your duty to feel everything the characters are meant to feel and then feel a surplus of shock and disbelief that comes from your own frenzied speculation.

... The characters are overly self-centered and are prone to behave in, seemingly, ridiculous ways. However, each character is built with their own narratives, and each is given a chance to portray their thoughts and emotions to the viewer. This creates the emotional investment that one normally has to a character after seeing them battle through tough opposition and heavy turmoil. Yet, at no point are you inspired to pity any of the people in the story. At no point are you asked to be understanding of their plight, and even so, at every point in the story you beg and plead for these damn kids to do what makes sense. You want the characters to do what you think is right, and in the end they don't.

At the end of every episode and at the start of a new one, one of the characters makes an entitled, selfish decision that shatters the plan you had created during the break between them. Each character seemingly disregards any external factors and simply gets swept up in their own grief or animosity. But that's what makes it as galvanizing as it is. After all, wouldn't we do the same? Although their actions can come off as hyperbolic, it is only so without the context of their narrative. No one has anything to hold them back from making rash decisions besides their very own conscience. There are countless times in everyday life we ignore our inner voice and do what we feel is right in that moment. Within Kuzu no Honkai, they simply take their unreleased grief and sorrow and channel it into poorly thought-out actions. However, it must be known that they are still too young to truly know better and haven't had any prior experience at dealing with these emotions in a reasonable manner.

Perhaps I hold Kuzu no Honkai in such high regard because I find its story relatable and its characters loosely justified, but even in its over the top delivery, the message it tries to get across is one that holds meaning. After watching the anime, you should come away with resolve along with all the sorrow. It truly is a bittersweet story from beginning to end.

No matter how badly you want something, perhaps the best thing to do is to let it go and move on. In this tale of unrequited love, we follow the characters through their own unique hardships and their journey to mature and learn what they truly want. Although it seemingly takes ages for them to finally reach a conclusion, it holds true to the path a hurt lover may face. Stuck in an endless loop of suffering, seeing and wanting but never moving forwards, it takes many mistakes and pains for everyone to learn and move on.

Kuzu no Honkai isn't a story for everyone. But for those who are willing to, or have faced the pain these characters do, it's a wonderfully unfulfilling story that will render you speechless in a variety of ways. Its incredible art and animation, along with its expertly timed soundtrack, are simply more things to captivate you when placed throughout the story.