Apr 4, 2018
All in all a solid 7/10 show for me.
The show did drop its ball here and there with certain depictions of characters through its writing, visual design, or with the lack of explaining of certain events. Such as characters acting very differently all of a sudden halfway through the series, certain character designs not fitting well with the persona of certain characters, or events just being implied without being fully fleshed out even though its integral to some conflicts between characters.
However all in all the most important part to the whole series was conveyed well. A satisfying emotional tale of a young character dealing
...
with grief and PTSD after a period of intense war, everything else was just supportive to this idea IMO. It touched upon how hard it is too adjust to civilian life that most shows don't really expand on for soldiers coming home from war. They really went all out with Violet development where they made me initially annoyed with Violet's beginning to fully empathizing with her by the end. (Which is the normal reaction I guess in hindsight to empathizing with people coming back from trauma, that failure/struggle to empathize and understand. Even getting annoyed sometimes?)
Animation was fantastic throughout, but I think I rather prefer simpler character designs with more expressive animation versus detailed designs with limited movements after experiencing Kyoto Animation go all out in the character designs. Film Composition did get tad annoying with the over-usage of depth of field effects, and the old photo film effect did make majority of the colors look desaturated and washed out then it should have intended.
The visual development artists definitely went all out for this series, since I was initially worried Kyoto Animation might not be able to do location designs outside of modern day Japan, but they nailed it. World building was fantastic not just visually, such as creating realistic but unique fantastic locations like the city of Leiden which combined Victorian and Mediterranean aesthetics, but also narratively with the nations of Flugel and Drossel, and its love letter tying with the peace effort after the war.
They satisfyingly end with very few loose ends, ending with a solid watching experience!
Reviewer’s Rating: 7
What did you think of this review?
Nice
0
Love it
0
Funny
0
Confusing
0
Well-written
0
Creative
0Show all