ARIA Series Review

Overall Ratings:
Aria the Animation: 8.0/10
Aria the Natural: 7.5/10
Aria the OVA: Arietta 8.0/10
Aria The Origination: 9.0/10

The whole Aria series is a slice of life genre anime with some comedy, a bit of a drama, a very little of romance and close to zero plot development. If the genre alone isn't enough reason for you to stay away from this series, you should also consider that it goes for as long as 54 episodes (including the Special and the OVA). As for me, I became interested in the Aria series only due to the third season's (Aria the Origination) outstanding ratings. Of course, the first thing that came to my mind was "oh, it's probably because only the most stoic fans kept on watching that till the third season it has that good average score". But a simple research on the season's popularity showed that it's not the case. And so, one evening I caught the right mood and start watching the series.

A floating islands and a spaceship above the city of Neo-Venezia

The setting is distinct and appealing. The early 24th century, Mars, now known as Aqua, was colonized and terraformed into a blue planet, more than 90% of its surface is covered in oceans. Advanced technologies grant humanity control over Aqua's gravity (it's maintained to match those of Earth, so there is no 0.38 g stuff) and climate, however those facilities are hidden underground and on the floating island respectively. The city of Neo-Venezia on Aqua, where the story takes place, is a cultural and architectural heir of Earth's Venice. In this city of many channels and waterways, gondolas are the primary mean of transportation for people, goods and even mail delivery (there are also air bikes, but they are far less common). Food and most of the goods in Neo-Venezia are produced by manual labor. The only things that constantly remind it's the 24th century and not the 20th is the Ukijima island, which floats in the skies above the city and spaceships with tourists from the Earth (now known as Manhome) which arrive and depart every day. An undine - a female gondolier acting as a tour guide - is an elite profession many girls dream about, but only a few are capable to become one due to the tight competition.

Mizunashi Akari, Aika S. Granzchesta and Alice Carroll in the only fleeting moment Aika had a nice haircut

The main character is an apprentice undine called Mizunashi Akari, who is employed by the tiny Aria Company along with her senior and close friend Alicia Florence, the current top undine in the whole industry.  Akari is cheerful and optimistic to the extreme. This defines the show's whole mood and atmosphere, since most of the show centers on Akari. Akari exchanges letters with Ai, a girl from Manhome, who initially didn't like Neo-Venezia, but changed her opinion of the city and Aqua thanks to Akari. This letters are cited in the beginning and in the end of each episode, and with every story Akari tells, Ai's affection towards Neo-Venezia grows, what is supposed to reflect the feelings of the viewer as well. Every episode depicts a different story from Akari's everyday life, what usually includes combined training with her friend Aika S. Granzchesta, who is the heir of Himeya, the oldest and the second largest gondolier company in Neo-Venezia and Alice Carroll, a one year younger prodigy from the third and the final gondolier company Orange Planet, which is currently the most successful. During their training, the girls together with the viewer learn more about the city of Neo-Venezia, its history, traditions, secrets and people. The other theme is girls' relationship with their seniors, "Snow White" Alicia Florence, "Crimson Rose" Akira E. Ferrari and "Siren" Athena Glory, known as "Three Water Fairies". Standing at the top and being the role models, as well as objects of jealousy for everyone, they struggle to be a good mentors for their juniors, despite constantly being over-occupied with customers. And that's it. The setting, well-written characters, light mood, beautiful graphics and music - that's all this show has. But, believe me, that's more than enough.

Look at how the snow on the back side of the stair is depicted, what attention to the details! 

A few words about the graphics and music. Despite having pretty low resolution , this show looks awesome even in the year 2013. Attention to the details is astonishing. The director Junichi Sato made a trip to Venice with his team prior to filming this show. That allowed him to include many architectural details in the anime, which were absent in the original manga. Depiction of rowing a gondola is also realistic and everything looks great in motion. The choice of colors is vise, a perfect balance between brightness and realism. The music is exclusively acoustic. The quality of the recording is very impressive, when I was watching this anime with my hi-end rig handling the audio part, it seemed that musicians were present in my room. All the instruments sound very natural and "alive" with no synthetics at all. As for the music itself, it just perfectly fits with the show. Most of the themes have light mood (as the show itself), though there are some heartwarming and nostalgic ones like "Mirai he no Kouseki" from the third season's OST.

As for why does the third season have the best ratings, the answer is simple: because it concludes the story. While I can only see the Aria series as a whole, every season ends on some logical point and there are some "specialization" between seasons. Aria the Animation introduces the characters and the setting, then shows a bit of everything. Aria the Natural is the main body of the series and shows Akari's life on her third year on Aqua (note that years on Aqua are twice as long than years on Earth due to the planet orbit). Aria the Origination is more about coming of age and shows the most character and story development of the whole series. When I finished watching the Animation, I was pretty satisfied with the show, but I thought that it ended just at the right moment after those 13 episodes. I had huge doubts that I would appreciate watching the 26 episodes of the same thing in the Natural. Yet, somehow it went pretty smoothly. After the Natural I had no doubts at all that I would appreciate the Origination and that parting with favorite characters would be sad. OVA: the Arietta is just like another episode of the Natural, or rather like on of the best episodes.
Continue to the second part (spoilers)

She might not look like it, but she is actually the number one apprentice of the one they call Siren

I never thought about "who is my favorite character" while watching the show, but that somehow became obvious without even thinking in the Origination. The favorite character is our little kouhai-chan Alice Carroll. Being the youngest of the three, she always acted as a proper kouhai of Aika and Akari, thus staying in their shadow in some sense, despite rivaling them in skill. She is also the most quite and detached of the three. I always sympathized with her the most and Alice-centered scenes were usually the most remarkable, but Aika and Akari just had much more of them and stayed in the focus of attention for the most time. I was surprised and very glad when Alice suddenly became Prima ahead of Aika and Akari. And then there was episode 11 of the Origination, which is my favorite episode of the entire series by the landslide. Seeing how cute Alice was when suffering from loneliness and thinking of her friends I understood, that I would never care so much about Aika and Akari. I should also note, that Alice is the only one of the three, whom I liked more than her senior. Akari and Alicia are always on the same wavelength sharing their ability to enjoy everything. But Akari is a bit extreme in that, while she lacks Alicia's gracefulness. Aika and Akira are also quite similar with their tsunderish personality, but Akira is strong and Aika is a crybaby. I also think that while Akira's personality perfectly fits her background, Aika just copied her, since she always seek to impersonate someone's else. I would say that the only thing I actually liked about Aika is her sincerity and deep sense of gratitude towards Akira. Athena is a bit moe with her clumsiness, but I liked her for her concern about Alice.

Not exactly what you expect of the sci-fi anime

The mystical subplot (regarding Cat Sith) introduced in the Natural is useless and poor made. The only purpose I can see for it is "Oh, look - Akari is so embarrassing, that even the supernaturals beings have a thing for her". I can see Akari's character really well even without it you now. The other thing that comes to my mind is that Cat Sith was probably introduced to make the city of Neo-Venezia look more wonderful and mysterious. For me it works in the reverse. It looks like there wasn't any "normal" wonders in Neo-Venezia anymore to show, so the authors were forced to introduce mysticism. The existence of Cat Sith also lefts it dubious what cats on Aqua exactly are. Personally, I prefer think of Aria Pokoteng's kind as artificially bred species, whose intelligence are close to those of humans thanks to the genetic engineering.

The romance in the series is dull. Aika's part are OK, but as for the boys, both Al-kun and Akatsuki-kun could serve only as some sort of comedic relief. I believe that the author just can't into romance. Then again, I read somewhere that Alicia's sudden marriage in the end of the show was introduced only because Amano Kozue couldn't think of any better plot-device to switch Akatsuki-kun from Alicia to Akari. Why did he need to be switched at all is a different question. Given all this, please consider what is written below complete nonsense.

"I was afraid of losing this beloved time in which I can be with you" says Alicia

I never found myself using yuri goggles. But after I finish watching the Origination, I had only one interpretation of the ending at mind. I strongly believe that Alicia was in love with Akari all the time. And then, she decided not to tempt herself anymore out of concern for Akari as their relationship could damage Akari's future. As to why do I think so, I must admit that it came to me naturally after seeing the last episode. First, nobody knew a thing about Alicia's marriage beforehand, it came out of the nowhere. But it was made clear, that Alicia herself planned her marriage some time beforehand. That means that she was either dating someone in secrecy or just had a proper candidate in mind. But it's also clear that Alicia had only a very little of time to spend with her future husband. She was occupied with work and she spent the rest of her time with Akari. And then, she made a confession that she intentionally postponed the time of Akari's Prima examination as much as possible, to prolong her precious time with Akari. But that also means, that she postponed her own marriage as well to spend more time with Akari! That basically means that she valued her time with Akari more than her time with her future husband. The fact, that her husband was never shown also somehow underlines his insignificance. That "no matter who" approach makes me feel like the reason for Alicia's marriage lies somewhere else from her feelings for that person. But than again, we know as fact that it can't be an appointed marriage, since nobody knew about it beforehand. And one more thing. If the plot needed Alicia's retirement from the Aria Company, her leaving for the Gondola Association alone was the enough reason. The marriage was unnecessary. If the author wanted to underline that Alicia found her happiness in marriage, than the marriage itself would had been given more attention (at least the husband would had been shown). The only necessary for the plot reason for her marriage I can think about is that she needed to part with someone, but that definitely was not the Akatsuki-kun. It must be someone who was the closest to her. And that could only be Akari.

Sword Art Online Review

Overall rating: 6.5 / 10

Sword Art Online anime, based on Reki Kawahara's light novel series of the same name, is one of the most hyped shows of the year 2012. Ranked third in the Blu-Ray sales in Japan (right after Nisemonogatari and the second season of Fate/Zero), and climbing to top50 in the MyAnimeList popularity rating - when SAO anime was airing, it was difficult to read /a/ without accidentally getting spoilers, because the Sword Art Online Threads were everywhere (most of those were full of haters). The main character Kazuto Kirigaya won the ISML 2012 exhibition tournament (I'm glad that at least Japan and Russia voted for Lelouch, lol). My expectations of SAO were particularly high, because of the another anime adaptation of Reki Kawahara's series - Accel World, which aired before SAO. AW anime impressed me very much and most people who read both series were saying that SAO is the better one (as of today, after reading the first four volumes of both series, I partially agree with that statement). Unfortunately, the SAO anime turned out to be much weaker. I surely liked it, but its flaws were obvious even without reading the original and overall impressions were not near as good as those of Accel World. I just didn't know at first who was at fault: Kawahara-san or A-1 Pictures. It turned out to be A-1 Pictures.

The floating castle Aincrad - the stage for the "Sword Art Online" Virtual Reality MMO RPG

Basically, they tried to squeeze too much material into 26 episodes. SAO anime covers the first four volumes of the light novel series, also it includes one side story from the 8th volume and the first chapter from the Sword Art Online Progressive as far as I know. While Accel World anime also covers the first four volumes of the novels and includes two side stories, it should be noted that the first volume of the Sword Art Online series are much longer and contains much more material than the Accel World's first volume. But what's more important, the two series differs entirely in both style and content. The pace which perfectly suits AW is too fast for SAO. Messed up composition aggravated it: the second volume of SAO, which solely consists of non-chronological side stories, was cut and inserted in the story in chronological order. As a result, the mood fluctuates widely and that ruins the impressions of the darker parts of the story. Of course, you can just assume that A-1 Pictures simply lacks the skills and competence being compared to Sunrise, and that SAO could have been much better even with all the content left intact.

The title "Sword Art Online" comes from the name of a virtual reality massive multiplayer online RPG, where the story takes place. The first volume of Sword Art Online ranobe series was written by Reki Kawahara in the year 2002. As far as I know, it was his first major work. To understand the very essence of SAO, let's look at Reki Kawahara's words, taken from the Author's Notes for "Fairy Dance", the 4th volume of the Sword Art Online series (thank Baka-Tsuki for the translation).

When I wrote the first volume of SAO, I found out that a RPG novel can't work without some kind of setting. Because, no matter how much of a life or death pinch the hero has in the game, the hero in the real world is not hurt the least.

An example of YGGR situation: 3 enemies, HP in the red zone, no tp - Hey, you're playing HC, not SC!

And so, Kawahara-san came up with a setting where death in game means death in real life. The author himself thought, that the story wouldn't be interesting and/or touching enough without that kind of plot device. Personally, I totally agree with that. The setting of "Death Game" is what makes SAO good. One hundred percent of story's emotional impact and atmosphere comes from that. To be precise, the way in which those setting was implemented is also important. I'm not sure if even Kawahara-san himself wholly understands all the nuances, that make his setting so strong (I explain why in the second part). But he definitely put the emphases in a right way. And unfortunately, that emphases were completely lost in the anime adaptation. When I was watching SAO for the first time, several ideas crossed my mind about what were left off screen. Some thoughts and scenes, which I imagined myself, impressed me far more than what was happening on the screen. When I started reading the novels, I was astonished, because many of those thoughts of mine had actually been listed by Kawahara Reki in his books. A-1 Pictures cut several meaningful scenes and even more character's unspoken thoughts in their anime adaptation, thus losing focus on what's important for the emotional perception. I would argue that even the original doesn't have enough focus on things and emotions that usually accompany someone's death (while death itself happens in the story pretty often). I suppose that Kawahara-san just didn't want to make his story too depressing. But if the original somehow lacks the touch, anime is just plain unrealistic in how "Death Game" is represented.

There is no blood in SAO: when you die, you just shatter into polygons and then get your brain fried

A few words about music. Please note, that at the moment only the first part of the Sword Art Online OST is released. The composer is famous Yuki Kajiura, whose previous work was Fate/Zero. Strangely enough, three of the four SAO OP & ED singers (namely Haruna Luna, Aoi Eir and LiSA) also previously worked on the Fate/Zero's glorious opening and ending songs. This time, however, I liked only Haruna Luna's song ("Overfly"). But the similarities don't end here. The main similarity is the soundtrack itself. Kajiura's last two works are practically indistinguishable in style. Take, for example, the song "Rule the Battlefield" from the Fate/Zero OST and "Survive the Swordland" from the Sword Art Online OST. Even the melodies are the same. Personally, I like both the F/Z's and SAO's soundtracks. However, I must also say that those two soundtracks are among the weakest of Kajiura's works. That's why I am particularly disappointed by their similarity. It's definitely not the style I would like her to continue working in. Still, SAO gave a nice addition to my Yuki Kajiura's music selection.

Continue to the second part (spoilers)

So, about the story's shortcomings (with spoilers). Basically, story's weaknesses are mostly continuations of its strengths. As I noted in the previous part, the setting of "Death Game" is what makes SAO good. What elements of this setting were especially strong (in emotional sense)? First, the existence of the resurrection artifact and its "10 second rule", of course. When I first seen it in the third episode of the anime, it instantly became clear for me, that every player should have at least ten second lag between "death" in the game and the Nerve Gear frying his brain. I didn't like how most players died on the screen. It's way too unrealistic. They never shown any traces of the strongest fear and the deepest despair. They never screamed in agony. They didn't curse, they didn't swear. Some of them even said their last words with peaceful face. It would be OK, if those players were some kind of samurai or members of the French Foreign Legion. But they were just the usual Japanese boys and girls, mostly teenagers. I just remembered how people were acting in the Accel World, written by the same Reki Kawahara, when they were on the verge of losing the Brain Burst program. And losing your one and only life is beyond compare with losing just an extraordinary "acceleration" ability. Of course, most causalities in SAO happened in the heat of battle. Probably, those who died just didn't have time to comprehend what were happening. Or so I thought until the third episode. Then, it suddenly turned out that after speaking those beautiful words or silently shattering into polygons, they had the whole ten seconds to completely comprehend what had happened and what were going to happen. So, there were screams. But not inside the game. Screams were either in hospitals, or in some "after death" location in the virtual reality. They just weren't shown to viewers/readers. But the difference between the anime and the novel is that in the novel Kirito did understand what "10 second rule" means. He did imagined the consequences. And that's what made the last chapter of the second volume much stronger than the third episode of the anime.

One of the most depressive scenes in SAO if you understand the hidden meaning behind those words

The second thing which I like about the setting, is the killing method and circumstances. For me there is a huge difference between the setting of SAO and the setting of The Matrix, for example. In both shows people who died in Virtual Reality dies in the real world. There is one crucial difference. In The Matrix, connection between death in Matrix and death in the real world was some kind of technical phenomenon. In some sense it could be called "natural". In SAO, strictly speaking, there was no such connection at all. Instead, there was an act of conditional murder. Or rather an execution. And very intimate one. A person lying helplessly on the hospital bed with the Nerve Gear on his head, which prevents him from feeling and controlling his own body, and then it suddenly sends the killing charge into his brain. This scene could be happening in front of the hospital's personnel, or even the person's family, who came to visit him in the hospital. Nobody can do a thing about it. What should have been done with those setting? At least one actual death should have been shown. The Aincrad story arc was concluded in the first volume of the light novels. Probably, it was Kawahara's intention to left it dubious till the end if the players, who died in game, did actually die in the real world. But that was confirmed by Kayaba Akihiko at the end of the first volume. There should have been at least a scene in the end of the second volume of how Sachi actually died IRL. Things like news articles about SAO victims or some kind of memorial for those who've died in SAO also should have been mentioned to show the incident's impact on the society. The story's emotional impact would have skyrocketed.

Sad fanart image which should been included as an illustration for "Red-nosed Reindeer" story from the second volume

Finally, you should note, that the whole killing system was artificial and were intentionally implemented in accordance with the ideology of Kayaba Akihiko. And so we come to the third thing. Those whole killing system was by no means necessary even for the sick Kayaba Akihiko's plans. Instead of killing the players IRL he could just transfer their consciousness to some other virtual reality with no access from Aincrad. People in the game had no means to confirm whether the person who died in game did actually die in the real world. For them it looked the same as if dead person's consciousness were moved to somewhere else. On the other hand, the rule that the person is killed if someone from the outside tries to remove his Nerve Gear could be left intact. Like this Kayaba Akihiko could have achieved exactly the same results, but with very little casualties. He consciously preferred to kill several thousands people including girls and children instead. What he did is one of the most terrible acts of terrorism in history. And that makes him a very interesting character. IRL mass murderers, dictators and top terrorists always invoke tons of sick curiosity. That's how people are. Yet, Kayaba Akihiko's character were left completely unexposed both in the anime and in the novels. That's surely a big failure of Reki Kawahara.

Well, the Aincrad arc ended out of the blue in the 14th episode of the anime. And then goes Alfheim... For starters, let's look at the continuation of Reki Kawahara's words, cited by me in the first part of the review.

Since that is «just a game», you can «reset it to end», to remove these two options, the first volume was a Death Game, that is dying in game means death in a real kind of setting.
But, always inside me, there's the question 'does it really have to be like that'. If a RPG novel can't be made without this kind of setting, then that would mean my feelings of excitement and passion as a MMO player would be fake. Making a party with friends, stepping gingerly into a dungeon for the first time, the joy from that, I want to see if I can make a story out of it. This is a huge theme in these two volumes of "Fairy Dance".

The question Kawahara-san asked himself is "does in really have to be like that". No, it doesn't. Actually, Kawahara-san proved it himself with the Accel World, which is totally fine even without the "Death Game" setting. Unfortunately, the Alfheim arc of SAO is just bad in nearly every aspect. For starters, it is not about people playing a RPG. It's mostly about Kirito searching for Asuna, without giving a fuck to the game itself. The plot device, which created the situation where rescuing Asuna was tied to some in-game activity, is totally dumb. The game itself was poorly covered and just boring. The only good scenes were those, where Kirito pwned random guys with his imba stats and m4d ski11z. At least it was funny. The love story of Suguha/Lyfa and Kirito... well, in my opinion it wasn't that bad. The only problem is that it was completely obvious for the viewer/reader from the very beginning that Sugu stands no chance. There was no intrigue at all. Still, I somehow appreciated watching the development of their relationship. But I didn't like the denouement. In my opinion, Sugu forgave him too quickly. Or rather she surrendered too quickly. It's just that she cope with her emotions unrealistically fast. After seeing Sugu's feelings being the primary content for the two-thirds of the Alfheim arc, I expected way more drama in the conclusion. What's next? The antagonist... oh, I liked him! I've seen tons of hatred towards Oberon in SAO threads. The same story were with the antagonist of the third and the fourth volumes of Accel World. Both Oberon and Dusk Taker were disgusting. And in both stories there were some NTR motive regarding those guys. That's what caused the most butthurt, probably. My logic is simple. If an antagonist is truly disgusting and he invokes strong negative feeling towards him - that's what makes him good as antagonist. Not all the bad guys are charismatic, you know. Still, the ending was crappy. Kirito didn't defeat Oberon with his own strength. He won only because of Heathcliff's interests. The whole grandiose struggle was for nothing. And once again it was obvious from the beginning, that Kirito as a player wouldn't be able to do anything against an administrator, but I still expected some plan or trick from him, not just the plain confirmation of the trivial predictions.

This is how Kirito defeated Heathcliff

Finally, one more big problem of SAO is its lack of realism. There are minor and major flaws in technical aspects. And then, there is a complete bullshit. The minor flaws are numerous, I'm not going to list them all. I would name just two of them. First, there is no way for such technology as Nerve Gear, operating directly with human brain, to be allowed for common use. Not in 2023 at least. It absolutely requires decades of testing before going to the mass market. And surely, such incidents would be predicted and prevented beforehand. Second, it was definitely possible to save people trapped in SAO from the outside with modern technologies. For example, using some kind of strong EMP could have helped. The major flaw is the existence of Yui. From Kawahara's point of view, who lacks any technical background, there is probably not much difference between the Nerve Gear and true artificial intelligence in terms of levels of technologies. But I would say that true AI is much more unrealistic. And how Kirito copied Yui into his Nerve Gear in one minute using unfamiliar interface, that's a bullshit. Even complete lamer like Kawahara should understand that. How Kirito "defeated" Heathcliff, that's an epic bullshit. How Asuna overcame paralysis with her willpower, that's a fucking terrible bullshit, which enraged me the most. If Kirito at least was some kind of a "chosen one", Asuna was just a usual player. Quod licet Jovi, non licet Bovi. The most ridiculous bullshit however is those virtual "laboratory" where the tentacle-guys were researching brains and where "material" ID cards were needed to operate the console. Since all of those bullshit was used as key plot-devices, it ruined my impression of SAO pretty much.

Strawberry Panic! Review

Overall rating: 5.5 / 10

For starters, I should note that I dislike shoujo as a genre. But I do like shoujo-ai to some extent. There are complex reasons for that, but the one which is probably the most important is that from my point of view, female characters in a typical shoujo manga/anime are nice, while male characters are not. I don't appreciate how men are depicted in shoujo in general. And if I dislike the characters themselves, surely I won't appreciate watching them playing romantic leads, while shoujo is mostly about romance. I also have a thing for female same-sex relationships, but that shouldn't necessary be in the shoujo genre. It's just that I appreciate shoujo-ai more than a straight shoujo.

Minamoto Chikaru, the best girl in the show

I would call Strawberry Panic! a half-good show. If you take all the things which were good in this anime, that would be about a half of it. Basically, the show consists of two typical love triangles (Shizuma - Nagisa - Tamao and Amane - Hikari - Yaya) and a lot of peripheral material with lots of supporting characters. Nagisa's part of the romance content is a messy one. That's what makes it good and interesting. Hikari's part is a plain one. That's what makes it boring as fuck. Of course, the story wouldn't be complete without Hikari's part, but I think it should had been reduced at least by half. It was left as it is probably in order to parallel with Nagisa's part till the very end. But there weren't nearly enough material for Hikari's story, so they just repeated the same moves several times and then used cliched plot device to create some shitty drama out of the blue. Regarding the supporting characters, most of them don't have their own subplot and just serve as living decorations and screen time fillers. Still, I think that Chikaru is the best girl in the show by a landslide, regardless of (or to some extent due to) the fact that she doesn't participate in the Special Olympics called "romance". I also liked Momomi and always empathized with her, even though she and Kaname were meant to be antagonists. The rest of the dramatis personae didn't impress me at all. Especially those kouhai girls, who obviously didn't stand a chance from the beginning but persistently appeared here and there.

Catholic setting: Hikari and Yaya in the choir

The setting - I liked it a lot. I only have a vague idea of what all-girl catholic schools in Japan are like. Regarding the schools in the show, the "catholic" part is obviously just for decoration, fortunately. There were after-meal prayers, but no christian propaganda prohibiting intimate relationships, especially homosexual. The setting fits the plot or rather the setting defines the plot. Most of the yuri/shoujo-ai anime/manga depict girls dating each other like it's the most natural thing to do, while it is not. That's why I would say that most of the yuri/shoujo-ai anime/manga are quite unrealistic. There are also more serious yuri/shoujo-ai anime/manga which explore the theme of female (homo)sexuality and acceptance of lesbian relationships in the society. It's much more realistic, but it's not so cute anymore. Strawberry Panic! is somewhere in the middle. It completely ignores the serious topics, but it is realistic, while also cute. You can expect that among several hundreds of girls, studying in three isolated all-girls schools, there would be some couples. And that surely won't pose a problem in those kind of society, while the vast majority of Strawberry Panic! characters are not lesbians, of course. However, experiencing some degree of affection (probably romantic) towards someone is a pretty natural thing for girls in their age and circumstances. Since only two pairs of characters were openly shown having an intimate relationship, that's completely within my expectations.

Main characters, Nagisa and Shizuma are talking at the piano

Music is what left me with some strange impressions. The composer is Yoshihisa Hirano. I knew him from the Death Note, Tatakau Shisho and Break Blade series. He is one of my favorite composers, actually. His usual style is imitation of classical pieces which he does quite well. He always uses authentic acoustic instruments besides synthesizers. He is particularly good in writing climactic pieces with choir and orchestra, but not as good in writing lyrical and melancholic pieces for instruments like piano, violin and oboe. He wrote a very decent music for Strawberry Panic! It just probably doesn't have the right touch and atmosphere. The "classical" parts don't fit with the mood. And the "modern" parts are just too short, too fleeting (like "Kaori no Theme" for example). What the soundtrack lacks is a solid romantic theme or/and the personal theme for the main characters, which would serve as the theme of love. There is only the theme of fate ("Unmei"), but it is not suited for "happy" romantic scenes. And so, the situation is like this: I really appreciate listening to the Strawberry Panic! OST as the standalone piece of music, but actually I wasn't impressed by the music while watching the show. I would also note, that the Strawberry Panic! OST are very similar in both style and touch with the Kannazuki no Miko OST (another shoujo-ai anime) which is one of my favorites, but the latter one is stronger in my opinion.

In conclusion, I just want to note two things, which I can explain in details only in the spoiler part of the review. The first one is that I really liked how the show ended. It somehow caught me completely off-guard. And the ending was by no means sudden or unpredictable, I just didn't see it coming because I had different expectations (I explain why in the second part). But the ending is very righteous in my opinion. The second one is that the show is full of what is called "mono no aware". It's a recurring motif which runs through the show and I deeply appreciated it. It is also strongly related to the reason why I think that the show's ending is "righteous". Actually, I would have rated the show much higher if it wasn't that boring.

Continue to the second part (spoilers)

As I've previously noted, Nagisa's storyline and Hikari's storyline are very similar. They are both transfer students, they both fall in love with the first and the second most popular girls in schools respectively and they both have a roommates who are secretly in love with them. I thought that their storylines were meant to contrast with each other. Hikari's relationships with Amane developed gradually but steadily, while Yaya hadn't been given a chance. Seeing that Nagisa's relationships with Shizuma were pretty irregular and misleading, I somehow didn't expect that Tamao would perfectly repeat Yaya's fate. Or rather I didn't expect that Shizuma would snatch Nagisa at the very last moment. But I'm happy she did it, from my point of view, that was the second best moment in the whole show. The first one was Shizuma's confrontation with Miyuki, who stated: "You are an Étoile", on what Shizuma replied: "But i am also human!" - that dialogue perfectly foreshadowed the ending, by the way, but I did not understand it at that moment. However, Shizuma always acted on a whim and in accordance with her emotions, disregarding anyone's expectations and sometimes even the common sense. That's what I like the most about her. Yet, it's those attitude what led her to falling in love with terminally ill Kaori, who soon passed away, leaving Shizuma heartbroken. And I personally don't think that there is a future for her with Nagisa also. After Shizuma graduates from St. Miator, she will probably never meet Nagisa again. So, as I see it, Shizuma once again goes into relationships which are doomed to be fleeting. But that fleetingness is exactly what makes the story beautiful in my eyes. Also, even though I feel sorry for Tamao, I doubt that Nagisa ever had any romantic feelings for her. Personally, I don't think that love is something that can be achieved through hard work alone.

The villain team, Momomi and Kaname are probably the couple with the most sincere and mature relationship

The other one whom I often felt sorry for, was Momomi. She was probably the only girl in the show besides Shizuma and Kaori, who was deeply in love with someone (I can't really say that Nagisa's, Hikari's or Amane's feeling were that deep), going as far as participating in Kaname's ignominious plans of seducing Hikari. While on the surface she and Kaname didn't seem to take each other seriously, it was obvious that Kaname had been the only one who was just playing initially. Regarding Kaname: Kaname's obsession with Amane was pretty stupid in my opinion. What's so big deal if someone is better than yourself in "everything"? If you don't have the talent, you should be plenty satisfied with being the number two. And Kaname's attempts to rape Hikari were just ridiculous. That should have been obvious for Momomi as well, but she patiently played along with it every time. Also, I think that Momomi actually didn't give a fuck about the Étoile title, she was serious about becoming Étoiles with Kaname only because she saw it as some kind of love bond. I also appreciated how Momomi always was the leader in their intimate relationships with Kaname. Seriously, Kaname should have been more happy, having such a nice girl as her partner and lover. I'm glad that she at least did make up with Momomi.

Accel World Review

Overall rating: 8.0 / 10

Every popular anime has a considerable amount of haters. Surely, it should have even greater number of fans - that's what makes it "popular". Than what about anime, which have many haters - but only a very little number of fans? Well, that situation is a bit strange. Especially if the anime in question is not some kind of well known "trash", but actually the one with a pretty fine average score. The Accel World anime situation is like that. From what I've seen, the general opinion on AW of the international anime community is Haters Gonna Hate "good" or at least "fine". Very few people (I am one of them) see AW as a gem, but huge number of people hate AW and even consider it unwatchable. The funny thing is that you will be 100% sure if you are actually one of the later just by watching it for 3 minutes. If the answer is "no", then there is a good chance of you enjoying this show to the end.

The primary source of controversy regarding AW is its male lead, Arita Haruyuki. It's hard to say what provokes people more: his visual design or his personality. The facts are that Haru is short and fat, he is cowardly and he gets bullied in school. His visual design is distinct and peculiar, that's also a fact. From what I knew, Sunrise depicted Haru in the way he thinks of himself, not how he is actually meant to look like according to the novels. All the rest are not facts, but impressions. The popular impression is that Haru in the anime is ugly and miserable and that his unrealistic visual style makes his ugliness grotesque and basically doesn't fit with the show. One could also have cognitive dissonance seeing a girl (or even girls) falling for someone so ugly and pathetic. My impressions are very different. I never minded Haru being short and fat to begin with, but I think that his visual design and animation style actually make his appearance extremely charismatic and very appealing. It probably also brings some comedic touch, but that's also perfectly fine for me. As for his personality, I find it nontrivial at the very lest. The thing which probably irritates many people the most is not how unmanly he is, but that he never changes or at least shows strong desire to change. And that's what makes his character interesting in my eyes. The one thing I like about Haru is that he knows his place and never pretends to be what he is not. And he does have his own pride, on the other hand. He is probably a bit too emotional, but it just adds up to his charisma. I clearly find this kind of male lead both more interesting and more appealing than your typical Japanese schooler kind of protagonist.

Haruyuki's and Kuroyukihime's VR avatars standing next to their real bodies

Regarding AW's female lead, there were little to none controversy. Practically everyone agrees that Kuroyukihime is a godlike tier girl. There are tons of people who watched AW only because of Kuroyukihime and there definitely would be more of those if not for the fact, that she is with Haruyuki most of the time. As for me, you can guess that I don't mind her being with Haru at all. I should also note that KYH is presently in my personal ~top3 of the best female anime characters of all time. The rest of the Accel World's female cast is also exceptionally strong: I would say that all of the supporting female characters in AW are better than female leads of most of the shows I like. There is a simple reason for that. As AW revolves around the "Brain Burst" virtual reality fighting game, most of its characters are people strongly related to this game. And I surely have a thing for good looking female hardcore gamers.

While I did say that AW is about people playing virtual reality fighting game, I would also underline that it's primarily about people, not the game. Usually, when I finish watching a title, I rewatch favorite scenes from it, if there are any. Regarding AW, I've rewatched many scenes from it several times, but all of those were actually dialogues, not the battles. So, from my point of view, AW is not an action genre anime, even if it looks like one. Still, one of the most impressive aspect of the AW anime is it's pace. The very first episode is particularly strong. It does the usual job: introducing characters and explaining the setting, just doing it mostly in action, so on one hand it leaves impression of being "information giving" type of episode, on the other hand it feels very lively and eventful. It sets the pace and the whole anime maintains perfect balance between action, character development and disclosing information. I praise Sunrise for doing so great job animating the Accel World novels: they stayed faithful to the original, cut the most minor details and never lost the atmosphere of Kawahara Reki's books.

Avatars in the Accelerated World: "Sky Raker" next to Haruyuki's "Silver Crow"

I won't say much about graphics and animation quality - from my point of view it's just OK. There were monsters of graphics in the year 2012 (Hyouka and K to name some) and there were shows that looks just too shitty for the year 2012 (Code Breaker for example). Accel World is neither of those. What's much more interesting for me is music. There are two criteria for soundtrack to be considered "good": to fit its respective show and to be good as standalone piece of music. Regarding the latter, I can't say that Accel World OST is as strong as my most favorite ones, but it's just one or two steps below them. But as for the first criterion, AW's soundtrack is just impeccable. Completely brilliant. I also appreciate how they write such a magnificent piece as "Blood History" only for be used just once as the background music for the Kuroyukihime's monologue in the third episode. That's what made an already good scene remarkable.

There is only one major flaw I can see in this show, and this flaw is solely Kawahara Reki's fault. It's numbers. I highly appreciate the world of 2046 that Kawahara Reki's depicted. I like both the idea of brain–computer interfaces aka Neuro Linkers and the concept of widespread augmented reality. I also appreciate the "Brain Burst" virtual reality fighting game he described. Since I know that Kawahara Reki has zero technical background in the respective areas, I never had any expectations of him to maintain any decent degree of technical realism. That's fine with me. There is only one thing that Kawahara-san definitely could have done and should have done, but that he never did. He did not put any thoughts into numbers. As the result he totally fucked up the realism not only in technical aspects, but also in the economical ones. Inconsistencies in numbers stand out just too much, one needs only the common sense to notice them (I listed them in the second part of the review). Unfortunately, it's just Kawahara's plain laziness and remissness, Sunrise could have done nothing about that. I can't really say that those things seriously damaged my overall impressions of the Accel World anime. But they are the reason why I can't rate it higher than 8.0/10 despite it being my favorite show of the year 2012.

Continue to the second part (spoilers)

About the numbers in AW. The impossible trinity: 1 second in real world = 1000 seconds in the Accelerated World, only 1000 Burst Linkers exist in the game, non zero chance to actually meet someone in the Unlimited Field without prior appointment. The inconsistent quartet: only 100 Burst Points at the start of the game, only one "child" per "parent, 1 Burst Point lost every time someone accelerates, Accelerated World existing for seven years. Which numbers are particularly bad? The answer is simple: both "one thousands" and 100. Acceleration by 1000 times is just too unrealistic for starters. One simple example: ping in most MMO games is measured in milliseconds and it rarely drops below 10 ms even on local servers. It should definitely stay below 100 ms not to affect gaming experience and those requirements are even more strict for the fighting games on pro level. Naturally, acceleration of thoughts and perception by 1000 times would also increase ping requirements by 1000 times. No technology can possible fit those requirements. And that's only the tip of the iceberg. Only a level 4 or higher Burst Linkers (less than 100 players) can go into the Unlimited Field. If the players spent in the Unlimited Field no more time than they spent in the real world on average, they should stay only 1.5 minute (of the real world time) per day in the Unlimited Field on average. Thus being said, the Unlimited Field should be empty more than 95% of the time. You can imagine the average population density per square of the UF. It's zero by any practical estimate. So, hunting on the players which are hunting on the "enemies" in the UF is absolutely impossible. Yet, according to Kawahara-san it's a bigger source of Burst Points than hunting on "enemies" themselves. Fail. The "Brain Burst" game economics is also a complete mess. 1 point is lost every time someone "accelerates". If every Burst Linker accelerates at least once a day, 1000 Burst Points are lost every day. That's equal to 10 new players. 10 new players per day means 3650 new players per year. That means that everyone of the 1000 Burst Linkers should produce more than 3.5 "children" in a sequence every year on average. If the success rate of the "Brain Burst" program installation is below 90% (and that was heavily implied) than in a several years Accelerated World would become dead. It's impossible for it to exist for 7 years. Fail.

Noumi Seiji. If you do hate this guy, it means that Sunrise and Kawahara did a good job

About Noumi Seiji aka Dust Taker. I've seen many people complaining about the last story arc of the Accel World anime being too long, while its antagonist being too weak and vexing. I loved it. Noumi Seiji is the rare kind of antagonist which can actually provoke some negative emotional respond. That's what makes him a good antagonist. There is no point for him to be even a bit more charismatic. As for the story itself, there were Sky Raker, Blood Leopard and Kuroyukihime's side story from the volume 10 of the ranobe to contrast with Noumi Seiji scenes. So the mood and atmosphere fluctuations during the last story arc are perfectly balanced in my eyes. And the last scene of the show (Kuroyukihime and Sky Raker's reunion) is just fucking incredible. It's just so touching I am at lost for words. I read this scene in the original and it was nowhere this strong. Sunrise did simply one of the best closing scenes I've ever watched.

About the Incarnation System. From my point of view, it's pretty logical and necessary solution. IS makes it possible for user's will power and imagination to interfere with the mechanics of virtual reality on a legit basis. Compared to Sword Art Online, where Kirito tramples on the laws of the world like "it's magic I ain't gotta explain shit", Accel World's Incarnation System is definitely a good innovation. Kawahara-san does actually learn from his mistakes.

About girls in the show. KYH > Raker > Scarlet Rain > Aqua Current >>> Chiyu.

Kawahara Reki

Kawahara Reki

If there is a man in the anime related industry for whom the year 2012 was especially lucky, that would be Reki Kawahara. He is the author of the Sword Art Online and Accel World ranobe series, both of which were animated in 2012. The rule of thumb is while only the most popular ranobe series get animated, sales of the light novels rocket when the anime adaptation is announced. You can also guess that one successful series would naturally draw attention to the other series from the same author. Yet, to think that a single person as a writer could simultaneously occupy both the first and the second place in the list of top-selling light novels in Japan with two different series - that's an extremely scarce situation. That's Reki Kawahara for you.

My policy is to never read anything (implying manga and ranobe) that has a good chance to be animated in the foreseeable future. Basically, I prefer to watch anime adaptation first and then read the original. It's just that anime as an art form currently has a higher priority for me than manga and ranobe. Even though, originals often left better overall impression than anime adaptations. Speaking of Reki Kawahara, I've read the first four volumes of both SAO and AW barely managing to resist temptation to continue, due to a hope for the second seasons of both shows. I think that I grasp the general idea of what that man is doing.

Kawahara Reki is actually a man who sold the same thing twice. Both of his series revolve around single phenomenon scientifically called brain–computer interface (BCI). And also, both of his series are about games. Virtual reality massive multiplayer online games to be precise. The genres would be VRMMO RPG for Sword Art Online and VRMMO fighting game for Accel World. A peek into the distant future of the current computer gaming. There are ongoing debates on imageboards and anime forums on whether SAO and AW set in the alternative worlds or just in the different timelines (events of SAO begins in the year 2023 while AW describes the year 2046). But the technologies involved are clearly the same. I must note that Kawahara-san obviously have neither even the slightest technical background in neurobiology, nor the knowledge of the computer science. He does have experience in the MMO gaming, though. He understands and appeals to gamer's psychology to the degree only insiders could do. If that's the case, one could guess that gamers are Kawahara's natural and most faithful audience. I have an impression that it's actually quite the opposite. Gamers are people who understand better than anyone else how roughly and incompetently Kawahara's virtual worlds are made. The real Kawahara's audience is much wider and way less meticulous, fortunately. And his strength lies in his ability to depict humans, not computer games.

Sword Art Online Volume 1 cover

If there is a single main idea or better said message in both Kawahara's works, from my point of view that would be "there is no such thing as the other side". It's hard to imagine VR-related series not having the contrast between the virtual reality and the real world as one of its primary themes. And then, there can generally be one of the following conclusions or morals: either that real world is always better than any VR simply because it is real, or that good enough virtual reality may be actually better than the real world. What I really appreciate about Reki Kawahara is that he states neither of those. He instead underlines that VR (namely games) is basically a part of the real world and you always stay yourself whether you're acting in VR or IRL. So any experience one can receive while being in VR and any relations one can build there are by no means "virtual". As a former hardcore gamer, I'm absolutely sure that Kawahara-san does actually believe in what he writes. Also he uses completely different plot devices in SAO and AW to expose those ideas. And because of it, the series have completely different touch and atmosphere. Also, I should note that while AW is smooth and solid, SAO actually consists of very distinct story arcs, which have pretty different touch and atmosphere themselves. From what I've seen, most people find the second arc pretty disappointing compared to the first one (which is especially bad because the SAO anime stops at the end of the second arc), but praise more recent volumes. As for me, I'm more disappointed by the fact that the first arc isn't nearly as strong as it could have been; from my point of view it had nearly endless potential in terms of atmosphere and emotional drama, but Kawahara-san decided that the mood of the story shouldn't be too dark.

Accel World Volume 1 cover

Looking at the year 2012 ranobe sales, SAO does nearly three times better than AW both in cumulative sales and sales per volume. When in comes to Blu-ray anime sales, SAO did more than four times better for the first volume and I have a strong feeling that this gap will increase for the volumes yet to come. That's the situation in Japan and as for the international anime community, judging from MyAnimeList popularity rating and average scores, SAO are clearly far above AW. Naturally, you can consider that between the two Kawahara Reki's series Sword Art Online is definitely the primary one. As for me, I can't really say that I like SAO more than AW or that I see Accel World as a "secondary product". And neither do Kawahara-san, judging from the fact that he steadily refuse to drop AW (volume 13 scheduled to be released on February 2013) in favor of SAO, despite immense difficulties of running two popular series at the same time.

As for the recent anime adaptations, I'm going to review both of them in the near future. Right now, I would say that Sunrise did a great job, making the Accel World anime an example of what can be called "perfect adaptation". Staying 95% faithful to the original, omitting only the most insignificant details and reworking a couple of scenes into those with the same meaning but even stronger touch. Unfortunately, I can't say that A-1 Pictures did a good job as well animating SAO. They didn't cut any scenes (for the first story arc at least), but they lose tons of important information, especially regarding character's thoughts, emotions and motivation. They also simplified the composition, inserting side stories from the second volume into main plot in  chronological order. As a result, the SAO anime turned out to be extremely messy and spasmodic, leaving very confusing impression. So, if you have interest in Reki Kawahara's stories, I strongly recommend to go with the anime for Accel World, but as for Sword Art Online reading the books is the only choice.