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I have not read the Web Novel, and this review will be regarding the first 5 volumes of the Light Novel.

To start from the conclusion, I can’t really recommend this novel in its present state. While I will admit that the quality did improve marginally around the 4th volume, even considering that improvement, it’s not exactly anything great. I’ll try and go into the details below, while avoiding any major spoilers.


Story (4/10):

By no means can I praise the start of this particular story. A world with glaring inconsistencies, very poor writing choices, and a disregard for the title and proposed theme of the work ... were what stood out to me from the very first volume.
To go into a bit more detail on this, the inconsistencies were regarding the setup of the world, where women have a higher status than men… Even though men are the ones that retain the inheritance rights. As for the poor writing choices, it comes down to a rather meaningless time-skip right after the protagonist gets Isekai-ed – there’s absolutely no point of having the guy reincarnate into a kid if the author isn’t even going into detail about the growth from there. Instead, he just skips 10 years or so without even filling in anything meaningful into that time. And lastly, for the thematic issue, the protagonist remains a powerless mob for a grand total of two chapters, after which he’s your typical overpowered harem boss with a bad attitude. Hence, he is neither a mob, not is life difficult for him in any way. There were also some very poor attempts at foreshadowing scattered in the story, which are obvious even at a casual glance.
As the story moves forward, some of these issues are addressed, such as the issue with the ‘world’, but for the most part, the story and the writing simply lack flow, and most of the events simply feel contrived. As of volume 5, the author has completely left the original theme of the work, and seems to be moving towards something else. While I can’t say I dislike the new direction, I can’t say that I am a huge fan of it either, so I’ll be on the fence for a while.
However, I haven’t quite given up on the story in this case, given how the author has also written Sevens, which also had a similarly rough start. So far, MobuSeka seems vastly inferior to Sevens, but whether it will improve or not remains to be seen.


Art (7/10):

Given how this is a light novel, the art is pretty minimal. It was relatively good, although it was often difficult to tell which character was being depicted, since the character art wasn’t exactly distinctive. Other than that, I don’t really have any complaints or praise in this category.


Character (3/10):

I’m sad to say that the characters are the biggest weakness of this novel so far, and they have some major issues.
First and foremost, we have Leon, the protagonist. Leon is an inconsistent and often irrational character, whose decisions may make sense on the surface, but if you look beyond that, it’s amply clear that he’s just a plot device. His actions and reasoning are often removed from logic, and he just seems to move in whatever way suits the story best. Rather than being an organic character that responds to the environment, he feels more like a puppet to the flow of the story.
Now, for the girls (identities would be spoiler territory, but it’s not necessary to give the names, since they’re all roughly the same). This is a harem story, and hence, there are multiple girls vying for Leon. In such cases, it’s usually a good idea to have each one stand out in different ways, so that they are easy to distinguish between and appeal to various types of readers. The girls in MobuSeka though, all seem like a copy-paste job with minor differences here and there – They are all pretty dull, lacking in character, and archetypal, even though the author somehow manages to make even those different archetypes seem and behave like a single one.
There are even a couple of girls that are introduced and hinted at, but they never really have any impact at all besides a couple of appearances. More often than not, I’d read some girl’s name and wonder who that even is, given how faint their presence was in the grand scheme of things.
As a special mention, the only character I actually liked in MobuSeka was the sassy robot. While occasionally inconsistent, he was pretty fun, and livened up most of the scenes he was in.


Enjoyment (6/10):

One thing I have to admit is that MobuSeka can be enjoyable at times. More often than not, it’s more of something that you’d enjoy if you ‘turn off your brain and read’, but that’s still enjoyment nonetheless. Many of the scenes where the author tries to build up hype do fall flat, but there are quite a few sequences where he succeeds as well. I did occasionally read an entire volume at a stretch, so that’s a success there.


Overall (5/10):

While a simple average gives a 5, a weighted average would’ve put the score closer to a 4. Either way, as I had stated at the start of this review, I can’t exactly bring myself to recommend this novel. It might be worth a read if you don’t have anything else to do, but if you want better novels with a similar setting, I would recommend ‘Falling in Love with the Villainess’ and ‘My Death Flags show no sign of ending’ over this one.
There is always the possibility that MobuSeka may improve along the way like Sevens did, but as it is now, it would be better to stay away from this novel. With this, I conclude.

Isekai Tensei Soudouki is a light novel that I find rather hard to praise. The basic concept of the LN is a rather clichéd one, with two people being reincarnated into one body in a fantasy world, with the original personality of that body intact. While the premise was nothing new, it could have set itself apart from the rabble by way of execution, but it failed in that aspect. The ‘three souls in one body’ idea was used in a rather inconsistent manner, and essentially only came up whenever it was convenient (or whenever the author wanted to go on a rant about the ... Warring States period).
The story here felt like the author was just jumping from one thought to the next, without properly substantiating on any of them before diving headfirst into the next idea. More often than not, the author ends up glossing over things that actually needs explanations, and going into far too much detail about things that don’t really affect the grand scheme of things. This leads to rushed story arcs and more importantly, rushed ‘character development’.
You often get characters that can essentially be summed up in one word or a short phrase, and they hardly ever even grow beyond that. The story eventually just started to feel like excuses thrown by the author to build the protagonist’s harem, while at the same time raising the protagonist’s fame to ridiculous levels.
As for the enjoyment aspect, I’m a bit torn. I dropped the first volume a couple of times, and stopped for a few months when I finished it. When I saw that it had 6 volumes translated, I just lowered my expectations a lot and went in. I found most of it to be trite, but I will admit that I saw some improvement in volumes 5 and 6.
Just a side note – the translations are alright, but it could definitely do with some proofreading/editing. Not going to complain, since it was translated for free, but just writing this as a warning for those of you who find such translations difficult to read.
On the whole, this Light Novel wasn’t really anything great, and could be skipped without missing out on much. For far better stories with a similar premise, check out ‘Falling in Love with the Villainess’ and ‘Sevens’.


Break-up:

Story - 4
Art - 6
Character - 2
Enjoyment - 4
Overall - 4

If I were to describe Record of Wortenia War in one word, it would be ‘Pretentious’. The first few chapters were relatively interesting, which had raised my hopes, but about two volumes in, I was ready to give up. This LN has a whole host of problems, which I’ll try to go into below.

Story (3/10):
What started as a traditional isekai ended up being an utter mess, caused primarily by the incoherent storytelling and cardboard-cutout characters. The storytelling was all over the place, with the perspective and narration jumping here and there with no real rhyme or reason. Progression of time was also quite iffy, with ... seemingly random time-skips, which were only referenced in hindsight, making you wonder when that even happened.
Another factor that starts turning up around volume 2 is politics, which is just hilarious. It appears as if the author just read a few novels which involved political intrigue and attempted to recreate that without any real understanding of the subject. The manoeuvring was completely two-dimensional, and all the seasoned politicians/nobles had the mindset of playground bullies or their targets.
Most of the story is just about making Ryouma look larger than life, and to have everyone fear and respect him. Each arc simply focuses on furthering this aspect, without actually advancing the plot in any way.

Art (5/10):
Eh, the artwork is decent, but the character art is rather wonky, especially the facial expressions and shapes. Not much else to say about it.

Characters (1/10):
Record of Wortenia War only has one character as such – the protagonist, Mikoshiba Ryouma. All the other characters exist simply to validate his existence in one way or the other, usually by being afraid of him or being in awe of him. The character relations are either rushed or completely skipped – one moment, a pair of characters may be suspicious of each other, and they suddenly have full trust in each other just a few paragraphs later, with no explanation to speak of.
As for Ryouma himself, he is essentially the definition of a ‘perfect’ character. Amazingly fit and powerful, smarter than an aged tactician, compassionate when required, ruthless when necessary… All at the ripe old age of sixteen. Seriously, what? The character is just so outright broken that you can clearly see the author struggling to throw in some weaknesses, so that he’d be more ‘believable’. Well, I can say for a fact that he failed miserably. Ryouma is always the smartest person in whatever room he’s in, and usually the strongest as well (even if not directly). He comes up with all kinds of strategies and plans that are amazing and novel to the other characters, but mostly common sense to your average reader. There’s also the fact that everyone else involved is an absolute fool, even the ones that are introduced as shrewd or cunning.

Enjoyment (3/10):
Not particularly enjoyable. It was mildly interesting to begin with, but it quickly became predictable and dull. I gave up midway through volume 3 due to the reasons I’ve explained.

Overall (3/10):
Record of Wortenia War is essentially at the same level as your average Chinese novel, and really isn’t worth your time. I’d pass on reading it if I were you.

DanMachi is a rather peculiar series. My introduction to it was in the form of the anime, and needless to say, I wasn’t particularly impressed. It seemed like your typical harem-bait show set in a fantasy world, complete with the bland main character who fancies himself to be a womanizer, and the hoard of females who seem to fall for him for no conceivable reason. Even the story seemed have adventuring as a side-focus rather than anything else, which gave me little reason to like the anime.
On picking up the light novel though, my impression started to change, little by little. My impression of the ... first few volumes was quite similar to that of the anime, just that the protagonist felt a little more believable in the LN. As I kept reading, I was quite pleasantly surprised, as the series managed to grow into something rather incredible. Only later did I find out that the author made the first few volumes as such on purpose, so as to gain an audience, and the volumes after that contain the actual story that he wanted to tell. Below, I will attempt to go into the details, while making sure to spoil as little as possible.

Story (9/10):
While the start is certainly slow, but the story picks up considerably after a few volumes, most notably at around volume 6, and yet again in volume 10. The story of DanMachi is centered on two main themes, namely Growth and Adventure.
The Growth aspect is mainly focused on the protagonist, Bell Cranel, whose main feature is his tremendously fast growth as an adventurer. Of course, the speed is only relative, and he simply grows a lot faster than his peers – he does not, in fact, become the strongest there ever was within the span of a few volumes. Bell’s growth, both as an adventurer and as a person is quite believable and fun to read about. It strikes the right balance between being slow enough to not seem rushed, and fast enough for him to stand out.
The Adventure aspect is quite self-explanatory – it’s all about delving into the unknown, with only one’s skills and allies for support, having little idea about what sort of situation one may end up in. This applies both to the labyrinth exploration, and to the various situations that the characters find themselves in.
As you keep reading, you may even notice that the author has thought ahead a fair bit, and brings up various elements in the later volumes that he planted the seeds for in the initial few volumes. On top of that, as the story goes on, it gets increasingly dark – much more so than the initial impression would have you believe. All put together, I would say that DanMachi’s storytelling is quite impressive, despite minor drawbacks.

Art (7/10):
I’m not one to care much about artwork, but I found the art in DanMachi to be pretty good. The ‘cool’ illustrations are done pretty well (especially some of the covers). Still, there are some illustrations that are purely for fan-service, even if the novel itself doesn’t really divulge into that.

Characters (8/10):
The characters in DanMachi start out fairly stereotypical and shallow, but the growth and development is quite well done, as the series goes on. Bell grows from some lecherous kid (not strictly true in the first place) to a proper, hardened adventurer. Even his negative aspects are explained fairly well, so I have no complaints there. While Bell gets majority of the development, the other characters aren’t left out, and receive a fairly good amount of focus. Characters like Welf, Lily and Hestia get a good amount of attention, and even less important characters such as Lyu, Miach and the members of the Takemikazuchi familia are developed, with various character perspectives being the main medium for doing so.
There are quite a few characters who are introduced later in the series, and they are generally of a decent quality and level of depth. Without delving into spoilers, there are quite a few characters who were introduced in volumes 9 and 10, all of whom I found quite interesting.

Enjoyment (10/10):
My enjoyment of DanMachi kept increasing volume by volume, until about volume 10, from where I began to view each volume as an adventure in itself. While there was an occasional drop in enjoyment (volume 7, I’m looking at you), it usually picked back up, with more momentum than it left off at. All put together, I find DanMachi to be an extremely enjoyable read.

Overall (8.5 ~ 9/10):
As you may have noticed from the rest of this review, I quite enjoyed reading DanMachi, and would most certainly recommend it. Of course, it requires a measure of patience, as the initial few volumes may feel rather lacking. Still, I believe that the payoff is more than sufficient to keep going. As long as you enjoy fantasy, adventure and a good fight here and there, you’d most certainly like DanMachi… Provided you persist, of course. With this, I conclude.

Rakuin no Monshou is not your typical light novel. It follows western literature in its style, which means that it neither contains hyper-sexualized children nor any of those overused anime tropes. Instead, it opts for realistic characters with appropriate depth, along with a story focusing on war and political intrigue. While this may sound rather dull at first glance, it is actually quite interesting once you get into it. The battles range from gladiator matches to open warfare, while the politics is done in such a way that it is actually interesting to read about. Below, I will attempt to analyse this novel.

Story (9/10):
The plot ... is quite similar to Spartacus, set in a semi-realistic fantasy world. While most of the technology seems to be pre industrial revolution level, magic and airships are present, which may bring Final Fantasy IX to mind. The story progresses with a good deal of plot twists and reveals, which make it a rather engaging read.
The pacing is handled quite well most of the time, although there are some parts that feel a little inconsistent. There was an entire arc that seemed pointless at first, but given some time, it managed to redeem itself.
The author managed to paint a rather vivid picture of his world. We get a good idea about the various countries and their relations, as well as the politics involved behind the scenes.
Overall, the story was done quite well, with very little to complain about. I was expecting a messy ending, having read another review from this site, but I was pleasantly surprised. While the ending was certainly a little anticlimactic, I wouldn’t call it a disappointing conclusion by any means.

Art (7/10):
I don’t see much of a point in talking about the art in a light novel, but I guess I’ll give it a shot.
The art-style was fairly clean, and makes it easier to visualize important scenes. While it isn’t anything spectacular, I’ll cut it some slack, since it’s an LN after all.

Character (9/10):
The characters in Rakuin no Monshou are quite realistic and well-written in general. The main characters, Orba and Vileena are both fairly deep and interesting, and they receive a good deal of development as the story proceeds. Not only are the main characters done well, even the side characters such as Shique and Ineli are fleshed out quite well. Nothing to complain about here.

Enjoyment (10/10):
Rakuin no Monshou was a gripping read from start to finish. Orba and Vileena’s journey was extremely enjoyable to read about – so much so that I was reading at a pace of one volume a day, and was left wanting more when it was over.

Overall (8.75 ~ 9/10):
All put together, Rakuin no Monshou was the best of its genre that I’ve read, and is also among my all-time favourites. If you’re interested in war and politics with a dash of romance, try this one out. You won’t regret it.

Romance is usually a concept that is difficult for children to wrap their minds around. Sure, you might like someone, but how do you even approach that person? Even if you do manage to approach him or her, how do you make sure that you don’t make an utter fool of yourself? Most kids end up arriving at one answer – show your interest by teasing the target of your affection. Sure, the target may not take it all that well, but at least you get to interact with them because of it, right? Karakai Juzou no Takagi-san (henceforth abbreviated as ‘Takagi-san’) is an anime ... about one such girl, Takagi, who shows her interest in a boy, Nishikata, by teasing him.

Takagi-san follows an episodic format, with each episode containing 2-3 short stories about Takagi and Nishikata, and usually one story about three girls who are in the same class. As far as story is concerned, there isn’t much to speak of. Nishikata tries to come up with a plan to win against Takagi, only to be completely foiled by her, after which she proceeds to tease him. Pretty much every episode follows that format, with various little changes here and there. While it does seem to be the sort of thing that would get repetitive and dull over time, it has a certain charm to it that keeps things interesting.

As far as Art is concerned, it makes use of rather minimalistic artwork. The coloring and details are nothing spectacular, but it doesn’t look all that bad either. Still, due to this, it looks rather clean overall. The Sound is relatively forgettable, although I found the opening to be rather catchy (or annoying – take your pick).

The show mainly revolves around the interactions between Takagi and Nishikata, and they are generally rather cute. Takagi always makes sure never to go too far, and it always stops at the level of minor teasing, rather than bullying. She simply teases him because she likes him, not because of any real animosity. The other characters that show up are usually nothing all that important, except maybe the three girls (Sanae, Mina, and Yukari), who get some screen time in every episode. These segments are usually just youthful ramblings of young girls, but it can often be rather funny as well.

All put together, Takagi-san is a cute anime which works really well as a palate cleanser, to watch in between more serious anime. It may feel rather repetitive if watched all at once, so I advise against binge watching the whole thing. A simple way to describe Takagi-san would be a gender-bent version of Tonari no Seki-kun, with a little more of a (childish/innocent) romance focus. I’d recommend this one to just about anyone, since it’s a rather difficult show to hate. With this, I conclude.

Every now and then, an anime turns up that stands out from the rabble. An anime that has the potential to be something truly memorable. Violet Evergarden is one show that had all the makings of being ‘that’ anime for Winter 2018. With high production values and Kyoto Animation behind the wheel, it was a no-brainer for many. Ever since the first preview was released back in 2016, fans have been eagerly awaiting its eventual airing… But as to whether or not Violet Evergarden lived up to these expectations, that’s a different story altogether.

Story (6/10):
The story of Violet Evergarden is fairly simple when you look ... at the bare basics. An emotionless soldier, a girl known as a human weapon, searches for a reason to live, and for the meaning of love. The premise seems fairly overused, but the execution and the attention to detail are done quite well, which makes it stand out from its peers. Still, the show suffers from its fair share of problems as well.
First and foremost, the greatest issue with the story would be the pacing. The series initially starts out with a continuous pacing, which went alright for the first three episodes or so. From the fourth episode, it suddenly took a detour into an episodic format, which was quite detrimental to the whole experience. From the eighth episode, the show returned to its continuous format. This process is repeated time and again over the course of the show. This meandering of pacing between continuous and episodic negatively affected both the character development and the viewing experience on the whole.
The one other aspect of Violet Evergarden’s story that stood out in a negative way would have to be the melodrama. The show has a habit of making even relatively mundane situations and events overly dramatized, simply to elicit some sort of emotional response from the audience. There were some moments in the show were the drama felt extremely forced and unnecessary. While it wasn’t at the level of say, Clannad: After Story (where the melodrama was so thick that it was almost palpable), it does suffer a considerable blow from it.

Art and Sound (9/10):
The art is perfect, or about as close as it gets. Just from one look, it becomes clear that Violet Evergarden had an extremely high budget, and Kyoto Animation seems to have made very good use of it. The lights and shadows are managed brilliantly, and the CGI is almost unrecognizable. The attention to detail when it comes to the artwork is quite praiseworthy.
The soundtrack and songs in the show are quite pleasing to the ears. Yet again, the budget clearly shines through. Also, the voice acting stands out (in a good way) at a lot of places, especially the emotional scenes.

Characters (5/10):
The characters of Violet Evergarden are certainly a cut above the average crop, when taken as a whole. The main cast has a fair bit of depth, and they have been explored to a satisfactory extent. Each character was given at least one episode focused mostly on them, which served to adequately develop them. There were some characters near the end whose roles became something along the lines of ‘showing the audience that Violet has grown’, which felt rather forced. That said, the real reason why I have scored the show relatively low in this category is the show’s namesake, the protagonist, Violet Evergarden.
To put it bluntly, Violet has about as much characterization as a brick, in the initial few episodes. She is thoroughly dull and boring, with no defining characteristics other that looking like Fate/Stay Night’s Saber with metal hands. I didn’t mind this all that much, since the show was supposedly about Violet’s growth as a person, or more accurately, her growth from a tool of war to a human being. I was looking forward to how this growth would be handled, since she made a rather poor impression to begin with. Unfortunately, this development was an utter mess, chiefly due to the aforementioned pacing issues. Especially in the episodes which followed the episodic format, it felt like Violet was a completely different person in each episode. Time was clearly passing between these episodes, but the way in which it was done was quite jarring.
I would like to stress on the fact that most of the other characters in the show were done relatively well, and the problem lay almost solely with Violet. Even then, the protagonist carries much more weightage than any single side character, hence my score in this category.

Enjoyment (5/10):
While the melodrama was rather overpowering at times, and the whole ‘searching for the meaning of love’ theme was rather sappy, Violet Evergarden managed to entertain to a decent extent. A few of the episodic stories, as well as Violet’s backstory were quite enjoyable. There was even an episode or two that managed to make me feel something – as someone who laughed through Clannad: After Story, I call that quite an achievement on Violet Evergarden’s part.
On the other hand, there were also some parts or stories that fell flat, or just defied logic altogether, which served to dampen my enjoyment of the show. A quick example of such a moment would be when a whole troop of soldiers armed with bayonets, standing at a fair distance from the unarmed Violet, charge at her instead of simply shooting. Of course, as per the laws of theatrics, this leads to her overwhelming all of them with little or no difficulty. Slip-ups like this were seen every now and then throughout the show, which felt rather annoying whenever it happened.

Overall (6.25 ~ 6/10):
All in all, Violet Evergarden is by no means a bad anime. The positive aspects outweigh the negatives, and it is certainly a visual treat. Yet, like any show, it suffers from quite a few issues as well.
Is it a masterpiece, like many claim? No. Is it unwatchable, as some others say? Most certainly not. Would I recommend others to watch it? Depends. Violet Evergarden is not for everyone. Some may see an emotional masterpiece, while others see an overly dramatic show with no substance. If you liked shows like Clannad, Little Busters, and Angel beats, you would probably like this one. If not, you can give this one a miss, and you wouldn’t lose out on much. With this, I conclude.

I will be starting this with a warning: If you are looking for fast paced action, suave dialogue, likable characters and great fight choreography… which is to say, an actual sequel to Shingeki no Bahamut: Genesis, then turn back right now. Close this tab and never look back at this show. This is not the sequel that Genesis deserved… or even one that it needed, looking at the end result. Virgin Soul can only be described as a convoluted mess, which not even the returning characters could save.
If that wasn’t descriptive enough, then read on. Below, I will attempt to explain exactly what went wrong ... with Virgin Soul. Do expect some minor spoilers with regard to the initial few episodes.


Story (4/10):

The story of Virgin Soul starts 10 years after the events of Genesis, and the world is quite different from how we remember it. Humanity has extended its reaches, as far as to bring demon-kind to its knees, while achieving great power along the way. These changes bring with them quite some intrigue, and world-building progresses at an optimal pace. Then, they introduce the new protagonist, Nina Drango. Even ignoring her endless libido and her shoujo manga-esque encounters with pretty much any young man, the story seems to be progressing somewhere. The themes of morality and sociology were quite strong in the initial few episodes, especially from the likes of returning characters such as Kaisar and Azazel. So far so good…
Then, somewhere along the way, the series started on a downward spiral that never really stopped. The intelligent conversations and ideas just slowly faded out into the background, and the focus moved on to a romance which would make the likes of Twilight look half decent. I can state without doubt that the romance in Virgin Soul is the worst I have ever witnessed on screen. One could hope that at least this subplot may help develop the characters in question… well, in this case, it outright broke the character of the male participant, making his personality impossible to salvage.
The rest of the story can’t exactly be called intelligent, with multiple contradictory or even outright stupid reveals and ‘plot twists’. Worst thing is, every single thing just somehow leads back to the central romance, which just sucks the life out of the series. Honestly, if this were advertised as a shoujo anime which was unrelated to Shingeki no Bahamut, it may not have felt like such an insult, but the way it went, it simply became a detriment to its ‘prequel’.


Art (7/10):

The artwork and animation are quite reminiscent of Genesis, and are quite pleasing to look at. The only real gripe I have is how they use some outright atrocious crowd CGI in some scenes, which seem completely out of place.


Sound (6/10):

Above average, but nothing really special. The openings and endings are all decent, yet forgetful. All the Engrish in the songs didn’t exactly help that. Even the soundtracks weren’t anything to write home about.


Characters (3/10):

The greatest failure of Virgin Soul was certainly the depiction of the characters and their interactions. I’ll be analysing this in two parts: New characters and Returning characters.
When talking about the New characters, the first and foremost would be Nina Drango. The best way to describe her would be a female version of Hyoudou Issei. She spends most of her time drooling over any good-looking guy (which, for some reason, seems to be the norm for men in this show), and the rest of her time utterly wrecking the sho…. Umm… Causing trouble for others. Other than her, we have Charioce and Mugaro. Charioce had some great potential, and his views were quite intriguing to begin with… but of course, they decided that he was better off as a pretty-boy version of Hitler. As for Mugaro…. He was literally a walking plot device from beginning to end.
As for the Returning characters, we have Favaro, Kaisar and Azazel (well, there was Jeanne, Bacchus, Hamsa and Rita, but they’re not really worth mentioning at this point). We start off with quite a bit about Kaisar and his views. This was interesting while it lasted, but he started to become more and more insufferable as the series went on. Near the end of it, you’d be left wondering if it’s even the same character anymore. As for Favaro, I had great hopes for him. He flourished in the leading role of Genesis, and I was hoping that he would breathe some life into the show… sadly, all he got was a minor supporting role as Nina’s father-figure. The one good character that we got out of this series was Azazel. His development was exceptional. He portrays a loner, in the truest sense of the word – he fights alone, and takes the full brunt of the responsibilities for himself, including the failures.
One strange thing I noticed is how the characters were never particularly consistent, and their behaviour varied quite wildly from episode to episode. The character interactions ranged from decent to horrendous, depending on the characters in question and the mood of the writer at that time.


Enjoyment (2/10):

Extremely difficult to watch. My tolerance for bullshit is generally pretty high, but this one made me absolutely lose it. There were some moments in the latter half of the show that made me scream abuse and point rude gestures at the screen, simply because of how frustrating and annoying it was. Watching this show made me question the writer’s intelligence (or the lack thereof), at multiple occasions. I had to force myself to watch the last few episodes, just for the sake of finishing this review.


Overall (4.4 ~ 4/10):

With this, it is quite clear that the anime was a disaster, and that the new writer was a mistake. In fact, I’d be glad if she never touches anime ever again. So to speak, avoid this anime – there’s absolutely nothing good waiting for you in this one. With this, I conclude.

This is a review of the Web Novel, which is completed at 343 chapters. While there are some differences between it and the Light Novel (such as some new characters and differing arcs), the core content remains the same. Of course, this review will be spoiler free.

Funnily enough, 7th (or Sevens) was a novel I picked up solely for its length. Not only was did it have over 300 chapters, it was also completed, which was exactly what I wanted. From the summary, I expected something a little above average, with a possibly decent set of characters. Boy, was I in for a surprise. As ... I kept reading, 7th slowly but surely climbed up to become one of the best novels I have read. Now, I’ll be going into the details of why it stood out so much.

Story (9/10):
Honestly, 7th can’t be said to have a strong start by any means. The main character, Lyle Walt, gets chased out of his house for reasons that sound absolutely absurd, and what follows just seems to throw up plot hole after plot hole. There are often times when various events just seem to stretch logic a little too far, and just ends up feeling far-fetched. Yet, as the plot moves on, you begin to understand that a lot, if not all these ‘holes’ are intentional. Not only are they addressed later on, they are even suitably explained. From this, it’s clear that either the author is really good at planning ahead, or that he knows exactly how to fill up holes that he accidentally made.
Generally, when one sees that the story is set in a fantasy world and that there is a harem involved, they’d assume that the story is purely wish fulfillment and not much else. In this case, the author has managed to turn that on its head. While the world falls into the fantasy world category, it is surprisingly well built, with a good amount of attention to detail. We get a detailed picture of the politics, trade and even social structure of the world. As for the harem aspect, it shows what could be called the dark side of harems, including infighting, faction formation and the politics that would invariably be involved.
One thing about 7th that I really appreciate is how it actually goes into detail about various aspects that are often avoided in such media. One example of this would be the harem factions, as I mentioned above. Another important aspect is how they go in depth regarding what they would do *after* winning, instead of solely focusing on victory itself as the goal. Overall, the story is very well rounded, and steadily improves as you keep reading. It has healthy doses of comedy, action, and even heartrending moments.

Art (8/10):
The Web Novel lacks illustrations, so this score is based on the illustrations in the Light Novel. I have no complaints regarding the artwork. It manages to match quite closely to the images one would conjure up while reading the novel.

Character (7/10):
7th has a rather large cast of characters, which can be called both a strength and a weakness. Initially, the author spends a good deal of time fleshing out each and every character, but as the story goes on and the cast gets larger, it becomes obvious that the author is having trouble keeping up. The characters that are introduced later in the series often seem flat, and may have been better off not being introduced at all. That being said, the author has done a great job with the core characters, which explains my score.

Enjoyment (10/10):
All said and done, 7th was an extremely enjoyable series. While it took some time to pick up, it steadily improved, and had me captivated till the very end.

Overall (8.5 ~ 9/10):
Put together, 7th was a great novel, which was well worth the time spent on it. It explored many themes that one wouldn’t usually see in such a story, and was all the better for it. As long as harem elements aren’t too much of a problem, I would highly recommend this novel.

Watching this anime is somewhat similar to drinking cheap supermarket cola. It's not outright disgusting, but it leaves a rather unpleasant aftertaste. In effect, Masamune-kun no Revenge is certainly not a terrible anime, but it's not really worth investing time on either.


Story (5/10):
Creating a mediocre anime by throwing in a bunch of tried and tested cliches is a sure fire way to earn some cash (by appealing to the otaku audience), and that's exactly what Silver Link has done here.
The story is absolutely nothing new - a fat kid works out and diets, becomes a pretty-boy and tries to publicly humiliate the girl who ... rejected him... only to find that he's falling for her. Of course, when he starts getting somewhere, a couple of other girls appear and voila!- a harem is made.
The developments are all rather abrupt and tasteless. It lacks any semblance of flow and the pacing is quite erratic. All put together, the story aspect is average, if not slightly below average.


Art (5/10):
I'm usually not one to criticize an anime for its artwork, but this one has some major issues. The main thing I found is that the character designs were rather weird - the faces and limbs were all elongated beyond an level that could be ignored, so much so that it almost felt like Code Geass. Other than that, the animation was alright and the color palette used was quite bright. Yet again, average.


Sound (6/10):
The sound in Masamune-kun no Revenge was alright. The opening and ending songs were decent, but the voice actors sometimes felt a little emotionless and flat. The soundtrack was rather bland.


Character (2/10):
I'm actually rather impressed with the creators of this series for being able to make characters this weak, while using only the common cliches as raw material. It's not that the characters are terrible or anything - they're just so shallow and two-dimensional that they can't even be taken seriously. I'll give a short description of two of the characters, just to give you an idea of what I mean -

-Makabe Masamune: The 'hero' of the series. Previously a fat kid who was constantly humiliated, he worked extremely hard to improve his appearance. Now that he's hot stuff, he wants to take revenge on the girl who humiliated him in the past... Sounds all well and good, until you find that he starts falling for her within 3-4 episodes. And that's it - That's the entirety of his character, nothing more.

-Adagaki Aki: The one-word description of her is (forgive my language) bitch. She has no positive points other than being rich - as for what draws all those men (including our protagonist) to her, I have absolutely no clue.

Other than those two, there are no characters of any real importance. Then again, having those two as the main characters already makes Masamune-kun no Revenge a failure.


Enjoyment (3/10):
It's extremely difficult to enjoy something you've seen hundreds of times before, but executed far worse than most. I, for one, couldn't go any further than 7 episodes before dropping it (although I would've dropped it long back had I not wanted to review it)


Overall (4.2/10 ~ 4/10):
The end result is that Masamune-kun no Revenge is a mediocre anime which doesn't bring anything new to the table. I wouldn't really recommend this to anyone, but if cardboard characters, boring story and somewhat weird artwork is what you're looking for, then by all means, give it a go.