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I like stories about friends overcoming hardships together. Stories with intriguing mysteries and backstories. Stories that make me think and reflect on my own life and past memories. I really LOVE a good tearjerker, and hell, I've been wanting more stories set during the wintertime. So what happened to A School Frozen In Time?

The story even starts off somewhat like Angel Beats, which, as flawed and unfortunately unfinished as it is, is probably one of my favorite anime of all time. A mysterious high school where no one in our group of characters can get out of and be reminded of their tragic backstories over ... time? I'm in... yet I don't feel invested at all, not even after some quick re-reading of all 4 volumes! I don't feel like I experienced anything or truly understood the characters, who aren't memorable or interesting enough despite their dedicated backstories which can get so over the top that it feels unbelievable, and not in a good way. Sure, in real life, most people are not going to (or even willing to) have convenient moments for others to see all sides of themselves, and there can be such thing as too much foreshadowing. But most of these characters feel so disconnected from their backstories that you could remove them and hardly anything would change. It doesn't help that much of these characters feel one-note and don't really have that much chemistry with each other either. Takano and Mizuki's friendship might be convincing, but I mean, if some of these characters have crushes on each other, shouldn't there be some more hinting on that than just the little of it there is? If some characters have some deeper history with each other, shouldn't that be shown more with more specific character moments? It just feels like these characters are only friends with each other just because... well, because. The plot demands it to happen, so... just accept it, I guess.

Speaking of which, the plot is just... okay. Once the first backstory is unveiled, you can kinda figure out how the rest of the story will choose to present and unfold itself—through tragic past events in an attempt to get the reader to quickly sympathize with the characters. These characters' developments are mainly just these sudden reveals and that's about it. Oh, and about these reveals... if you're the type to get queasy about blood and topics like suicide and self-harm, you probably will want to stay away from this series now... unless you're into self-help/motivational books, because a good amount of this series kinda read like one. Not exactly a negative for me, as that kind of thing can be written well in heavy dramas that want the reader to learn something from the content through things like emotional scenes, but I know a good amount of people aren't into that so I'll just put that out there. There are a few plot twists scattered about that are some admittedly cool ideas however, particularly in the last volume; but again, because of the execution, they don't feel as satisfying as they should in my opinion. They give me more like a "huh...? what?" feeling rather than a "oh what?! ohhhh... now that's clever!" kind of surprised feeling. The answers to all the mysteries similarly don't feel as satisfying.

This manga's art is done by the manga-ka famous for the beloved drama Your Lie in April. I haven't read it or watched it yet aside from the anime adaptation's famous opening, so I'm not too sure what that manga's art is like. But it's clear that A School Frozen In Time was made before it, because I doubt people would praise that manga for its beauty if it looked more like this. That's not to say it's terrible, as much of it from the backgrounds and drifting snow to the kind of atmosphere in some panels are serviceable; but neither the art nor the panel composition are anything particularly special, especially early on. One thing you'll immediately notice are that the characters' faces can look really wonky at times, especially when they are turned at 3/4 angles; though I suppose it works for the moments when their faces get really distorted, like when they are horrified beyond belief or intentionally get out of character. Also, I had found this series through physical copies of Vertical Comic's English translation, which has a main font choice I might've otherwise seen for tiny speech notes or something that unintentionally adds to the somewhat amateurish feeling of the art. The art does kinda improve a bit after the second volume or so though.

I don't hate A School Frozen In Time. I really don't. But it really could've been much more than it is. Give it a read if you're curious regardless of my own thoughts, I can see a lot of other people caring about this more than I did.

Itsuwari no Freja, aka "Artificial Freya" or Prince Freya, may not be exactly as elegant as the book covers appear, but speaking as a shoujo manga fan, the first 5 volumes are still probably worth a shot.

Speaking of those book covers... I really do mean what I said there, which could also apply to much of the actual art within the pages. The first three volumes feature a close-up shot of a different main character wielding a sword that reflects someone not otherwise present while flower petals are scattered by, while the other two volumes I read had covers depicting the main character beside one ... of the story's many male characters. These are great covers that had both gave me a good idea of what to expect from this series and had me intrigued about the story. Exterior aesthetics aside, the art within Prince Freya's pages is very detailed and pretty, with decent usages of screen tone (especially during emotional moments), shimmers, and occasional floral imagery. Probably standard shoujo fare for some, but considering these types of art styles are a huge part of why I love shoujo manga in the first place, I have no issue with this. However, this series is also a war story with a medieval setting, and with these first few book covers, it wasn't too surprising to find a lot of action scenes here. Sometimes I couldn't tell what happened at first for some scenes, but they're otherwise pretty clear if not maybe feeling a little weightless at times.
What I WAS surprised by, though, was the amount of blood in here, especially considering this manga is marketed as shoujo. I feel like manga companies sometimes just slap on random ratings carelessly, but Viz's Older Teen (16yo+) rating is actually kinda justified here. There are even some sexual implications towards the end of volume 5, and while nothing really explicit was shown enough to disturb me, it's still worth noting for those who hate even the slightest hint of sexual themes. The gore doesn't really faze me that much aside from the initial surprise, but maybe keep these two elements in mind before you pick this manga up or recommend it to someone else who may be sensitive about these kinds of things.

But yeah, Prince Freya is a fairly brutal war story that starts off in a similar way as the fan-favorite Yona of the Dawn. I haven't read any of Yona of the Dawn in a long time, and even then it was just the first volume, so I won't go about comparing the two very much... but if you're looking for more action-packed shoujo with a female protagonist forced onto the fray, this series might scratch that itch for you. Obviously no Korean-inspired culture here, this story's setting is more like medieval Europe, but romance isn't that much of a focus here unlike Yona of the Dawn or really most other shoujo; like, it's there, but it feels more about platonic interpersonal relationships, the main character struggling to live up to her new legacy, and later a bit of adventure when blood isn't being splattered everywhere. I don't really mind a lessened focus on romance, even in shoujo, and the story does have its moments, but... I dunno, I'm not sure why I don't like it more. It's not exactly average and there are many ideas I like here, but I also don't feel that excited or attached... just barely good enough for me to still be interested and not drop it. Plot's just plain good so far, I suppose, haha.

The characters are also just... fine. Freya starts off as a bit of a cute crybaby, but as you might expect with this kind of story and conflict, she grows to be a more confident woman who starts to get used to dealing with violence. I like pure characters and I love characters that grow in these kinds of ways, but despite having some great character moments I'm also not quite that attached to her. There are many times where she quickly gets into her Prince Edvard persona (who is pretty much her complete opposite) that I wasn't all that convinced on believing, since it feels like she somehow pulls it off to the rest of the characters way too easily, but I feel like I warmed up to that aspect and Freya as a whole as I continued reading. Nearly every other character in the rest of this story are male characters who work in the castle alongside Freya, and they're also just... fine. Not terrible, enough for me to still want to follow them and see what they will do, but they're also not very memorable. I don't have any particular favorite characters in this series, but ngl I still kinda root for one of her childhood friends haha. Julius has his moments, especially later on, but he kinda feels too stoic for me. I'm really not sure what to think of any of these characters, really... lol

So far, Prince Freya honestly isn't anything super amazing, so I guess I shouldn't be surprised by the current MAL average score and the low member count (7.06 based on ratings from 315 users). It honestly does feel more like a low 7 for me based on these first five volumes. But considering people love Yona of the Dawn a lot and I actually can't think of too many shoujo quite like it and this one, I guess I still expected people to talk about this one a bit more. If the synopsis and art intrigued you even a little bit, please disregard the score and give this a read for yourself. The light from this new artificial star may be more brilliant than you or the rest of the general public might have thought at first glance.

Released on the Nintendo DS over 15 years ago, Pokémon Diamond and Pearl have been beloved by many in the Pokémon fanbase, especially (and particularly) the enhanced third edition Pokémon Platinum. In response to nostalgia for these games reaching an all-time high, The Pokémon Company recently released two games for diehard Sinnoh fans—Pokémon Brilliant Diamond and Shining Pearl, a "faithful remake" of the original games, and Pokémon Legends: Arceus, a whole new open-world reimagining of Sinnoh set in the distant past. However, instead of revisiting generation 4 through these games, I personally chose to revisit a little-talked-about but related manga series that I had read ... a bit of back then but never finished... until now.

The core Pokémon games are somewhat odd cases of JRPGs in that they were more about the adventure you make with the team of monsters the player decides—especially in the first two generations—rather than a concrete narrative that spans over a cast of (usually) well-defined characters. Even though the games started to go harder on story since generation 5 (which is arguably considered to have the best-received plot out of all the generations even to this day), plot was honestly never really much of the core series' strong suit. Naturally, many older Pokémon fans actively look for not just more difficult gaming experiences, but also more well-defined and/or mature story experiences with all the potential the franchise has to offer—I mean, there's a reason why Pokémon Mystery Dungeon: Explorers of Time/Darkness/Sky has such a devoted cult following! Those types of Pokémon fans tend to enjoy the long-running manga series Pokémon Special (aka Pokémon Adventures), and perhaps also want something aimed more towards their demographic, such as a traditional shounen manga, with the closest example of that actually existing being Pokémon RéBurst.
Despite its English title, Pokémon Diamond and Pearl Adventure is not related to PokéSpe at all, offering its own interpretation of Diamond and Pearl's story that features and mainly follows the original characters Hareta and Mitsumi. And in my honest opinion, DP Adventure and its shounen-esque approach is the Sinnoh adventure that the original DS games should have had from the very beginning. Many including diehard "Sinnohfetuses" (yes that's a real term, look it up) consider the plot to be the weakest part of Diamond and Pearl, with some of the main criticisms being flat characterization (mainly Akagi/Cyrus), the wacky but very aimless and random Team Galactic, and the inconsistent pace of exploration and Gym Badge collecting. But DP Adventure's take on this plot is fairly refreshing and exciting, which is fairly impressive because the general plotline doesn't actually stray that much from the Sinnoh games—the main character must stop Team Galactic and its power-hungry boss from summoning the Legendary Pokémon. Despite that, this is more of a character-driven affair of a young boy beginning his Pokémon Trainer journey, fueled by the desire to meet the "god-like" Pokémon Dialga. It's not really even about collecting Gym Badges like you might expect from the original TV anime with Satoshi/Ash; it's seriously more about Hareta's comedic travels that eventually go into threatening territory as Team Galactic reaches levels of being a legitimate threat far higher than in their original appearances. But even though the story does go there, much of this story is all still somehow fairly light-hearted and hopeful enough for a kid to still be able to enjoy. Of course, this manga's not perfect; for all its changes it's still not TOO different from Diamond and Pearl's story, and I feel like there could have been more interesting changes and story directions, as well as a more firm-feeling ending. But simply put—this series' manga-ka remembered and stuck to the basics of storytelling, tucking their interpretation into the original storyline well enough that characters ended up fairly enjoyable and somewhat memorable in a good way.

Speaking of characters... there are only four original characters added alongside much of the Sinnoh cast (unless you count K-2/B-2... ah that guy lolol), and while they're not the most original of characters, they were certainly fun to follow. Hareta may be the clichéd hopeful shounen protagonist with a hidden stroke of genius, but boy, does he make for a simple but good example of why that archetype is still popular.... such an innocent and cheerful, fun-loving kid. He really does make you root for him, and the manga-ka made good use of his background of living in the forest with Pokémon his whole life by creating many goofy scenarios where he often misinterprets common things and terms in human society and unintentionally acts unexpectedly against typical social norms. Hareta's female companion, Mitsumi, is also a great straight-man to his newbie and/or animalistic habits, and is far from a "useless shounen female character," but I can't really talk about the true nature of her epicness without spoiling the crap out of this manga... you REALLY SHOULD read this manga for yourself if you're intrigued. There's also two other original characters, but those characters are introduced in volume 6 of this 8-volume series, so I will not mention them in this review.
As for the Sinnoh cast, they're not as developed as the main duo and one of the later original characters, but they do certainly make a presence. The Sinnoh rival Jun/Barry is made as a recurring character who meets up with Hareta and Mitsumi every now and then, and while he doesn't show up as often as he does in the original games, any time Jun appears is a fun time. As I've said earlier, Team Galactic is far more threatening than pretty much any of their video game portrayals, but they also show some new sides and can even be somewhat sympathetic—which is certainly a plus! Several of the Sinnoh Gym Leaders show new sides as well, especially Tougan/Bryon and Suzuna/Candice, which is a bit crazy to me since the former was already pretty cool and somewhat popular. Sure, not all of them got this treatment and I definitely wish they did and showed up more (hell, Denzi/Volkner LITERALLY NEVER SHOWS UP in this story, yet his buddy Oba/Flint did lol), but hey, at least they definitely show up enough to justify their extended inclusions to the story and I do appreciate whatever amount of screentime they got regardless.

Now... the art. Let's not mince words here, the art in DP Adventure is CLEAN. Line art is consistently crisp, and looks amazing whenever the manga-ka decides to combine it with gradient screen-tone! Proportions are somewhat cartoony, but it looks great (especially whenever characters grin) and adds a lot to the goofy nature of this gag manga. Backgrounds look good too, even though sometimes crazy perspective shots can look a bit too warped in my opinion. I don't mind it as much for battle/action scenes though, which are definitely highlights and reasons enough to read the whole manga alone. Tons of action lines are everywhere, and actions such as Pokémon attacks and explosions are drawn to be appropriately striking to the eyes... and yet it's all clearly presented so one shouldn't have too much trouble figuring out how action scenes are played out.
Much of the story and panel layout are arranged in a way that the story feels fast-paced, often featuring a bunch of information within a single page. This fast pacing doesn't feel off to me though, probably because the whole series is mainly a comedy manga through and through; I mean, there's comedic chibi panels even within climactic, ultra-serious fights, but they somehow don't detract much from the scene. It's almost like what Akira Himekawa tried to do with the more shorter volumes of The Legend of Zelda manga series, though the panelwork in DP Adventure is nowhere near as stylized yet (tbh) more appropriately consistent pacing-wise.

Overall, Shigekatsu Ihara's Pokémon Diamond and Pearl Adventure is an interesting reinterpretation of the Sinnoh games, with the main story making up the first 5 volumes and the last 3 volumes being what Iharu calls this manga's "Platinum Version." Those seeking to revisit Sinnoh but don't feel like picking up either of The Pokémon Company's current offerings should consider giving this manga a read; the story is remixed enough to feel like a new experience, but not so much that it would feel super out-of-place to veteran Trainers. In fact, there's lots of references to things like actual Items, Type advantages, and even Abilities, all of which were pleasant surprises to me as a long-time "Johtoddler" (yes, another real fan term, look it up dude idk lol). The characters are simple but effective, and there's some sweet dynamics and new sides to the Sinnoh cast here. Sure, there's a ton of really kooky and/or juvenile humor, but that's kinda to be expected for a kodomo/kids' manga and I think it all works... and besides, at least the art should still be a treat! All of these elements make DP Adventure a simply solid and really out-there entry to the overlooked world of Pokémon manga... a world I hope will continue to grow bigger and into newer directions in the future.

Like a bolt from the blue, here comes Fario-P's Reaper Review... and I need to be honest here.
There might be potential game spoilers for anime-onlies, but I will otherwise do my best to express my feelings in my very first anime review as spoiler-free as possible. Please Excuse My Dolefully Angry Statements in advance.

"Wake up, shaken up, plastered on asphalt
Phones can't block the voices of the masses
Seven days left between you and Death
Better race, place, Reapers won't give up the chase"

This is what's written on the back of the American box art for the best Nintendo DS game of all time. No, we're not counting ... ports like the Ace Attorney Trilogy and Chrono Trigger (literally the best version to play other than the original SNES version btw) for this achievement, and yes, I do believe it beats remakes like the fantastic Kirby Super Star Ultra and the heartfelt, soulfully made Pokémon HeartGold and SoulSilver Versions. (Sorry not sorry for the pun.)
So I bet you can imagine that I had fairly high expectations for Subarashiki Kono Sekai The Animation, regardless of how many people had tried to warn me about the usual nature of video game adaptations... and I honestly should've completely taken my headphones off at the time. It really was THAT zetta disappointing. I am sorry.


I suppose it's best to start off with the aspect that I have the least amount of problems with—the SOUND.

It was certainly a pleasant surprise to hear that the original composer and nearly all the voice actors from the original game would be returning for this adaptation, especially Anna Hachimine as she had never voice acted for an anime before. Though there weren't many amazing performances to note, the voice acting in The Animation was decent and I didn't really have any problem with it, other than a minor gripe I had with some dialogue pacing... more on that later. As for the sound directing, it was... passable. I dunno, it was just fine and I didn't find myself thinking much of it while watching the show. Probably the only thing I really remember about it were the extremely loud sounds that played whenever a Badge (Pin for English-version Players) showed up just before the main character attacks... more on Badges later.
Now the music... OH, the music. One of the most highly acclaimed things about Subarashiki Kono Sekai that you will never see any diehard fans shut up about—including myself—is its Official Sound Track. Most video game soundtracks are usually comprised of voiceless background music, which is usually all fine and good, especially in Nintendo games other than this former Nintendo exclusive. But the original SubaSeka had some of that IN ADDITION TO mostly original insert songs with a variety of artists and song types... and it is ALL just so zetta good. There is legitimately NOT a SINGLE song from the original game, whether it's BGM or an insert song, that I even REMOTELY dislike.
So you can imagine the excitement that many fans had when they heard that Takeharu Ishimoto was returning to compose music for The Animation. I was excited too, but I had also sorta expected that it was going to be mostly new background tracks and not mostly inserts like before... and for better or worse, I was right.
The background music that was made exclusively for The Animation seems to be mostly made up of somewhat ambient, mysterious-sounding noise (heh heh). I'm actually listening to some of it while typing this part of the review up, and while the synths and stuff does at least sound like they fit for this plot, nothing actually stands out all that much as anime OST I'd go out of my way to listen to every now and then. I might remember the more somber-sounding tracks, but overall The Animation's BGM sounds fine but not really memorable; though I guess there's the new insert song "Disconnect Me", which had a brief sample released to the public before The Animation aired and was initially known as "Walls" within the SubaSeka community. That song was pretty neat and I kinda wish that there were more tracks in The Animation's OST like it.
Added alongside these exclusive tunes are a few of the original game's tracks, though in slightly remixed forms. The first of these you will hear is "It's So Wonderful", which was originally the main menu theme. It's a pretty good remix of the track, but it is used the most out of these select few old tracks (iirc at least four times?) and The Animation honestly doesn't know how to use this piece well AT ALL. The second you will hear is "Calling", one of the most recognizable songs from SubaSeka that is also one of my absolute favorites. It is used ONLY TWO times iirc and first plays as the opening for the first episode, where it honestly doesn't quite fit... though that may be because The Animation's opening was originally supposed to be a song called "Teenage City Riot" by the now-defunct band ALI. Because of a certain factoring hectopascal, the opening had to be replaced altogether by this remix of "Calling" and, from the second episode onwards, a "new" remix of "Twister". This song is another returning track from the original game, this time being the original opening song, and it has gotten so many zetta remixes that the SubaSeka community is honestly kinda tired of it (hahaha). I'm calling The Animation's remix "new" with quotation marks because this remix is literally just the vocals from "Twister Gang Mix" (one of SubaSeka's many in-battle insert songs) plastered with the instrumentals from "Twister Kingdom Mix", which was originally an exclusive remix made for another Square Enix title, Kingdom Hearts 3D: Dream Drop Distance. I am not kidding. Seriously, look these remixes up and listen to them if you don't believe me. I normally would be thrilled to hear old songs again, but... eh, "Twister (Animation ver.)" is just an "okay" remix for an "okay" anime OST.
At least the new end credits theme, "Carpe Diem" by ASCA, is kind of a highlight. Love the new illustrations for it too.


Next is the ART and overall visual presentation.

I've gotta say, for all the things I have to say about this anime, I cannot deny that the main art style for the characters is spot-on. The Animation's main visual presentation is what you get if you took the urban, street-art-like approach of SubaSeka's art style, used less black and similar dark colors, made the characters less anorexic-looking, and cranked up the brightness, contrast, and saturation levels a notch. While it took a while to get used to the more vibrant color scheme, I do have to admit that there may be some genuine angels over there at the staff behind The Animation. They even kept the original shading style and thick outlines for the characters, which I imagine was not easy to animate...... but alas, here come some more problems.
I do like The Animation's recreation of Gen Kobayashi's art style, I really do. But the overall execution in the actual show can get a bit... iffy. I can't quite put my finger on it. On one hand, there are some genuinely great-looking images of the characters and even some cute visual homages to SubaSeka through location title cards and even character sprites... and on the other... well, it's not as jarringly derpy like the timeless "Meduka Meguca" meme, but some parts of The Animation still looks odd at times. There are some shots, especially perspective ones, that look somewhat off-model and I don't mean it in a stylish or even good way. It's so noticeable that I recall some people making fun of stuff like with the main character's arms and legs in some shots and even turned a few of these shots into stuff like emoticons for the lulz while the show was still airing. The backgrounds for The Animation are passable; the iconic CAT graffiti on Udagawa-cho as well as pretty much any other graffiti shown in this show looks great, but I don't really remember the rest of Shibuya standing out in the same way. Maybe that one nice sunset setting was nice, but I don't remember much else especially since it's not shown for very long... oh well, at least some areas tried to match SubaSeka's backgrounds. As for shot composition—the storyboarding—well, there's not really much to note here either. As I've mentioned before, some of the original sprite poses as well as cutscene imagery were actually somewhat retained, though whether The Animation's version of these are better or not are more of a subjective thing in my opinion.
It sounds like I'm being fairly generous about this aspect of The Animation so far, but that's because the aesthetic's not even the real issue that I and many others have about the visuals. The actual biggest issue about it is the actual quality of the animation itself. Everyone likes to jump on the giant elephant Noise in the room here that is the CGI—and don't get me wrong, I do prefer anime to be hand-drawn 2D and I would have liked it if they didn't have to use CG. But I don't think that the CGI was the problem for me. Sure, it was noticeable, especially the Noise models, but I felt like there were a few times where the staff was honestly trying to make some battle scenes look interesting with the 3D human character models (which didn't even look that bad btw) and camera angles. No, I personally think the problem here was more about the FEEL of the general motion. Maybe it's because SubaSeka's art style is just that hard to replicate, but the actual animation often looks SO ZETTA CHOPPY. It was almost like I was watching an anime in 0.5 speed or something, because there were many times where I felt I could practically see all the individual keyframes without even pausing—including a few times within the OPENING, which is generally supposed to be where an anime looks the best it possibly can. Dunno about everyone else, but when there isn't really a consistent animation quality/frame rate throughout the intro music video that's meant to sell others on the show, it kinda says something to me... as if part of it should be a red flag that the rest of the show might appear as a bit of a noticeable downgrade. And it indeed was a red flag, as you could easily tell that simple dialogue scenes were made to be done with as little work as possible just from watching them. It even feels like that for a few battle scene shots, which is kind of a big deal for some looking for an action show like The Animation is supposed to be (which I'll talk more about in a moment).
It's fine for some crucial moments to be somewhat slowed down for dramatic effect, but when nearly the whole show's animation feels like this, you can practically tell that The Animation wasn't given that much of a budget. (Kinda ironic, isn't it...)


Oh, and speaking of budget... *sigh* it's time for the STORY and CHARACTERS.

When a beloved 25+ hour long RPG gets an TV show that only lasts 12 half-hour episodes (roughly 5 hours) with this kind of animation, you can REAAAAALLY tell that making said RPG into an anime was probably not very high on Square Enix's production priorities. I recall seeing some fans here and there in the past who said that SubaSeka could theoretically work as a single cour anime, but I've always disagreed with that idea. I really didn't want to feel kinda smug saying this, but I'm admittedly quite amused that The Animation actually proved me right.
The main conflict of SubaSeka is the Shinigami's Game—aka the Reaper's Game for English-version Players. Random people around the area are selected to be moved from the visible plane of existence known as the "Realground" (RG) to an alternate plane known as the "Underground" (UG). These people will be made "Players" who participate in the Game and are given a Player Badge, which gives proof of their Player status and will let them scan for not just the thoughts of those in the RG, but also "Noise", enemies that will try and erase them from existence. Along with Noise are the Missions that Players will receive from the Shinigami each day on their phone, and failure to complete them can also spell erasure for Players. Players will have to find a Partner to pact with and survive from erasure for seven days, which means a lot of teamwork throughout Noise fights and Mission clearing is required to win the invaluable, vital prize that the Shinigami's Game holds. Top this off with an uncooperative spicy tuna roll for a main character and you've got yourself a recipe for an interesting premise... and yet, The Animation still somehow found a way to make it a recipe for disaster.
Though I guess "recipe for BOREDOM" is probably a better descriptor here, because this show is somehow not all that interesting to watch. The Missions that the Shinigami gives Players comes with a blood-colored timer literally imprinted onto their hand, but despite the literal clock ticking their lives away, it doesn't feel like there's really much tension within either the Players or much of the entirety of The Animation. There's no sign that these characters are nearly running out of time nor is there much worry—or if they actually did worry, I wouldn't remember because this anime barely bothered to emphasize this. Maybe the voice actors tried, but there's no fast-paced/ominous "oh SHIT!" music and no shaky terror-filled shots to convey danger towards the audience... or at least when it comes to the Mission completion parts, anyway. This uneventful-feeling execution of the Shinigami's Game Missions only continues to feel uneventful with the main objective of these Missions—the show's concern of putting as much action scenes as possible. It gets to the point where some interesting concepts get underutilized in favor of these action scenes; for example, there's a thing called Imprinting where Players can take Key Words (Memes for English-version Players... yeah that aged well) and put them into the thoughts of those in the RG. Imprinting Key Words shows up in just one episode in ONLY one scene with a certain side character. That's it. No, seriously.
I may be more of a shoujo/magical girl fan than a battle shounen fan like most of the anime community, but I normally don't have a problem against action scenes. I do in fact love some well-filmed movie violence, as seen with my 10/10 scores for Puella Magi Madoka Magica and its sequel The Rebellion Story. But The Animation's battle scenes just somehow fall flat, no matter how hard the staff behind this tried. It took me a while to reverse-engineer a calculation into words, but I think I have a feeling as to why it feels flat—and no, I don't think it's just because of CGI. It's probably because The Animation has more of a Steven Universe problem. As beloved as that show was, the actual fight scenes are probably the least talked about aspect of SU and I personally believe the YouTuber Robobuddies did an amazing job at tackling that in their old video "The Steven Universe Rant"; basically, they felt that a good fight scene should have "Weight, Environment, Composition, and Character", but SU's fight scenes often lacked in these elements, especially the proper "feel" of the attacks and keeping track of what abilities characters actually have. And I feel like The Animation has a similar problem, especially with that latter point there—character abilities. Here is where I come back to the topic of Badges: once two Players make a pact, they can face the Noise by essentially channeling the energy of the Badges they collect and attach onto their clothes. But you wouldn't know this unless you played the original game first, because iirc The Animation doesn't EVER explain this very crucial plotpoint to an audience full of anime-onlies. All this anime does with Badges is flash a brief image of a random Badge the main character is about to use (which serves as fanservice for those who played SubaSeka) and blasts the aforementioned loudass sound before he executes it. The show never explains where on earth he gets all these cool attack Badges, never shows him putting them on, or really anything. The characters don't even question how the main character essentially gets to be a jack of all trades while everyone else can really only use one Badge—another crucial plotpoint The Animation doesn't bother to include. There could have been some interesting story ideas where the characters decide on which Badges to use, maybe even a side-conflict where the main character doesn't want to bother trusting his partner's battle strategy suggestions, but NOPE! We don't have time for all that, just gotta shove in a bunch of action scenes and other important scenes that happen just because they're supposed to happen!! Don't bother to make the characters' victories actually feel victorious, just halfass the illusion that they might lose before they unleash their super duper Limi—oops, I mean—Fusion attack, and it'll ALL be okay!!!!!
Combine this lack of significant information along with the nonexistent "feel" of these scenes, unnoteworthy shot composition, barely any epic battle music, and constant reliance of Fusion spamming, and you've got yourself a whole bunch of unmemorable "filler" fight scenes. The worst part is that EVEN THE BOSS/MAIN ANTAGONIST fight scenes are like this. It really sucks because I kinda feel like the staff was honestly trying in a few occasions: the few times where a 3D camera spins all around the characters were short-lived but neat, the very first fight scene in the first episode felt like it had the most impact imo, and... maybe the last few fights towards the END. Too little too late though; to quote an infamous IGN review, "by the time [The Animation] starts to do interesting things, it's over."
And when the whole show is THIS dedicated to "inconsequential" fight scenes, there's barely any time for the characters to shine.
The Shinigami's Game is a lot more mysterious and surprisingly dire than at first appearance, so naturally there are some huge revelations the plot brings to not just the audience, but the characters themselves as well. But The Animation's pacing not only screwed over the fight scenes, but the character development and these emotional scenes too. The first thing everyone who watched this show immediately noticed is the SO ZETTA FAST pacing of the first episode; the pacing does thankfully calm down a bit after that episode, but it's still quite inconsistent throughout the whole runtime, which gives you a good idea of how the rest of the show's scenes will be paced.
Some emotional scenes are done well, but they're more like a drop of water within a huge wave of rushed nothingness; a tidal wave large enough that you could practically surf on it and feel more emotion from doing that than watching this anime. A lot of things happens to these characters, some side characters, and even the extras in the RG, but these moments hardly have any weight because The Animation doesn't really give these potentially fun characters time to be themselves beforehand. Not even the main character feels like he had time to be himself; fellow SubaSeka Players had a complaint with the main character that I'll briefly get to later, but the complaint that I PERSONALLY had was that his development from being a brutal loner to a more trusting person felt unnatural and extremely rushed. The scenes where The Animation "tries" to convey his development to the audience are more like they're insisting to you that he's changed instead of actually showing that, and the execution often varies from "yeah right" to downright laughable. There are even a few anime-original scenes added in to try and develop some characters AFTER THE FACT, and all I thought after seeing most of these added scenes was "cute but unnecessary".
And oh man, speaking of unnecessary... the script can get really frickin' unsubtle and even downright cheesy at times. This is saying something from someone who's read TokyoPop's mutiliated English release of Tokyo Mew Mew and watched ALL 200 episodes of Sailor Moon WITHOUT skipping any filler at least TWICE in their life. Let me give you a non-spoiler example: there is unironically a scene at the very beginning where the main character is in front of a moving truck that doesn't see him and thinks he is going to die. That is not a joke or even an exaggeration. Yes, frickin' TRUCK-KUN appears in a modern NON-ISEKAI anime. If you are a current seasonal anime fan who watched this scene and DIDN'T LAUGH out of the lack of self-awareness of this anime-original scene, then I honestly do not believe you. That's not the only meme on spotlight either—there are unironic multiple shots of the main character's clenched fist like it's frickin' Arthur's Big Hit (lmao). Not joking about this either. And I said MULTIPLE too; I even made sure to mention it in my personal notes the first several times this shot showed up while watching.
Anyway, other than those moments of peak anime fiction, there's hardly any funny or even cute quirks to note, because all I can remember is how much the show is just replacing all this character time with a ton of "meh" battle scenes, jostled into a FAIRLY CHARACTER-DRIVEN PLOT for the sake of a very specific irl purpose that I'll touch on at the very end of this review. But most unnecessary of all, even more than the added cheese, are the reliance on flashbacks. Like with action scenes, there's technically nothing wrong with using flashback sequences, especially since this was a weekly airing show and some people are bound to forget some things. But I really do mean to use the word "reliance". If you didn't believe me when I said the show had a tiny budget when talking about the animation and episode count, then you definitely will once you see just how many flashback scenes show up after the first three episodes.
Honestly... *sigh* it's no wonder that this show's MAL average score was fairly low while and sometime after it finished airing. Most of The Animation seems like an average to "meh" anime that felt like it was wasting your time with a whole bunch of "meh" budget action scenes, a "meh" budget script, and a half-hearted summary of a 14-year-old video game that most people might not even care about—and probably still won't because the show doesn't do a good job of convincing people otherwise.


Finally, we arrive at... ENJOYMENT.

...I'll be real and get straight to the point here. I am so zetta salty about how The Animation turned out. I've already expressed multiple gripes all throughout my review, but... please allow me to mention just a few more.
Okay, I tried my best to not compare this anime to its source material (unless it was absolutely necessary, such as Badges) up to this point, but my enjoyment is so highly connected to how bad of an adaptation this anime was that I feel the need to point out some missed opportunities. I'll even use just English names for this section, just to make it easier for me to write and for fellow Players to read.
I'm not going to make this section solely about how wonderful The World Ends With You is and what exactly makes it so wonderful. I could go on all day about all the things that The Animation decided to remove, such as Reaper Creeper, a certain sport, Ramen Don, Tin Pin Slammer, PANTS (if you know, you know), et cetera... but please, just bear with me, I promise I won't spoil anything and there's a good reason for delving into the game for this. TWEWY is a tale of Neku Sakuraba, a 15-year-old lonesome misanthrope waking up in the middle of not just Shibuya Crossing, but also the Reaper's Game. The Animation does indeed recognize this, but it also fails to TRULY realize that TWEWY is also a tale of Neku waking up to both the world and the people around him. The Animation is so focused on chugging a bland Soylent-esque version of the game's story (seasoned with some dry-tasting fight scenes) quickly through your throat that it forgot to add something to the concoction.
And that something is so important that it's literally part of the very title—the world.
Whether it's through the literal setting or all the people, the world plays a key part throughout the whole story and it disappoints me to no end that The Animation ironically doesn't want to bother with it. I've never been to Japan so I'm not going to claim I'm an expert or anything, but Shibuya is quite known for being one of the most fashionable and commercial areas in Japan. There are several stores and little attractions all over the place, and whoever was behind the new Twitter account for TWEWY clearly knows this as there were several posts showing real life photos compared to stylized backgrounds of the same areas, made just for The Animation. And yet I feel the actual show hardly utilizes these settings and the type of culture that goes about there.
Which only adds to my frustration because the original TWEWY had actually tried doing all this and it all works there. The fashion element of Shibuya is all over the gameplay to the point where you literally cannot erase it without losing a part of the game's overall charm. Not only do multiple NPCs wear and think about various trendy things (or at least they were trendy at the time lol), but the player is actually able to influence the trending fashion based on the brand of clothes and pins they wear as they fight. The commercial nature of the area is also shown through all the stores the player can go to, and several of Shibuya's main attractions are not only featured but also straight-out DISCUSSED about in-game. Sure, The Animation kinda tries with its backgrounds, but mainly on the visual end and doesn't seem to care about what's particularly notable about some of these areas. Does no one else realize how odd it feels to watch a show about an amnesiac who constantly passes through the Statue of Hachiko, a VERY notable part of Shibuya that's become a bit of a tourist's spot, and doesn't ONCE ask what on earth it is or why there's so many people around it? What's the point of even setting this story in Shibuya when the setting is so barely utilized to the point where you could have set it in literally any other city?
Earlier I mentioned Neku waking up to not just the world, but also the people around him. When I said that, I didn't mean just Shiki, Beat, Rhyme, Joshua, and all the other people he meets in the UG—I'm talking about people in the RG too. Several minor RG characters with their own distinct designs and even the slightest hint of personality showed up here and there throughout TWEWY. And I feel that removing most of these moments and relegating most of these minor characters to very brief cameos the way The Animation did is a huge problem. The reason why the main characters feel kinda underdeveloped in this anime is because they didn't really get a lot of time to be themselves in between all those key story moments... and most of the time where they actually got to do that in TWEWY came through helping these seemingly unimportant RG folks. Helping these side characters were NOT filler, as these moments helped pace the story, character development, and contributed to the amazing humor present throughout the game. Removing these characters is another way of removing the world, which lessens the enjoyment and investment I could have gotten from the show and makes the lesson Neku learns a bit less effective without these subtle examples... what's the point of literally naming your show "It's A Wonderful World" if you're not gonna... you know, SHOW the world and how wonderful it can be?
...Erasing the "world" aspect is probably the main "adaptation comparison" I wanted to mention here, but I'm not done yet. OHHH yes, The Animation has done more than just that to ruin my enjoyment. It's the little things that got me to care about TWEWY, and it's the little things that gets me somewhat annoyed for The Animation. While the anime does follow the story, it's not an exact T as there are weird RETCONS here and there. Not getting into specifics since it requires spoiling, but some of them do not make much sense to me, and if you played TWEWY, you might be able to understand how I feel. And changing parts of the story without doing so meaningfully are not the only inconsistencies this show makes as an adaptation. It's really weird to see Neku mainly deal his pin attacks with direct punches, including the Pyrokinesis pin, which originally wasn't even a physical pin that added fire to your punches, but instead an INDIRECT way of sending flames far away from the user using psychic energy. And speaking of Neku, Players complained that he wasn't more abrasive like he is in the English version of the game, and after hearing of his somewhat calmer nature in the original Japanese version, I shrugged it off at first... until I did a bit of digging and found a Tumblr blog detailing dialogue changes between SubaSeka and TWEWY, and found that there's still more to him than The Animation shows, like his snarkiness. And I didn't even realize this until typing up this review, but there is one scene where Joshua is eating some ice cream cones despite it being CANON in the game that he doesn't even like eating those particular foods. Okay, SERIOUSLY, what on earth is going on here??
All in all, The Animation likes to go through quickly and so it quickly felt boring to keep up with after a while. The battle scenes didn't excite me, the story couldn't get to me even though it did that and so much more before, the characters were robbed of a lot of their fun, and the world didn't really add to the entertainment. It felt so much like a chore after a while that I started noticing yet another thing that ate away at my enjoyment—now is the time to finally get to dialogue pacing. I couldn't help but notice the dialogue pacing found within several episodes after a while, and my goodness, did it quickly get distracting for me or what? There are many, many times where there is a distractingly long pause in between dialogue lines, and I feel like it adds to the slog in the same way that Pokémon Diamond and Pearl's many little lags between simple actions like menu navigation does for some people. It got to the point where dialogue scenes started feeling like Kingdom Hearts's dialogue scenes, and I do not mean that in a good way. A long and "meh" recap with much of the "fluff" removed... wow, it's almost like The Animation is like the 358/2 Days and Re:Coded HD compiliation movies for TWEWY! Crazy how I only NOW realized this (lol).


...*sigh*
Before I conclude this review, I just want to say this: if you bothered to actually read all of this, you deserve a certified "F it to high heaven!" for lending some of your precious time to reading a wall of text from a pitiful, heartless nobody like me. I really mean it, especially since writing this review was difficult (especially without spoiling the crap out of everything), as I had to spend at least a week writing and revising it all.

...I really wanted to love Subarashiki Kono Sekai The Animation. I really did. After all, I felt like the original Subarashiki Kono Sekai game was just ASKING to be a 2-cour anime ever since the moment I picked it up, with its heartfelt characters, surprisingly abundant charm, that GOD TIER soundtrack, and... that story, oh, what a story.
But, no matter how much I tried to be optimistic, (ironically) trying my best to trust it, The Animation unfortunately did not deliver in my opinion. When a 2-chapter promotional one-shot manga reviled by a considerable portion of (at least the Western side of) SubaSeka's fanbase is MORE FUNNIER than a reportedly "faithful" and complete adaptation, you've gotta realize that's how disappointing this anime was. And, after witnessing Square Enix announce a sequel to the original SubaSeka months after this anime was announced, I could not help but realize that this rushed, 1-cour recap only exists just to be an advertisement for the new game. It tries to sell anime-onlies onto the upcoming game by giving them a half-assed plot summary of the first game with a bunch of diluted characters and unmemorable action scenes, all made within a (clearly) limited amount of time and money; and I feel that this will all repeat again for that recently announced Legend of Mana anime adaptation.
Look, I don't necessarily have a problem with bad adaptations. The 2002 TV anime of the soon-to-be-20-year-old shoujo manga Full Moon wo Sagashite hardly follows its source material after episode 1, but it still manages to understand what made the source material popular; it still kept several main plotpoints and maintains the kind of charm, comedic timing, and feels with similar but anime-original content, with some of this new content honestly being great. Studio Ghibli's adaptation of Howl's Moving Castle hardly follows Diana Wynne Jones's original novel aside from most characters and significant plot points, yet it's still considered by many to be a great film even among those who actually read the book (myself included). So loose adaptations still have the potential to be good... and it's a shame that I can't even consider The Animation as one of those types of adaptations. It's sadly yet another video game adaptation to add to the sorry pile of disappointing video game anime/film adaptations.

It really just goes without saying that the original Subarashiki Kono Sekai, especially the original Nintendo DS version, is more worth your time. Even just watching a Let's Play online will give you a better experience than watching The Animation.

Sorry On Hoping Carelessly And Heaving Tirelessly On Adaptation.

One of the nicer things about the Internet is that you might find something that you never knew existed and might even appreciate learning about it. One example of that for me was finding this obscure yet cute short manga, which I had found through a Yumeiro Patissiere recommendation.
"Lovely Decoration!!" may not be the best, "absolute-must-read" cooking manga ever, but it does have some... I guess you can say... "sugar, spice, and everything nice" in it.

Now, first things first... I feel it's worth noting that the synopsis for this story is actually a bit misleading (in my opinion, anyway). While it is true that this ... is a story about a cake shop owner's daughter and his apprentice left to manage without said shop owner, the story doesn't actually focus on Ginjiro Cake Shop that much.
The synopsis implies that Lovely Decoration would be a bit like the game Diner Dash (weird example, I know, but stay with me here), where everything mainly takes place in the shop and the main characters would have to keep customers happy by taking on lots of orders and keeping the place well maintained and innovative (as in by adding new things to the shop). That in itself sounds pretty interesting, but this manga doesn't exactly deliver that way.

What this manga DOES deliver is essentially an origin story for our main character's possible passion for pastry-making. There is an order taken, but it's not in a casual way like how I described with orders earlier— it has significance in the story by presenting a challenge for our main characters while drawing out passion from the two main characters in this story. Not exactly the focus I thought this story had, but it's not a bad direction, especially for a manga of this length.
So how exactly was this direction handled? I'd say it was all right. The story does have main characters that aren't that unique with this genre, and there are, of course, cooking duels throughout. It's not too surprising to see comparisons to Yumeiro Patissiere with what ideas are explored in here— in fact, I find myself feeling like this could've been an inspiration to Yumeiro Patissiere (remember that Lovely Decoration came out first). But both manga have their own takes with some similar ideas, and what this story went with, in my opinion, does have its place.
It has attempts at comedy, but it wasn't anything particularly laugh-out-loud for me. The series of events was good enough for me, and it's good that each chapter briefly foreshadows or connects with the next, because it means that nothing in the story really feels like filler.

Artwork (as well as panel design) for Lovely Decoration is pretty much standard for a shoujo manga, with cute eye designs and simple but smooth hair designs. Aside from the main characters looking a little different between the front cover and the actual comics, the art style and characters are consistent throughout the whole book.
Some parts of the book could have been drawn a bit differently in my opinion, though... there are a couple of panels that I feel could've been more effective if it was a bit more experimental or had more space on the page, and a few panels are drawn in a way that feels a bit odd or slightly lacking to me. But then again, this is a story with only 6 chapters that make up one volume, so I can't complain too much.

Earlier, I mentioned that the characters weren't unique with the genre. Our main character, Anzu Sakurai, is a junior high schoolgirl who is energetic, quick to react, and loves to eat cakes, especially the ones made by her father's bakery. That may sound familiar to others who've read other cooking manga before, but she stands out from the other female protagonists I've seen in other cooking manga with two things: her energetic nature is shown naturally through her karate skills, and that she actually starts off by having no interest in following her father's line of career.
This is what I meant by the story being handled like an origin story. Slowly but surely with each chapter, Anzu starts to have visible changes to her character— she doesn't even realize that she learns to like cake-making, and she learns to be more engaged towards the challenges she accepts. Anzu may not seem unique at first, but it's the little changes throughout the story that made her into a bit more interesting of a lead role.

The other main character we follow other than Anzu is her father's apprentice, Tsukiya Naruse. He gets easily annoyed with Anzu, whether it's from her regular food heists, her lack of cooking skills, or from her more pessimistic actions. But he doesn't seem to actually hate her, and is in fact, glad to see that Anzu is learning to see and share his passion. Maybe it's because she is his boss's daughter, but hey, he isn't a complete jerk at all, so that's something.
There is a main antagonist that does eventually come up, and although I really like their character design and how they are introduced in the story, they honestly are a bit lacking in terms of character (aside from hating the main characters, of course). Even if they had to be an antagonist, it would've been a bit nice to see some kind of character trait or shtick from them. Can't be a short story without something getting the short end of the stick, I guess...

So what Lovely Decoration has here is a small, one-volume treat that may be worth of occupying a bit of your time. The story's length and unlikeness may be small, but there is some charm in here that is bound to please somebody. If anyone would like to read a small cooking story, or just want to see a shoujo manga that actually doesn't focus on romance, you might want to help yourself to Kaoru Igarashi's story of a girl learning to work in a bakery.

Once upon a time, Disney worked with Sega to make an arcade game in Japan and got the mangaka behind Disney's Kilala Princess to make a tie-in shoujo manga for kids. The result is Disney's Magical Dance, which unfortunately did not leave a magical impression on me.

Magical Dance wastes no time on unveiling its main characters, but within the first few pages, it seemed very clear that the story would feel as cliched as the first four words of this review. The story starts off with showing our main character, Rin, and her goal, by simply having her watch a dance event on TV. It ... then goes straight to introducing Kai, who obviously seems like he will be the main character's love interest if you're familiar with a lot of shoujo stories. Another character, Yuna, is introduced in the next page, and it is very clear that this character is the main character's rival. Rin eventually runs into Tinker Bell, who for some reason gives her a card that can be used to summon Disney characters. Each of these characters and their roles in the story are introduced in the most basic way possible and it's easy to guess how Rin will end up in relation with her goal and the other characters. Despite the predictability, I read on in hope for some kind of enjoyment.
I'm assuming the Disney characters that are summoned are supposed to teach Rin something about dancing, but most of the time it feels more like a cheat card to get herself out of the problems she gets herself into. In situations where there's a crowd, the Disney characters come out of nowhere near Rin and suddenly makes the crowd looking approvingly at her, with not much questioning. There are times where Rin can't do something until a Disney character eventually says one thing, and suddenly she does it perfectly, without it being feeling like she earned it or was actually demonstrating it in a way that I could properly understand.
I'm not sure if this is a pacing issue or not, but the execution of the morals certainly feels half-baked and there could have been more to this story than letting Disney characters win everybody and the reader over.

Speaking of characters, the Disney characters that were featured are pretty much the only characters that don't feel flat in this story. This is perhaps because Magical Dance relies on the reader to recognize these famous and already-established characters in order to want to read the story. It's pretty clear from the author's side-notes that there was a lot of work in making these characters feel like the same ones everyone's known and loved, since they re-watched Disney movies for this manga.
So when it comes to re-creating the Disney characters accurately, this manga does that well. However, the new characters, such as Rin and Kai, don't feel memorable to me.
Rin is a tomboy who's energetic enough to want to follow her dream of being a dancer, but her lack of dancing skills lead her to not be so confident about that. Kai seems to notice her, despite the fact that he doesn't interact with her much aside from when she's troubled. Yuna clearly wants Rin out of the spotlight and from Kai's way. It sounds like they have some character, but to me, from how they're portrayed in the story, they could be replaced by anyone.
We never get to really know the characters outside of their dancing goals, like their family or their home lifestyle or any real worldbuilding, which is pretty ironic considering there is a chapter where the moral is that people should get to know others better.

Despite the lackluster story and characters, the art is very cute and is actually worth mentioning. Nao Kodaka knows how to draw cute, yet realistically proportioned characters with stunning eye designs, and basically has the shoujo drawing style straight to its essentials. Kodaka also kept the Disney characters to the art styles they were originally drawn in as close as possible, as she did in Kilala Princess, and these characters are re-created very well from their iconic appearances. There's nothing overly noteworthy or unique about the panelwork, but it's functional enough that it's easy to read— which is good enough for a manga aimed at kids.

Sadly, the artwork is the only real recommendable part of Disney's Magical Dance. I tried to go into this manga with a neutral outlook, but in the end, it was impossible to unsee that this was just a basic shoujo manga filled with fan-service for die-hard Disney fans. To me, the characters never really feel like they truly earned what they got or learned something from this story. It was frustrating for me to figure out how to convey why I easily got bored with this manga, but somehow was impressed with other kids manga similar to this. Unless you have a younger girl in the family who loves Disney and might like reading manga, I can't really recommend Disney's Magical Dance to anyone.

After making a ton of recommendations, it's time I made my first review on this site— and why not begin with a late-childhood-favorite that doesn't have any reviews yet as of this writing?

Fairy Idol Kanon is a fun musical-themed fairy tale that was Mera Hakamada's first manga series. While people who know of her are more familiar with her GL works like The Last Uniform, I've always known her for this underrated gem of a children's manga. This is one of those manga series that I really believe deserves an anime adaptation— lots of funny scenes, cute character and outfit designs, some nice morals, and ... lots of potential for more development and such.

The story has a simple premise: three elementary schoolgirls who like to sing become idols with the help of a fairy princess from a musical kingdom in need of help. It can be a bit slow to get to the beginning of their musical careers, but the buildup is rewarding once we see our main antagonist and the story gets really interesting.
There's lots of funny scenes and cute outfits throughout the story, but we also get a bunch of dramatic moments and some development in world-building and characters. This series surprised me with some of the more dramatic parts and with how much I got hooked into it as a kid, and I'm still charmed by so many things in this story, like some of the morals touched on about having fun.

The art in this series is all right, with lots of very round and cute drawings throughout, and the two chapter splash pages that are in color are pretty decently colored. There are some inconsistencies here and there though, like how some characters have different shaped faces or eyes in some pages, so I don't blame people who may feel that the art is the worst part of the series. But the simple art style is still enough to win me over, and it really works with the more delicate-feeling panels. Screen tone is used very nicely in some pages too, especially with the very light or soft-looking panels.

The characters in this story get some levels of development, but they were still very enjoyable to see! The main character, Kanon, may be a bit Mary-Sue-ish with how amazing her voice is, but she was still a very enjoyable protagonist in my opinion, since she still had her flaws and optimistic personality addressed.
Her friends are fun to see too, with Marika being the more stern but realistic one and Kodama being the cute, knowledgeable fangirl. Their agent, the fashionable Pierre, is easily the funniest character in the story and I can totally see Hakamada and her assistants' enthusiasm with drawing him. Their cute fairy princess friend, Alto, is funny too and I always smile when I see her smiling (too cute!!).
The girls' rival, Julia, is pretty bratty and proud. I realize with reading more idol manga that this is a pretty typical rival with these types of stories, but I still enjoy seeing her emote and being absolutely hilarious with her pettiness over the main characters.

Overall, this series is a fun read and I recommend it to anyone who enjoys a good idol story, fairies, or just some good light-hearted children's tales. The story is very nice considering its short length, and the characters are fun. The art is simple and sometimes dwindles in quality, but it is very pleasing to the eyes on the series' best panels. This series totally deserves an anime adaptation, considering its visible appeal and the simple fact that music doesn't translate well in a visual-only medium. I hope anyone who is reading this enjoys Fairy Idol Kanon as much as I did and has as much fun as Kanon and friends in the story!