antonetta65 - 2014-10-29 13:49:10

quitzon.floy - 2014-08-06 10:19:14

evelyn43 - 2014-07-01 23:20:36

This will be my first anime review, and for a series that's about to get another new anime based on "Persona 4 The Golden" game. Oh boy.. 
Please note that I have played Persona 4 the video game on PS2, and I am rating this anime based on both its own merits as a series, and in terms of faithfulness to the game, and how well it translates as a series. 
The Rundown- 
Persona 4 The Animation revolves around the story of Yu Narukami, a boy from Tokyo who is forced to move in with his Uncle and cousin, The Dojimas, in the small, boring town of Yasoinaba for a year. While there, he will be attending a new school called Yasogami High as a transfer student, and while attending Yasogami, he meets three new friends and classmates named Chie, Yukiko, and Yosuke, and later in the plot, meets a strange bear named Teddie, a former Idol named Rise, a roughneck underclassman named Kanji, and a young "boyish" detective named Naoto. During his time in Inaba, a string of strange deaths have occurred at the hands of an unknown murderer, which connects to a strange world known as the TV world, host to the "Midnight channel", (a channel that comes on during rainy days during the midnight). Yu, while staying up to watch the Midnight channel, discovers he has the ability to enter the TV World through a TV screen.  As Yu and his gang of friends enter the TV world, they discover they have these strange creatures at their disposal called "Personas", which are manifestations of the human psyche that can be used for combat against evil creatures that live in the TV World known as "Shadows". With the help of their Personas, and while looking for clues during their time in Inaba and defeating shadows, Yu and his friends attempt to solve this mystery by saving the victims of future attempted murders and stop the mystery TV world murderer once and for all. 
The plot is very solid. Any fan of the game would know that the plot was one of the strongest points Persona 4 ever had, and this adaptation doesn't disappoint. Of course, things were left out, considering this is only a 20+ episode series, but many of the aspects that were in Persona 4 the game remained the same, and were still as likable as ever. 

The Characters - 
If you are a fan of the Shin Megami Tensei series, you'd know that the Persona series is known for having a combination of amazing plots, interesting game mechanics, and interesting characters. In the case for Persona 4, this stays true, but in my opinion, P4 did the best in terms of characters and their development. Persona 4 The Animation's adaptation stays true to this, because all of the characters stay roughly the same in how interesting, different, and well developed they are. Each character has their own personality that is not the same as any other. Yosuke is the comic relief/slightly perverted/game planner. Chie is the tomboyish martial artist/foodlover, Yukiko is the beautiful and shy character. Kanji is the tough guy yet softy on the inside (and outside), Teddie is the oblivious, non-human with a heart of gold (and terrible bear puns if you watch the Dub). Rise is the super cutsy, idol styled schoolgirl, and Naoto is the mature, super serious character who tries to solve the issues. It's almost impossible not to like something about one of these characters. The only character I really didn't care for...was the protagonist. He was just not that great of a personality. He's kind of just a placeholder for a protagonist that needed to be in the anime due to the main protagonist (Yu) being in the game, but had an option responsive system that made him more of a character you use to see the stories of the other characters. That type of style may work for games since they are interactive, but not for an anime. Of course, Yu isn't just a dead body who walks around with the characters. He has his moments, and it was pleasing to see his responses to situations that you couldn't really see or feel on an emotional level in Persona 4 the game. 

The Ending -
There are technically two endings to this series. Of course, this is the same when it comes to the game as well. Both endings are watchable, but when it comes to the "True" ending of the anime, it was much different than P4 the game's true ending. It was a satisfactory ending in my opinion, and highlighted more of Yu as a character, but P4 the game's true ending was so much better. It was an ending that involved all of the characters, not just Yu, and made the ending feel like it was a journey regarding you and your friends, and not just the main protagonist. The other ending was nothing special, and I will say that the True ending is much better, and pieces the story together on how Yu gained his powers and how the murderer did what they did. 

My Gripes -
I have some major grimes. Obviously, as stated before, Yu felt a little too dull for me as a protagonist, and the ending was morphed into something that was clearly not as good as the ending for the game. Another issue I had though was the animation. For the most part, the animation was not bad, but there are areas where it seemed like faces were drawn very lazily. There's also an art style to the characters regarding their lips, which I didn't really care for. It reminded me of how upper lips for female characters were drawn for a cartoon like "Kim Possible". It wasn't anything too negative, and the art styles still very good, but definitely different from what Persona 4's original art style was. Also, I really didn't like how the characters did not have their weapons. In the Persona 4 game, every character had weapons they could use, and they were specific styles of weapons for each individual character (Yu used a sword, Chie used leg gauntlets, etc). My major gripe though was Teddie. Teddie was very annoying, and even more annoying than he was in the game. Both in the game, and in the anime, Teddie makes a lot of bear puns, but in the anime, it just felt like he made so many more puns than he usually did in the game. It was...UNBEARABLE (Yes, that pun was bad, and YES, that's how bad his puns are in the anime). Of course, you have the option to watch the sub, which takes the puns away for Teddie just saying Kuma after everything, which is less annoying, but in my opinion, Teddies Japanese voice was more annoying overall, so I stayed with the Dub. You'll have to BEAR with it I guess (God, these are terrible). My final gripe is that the anime gets a bit formulaic when introducing new main characters to the plot. It feels like the ending of a pokemon episode regarding these characters coming into the plot. Character has to face their shadow, character denies shadow as their true self, Shadow attacks character, Yu and the gang defeat shadow, and character then accepts the the shadow as who they really are. Although, the pro to this is that you learn more about the character, so it wasn't a very huge problem with me, but it doesn't leave too much suspense regarding what to expect. 

My Enjoyment -I loved a lot of things regarding this plot. The characters are probably the number one thing I liked about Persona 4 the Animation, but the story is also very strong. The anime also has some great humor that had me in stitches. For an anime that revolves around strange murders and shadow monsters, the tone ranges from sad, to somewhat dark, from colorful, to cheery. It builds so many tones together that actually work well. I love me some super-serious, dark tone in anime as much as the next fan, but I love when things change up like this. The anime also has mystery elements to it that can definitely get you involved, similar to a series like Detective Conan, but not as in depth. RPG elements can also be found in the anime, which is awesome for those who are a fan of the game. Also, there are moments where this anime even had me in tears due to the connection these characters gave me. Even after playing the game and balling up in tears after I beat it, I was still crying at how emotionally gripping the connection between these friends were in the anime. The plot isn't just a murder mystery. It's a plot about how a boy makes great friends with some interesting people in a years time.  The Dub was also satisfactory. You may not like some of the new voice actors for some of the characters that had different voice actors in the game, but I felt they all portrayed the characters very well, and over time, I got use to the new voices. Chie's new voice was the hardest to get use to, but after the 6th episode, I didn't really care how her voice was different, and now, I actually prefer it. 

Verdict - 
I would highly recommend Persona 4 The Animation IF you choose not to play the game. Not everyone is a fan of JRPGs, or even video games, but you don't have to play the games to enjoy this anime. Of course, if you did enjoy the anime, you'll be missing out on things not included in the episodes that are in the game, so please, if you do watch the anime and enjoyed it, at least try the game, even if you don't like video games or JRPGS. 
My rating for Persona 4 The Animation is a 7 out of 10. It's faithful to the game, and probably one of the most accurate adaptations from Video game to tv series, but it does suffer from some issues that didn't translate to well in anime form, the protagonist was dull, Teddie's puns suck, and the ending was not as good as the video games. Regardless of those issues, it's still solid and I would definitely recommend it to fans of both P4 and anime in general.

clyde86 - 2014-02-22 17:48:58

From my blog: http://hsmedianerdreviews.blogspot.com/2014/02/anime-review-persona-4-animation.html

Before I begin, I’d like to thank Youtuber star6wars1 for recommending this anime. I really appreciate it! Now, let’s move onto the review.

You know, there are actually a ton of anime that are adapted from video games or visual novels, which is kind of the Japanese equivalent to a video game that plays out like a story, and the player’s decisions make up the plot. If you’re confused in any way, here’s a link to a Gameplay video of the video game that this anime is based upon:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hozO8ZXmYdQ

From what I can tell, Persona 4 is kind of a combination of the two, but don’t quote me on that because I’m not much of a gamer. Anyway, some other examples of anime that were based off of games are Dangan Ropa – The Animation, Devil Survivor 2 – The Animation, 11Eyes, Clannad, Kanon (both versions), Air, School Days, Fortune Arterial, Photo Kano, Diabolik Lovers, Fate/Stay Night, Utawarerumono, the list goes on. Even though I haven’t seen all of the anime listed (only Dangan Ropa, 11Eyes, Clannad, Kanon 2006, some of Fate/Stay Night and one episode of the monstrosity that is Diabolik Lovers), I’ve noticed that visual novel adaptations are…average. Sure, there may be one or two that stand out, but other than that they can range from mediocre to downright terrible. So, with all of this in mind, I went into Persona 4 with a lot of caution. So, how did it hold up? Sit back, relax, and read on as I review Persona 4 – The Animation.

The Setup:

Set in the Japanese countryside, the anime begins with our main protagonist named…the Protagonist. Wait, wait, wait…the anime gave him the name of Yu Narukami, my bad. So, Yu is moving from Tokyo to the Japanese countryside to live with this uncle Ryotaro Dojima and cousin Nanako for a year because his parents were working abroad. While getting adjusted to the new country life, he meets some of his classmates in his new school, namely Yosuke Hanamura and Chie Satonaka, along with Chie’s friend Yukiko but she’s not really an important character yet, so she barely gets an introduction. Anyway, Yu has also noticed some strange disturbances concerning the Midnight Channel, a television “program” that plays only at midnight on rainy days. The strange disturbances are the fact that those whose faces are shown on the channel end up dead within a few days. On top of that, Yu tries to touch the TV screen and notices that his hand can go through it. He tells Yosuke and Chie, so they head over to the nearest department store to see if Yu’s telling the truth. As a result of this, as Yu is testing out his ability to go into the TV, Chie and Yosuke begin arguing, and accidentally makes all three of them fall into the TV. There, they meet a creature known as Teddie (because he’s a bear) and they’re attacked by these monsters that Teddie calls “shadows”. Then, Yu discovers a new power of his; the ability to summon a “persona”, defeating the shadows and getting everyone else out safely. Thus, the story begins. So, as you can see, Persona 4 has a very eventful first episode, and if you’re somehow not the slightest bit interested by it, then I’m not sure of what will interest you.

The Characters:

The characters of Persona 4, while not the best characters in existence, are pretty memorable. One of my favorite aspects of the anime in general is how the characters obtain their Personas; they have to battle their “true selves”. In other words, the battle for the Persona is also a battle against a part of you that you would rather not let people see, which I found rather fascinating and it developed each of the side characters rather nicely. Now, let’s move onto the characters themselves. When I first saw Yu I thought he would be the definition of a generic main character. He had little to no personality, his dialogue was bland, he didn’t strike me as interesting, and his character design made him look like a generic main character. When I finished the anime, however, he became my favorite character in the entire show because his character development was absolutely fantastic. He literally went from a blank slate to an emotional, relatable, and incredibly well-written main character, to the point of which I would say that he’s one of my favorite anime main characters period. Now that I think about it, I get the feeling that the anime was trying to make him as blank as possible originally, so that when you see him form bonds with people it would affect him emotionally. Granted, we don’t really see his life before his move, but I still think that my point remains. As for the other characters, they were okay, but not nearly as memorable as Yu. Yosuke is fine as the best-friend character, Chie is the perfect example of how to do a tsundere correctly, Yukiko is quiet but has some pretty good character development, Teddie makes some BEARY BAD BEAR PUNS (but you’ll get used to them), and three more characters named Kanji, Rise, and Naoto join them later on. Kanji tries to act like a tough guy but has a softer side, Rise is a former idol that is on hiatus, and Naoto is a child detective. The main villain (of whom you find out much later in the story) is also really well-done, and who it is will most likely surprise you. So, the characters are pretty good, how does the story hold up? Well, not as well.

The Story:

While the main story of Persona 4 was definitely intriguing and kept my interest, it’s also where my two main problems with this series lie. Firstly, the filler episodes just bug me. I don’t care if they were part of the game, I don’t care about your definition of a filler episode, I think that a good portion of the episodes in this anime are just flat-out filler. I’m normally pretty lenient when it comes to filler episodes in anime, because if I can see some worth within the episode whether it be character development or development of the setting then I don't consider it to be a filler episode, but Persona 4 doesn’t meet up to any of the requirements of not having filler episodes. For example, there’s an episode where the kids go on a school camping trip. Sure, there’s comedy to be found there, but I don’t remember there being any important character development or development of any sort. Secondly, I don’t like its constant usage of deus ex machina. For those who don’t know, a deus ex machina is a plot device that is used to get a character out of a nearly impossible situation by giving them a power that literally comes out of nowhere. An example would be the entire climax of Sword Art Online’s second half. Now, in Persona 4 it isn’t nearly as bad because they do offer up some explanations as to why a certain power is given to Yu, but they don’t technically show it to us, so the climax at the end of episode 13 for example just felt anti-climatic. The explanation given is that every time he forms a new bond, he gains a new Persona. Sure, okay, I’ll buy that, but how many bonds did he make in order to gain so many new Personas? I think that this is due to the fact that Persona 4 is based off of a video game, because in a video game, you can gain any power you want in order to defeat the game. In an anime, however, it makes no sense to see a character with powers that the audience hasn’t seen beforehand without some sort of explanation or have the audience see how exactly the character gained that specific power. It will probably make more sense as you watch it, but I think I got my point across.

Animation and Sound:

The animation of Persona 4 is okay. The movements are a little clunky, but it’s made up for by its creative character designs, colors, and atmosphere. As for the soundtrack, it’s really good. It’s very memorable and is very stylish, setting the moods perfectly. The best song of the OST can be found here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SwCfaO_9pNs None of the opening or ending songs stood out to me. As for English or Japanese, go with the English dub. It’s well-acted, and Johnny Young Bosh does a fantastic job as both Yu and another character named Adachi. Can’t go wrong with that!

orlo62 - 2014-01-07 21:02:28

Wells here goes, my first anime review :p

Story 8/10

The main plot does bring tension, comparable to such of Death Note and Mirai Nikki, but at the same time, its lightened with a warm hearted, up beat tone. But one thing to note, is that the game's story is a lot better than this game-to-anime adaptation. There is more attention to detail, and you can do a lot more than this anime shows, making this 'overly attached feeling' come back full force, even harder than the anime does. I'll give the run-down of the plot without giving any major spoilers. The main character is a teenage boy from Tokyo named Yu Narukami. He is moving to Yaso Inaba for the year until the next spring. He makes many friends, and is greeted by his Uncle Dojima and his little cousin Nanako. One thing to know is that it is easy to get very attached to the characters. Yu and his group of friends hear about a rumor of something called the "Midnight Channel" where you would supposedly see your soulmate on the screen at Midnight on rainy days. One point for originality. Originally, the gang discovers that the Midnight Channel links in with a serial murder case, and they use their power called "Persona" to help solve the case. Its just, great. Thats all I can say.

Animation 7/10

If there is anything this anime suffers with, It's the animation. And the animation isnt really that bad. I sometimes feel like the drawings were a bit rushed, compared to modern anime. But still, It isnt really all that bad. I wont complain, and you wont either.

Sound 10/10

This is easily one of the biggest strength of this anime, and the game as well. The soundtrack is AMAZING!!! And the voice acting is incredible as well. I have downloaded the entire Persona 4 Never More Reincarnation soundtrack, and its what I listen to the most. In the car, walking in between classes, even when I go to sleep. Thats how much i love this soundtrack.

Character 9/10

I hope this category doesn't just mean the main character, because I will be going over how great all the character development is. For the main characters, at least.

First off is Yu Narukami.

This is the main protagonist. Unlike the video game, this anime gave the character a personality, and a soul. He's a bit of a smart ass, but I like him that way.

Then comes Yosuke Hanamura.

He's like a second male protagonist, almost like a sidekick to Yu. This guy is even more of a smart ass than he is, but his character is quite laughable and comedic at times.

Chie Satonaka

If I would have an anime crush, this would be it, embarrassing as it is to admit. Somehow, her personality is a bit attractive. She is just really cool, and kinda like a tomboy. Her favorite type of food is meat, which is kinda funny.

Yukiko Amagi

This ones the stereotypical asian of the group. Shes overly intelligent, and takes things seriously.

All these characters have their own dark desires, and these are very relatable. You get to see all these character's struggles. And you connect to them deeply. You even sometimes feel like they are your real friends, its weird. But its something great about this anime.

Enjoyment 10/10

I really enjoyed this anime. This anime can be separated into two sections. The Social Link episodes, and the Investigation Team episodes. The Social Link episodes are basically the comic relief episodes, of the characters bonding together. The Investigation team episodes are basically how the main plot continues, of them solving the case in such. In my opinion, the Social Link episodes are more enjoyable, since they are quite comedic. Never the less, this story is just really enjoyable with its up-beat tone and its charming personality.

Overall 9/10

This was over all an AMAZING anime. I actually watched the anime before I got Persona 4 Golden and played it the whole way through. I actually watched it 2 times before. And i thought it was great. The emphasis in friendships, love, and bonding, may be corny with most anime. But this one does it right. You get the feeling while watching this anime (especially while playing the game) where you get overly attached to the characters, and because of that, I didn't want the story to end. After playing the game fully, with the true ending and all, I went back to the anime to re-watch it one more time, and I wasn't as pleased as I was before I played the game. But never the less, it is still a great anime.

emckenzie - 2014-01-02 19:52:30

My review of Persona 4 The Animation. An adaptaion of my favorite video game of all time. Does it dissapoint?

joshuah01 - 2013-11-13 14:07:17

I am deeply in love with the persona games. when i heard about that Persona 4 was having a anime I jumped for joy. when i got a hold of the blu-rays on a trip to Otakon and i sat down a marathoned the first few episodes. When i got home and the story was so linier. I loved the persona 4 story so i knew i was going to love the story. I loved almost every aspec of the anime. one of the funniest things i saw was how they made yu comic relief as a pic i found said. Mute in the game Comedy gold in the anime.

marilou.miller - 2013-05-28 17:33:23

Before i begin my review I will tell you one thing:don't watch this anime if you have a PlayStation Vita or a PS2!Buy the game because is one of the best JRPG that you will ever play.The anime covers every single event from the game(the first Persona 4 and not the improved PSV version Persona 4 Golden) If you don't want to play it then it's ok.

Persona 4 The Animation is created by the studio AIC,the studio that brought you Blue Gender.

 Now for the story:The story is riveting.It begins when the protagonist Yu Narukami arrive in Inaba to stay with his uncle and his cousin for one year because of his parents jobs that require them overseas.By the time of his arrival strange things begin to happen in Inaba:a strange fog suddenly covers the town, an a TV reporter is found deadand beside this there is an ongoing rumor that if you watch the TV after a rainy day at  midnight,you will see your soulmate.

I will not spoil the story further because it has to be unraveld by you.It's a deep satisfying story that it will grip you fast.

In this adaptation the studio introduced a new character Aika Nakamura,as a fan demand because of Chinese Diner Aiya conversations from the game were her father always talked about his daughter but never showed her in the hole game

I really don't have nothing to say something negative about this adaptation!They really nailed it!ATLUS definitely washed some mud off with this adaptation after Persona:Trinity Soul with was a total disappointing adaptaion for the fans ot he persona series.

In conclusion is a must watch for the people who already played the game to see the story from another view and also a must watch for every anime fan who loves supernatural,mistery and adventure!

And by the way did i told you how brilliant the soundtrack is?The soundtrack was done by the same compouser of the original game!Just check this http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eoBkb3c1TeQ!

.

rorn - 2013-03-16 22:06:18

I have to say when Persona 4 the Animation was first airing I really had no idea what I was watching and got a little frustrated by the pacing of the show in generally, but that was before I started playing the game series.

After I started to learn more about what the Persona series was and got my hands on my own PSVita and a copy of Persona 4: Golden I really started to see where the charm of the show and the series actually came from as a whole and it all started to make perfect sense.  Now going back to watching the show and understanding the pacing and mechanics the show deals with I enjoyed it a lot more and found it really well done if not a little bit rushed.

Story 7/10

The story in Persona 4 follows the game's story to the letter with slight deviations from the game due to time constraints and how much individual player choice came to affect the actual pacing of how the game was played. 

They did pull off all the needed social links perfectly and kept all the lines and dialogue that were great in the game, in the anime series as well. 

Animation 7/10

I'll be blunt about it the animation isn't the greatest in the show though it still is good and keeps the game's original cut scene feel to it but a little bit more touched up. While I liked the animation after I played the game after I grew a fondness to it the animation originally threw me off not having experienced it before.

Sound 10/10

The music in the series is probably some of my favorite due to the fact that they keep the original in game music with it's own slight spin and the opening and closing songs for the show are both down by the original artist who did the games opening and closings. Something deep inside me gets really giddy whenever I hear Reach out to the Truth (currently one of my favorite battle songs currently). 

Character 10/10 

The anime series keeps ALL of the original characters main or secondary, and each of them play their role in the show like they do in the game and show just how much the MC grows along his journey. Yes I said MC sorry Narukami Yui you do a great job of being the legendary ladies man of Inaba but you will always be the MC to me. 

The greatest thing about the Persona series is that it is so heavily character dependent and how each of the characters work and interact with each other due to the social link system which the show tries to pull off.

Enjoyment 8/10

I got almost as much enjoyment out of the series as I did with the game after the jokes started to make more sense and felt for each of the characters, but that's all it was, all the enjoyment I felt for the animation was only there because of the game so I can't really quantify how much actually changed from it in the first place.

Overall 7/10

I'm not going to say this animation adaptation of what is widely believed to be one of the greatest RPGs of all time should win any outstanding awards, because it already has the greatness of the game going for it. I can really only say that it was fun to sit down and watch the game I had spent 88 total hours on so far (yes it is a very long yet very fun game) in anime form with the MC having a voice, which by the way sounds totally badass in either the Japanese or American dub (yeah I said it the I enjoyed the American dub to Johnny Young Bosch /swoon) 

So if you have a PSVita I would first suggest totally getting Persona 4: Golden to play before the animation or even Persona 4 the Arena which does take place after Persona 4 but does a pretty good job of not spoiling anything. Definatly a must check out though for fans of the Persona series if you have not seen it already.

gwillms - 2013-03-15 08:28:53

The majority of people seem to praise Persona 4: The Animation for its faithfulness to the source material, calling it “the best game-to-anime adaption ever made.” As someone who finished their first playthrough of the game while the series was almost halfway through syndication, I’ll agree, the series is certainly faithful. And game-to-cinema adaptions don’t really have a high standard anyways, so this is probably the best adaption also. However, this is ultimately one of the main reasons why The Animation fails to be as good as the original game. (And since the original game’s story was merely “good” in my eyes, this causes The Animation to sink down into mediocre.)There seems to be misconception that if an adaption is faithful enough to the source material, than it’s garanteed to be good-so long as the source material was good in the first place. This is incorrect because when a story is written for certain medium, it tends to work best in that medium because that’s what the story was designed for. Persona 4 fundamentally works best as a video-game, because that’s what it was written for. You could still make a good television series out of it, but in order for that to happen you have to actually change stuff and play around with it.The first of these problems is the pacing. Persona 4 is a game where you live out the player-protagonist’s highschool life day by day, with trips to the TV world every few weeks. It takes about 60-80 hours to beat, and features a very slow pacing. For a 25 episode television series, they of course would need to compress the overall story.For example, it’s not until a whole hour into the game until the player-protagonist actually gets to fight some Shadows. Since fighting Shadows is apart of the show’s premise, you of course need to include that in the pilot. Therefor, the writers had to rush through the first hour of the game and compress into a 20-minute episode, which results in an overtly fast pacing.Secondly is the formulaic structure that comprises the majority of the plot. It roughly goes something like this: “Episode A: The heroes find out who’s on the Midnight Channel, and try to gather information on them so that they can save them from the TV world –> Episode B: The heroes go into the TV world, and rescues the victim. The victim then joins their party and helps out in the next story arc–> Episode C: Filler episode –> Repeat.”The formula was no problem in the game, since the slow pacing made it so you barely even noticed the formula in the first place. However, since the formula goes through a mere three episodes of the anime, the quicker pacing makes it seem more repetitive.Lastly, there’s Yu’s ability to summon multiple Persona’s, and acquire ”Social Links.” In the video-game, these are only briefly explained, but it’s no problem because it makes sense in the context of a video-game. But with The Animation, they still don’t bother to give an in-depth explanation, and it no longer makes any sense because it doesn’t have the context of a game to back it up. In the game it makes complete sense from a game play mechanic, but in The Animation it serves absolutely no purpose other than to occasionally show off some of the obtainable demons.This is one of those shows where it starts out rather nicely; even though the first few episodes suffered from such overtly-fast pacing, they were otherwise rather enjoyable and of decent quality. After episode 4 however, the series started to steep deeper and deeper into mediocracry, and it wasn’t until episode 21 (near the end of the series) that it finally started to be of exceptional quality. This is partially due to how the series quickly starts to focus less on the mystery aspects of the plot, and more on the formulaic nature of rescuing people from the TV world and forming Social Links. In other words, barely anything interesting actually happened for a large part of the series.When each character is introduced in their respective story-arcs, they are indeed compelling characters with a good amount of depth to them. However, as soon as they face their inner selves and are rescued from the TV world, they quickly degrade into flat one-dimensional characters. They’re all still likable to a certain extent, but not enough to make slice-of-life episodes (i.e. the filler episodes) worth watching.The fight scenes were also underwhelming, usually feeling rushed. They barely have any tension to them, and usually ended far sooner than you would have liked them to. A few times they tried to mix up the fights by adding in some zany element, such as the male characters turning into old men, or the a hot liquid appearing on the floor that impaired the characters movements. Sometimes it worked, but other times it was just added a bit of stupid and unnecessary comedy.If there’s anything that saves this show from being terribly mediocre, it’s the final four episodes that manage to pull a few plot twists and make the whole mystery plot actually interesting.Overall Rating: 6/10. For the most part this is a mediocre series, but it had enough saving qualities for me to rate this as “above average.” For a short while each character was compelling and complex, and the last four episodes were of exceptional quality.But even so, I highly recommend you avoid this series, and just play the original video-game. I wouldn't call the game a masterpiece or anything, but it's certainly better than The Animation is virtually every way.