Red Garden

This anime was pretty different from what I expected based on its synopsis and in this case it wasn't in a good way. There actually isn't a whole lot of combat or mystery or drama. The anime is actually probably closer to a slice of life than anything else. The main characters, a group of four girls, die very early on in the anime and one would think this would be a pretty monumental, life-changing event but instead, upon the girl's "revival" if you will, almost nothing changes. They go to school, work their jobs, go on dates, worry about bills and do all the ... normal things they were doing before as if they'd never died. It is extremely difficult to believe and it makes their death seem almost inconsequential, which is just silly.

Perhaps this was done intentionally, as it could be how Japanese animators perceive Americans, but I didn't care for the art style at all. I found the show outright ugly sometimes and the character models, in particular, left a lot to be desired. There were a couple of characters that looked as if they'd undergone seriously botched plastic surgery.

The show also lacked cohesion. Randomly in a few of the early episodes the girls would break out into song. The anime suddenly becomes a musical without warning. But then, just as abruptly and without warning as these things began they then stop and they never happen again. Why? What was the point? I have no idea why this decision was made, but it felt very random and out of place.

The ending felt very rushed too. If you're going to just have an us versus them winner take all battle royale, why wait until the final episode? This could have happened at any time during the two side's longstanding, ongoing feud. It waited until the final episode to happen because the plot wanted it to, period.

The one strength of the show is probably the character development, because we spend the large majority of the show following around the four girls as they live their day to day lives as if they hadn't died and we get to see their interpersonal relationships and individual life circumstances. That's fine, but it doesn't fit with the whole "Oh by the way I'm dead" thing.

It wasn't sleep-inducing, but it often felt slow and on the boring side. The entertainment value here isn't all that high.

Overall I found this anime pretty disappointing. It wasn't awful, but it didn't do much for me. I'd advise those of you on the fence about watching this to know what you're getting into. It's slow, it's character focused, it has underwhelming and infrequent action and it's about the girls and their personal lives first, everything else a distant second. I didn't dislike it enough to regret watching it once but I have zero interest in watching it again.

OBJECTIVE RATING- 6
PERSONAL ENJOYMENT RATING- 5.5-6