schaefer.webster - 2013-12-20 01:59:29

Kyoukai no Kanata aka Beyond the Boundary started out being my favorite show of the fall 2013 simulcasts by Crunchyroll. In the end other shows caught my eye, but Beyond the Boundary still found its way to be elegant and enjoyable, but is it KyoAni's ace in the hole like everyone talks about?

Story 3/10
- pacing (It started out strong, but then broke into character and story arcs that made no sense.)
- world building (They start to build something of a world later in the game, but there is no conclusion or fleshing out of the world itself)
- Consistency (Lol, this show doesn't have that one bit.)
- Flow (Yeah just like I said in pacing it has flow issues as well going from place to place with little connectivity)

The story in a nutshell starts off between a peculiar romance between the immortal half-Youmu Akihito and the descendant of the cursed clan that uses blood, Mirai Kuriyama. Akihito and Miria go on a basic misadventure in helping Miria become a better Spirit World Warrior. In this world Spirit World Warriors hunt youmu for crystals which they can sell. Youmu are beings who represent negative emotions and the ilk that comes with all of that bad noise. So these two characters and their friends commit acts of youmu genocide for profit. However, mid-way the series ends up clamming in a few side plots that just conglomerate the story into a mess.
Don't get me wrong I found it at enjoyable mess, but this pace and side plots are just as bad if not worse than Tite Kubo's writing in Bleach. It is all over the place, and even worse by the time we get to the climax... it is like Tite Kubo wrote this script. The big reveal is rushed and not at all hinted at. The main problem with the story is also that it is all for nothing, it ends on good terms and the drama at the end is meaningless. I mean Shakugan no Shana did a better job in its many seasons to tie loose ends better than this, and I hate Shakugan no Shana.

The pacing is bad, the reveal and climax is rushed, and in the end it is all for not ,because everything is fine. The build-up of the later half of the series is squandered for appeasing the audience and having a-happy-go lucky feel to it. Yeah, having a happy-go-lucky feel is good, but all the moe parts ruined this for me.

Kyoukai no Kanata doesn't work on the world building until the end, but it is mostly about the characters and not about the world. Which is kind of stupid when you have these characters who are supposed to part of factions fighting each other. I found it boring that there was a mystery building and we didn't get any closure on it. Now really why in the hell is this show building a climax of confrontation and basically give us nothing in return.

Animation 9/10
character artwork- Actually pretty interesting character artwork, good to look at.
background scenes- This show has great scenery porn.
animation- If you like shiny fight scenes then this is the show for you in terms of battle animation.
visual effects- all the budget went into the animation and the battle effects are amazing.

However, where the story is just a mess, the visuals in this show are breathtaking. This was the prettiest show of the 2013 fall season and probably one of the best animated shows I watched in a long time. It isn't artistic in its creativity like Bakemonogatari, but it is visually stunning. I really enjoyed the contrasts of light and dark, and the animation sequences are well done. So basically Kyoto Animation pulled a Guilty Crown. They put all of their money into the visuals and animation and forgot to hire a writer.

Sound 8/10
music- Opening and ending are solid and the in-show idol scene was cute and hillarioius
sound effects- Not overused, and had an effect when shit hit the fan.
voice acting- no real annoyances here, but Minori Chihara is the only one that shines.

Having an opening by Minori Chihara, who also voices a character, already stole me on the soundtrack. There are other times that Minori Chihara shines as a seiyu and vocalist in this show, but besides that the soundtrack itself and the sound-scape of the show is breathtaking. Especially in the end the sound itself of Beyond the Boundary shows its immense power and strength. I really enjoyed both the music and the sound selection in this show.

Character 4/10
relatability- No relatability here, so stop saying you can relate to Mirai.
development- Besides Miria we don't get any of this, and it is only in small detailed developments.
personality- They don't have any personality and are very apathetic to the situations.

The characters themselves are pretty two dimensional. There is little character development outside of Miria Kuriyama, and the story only focuses on Miria and Akkey's relationship. Akkey doesn't grow as a character, we learn very little about him, and the other characters are pretty much cookie cutter. Even the antagonists are only hinted at the end about their own origins and goals. I didn't hate any of the characters, so they hired a better writer than Guilty Crown did. Nice one KyoAni.

The rest of the characters are one dimensional and boring. The have cliches and are not at all relatable. They have little to no personality and seem apathetic most of the time. They have no real development and are all flat characters. Although Miria Kuriyama has two story arcs that flesh her out we do see some character development. Despite her being a moe stereotype that is faced with a daunting journey. But in the end it doesn't matter because they ruin her.

Entertainment Value 7/10
Engagement- I was engaged right from the start, but after the 2nd story arc things started to go down hill.
Rewatchability- I would watch it again, and even did watch it again only to be disappointed.

I loved the show, and it started very strong. It is just by the time it ended the story was at so many places, and what they did try to build-up ended up in tatters. It was one of the shows I did legitimately want to watch each week, if not for the visuals and opening theme.

quigley.dale - 2013-12-19 06:12:52

Alright so I'm going to be the one who says they liked, fuckin sue me for being a casual

tstehr - 2013-12-19 03:50:58

Let's skip the rubbish and move on with the review in formal manner shall we?

Kyoukai no Kanata is based on an LN produced by KyoAni itself, so in short it is 'almost' an original production in a sense. Basing on this alone, we would not know much on what to expect from this anime except from the fact that this is KyoAni anime and we know what things they make and how they earn a ton of cash from it. In overview its a story about a spirit hunter girl, Mirai Kuriyama who just came to town in pursuit of a Half monster, or you may prefer to it as "youmu", young man named Akihito Kanbara. She is still an amateur at youmu hunting so she proclaimed that he was an "easy target" for her to have a practice. Of course that is not the case since Akihito just receives the damage like its nothing. Akihito is a an immortal half-youmu who loves girls in glasses so a glasses wearing girl like Mirai would see fit in his fantasies. After many fruitless attempt to destroy her only target, Akihito struck a deal with Mirai to help her catch a youmu so that she will finally stop pestering him. After her first successful attempt at defeating a youmu she decided to just leave him alone, but Akihito insist that she not need to seclude herself from others. He introduced her to the people in his life and in a sense, showed her what it means to live a life outside of youmu hunting. Along the way they will face some challenges that will test the strength of their newly formed relationship. And here, ladies and gentlemen, is where it all fell apart.

Let us first talk about the overall core of the story. Quite frankly, it has potential. But what is a potential without proper execution, right? The introductory part of the story is very engaging and when additional characters where added it adds a new layer of interest. The problem were the expositions and the pacing. The expositions are often all over the place and often appears when we least needed them to see. I am really disgruntled over the fact that the explanation about the true nature of youmus is ridiculously placed in the last episode. Have they placed this somewhere in the middle, we could at least have an idea about the psychedelic events when fighting major youmus. It seems they just want to explain things to us when they feel like it, and often in a rush as well. Another thing that made it bad was the pacing. It was too damn slow at the beginning, went nowhere in the middle save for the little foreshadowing scenes, and then dropped all the events at the last parts. Its a petty trick to fool us into thinking that styles like these work well, but no, it does not. They even have time to add a filler episode or two. I mean, seriously, why not just place that in a OVA or DVD special? With the messed up pacing the story felt so damn rushed and incomplete, but with the almost dragging pace of the earlier episodes, we are still pondering why it ended up like that. There are plenty of events that needed time to fully develop for us to get a grasp of the situation, but nope, they just often end it with a snap. I just don't want to say specifics to keep this spoiler free, but those who watched this already probably know what I'm talking about. Long story short; great potential story, crappy execution.

Characters are mixed bag from the very beginning with some being copied from popular tropes like the token "glasses girl" and the "siscon guy". But to their credit, the characters here are likable, save for the minor ones who try too bad to fit into the scene but still felt out of place. The lead ones, Mirai and Akihito, are likable in their own rights. Alone they seem quite boring and pretentious, but together its a completely different story. In all fairness, it seems that their love-hate relationship (not the usual 'dere' manner either) is what kept the anime entertaining in general. The major support characters, Hiromi and Mitsuki Nase, adds color to the already quirky relationship of our two protagonists. And there are these "other" characters who, unfortunately, just ended up as plot devices. Hell, even the antagonist, whom I wont mention for the benefit of new set of audience, almost seems non-existent. He went in, did his evil doings, somehow failed, then leaves without a trace. Great. KyoAni still must learn how to make a proper antagonist after Gauron...and Gauron is an adaptation character! The point is, there might be some spots here in there for character development for the other characters in a story driven show, but yeah, they screwed it up.

Production quality is...oh heck, what else is there to expect?! This is a studio that can make picking a nose animated well! Joking aside, the animation is very top notch accentuated by very vibrant colors in all occasions during the entire show. The figth scenes, despite being redundant, are a far flung quality from the usual shounen action scenes. Everything here, wether its your typical SOL scenario or a high-octane explosion fest, is just breathtaking. If the first major fight scene alone won't convince you, don't worry, there's plenty of that. The balance between action and moments of melancholy and tragedy are very noticable. Save for the final battle scene where they just threw everything so badly that it almost felt like a Dragonball Z episode. This is almost a showcase of the capabilities of this studio in term of animation quality. The soundtrack department does not compromise as well. The dark undertones of the serious scenes are quite new for KyoAni yet it worked so well. And do not forget the OP and ED, both of which are justifiable in their rights. The ED song Daisy is a top favorite this season because of its simplicity and really inspiring message.

Lastly, how do we enjoy it? Well, it will squarely depends on what matters to you, production value or story? If this show is another mindless SOL, then by all means go for production value. But no, this actually HAVE a story. It was somehow delivered well, but in the end, it just added confusion among the already perplexed audience. It felt irrational, rushed, and in some point, incomplete. Adding additional episodes wont do the cut for it will just drag on the story, but knowing this can be wrapped up well if only they didn't messed up the pacing it could have been an actual sleeper hit.

Well, so much for that. My biggest gripe is the story execution. Regardless, it is memorable show despite being a somewhat dissapointing one. Wasted potential? Yeah. Possible sequel? Screw that!

volson - 2013-12-19 00:04:37

For a Kyoto Animation show witch i remember only do "cute girl doing cute things" kind of shows... and men swimming awkwardly... this was pretty ok. I never expected them to mess with demons and blood cursed demon hunters. The MOE is there but is not main thing in the show and i really liked that. Maybe the characters don't have the best development, or any development i think, the animation is just beatiful, that is obvious and the story is not the best ever but i enjoyed watching it, watching something from Kyotoani that is not the same that they always do.

schultz.polly - 2013-12-18 23:32:34

Have you ever heard of the term “wasted potential”?

Intro: Kyoto Animation has developed a reputation over the years. They’re known for amazing animation, but they tend to focus mainly on slice of life shows with tons of MOE and basically cute girls doing cute things. They only recently stepped out of this rut (sort of) with the manservice show known as Free. But then again it played out like a typical Kyotoani show, but with guys. So when I heard they were making a show focused more on action, I was immediately skeptical. Did it impress me? Let’s find out.

Story: Kyoukai no Kanata takes place in a fantasy world filled with magic and monsters. These monsters are known as Youmu. Most of these Youmu are presented as terrible creatures that kill humans. Then there are humans called Spirit World Warriors who use magic to stop these creatures from killing people. The story follows our main character named Akihito Kanbara. He is an immortal half Youmu/Human hybrid who meets a Spirit World Warrior named Mirai Kuriyama. It continues from there as you learn about the world and how they live in it.

I have a huge problem with the story. It sets up this big and interesting world that you want to find out more about, and it’s barely explored. We don’t really find out much of anything about this world, which I was very disappointed with. I would have loved to see some other Spirit World Warriors and how their society works. It doesn’t help when the anime itself has filler episodes. They could have easily cut these two episodes out and gave us two for more world building or character development. And to make things even worse, the last few episodes have info dumping, which could have been fixed with two more episodes to work with. And the ending of the story contains an ass pull that is simply there to give it a feel good ending. And if you’re wondering, the characters aren’t much better.

Characters: One word description for the characters: bland. There are four main characters in Kyoukai no Kanata. Akihito Kanbara is an immortal half Youmu/Human hybrid who is open, VERY OPEN, about his glasses fetish. Mirai Kuriyama is a Spirit World Warrior who has the power of manipulating her own blood. She is also your typical Kyotoani Moe girl. Hiroomi Nase is a friend of Akihito who has a sister complex. Then there is his sister Mitsuki Nase who verbally abuse Akihito and her brother.

So you might be wondering about character development. My question is, what development? These characters don’t develop at all from what I remember. They basically stay the same the entire show. Okay, MAYBE there is a romance subplot that goes absolutely nowhere. The side characters do little to nothing to help the plot and there are times where I can’t even remember their names. There’s an antagonist that is extremely forgettable and character back stories that allude to something great but we get NOTHING.

Animation: This is Kyoto Animation. So Kyoukai no Kanata looks GOREGEOUS. From the movements to the colors and character designs. This anime is visually stunning. Action scenes are one of the shows biggest highlights and it looks freaking incredible. I didn’t notice the animation quality dip at all in this anime.

Sound: The only noticeable piece of music is the ending song. Aside from that, everything else is pretty hit or miss. Sure the music is fitting, but it’s pretty forgettable. The Japanese voice acting is fitting and they all express emotion where they need to.

Conclusion: Did I enjoy Kyoukai no Kanata? Well, sort of. I enjoyed the action scenes the most, while the story and characters just fell flat for me. I felt that the anime could have been something much greater than what it turned out to be. It fell to being a fairly average anime with great animation. That is what you call wasted potential. 3.5/5

carrie84 - 2013-12-18 21:00:33

Kyoukai no Kanata started kinda meh because nothing happened, but it started to improve dramatically since that idol episode.

The story is ok, but there are a lot of things unexplained. How did she come back to life at the end? Who is that old man boss from the underground? Why KyoAni refuses to show a fucking kiss in any anime? Will we ever see Ai-chan's hot photos?

The animation gave me several boners. Look at this and tell me it isn't the best thing since sliced bread:

Anyway, good anime but not superb, and it could've been if the plot was better.

tmosciski - 2013-11-24 20:55:17

This anime is brilliantly done! In every single aspect of it that is. Already a lot of character development, just finding out their personalities. The story is very unique for Sci-Fi genre. As for animation and sound they are perfectly done, better than any anime I have ever watched! Very fulfilling and entertaining if your into Sci-Fi!

What's It About?

This anime in particular focuses on Akihito Kanbara, who saves a girl named Mirai Kuriyama from suicide. After doing so, many strange things happen to the two of them, in turn, kicking off the storyline.

Effects

Because of Kuriyama's ability to form her own blood into a weapon used to fight creatures called youmu this is essential! Here is a gif I found from episode 1, during Kuriyama's very first against a youmu:

Although I believe this gets even better. :D

Overall

This is one of the best I've seen.

Characters (main): Mirai Kuriyama

Akihito Kanbara

luciano23 - 2013-10-14 03:47:14

Stories about supernatural usually end up as ghost stories to try to scare the watchers, but Kyoukai no Kanata is the total opposite. From the ghosts to the supernatural beings until the characters, it gives the watcher a feel of being a part of the show. It's very enjoying and the story is so-so. A great anime considering that they have tackled a critical genre. Fast-paced and a must-watch.

woodrow.towne - 2013-10-09 02:22:50

Fast paced, with a very unexpected beginning. The OP is nice, and BGM good too, but the ED is just amazing. Interesting main character so far, and hopefully the lead female isn't just a moe blob (she does seem kind of badass). The world hasn't been explained much, but there's only one episode out so far.

vinnie21 - 2013-10-03 10:48:18

Kyoukai no Kanata first impression

Interesting to see Kyoto animation take on this light novel, so far so good.

Story: Based on the light novel of the same name, as far as the story goes it seems to be on the right track, its always great to see words come to life. Personally I think the story is abit cheesy in the beginning however story will eventually get more interesting as it progresses, aslong as kyoto animation is doing a good job in the adaptation.

Animation: Great animation from Kyoto animation production team as usual, the level of work coming out from such a small production company is staggering, having be well known for light novel and visual novel adaptation Kyoto animation has been amazing at their work since 2003 and is well known for quality adaptation since then.

Sound: voice actors were great, won't say they are perfect fit for the characters but they will grow on you over time. Viewers of Kyoto animetions past work would quickly pick up the familiar voices from Hyoko and K-on The music compositions are great, captures the animation perfectly, well in sync with the theme and structure of key segments.

Characters: Again cheesy to begin with, as long as Kyoto animation does a good job with the overall adaptation of the novel, the characters themselves will grow on you as the story progress. There isn't a REALLY plot driving character per say but they will get more interesting as the story progresses. Great design on the characters keeping it true the novel while retaining the classic Kyoto animation artwork, although design are much closer to Hyoka then anything else.

Enjoyment: Great to see Kyoto animation's new adaptation after Free!, as far as the Enjoyment goes it shouldn't disappoint anyone. Kyoto animation are amazing, all their adaptation are at least above average enjoyable compare to most of the animes air on the same season, although the level of interestingness do differ from work to work, I surely hope Kyokai no Kanata become one of the better adaptation Kyoto animation push forward in recent year. Can it be Kyoto animation's new ace in the hole? 11 episode left to tell

After season Final thoughts

Now that the show is actually complete, lets go back and revisit this Kyoto animation's adaptation of Kyoukai no Kanata. Originally this is meant to be a dark, tense action story unlike the usual genres Kyoto animation are accustom to, but Kyoto anime do what they do best and made it more "splice of lifely", don't get me wrong though since it one of the redeeming aspect of the show, character interactions and their "daily turn of events" truly drive the story forward. However same can't be said about the action and battle, despite being a "dark action packed show" other than nice animated battles, it really isn't the most interesting part of the anime. Sad to say but other than gorgeous art and top notch music Kyoto Anime fail to deliver a good adaption true to the original's intended genre, BUT as an anime in itself Kyoto anime delivered some different, some very beautifully crafted animation, some of the best OST in recent years, and packed in a short but interesting anime.

Kyoto anime's Kyoukai no Kanata is not their ace in the hole in 2013, but safe to say it is one of the best looking anime of 2013. If you loved the original light novel this show will differ in tone so do give it a try, it is a fresh take on the story. For those who haven't read the original story, i believe you will find a very interesting world view and setting backed by gorgeous art, fluid animation and one of the best OST in 2013.