Here finally after 2 and a half years of continuously watching anime, I found something that I can call my "Most Hated" show ever. I just completed this show and decided to read some reviews and I honestly don't understand the appeal of the show whatsoever. I know this is somewhat of a controversial opinion but bear with me.
First of all, let me say that I am not a hater of an anime/manga about LGBTQ at all. If you check my list you will see that I consider 'Doukyuusei', 'Bloom into You', 'Asagao to Kase-san to be pretty good shows and 'My Lesbian Experience
...
with Loneliness is one of my favourite manga of all time. So I don't particularly hate Umibe no Etranger because it is BL.
First I would like to praise it for having good visuals and voice acting. The art style is pretty decent but the animation is eye-catching and the background visuals perfectly fit with the character emotions and the mood of the show.
So that's the only praise I have for this thing.
Before talking about my problems with the show I would like to say what I think is the most important thing about Romance anime. "The romantic progression between the main characters (why and how they fall in love)".
Now talking about my first problem with this anime and that is the romantic progression between the main characters.
We don't know much about both of our main guys especially Mio. We know Shun lives with a lesbian couple and an old lady and his parents were against him being a 'Gay' and Mio lost his mother and always sits on the bench outside where Shun lives.
And Shun started having feelings for Mio. Why? Because he is gay? Is that how straight people think about Gay people? that they like whoever they see as long as it is a boy? At first, when Shun talked with Mio, Mio yelled at Shun coz he thought Shun was just talking to him out of Sympathy. And by looking at that it's obvious that they won't be able to get along with each other for quite a bit of time. But No. Mio immediately apologise to Shun the day after and decided to spend a day together. And Mio decided to go to the mainland and he returns to Okinawa after 3 years and confessed his love to Shun. Everything progressed way too fast that it's unlikely for people (at least for me) to care about the characters and their relationship. What I hate about most romance anime is that " Characters will fall in love even tho they have no logical reason to" and what makes it even worse is when characters fall in love with each other but we dont even know much about either of the two. Why should I care about the love story of 2 dudes when I barely know them or I have barely seen how they've grown their feelings for each other? Its like watching some random kids in public fight. We enjoy watching them fight but deep down we wont care even if someone dies right there.
And for a romance anime if you cant make viewers care about the main relationship it's pretty much impossible to make up for that flaw.
Now about my second problem with this anime aka. "The Characters"
Shun and Mio are bland as fuck.
They arent blessed with many character traits. The only thing we know about them is that they are 'broken' and love each other. And that's the only thing we got when we asked more about the main guys character traits. The author tried to rely on their not so good childhood to make viewers care about them but failed to do so. And even tho the author showed us some bits of Shun and Mio's childhood we never saw the complete picture of it. Which further makes their 'Broken' trait even less interesting and makes viewers care even less. And supporting characters are almost nonexistent. The Lesbian couple did some teasing to Shun and Mio about their relationship and that's the only thing they did. And Sakurako who had some sort of role in the story was not executed properly too. She was there to make Shun overcome his trauma (his parents being against him being gay) and make Shun return to his home. But we didnt see Shun doing so. So I'll say she was a wasted character.
Now about some problems I have with the show that some people might not have problem with.
1: Their first kiss was stupid and forced asf. It was only there to satisfy the thirst of some fujoshi.
2: There is a time skip so early in the series that makes the relationship of mc's even more confusing. Especially considering what Mio said to Shun at the ending of the show " I love girls but still I fell in love with you". But but why? What happened in those years that Mio fell in love with Shun? Guess we'll never know.
3: Like the Kiss scene I was talking about the S3X scene in final part of the show is uncomfortable asf and the comedy between the scenes ruined it even more.
Those are it.
Umibe no Uranger is my most hated show of all time but I don't think it is the worst thing ever. It might be pretty enjoyable for the targeted audience.
A lot of unexplained stuff, lack of depth in character, pacing issue, lack of logic behind romantic progression etc ruined this anime to its core.
Only if the main guys had a bit more depth to their character, instead of the huge time skip if it was focused on their romantic progression and if side characters were focued slightly more this anime would have been somewhat enjoyable to watch but we can do nothing except for imagining about it.
In Short/ Tldr: Watch 'Doukyuusei' or 'Bloom into You' instead.
Thanks for reading. I am open to criticisms so feel free to comment if you disagree with my review.
Have a good day/night.
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Aug 5, 2021
Umibe no Étranger
(Anime)
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Here finally after 2 and a half years of continuously watching anime, I found something that I can call my "Most Hated" show ever. I just completed this show and decided to read some reviews and I honestly don't understand the appeal of the show whatsoever. I know this is somewhat of a controversial opinion but bear with me.
First of all, let me say that I am not a hater of an anime/manga about LGBTQ at all. If you check my list you will see that I consider 'Doukyuusei', 'Bloom into You', 'Asagao to Kase-san to be pretty good shows and 'My Lesbian Experience ... |
