Hello ladies, peoples, and animals it is I, the Arcane Reviewer! Here to bring you a new anime review. Seeing as how I had to sit through a whole bunch of crap last week I figured I treat myself a bit and watch an anime that I've been meaning to check out for a while now. Back in the Spring of 2011 there was a little anime that was gathering some attention from a lot of regular seasonal viewers, especially those that are fans of romance. That anime being the very one I'm going to take a look at today. So now I present to you my review for, Anohana: The Flower That We Saw That Day. Is this anime really as good as some say? Well let's find out shall we?
Story:
We follow Jintan, a young man who is just about a complete shut in. He doesn't really go outside much, he doesn't have a lot of friends, and he's pretty much given up on going to school. All within good reasons though as we figure out that when Jintan was younger a very close friend of his unfortunately passed away. That friend's name being, Menma. Since then he's been living a pretty pathetic life. However things change when he starts seeing the ghost of Menma. Even more odd is that she can actually have physical connect with everything and everyone but no one can see or here her, all except Jintan. Jintan believes that he's just suffering from some sort of hallucination until the spirit of Menma very much shows that she is very much real by bothering our main character, which in all honesty is pretty funny to watch. Menma suggests that she most likely came back because she had a wish that she was never able to grant and that she'll need not only Jintan but his old group of friends that him and Menma use to hang out with. So that's pretty much the plot. Jintan has to reunite with all of his old friends so they can send off their deceased and let her rest in peace. So all I have to say is that this show anime's story is pretty damn good. The plot isn't just about sending Menma off, you also have the whole side plot of Jintan and his friends coming back together and rekindling that old flame that brought them together when they were younger. It's a really nice story and bring you back to a simpler time in our lives when we didn't have to worry about all the drama that we do now. But that's not to say that it's skips on the whole growing up aspect as it does say that growing up is a very important point in our lives that we have to face. But it also tells to never forget about our fondest childhood memories. As you would expect the anime is also very romance heavy and it's pretty damn cute. The two lead characters, Jintan and Menma, are very cute together and their romance comes off as a very sincere relationship. So the story and romance here is very good and is told in a very heart touching and mature way that in no way tries to goat the audience into feeling a specific way. They earn all of the strong emotional moments and earn all of the tears that will be shed when watching this show. Unlike other shows that completely try to manipulate the audience into feeling sad at the expense of completely pulling a love confession out of nowhere and braking the entire show with a huge ass gaping plot hole at the end. I'm looking at you Angel Beats!
Animation:
Animation here is very nice. Simple as that. The animation is clean and very pretty to look at and all of the expressions that the characters convey on their faces are done very well. If there is one thing that I loved though was how the tears looked when someone cried. In a lot of anime you'll have a character just drop a few tears and it's mostly goes down in a simple pattern, simple as that. Well in this show the tears actually looked messy. They would go in different patterns on the face and the character's noses would start to run as well so you'll see some mucus coming down along with the tears. Just like how an actual person's face while crying. Also the tears would get fucking everywhere. I mean they would go all over the place whenever a character would start to move around a lot. They would fall all over their face and leave stains and shit. The tears here where they're own character in this show. It's great and I really liked the animation. Also those tears should get a damn Oscar. I don't care if the show's three years, make happen.
Music:
The music here is sadly a bit of a let down. Now when I say that it doesn't mean that the music here was bad. But it was pretty forgettable. The music did a good job at setting the tone in the show but I really didn't feel like it had much of an impact in the overall emotional factor in the anime's more serious and dramatic moments. Now to be fair whenever these moments would occur the anime did use silence a lot which in my opinion actually made the scene a lot stronger. But on that same note whenever they did decide to have music accompany any of the major scenes it would go unnoticed because you got so used to the silence that you kinda start ignoring the music in the back. Also the music itself just didn't have that lasting appeal to it to really gain any type of recantation. At least from me anyway. Though I will say that the opening theme is a great song and sets the tone perfectly when it comes to the show. It's really good compared to the show's music.
Characters:
Now as you would expect this show has a pretty big cast. Thankfully the cast is really good. Well kind of. As mentioned before the two leading roles are perfect, Menma and Jinta are really well developed characters and I feel like they themselves are just great characters. You also have the rest of the friends like the big goof that everyone loves named Poppo. he is a big guy that just loves being around the people that he loves. He's funny energetic and always puts a smile on my face. You also have Anaru and Tsuruko, the two other female characters. I really liked them because they have a lot of emotional baggage on them and they get a lot of screen time to fully flesh out their personal problems. They, just like Jintan and Menma, have very well done character development and come off as pretty real individuals. I really liked them and they where enjoyable to watch. However the other side characters didn't get a lot of screen time like Menma's parents and little brother as well as Jintan's father, who is likable but barely gets any screen time to really develop as a character. Oh I know what you're saying "Arcane, isn't there a sixth character in the main cast of friends that you didn't mention?" and yes, you are right. I didn't mention the character of Yukiatsu. Why? Well you see it's simple.
Nitpicks:
Yukiatsu is a fucking asshole. He is a sympathetic and you do see the reason to his motives. He is not a poorly developed or written character. He is however very unlikable. He is a complete dick through out the show and I just couldn't stand him. He's rude, he's cocky, he's insensitive to other people's feelings, and he is a pretty sick person. I won't say how but he does do some sick stuff. He's just an awful person and someone I would never want to be around. But like I said he's written well and you get to see and eventually understand why he is the way that he is. He's stick a fucking prick but you know at least you understand now. Also the ending got a little silly. I won't spoil anything but I will say that in the lead up to the climax of the show everyone just starts to do revelations and it's a bit silly really. The scene starts off great and all but eventually everyone just starts revealing things back and forth that I actually cracked up at a part that wasn't supposed to be funny. I felt kinda bad laughing at that.
Overall:
So to close up this review I'll make things pretty clear. Anohana is a great anime. I has a wonderful story, a great cast of characters, for the most part, and an ending that might just leave you in tears. Not gonna lie I cried for ten minutes straight after the show ended. Now I just lost my man card. Dammit. But in all seriousness it's a great show you I highly recommend it.
Arcane Reviews gives Anohana: The Flower We Say that Day a 9 out of 10.
You can watch "Anohana: The Flower We Say That Day" on:
Crunchyroll (Sub Only)
Hulu (Sub Only)
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