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In brief, Rondo an excellent refresher on the events of the series, but a poor substitute. If you're short on time, watch the original. It's not that long. But if you've already seen it and want to jog your memory before watching the sequel movie or visual novel, then I strongly recommend Rondo.

The original Revue Starlight series is already so lean in its storytelling, leaning heavily on evocative abstractions, that when pared down by more than half it becomes too disjointed and confusing. That isn't to say that Rondo doesn't cut the series as deftly as it can--it does. The editing is captivating. But ... aside from repeated stock scenes (the opening, the ending, the transformation sequence), every scene in the original series is load-bearing, charged with vital purpose. None can be discarded without diminishing the overall work.

The scant new scenes which contextualize the film as a reminiscence of Nana aren't enough to make this movie essential watching, but are an enjoyable metatextual wrapper to the events of the series. I imagine to anyone seeing Rondo in a vacuum, they'd only serve to make the film more confusing, but they're a nice bone to throw to fans of the original. A treat, not a meal.

This film exists for a such a narrow niche that in all likelihood, if you're reading this, it's not for you. Want to get into Revue Starlight? Don't start here. Hot off the series and looking for more? There's not enough new here to bother, just go watch the sequel movie. Are you the sort who only watches movies and not series? I imagine you'll leave this film confused and unfulfilled. There are far more people I wouldn't recommend this movie to than people I would. BUT if you fit the criteria outlined in the opening, give it a watch. I imagine you and you alone won't be disappointed.

Just who is Pon no Michi for?

It's not for mahjong fans. While the central conceit of the show is that the main character inherits a mahjong parlor and befriends a magical mahjong spirit, she ultimately doesn't seem to care so much about the game as she does about hanging out. Her friends are much the same. It's fun to see them goof off lightheartedly at the mahjong table in the earliest episodes but after that point they lose interest. When the 5th and final Cute Girl, the only one truly passionate about mahjong, is introduced under the pretense of a rivalry with another member ... of the cast, they spend several episodes denying her in order to Do Cute Things (i.e. not mahjong) and stamp out the fire inside her, taming her into another genericized member of the cast.

But what about CGDCT fans? The mahjong is just a distraction. If anything, most of the cute stuff they do vis a vis mahjong is just reenacting scenes from other famous (and better) mahjong stories. And beyond that, the time they spend hanging around feels contrived and unrealistic. Who has a defunct mahjong parlor just fall into their lap? Where are they getting all this time and money? To me, CGDCT works when it either leans into realism and shows Cute Girls Doing Cute Things in spite of it all, or leans into fantasy and invents whole-cloth dreamlike situations in which Cute Girls can do Things so Cute they'd be impossible for mere mortals like us. Ideally CGDCT is relatable and/or absurd and Pon no Michi is neither. It introduces promising ideas, issuing challenges to the characters which would help us better understand them, and then promptly forgets about them to go do something else. What we're left with are a cookie cutter ensemble who die stillborn in the egg of their archetypes: Spunky Klutz #1, Big Boobs #2, Tomboy, Rich Girl, and Goth Tryhard.

So why does Pon no Michi even exist? Functionally, it's a long commercial for Onomichi tourism, and a slightly-less-long commercial for Mahjong Soul. But it's not even a very good commercial. When transparently sponsored, product placement anime like Super Cub exist and are actually able to tell a moderately compelling story, Pon no Michi has no excuse.

Side notes:
- The auto-tuning in the opening is atrocious.
- Of the subs available, the bilibili subs are machine translated garbage, and the 4chan subs are meme trash. ADN is passable but not amazing.
- :->

The best mahjong manga for actually learning how to play mahjong. The main character is an online mahjong pro looking to break into the world of gambling. The story itself is relatively straightforward, and the art is charismatic and expressive. But the real star is the deep dive into riichi mahjong strategy, and what goes through the minds of players who play the game at a high level--the intricacies of reading one's opponents, navigating the vagaries of fortune, and walking a psychological tightrope to remain level-headed enough to make the right move at the right moment.

The narrative is fairly simplistic, as are the characters ... themselves. I'm not sure I'd recommend this to anyone who isn't already familiar with the rules of riichi mahjong. But if you are, you absolutely need to read this!