This review contains spoilers for the TV series and the 1997 Movie End of Evangelion.
Evangelion, if an experienced anime fan hear this name alone, they'll probably be reminded instantly to the two great dichotomous opinions in which, one side will praised it as a classical masterpiece while as for the others, will hate it as well as claiming for it to be one of the worst and most overrated anime ever made. Thankfully enough, I was on quite minority of these two polarizing opinions. I have some elements from the franchise in which I liked, as well as some in which I despised. I think
...
that would made me as a minority in which belongs to none of these groupies. Based upon the 30 anime critics votes on shinchosha, Neon Genesis Evangelion has been placed on #1, with the total of 14 votes on it. But as an audience whose also tend to criticise the work of fiction that I consume, I have to disagree.
For me, Neon Genesis Evangelion plot is akin to the void of creativity. Yes, as I've stated before, I have received that bit of information about the franchise in which it's a character driven story, but I have never once expected that the plot progressions to be so tedious that it almost sleep inducing. It's an irony if these statement has to be said for an fiction in which includes action, for the purpose of actions is to induce an adrenaline rush to the audiences. Almost every angels fights can be simplified to be look like this scenario:
1. An Angel appeared, there will be someone who said the probability chance of winning is 0.01% or something extremely low.
2. The teens will get into the robot, fought the angels without much briefing, went overwhelmed, and took a temporary retreat.
3. They changed the strategies on their headquarters, and took plan b.
4. They went with the plan, and succeeded. Either it be a flawless victory or just simply unit 01 went berserk, and destroyed the angel.
Never once there's serious injuries within every fights, let alone casualties. The constant abuse of extremely low success rate information in conjunction with the almost nonexistent physical damage within the pilots is more than just breaking one's suspension of disbelief. It's predictablility can only be rivaled by Revolutionary Girl Utena, in which is safe to say that the work have recycled the same scenes during the duels. It went even more ridiculous during one of the last fight that there's a huge explosions that could easily nuked a complex of skyscrapers but Rei Ayanami, the pilot of the said robot who have sustained the fatal damage, only received minor injuries. Predictable-ness is the most hated elements that I have to experience in the work of fiction, moreso than deus ex-machina , asspulls, or unreasonable shock factor. The same tricks won't work for more than three times, moreover it it was abused ad nauseum. Keep in mind that I also have a severe disdain for the mundane and chore aspects of life, as my personality type belongs to the one who craves for the unknown sensation. But still, I've tried really hard to just embrace it, and I could appreciate many slice of life such as K-ON, Aria, Honey and Clover, and many others, which is the proof that I too can feel the "beauty in the mundane". But this was a sensation I unable to found on Neon Genesis Evangelion. The notion of life-risking task of destroying the angels to ensure humanity's civilization is too grand to be called those of a mundane. However, it's really mundane if seen from the audience perspective, all thanks to what I said before. One of my favorite works Dies Irae have its share amount of predictability but in the end, it gave a satisfying reason as well as how it correlates with the subtext of it, but I found no underlying reason for the fights to be so predictable and tedious. The plot twist that's explained on the backstory wasn't that phenomenal either. As for why this SEELE organizations wanted to converge the whose earth into a single entity, it's never been explored further. They just wanted it because they thought that it's good like a group of an antisocial people they are. And yes, it's an oxymoron and rather slightly contradictory and really unsatisfactory as well.
Tis really unfair to speak about Neon Genesis Evangelion without giving a proper discourse about the infamous protagonist Shinji Ikari. Shinji is the main underlying cause Neon Genesis Evangelion has garnered so much praise as well as hate. Many of the haters despised him due to the fact that he was too much of a cowardly whiner who doesn't want to get into the robot in their eyes, while the fans found his demeanor to be relatable, as Shinji has to deal with a parental issues in which his perfectionist father Gendo Ikari objectified him with a little to none sense of fatherly kindness. What's worse is that Shinji have witnessed the incident in which took her mother's life due to Gendo's experiments as a kid. One would've have a hard time trusting such person. My own opinion towards Shinji is actually rather positive. I found his demeanor to be believable, but have I myself been put on his position, I'd certainly piloting the robot without complaining, despite my hatred towards my supposed father Gendo. I do realized if piloting a robot against a powerful alien creature was by no means an easy task, but I also do realized as well that if I don't get to the robot, then the world, all the human civilization that has been built since the stone age until that year of 2015, would be clobbered into oblivion. If I get into the robot, I still have a chance to be the humanity's last glimmer of hope and might came out alive. Whereof I choose not to, all that hope is lost, I will experienced a certain death. It's quite obvious to me the choice I have to pick in between the 0.01% chance to survive and the 0% one. But Shinji has his own reasons to not pilot the robot, in which albeit I have to disagree with him, I respect it. Shinji could care less about others necessities, and his thoughts process is so internalized that he could only thought of a gentle, parental care and neglects almost every other issues of life in which led to what the show called as "The Hedgehogs Dilemma". The Hedgehog's dilemma the term in which rather frequently referenced in the anime to describe Shinji's state. Much alike Hedgehog's dilemma, Shinji craved for a soothing warmth of kindness and care, but his disobedience attitude as shown to his frequent rejection to ride the robot as well as how he made the decision of destroying the 4th angel despite the robot critical state instead of retreating as commanded by his superior Misato Katsuragi, is akin to the hedgehog's spikes, in which distanced him from the other person in his relationship and therefore, the warmth he wished for. I found that almost every aspects of Shinji's character to be believable, and that he himself is not presented as a boring protagonist. His internal struggles are showed frame-to-frame throughout the series that it's most definitely Neon Genesis Evangelion charm to it's fans. The final growth of his character is great, in which basically he decided to throw away all of his 'spikes' by took the decision to care about others necessities, as well as loving himself more in result. These moments, for those who relate on a personal level to Shinji since the beginning of the show, might've struck them so hard it speaks directly to them as the solution of their own biggest life issues that it's almost autobiographically written by a certain someone who have experienced such issues, and have win against his inner conflicts by removing his "spikes".
However, despite my heavy praise towards Shinji's character writing, I have one issue with him, and that is about his relationship with Kaworu Nagisa. So Kaworu is supposed to be a person that's being sent in order to replace a certain someone in which are too mentally damaged to pilot the robot. He appeared way late on around episode 23, and have stated that he might have been born just to met with Shinji, care to him, and showed it by some bit of gentleness. However, in episode 24, it's been revealed that he's actually the last angel Shinji has to slay, and that he controlled unit 02 as his defense in order to get to the central dogma, achieving his purpose as an angel. Shinji have a huge conflict whether he has to kill Kaworu or not, and it has around 1 minute of still image alone for these scene accompanied with classical music piece being played, in order to emphasize his inner conflicts. I found this conflicts to be unreasonble. As a person have rejected all the people he know and deemed them to be an non-understanding nuisances, he should've developed a paranoia in which he won't trust anyone so easily anymore. However, he developed these trust to Kaworu almost right instant the moment Kaworu stated he was born to met him and shares room with him, in which can be said it's pretty much less than a week. Kaworu's appearance himself is pretty dubious, as he have an unusually red eye, in which none other of the casts possess with the exception of Rei Ayanami, in which demeanor herself was mysterious and by that time, has been proven than she's a clone of her mother spliced with some gene of the angel's progenitor. The fact that Shinji never become suspicious with Kaworu, and trusted him in such a short time, while even rejected Misato's love in which akin to a boss love to their employers love that's been there for longer, bugs me a lot. But despite these minor issues of mine, I still think he's a great character in which carried the shows as well as ithe whole Hedgehog dilemma thing.
Rei Ayanami is another interesting main character. One of the point of her characterization is that she is supposed to be how the writer thinks of how a "kuudere", an anime tropes anime fans often praised and think as an ideal wife, looks like with a justification. The writer apparently believes that such thing doesn't exists and if it is, they're just an emotionless clone, unable to breed?. But still in the end, despite being a clone, Rei also develops, proving that she still retain some of her human senses and that even clones would at times stopped being such archetypes. Rei, due to her unfamiliarity with the many common sense, just accepted the given fact that she's a robot pilot who have to fight against the angels. In which in return, she gained the warmth Shinji craved for, despite not actually demanding for it. This also make growth of her affection towards Gendo as a good fatherly figure, in which the reason Rei got angry when Shinji outright stated he hated his father during some scene and slapped him. Her development with Shinji is also nice. However, her development in Neon Genesis Evangelion is rather unsatisfactory is her last scene is where he helped Shinji a bit in his fight with Kaworu, proving that she also has an AT Field like every other angels, and that's it. She only appeared again in the last 2 episodes in which basically the narrative summary of the characters conflicts throughout the prior 24 episodes and Shinji's finale.
I really wanted to skip this part if I can but due to the fact that she has many fans around the anime community and that she's also one of the main character as well, here I am, I have to speak out about my opinion towards Asuka Langley Soryu, in which name I haven't spoken up until this moment. I've done a lot of things in order to add to Asuka's hate train, whether it be ranting everywhere on the anime forums, memeing her name, and many others. Now it's time to finish this once and for all. Asuka, in a single line, can be described as a character in which purpose just like Rei, but for "tsundere", another trope which garnered a lot of fan within the anime community. In simple, Asuka is an arrogant, incompetent, and thinks that she's better than other pilots. These traits alone is enough to made me despised her to the point that if I have met someone as such in my life, I'll have a deadwish for her. She never have the ability to solo even one angel, so please, refrain from calling her talented, because she's not. In addition, removing her from the franchise will not hinders the plot progressions, because Shinji will still be able to solo all the angels via unit-01 berserk button. Most of the Asuka's fan will call "realistic or relatable" in defense of her. Some will also mentioned her justification of these obnoxious attitude in which is her backstory. But I have to say right here, right now, thar such person doesn't deserve sympathy in the slightest. If one have mentioned Asuka to be "realistic", have people imagined what Asuka is in our very real life? An arrogant, insecure person who wanted people to accept her superiority while in fact is an incompetent loser, I can't think more better description to suits a group of person we refer as Feminazi/SJW/Alt-right, in which they're all only loved and sympathized by those who belongs to their own group. Interestingly enough, they're most likely to also have a parental issue as well, but still many people have the opinion that they're actually a cancer, scum of the community. So if one said that they relate to Asuka, sorry, bit I already have a bad image of what you looks like in real life. And moreover, if you stated that you hated feminazi/SJW/alt-right and also a huge fan of Asuka, I call hypocrisy. Lastly, my favorite Asuka moment in Neon Genesis Evangelion is the moment when she got mentally attacked by the angels within the space. The moment she screamed in agony and how the sound wave based attack that sounds of "Hallelujah!" made it looks loke as if she's a devil in which being exorcised by an angel (wow, I made a pun). His relationship with Shinji is just like what you're expected, which is they can barely get along well. Asuka herself is also a hedgehog's dilemma carrier afterall. Unrelated, I think that Anno is rather uncreative in creating a diverse backstory because the two characters that steal the most performance has a nearly identical past, in which is father negligence and objectification accompanied with death of mother. She's a nicely written character, but meant not to be sympathized moreover related.
My favorite character of the show, Misato Katsuragi, served as the commander of the teen robot pilots. She's caring, but values discipline much to Shinji's disdain. Shinji was unable to realized her love due to the fact that she delivers it not in the way he wanted to. His relationship with the teen pilot is akin to those of seniors/boss to juniors/employers, in which I found her to possess the most likable traits. However, she is not a woman without issues. She's (again) losing one of his parents due to research in which happens years prior to the events of the story and thus, sought after a fatherly figure to cope with her loneliness. She tried it by dating a guy called Kaji Ryoji, but ended up having broke up some time after they have love together. I like her because despite being disciplined, she's really kind and caring, the trait every main character of Neon Genesis Evangelion craved for, yet having issues to get one.
Gendo Ikari is also necessary to be shortly discussed about, since he's the father of the protagonist. I found that it's rather poorly explored on why Gendo have little to none sense of caring towards his very own son, Shinji Ikari. His reasoning as a NERV supreme leader for instrumentality is more justifiable that seele's reason of instrumentality, in which that he wanted to be with his wife Yui Ikari out of the grasp of the SEELE.
The End of Evangelion is a movie in which made 2 years after the making of the TV series to remake the last two episodes due to the originals are made in lack of budgets and time. For the movie, I found that Rei's finale to be satisfying. She finally made her own deicision after seeing the big picture from all the sides, unbiased to her felt of father towards Gendo nor her sympathy towards Shinji, to enact the Instrumentality Project and let Shinji decided whether such world was an ideal world he wished for, or not. After receiving a dying kiss from Misato, Shinji finally gains the courage to get in the robot and thus begans the instrumentality. Based on what he wished for, it's seemingly will be an ideal world for him, where every human being is a single entity so that everyone could understand and therefore caring to him. But after what Rei suggest, Shinji finally realized that things aren't supposed to be happening the way that be. Humans socializes. Even when sometimes you get hurt by what people said, it's still better, more beautiful than if one not socialize at all. In fact, you are also shaped by how the way the society views you (the theory of collective consciousness). It's a great theme being tackled, but at this point it's basically pointless to reject the instrumentality. For the whole world has been turned to a sea of tang like substance called as the LCL. Also, there's no other inhabitants left on the Earth, in which means that you'll still be a lone, unsocial creature. The remnants of the TV series in which his reaction towards Kaworu that sets his early state in the movie still bothers me too. Asuka however, still the same as ever. She attacked the angels like a rampaging beast, but failed miserably. Even in the end, she's still as obnoxious as the way she is in the beginning. And the end scene showed that Asuka also be another person who survived the instrumentality, and that Shinji accepted Asuka. Okay I get the subtext that you should blend yourself with the society instead of being a demanding creature who seeks for others attention amd warmth towards you without even trying to brought warmth to others as a first move, but I believe that there's a limit to everything. Will you still accept a degenerate feminazi/SJW/alt-right that only causes burden into your life? Sorry but, I won't. This is the main reason on why I despised the movie.
Now finally, there's one last thing I need to put in discourse and it's regarding the anti-escapism subtext, in which these show is rather blatant on it, notably Neon Genesis Evangelion. I have to say that the way it presented the subtext is highly disagreeable. The anime treated as if escapism at its slightest bit is wrong, and ridiculously mocked every attempts of it, such as making Asuka as hateable and degenerate as possible, taking a peek for thousand of other Yui Ikari's clones before finally dismantled all of them as if they're a pile of junk, and many other scene I won't mention one by one that makes sure the watcher thinks if these anime tropes are all bad escapism. To be fair it's not only a generalization of all anime watchers are perceived as a bad escapist who should feel bad, but also disrespectful to the trope itself.Now my personal philosophy is that escapism itself is also a rather bad thing, but at times, you need it. For instance, when I have finished my nightshift and wanted some good, nice battle ecchi anime before I sleep, and I laughed to it, it actually safe to say that it's an essential refreshment for my busy life. As for anime "archetype" such as "kuudere", "tsundere", or many others (I'm not a fan of them but I can tolerate people who love them), Neon Genesis Evangelion have torn the image of it, but I too have to disagree with the notion of said things are unreal and can't be good. For instance, if you're rich enough, you can just go to the tsundere/kuudere maid cafe and enjoy the waitresses roleplaying as one. Asking your couple to roleplay as one isn't a no-go either. It's so one-sided that it feels like a blind hate speech to the medium tropes.
To conclude, I believe that Neon Genesis Evangelion has a noticably great themes and characters, but the falls flat in the plot deivison, it's so generic and tedious that it's hurting to be able to predict on what happened during the fights that it's almost safe to tell that it's skippable and its anti-escapism subtext is insulting. But still I have to say, Evangelion is a must-watch. The audience will find out that they'll be either loved it to death, hated it to death, or become a small minority like I am to think that it's just an average show that gained popularity. I regrettably must admit that I skipped some of the topics in which have been discussed a lot about around the internet and just glossed over it, but hopefully, my simple bit of writing have brought a new light about my thoughts on the series, as well as expanding yours. Thank you for reading.
Sidenote: I found it rather ironic whenever I see an "elitist" Evangelion fan. The TV series stated that for your craving for warmth to be fulfilled, you must remove your "spikes", and elitism is one of them. I really wonder whether these "elitist" fans get through the subtext or not.
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Dec 4, 2017
Shinseiki Evangelion
(Anime)
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This review contains spoilers for the TV series and the 1997 Movie End of Evangelion.
Evangelion, if an experienced anime fan hear this name alone, they'll probably be reminded instantly to the two great dichotomous opinions in which, one side will praised it as a classical masterpiece while as for the others, will hate it as well as claiming for it to be one of the worst and most overrated anime ever made. Thankfully enough, I was on quite minority of these two polarizing opinions. I have some elements from the franchise in which I liked, as well as some in which I despised. I think ...
Reviewer’s Rating: 4
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Jul 5, 2017 Recommended
I usually don't watch seasonals, moreover reviewing it the instant right after completing it, but for this occasions. I just can't help to do it. Yes, that's how "Shuumatsu Nani Shitemasu ka? Isogashii desu ka? Sukutte Moratte Ii desu ka?" or SukaSuka has tempt me by its bewitching allure. People may meme about how studio Trigger saved anime with their originals such as Inferno Cop, Kill la Kill, and other shows. But this word comes genuinely from my heart, without any sense of irony, in which that, SukaSuka is the flawed savior of anime.
Enter Willem Kmetsch, a human survivor from the world destruction. As he ... met Chtholly and worked as a carekeeper on her dormitory, he learned what does it takes to be a parent figure, and the importance of family itself. From the midst of superhero action anime and Light Novel adaptations with donkan overpowered protagonist which recently gets viral lately in terms of both popularity and quantity (or if I have to be more blunt, have plagued anime quality/is killing anime) yet I can never see much enjoyment or merit of them (such as Boku no Hero Academia, One Punch Man, and many other titles), experiencing SukaSuka is like finding a cure after being bit by 10 cobras. SukaSuka can be seen as a criticism for these types of anime but yet, it's still a really sincere work that doesn't come as being pompous on its criticism. It subverted the fundamental tropes of them. As much as I see the heroism theme portrayed in Boku no Hero Academia or being a donkan is the way to get girls attention are a total hypocrisy and delusional, I saw that the theme about heroism portrayed in SukaSuka as the most mature portrayal of it so far. The setting of SukaSuka is nothing new, but the implementations of it's core themes towards this kind of settings is what makes SukaSuka unique. I also found that this theme about family is rather barely explored in most anime so this is also where you can enjoy your stay for it. Our protagonist Willem, who now lives in a sky continent in a post-apocalyptic setting, begins like no more than your typical Light Novel self insert character. However, throughout the series, it's proven that despite being slightly dense, he never went full donkan that it makes his personality more believable. Despite also being quite overpowered to some extent, Willem has a worn-out bodies that limits him for being a Gary Stu and throughout the series, we can see on how his inner conflicts due to his undying fighting spirit in order to be a hero that fight against the beasts to protect the people. Or is it what it means to be a hero? Can it also mean about something else which is more trivial to be protected? Willem can be distinguished from your typical hero by his limitations in conjunction on the redefinition of what does it meant to be a hero. The heroine, Chtholly Nota Seniorious, is a mysterious 15 year old Leprechaun whom little is known about her past until the series went further. Leprechauns are the continents trump card in their battle against the beasts, and they are trained in order to have no fear of death. However, due to their appearance that resembles those of humans, whom are thought to be the one responsible for the world destruction, they are being shunned by the common society and regarded as being "featureless". At the first few minutes of the anime, Willem saved Chtholly from slipping and being the object of hate by the mass, and then took her stroll together with him. After they lives together and he taught many thing Chtholly never feel before due to her lifestyle, she began to question whether all the "fighting with bravery" mindset which had been planted on her since her birth was really the way of living on its truest. Her quirks really shown in a detailed manner, more than even the protagonist, which makes the watcher attached to her all along to her, for a very nice reasons. To be frank, the romantic relationship between the two main characters sprouts too fast. But once it sprouts, it develops in an excellent pace. The bashful nature of both parties, yet knowing that they do love each other can never fails to made me smile. Unlike many other romance I have experienced, SukaSuka gives both views towards the other, which is something important in order to make a good romance since I believe that romance is a double sided relationship and portrayal of just a single party will make the other party an object instead. SukaSuka knew this well and avoided it. Portrayal of humans on SukaSuka are very evil. It's believable on how the settings took place most likely on the far future where humans might got overboard with their greediness and exploitation. It serves as a contemplation for the watchers on what have we become so far, did we have turned to be nice to the mother earth or is it the opposite? Does all experiments make the world a better place? Homo homini lupus, and this actually fits really well after you learn some truth regarding the plot point. Of course, like other works which has living biological weapon plot point, it also portray on how it's unethical on the usage of it or I can say that war in general is a futility. Unlike most popular post-apocalyptic anime nowadays, the focus of SukaSuka isn't the action, but rather the family themed character drama instead, but it still realized that the characters are in a life and death situations without abusing many fight scenes. Balancing such a lighthearted tone with a darker one is hard, but it still manages to can have a mostly light tone without forgetting the situation they're in. More good news, this tone blends well with the core theme of he show.SukaSuka have an ok worldbuilding, in which starts out delivering few expositions towards the world they lived in, and manages to give a slow but steady and sufficient amount of it as the series progress. A lot of information still being missing however, but I can comprehend that since it only adapts about half of the Light Novel. It explained why the people took refuge on the sky island, how it was made, about the war against the beast in depth, and so on that the essential information make the watchers can follow the story easily. Sometimes, bombing the watchers with a lot of expositions is obnoxious, especially if done by monologues but none of them happens in SukaSuka and it feels natural. One other thing worth mention is that SukaSuka is feminist friendly, as how the Leprechauns done most of the fights while Willem being a nurturing figure for the Leprechauns. It also added by the fact Scarborough Fair was sung by a female singer, but use the masculine lyrics that modifies female third person into the male ones. Scarborough Fair also blends perfectly with the medieval esque settings of the Sky Island, to add up for the overall quality. Despite my praise, SukaSuka have a considerable amount of flaws too. The theme presentation is kind of childish for the earlier episodes and the type of comedy doesn't fit with the show settings, as most of them are more befitting to a school harem anime. The visuals is quite nice but can be improved in a lot of ways, especially the characters expressions most of the time. Lastly, due to the amount of focus to the main character, almost all of the side characters fell flat out one-dimensional which is barely memorable, although those who like characters with said personality might remember them very well. Aware with all these flaws, I still think that the pros really outweighs the cons. SukaSuka gets better over time and the ending made me overflowed with feels towards it. The slow motion scene power was also backed up with the song which have been tuned at the first episode. How the ambience, melody, and the lyrics can't fit any better to the situation they're on the ending is outstandingly scary. Trust me, even when the buildup from the prior episodes don't affect you that much, the ending is still golden, despite its predictability. The execution of cinematography went all out on the ending, especially that scene which is more than a satisfactory for me that usually don't feel for a melodrama. If such scene isn't emotionally engaging at the slightest, then I don't think emotionally engaging anime moments existed. SukaSuka is one of the best beverages for the pacifist soul like me, and it has become one of my most enjoyable anime so far, if not the most. It also restored my faith to seasonal anime and become my medicine for generic action anime nowadays. The accurate depiction and thought provoking message about what does it take to be a human, heroism for the adults, family, valuing the present over the past or a vague future, living one's own life to its fullest, and the delicate wrappings of all these mature themes into such story is what enchant me to this Light Novel adaptation. SukaSuka might not the savior the community deserves, but SukaSuka is the savior that the community needs.
Reviewer’s Rating: 9
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Jun 18, 2017
Mahou Shoujo Madoka★Magica
(Anime)
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*Might contains minor spoilers, after the review ends I put my interpretations which has 100% spoilers*
Magical girl genre is one of the more niche genre even in anime community. Anime fans proportions is heavily dominated by action fans. Yet in this action fans group, chuuni subgenre can be considered as unpopular compared to those that dominated the market, with the only exceptions for nowadays being Fate series. But by combining the aspects of those in this two genres, Mahou Shoujo Madoka★Magica has become a new achievement for the medium. It popularized both genres, and has made many other magical girl shows that's created afterwards, tried ... to imitate its legacy. Mahou Shoujo Madoka★Magica is one of the few series which can be enjoyable by wider audiences, it can serves as one of the gateway anime for newcomers, those who watch anime casually for just hobbies, and even some anime veterans who have longer experience for the medium and loves analyzing anime. More pros for me is that it has only 12 episodes so it's easy to binge, as I don't usually wanted to invest my time for a really long series except if I heard many good things about it. Entering Mahou Shoujo Madoka★Magica, we will be greeted by pink haired girl, who runs throughout a long staircase until the door in the end of the staircase opened up for her, and then a bizarre scene featuring a black haired magical girl struggling in a hopeless fight against an abstract being which seemed to be from another world, with dark metal OSTs being played. This scene implies the tone of Mahou Shoujo Madoka★Magica a lot. Introduction matters in order to grab one's attention towards a certain thing, it's called as first impression, and Mahou Shoujo Madoka★Magica can utilize it in order to make the combination of the two niche genre become popular, and enjoyable. Magical girl genre has a history of having darker tone as the series goes and many of them also deal with the theme of sacrifice. While Mahou Shoujo Madoka★Magica also did the same with their predecessor, it also invented something's new, fresh, and ingenious messages that's being embedded as the core theme of the story. It meticulously utilizes forshadowing, characterizations, and dialogues in order to imply it, making this theme anything but hard to digest, at least for me. People who want to watch Mahou Shoujo Madoka★Magica however, can still enjoy the series for having a visually stunning fighting scenes, surreal magic world, the eerie-yet-relaxing atmosphere of the series thanks to the comfortable looking school, the tragic events that happened within the story, with the background music that's really strong to evoke such feelings to the viewers. Other people can also simply enjoy this series for being dark and full of despair without overthinking about it. Yet for some people, who likes to analyze a series Mahou Shoujo Madoka★Magica might also still hold a special place as a great work. When I firstly watched Mahou Shoujo Madoka★Magica as a new anime fan who only have few anime on my completed list, I consider it as awesome for the former reasons, yet when I decided to re-watch it after I learn on how to analyze works, Mahou Shoujo Madoka★Magica have made me let out a sincere smile due to how intelligent it tries to deliver its core thematic elements with satisfactory ending. The core thematic elements of Mahou Shoujo Madoka★Magicais simple, yet poignant. Imagine that you've met a creature who can grant you 1 wish of anything in your choice in-exchange that you'll become a magical girl that should fight against an evil beings called witches. Sounds cool? It maybe is for some watchers, and some others surely will notice that it's already said that such battles can costs your own life. Is there a wish that's more important than your own life? Being a chuuni genre, of course this theme looks exaggerated that one should fight in a life-and-death battle, so to put it realistically that almost everyone can apply it on their own life, "When you wish for something, is it the actual thing you need the most from the inside of your mind so that if you die tomorrow, you will regret nothing?" I have questioned this in my life for several times, and thankfully, Mahou Shoujo Madoka★Magica is the first step for me in order to realize the answer. Speaking about plot points of Mahou Shoujo Madoka★Magica is impossible without mentioning the characters, as the structure of the story being a semi-character arc and in the end of almost every character arcs, new plot twists are introduced instead of being having "Monster of the week" plot progression, which I found in almost all magical girl shows that I have seen and I have to say honestly, that kind of plot progression is boring. This method of plot progression also will made the user think on how in the world will this series which has high dose of despair and hopelessness will end up as more twists are introduced? The first twist being the visual introduction of the actual tone of the story, the second being the introduction of the core thematic elements, which is further implied with Kyouko and Sayaka's dialogue before they started their next fight and lastly, the true definition of being a magical girl is on the world. Episode 10, which is infamous for having the rest of the cards being revealed from Mahou Shoujo Madoka★Magica's sleeves, can be interpreted in two ways. One may look it as an inevitable bad end that will land upon all the main characters that made the characters anguished until they developed into what they're yet still not solving the problem, while others might see it as a hope, which is foreshadowed on the episodes that the magical girl in action just have repeated the same mistakes over and over again in which the culmination of all the bad ends. But unbeknownst to her, had she did something that simple before, all the mistake she had should never happen. To summarize in the end, every characters on Mahou Shoujo Madoka★Magica have done the same mistake and that they can't tell the others before falling to the pit. As how the life implications will be when you have fall to these pit of "can't think what you truly needs in mind yet have done said actions", only regrets remains. I found that this mistake, despite on what kind of personality you have, has been at least done once by all people in the world, as nobody can escape for being wrong. And yet you need to get over with it and not fallen deeper, in this which part I will describe on the spoiler section. The chuuni tone of this anime is also fun at least for me. It deals with the existentialism elements of the history of humanity and magical girls and how the world of Mahou Shoujo Madoka★Magica works, befitting any of the common chuuni titles. According to my friend who studies Chemical engineering, it has some truth on it too, making it more appealing for those who are fans of the genre. One might question whether our universe is actually run with such conspiratory and unfair system, which is fun to think about it. I don't take it on an individual levle but simply because thinking like chuunibyous is fun to do. Mahou Shoujo Madoka★Magica have a high production value and know how to use it properly in order to create an epic visuals that is surreal as if the existence of magic itself do exists in that world, having the witch labyrinth that gives a distorted feels on such an evil being, as expected from SHAFT studios which is renowned for its previous works Bakemonogatari. The character design looks nice too, and moreover, the magical girl clothes models can be linked to each of their own wishes. This also makes help on the characters memorability, aside from their quirks and character explorations, which I also have to put on the spoiler sections. The voice acting is also wonderful. One can notice the level of voice acting with how much do you feel a character as they speaks, and I can at least totally understand their feelings even if I have to watch this raw despite not knowing what they're talking about. This is a sign of good voice acting as if the voice actresses know how to blend with the characters personality and to evoke certain feelings. The OP lyrics is actually another foreshadowing on the show actual tone, as it is actually pretty sad, and the first scene itself shown that Madoka is crying on it so that one can already guess the tone shift, so I have to digress the people who said that it has no signs of it. The ED, which is actually the first song you've heard on the first 2 minutes and appears on episode 3, gives a darker tone, but the lyrics is surprisingly more positive compared to the OP. It also depicts on the magical girl chasing for hope through the darkness, in search for light that will brought peace upon her. As for the OSTs, like I have said before, brought by the talented composer Yuki Kajiura, it never fails to amuse me. My favorite OST among all of it would be "Sis Puella Magica", because it gives a strange sense of emotions for me. It feels both relaxing, mysterious, and depressing at the same time and this kind of theme truly befitting for Kyubey the most. I have to admit that the cover poster of Mahou Shoujo Madoka★Magica is deceiving, it looks so lighthearted that people can easily mistaken it's a lighthearted series, despite it balanced the light and dark tone in my opinion. To summarize, Mahou Shoujo Madoka★Magica is a fantastic ride of a more chuuni magical girl series that you will hardly found in any other anime. Magical girl in general might be weird for having darker tone in the end, but Mahou Shoujo Madoka★Magica put it on another level along with the implication of a simple yet profound themeatic elements, yet subtly show that a speck of light on the darkness of Mahou Shoujo Madoka★Magica can be seen, if one have enough love for it. It is by no means a perfect work, as there's few off-model scene and the character arcing is too visible that it doesn't have dynamics that much except for the characters required for said arcs, but it has achieved many things it has to offer for me for just 12 episodes in an entertaining way. It skillfuly throw hints on what this core thematic elements is all about that those who have enough love on it will realize on how compelling Mahou Shoujo Madoka★Magica actually is. This marks the ends of this review with minor or might be no spoilers. For the implications of said themes to each characters for you who have lesser love for the series to realize it, which I have already posted it outside of MAL (100% spoilers): The first few episodes are more of focused on Mami Tomoe, the senior magical girl which saved Madoka Kaname and Sayaka Miki from the witches. She can be described as a seemingly poised but actually fragile and reckless person. This is reflected on her fight with Charlotte (and it's emphasized on episode 10 when she is the one who lost her emotion control the first after realizing the truth of being a magical girl and shot the others.) When her family involved in a car accident, Kyubey approached her to offer her to become a magical girl and granting her a wish, and her wish is to live her life by her own, possibly because she know that she won't survive without her parents financially. So now let's see now on the basic traits of Mami, shall we? Among all of the Magical Girls introduced within this series, Mami looks the most elegant and luxurious of all. This is reflected by her magical girl character design (She has a curly tails harstyle while all the other girls have a simple and plain hairstyle, Her dress also gives splendor feels the most for me, and yellow is the color that represent money for me), the way she fights witches that backed up with the soundtrack "Credens Justitiam" make me feels that she's a gorgeous magical girl who fights for justice, and the place where she lives looks the most expensive compared to others. For me, all the splendor that Mami has was all rooted from her wish when she made a contract with Kyubey, which makes sense. But then again, is Mami's wish all that she will need the most for her life? How is it when a middle school girl live alone without feeling the love of her parents despite already having a luxurious life? I bet the first word that comes to mind will be: Lonely. Yes, Mami is a really lonely person in the heart, which is shown during some scene before she tried to fight Charlotte in episode 3. Moreover, she is also the most mentally unstable among the girls. For me this implies that her parents really loves and cares about her, so that the sudden loss of that feelings gives Mami a shock effect that makes her to that state. The next character that I will talk about is Sayaka Miki. My comments on Sayaka Miki's characterization in it's simplest form will be "The least historical but the most fleshed out." She is depicted as a tomboy girl which is Madoka's best friend and classmate. Like Mami, she also has a strong sense of justice, proven on how she acts during the first time she become a magical girl. After Mami's death, she got a bit concerned about being a magical girl, but then she decided to do so, after knowing that her crush Kyousuke has suffered an injury on his hand so that he could never play violin again, which is his best abilities he likes to do, she decided to become a magical girl with the wish to heal Kyousuke. But is that what Sayaka Miki needs the most? Let's see how the story will flow further. At the first glance, Sayaka was so happy seeing that Kyousuke was healed and he can play the violin again, and Kyousuke looked happy to at Sayaka when he return to play violin. Sayaka then, as a magical girl began to hunt down for the witches, even the witches independent familiars (The one that also appears within the witches labyrinth, but then flew away from it. It can devour humans to turn themselves to witches but in that form, they don't drop grief seeds.) Another magical girl called Kyoko confronted her shortly, telling her that a familiar don't drop the grief seeds, thus making them useless to be killed and that she shall wait for it to become a witch so that it will clean her soul gem from being tainted. But Sayaka got enraged, believing that it's the same with she let a human die, which means killing humans for her. The two engaged in fight but Homura comes for them to cease the fight after Sayaka seems to be losing. But because of her wish that is related with healing, her pain dissipates quickly. They both have another fight in a street bridge after Kyoko said that she should've wished for him to like her and now that its too late, she will break her leg to make it happen, also with the prescence of the other two magical girls, and Kyubey. But this time Madoka threw up Sayaka's soul gem, hoping that doing so will prevent them to fight further. But another plot twist has just began. Sayaka lost her consiousness while Homura was chasing for the soul gem and returning it to Sayaka. Kyubey then explained that during the process of one to be a magical girl, when they're saying their wishes, their soul was being extracted and turned to be the soul gem, rendering them unconscious if their soul was 100 meters away from them. This subverted almost everything we expect about being a magical girl during the first two episodes (yeah I know that some magical girl anime have a somewhat tragic theme, but this anime didn't try to make it so at its first impressions.) After the incident, Kyoko tried to befriend Sayaka, but Sayaka with her strong sense of justice, often left her and keep thriving against all witches and familiars, doing what she believe was right. But then when she heard that her friends Hitomi, who also have a crush with Kyousuke was going to confess to him, she began to fell in despair. She feels that she can't be a good couple with Kyousuke with her current condition. She afraid on how if he knows that she was practically a zombie that fights against so many grotesque looking monsters. So by this time, we know that Sayaka's wish wasn't what she need the most. Ironically, its on what Kyoko said to her, which is to make Kyousuke fall in love with her. Because of this one mistake Sayaka has done, her personality grew darker as she rampagingly fought through countless of witches and familiars. She didn't even take the grief seeds, believing that its pointless now that her wish went wrong. She fell deeper into despair when she heard some guy badmouthing about a girl which is implied to be a magical girl. She got angered upon them and its implied that she murdered them both, believing that those guys aren't any better compared to the witches. So let's see now, does Sayaka still bring positivity, justice, or whatever you call it after knowing Hitomi was going to confess to Kyousuke? Or is it the opposite? Isn't she just become like the witches now that she killed those guys despite their attitude? And most of all did she still have any positive aura on her? All we can see is just that she was in a total desperation and even brought negativity rather than the positive. So now we even can come up with the question: Isn't this Sayaka become more and more witch like? And so it happened, when Sayaka's desperation was already beyond help, her soul gem shattered and she turned to a witch. The lesson is: Don't let yourself being eaten by hopelessness just because one of your wish went wrong, move on and do what you think is the best for you and this world sake. Let's went to another character now, I bet you can already guess who is it. Yep, it's Kyoko Sakura. Kyoko is by far the best characterized magical girl for me. She has a balance between her backstory and how she acted on the series. Unlike Mami, Kyoko comes from a terrible family records, which makes her quirks differs alot with Mami. Her father was a preacher. When Kyoko's father see the suffering of some people, he thinks that the church must be revolutionized so that he used a new doctrine for his church. But then again most people seems to be disagree and thus they left the church one by one. Kyoko's family went to an extreme poverty after that. Kyubey then came and offered Kyoko a contract. She wished for her father to regain his followers. But is it what she need the most? Will her wish become as what she wanted or will it backfires? The fact happens to say that its the latter. Kyoko's father happened to be disliked on how his followers acted more of a cultist rather than a normal person. It went worse when Kyoko said about the truth. His father claimed that she isn't any better than the witches and he began to lose his sanity, become a drunker, and ultimately killed all of the family. Yep, Kyoko have done the same mistake Sayaka did. She should've wish for her family wealth and happiness instead and she knew if she just did a mistake on her wish. Kyoko's changes on her family was less of a shock compared to Mami's and was never to be as loved as, making her personality firmer, selfish, and more badass. She is more tomboy than Sayaka. Also the fact that her family has ever suffered in an extreme poverty made her value food so much, which is shown on how she was angry when Sayaka thrown the apple she gave to her on episode 7. She also believed that humans, witches, and magical girls is just like a food chain and only kill the witches. After Sayaka's collapsing incident when they have some fight and Kyobey explained some fact about being a magical girl, felt decieved, she got angry upon Kyubey saying that he only turned them to zombies. But this event also makes Kyoko felt sympathy for Sayaka, thinking that they both have did the same mistake and undergo the same burden of being a magical girl, and both girls being tomboys. And this is where we can see the difference between Kyoko and Sayaka, which is Kyoko is a more easy-going person, given she has went through a lot of shit which was worse than knowing the truth of being a magical girl compared to Sayaka. This also being showed before that she didn't hold grudges to Homura for stopping her fight seemingly sided with Sayaka when she come to her when she played some Pump it Up like games while eating chocolate sticks. She also cared a lot about Sayaka's safety, proven that she always followed wherever Sayaka hunt for the witches and familiars and she even helped her once, and probably will do that more if she got overwhelmed. She still wanted to save Sayaka, despite the girl had already turned to a witch. She asked Madoka to help her on this. During the fight, Madoka tried to call for Sayaka's witch form in attempt to make her back to her original state while Kyoko dodged and defended her attacks. But it happens to be pointless. So that Kyoko perform a double suicide with the witch with her magical ability while Madoka got escorted by Homura who was arrived just then. This showed us on how Kyoko truly loved Sayaka, given the fact that she could care less about justice, other people's sake, and even other magical girls. Overall I think Kyoko is actually a likable badass redhead girl. She has a great resolution and strong too. Her musical theme is somewhat gives damp and soft feelings, in contrast to most of our first impression to her, perhaps this was meant for she show her caring side towards Sayaka after episode 6. Also, I like cheongsam! Okay so we will go with the character which is liked the most by the fandoms (me too), Homura Akemi. Homura was actually starts off to be the most timid among all the magical girls, even more than Madoka. When she was just recovered from a long-term illness, which made her not being able to attend school for a long time, she enrolled on Madoka's Middle School on Mitakihara. Homura during this time had a twin braid hairstyle, wear an eyeglasses, and weak at sports, the complete opposite on what she is when she was introduced on episode 1. Madoka is the first person who acted like her close friend to her, while also saving her life when she was being attacked by a witch along with the other 3 magical girls. They become friends each other. Homura is the only person who haven't become a magical girl yet during this timeline. When there's a giant witch called Walpurgisnacht attacked the city, the magical girl team had a fight with the witch, and ended with all of the magical girl are killed in process, due to the massive amount of strength this witch have. During this time, Homura was saddened seeing Madoka, the one she loved the most, dying. So she made a contract with Kyubey and wished to be able to redo her first encounter with Madoka. So then during this timeline, there's 5 magical girls. But things still not fixed. Homura is the only magical girl who survived, whilst Madoka, struggling for her life in agony got her soul gem tainted so much that Homura witnessed by herself on how she became a witch. Homura then resetted the time, now trying to tell them the dark truth behind being a magical girl. Things didn't work perfectly as Homura wanted, Sayaka put her distrust upon Homura and parted way with the team, and turned into a witch, possibly due to the same reason on what happened on the previous episodes. After defeating Sayaka, the girls now believed on what Homura said before, but Mami loses control on her emotion and wanted to kill all the other magical girl. She killed Kyoko in the process, but stopped and shot by Madoka when she was going to kill Homura. So now there are only two magical girls remaining. They ended up defeated Walpurgisnacht, but both are in a dying state and there's only 1 grief seed remained. Madoka asked Homura to use the seed and kill her, in which Homura once again turned the time back after doing so. Through countless number of time loops, Homura still failed to save Madoka. This is what made Homura got desensitized and being somewhat "cold" towards stuffs, even deaths, because she had witnessed it countless number of times. She also may have used her infinite time to practice a lot amount of skills (shown by how she was superb at sports and studies during the first episode compared to how she was during episode 10.) But her goal is still the same, which is to prevent Madoka becoming a magical girl, which is obvious upon all the word she said during all of the episodes. So did Homura's wish actually what she needed the most? No, what she obviously need is just living happily together with her friend which she love and adores so much, Madoka Kaname, forever. Despite not actually care about other magical girl life other than Madoka, she still has her human sense of pity, seen by how she try to give Sayaka some grief seed knowing that she will become a witch if she didn't use it. I know what people likes about Homura, which is probably her cool looking style and behavior, her black design (lol she do the flipping so many times) and also what she have gone through. Yep, I like that about her too, she was so determined to save Madoka. But then things got worse after she knows that Madoka and Walpurgisnacht got stronger on each of her time travel so that she was trying to defeat the witch alone. But sadly she failed until "it" happened. Lastly, her music theme is somewhat feels like a hidden sadness for me, which is revealed to be true at episode 10. Now before go with Madoka, let's go with Kyubey first, shall we? This creature is also have strong determination to make teens a magical girl, which is in this case we see a lot is Madoka. He even went as far as lied to Madoka on saying "It's been a pleasure to know you." to make her a magical girl. The fact on why he wanted to do so is that because there's some energy that can be actively used when a magial girl turned to witch so that it would prevent the world from doomsday, which also means his species extinction. Well I've read somewhere about the theory of creation that the universe are created from a "Big Bang" which one gigantic star explodes and all its matters separated and went away each other and it has something like nebula on it, which created stars, planets, etc. If all of the gigantic star matters keep went away, the nebula will be finally drained and no more stars will be created, whilst the existing star will die and it will be a true doomsday if no new stars were created. If being a magical girl can be used to made some spacial energy to nebula or to at least preserve the Sun energy than it makes sense for Kyubey to want more magical girls. He also said to Madoka that the collaboration between human and incubators already exist since the beginning of the human age, and the wish of all the girls is what make human civilizations grow further. But he hide all this dark truth, in fact, he did it on purpose to make one impression on being a magical girl is fun so that they made contract with him. Sadly enough, since there's noone would ever think that far, one wouldn't ask for it so he will never tell about it. What makes him creepier is that he didn't have any kinds of feelings, and will do everything to achieve his purpose while still maintaining his cute an innocent design. Cute and expressionless, now that's a combination that I've never seen before. And now let's go to our final character we're going to talk about on this series, Madoka Kaname. Alright I got it, she got most of the screentime so you can see on how she was first being introduced as your typical cute, hopeful, and innocent little middle schooler who came from a fine family until that ending. She was the most excited to become magical girl after being introduced about it by Mami, but she haven't think about the wish well, since she knows that it can only be used once so it must be thinked properly. But then she got concerned about it after seeing Mami's death. Imagine how shocking would it be for a person like Madoka to see that scene? That would be the most horrible thing she had ever seen and will traumatize her hard, right? That's why she got depressed about Mami more compared to Sayaka, supported that she is the type who wanted everyone to be friends and happy. She try to avoid fights as much as she can, she even try to stop any fight between the girls, shown by her act of throwing Sayaka's soul gem before they fought (actually she wanted to stop the fight before too, but being powerless and they already fought, she can't do a thing.) The interesting things is that there's always some incident that happened on this timeline in which prevent Madoka to made contract with Kyubey, so finally what Homura have did for ages have grown its fruit. Yes, she got mindraped the most by Kyubey during this timeline, but its still better than losing her life and turned to a witch. But the main difference that happened during this timeline is that she realized that being a magical girl can turn one to a witch before she herself turned to a magical girl. So after knowing all the truth all over through all the incidents, she changed as a person. Now she know how she should say her wish and really determined to do it compared to how she was during the first time, it is even emphasized by her against her mother for the first time for this. Now then let's analyze this. When Homura almost end upp in a total deseration and turned to a witch, Madoka finally come and made her wish to Kyubey. Her wish is to "Erase every witch that has ever existed and those who yet to be born in every universe, and if there's any law that forbid her to do so, those law will be broken." This means that Madoka's wish will broke the law of nature and thus making herself the new law of nature, rendering her a godlike being, since that means she also erased her own witch which is yet to be born. Did Madoka happy in the end after reaching her godhood? Yes, she stated that at the conversation with Homura. Did she achieve her goal to made all the magical girls happy and have no woorries on their life? Yes, although it will be sad for Homura at the first time, but she recovered from it some time after the event. So that's why Mahou Shoujo Madoka★Magica is my favorite anime. It achieved way too much on just 12 episodes. The plot twist that this show brought really will give any middle school girl into a total despair and hopelessness, if that was real. It also explores through how people wish can be wonderful if done right, and how it could backfire when it isn't truly what they need the most, and how each characters used their wish for with their respective results. Also the show didn't make us to notice that the "wish granting" system is heavily flawed so that it is possible for someone like Madoka to break through it. I've been in middle and high school too and there's so many people who can't describe what they actually need properly, which been done by mostly female over male statistically. So does this show meant to be for everyone? I guess not, some people may dislike the progress of this show theme from being heartwarming to downright gloomy. But since it only has 12 episodes, I think everyone should try this anime, and for deciding whether they like it or not, that's all back to yourself. And if you asked about my favorite Puella Magi, I'll said that I liked them all firstly, but if I have to sort it out from my most favourites that would be Homura, Kyoko, Sayaka, Madoka, Mami. Via all these characters struggles, this story tells about a life-changing themes. Moral of this story: In some events of life, you may have encountered a big problem, or your wish didn't go as well as what you need that is seemingly impossible to face them with a smile. But you must! Just do it! The moment you whine and desperate about it is the moment you become a "witch", the one who causes negativity to others that may give birth for another problems for others while not solving yours. Use any methods, as long as its legal, and the path will open itself for you as long as you never give up.
Reviewer’s Rating: 10
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Apr 8, 2017
Shigatsu wa Kimi no Uso
(Anime)
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Mixed Feelings
Your Lie in April is a musical drama anime that told about the life of a middle schooler named Kousei Arima, who was the best child pianist that won several music competition on his childhood. But in fact, he diligently trained with piano because of his mother, who was being strict and harsh on him to play the piano, due to her fatal illness and she knows that if she died Kousei will have a hard time in life due to lack of money. But her plan backfired. When she passed away, Kousei become traumatized that he can't hear the piano tune he played, until
...
he met a girl from the same middle school as him named Kaori Miyazono who might change his musical life, and so the story begins.
So I watched this because I see this anime on MAL and it looks that it's quite new as well as have a high rating (8.93 at the time I see it), and it also only has 22 episodes so I think that I might give this anime a shot, and I have a quite high expectations on it. But well as if you people can see on how I scored this anime, my expectations was betrayed. I used to think of why I was bored watching the first few episodes of Your Lie in April until one day, I figure it out. First of all, it's the dialogue. Since the first episode, the dialogue was really boring and repetitive, they keep talking about the same (if not similar) thing over and over again to the fact that this anime make me sleepy at times. Most of the dialogues are only meant to try building Kousei as a character, while neglecting other stuffs such as the relationship of other characters, etc. Your Lie in April really spend out a lot in order to build Kousei's character, but looking retrospectively from what it accomplished in the end, the negligence of the other aspects that the character dialogue could built aside from Kousei's characterization weakens the foundations of what it tries to achieve for the audiences regarding the ending, notably Kaori's characterization and dynamics with other characters. Second, it's the pacing. Since the anime wanted to give all of it's focuses to Kousei, it's slow paced. Do I have a problem with a slow paced anime? Not if they can give an intriguing atmosphere that can keep me excited to keep watching it instead of being a total sleeping aid, and this is what Your Lie in April failed to give me. In order to make the audiences keep intrigued, this anime throws up a slapstick type of comedy, which includes slapping, breaking window, overly nosebleeds, etc. This type of comedy totally don't fit with the slow pacing and calm tone nature of Your Lie in April, and fits to a faster paced romcom such as Toradora, etc. To make it worse, they don't use another type of comedy and keep doing this type of comedy repeatedly. The overuse of single type of comedy, even if it succeeded to make you laugh during the first time you watched it, gets dried fast. By now you should've realized too that this aspects of comedy also defies psychology realism, as how I have described on my intro that Kousei is a child on his PTSD and this "comedy", should've made a PTSD person's mental state even worse, to the point that they might consider suicide. The second half focused on the drama more rather than the comedy, as well as keep making Kousei develop as a character. But honestly, despite the drama are the main genre of this anime, it isn't really that much for me too (the fact that I'm not easily get moved by drama may also took account too). Good drama should be backed up with the empathy of the audience to the events happening with the story, and what the characters are thinking about but sadly, I don't see that Your Lie in April have achieved it in a brilliant manner. But at least in overall, the second half drama was more well-executed than the first half, even though the love triangle stuff can be handled way better to give an emotional impact to the viewers. The characters, like what I have said on the previous sections that almost every character on this anime are just there for developing Kousei Arima as a character, while they themselves don't have that much as a character. Due to this nature of characterization, Kousei will make a good character, but it also make the endings gives less feels for people who watched this (except if you can really be drawn by feelings easily.) For example, Kaori and Watari. In the beginning, Kaori had crush on Watari, but I didn't see them hang out together along that much, I even saw Kaori get along with Kousei more than I do saw her with Watari, although it's explained why later, this already give a big foreshadowing to the viewers that there's something wrong with Kaori and Watari relationship, while Watari himself also only there just to support Kousei, as he got really lack of screentime with a proper dialogue to explore his character. Another example are Kousei's rivals during his childhood, they're also the same, being there to support Kousei to play the piano again, and don't seem to have much rivalry too, nor have a characterizations other than they wanted to be the best in music like no one ever was. As for the main characters, I'd like to say that Kaori, based on family characterizations, are flawed. She have a family background, which was from a nice and kind family, but how can she become a tsundere? Tsundere by it's nature, come from a broken family or when a person have a lot people who got crushed on them and/or afraid of falling in love with one of them that it will make the others got jelly, but Kaori had none of this (but well, at least she got a family shown on the series.) Tsubaki on the other hand, also shown a bit of tsundere tendencies, maybe the writer of this story really addicted to tsunderes but who knows? And honestly as a character, Tsubaki has even less to offer than Kaori. As for me who dislikes the majority of this trope, I'd say that I don't like them both too. Another problem for me is the romance. This anime excels at the drama but don't have a complex character chemistry so that as a romance, Your Lie in April didn't stand out that much due to its lack of meaningful dialogue between the characters except when it's related to Kousei (Yes, this anime is the drama over the romance so don't the character chemistry to be on Honey & Clover caliber.) But still, Kousei is a good character at the very least (although some people might dislike Kousei's personality and call him as "dull".) I also have no character that interest me in particular but if I have to choose, I think it would be Saki Arima (Kousei's mom). The most memorable scene of them all was when Kaori said "Elohim, Essaim, Elohim, Essaim, I implore you." This chanting of Kaori really goes to my brain due to some part of me being a chuunibyou;it gives a mystical vibe for me. And despite being a very melodramatic story (especially the second half) I didn't cry nor feel sad in the slightest. Perhaps my dislikes towards tsundere also took account for this. The voice acting is well, for me it's mediocre at its best. It doesn't give any strong attachment to the character for me. As for the music, I really like all the classical music piece this anime have played as well as Kaori's violin piece. it's spectacular, but the other soundtrack is meh for me. I barely remember how any of the OP and ED anymore in a week. Also if you noticed the 2nd ED, doesn't it like foreshadowing what will happen in the end of this series? Might took away your dramatic moments too tbh. I'm an Asian and I really do know what "water" element is associated for in East Asian mythology. I hope this give a vague hint to you on what happpened and why do I think Kaori's intense characterizations is really trivial to Your Lie in April. The best aspects of this anime without a doubt for me, is the visuals. It's rare nowadays seeing an anime (especially in shounen) that uses a watery coloring on the background as well as how meticulous the necessary particles the background has. The character was also drawn in mostly non-vibrant color, but yet still can show that it doesn't look dull at all, but rather refreshing, detailed, and pretty. It was great, and also one of the anime whichi the CGI images doesn't look bad at all. The animation was quite well-executed and sakuga too. I saluted this department of A-1 pictures. Overall, I would say that Your Lie in April is a shounen series which tries to take aspects from shoujo romance, but can't leave some of its shounen aspects as well as quite underwhelming execution on directing with good production value and classical OST so that it didn't actually stand out much as a story. I might recommend this for a person who can easily be drawn by feelings and not having trouble with tsunderes as well as likes musical drama because in fact, the musical dialogue is what makes the dialogue of this anime the most rather than the actual dialogue during the first half. If you're either not easily get the melodramatic "feels", wanted an fast paced anime or actions, or maybe a connoisseur of drama genre, this series is definitely not for you.
Reviewer’s Rating: 5
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Sep 22, 2016 Mixed Feelings
This review was posted before on other site which has relatively younger user in average and I hope it's not cringy and weeb enough to post this on MAL (I edited some part of it although the dialogue and fight joke still exists.)
Me: Ladies and Gentlemen, welcome to my review coliseum. As for for you guys who were expecting that I'll be the one who review Re:Zero, then you're wrong! Here, I'll have two companions who will do the review here instead of me myself, and now I'll call forth upon them! In the blue side, we have Rem, the handiest maid from Roswaal's mansion! Rem: ... Thank you everyone, I'll do my best on this review battle and defeat my opponent! Me: And on the red side, we have Elsa Granhierte, the infamous assassin known as the bowel hunter! Elsa: Ara, isn't that Rem, the most dysfunctional maid ever? I won't hold back then, this is going to be so fun! Me: Without further ado, let's began the review coliseum, shall we? First tell me about Re:Zero from your perspective girls, I want to know about this series more like, how's the characters, storyline, theme, visuals, sounds, or so. And please avoid spoiling the anime okay? Rem: Minna-san, Re:Zero kara Hajimaru Isekai Seikatsu is a 25 episode Light Novel adaptation anime that started airing on spring 2016 and was produced by the studio White Fox. This anime tolds us about a Hi-umm..what is it again..Hik..Hiki..ah it's Hiki-NEET Subaru-kun who suddenly got transported to our world. On that day he met Emilia-sama and helped her in retrieving her insignia and also saving her life from being murdered by Elsa-san. But Subaru got injured in process so Emilia-sama brought him to Roswaal-sama mansion and heal him. Etoo..Subaru-kun then began to adapt to this world. And I remember that Subaru-kun ever said to have the power to return to the past when he got killed that he called as..Returned..by..Death? That's all that I know, but Re:Zero is totally a great anime, it keeps stirs up my feelings when I and Subaru have troubles, it's so heartwarming when we are on a peaceful condition and I have the feeling that the people who watch us will feel the same too. Elsa: Yes Rem, My act and fight scene is so thrilling for the audience right? So that Subaru actually survived me by repeating the time? How wonderful! Hey Rem, do you know how he gain those time loop skills? I want to have that skill too! I want to keep dissect that half-elf bowel! Rem: I honestly don't know how Subaru-kun got that power, but when he said that he have that power, he smells like a witch, and hey, how dare you try to do such thing to Emilia-sama, you beast! Elsa: Ara, how unfortunate then, seems like those power is just a plot device at all. That's quite embarrassing. Rem-chan got salty for my words? How wonderful! Ah and anyways Rem-chan, what is this Subaru-kun family background and relationships before he was here? I seems to take a quite liking to him, knowing that he also can move without trouble after I gave him a blow for a few moments and then blood spouts randomly from his belly after he saw the club got cut in two. Is he got some superpower that can prevent his clothes and belly from being torn for few minutes? Rem: No, he is but a human so he doesn't have that kind of superpower so it's just..it's just.. Elsa: What is that? I began to feel that all other cast other than me are played terribly. Rem: Elsa, stop being mean! Elsa: Salty much Rem-chan? It's sad that I only given 3 episodes of screentime and I don't appear that much, I wonder why the director chose all these miserable characters to have more screentime than me. Geez, why do I have to watch all these characters from the screen instead of actually acting after episode 3? sheesh. Rem: *prepares her spikeballs* Me: Stop it you both! We will have a discussion here instead of fighting, so don't start a fight while the review battle coliseum time is not over. Elsa & Rem: Yes, I'm sorry. Me: You can fight when I have gone though. Rem: Roger that! Elsa: Aaah, how boring. Anyways Rem, how's Subaru during his time treated on Roswaal's mansion? Rem: He is quite a weird person, extremely energetic, but he can't do work that much. And He smelled like a witch so I was suspicious for him to be a witch spy. Elsa: Ara so that's how it is? And how about the other person in Roswaal's mansion? Do they have some special traits or interesting family background or such? Rem: Let's see, Roswaal-sama is the wizard and the owner of the mansion, sponsoring Emilia-sama which is Puck-sama kind child to reign over the land while Beatrice-sama is our mage that heals Subaru-kun and has the power to warp her library with some catchaprase "I suppose", and Ram is my elder twin sister whose weaker than me due to her noble sacrifice, she might be quite lazy right now, but she have did a lot of things to me in my childhood that I can't ever repay with anything. I think we live happy together on this mansion. Elsa: But that's uninteresting, for me only you twins got a quite good depth as a character because the director gives you some childhood flashbacks, ah and from what I see on the screen, all other characters are just as shallow, what a misfortune for this anime after my screentime is over. Rem: B-but..we do our best in acting like how we should be? I bet many people likes us as a character, right minna? Elsa: My ear never be amused whenever I heard that loli-mage voice acting and it's disturbing. Ah I also saw that Subaru casually committed suicide on episode 7 and then claimed that he insanely fear of dying later on episode 9. It that true that he contradicts himself? Rem: I think I wasn't there on both scene but from what I heard from Beatrice-sama, yes. Elsa: Oh yeah and don't you think Subaru is kinda sexist Rem-chan? He stopped you when you was killing the dogs and letting him got bit instead, isn't that both a fool and sexist move to do? Also I heard he tried to save Priscilla because he see her as a weak and after being kicked hard he still can said that she can't handle the thugs. How can you manage to love this loser? Rem: Subaru-kun is not a weak loser! Deep in his heart, I know that he wanted to protect me and Emilia-sama, it's just that he isn't strong enough. And as a character, he developed in the second half from his Hiki-NEET after realizing his flaws and become a smarter and reliable person. Elsa: Ara that reminds me Rem-chan, how do you feel at the end of episode 18? After all that you did to Subaru, the one who will still remembers the loop, he said that cruel thing to you, how was it? Are you hurt? It's so wonderful and memorable scene to me, you still love him after what he did to you? Aww such a poor creature, do you desperate looking for love Rem-chan? How amusing. Rem: STOP IT ELSA!!! *Transforms to the demon mode* Elsa: So you wish to fight? Ara, This shall be good. Is your bowel prepared for the ultimate pleasure? Me: CAN'T YOU BOTH JUST HOLD UP AND NOT STARTED THE FIGHT FOR A LITTLE LONGER?!!! This is almost over!! Come back to your sense Rem and Elsa, stop provoking Rem! Smh Rem & Elsa: Yes, sorry. Me: So then what's left now, visuals? sounds? recommendations? Rem: I think the visuals of Re:Zero is really stunning. The colorful background and the character drawings are so wonderfully made and it helps alot on setting the atmosphere for the constant mood change of this story as it goes from peaceful to thrilling so many times, and also we did our best for our voice acting and I like the music used on Re:Zero, how about you Elsa? Elsa: Well of course Rem, afterall I'm so beautiful right? I couldn't agree more with you with your statement on character design. But don't you feel the background kinda oversatruated? Also I've said this before that Beatrice's sound is rather unamusing and the plot goes childish after I gone. Me: So do you girls recommend Re:Zero to be watched by people? Rem: Yes, you can see me, who tried my best to help Subaru-kun in helping Emilia-sama and all the trouble and twist we have to face as well as how Subaru tried his best to adapt with our world! Our fighting scene is so epic! I barely know why I'm still alive now, I nearly lost most of my fights! Elsa: You an drop this after episode 3. I'm the most fabulous character on Re:Zero and they took me down after 3 episodes so it's going to be suck without me. Do you want to see an anime with plot holes and sexist idiotic Hiki-NEET with unrealistic desicions who keeps contradicting himself and many poor bland characters like that half-elf? I heard you humans have something called "3 episode rule", so then I'll give you pleasure on watching me during that 3 episodes, but just a reminder, I won't be there anymore after episode 3 so Re:Zero will be worse later on. Also that Petelgeuse is such a boring, childish, and pathetic villain compared to me, only little kid will fear watching him and it will only took 1 episode for me to cut his bowel instead of 10. Me: Ah thank you very much for your time, Rem, Elsa. So now since we have a two polarizing arguments, which one do you support? Are you an avid fans who are moved by all the "feels" Re:Zero has brought to you? Or are you a passionate haters who can say all the writing flaws and feels bored or even having your eye hurts watching this show? Well the answer is on your own heart of course, I shall take my leave now. *teleports away*
Reviewer’s Rating: 5
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Apr 28, 2016 Not Recommended Spoiler
*This Review Contains Spoilers*
Okay so First of all, I'll assume that all of you guys who read this review have already seen the TV series of Neon Genesis Evangelion so I think its safe to spoil it here, and as this is more of an analysis, then I'll probably spoil some part of the movie too. End of Evangelion is often praised by people for covering up the missing 'plot' within the last two episodes of the original TV series so that many regarded this movie as a masterpiece, alongside with that mindblowing conclusions. But as for me, having just a mindblowing ending isn't enough to ... make one a masterpiece, and yet I think some people failed to notice that this movie is actually a major trainwreck! Believe me guys, congratulations ending is the best ending! Why? Okay I'll explain below on how End of Evangelion screwed up, which is mostly regarding the characters personality and its correlation to the ending. First of all, we all know that this movie took place after the episode 24 of Neon Genesis Evangelion TV series, not let's went into flashback on what happened lately: Shinji killed Kaworu using EVA-01, Asuka being comatose after the fight with the 16th Angel, ang Rei is on her recovery phase. Now in this movie, SEELE began to attack NERV HQ and we will see that Shinji, after masturbating to the comatose Asuka, now being back to his " I won't pilot EVA-01" state. This scene makes ABSOLUTELY NO SENSE AT ALL!! Your "most realistic" or "most human" character just becomes unrealistic now. Why? Oh please, let's have some more flashback now. Shinji have already become determined to pilot EVA-01 whatever it takes after the conversation with Kaji when he watered up the plants. But now he returned to that state when the EVA-01 being dummy controlled. Let's search for the reasoning behind this. Most of the watchers will already know this, which is: He was depressed after killing Kaworu, a guy who said 'I love you' to him. Is this a realistic reasonings? NO! How the hell your determination can be crushed by a guy you just know for just few days who turned up to be an angel and attacked you with EVA-02 he controlled? Can't one realized that by the fact that he levitated means that he isn't human? Even my little sister who is currently 14 will realized that, geez! The fact that now he secluded himself even more so that he cried is super exaggerated and totally unreasonable. Okay, so that's all for Shinji. Next, we will go to Asuka. So much people I met said that Asuka is getting better in the movie compared to her annoyingness in the TV series. Okay so what Asuka have done? After she awakens from her comma, she act just like how Shinji act when killing the 4th angel, the only difference is that she failed to kill them as its a 1 vs 9 situation. Asuka, what just happened to you? Your act are almost the opposite on how Shinji act during the TV series and now, why do you act just like him? What changed her? The comma after the "Hallelujah" mindraping? Do that actually can changes ones personality? I don't think so. Okay let's go to my favorite character on this series now, Misato. What is her role in this series? Oh noo End of Evangelion why did you do this? Why do you make the best girl just a Deus ex-Machina for Shinji before dying? Screw it, EoE! Okay now let's talk about the ending, which is probably the final part of the negative section. What happened in the end? Oooh what a mindblowing conclusion! Third Impact actually happened! Oh lol now Shinji can 'choke Asuka' and deny the Third Impact resolution! And what do you see after that? Shinji comes back to the world and hey, Asuka is there too! This is really an asspull. I've read some theories regarding this and I'll answer that here. First, there's one who said that those children who born after the Second Impact have no souls so that the won't turn to LCL during the Third Impact. With this theory, It means that all of Shinji's classmates won't turn into LCL and stay on the world, but we only see Shinji and Asuka here. There's another theory that stated if those who really wanted to comeback to the world, they can do so. But that also means that there will be some people who can came back,, not just two. And also why among all peeps, Asuka? Is it because of the "mantra" she said during beaten up by the 9 angels? Well that's a point too, but it's not made that there's no other person than them that wanted to return to the world. On the other hand, the visual within this series is definitely better and can be considered great on it's year of production, you won't see that 1 minute scene anymore here, and that song during the Third Impact is also good too, although I feel that it will be better if the song is more orchestratic. Asking for my enjoyment? Well I think you can already guess whether I enjoyed this or not seeing the best girl treated like that while Shinji fapped to the worst girl who managed to come back to the world. Yep, I friggin hate this ending! Burn Asuka with fire! Okay so that's all for what I share about this shows, I think. Overall End of Evangelion in my opinion is the worst way in attempt to make the last two episodes of the TV series to have a 'plot'. If things just let be, we can assume it with all our opinions, even if it is that the last two episodes of the TV series is just thing in which happened within the casts mind and NERV can defeat SEELE troops. Thank you for reading and remember: #CongratulationsEndingBestEnding.
Reviewer’s Rating: 4
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Apr 5, 2016
Boku dake ga Inai Machi
(Anime)
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Mixed Feelings
Hello guys! This is my review on an anime that have recently finished airing, Boku Dake ga Inai Machi or ERASED.
Okay so ERASED was the most hyped anime among all of the Winter 2016 anime as far as I know and then when it ends, it disappointed so many people out there, some of them even saying that this is just like Sword Art Online (in which I can't deny it fully since both are produced by A-1 pictures.) Okay so I personally think that ERASED isn't that bad. It's just average. So without further ado I'll review this anime. First of all, we have the ... characters called Satoru Fujinuma, in which acts like your typical shounen Seigi no Mikata (Ally of Justice), helping everyone in trouble with his 'revival' power, in which let him to time travel back to the past few minutes. He works as a pizza employee with a teen girl called Katagiri Airi, and also having a mom in which love him so much. To be honest the characters introductions were great, as well as in the end of the episode 1, the murder incident and Satoru's time travelling back to his childhood era makes us glued to what can actually happened next. So then Satoru, believing the culprit of her mother's murderer was the same as his friends murderer during his childhood, he decided to protect his childhood friend while also try to findout the culprit while more characters were introduced within the story. Okay so here lies the first problem for me. Actually, by seeing on how the characters act, there's already a pretty big clue on how is this on the 4-5th episode, so basically, the major mystery ends here. The way of that culprit somewhat a bit nervous and contradicting his past words already makes that culprit very suspicious. But still somehow as a 29 years old in mentality, Satoru our protagonist, seems never noticed that. Next I'll talk about the first murder victim Kayo Hinazuki. Despite the story are based upon Satoru's POV, Kayo is actually the most well written character among all of the character. The way she act, is somewhat feels realistic for me. As a child who's being treated that bad, there's no way that she won't be mentally down and shut herself upon others and also having a bit paranoid. Also, her ending was realistic enough for me. No single problem with Kayo. So what's the problem with this show? Why there's so much rants, complaints, etc upon this show? Okay so from now on, I'll tell you about the problem that lies within this show. There might be a little spoilers here but I'll kept it minimum. The first problem of this show is that has a bunch of plot device on it. What are them? First, it's the 'revival' ability. Honestly this 'Butterfly Effect' ability sounds pretty unique for a person to have one, but until the end of the show, as probably other reviews told, this abilities was never explained or explored further. On the other hand, although this ability seems to come out randomly when there's a person who gets troubled, it also will loops our protagonist back to his childhood when he got caught by the police. Is this the rules or just a coincidence? We never know. It's never explained further within the stories. The background of other victims of the murder was never explained further too, which is also for me, counts as another 'plot devices'. As for Airi, she had at least some background on why she being nice to Satoru and so on, for people who saying that she's not a well written character, I'd like to say that based on her amount of screentime, she is a pretty well-written character (yep we need more of her screentime tbh.) There's plenty other 'plot devices' within this story (e.g Satoru's childhood friends, etc) but well let's just end this section. The next problem of this story lies in the execution on the last 3 episodes. Most people said that the revealing was bad, but I'd like to say that it's not and it's perfectly normal, what isn't normal for me is when another major clue was introduced a.k.a the loli, Satoru still can't recognize the culprit. SO where's the problem within this part? So when this culprit decided to drown Satoru in the car, I found that it's pretty weird if he can't just slip below the seat belt to escape his fate, as his body is tiny enough to do that, not to mention that the car window was open wide. Satoru as a protagonist is well, pretty unexplored for me as a 'Seigi no Mikata' type of protagonist. And also sometimes although he is a 29 years old in mentality, sometimes he acts in reflex just like a 10 years old. Well of course he must act like one to avoid others suspicion, but sometime I found that his way of act is somehow like not pretending but a real, childish act. As for the pacing, well I don't read the manga, but I feel that when Satoru tried to save his other schoolmates, it was clearly rushed. I can't tell on how he survived during the incident I said at the previous paragraph. Well I heard it's explained in the manga though, that's why I said it's rushed. And also as for the ending, some people might disappointed due the difference with the manga, but after I heard about how the manga ends, I found that the anime ending was far more realistic than the manga, considering Satoru's condition during that time. But still, there's some part on the last episodes about Kumi which is a bit miss for me because of the rushed pacing, but well I still can relate on what Satoru's did to her so that's not a very big problem for me. The culprit itself isn't that bad as a villain, he's just average for me, although his reasonings may be not that relatable, but at least he have one not like your 'evil for the sake of being evil' villain. So was ERASED that bad? Not really. As an atmospheric anime fan, the scenery from Erased and the artwork was indeed a very well drawn, not to mention that the music which brought us to a mysterious and cool place in a winter during Shouwa era. As for me I liked the ED more than the OP, perhaps because I'm really into that kind of music. Perhaps this show had a big budget revolves around it so that they can make it that great. Also overall, ERASED was a quite enjoyable anime, despite of its major flaws. For a story in which the main plot revolves around the time travel I highly recommend Steins;Gate, although I don't really like a hardcore Sci-Fi myself. The exploration of the theme, settings, and characters are somewhat better in that anime. Thank you for reading my reviews and have a nice day.
Reviewer’s Rating: 5
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Mar 1, 2016
Utsuro no Hako to Zero no Maria
(Manga)
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"Do you have a wish? This is a box that grants any wish."
"Kazuki Hoshino, I'm here to break you." "We are surrounded by soft, sweet, and pure white despair." The Empty Box and The Zeroth Maria is a dark story about a flawed wish-granting device that causes trouble for our protagonist Hoshino and Otonashi. Settings: The story took place around Ikebukuro, in which a district of Japan. The settings are mostly involving just one tileset at each volume, mostly around the school. But the story are somewhat unique that you will not be bored despite being so. Plot: The story begins when a transfer student called Aya Otonashi, that have just ... transferred to a a school and intends to 'break' Kazuki Hoshino, a normal boy in which likes umaibo snacks and heavily attached to his daily life, right after her introduction. She claimed that it's her 13,118th transfer. She then told Kazuki about the existence of box in which could grant any wish, and that they're trapped inside a box and must find and stop the culprit, because some tragic incident happened involving the box, in which every box design was the symbolizations of the 'owners' characteristics, as it's their wish. Because of this, Kazuki's 'daily life' ruined. As the story goes, stress, depression, identity crisis, moral dilemmas, how a seemingly perfect system flawed heavily, and even death occurs. HakoMari managed to give a heavy thrilling, sinister, and surreal athmosphere as you read it. There's also so many other unexpected plot twists too, but I avoid of telling them so that you can enjoy HakoMari at it's fullest. Art: Nothing Much to say here, same as other Light Novels, there are only few illustrations about it, it somewhat surreal, and it's good IMO. Characters: This is one of the most interesting part of HakoMari IMO. There are many characters here and most of them are well developed, in which a character that takes a main role on a volume may recurring at some next few volume, either be a protagonist or an antagonist. I can also say that all of the characters are well developed, as how their backstories such as tragic pasts, how they deal with the 'box', their involvement on mind games, ulterior motives, how their personality changes as more box involved around their life, and their aftermath. I think almost every characters tend to have spoilery stories so I also avoid to told it more. Such tragedy happened in almost every characters and you may even shocked or shed some tears. Enjoyment: Couldn't expect more from this story, it's a brilliance IMO. I glued at this story, even when I was a bit sleepy, HakoMari managed to make me stay awake when I read it. Even the tiniest bit of comedy managed to make me laugh as I read this story. Also, I enjoy this story because of it's not focused just on one characters (I don't really like stories that only develops 1 character) To be honest, I can say that this is the current Magnum Opus story I've read so far. Completely mindblown. I highly recommend for you guys who are fans of time traveling stories like Madoka Magica or Steins;Gate, and Survival or Mind Games like Death Note or Danganronpa to read this LN. And if these LNs was sold in your local bookstores, I recommend you to just buy it, because it's a bit sad that such a Masterpiece not sells pretty well in Japan, as this story is 'different' than most LNs. Okay I think that's all for my reviews, thanks a lot for reading and I hope you enjoyed my review!
Reviewer’s Rating: 10
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Mar 1, 2016
Macross: Do You Remember Love?
(Anime)
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Mixed Feelings
Macross is a classic mecha series that's surprisingly suits well with the musical dramas settings on it.
PLOT: In the fictional modern world of 2009, Humans were engaged in war with a giant male aliens in which was called Zentraedi and their female counterpart Meltrandi. These two types of aliens were also warring each other. At one time when a singer called Lynn Minmay doing her concert, the Zentraedi began their invasion to humans, and she almost die during the incident but being saved by a young mecha pilot called Hikaru Ichijo, in which he unintentionally saw her struggling when he retreated to the Macross, humans mothership. ... They soon get trapped somewhere at the mothership and was founded later. After then, Hikaru begins his romantic journey as well as his war to defeat the giant aliens. The premise was pretty good, combining musical romance with mechs fighting. The pacing, considering this is a movie reboot of a 36 episodes series which will probably be rushed, is acceptable. And the ending was also pretty well done, although not as good as my expectations. So overall, it was pretty good one. CHARACTERS: This movie have so many characters introduced considering the duration so well, most of them aren't well developed, only the protagonist seems to be quite three dimensional (or maybe between two and three dimensional.) The characters are somewhat relatable for me. I'd say overall the characterization was slightly better than average. SOUNDS AND VISUALS: This is probably the best part of this movie. The art was very fluid, the action was drawn good, and it surprisingly also has a great atmosphere, but keep in mind that I also consider the year of it's release too, it's brilliant for a 80-s film. As for the sound, what can you expect more for musical film? Lynn song was beautiful IMO, and the sound effects during the actions are also very good. ENJOYMENT: This is probably the worst part of my review. Not that I didn't enjoy old shows, but rather like I'm not very interested in mechas, NTR scenes, and high dose of sexism, even more than nowadays ecchis or harems (I didn't really like the idea of overly sexist or feminist story tbh since I'm an egalitarian.) But other than all that thing that turning me off I pretty enjoy the other aspects. The fact that I haven't watched the 36 episodes of the series may be also take account to some of my discontent to this show, so I'm going to say sorry for you guys Macross fans. If you're a mecha fan and okay with old shows and sexism, I pretty recommend this show to be watched tbh. Okay guys I think that's all of my review, thank you for spending your time reading this, I hope you enjoyed this!
Reviewer’s Rating: 6
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Jan 30, 2016
Yojouhan Shinwa Taikei
(Anime)
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Mixed Feelings
"Dream as if you'll live forever. Live as if you'll die today." - James Dean
That's what Tatami is all about, for real. It gets such a high score on MAL, widely being praised everywhere, because The Tatami Galaxy also speaks to the audience about this, and some people is just really a perfectionist in the first place which makes the unnamed protagonist (Watashi) relatable for them. Having a message to convey to the audiences doesn't equate to a good story, and having surreal and "distinctive" artstyle doesn't mean the artstyle is good. But still needless to say, they exists here, and it adds up some merit ... for it. And in the end, fun things are fun. So here it is guys, my updated review of Tatami Galaxy, and of course, it's still a 6/10. Keep in mind that spoilers will be inevitable for this review due to Tatami Galaxy's story structure, which is some perfectionist guy keep resetting time to redo his 2 years to seek for the perfect life he refer as "Rose colored campus life", and episode 1-10 shows how he began his new life in a different club after his attempt to reset time. My first problem for Tatami is well, it doesn't really have a genre in which it excel itself upon. I've seen better mysteries (Haruhi, Shinsekai Yori, etc), I've seen WAY more better romances (Honey & Clover, Spice & Wolf, Kimi ga Nozomu Eien, Shigatsu wa Kimi no Uso, even Kimi ni Todoke which is a really simple romance, etc), and also I've seen many better comedies (Inferno Cop, Kill la Kill, etc). The characterization of this anime was viewed from Watashi's perspective, each time he resets time, you'll find more characters and learn more about the already introduced character about their life, and of course this protagonist develops from his stubbornness in the very end, which resonates well with the story theme, adding the quality merits of the show remarkably. But aside on Watashi's character development and one life lessons it constantly emphasized upon on how there is no perfections in life, I don't see anything special about this anime. Perhaps I have never experienced things like Watashi did, but for sure, a lot of people do. If you found the protagonist really relatable with you, then good for you, since according to the fans, it's the charm of this series. Unfortunately, I failed to perceive it so. Going deeper through this series, I'd like to say that I got pretty disappointed knowing that the time travel cause has never been explored (well some people complaint upon ERASED on being so but then hey why didn't anyone who complaint about it got bothered with Tatami), and I found that none of the characters have any backstory to justify why they acted like that, which the most important thing for me goes to the protagonist himself, since he was so stickler to his "Rose colored campus life". One doesn't simply become so idealistic to their life like him out of nowhere, IMO. Side characters here can barely attach to me because the story being too protagonist-centric. The side characters is nothing abysmal, they have their quirks quite well, but nothing really fleshed out, but it's totally understandable since the narrations is Watashi-centric, which sadly, crash with one of its themes presentation, which leads to my biggest issue with The Tatami Galaxy. The biggest complaint for The Tatami Galaxy of mine, is the romances, which this part is that I should say it's below average. Sure the show trying to imply to us that you can't do the impossible (this is why I wonder on why people who likes Tatami likes TTGL) and just chase the best opportunity that this world has offered you, but is his final choice really the best opportunity for Watashi that he can do after the 2 years? No, not for me. Regarding this opportunity, I wouldn't deny that it's heavily revolve with the romance, since one of Watashi's prior goals is to "find a long raven haired girl". And here's where I think, the buildup to make said "opportunity" interesting is poorly executed. Why? Let's see into the character persona now. Which one is more talkactive? Watashi or Ozu? It's Ozu right? Extroverted guy should get along with introverted girl, because it gives a nice romance dynamics, as one would be the talker and the other would be more of a hearer. This was spoken by me as an introverted guy myself. I like assertive girl more than the silent one, and that's should be the opposite for those guys who talks much IRL. Pairing an introvert with an introvert would be bad as hell, as noone would take the initiative to do something. There is one girl which is really assertive (shown on episode 6-8), which is for me, the better couple for Watashi. You might say that Watashi has been given an opportunity (the mochiguman) to get with his goal, and I have to admit that this empowered said opportunity value by a bit, but is that mean that he doesn't have one with others? I don't think so, if he just didn't run on the episode 6-8, he will be hers. The winning girl character seems to have attached to most of the viewers as how I see that she got much favorites too here on MAL, about 65% compared to the protagonist Watashi, but she just don't stick well with me. Throwing one or two scene where she talked with him can't make me attached to a character (like I said before, other characters are barely affectionate), besides the fact that I never liked ice-cold personality in the first place, there's always exceptions. One of my favorite characters is a tsundere which is well, a trope that I used to generally dislikes even more, but the story can make me emotionally attached to her thanks to how it gives her a lot of perspectiveness, which Tatami lacks of besides having explore other characters activities on each loop. Love is a double-sided relationship, and failing to achieve this means that makes a bad love story. Another part I dislike is that he went to a sex doll which isn't even his belongings first (episode 7) before seeking through his penfriend (episode 8). A sane person will do the contrary for me. It might be not that important for some people but that scene is what infuriates me the most to this anime that I give a heavy facepalm. Aside for my "rant", I actually enjoyed some moments of this anime, notably the end of episode 1 when he got his first misfortune, and how Ozu appears out of nowhere. So that means it's not that it gives me cringe from the beginning of the story until the end but rather, has a mixed feelings on it in terms of enjoyment. People often complaint on how fast the protagonist narrates the story and that's not necessarily a problem to me, but yeah here goes my reminder for it. As for the OST, I can't say much, the OP is pretty refreshing, people usually liked the ED more, but it was just not for me. Some people also tend overanalyze on how on the last episode when the protagonist realized what he have done all the time and gained resolve to fix it, it's intentionally reversed to create the image that his way of thinking already been changed from being a dreamer to an opportunity seeker, but for me it's just how like most anime is, many other anime has their last episode OP played when the story ends too. And to be frank, the OP of episode 1-10 hints on the twists happens on episode 10, but can still keep it subtle that it won't spoils you like many other OP/EDs. People generally attracted to its wacky and surreal artstyle because its "distinctive" but surrealism=/=instantly good for me, and moreover has a two off-model scenes which I used to rant a lot about it (The weird elbow shape on episode 10 and the bag disappearance) but I don't really care that much as for now, but more of because it's being surreal just for the sake of being surreal. My favorite series of all time is heavily surreal and it has a very good reasons of it because it was told from the perspective of a character who has a severe delusions. I also don't mind with supernatural anime or any anime where the character is getting high for being surreal but in the end, Tatami doesn't have any of it. It's just an anime about how a guy strives for ideal life which will never going to happen. But that doesn't make that the art is horrible, it just doesn't adds so much to the quality (it adds a bit, really). I don't know if you might been this idealist or perfectionist before but well I never have great expectations for life afterall. Also other personal reasons is that I'm a firm believer that romance relationship is once in a lifetime commitment so once again I have to reiterate my statement that, Watashi's final decisions is kinda, eh? But in the end, The Tatami Galaxy tries to destroy how many people expects too much about life, which makes you can relate to the protagonist much. It's a great message, I like it so much despite not struck me like other audiences, but the presentation of this theme to the story is just, meh. So well if you feel like you're just a normal or below average guy who has been an idealist all the time, I recommend this anime for you highly. But if you look for a story which cares a lot about character dynamics, and want to also being attached to the side characters, or want a story that has a detailed explanation about how the world works, this series is weak on it so don't go for this one and just watch something like Legend of the Galactic Heroes where there is an actual narrator who become a Mr. Exposition with bunch of episodes and casts. But which elements does a great story must consists of for you? A detailed exposition which covers up all questions you have with even characterization? Or those that speaks to the audiences? Certainly both for me, but if I have to choose, I'll go with the former, unless the story intended to end it with an open interpretations.
Reviewer’s Rating: 6
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