First things first, the anime is based off the original Otome game (Visual Novel/Dating sim for da girls), so it's basically a reverse harem of 1 girl VS 5 guys as love interests. The plot is about a girl waking up forgetting everything about herself and her previous life because some ethereal spirit called Orion bumped into her soul and transferred her memories to outer space or something, it's of 0 importance to the anime itself methinks. She realises that there are 4 guys in her life who work at this cosplay cafe with her and another guy who has a split personality and stalks her and stuff. She would get herself into an accident and wake up in an alternate dimension on the same date (August 1st) but she's dating a different guy in every alternate universe, the process repeats itself as she constantly gets herself killed. Seriously woman stop trying to die already.
Let's talk about the characters, they're very typical male archetypes for any shoujo mangas. First we have Shin, who's the typical forceful tsundere type except he's younger than the protagonist so she's pretty much a pedo. Then we have Ikki, who's a typical manslut who has his own fanclub. Kent is the smart glasses-wearing guy but he's unique in that he kind of represents the reader and instead of producing extreme dramatic irony like all the other characters he actually questions the plot on a deeper level, breaking the 4th wall? Metafiction? Toma is my personal favourite, he's Shin's big brother and despite being a sweetiepie on the outside he's actually a psychotic yandere who eventually locks the protagonist up in a cage. Ukyo is the stalker guy and I'm not up to his episodes yet but he apparently has a split personality and he has something to do with why the protagonist lost all her memories. The protagonist is... one word, WEAK. Although I wouldn't categorise her as a Mary-Sue because she DID just get amnesia and floating around like a hollow shell seems legit to me.
The artwork for the anime is quite well-done, as expected from a new anime produced in the 21st century. The backdrop sceneries are quite detailed and sometimes it feels weird when juxtaposing animated characters next to such artistic landscape. The protagonist aside the males' appearances are quite... unconvincing. Their outfits... Y SO COLOR-COORDINATED 4?! I know they each represent a different card suit but wearing those rippy clothes IRL is a big No-No. Dem leggings... Shin Ikki stahp! Toma's outfit works but everybody else GTFO.
I really, REALLY enjoyed the soundtrack for this series. The opening 'Zoetrope' by Yagi Yanagi really captured the melancholy, enigmatic yet exciting feel the entire anime gives off. I LOVE the first few lines it's so Opening-y!! It's also a great standalone song and the opening credits really matched it. The ending 'Recall' by Ray slowly fades in when every episode reaches its end and it makes the listener feel really lost and confused- mirroring the protagonist's FEELZ.
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| Eyes |
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| Wat r u doin |
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| Eyes |
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| Stahp. |
So, all in all, this anime can really drive one insane with its... unique plot and its... special character designs. But hey, the characters all look hot, the plot progresses steadily and one can't really expect anything more from an adaption based off of a Visual Novel (although stuff like Clannad begs to differ). So if you're into corny fanservicy stuff, go for it. Otherwise in my biased opinion an anime like this has so much more potential which it failed to take advantage of in its creation.
