The second 2013 title in this blog’s ‘Anime of the Year 2013’ audition that I decided to watch and then review today would be yet another anime with a long title titled Mondaiji-tachi ga Isekai kara Kuru Sou Desu yo?. Completely different when it comes to plot when compared to the first title in the audition, the long-titled Yahari Ore no Seishun Love Come wa Machigatteiru, can the shortest anime series in this audition be able to challenge the surprise early front-runner of this audition in the form of the latter? By the way, this review will be the only third one that doesn’t have any screenshots.
Story:-
Three gifted teenagers from three different parallel worlds was invited into ‘The Garden’, a mystical fantasy world vastly different from their own versions of Japan. In The Garden, the gifted teenagers that comes from different eras of Japan will get to alleviate their boredoms by participating in ‘Gift Games’ hosted by the powerful and (in)famous characters in that world. Therefore the three teenagers started to have it their own way and fighting their way through those games, with varying results.
Storywise, this anime is a fast starter compared to Yahari Ore no Seishun Love Come wa Machigatteiru, with the first five episodes of this anime being better than the first 5 episodes of the latter. Unlike the latter though, this anime does not improve in its final five episodes therefore, Yahari Ore no Seishun Love Come wa Machigatteiru has better final 5 episodes than this anime. This doesn’t mean that the quality of the plots of this anime has plunged in the those last 5 episodes, it is just that the plot barely improved in quality in those episodes.
Now the biggest question I have for this anime is ‘Why this anime has only 10 episodes?’. The way this anime’s screenplay was written AND THEN presented to the viewers, it is as if this anime has been truly planned to have at least 24 or 26 episodes (2 cours) instead of only 10. If the director knows that this anime has only 10 episodes, why is that he/she lets the writer wrote the story the way it is currently seen now? The second season of Hakuouki Hekketsu-roku also have 10 episodes, but at least its plot was written exactly to fit into those meager 10 episodes at the cost of pacing.
This is a pity because this anime could have turned out to become a very good action title. Just like Yahari Ore no Seishun Love Come wa Machigatteiru, this anime do still has a lot of potential still left in its storyline. The setting of ‘The Garden’ is excellent and can provide plenty of inspiration for the writer to draw more decent-quality plots out of it. The ending of this anime then feels like it ends abruptly, which is understandable because in any other action anime title, its ending will be commonly seen as an end to an arc, not an end to an anime series or season(s).
Considering the 10-episode nature of this anime, the pacing of this anime is very good. Not like the very fast pacing of Hakuouki Hekketsu-roku reviewed here before. The flow of the storyline is also great, better even than Yahari Ore no Seishun Love Come wa Machigatteiru. While this anime doesn’t have any characters that is on the same level of Yahari Ore no Seishun Love Come wa Machigatteiru’s main male protagonist, the developments of the characters in this anime are more balanced than in the former. Again I do have a feeling that the character developments of the 3 Japanese teenagers are devised on the premise that this anime would need at least 2 cours to be executed properly.
Just like Yahari Ore no Seishun Love Come wa Machigatteiru, there are no second season planned for this anime yet as of writing. I do think this anime do deserve one with much higher episode count. At least this anime is much more watchable, unlike another anime title reviewed here that also doesn’t have any screenshots in it…
Character Design:-
The character designs for the two female Japanese teenagers whisked away from their parallel worlds is good, especially for the one that can talk to animals. The design for the only male character is ordinary unlike his awesomely powerful gift. In ‘The Garden’ there are very few black-haired characters in it, but instead has plenty of real cat and rabbit ears on humanoid forms. This anime has done better than Yahari Ore no Seishun Love Come wa Machigatteiru in this regard, but then again the ‘The Garden’ settings really helps this anime here.
Voice Acting:-
The voice acting gigs in this anime is good overall. Characters whose voice actors has done outstanding job includes the girl that come from the post-war Japan and also the white-haired Floor Master. The other two teenagers are good though voice-acting-wise, but quite far behind them. Other recurring characters too doesn’t have any gigs that is not at least above-average in level. This anime has definitely done better than Yahari Ore no Seishun Love Come wa Machigatteiru in this aspect.
Music:-
Unlike Yahari Ore no Seishun Love Come wa Machigatteiru, this anime has very good soundtrack. But just like Yahari Ore no Seishun Love Come wa Machigatteiru, this anime has crappy OP and ED themes. And insert themes too. This anime is barely better than Yahari Ore no Seishun Love Come wa Machigatteiru I suppose in this aspect.
Animation/Direction:-
This anime employed the blurry animation technique which will result on 1-point docking from this anime final evaluation score. Apart from that, general animation quality of this anime is at least flawless, but there are times when character animations is going to be jerky. No problem with character composition unlike Yahari Ore no Seishun Love Come wa Machigatteiru. Integration between traditional 2D animation and CGI sequences is excellent.
Choreography in action scenes is below average though; a blip for this anime. Apart from the suspect editorial decision I have mentioned in the story section above, the director has done a very good job for this anime, especially for its presentation.
Conclusion:-
7 out of 10. This probably would have done well with more episodes. Yahari Ore no Seishun Love Come wa Machigatteiru still remains a surprise front-runner in this audition, I hope other titles in the audition can do challenge it in the future.
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