THIS IS MY FIRST REVIEW EVER ON MAL, SO I'M SORRY IF IT'S NOT AS GOOD AS OTHERS. I TRIED MY BEST :)
SPOILER ALERT FOR JOURAN: THE PRINCESS OF SNOW AND BLOOD
When looking into animes to watch for this season a few months ago, I stumbled upon Jouran: The Princess of Snow and Blood. I liked the premise it presented and I decided to give it a chance, considering that it was receiving mixed opinions at the time. After watching the first four episodes and finishing the anime a few days ago, I can say that this is a dissapointment of an anime.
STORY: 3
Even though
...
the story seemed interesting and a little bit repetitive at the beginning, after a few episodes in I understood that I didn't understand the story at all. The synopsis given by MAL is true for the first four episodes which, by the way, were extremely forgettable, considering I don't remember anything from them other than the main plot that was presented was pretty much completed in the first arc. The second arc, or Book II, was ridiculous. I couldn't understand the reason for anything in that arc other than Sawa and Asahi wanting a peaceful life. The third arc, or Book III, is like a combination of being forgettable and also being ridiculous, especially the ending. After everything Sawa managed to survive, after suffering a lot and after pretty much winning thanks to Jin's sacrifice, you're trying to tell me she died from a stab in the back? Poor and lazy writing, and just a stupid excuse for the story to have an unnecessary tragic ending. The story was overall a mess that was, at least for me, hard to follow. And I haven't even mentioned the ridiculous amount of plot twists and death fakeouts that were included in the story. Seriously, every character faked their death at least once in this anime. IT'S A TWELVE EPISODE ANIME. However, I must give props to Jouran for actually having an interesting story, that unluckily became increasingly worse and non-sensical.
CHARACTERS: 5
Most of the characters are normal, mediocre characters. Sawa is your normal MC, a character in seek of vengeance that, after obtaining it, doesn't know what's next in her life. I wasn't interested enough in Hanakaze to be honest, but I thought she was okay as well. Asahi just served as Sawa's motivation for living after the fourth episode, but she was okay as well, and I thought Jin was quite interesting after showing us a little bit of his background. He is probably the best character in this anime. My main problem with the characters in this anime, however, is Tsukishiro. WHAT THE FUCK??????? This character betrayed her supposed team at least three time throughout the whole anime and her motives for doing anything were completely unknown. In Book II, particularly, I lost track of what the hell she was doing. So she first gives Asahi a poison to kill Sawa, BUT WAIT, turns out her plan is for the poison to be a death fakeout for Sawa so Asahi and her can escape, BUT WAIT, turns out that after they escape, Tsukishiro follows them and tries to convince Sawa to come back and attempts to kill her, AFTER HELPING HER ESCAPE????? Seriously, what the fuck was Tsukishiro plan's? I'm so glad she got killed, the story just became a little bit more enjoyable after they got rid of her.
ANIMATION: 6
Definitely Jouran's strongest part. One of the reasons I got into this anime was because of the art, which looked really cool. The artsyle, indeed, is really good, but the animation is very inconsistent. I just feel that it lacks in animation and that it could've been done better. However, the fight scenes looked really good in their majority and the artsyle, as I already mentioned, is very solid overall.
SOUND: 5
Could've been the strongest part beacuse RAISE A SUILEN absolutely killed it with the OP and the ED songs. The OP was one of my favorites for this season. However, the overall OST used in the anime itself was pretty average and the sound mixing was very poor at times, especially the first few episodes, where I had to increase the volume just to hear what the characters where saying. RAISE A SUILEN definitely carried this anime's sound, at least for me.
ENJOYMENT: 5
Honestly, I found myself enjoying this anime at times, thanks to the artstyle being very nice to watch and some parts of the story being interesting. However, the inconsistencies in the story itself, the whole existence of Tsukishiro as a character, the terrible sound mixing at times, and many other factors contributed to me being both invested in the anime as well as sleeping while watching it. It wasn't good, but it wasn't the worst either.
OVERALL: 51/100
I must say, I'm pretty disappointed. Bakken Record is a seemingly new studio and, for Jouran to be one of their first animes, is not a bad effort. However, the final product is very mediocre in itself. I have high hopes for this studio as the animation presented wasn't that bad at all. However, if they are planning to do another anime original, they better step it up with the story, since I think it was a convoluted mess who was done poorly. Overall, very mediocre anime, but a promising studio who I have hopes will probably have better works in the future.
Jun 17, 2021
THIS IS MY FIRST REVIEW EVER ON MAL, SO I'M SORRY IF IT'S NOT AS GOOD AS OTHERS. I TRIED MY BEST :)
SPOILER ALERT FOR JOURAN: THE PRINCESS OF SNOW AND BLOOD When looking into animes to watch for this season a few months ago, I stumbled upon Jouran: The Princess of Snow and Blood. I liked the premise it presented and I decided to give it a chance, considering that it was receiving mixed opinions at the time. After watching the first four episodes and finishing the anime a few days ago, I can say that this is a dissapointment of an anime. STORY: 3 Even though ... |
