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Mar 26, 2015
When I first started watching My Little Monster, I was already following Say 'I Love You' and I must admit, the initial impression I was left after three or four episodes with was mixed. One of the strengths of this show - and this is already strikingly clear from its first episode which was a very strong start - is the amount of content and fun it can cram into 20 minutes. However, I was a little bemused at the first-glance appearance of the relationship.
Haru's casual rape threat in the first episode, and repeated use of his physical strength to have his way made me
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wary, given Shizuku's remaining at his side without much objection. The relationship definitely has some interesting moments and eventually becomes much more appealing and less tasteless than it seemed at first - both are very interesting, flawed characters (especially Haru, whom you might not even end up liking much) and their differences certainly enrich the experience. Shizuku is by no means a weak lead character.
However the underlying truth is that, despite all of the teenage turbulence, ups and downs etc. their relationship hasn't really gone anywhere throughout the one cour of MLM that we'll (probably) ever get. Shizuku can't be straightforward and sees the distribution of her energy between Haru and studying as a zero-sum game in which the latter is more important. Haru is alarmingly frank about his feelings but is repeatedly self-sabotaging in his attempts to unravel her defences and by the end, since the first episode, we feel that he has in a way made as many steps backwards as he has forwards in pursuing her. At this point, much of our attention is captivated by the other characters.
Normally, a romantic primary plot that doesn't really get anywhere wouldn't be too much of a problem, but it actually becomes fairly noticeable in this show simply because of how pumped full of content and activity each episode is - a fact that the very exciting first episode only exacerbates. Sure, quite a lot can go on in a single episode and this is definitely, overall, a forte in terms of fun, laughs and subtle developments. However, the big problem is that the fact that there is such a limited sprinkling of the dramatic over this whirlpool, and the fact that our character's stories only change very gradually somewhat trivializes most of the content and makes it less deliberate or meaningful, as you would get from some of the other great rom-coms. I consider myself a fairly patient viewer, but by the end I was really hoping for some zest, some drama, some passion, which I think would really add completion to MLM and bump it up to a 5-star rating, but which never really surfaced in these 13 episodes. This isn't really a big deal though, the high-school setting managing to overcome the absence of feels quite passably and charmingly. Besides, MLM is quite full of laughs and it isn't a dull show. You will be enjoying yourself.
As for the secondary characters and their relationships: Surprisingly, these are the hidden strength of the series. You can relate to MLM's secondaries quite strongly. They emerge gradually in line with the show's "fast but actually slow" pacing and as I said before, at the end they have somewhat forced their way onto the centre stage alongside the primary relationship. Jaded romance-viewers might find the character line-up a little standard, but I think they were overall well-handled and endearing. Things weren't particularly predictable to me. Despite this, the sluggish progression of significant events means that we haven't really seen much more movement with the secondaries than we have with the primaries, even though they are all well fleshed-out. It seems that this season has been a big preparation - ie. gradual introduction of characters etc. which will precede the crescendo. But then as I said, that crescendo will probably never come as this may have just been a big advert for the manga.
Last but not least, on the technical side it's very solid. The art is superb and sometimes the movements are quite impressive. Character designs are good and quite unconventional in this day and age, supported by plenty of fun expressions. No complaints here. The music is also great, with a fantastic OP and ED to wrap each episode in.
Overall, MLM has some great moments hidden within. It's highly entertaining, and seems destined to become even better if it's ever given a second cour. The lack of both potent drama and a more determined linear progression in the relationship dynamics have been the main weaknesses of this season, but they are not significant. It's a solid and fun watch and deserves its recognition.
7.5/10
Reviewer’s Rating: 8
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Mar 26, 2015
This show is madness. As long as you have a crass sense of humour and are an anime-viewer of dubious self-respect, you should probably go ahead and check this out. The jokes are generally less tame and hit-or-miss than those you find in other anime, and the writers did a great job at injecting satire of a bunch of anime tropes into the show. The result is a delightful cocktail of preposterous ecchi humour, caricatural harem dynamics and dirty slapstick gags that would make a serious audience retch.
There are bad episodes, and these tend to be where they shift from inane humour to basic high-school
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soapy stuff and don't make enough use of the clearly considerable creative wit they possess. Still, those are only few compared to the mainstream of ****s and giggles, and you can tell exceedingly clearly what you're going to be getting with this show from the first episode.
I admit, despite never intending to watch this each morning for anything other than a bit of comedy, Yukihira grew on me - her cute design aside, her main voice-actor, bizarre deadpan humour and schizophrenic awkwardness gave her a good dose of charm. Aside from that I was pretty meh about the other characters and plotlines for anything other than lulz, which – to be fair - they provided amply.
Overall, unless you have a stick up your butt, do yourself a favour and give it the twenty minute test. It's very, very fun.
Reviewer’s Rating: 8
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Mar 26, 2015
At first, it looked like a light spot of fun with the addition of awesome airships to spice things up. So, three sisters are going on a quest, pursued by an evil corporation and some colourful pirates, right? "It's fine", I say, "it's normal for anime premises to sound a bit goofy, and the universe looks like it has great potential". So I decided to give it a chance, in the hopes of some good fun, drama, character development and all of that jazz - indeed I got my hopes up in such a way as the show progressed: At a point, it looked like
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the characters were set for some interesting exploration and evolution individually and collectively. Moreover, I was impressed by the tone of two adjacent episodes in the mid-point in which things became pretty serious all of the sudden with some new, darker themes introduced. I believed I might have found a hidden gem, that the sisters' relationship and personalities would be explored satisfyingly, that I would be fearing for their safety in crises and filled with good feelings when they succeeded. Yes, I sensed the tendrils of that goosebump-worthy anime magic that can bump up my ratings of any series creeping their way around GD.
Yet none of these ever happened. The show didn't reach nearly as far or as high as I had hoped, and the bad aspects that were apparent near the beginning only inflated towards the end, snuffing out any magic that might have been had. The characters fly around wielding plot armour and using lazily frequent mechanical hocus pocus, the dialogue gets dull, whilst ridiculous or boring events become the show's bread and butter. Interesting character developments are dealt with in only the most rudimentary and unsubtle manner, and once Kozuki is done it would be generous to say that they slow to a trickle - including one of the most mediocre villains I've ever encountered in anime. The plot and story all but collapse in the final three episodes, culminating in a conclusion devoid of pacing, drama, intensity, emotion, depth or anything that might carry the viewer with it. GD never sets out to be funny, but combined with the above defects it doesn't really have much going for it sadly, just a kind of watered down, lukewarm averageness.
Alright, maybe I'm being a bit harsh. On the technical side, you'll be able to expect a fantastic OP which was a pleasure to watch each time, with the rest of the score and ED being pretty decent. The expressions and animation are decent, while the costumes and mechas are a noticeable strong point. The main strength of this show are the pleasant, positive moments between the characters that surface quite often, as the dark ones are quite rare. They're simple, and in no way exceptional, but they keep the show together and make it somewhat enjoyable on a basic level. And yet, when I think about other shows that I've given four stars and how much I enjoyed them in comparison, the overall result comes a bit closer to a 2 than to a 3 star rating for me. I can see why people might enjoy it, but if you don't like the idea of investing a good amount of time in something that turns out to be kind of dull, I hope you find my feedback helpful. Whatever the case, I find this all a big shame because it's clear that the people who worked on this gave it an honest go to make it worthwhile/special, and if they happen to bring out an OVA, I'll give it a fair chance.
4/10
Reviewer’s Rating: 4
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Mar 26, 2015
I gave Recently, My Sister is Unusual a watch in search of outrageous, original ecchi lulz. In this I was sorely disappointed, not least by the lack of more frequently inventive use of the show's premise to create entertaining and memorable scenes.
That's not to say it was a terrible show. It cut a light-hearted dash among the rest of my queue for this season, which involved a mixture of drama, intensity, violence and plot-twisting, whereas Recently, My Sister is 90% warmly predictable high-school bread and butter, and 10% risqué scenes that range from mild to fantastic, though unfortunately the latter was pretty darn rare. I
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can see why some liked the characters, but for the amount of time we're spending watching them interacting each episode, I honestly think they could be far better.
The basic premise is outlined in the first episode, and from there on it's a pretty slow procession of largely trivial events played out by a very white-bread, boring male character (Yuuya), his cutely tsundere little sister (Mitsuki) and her uncontrollable ghost (Hiyori), plus four or five other characters who are even more forgettable, including Yuuya's buddy, whose provision of the typical perverted idiot-buddy role fostered two or three chuckles across six hours of content. Really, we're definitely not talking anything above average here in my opinion even by slice of life moeblob standards, and when it comes to the 'plot', if I were to be brutally honest, it's an entire season of pretty mild filler without any real qualities compared to other anime of the genre. Additionally, the visuals and soundtrack are really quite unimpressive as can be expected from much high-school anime.
The problem for me is that because of how boring and conventional the dynamics and characters were, I placed my hopes for the show in bold, quasi-incestuous ecchi entertainment. It's really unfortunate that most of what you get in Recently, My Sister is simply tame and done to death, consisting of tropes you can find in hundreds of other anime: Falling over in awkward positions, blushes, accidental boob-touching, pantyshots (in this case chastity-belt shots) and off-screen slaps to the cheek alongside screams. There are four or five scenes which step out of this pretty dreary routine (including the brilliant 'Metal Gear Yuuya'), but unfortunately they're too few to really make a difference and bump it up to 'upper average' for me when compared with other shows. While this one had the potential to be a total blast like Noucome, it ended up just being too mild, reserved and conventional to really achieve anything.
3/10
Reviewer’s Rating: 3
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Mar 26, 2015
Despite the standard grade, this isn't really one of those 'meh' series that you rate indifferently. It's quite particular, with a set of pros and cons tearing at it in opposite directions that wind up making for a middling grade. Read on if you're interested in hearing what these strengths and weaknesses are so that you can figure for yourself if it'll be worth your time. The most potent thing about this show is its artwork: it uses very outspoken blends of colours with a particularly neat use of shading, and most of the action sequences feature an amazing, psychedelic change in the palette. Innovative
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stuff as far as I'm concerned, and it made any of the content very pleasing to watch on a visual level at the very least. Other things alongside this are the great soundtrack (OP and ED are only average though IMO) and a carefully-nurtured general atmosphere that prevails over the wild tonal shifts of the plot: it's a carefree, rebellious vibe that fits right in around the beggar-heroes of 'Café Nowhere' and makes each episode work within itself, even compensating a bit for the lack of linear storyline progression. It's undeniably stylish and though it has obviously been influenced by lots of other shows, it has plenty of its own flavour.
Given that this is the first season only, most of the episodes focus on attempting to provide a background and some development for each of the major characters (there are quite a few). Your interest will be piqued by the case that will emerge for them to resolve, you may giggle a bit at some of the humour, the action will likely be fairly average by the standards of action-oriented anime, the adversity in each episode will be overcome in traditional manner, and then we'll be back with everyone at the Nowhere, before rounding off with a sinister glimpse of the villain's machinations in the mean-time (these short scenes are the main recurring factor that advances the over-arching plot in each episode). The individual episodes are not hugely engaging or intense, but they're entertaining enough to maintain interest, while the thing that really makes Hamatora particular is the way it trades tones like a politician trades policy: one second the show will not be taking itself seriously at all, whereas the next we'll be getting dark and violent twists, combined with grandiose monologues and such. Make of this what you will, I found that while it prevented boredom, it made things a tad incoherent and wasn't great at drawing you into the mood sought after (example: When an unexpected, serious twist comes out of nowhere, and then the next episode is a goofy beach episode).
Finally we get the characters: these are the main meh point for me. I mean, it's pretty clear that the female characters were kind of thrown in cynically in order to placate the show's male fans: they settle for clichés that some might find cute but didn't really have an effect on me, and are basically left undeveloped for the whole runtime. As for the male characters, they're quite skilfully explored in their episodes, but the simple fact is that the creators tried to decentralize their focus too much and develop all of them in equal amounts one or two at a time, which made the development seem a bit artificial. Not only did the fleshing-out of each of them decrease the flow of the plot as I mentioned, but it makes it harder to bond with Nice or to endear him to us. The villain intrigued me at first, seeming a bit like a sillier and more eccentric Makishima (Psycho Pass), but he really gets a bit tiresome after a while, endlessly repeating the same monologue with his hands stretched towards the heavens. The finale was unfortunately pretty underwhelming, particularly given the cynical cliffhanger trick employed by the writers as a run-up to the sequel.
Overall, it's well-worth trying the first episode out, which in my view can give you a pretty good idea of what you're getting. It draws inspiration from a lot of sources and so may seem unoriginal to some. However it's also good fun, and if you like the visuals, vibe and premise, you might find both this season and its sequel fairly rewarding.
5.5/10
Reviewer’s Rating: 6
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Mar 26, 2015
Don't be dissuaded by the immaturity of the characters upon a first glance: despite their seeming like an annoying bunch of teenagers, things get better. We have Hikari, who starts at a low point but grows significantly throughout the show, while there are several other characters (Tsumugu, Kaname, Sayu) whose initially auxiliary appearance gives way for their gradual blossoming. In fact, I think anyone can find at least one character worth rooting for in this show. But characters aside, the technical icing is what makes Nagi-Asu the gem it is – in terms of visuals it has been one of the most gorgeous series I've
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seen. The creators managed to fill their work with sublime moments through a conjunction of masterful artwork, a good script and a tastefully-employed OST. Each of these is wonderfully used in a way that suffuses important scenes with true anime magic and a special atmosphere. It's a world which is familiar to us but is also unique in its own way, tinged with nostalgic, faded blue hues coating the man-made parts of the world, and a marvellous underwater life that makes for some very pleasurable watching.
The universe isn't the only thing of note. I'll warn that the relationship dynamic is quite the leviathan, with an octagon of unrequited feelings emerging that inevitably won't satisfy everyone once the end is reached – if you are a person who needs a resoundingly conclusive ending in romantic drama, this might frustrate you. However, I was always happy with how the creators explored their characters' feelings when they open up to each other, as unlike in couple-based shows there are plenty of important characters here, and all are treated with respect by the writers. An apt blend of subtleness and direct dialogue is used to let us know what people are thinking. For a good amount of the show there is a real, ominous feeling of threat as we notice that in this world, much like in ours, people have difficulty seeing through barriers imposed between communities and oppose the right of others to pursue love across them. I'll conclude that on the drama front Nagi-Asu managed to be poignant and tasteful in its execution, and is usually brimming with feels and understated, softly brilliant moments.
That being said, the effect of these was often watered down by tears. Yes, Nagi-Asu indulges too much in the trope of having girls break down in tears or start wailing uncontrollably in order to convey drama, which I just roll my eyes at most of the time, personally. This is something distinctly related to the four primary female characters of the show, who possess interesting facets but sadly end up not breaking free of the conventions of being fragile, exaggeratedly sensitive Moe maidens and therefore not feeling as real as they could. The less well-executed drama of the show usually involves them sobbing or running away, though to be fair they aren't universally bad and have plenty of good and endearing characteristics to compensate for Moe blandness – there just isn't a single one of them who breaks free of this uninspired basis, which I found unfortunate.
I'll conclude with the following: Nagi no Asukara is a labour of love that has a lot to offer, and I'd recommend it to people looking to give anime romantic drama a go. It has a strong emotional impact with potent storytelling, memorable scenes and characters who are generally endearing and evolving. The artwork, score and dialogue are all first-class. You might be let-down if you are very particular about resolution, and if a slew of brittle female characters aren't your thing. If you want to watch it, please don't write it off immediately based on initially flawed characters or their age, and eventually the waves of this world might just lull you.
8.5/10
Reviewer’s Rating: 8
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Mar 26, 2015
Some might find it difficult to get into this show. The way the story is told to us makes it clear that the two main characters have survived whatever ordeals they faced, and the action itself is not nearly as kinetically satisfying, juicy or frequent as you get in lots of other anime, particularly ones that tend away from the moe side of the scale. Therefore, don't go into this expecting a huge amount of intensity, drama, action or gushing feels. Gifu Dodo is in essence a temperate tale told in smaller stories and adventures that tend to involve strategy, philosophy, courage and loyalty, all
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imbibed with and pulled together by a theme of fraternal righteousness that actually has an effect unlike the best dialogue between characters many other shows have to offer. It somehow manages to do this without coming across as pretentious, most likely given the upbeat and ridiculous yet resolute tone embellished by some great, strong visuals and soundtrack. Though the show is for the most part extremely serious and can be taken as such, this actually makes it quite humorous too on the side. This is summarized aptly by the character of Uesugi Kagekatsu, the' man who has never smiled', who furrows his brow in such a manly way that it makes creaking sounds...
Despite the humorousness of the exaggerated masculinity, the series is riddled with memorable scenes that are slowly and deliberately set up. It's soothingly anti-hyperactive material that you can really sit down to and appreciate at your pace, one episode at a time or several. The same can't be said of many superior animes, which often are either action from start to finish, or which unhappily lurch between this and filler episodes that fail to satisfy.
Unfortunately, the budding brotherhood between Kanetsugu and Keiji, which by the midpoint of the show had evolved to become one of its main charms, was all but discarded for the second half. It starts to feel strange that Keiji only really has a presence in the opening and closing credits as well as the sake-drinking scenes of discussion with his friend in the present, given that the show seemed to be about the two of them rather than simply how awesome Kanetsugu is, and the plots around his origins. A host of side-characters file in and out of the episodes, but tend to fail at filling the gap left behind by the eccentric tiger-warrior, not least when they introduce a certain non-human character and give the slightly dull ninja a more central role. I'm not saying any of this to spoil anyone, but rather because I kept expecting Keiji to show up again during the second half, and my viewing experience suffered due to this never happening.
Moreover, while I only have praise for the better scenes of this series, there is a lot of time in each episode filled by less impressive or interesting activity, which is a shame because it results in a test of patience that it would appear many potential viewers of this show weren't prepared to put up with. The theme of righteousness and exploration of various individuals' pursuit of it in their own ways is also somewhat dropped and altogether, despite the brilliant denouements in episodes 21 and 25, the second half of Gifu Dodo felt somewhat lacking in departments that it initially charmed me with.
Still, it remains a great anime, its flaws being largely made up for by its exaggerated, uplifting, masculine charm. Feel like a change from screaming, teenaged protagonists, moe and hyperactiveness? Kick back and watch Gifu Dodo.
6.5/10
Reviewer’s Rating: 7
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Mar 26, 2015
It's generic fantasy done fairly well on the surface, but ultimately it's a hollow experience which reeks of missed potential. Though I haven't really spoiled anything explicit, I do refer to a fair amount of events in this review, so it won't be for those who don't want to know any details of what they'll see.
Plenty of SoU's merit rests on our shared experiences with the characters from the previous season. It also does a satisfying job of tying things from AoU's storyline into this one, though unfortunately it fails to improve on AoU's foundation or deliver satisfying resolutions of its own. SoU started off
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pretty strong, with an exciting build-up in the first two episodes as the old crew gets reunited, and some fun adventures through exotic landscapes and fiendish new enemies in the more threatening Mythical Tower, culminating in the somewhat emotional 7th episode which was in my view the high point of the series. Some of the characters here receive interesting glimpses of characterization and there's hope that the story will continue to do things with them. And yet, by its end the show has devolved into a chaotic, ugly blend of clichés, yet more boring betrayals and often shaky dialogue whilst seeming to take itself far too seriously for the crap that it's giving you. It features a very weak and kind of ridiculous "battle against heaven" and unimaginative fights lacking the animational potency or enough unconventional features to be interesting.
The most frustrating aspect of the DRUAGA story is that none of the characters ever received as much investment and care as we could have hoped: At the end of the day they're just vocational "Climbers" who seem to do it without even needing an objective, apparently because there's so little else to do in their world. This is pretty aptly conveyed by the point at which Utu, carrying a wounded Fatina, angrily demands to know why they're putting themselves through all of this to follow Jil, and what his reason is for going on (out of the blue, after seeming perfectly fine with not having an objective this whole time). I could only put my head into my hands when Jil replied "because I'm a Climber", with both of his sidekicks seeming mightily impressed by his response and no longer questioning what the hell they're doing. There are a huge amount of characters all aiming to reach the top, but all this does is weaken the focus (that might have been used to make core characters more interesting) and muddy the waters as to who wants what, or most importantly why they want it.
At the end of the day the show just fails to get you to care enough about the characters given that their purpose, backstory and aims seem so empty and unexplored. The old crew are by the end of the season your typical auxiliaries who can't really participate in the end battle alongside Jil by dint of not being the "chosen ones", so they ended up pretty much spectating. The deaths of a few mostly forgettable side characters really fail to make things feel more serious, while lazy writing ensures that some characters don't even receive any worthy closure to their stories at all, and feel utterly pointless. Betrayals will also have as little effect on the characters as they do on you and we can't even relate to the characters because of how undeveloped they are, how ambiguous their blank faces are about their emotional states, and how little detail we have upon their motives when they make decisions which often don't seem logical. Female characters are mostly seen falling for male ones, being rescued or fighting supportively rather than independently so there's nothing refreshing there, while the 'chosen couple' is also very bland, given their dull personalities and almost universal lack of real bonding between them throughout either of the two seasons, with most of us inevitably having opted for Fatina over Kaaya.
What kept TToD - SoU alive is that it remained a pretty fun adventure, it was easily watchable and had a nice atmosphere almost entirely thanks to its good OP's and ED's - these are graced by fun songs that draw you into the world a bit more and wrap each episode in nostalgic, magical feelings. I'd imagine it's because of these feelings and the (albeit somewhat primitive) connections we established with Fatina, Utu, Melt and Coopa that we're all a little sad to leave the world of Uruk for good. Despite this, it just didn't manage to make its best characters more than fun sidekicks for the most part, or to make its story compelling enough given how unclear and shallow the reasons behind everything relating to the plot are. It suffers from the same weaknesses of its predecessor in the domain of animation (gaping lack of facial expressions) and just doesn't really have what it takes to be a superior anime. With attempts at humour that are passable but no real improvement on its predecessor, it's as if SoU tries to be lots of things but in the end doesn't really do anything that well.
4.5/10
Reviewer’s Rating: 4
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Mar 26, 2015
TToD takes the generically vacuous premise of an 80's arcade game and attempts to make a good story with it. They partially succeeded. The narrative (discounting the dangerously misleading but brilliantly satirical first episode) starts out very light and often humorously, making for easy, pleasant watching in bulk when you're hungover or otherwise unable to cope with fast dialogue, complicated plots and frenetic action. For the amount of characters included they did a fair job of establishing them in this chunk and making all of them passable in their own ways. It's in the second half that things start to get more serious, with a
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good amount of mysteries to be uncovered and some interesting turns that venture beyond the conventions of most aventure-fantasy stories.
There are very basic things which drag this show down, however. While episodes 2-6 do manage to have a fun, adventurey feel and establish the characters, they're not complimented by much memorable humour, which I feel is something they could have done with. The second half sees more in the way of depth and seriousness, but it doesn't accompany this with any good action, with the rare battle sequences feeling unfortunately boring, and the drama involved wasn't all that poignant. The latter defect probably wasn't helped at all by what another reviewer rightfully pointed out as the very emotionless face-animation which detracts from both the humour of the lighter scenes and the intensity of the more dramatic ones. The soundtrack is pretty decent but it didn't really manage to 'make' any scenes like it can in other shows, partially as there weren't enough tracks to begin with. The universe of TToD itself is supposed to be fairly generic, so you can't expect any saving graces from there like you would be able to with, say, Log Horizon.
All of this being said, I definitely like the way the storyline culminated in the last few episodes, setting us up for a conclusion of the adventure in Sword of URUK which I was quite eager to experience. TToD is no top tier must-watch anime, yet despite its defects it was an enjoyable watch and deserves its share of credit.
5/10
Reviewer’s Rating: 5
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Mar 26, 2015
Argevollen isn't as bad as people made it out to be after the first episodes rolled out. It was a rare and appealing experience to a military history fan in that the plot structure is often focused around the political and military dynamics of the conflict. Unlike in a lot of other anime, we're simultaneously privy to the strategic momentum of the war from both sides' perspectives, their internal divisions and agendas, as well as progress on the field involving a whole array of tactics and plans. This means that there's more to it than a screaming protagonist smashing bad guys. Unfortunately he just has
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to be there in the first place.
Indeed, to be blunt, none of the characters in this show were good. They had so much time in the quieter filler episodes to make things interesting, but the dialogue and artistic direction outside of action sequences really didn't hit the mark enough to create memorable character-based moments and foster genuine character development instead of empty sentences thrown back and forth between Tokimune and Jamie. There was a lot of time wasted on the numerous side-characters whom it's hard to really connect with except on a very basic level, such as the primordial charm of the two other pilots of the Independent 8th (though don't be expecting them to receive any development at all). This is especially true of Namie, who was simply a plot device from start to finish. Moreover, although it was supposed to be a story based in war, there's a distinct lack of tension and tribulation. Nobody ever seems to feel under pressure, everyone is always clean, laughing and comfy, dramatic emotional sequences are kept to a minimum, we're very rarely exposed to the grimmer sides of conflict, and throughout it feels like we're watching a bunch of kids pretending to fight a war for a school play rather than the real deal.
To be fair, however, it's an action and plot-driven show rather than one based around characters, and things were kept fairly interesting for me because apparently unlike a lot of other viewers I'm quite happy with a bread and butter of honest warfare between two sides and some background political/technological dynamics that keep you guessing how things will end up. There were sprinklings of good drama at odd points though perhaps not enough to warrant the wooden characters and attempted seriousness of the mood most of the time.
Essentially it's the SAO of mecha to me - very fun and watchable when it sticks to its guns (literally) and gives us plenty of high-class action, but usually falls short when it tries to be deep or create interesting characters.
5.5/10
Reviewer’s Rating: 5
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