This is basically an advertisement for Murphy's Irish Stout, and its incidents are just as the synopsis says.
However, it is an excellent ad which relays a strong atmosphere of a post futuristic megalopolis setting. The cyberpunk apocalyptic scenario along with its excellent design, superb choreography and smooth animation makes a very enticing experience for the eyes while an exciting music playing in the background. Production I.G. nailed it. And it ends it with an interesting unpredictable ending that serves like a cherry over a tasty cupcake.
It delivers an interesting view of a futuristic world. There's not much to say about this 19 years old ad
...
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Feb 27, 2016
NHK ni Youkoso!
(Anime)
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Welcome to the NHK is an unconventional slice of life drama that deals with hikikumori lifestyle. A hikikumori is a person who fails at socialization and therefore confines himself in his room/home. This anime follows a hikikumori named Satou while he strives to get out of this adverse lifestyle.
In the beginning of the pilot episode, we see Satou remembering the small incidents that took place before he became a hikikumori and could probably lead to his failure to socialize, while also living his usual life. NHK creates a fitting environment of a hikikumori's room with emphasis on details. The disastrous condition of his room and ... his appearance reflects his shabby lifestyle. His physical and psychological state is presented through silly behaviors and unorthodox imagination. Thus, this anime fleshes out Satou's characteristics and a hikikumori state simultaneously. This anime actually goes deep into the root of this problem, showing us exactly why it happens and how hard it is to be free of this problematic lifestyle through Satou's continuous failures. It also provides the proper solution to it by comparing many different solutions the characters try out. From the core to the solution, this anime explores the hikikumori problem deeply and views it from many angles. While the hikikumori lifestyle is emphasized on the most, Welcome to the NHK beholds almost every possible scenarios an unfortunate individual may face as well. It also works on other Japanese subcultures like NEET lifestyle, otaku attitude, lolicon, Internet suicide pacts, etc. It even emphasizes on the smallest of points of daily life. The anime also deals with psychological subjects like inferiority complex, suicidal tendency, borderline personality disorder, etc. The subtext of having someone or something to pass some blames to and believing in God's existence are two other daring and interesting themes this anime works with. The story of this anime is repetitive at how Satou gets himself entangled into problems in every arc. But, the variations of these issues and the different incidents taking place in each arc make it somewhat unpredictable and interesting. Despite the similar formula, all the arcs actually stand out. Seeing how thorough this anime uses the adversaries and their solutions to present the story, one is convinced to think that it's written after much research. The pacing in each story arc is decent as the plot of the arc progresses quite well in every episode. But, the overall progression is slow because after the end of each arc, there are very little change in the plot. And the anime doesn't really use it as a plus point unlike Tatami, so it comes off as a drawback. The transition between each arc is well handled. The keys to the climax in every arc come from the incidents before it. So, there is no inconsistency of the flow in between the arcs. It keeps getting better till the end. The story in a nutshell isn't particularly something magnificent, but very good nevertheless. The side stories are pretty good and very touching at times. The ending isn't anything slice of life cliché or typical. It is in fact quite unpredictable in a realistic manner. There's isn't much of a narration done in this anime and it's better this way as this is an anime where the characters' actions run the story. The MC acts as an unreliable narrator. This results in a proper exposure of his thoughts. His behavior is justified from a psychological point of view. He is a well-explored character and a "perfect window for the viewer" protagonist. In each arc, he develops little by little through different experiences. The development is slow and realistic. By the end of the series, he becomes a man a lot different from the beginning while also having his key traits present. The realistic problems that the characters face make them very relatable. One cannot but empathize to their sufferings. They develop considerably while trying to solve or live through these problems. The characters aren't pawns to the plot and can contradict it when it's adverse for them. They create a dimension of their own. Here the characters actually try and developed themselves. What helps the characters to be more realistic is the character design. The production team designed the characters differently without adding unrealistic visual traits. The body proportion is done right. There is no large eyes and the noses are visible. The illustration of the characters however is sometimes inconsistent and therefore the anime has derp faces every once in a while. The color palette in this anime is also realistic. It's not vibrant nor is it dark. The color tone is the same for both the characters and the environment. As a result, they harmonize very well. The choice of colors is great and nothing out of place or excessively eye catching, just how it should be. The background is detailed. The animation is usually decent, but has small problems like static jaws when talking, or unmoving camera, etc. Aside from these small, and sometimes not so obvious shortcomings, the choreography is done well with plausible movements of the characters. And the cinematography is also decent with well calculated view from different angles, well measured gradiants and proper lighting & shading. Overall, the visual department isn't extravagant and does what's necessary to assist the anime. The opening song of this anime has some of the most visually compelling animation job with free flowing motion, well choreographed movements, squeeze and squash effects :^) , indicative art style, juicy colors, which are coherent to the rhythm of the catchy and enjoyable song "Puzzle". The symphony is well played. The ending is something extraordinary, with overwhelming piano playing in the first few seconds and some compelling scenes; and then an interesting song of absurdity. The background musics in this anime are fitting and impressive. The voice acting at first was slightly out of place, but got better soon enough. I had no problem with it. The sound and screenplay are cohesive. The production value of this anime is great. Welcome to the NHK is a dark comedy with significant amount of realism. Entertainment is a very subjective matter. Personally, I really enjoyed its comedic aspects a lot although it didn't exactly hit the nail as I'm not really much into comedy. Some jokes managed to really crack me up real good and I laughed harder than I should have. It has its fair share of seriousness which is also quite entertaining. It had enticing moments, moments of suspense. It's a very enjoyable anime overall. This anime does its job very well. It's a purely psychological anime with slice of life aspects which is quite a dareful challenge of itself, but the anime executes it well. It's an excellent anime worth 9/10 in my opinion.
Reviewer’s Rating: 9
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Feb 25, 2016
Mushishi Zoku Shou
(Anime)
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Having written a short review on Mushishi with vague statements (it's in the first season of Mushishi), I feel like writing a full fledged analytical (self proclaimed :v ) review on the series as well. I'm not giving a spoiler warning because it's not really possible to spoil Mushishi like that. But, this review will contain plot points from within the series. So it's better if you've already watched it. This will take a really long time. Alright, let's get to the point.
What is mushi? To put it simply, they are the most primitive lifeforms. They're unlike any flora or fauna we're familiar with. But, ... they're not creatures from outside this world, rather they are the basic living beings. These entities are the closest to life itself. To be more precise, they derive directly from the essence of life, known as kouki. I'll give an idea of what 'kouki' is a bit later. But before that, let's take a moment to think about how brilliant the very idea of such existence is. I don't know about others, but this elegant idea produces deep respect for the series in me. That alone wouldn't amount to much if it wasn't deeply thought out. 'Kouki' is the essence of life. It can be said that kouki is life itself. Don't make mistake, life is different from physical organ. Organs and organisms are made of carbon, hydrogen, oxygen and nitrogen, while Kouki consists of rain/water and sunlight. I found this to be a metaphor. Most of us probably know that water as well as light are called life. This anime literally uses them as the source of life. The form of kouki is quite vague. It's mostly shown in a liquid form. This semi-physical substance is what provides life energy to the living beings. And mushi are the beings that originate directly from kouki, thus they're closest to life. As a result, they're also vague in existence and don't have particular physical distinction to categorize them. Thus, there isn't any particular taxonomy for these beings. But, as we can see in the anime, there are researches constantly being done as well as a collection of data on them. The concept of mushi is also explained through comparing them with other organisms. To put simply, the more primate the creatures are, the further they are from life. As mushi's existence is vague, people are divided into those who can see them and those who can't. The people who deals with mushi related incidents are called mushi-shi. There are more elements that the anime deals with, like koumiyaksu, second eyelids, mountain lords, etc. All these are explained in a very wonderful and attractive way. The explanation never created any hindrance to the story. It naturally comes off as a part of the story. Japan is a country with rich and interesting culture, traditions, etc. Japanese folklore is considerably vast. Mushi-shi explores these folk cultures, folk tales, traditions, etc through the concept of mushi and also explains them with it. That's something I would like to call 'theme/source rewrite'. I dunno if there's a specific name for this type of buildup since you can't look them up just that simply. Anyway, Mushishi does this job very well. I found almost every episode to have a theme from Japanese folk tales and traditions, and in each of them, Mushishi rebuilt those elements through the concept of mushi. This anime uses scientific ideas to solve many problems and explain many incidents, which I found to be quite amusing. Fantasy series tend to have very sloppy writing because of its fantasy genre. But, as we can see from the points above, Mushishi is not one of them. It is intelligently thought out. It is well rounded, well fleshed out and quite plausible. Mushishi presents the connection between man and nature. The message it carries is "Cure lies in the curse". Snake's venom is used for making its antidote. Extermination of snakes is uncalled for. This point has been addressed multiple times in Mushishi. The mushi interact with people in different ways. Sometimes they bring happiness. And sometimes they bring sufferings and sorrows. But, it's not their fault. They're just living their lives. This is a very valuable message this anime delivers. This is, of course not the only message provided by the anime. There are life lessons hidden in every episode. When a fiction works with so many themes, there's always a chance for loose ends, improperly tied plot points or untied points (Hunter x Hunter 2011). And even if it does tie them up, they may seem too sloppy, desperate and/or implausible (To Aru Majutsu no Index), in fact, may totally fail. Mushishi is something that doesn't fall into these inconsistencies. The elements are well connected and very well executed. The themes it works on are coherent. Before going for flaws, I'd like to inform/remind you that there are two basic types of flaws. Flaws that matter, and those that don't. Amongst those that do matter, there are major ones and minor ones. Having that cleared, let's shed lights on some points that seem like shortcomings. Firstly, there are, albeit very few, cases when the mushi related incidents are not explained as much as the others. Due to this, those occurrences seem a bit awkwardly unbelievable. Make no mistake. They do explain them, but it just that the explanations are a bit weak compared to others. This is a very minor drawback, which might not even appear to all. Next, we have a common complaint. Not explaining why Ginko is the only one seen in Western dress. Also, how there are modern instruments. The era of this anime is never really explained in the anime. But, iirc, it's set in an imaginary era. Well, as a fiction, we can allow a bit different world. So, yes, we can leave this issue as a part of its world building. Another issue I found is that it never explained why some people attract mushi so much. It's an issue that doesn't matter much, because it could be considered a random occurrence. It doesn't need explanation. An irrelevant side note: If you're thinking "what? This guy just gave a little solution for the problems too. What a fanboy!",then I'd say that I'm not audacious enough to dig deep to find problems but not do it for finding solutions. And yes, the fact that I'm a Mushishi fanboy also contributes. Well, one might complain that the history of mushi's arrival is avoided using 'time immemorial' excuse, but that would be a retarded complaint. Mushi are the closest beings to life, so their appearance could very well be older than us humans. That being said, this anime doesn't completely avoid history. There are old incidents and they're adequately explained. The world it built up is unique. The existence of the mushi has been effective on its world. We have people who makes a living dealing with them. They are mushi-shi. There are people who uses mushi in different ways. There are people who does business with mushi related objects. Some like to collect these things. The group of mushi-shi isn't monolithic. They have different points of view, mindsets and different ways to deal with mushi. That's what makes it more interesting. There is a place where many mushi related matters are recorded. There are stuffs about clans and all. Mushi don't only have these long term influences, they also have short term effects on different spheres of people's lives. Through these small effects, these small points are also addressed. We get a peek into the characters' lives. That is what the stories of this anime are about. The lives of the characters. Mushishi is an episodic show, meaning that a story is told in one episode each time and there isn't any particular connection between the episodes. So, if you're expecting an overarching and highly progressing plot in its story, this is not what you are looking for right now. But, if you wanna take a break from your daily action series, have a different experience, or simply relax, then Mushishi is something to look forward to. And as a person, that is highly likely to happen one time or another. This anime usually takes place in a village, or a town, or a mountain, forest, seacoast, or in the sea and sometimes even on the road. These handful of types of places contain the stories. So, each type of places are used multiple times in the anime. But, they aren't identical to each other. Each place is different from the other, even if a little. Which shows us how it's not written by a lazy person, but rather someone who puts some thoughts on what she works on. Due to its episodic nature, one might presume that all the episodes follow a single pattern. But, that isn't the case. Each episode is unique and different from each other. They don't follow any specific pattern or formula, so it's not repetitive. Thus, they're each a different experience and that makes it really interesting. Through its 46 episodes and 3 specials, it delivers 49 stories that are different from each other and interesting in their own ways. The stories are written wonderfully. There is no info dump to interfere and cause hindrances to the storyline. I've previously said that the stories don't have highly progressing plot, but that doesn't mean that the plot is stagnant. There is progression even if a little in almost all the episodes and that is more than enough for an episodic anime. This anime has a great balance of dialogues and actions. It knows when enough has been told and where to start showing, and vice versa. The transition from dialogues to action or action to dialogues, and sometimes the coexistence of both is masterfully handled. Another aspect that makes it well written is that this anime doesn't come up with retarded, baseless incidents to create climax or tension. Rather it's well thought out and reasonable at coming up with a climatic situation. The solution is also equally intelligent. That's what makes its stories excellently thought out. This anime doesn't resort to convenient storytelling. No sloppy writing. If you put each of its stories in a nutshell, some of them might not stand out as a masterpiece, but most of them will. More like almost all of them. It has some extremely high quality stories that can rival the best of the bests. They are top tier masterpiece stories. This anime is really comprised of compelling stories. But, what makes every episode of it a masterpiece is the excellent presentation and the narration. it gives us a feeling of listening to folktales told by Grandma in a small house in a rural area. It's a precious experience. And Mushishi thrives with this specialty. Mushishi's atmosphere is strong and impacting. It relays its atmosphere perfectly. You could really feel cold in winter and hot when it's hot summer in the anime. The suspense absorbs the viewers deeply. The ending of every episode is excellent. Most of them are bittersweet. Some endings are the bests I've seen in anime. They sometimes show you hopes that in the future, the characters may be happy. Sometimes they imply that they may not. Some says that there is no other choice. Each endings are unique. Nuff said. Mushishi's pacing in every episode is perfect and extremely coherent to the story telling method. Mushishi has some very well written twists and revelations. They're not well written in the way that 'it provides all the clues but you won't predict them before revealing'. No, Mushishi is not like that. You actually don't know anything before they tell you and you don't have any clue to the twist. But, when it's delivered, you will think, "Oh so that's how it's done!" Usually, the definition of a good twist or revelation to me is that it provides all clues but you still won't be able to predict it before it shows the twist/revelation. Mushishi is probably the one of the rarest fiction that excels in this aspect without following the definition. All these make Mushishi one of the best episodic experience, if not the best. As a show where the story begins, progresses and ends in a single episode, almost all the side don't appear in multiple episodes. This leaves a risk of not having properly fleshed out characters. There are risks of not having a cast to care about. But, in all honesty, Mushishi didn't fail at fleshing the characters out. And in each episode, you will root for the characters. At least I did. All the significant characters had proper amount of traits. This is an anime about normal people and Mushishi perfectly pulled that out. As someone who lived in a village, I could relate to them and share their feelings. That's the most important thing in Mushishi. The difference between each character is small but realistic and adequate. The main character of this anime is a mushi-shi named Ginko. It follows his adventure as a mushi-shi. He goes around helping people with different mushi related matters. But, that doesn't mean that he's just a tool for the adventure. His past is well explored. His characteristic is fleshed out. He doesn't like to kill those that are alive. But, it doesn't mean that he won't do it if it's necessary. He would stain his hands to solve problems if the situation requires it. He wouldn't want to do so at first, but he still convince himself to do what's necessary. Here's a conversation from the anime that shows his resolve- Mushi: Why are you going to kill us? Ginko: Because you consume human children. Mushi: But it's not our fault. Ginko: It's not our fault either. But we're stronger. So you will die along with your seed. Then he destroys all mushi. Just kidding. But, yes. He's not your goody justice guy either. He'd do what needs to be done. But, he would definitely not resort to killing if there's any other way. Ginko has other flaws as well. He can make mistakes, he acts on instant impulses. He gets annoyed at others. Furthermore, he's much more human than one would expect. His character development is also well done. Not just Ginko, but all the mushi-shi have different and interesting personalities. Thus, the group of mushi-shi is not monolithic. Despite the short span, the characters in Mushishi is delivered wonderfully. Their wishes, goals, point of view, all these have been well executed. Some of them even develop in this short period and the development is really natural. Let's have a look at the visuals. Mushi are designed excellently, with superfluous details. The animation work on the mushi is carefully done, which makes them come to life. The art style used for designing the characters is artistic, realistic and lovable. The character design for most side characters in Mushi-shi is actually quite similar, but they're never identical. Although little, there are differences in the design of each characters. That much difference is adequate in my opinion because you can't expect all the village people to be totally different from each other. The main character, Ginko is excellently designed as well. The anime is not a piece of art, rather a huge collection of tremendous amount of art pieces. It feels like it uses moving artworks as its background. Each frame is a beautiful piece of art. The effects are masterfully used and colors are wisely chosen. The animation makes these amazing sceneries lively. The slow and subtle animation deepens the tone of the moments and gets us completely absorbed into the scenario. The art of the characters and the environment are a bit different in quality, but they blend in wonderfully. This is accompanied by excellent background music played by Masuda Toshio, which blend in perfectly with the atmosphere, intensify the moods and move us subconsciously with their captivating rhythms. They don't distract the viewers, but rather engage them more into the anime. Both of the opening songs are extremely refreshing and enjoyable. Just listening to them removes your weariness. The ending themes are different for each episode with different sceneries presented with them. They are relaxing and possessive. The voice acting is realistic and amusing. The narration is excellent. The sounds that the mushi make, along with the visuals are ecstatically wonderful. The environmental sounds are equally compelling. The natural sounds alone can form the sceneries. The screenplay and audio are carefully measured and synched. This anime has one of the best production job ever. All these make Mushishi one of the most relaxing and refreshing experience, if not the most. It was intriguing, at times enticing, sometimes funny. Then at times depressing or melancholic. But, even in the presence of all these emotions, one feeling is always there. It is a deep, absorbing, overwhelming feeling, which in one word, is 'awe'. A feeling of respect combined with wonder. It's atmosphere is perfectly relayed. It's aesthetics caused me euphoria. It provided me with many forms of enjoyment mixed up magnificently. Now, let's see what Mushishi tries to do. To be frank, it's quite difficult to ascertain what it aims for. Not because it has no goal, but because it's so naturally presented that it never seemed to be desperate to achieve anything. But, one thing is for sure. It doesn't aim for your cheesy and shallow entertainment with brain dead humor. It doesn't aim for an attractive shonen battle. What it tries to do is to deliver a genuinely well written, well executed mature experience. And it succeeds greatly. It tries to be a soothing experience and turns out to be the most soothing anime. It's tries to deliver its message wrapped up with an excellently fleshed out elements. And we get from it elements that are some of the bests of fantasy. It tries to cover rural people's lives, Japanese folklores, connection between man and nature with its elements. It does the job as good as possible. Despite all the details and depth, Mushishi manages to be a simple show, which is another one of its achievements. It is in no way pretentious. It's an elegant form of art and pure with its context. It's an unique experience. Mushishi couldn't have been better. As far as perfection goes, this is as close as it gets. 9.7/10. I just love this show.
Reviewer’s Rating: 10
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Feb 21, 2016 Recommended
"Cure lies in the curse"
With this simple, yet deep message as the core theme, the masterpiece named Mushi-shi is presented to us as the purest form of entertainment. A lot of pieces of art and literature try too hard to get their message across through a good concept, and at times fail to do so. However, Mushi-shi delivers its message perfectly, accompanied by an excellent and perfect concept, without ever seeming desperate. Mushi, the entities closest to life itself, is one of the most brilliant fantasy, supernatural elements I've come across. The wonderful design and subtle motion really bring these existences to life. As neat as ... it is, this anime doesn't rely on its fantasy genre to cover for sloppy writing and polishes the elements well enough to be plausible all by itself. It is detailed, well fleshed out and its field is widely spread. As mushi are involved in different spheres of the people's lives, we get a peek into and observe these various parts of life. The phenomenon concerning the mushi and how to deal with these occurrences is explained extremely well. Nothing in it ever felt forced, but simply natural. While the element is perfect by itself and coherent to the theme of this anime, that's not all that Mushi-shi offers. Mushi-shi presents, explores and explains different Japanese folk tales, traditions, custom, legends, in short, Japanese folklores through its own unique concept. No other attempts on this has been better, as far as I've seen. Mushi-shi has many other original concepts that are unique to Mushi-shi only. These elements are nicely explained as well. The stories usually revolve around villages, mountains, towns and forests. With the touch of the brilliant art, these places are masterfully presented. The rivers, houses, household materials, fallen leaves, all the little details make the places seem real. And despite the stories occurring surrounding these areas, none of the setups are completely identical to each other. This show is episodic in nature. Although every story is mushi related, one can't really find a specific pattern or formula of the series of incidents. In other words, this anime is not repetitive and each episode provides us with new experience. While the stories are unique, they are also incredibly well written. As I always say, "Mushi-shi is the compilation of 49 masterpieces (26 episodes+20 episodes+3 specials)". Every episode of Mushi-shi is a life lesson and more or less a masterpiece. From the beginning to the end, every episode held on to its atmosphere, never losing a bit to fatigue. The stories are told wonderfully. The small details are highlighted carefully through conversations and actions, never falling to the level of information dump, or anything close to that. It knows when enough has been told and where to start showing. The balanced transition of dialogues and actions is excellent. The narration is done perfectly, not too much, nor too less and perfectly timed. The narrator's voice blends in nicely with the storyline, giving us an experience equivalent to hearing stories told by Grandma while sitting in a room of a small house in the rural area. This is a priceless experience. All the episodes have excellent and satisfying ends, some of which are in my top five anime ending list as "some Mushi-shi endings". Being a purely episodic show, other than the MC, Ginko and Dr. Adashino, the characters rarely appear in more than one episode. While that might seem quite a disadvantage, Mushi-shi used it to its advantage, which we get to see later on. Within this very short span, Mushi-shi fleshed out the characters wonderfully. As someone who has lived a long time in a village, I could understand and relate to the characters and was also able to discern the small yet adequate amount of differences among them. I grew care for the characters and that's what matters the most, since Mushi-shi is about their lives. Some of them even develop in this short period of screentime in a plausible way. The main character, Ginko is a brilliant character. What I'm about to write next didn't derive from myself but I totally agree with it. And his/her presentation is better than what I can come up with, so why not! It goes somewhat like this: "Ginko is not the last piece of the puzzle. He's the one who will have you put together the pieces and finish the puzzle. Ginko is you". Well, it's been a long time since I saw that statement and I only read it once so I probably didn't use the exact words he did, but this is more or less it. Ginko's past is explored enough and he had superfluous character development. Also, he isn't inhumanly perfect. He makes mistakes, he acts on instant impulses. His characteristics has its own distinctive ornaments. In fact, it is a wonder how the personalities of the mushi-shi(s) are so different from each others', their methods of dealing with the mushi phenomenons included. Their views and outlooks on matters are also varied. This shows how the group of mushi-shi(s) is not monolithic. Actually, every important character in this anime is interesting in their own ways. Some characters' behavior may seem a bit overdone or weird, but they're always in a realistic limit and most of the time justified through the concept of mushi. I may forget their names, looks and actions, but their essence will always remain strong in my mind. The character design for most side characters in Mushi-shi is actually quite similar, but they're never identical. Although little, there are differences in the design of each characters. That much difference is adequate in my opinion because you can't expect all the village people to be totally different from each other. It's artistic and quite realistic as well. The anime is not a piece of art, rather a huge collection of tremendous amount of art pieces. "It literally uses moving artworks as its background", is what someone I know said and I don't see any reason to disagree. The sceneries are the most beautiful I've seen in anime or anywhere else in entertainment industry. With masterful use of effects and wise choice of colors, each frame is a valuable piece of natural portrait. The excellent animation job does everything necessary to bring these sceneries to life. The slow and subtle animation deepens the tone of the moments and gets us completely absorbed into the scenario. This is accompanied by excellent background music played by Masuda Toshio, which blend in perfectly with the atmosphere, intensify the moods and move us subconsciously with their captivating rhythms. They don't distract the viewers, but rather engage them more into the anime. Both of the opening songs are extremely refreshing and enjoyable. Just listening to them removes your weariness. The ending themes are different for each episode with different sceneries presented with them. They are relaxing and possessive. The voice acting is realistic and amusing. The sounds that the mushi make, along with the visuals are ecstatically wonderful. The environmental sounds are equally compelling. The natural sounds alone can form the sceneries. The screenplay and audio are carefully measured and synched. The production of this anime is perfect in every way. Well, nothing made by man is absolutely perfect. Even the definition of 'perfection' is imperfect. But, Mushi-shi has no flaw worth mentioning. There are very few shortcomings that cannot be pointed without nitpicking. Albeit rare, there are cases when the mushi related incidents are not as explained as the others. Due to this, those occurrences seem a bit implausible and absurd. But they're far from what one can call 'sloppy writing'. Some people do complain about Ginko's attire being the only Western one, but that's not at all the point. However, it is not really illogical, given Ginko is a traveling mushi-shi. It's not really impossible that he's one of the few people who was influenced by Western fashion considering the era. And it's certainly not surprising that amongst the very few of them, Ginko is the only one seen in this anime. However, the weird thing is that no one is curious or surprised to see Ginko in such odd dresses. Again, that's not an issue for this anime. Mushi-shi is one of the most relaxing and refreshing experience, if not the most. It was intriguing, at times enticing, sometimes funny. Then at times depressing or melancholic. But, even in the presence of all these emotions, one feeling is always there. It is a deep, absorbing, overwhelming feeling, which in one word, is 'awe'. A feeling of respect combined with wonder. Mushi-shi is one of those few series that succeeded to convey the atmosphere perfectly. You could feel the environment relayed in each season. It's aesthetics caused me euphoria. It provided me with many forms of enjoyment mixed up magnificently. Mushi-shi couldn't have been made any better. It's an unique experience that cannot be compared. So far, this is the best anime I've seen and nothing came close to its level. It's a masterpiece worth 9.75 out of 10 in my current rating system, which is the highest score I've given so far. As 'perfection' goes, this is as close as it gets. Mushi-shi is highly recommended for anyone. It's my second most favorite series and my most respected work of fiction.
Reviewer’s Rating: 10
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Feb 14, 2016
Yojouhan Shinwa Taikei
(Anime)
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Yojouhan Shinwa Taikei aka The Tatami Galaxy is an unique and very interesting anime. It perfectly delivers a nice, useful message related to Buddhism, wrapped up in a campus romcom setting. The delivery of the message was nice and clean. This anime works with two themes that I find very amusing. The first one, the timeline concept is used well in this anime. It may not make sense from a scientific point of view, but that was never the point of this anime. Another theme, depression for failure in socialization, was also executed perfectly. I like both of the ideas, but never thought that they
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could be used together, let alone colliding with the message it delivers. But, the anime pulled them together so well that I believe there cannot be a greater mixture. It made me feel like these themes were made for each other. And this job could not have been done better. Through this crazy, yet careful mixture, the anime delivers the world of the main character. The room and boarding house he lives in, the places he goes to, the ramen he eats, all these were magnificently fleshed out. It perfectly detailed the campus life setup. There was hardly anything missing. The whole setting was detailed through different timelines. But, then again, as an absurdic series, it has its own shortcomings. A lot of things make little sense. But, that's really not the point, as I've mentioned before. This anime has many hidden messages, symbolism, metaphors and references throughout the series, and they're perfectly presented, nicely merged with the story. The anime didn't just perfectly do what it's supposed to but also surpassed its limits.
The same goes for its storyline. The amusing story though, wouldn't have been anything close to what it is, if it weren't for the excellent presentation. The unique narrative is so majestic that it turns something that are destined to be info dumps into an attractive part of the story. The story, by itself is just very good and really interesting. It is how the anime presented it, is what turned it into a nigh masterpiece storyline. The story telling method perfectly described anything or any place that were greatly detailed, in a short time and a fascinating manner. The story used the little threads of events, weaved them and ended up with a piece of brilliance. The anime ended in an extremely good way. Not only did it perfectly pulled out the smallest of details in the end, but also left a huge impact. The story of this anime couldn't have been better in any way. The characters were introduced excellently. They may seem slightly one dimensional at first, but as time passes, the flat characters turn out to get more and more real, relatable and more multidimensional. That, of course, is a part of the anime's objective. And I, the viewer started growing on these characters. The MC, who is addressed as "Watashi" (I/me/myself) or "You" (by others), is a very interesting character. His characteristics are very well fleshed out. And he had extremely good character development. The best thing about him though is relatability. If anyone claims that he didn't have a single common thing with him, I'd believe that he's lying. Though his actions may be a bit too exaggerated, that doesn't change the fact that he's one of the most human-like realistic and relatable characters in anime. He has problems in life and flaws as a human, and he suffers and gets depressed about it. The whole story is told from his perspective, so his personality is presented perfectly. The rest of the cast, although not as much as the MC, are well fleshed out as well. They weren't copious or bland in any way. The screentime distribution is great. The character interaction and relationships are wonderful. The visuals of this anime is very unique. It uses an abstract art style. I loved the minimalistic art, but sometimes they were a bit too experimental for me. The character design is excellent. The environment was well designed. The abstract use of colors was a cream for my eyes. The animation and filming are masterfully done, but similar to the art, it sometimes can be too experimental for me. But, this department did the best possible work for the anime. The sound system was really good. The OP is an enjoyable theme, which is meaningful as well. The ED was euphoric. I don't see/hear anything to complain about the environmental sounds. The background musics are fantastic and really goes well with the mood and flow of the story. The voice acting and narration is perfect and couldn't have been better. Overall, this anime has an excellent production value. Some might and do find it hard to follow for its high speed monologues, but that's what made this anime charming in my opinion. It was fun. it was heart warming. It had its lugubrious aspects. Overall, it was a really interesting experience. A highly entertaining show. This anime overall is worth 9.15 out of 10, in my opinion and that's pretty close to a masterpiece. The anime is quite polarizing. It's definitely not everyone's cup of tea. Many might even hate it. Well, I'd suggest watching through the first two episodes as a trial, although the anime gets a lot better after the third episode. But, if you don't think this is cut out for you after two episodes, you might not find it very enjoyable, and you may drop it whenever you wish. After all, you don't look for fishes in trees. It's an excellent piece of artistic film. And it's worth rewatching many times. The entertainment or intriguing amusement doesn't cease even if it's a rewatch. In the end, I do call shit on it in different communities for fun, but hey! "That's how I show my love".
Reviewer’s Rating: 9
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Jan 28, 2016 Recommended
Planetes is one of the few anime I've come across that are worth calling 'masterpiece'. The main theme, the main idea of this anime is very unique and significant. It mainly highlighted the importance and magnitude of something one wouldn't notice despite the subject being very important. Hat's off to that. After watching a few episodes, I expected that this anime would have a great world buildup. But the works it did on building up the world surpassed all my expectations. The overarching focus on everything starting from the matters surrounding the main theme to the situation of the world, wars, etc. was excellently built
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and thought out. It touched and worked magnificently on themes I never anticipated. The realistic system buildup and well handled technology progression once again reminded me why I love hard sci-fi so much. It didn't leave out the smallest of details and went through the apotheosis of space drama setup. It delivered uncountable informations regarding the whole franchise perfectly. What I particularly love about this anime is that there is no info dump to interfere with the flow of the story. Rather, the informations were provided slowly, subtly and as a part of the story. The story itself is told wonderfully. I expected it to be an episodic anime with a very good story each episode, but what I got is a lot more. This is at the same time, a very well written love story, excellent drama (definitely not melodrama) and an extremely touching and humane story of life. This is a story full of realism. The anime starts off with a good pacing slowly getting us introduced to the characters. It slowly and carefully starts getting more and more serious and around the end, the story is at its peak. Then we get a very satisfying ending. The story doesn't only aim big, it also provides small parts of life all the time throughout the series. It has one of the best propose scene I've seen. A compelling point of this anime is the fact that it doesn't leave any event or incident incomplete, aside from the last part where it was definitely a better choice to do so. If this is not well written, I don't know what is. It's a story about life. The lives of the characters and their struggle through them. The cast is comprised of interesting characters with different characteristics. All of them are more or less well written. Some characters were quite typical, but they are far from being bland or one dimensional. It's also an excellent example of the anime's realism. There certainly are many types of characters in the anime and it does a great job building them up. Although one of the main characters had a bit too superficial ideal, that character was also quite well written. The character development was a masterful job. It didn't go for a huge unnecessary development of the cast, but rather did the job as much as needed. The best part about its characters is the character interaction which is one of the best in anime. The steadily developing relationship between the characters grew on me. The anime successfully made me sympathize with the characters.
Excellent plot, well written story and a grand set of characters, all these are accompanied by superb visuals. The art of this anime really gained my favor. The artstyle was realistic. The lines are drawn well. The character design is excellent. Loved the realistic and brilliant use of colors. I just feel like there is a slight lack of effects on the characters. But, it wasn't a problem once I got used to it. It wasn't a considerable problem to begin with. The environment design is perfect. The graphics work other than on the characters is amazing. The anime provided a good amount of aesthetics. Although it barely caught up to my expectations, I did expect way too much. The careful job of the views from different angles is magnificent. There wasn't any particular color theme of this anime, but that's better. The animation is very good. The great production job is not only limited to the visuals, the audio department is also excellent. The music of this anime was great. The opening song is fantastic! I loved it both as a part of the anime and a standalone music. I loved how they provided many important information through the opening theme. The tension moment was well handled in this music and it let the potential loose into kinetic at the right moment. The instruments are well played. I couldn't bring myself to skip it for once. The ED was also a very enjoyable piece. The BGMs used in this anime was great and perfectly blended in. The voice acting of both sub and dub was great. The environmental sounds were okay. The directing was good. Overall, it's production value supported the other aspects almost perfectly and was nearly a masterpiece. All these together created a fine piece of entertainment. It was thoroughly enjoyable. But, there are some parts, especially around the end, that touched my hypothalamus deeply. Overall, there was a bit of something about the execution that felt slightly off at parts, but the anime still remained a masterpiece. 9.2 out of 10 is a justifying score, in my opinion. But, since decimals are not allowed, I'll give it a 10/10 because a 9 doesn't do justice to a masterpiece.
Reviewer’s Rating: 10
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