I'll actually move my ass and write a review, because seeing all the pseudo-experts spewing bullshit about this anime is just painful.
Let's start with the most obvious part, art/animation.
It's gorgeous, even distant shots of characters have a certain degree of detail and quality. You will not see derpy animation with characters "spilling out" due to too little frames or rushed drawing. Art attempts to be as realistic as possible for an animation and it succeeds, characters look different, they have distinct features and the way they look suits their personalities, that goes for supporting characters, like the Creators too. Animation's flow is great, there's
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no "too fast to see" bullshit. Sword fights are especially well done with viewer being able to catch every movement. What I really like about this show, however, is how sparingly it uses lighting to improve the art. We don't get blurry shots of characters to make them look more appealing. It's not that artists were lazy, the show simply doesn't need it.
The next one would be sound and I'll include voice acting here.
Starting with the most obvious, the opening. It builds up the tension quite nicely only to release it in melodic and optimistic chorus, which at the same time lacks overcolourized emotions, feeling quite natural. The lyrics combine Japanese and English, the latter being quite good (which seems to slowly become a standard in anime).
The second opening goes along very similar lines with verses giving it a bit more mysterious feeling, while the chorus has a lot more pop feeling, like something you'd find on the radio. At the same time it feels much more emotional. Again, Japanese and English are being mixed, with a good effect.
The first ending brings back memories of Yui's Rolling Star and other Bleach openings, soft, melodic and simple J-rock makes for a good candidate to your playlist and surely an ending you don't want to skip.
Second ending doesn't exactly suit my taste, it has, by far, the most powerful background of all the opening and ending songs, however a high-pitched vocal makes you think of generic anime endings. Despite that the composition is alright, the bridge does well at building tension which is released before chorus.
Now, about the BGM. The first opening is extensively used in battle and high tension scenes. Its tempo and groove make up for a great atmosphere during beautifully choreographed and animated fight scenes, while also fitting the more comedic ones. The rest of background music is a mix of different styles, most of vocals are sung in a well sounding English and some of them are based on Western genres. Cutting it short, the BGM consists of various musical styles, it's not just epic orchestral music or dramatic drumming, the compositions are quite entertaining and don't get boring partially do to being used in a fitting way and rather sparingly. However each time BGM kicks in, you feel hyped like a rich kid before their father's payday.
Let's get down to Re:Creators' selling point, the characters.
I will not lie, characters are rather stereotypical. We have a "book lover" Meteora with voice devoid of emotion, magical girl who doesn't like fighting and hurting people (yet has no issues blowing up a skyscraper) etc. Do not look for Senjougahara or Hanekawa here. The main dish are not the characters themselves, but their backstories and interpersonal interactions, especially with their respective Creators. Seeing Matsubara's and Selesia's relation growing and changing is one of this show's highlights. Despite coming from different worlds the Creations can create interesting relations as well, like that of Yuya and Kanoya, or Mamika and Aliceteria. As the series goes on their teamwork and ties grow stronger allowing for some utterly awesome moments mixing magic, occult and high tech universes in single scenes. With amazing effects.
This being said, it doesn't mean that the characters are flat, they sure feel so right after coming to our world, following their character descriptions very closely, yet with time they develop little quirks and additional features which make up for interesting personalities.
Then, there's the antagonist, Military Uniform Kid/Princess/Girl. Her motives and ties to Souta become known around 9th episode. While her reasoning is rather shallow and childish, her pure overpoweredness and personality of an evil, scheming entertainment mistress, make up for a great villain.
In between two warring camps, there is, but one person, who doesn't give a shit, namely Magane. A neutral chaotic character doing things her own way, for her own entertainment. She doesn't care for either side and just wants to have fun while eating crepes and sowing chaos for audience's entertainment. With a power over lies, she can use everything you say against you, making up for some truly great scenes when paired with more impulsive characters. Certainly, waifu of the season.
Story
As noticed by many before me, the premise is interesting. While the first half of the show develops rather slowly, allowing us to get to know a very large cast much better, the story picks up a lot of pace after Souta's and Altair's relation has been discovered, and new Creations join the fray. Tension raises and is kept high until the very end, and as of episode 20 it's still impossible to say who will win, as the Creators pull out heavier and heavier guns in their fight against the Military Uniform Cutie, their ideas going from cheesy to great, like in a proper story.
Not only is tension kept high and built in a rather natural way, with more and more information about Creations and Altair being discovered with every episode, allowing for fast and naturally paced developments, but the story itself is well thought out with great writing, which is especially visible when rewatching, with some interesting hints being thrown here and there.
There are also some great references to the real world showing how much care was put into coming up with this series, and a lot of 4th wall breaking, Re:Creators style.
Similarly to PriPri, this anime is not a good choice if you want to turn off your brain and write a shitty review using some smart words. You have to focus and watch it carefully to catch everything there is to it. I'm currently at my 1st rewatch, on episode 8 and the entire series looks even better, as I see more and more connections and hints about fates of different characters.
Enjoyment/Overall
What can I say... Great BGM, great animation, very good and well thought out story, with interesting relations between characters. Just saying that I've decided to rewatch it even before it's finished, already says a lot about the overall enjoyment. It's just a great show with awesome parody elements, poking at stereotypes in anime and manga. It's way over the top when it should be, it's toned down and dramatic when it should be, resolutions of each character's fate are natural and well written.
I'd give it a 10, if it wasn't for very few shows which simply do things perfectly, like Monogatari Series. As such, a strong 9/10.
Sep 3, 2017
Re:Creators
(Anime)
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I'll actually move my ass and write a review, because seeing all the pseudo-experts spewing bullshit about this anime is just painful.
Let's start with the most obvious part, art/animation. It's gorgeous, even distant shots of characters have a certain degree of detail and quality. You will not see derpy animation with characters "spilling out" due to too little frames or rushed drawing. Art attempts to be as realistic as possible for an animation and it succeeds, characters look different, they have distinct features and the way they look suits their personalities, that goes for supporting characters, like the Creators too. Animation's flow is great, there's ... |