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When Oshi no Ko was first released, I was HYPED. I had heard of the manga prior to the anime coming out and sort of understood the premise (but didn't read it at the time due to many things going on in life at the time), and even sat down to watch the first episode while at an amusement park. THAT'S how excited I was for this show, and the first episode was great. Beautiful animation and somewhat likable characters. The problem? The rest of the show.

Story (7/10)
Goro is a doctor who is into idols a lot due to his bond with his patient named ... Sarina who has a terminal illness, with their favourite idol being Ai of B-Komachi (an idol group). It comes as a shock to him when one day none other than Ai comes into the clinic due to her pregnancy. In short, Goro goes out one day, gets stabbed, is reincarnated as Ai's newborn son. (Also, Sarina died and was reincarnated as Ai's newborn daughter). Life goes well for the three of them for a while. Ai is still being an idol, while taking care of her kids with her coworkers (which many don't know are her kids due to her not wanting to let everyone know) and all is well until a stalker finds out Ai has children and stabs her to death because he felt 'betrayed.' After Ai's death the two twins named Aqua (formerly Goro) and Ruby (formerly Sarina) pursue the entertainment industry with different intentions. Aqua joins to track down the person who gave information to Ai's killer, and Ruby wants to be an idol like her mom (even though she saw how it ended for Ai).
Overall the story is pretty interesting and a unique spin on the usual idol anime, so for that it gets a 7.

Music/Soundtrack/Voice-acting (10/10)
Amazing.

Characters (4.5/10)
For a show that is acclaimed to have such compelling and amazingly written characters, Oshi no Ko sure has an annoying cast. Well, annoying is a bad way to put it, because there is Akane, who I believe to be the saving grace of this show (which is crazy, given how she's a SUPPORTING CHARACTER). Almost all of these characters just feel so repetitive though? There are moments that come in and you would think that these moments would provide growth for the characters, but it just doesn't and then (almost) every episode they go back to this conflict as if they didn't just cover this exact same conflict?? (I am referring to one specific character, so I'm just going to nitpick each important character)
Aqua - (ngl I had a small crush on this mf for a hot second) Due to him being a doctor in his former life, his medical knowledge (WHICH NOW THAT I THINK ABOUT IT WAS NEVER BROUGHT UP EXCEPT FOR ONCE) and wisdom technically makes sense, so kudos to him for that. However, something weird was the way that, aside from knowing who gave the information to Ai's murderer for plot purposes, Aqua seems to be all-knowing of everything and is ALWAYS behind the scenes and always has everything planned out, which bogs down his character. You can have a cunning and manipulative character without them being practically inhuman, which conflicts with a show that goes on about the human side of entertainers and flaws. It can be argued that his manipulative personality is a flaw in itself, but if it is, then why is there no conflict surrounding that flaw? Why does he never have any setbacks due to this trait? He actively goes out of his way to make sure that Ruby wouldn't be an idol and sabotages her multiple times. This could have been an interesting road for his character to go down and realise 'oh wow my actions are hurting people' and step back from his manipulative ways, but he just doesn't. And the dumbest thing is that when he confronts Ruby about her wanting to be an idol, she just stubbornly tells him that she's gonna be one, and he just backs down??? The whole point is that he doesn't want her to be an idol so she doesn't end up down the same path as Ai, but now he's just backing down? Now, what if the new B-Komachi became popular and an incident occurred that made it to where Ruby either gets badly injured or loses her life? He would be looking stupid then because he ACTIVELY just let go of this protectiveness and was like 'well ok you can be an idol'. Now, the viewers of this review are probably going, 'Well the production company's president is Miyako so something like this couldn't possibly happen!' ANYTHING is possible, even with high security and being with a company consisting of people close to you.

Ruby - Ruby is your typical genki girl who wants to pursue her dreams in the idol industry and following her mom's steps (hopefully not the getting stabbed by stalker fan route though) andddd that's all to her character. The show technically focuses on her a bit, but all of her moments consist of her being so blissfully ignorant and enthusiastic. I'm not saying that her being an enthusiastic character is bad per se, it just makes her boring when that's her only personality trait.

Kana - I HAVE BEEN WANTING TO TALK ABOUT HER (not in a good way) Kana is what comes from a show trying to be deep but just keeps throwing it in your face that 'oh x is bad'. She started off an alright character, but the more spotlight she got, the more annoying she became. Her main thing at this point is that she feels insecure over people not wanting her and her crush on Aqua (which, by the way, on a verbal scale she treats him like crap. I get that everyone knows that that's not what she actually means, but dang does it get annoying when the two are trying to have a genuine conversation and she returns to the status quo). Also most of her 'character development' feels very....sexist. Time to put on my 'woke SJW feminist' hat right now... Kana is the typical case of being an insecure character who needs her confidence to be built up by a male character. An example is in the last episode where Kana starts to doubt herself because she sees no lights for her in the crowd at the B-Komachi concert and right when she's about to give up, guess what? Of course, Aqua is there to cheer her on with a white glowstick! First of all, I saw this moment coming from a mile away. Second of all, this moment is just a MINOR example of what Kana's 'character' is. If you even want to call this a character, when in actuality she either is functioning as a mouthpiece of the burnt out child actress or as the voice of reason and occasional comedic relief.

Akane - Probably the only good and worthwhile character in this godforsaken show. I loved the point where she decides to play a character to avoid getting hurt actually, because it's a realistic portrayal of real life situations. One thing I hated about her character is the fact that they just had to bring her character back to Aqua and made her act like Ai because apparently that was Aqua's 'ideal woman' (as well as the fact that Aqua was the one to save her from jumping off the bridge, even though the entire cast of LoveNow was there). Like....why? Why does every character in this show have to come back to Aqua? Why can't a character be important in this show on their own? The closest thing we've seen to a character who is independent from Aqua is probably Mem, but she's just not there that much so....

Ai - The literal poster girl for this series who actually dies in the first episode. Much like Kana, Ai is a 'character' with her just being a portrayal of the dangers of parasocial relationships and idol culture, as well as how idols 'lie' and how everyone loves to be lied to (will get back to later). She serves no other purpose than to remind you how dark the idol industry is. Oh yeah, and apparently she's a good idol due to her 'charisma', which is ironic given how boring and generic her performances and singing seem to be. It feels like her appeal boils down to her good looks, which could have been a plot point of how many 'fans' only care about how pretty she is, but of course that would make too much sense! Also, as for the whole idols 'lying' to fans would be an alright point if they didn't, in my words, 'Kana' it and CONSTANTLY throw it in our faces. WE GET IT.

To wrap things up, Oshi no Ko is a prime example of show-don't-tell, with how the creator (I will not blame the studio here because they're just following the source material) is obsessed with telling us why X is bad and the series' themes without actively showing us ANYTHING. If you want us to care about these things, then SHOW US. It's frustrating when the conflict or just anything has to be thoroughly explained and spoonfed to the audience through all this pretentious dialogue in an attempt to get us to care. Give us more instances like Akane's bullying or Ai's death (not saying just killing off characters would be good..) to actively show the audience just how damaging the entertainment industry is to entertainers!

4/10 (this review is all over the place, but so is this series)

This review is going to be pretty short.

Seishun Buta Yarou, or rather simply Bunny Girl Senpai is an anime that has been loved by many but I couldn't get myself to love or even like this one. I tried and I tried so hard to see what was so great about this and I just didn't get it.

Let's start of with the plot. The story is about Sakuta Azusagawa, a second year in high school who encounters several girls who experience Adolescence Syndrome, the result of instability and sensitivity during adolescence that causes strange phenomenons. This...is a surprisingly alright plot. I mean, it isn't a ... completely new idea, given that the whole 'edgy mc saves girls from problem' plot has been used in series like Bakemonogatari. Therefore I deem it below average with a 6 out of 10.

The art in this series is actually really good, in my eyes. I've seen people who dislike the series criticize the art but I personally find it beautiful. The calm colours are nice on the eyes and are accompanied with thick lineart (I personally love thick lineart in anime). Each character design is also not oversaturated like anime characters usually are and most of them have brown and black hair colours and dark eye colours. No crazy colour schemes and unbelievable character designs, just simplicity, which I always like in a series. So, I'll give props to CloverWorks for their great art for the series.

The OST for this one is great as well. I loved the opening and endings, which is normally rare. The voice acting was also amazing. Sakuta's confession to Mai was peak voice acting and amplified the experience. Plus, it threw me off a little, given how monotone his voice usually is. Mai's seiyuu also did great with her emotional scenes, as you could feel the emotions brimming.

Here's where the show crashes and burns for me. The characters. I usually don't even pay attention to the plot of an anime as much as I do to the characters. (Fate/Zero is an exception bc I love the plot AND the characters) The characters always serve as the backbone of any series. If you have dislikeable characters, there's a 90% chance it'll damage my feelings toward the series for me.
There are in total 7 characters that the story revolves around. Let's start with our godly main character Sakuta Azusagawa. I could write an essay on why I hate this man, but I'm not gonna go this far. Sakuta is our main male protagonist. He's perverted, a loner, and witty. Or this is how he's described but it never feels that way. His 'wits' are reduced to making cringey 'jokes' about the female characters he encounters. Let's take Saki Kamisato for example. Saki is basically Sakuta's friend's girlfriend who is always out to get him, as she wants him to stop hanging out with his friend so that it doesn't damage his (the friend's) reputation. I was initially interested in how their interactions would go down when I first viewed the anime and it was just basically Sakuta coming back at her with the typical 'are you on your period' card. To some, this may have been hilarious, but this joke was a huge miss for me. For a person to be a witty person, they need clever humour right? So what about comments like this is clever or funny? Another issue I had with his character was how he felt obligated to help every single girl with Adolescence Syndrome that breathed in his presence. While his actions did have SOME justification behind them, as he didn't want people to go through the same thing his sister did. Even so, the problem with this is that he always tries to be the one who solves the problem for the girls, rather than him helping the girls solve their problems. If this sounds too confusing, I'll try to give an example. Say you're working on a math question, right? In order to solve the math question, the teacher helps you with the problem. The teacher shouldn't have to solve the problem for you, they should give you the push in how to solve the problem yourself. In reality, you can't just solve people's problems for themselves, because sometimes there are problems people have to confront themselves and solve for themselves. Sorry to branch off here, but another thing that bugged me is that it seems that after the Adolescence Syndrome is resolved, it doesn't have any lasting affects on the characters (unless it's Sakuta and Kaede, which are probably used to give explanation for Sakuta's motivations)
Enter Mai Sakurajima. Mai is the poster girl for the series and the main heroine along with being Sakuta's girlfriend. She's sassy, confident, and serious, even around her boyfriend. She is actually the third girl that Sakuta encounters with Adolescence Syndrome (The first two were Shouko and Kaede) but the first girl he helped with Adolescence Syndrome. While I desperately wanted to love her as much as many fans do and call her my best girl, she was bothersome. She seemingly has no flaws following her character arc. Her character arc is three episodes long and covers the first volume of the light novel. It centers around her Adolescence Syndrome which causes her to become invisible to those around her and for others to subconsciously ignore her. But guess what? Her Adolescence Syndrome gets resolved by none other than our hero Sakuta (who only helped at first because she's hot. but I don't even blame him). This arc would've sat right with me if it had resonated with her forever. Aren't there any lasting affects on her mental health? Did this give her a complex about being forgotten? Nope! Let's just move on to the next character! In the end, that's it. That's the show for you. Sakuta meets girl. Girl has Adolescence Syndrome. Sakuta resolves Adolescence Syndrome. Character is never to be seen again unless they are of any importance to Sakuta. Wash, rinse, repeat.
Koga serves a victim to this curse.
To be blunt, Koga's character arc revolved around her (and Sakuta of course) being stuck in a time-loop because she wanted to fit in.
Her character arc lasted for only two episodes, so it felt pretty rushed and actually ended with her confessing to Sakuta and breaking free from the time-loop. This was pretty nice, seeing as how Sakuta wasn't the one who resolved her Adolescence Syndrome but rather herself resolving it, but wait. Her arc is over so she's practically useless at this point. After these episodes, Koga's screen time gets demolished and she serves as the gag character for Sakuta to make butt jokes (even though her butt looks pretty flat but that's not the point--).
That's the problem with this. After a character's problems gets solved by Sakuta, they're basically irrelevant after. The only characters that have a remotely large role is Mai, Kaede, and Rio. In the end, the only reason they are kept around is because Mai is Sakuta's girlfriend, Rio is Sakuta's friend and gives him logical explanations on Adolescence Syndrome with quantum physics (which are thrown down the drain with something like 'they have an inferiority complex' and Kaede is Sakuta's little sister and the reason why he feels the urge to be Captain Save a Hoe.

Overall, this isn't an anime I could ever see myself returning to. The characters annoy me, the plot is weak, and the only was I could see myself watching this again is for the animation. But even for that, I'd just look at screencaps rather than watching the actual show.

When I first went into Classroom of the Elite, I admit I was a bit skeptical. The plot didn't seem to be all that and the characters seemed uninteresting. Little did I know that this series would blow my expectations out of the water.

Classroom of the Elite is a story about reaching the top, to be blunt. The series takes place at the Advanced Nurturing High School. This school is extremely prestigious and is said to have a high college and employment rate. In reality, this sounds like the absolute dream. Or on the surface, that is. It is later revealed that the school ... has a cruel system where your grades determine which class you end up in. Enter Class D. Class D is where the school dumps the students with low grades. These students are considered inferior compared to classes of higher grades and status like Class A, for example. Class D is a class treated like less than dirt by the hierarchy while classes like Class A are praised by many. In order to climb up to this level, Class D works to get higher up to the point of overthrowing Class A, via getting higher grades. Class D is ALSO the class that houses out main protagonist. His name is Kiyotaka Ayanokoji, a boy interested in making friends who doesn't like to stand out and would rather be one who blends in with the crowd. While this story may seem cool to others, I didn't really see the appeal. It was alright but not the best, plus the thought of a hierarchical school system had already been used, as seen in Assassination Classroom. Therefore the story overall is a 6, especially considering that I didn't come for the story.

On the other hand, this series was animated by none other than studio Lerche. Known for works like Assassination Classroom. Monster Musume, Danganronpa : The Animation, Carnival Phantasm, and so on. (These are the titles I think of when I hear Lerche, anyway) Lerche really outdid themselves with this series, though. The colours mix together pretty well and the character designs are beautiful. I also couldn't help but admire how the colours on the characters become gradient. For example, Horikita's hair is black but fades into white at the end. It's something about this that makes the character's designs so satisfying. The settings are also drawn well too. The dorms of the students to the cafes all feel so strangely refreshing to look at to me. Nothing is over-saturated and is easy on the eyes.

As for the sound, it wasn't that impressive to me. The opening and ending themes honestly sounded pretty bad...
The only reason why I didn't give it a lower score was because the voice acting. While the voice acting isn't the best of all time, it's pretty on point and the voices match the characters.

The characters were the strongest link in the series for me. Ultimately, the characters were so entertaining to watch that they carried the show for me. Since the anime doesn't cover the source material fully and does not give all of the students fleshed out backstories and such, I can't say ALL of the students were the best, but for the most part, they were still rather enjoyable. Let's take Ayanokoji as an example. If you were to look at my profile, you'd see that he is in my favourites, so this may sound a bit biased here. When I had went in, I thought this was going to be another Seishun Buta Yarou or OreGairu where there's a loner MC who's witty and always gets the girls. Or in short, another Sakuta or Hachiman, so I didn't care for him at first. When the story went on, though he slowly grew into a favourite of mine.
(Quick rundown of Ayanokoji's personality)
Ayanokoji is described as an average person who just want friends. Seems simple, right? Normally, in LNs (Light Novels) the main character seems like an asshole but is secretly nice. Ayanokoji differs from this trope. On the outside, yes he can be kind. If you were to watch his first interaction with Horikita, then you'd see that he's just a kind fellow trying to make friends. It is later revealed that he is a rather twisted person beneath this exterior and is willing to manipulate others for his own benefit and sees people as nothing more than tools. This includes Horikita, his classmate that he tries to be friendly with. Crazy, right? Given his mentality, it makes you question who he really considers friends and who he's just put to manipulate and gets your cogs turning. And even better, he doesn't fall in love with the dark haired kuudere--
Another good example is Horikita, Ayanokoji's classmate who sits next to him. Horikita has a cold demeanor and dislikes the idea of making friends. She is cynical and blunt. Deep down though, she feels inferior to her older brother, who's in Class A and strives to stand on the same ground as him. While this has been done before, it does build some sympathy for her and gets you rooting for her all the way through.
The likeable things about these characters are that on the outside, they are one thing but on the inside, they're completely different. It makes you think and reflect on the other characters to think if they are putting up a front as well.

Overall, I personally loved this show for its ability to get you thinking and questioning everything given how fronts are always put up for...well everything. From characters being cold on the outside but insecure on the inside to a school that seems perfect but is highly a hierarchical system not afraid to look down upon those with worse performance than others. There are always twists and turns willing to make me gasp and keep my eyes glued to the screen waiting for what happens next. It's a pretty good series that seems bland at first but will get you to want more in the end.