A big season has a major advantage, but also a major disadvantage. The major advantage? There will be more great shows. This will only become more apparent as the season goes on, and right now there are already a ton of shows that are really good. The downside though… is that there also will be more bad shows. This season was no exception.
When I checked out Anohana’s first episode, I had nearly given up. Seriously, I haven’t dropped so many series in one season in a long while. There are just so many mediocre series in this season, let alone bad ones. Things like Hidan no Aria, Sofuteni and Hoshikaka, among many others, had these terribly annoying character. Seriously, what’s fun about them? And then there also were series as Sengoku Otome, which I guess didn’t have any harem stereotypes, but also did absolutely nothing to stand out.
Moe in Noitamina? I really had no faith. Mari Okada surely is an amazing writer, but there is no way that she’d be able to write three series at the same time. Again. Where two are completely original stories. The Fractale debacle of the previous season didn’t help either. And then I started to watch the first episode of Anohana. And indeed, it looked like all the others at first, with a guy and a girl having random fun. And then Naruko turned up, it became clear that Meiko was a ghost, and it just blew me away. It’s been ages since I watched such a heartwarming teenaged drama.
A ton of character development, already in the first episode, excellent animation, these characters are just amazing. They’re unlike the stereotypes you usually see: they feel like people. They have personalities, but aren’t completely dominated by them. They have their own stories, but also feel like characters beyond that. Take this episode for example: Naruko was pretty tsundere, but for once I wouldn’t blame her, considering what happened. And at the same time the tsundere wasn’t the only part of her character. It’s clear that all of these characters still have their feelings about their childhood days, but they all grew away in their own ways. This really turned out to be a wonderful story about people growing apart from each other, with some being left behind. Also, this episode really hit home as well when they started talking about Pokemon (or… Nokemon) which they played together. You usually see kids play video games and all, but rarely do you see this much meaning put into it.
The thing with annoying characters is… well… they’re annoying. There are basically two types of them: the types that are annoying because the writers can’t write good dialogue, or the ones that are really meant to be annoying. And even the second category can become a pain to watch if the character in question is just one-dimensional. Meiko has impressed me, though: she has just the right amount of annoying antics so that it becomes a part of her character, while she also has plenty of scenes that just portray her as a normal girl. She has quite a few sides for only two episodes, which is really great to see. Remember Nessa from Fractale? She mostly ran around being happy and once in a while she got sad when Phryne was involved. Meiko is much more dynamic. Thank god!
Whether this series is going to be better or not than Hana-Saku Iroha obviously can’t be said yet: Hana-Saku Iroha is 26 episodes, so it can take its time to take detours to porn novelists. This just has eleven episodes, so it has to deliver in these eleven episodes. And it’s doing a mighty fine job so far!
Rating: *** (Awesome)
