Secret Santa Review
Before I start, I would like to mention that this review will most likely contain spoilers. If you do not want this show to be spoiled for you, then read no further.
There, now that that's out of the way, let's start the review proper. This supernatural slice of life drama had been on my radar since it aired, but I never got around to watching it until I got it recommended by my Secret Santa.
It starts out quaint enough, introducing us to the female lead, Izumiko, that lives on a very pretty mountan with her odd guardians, what with her parents being else where most of the time. She is immediately set apart from the rest of her peers, not just only by her sheltered upbringing but also the fact that she has odd powers. Shortly after that, we get introduced to a new character: Miyuki, Izumiko's new companion – or manservant, as they say – with severe attitude problems. The show got way less fun to watch when his bratty teenage moping got way more screentime than I felt it warranted. I am glad that phase of his it ended after a few episodes because any more of that and I would have rated this show much lower than I did.
After a few episodes, they transfer to a new school. Of course, there is more going on under the surface than what a momentary glance will reveal, and this school is trapped up in a power struggle between two factions. This is pretty much kept on the backburner for most of the show's run, and there's a lot of other smaller arcs happening as well. Sadly, none is very entertaining to watch, and the mixture of slice of life and small drama arcs makes the show feel like it lacks coherence and a sense of direction, even though the arcs are never outright bad or left without a proper conclusion.
There is never a sense of urgency to the conflict because so little is outright said or explained, nor does the show tell us why we should actually root for the protagonists – simply being protagonists is really not enough – until the very end. The antagonists are also pretty loosely defined, without any clear and defined motivations. Because of that, I found myself lacking interest throughout. It felt like it tried to be suspenseful, but in the end it was just tedious and unengaging.
The characters are thankfully way more consistent than the plot, but they're still very unremarkable – forgettable even – especially the secondary characters. Izumiko and Miyuki are the only ones that I would actually call rounded, developed characters, and even they are nothing to write home about. Miyuki goes from being an annoying, callous and self-centred brat to a more understanding and tolerable person in the first few episodes, but he is otherwise pretty static.
Izumiko is the most human of the bunch, and yet I can't really bring myself to like her as a character because she doesn't really stand out and I really can't emphasize with her struggle to become normal, mainly because the anime treats it in a rather off-hand way most of the time. It's a real shame too, since it's a great concept, but there is little done to actually utilize it in a good way.
The soundtrack is good, which some really nice moody tracks in the OST. The opening and ending songs are above average as well, and more importantly: they are very good at setting the mood. With their mellow and slightly ethereal moods, they're pretty much a perfect fit for this show.
As for what I think of the show as a whole, it left me feeling very ambivalent throughout. Every good thing about it was tempered with parts that were not very entertaining, but most of the time it was as dull as dishwater to me, with a lot of episodes feeling like they were thrice their actual runtime. The plot and setting showed promise but it never delivered, so instead it ended up being just a waste of great production values for the most part. The show really could not decide what to be and did never really play to its strengths, which is a crying shame. I really wanted to like this more than I did, but it just ended up feeling like an average watch. The setting was good, the animation was stellar and the soundtrack was great, but it lacked character and staying power. Furthermore, the ending was rather by-the-numbers and felt really unsatisfying to me.