Amanchu!

destinyfatedreams Oct 14, 2016

4

I can't. I tried; I really did. My sister sung this show's praises and I'll admit, I was very excited about it. I've always been interested in diving and the water animation looked to be amazing. Well, it was but that was about the best it had to offer. I'm not a huge fan of slice of life so characters are key for me. Ooki Futaba bored me to absolute tears. As someone who had to move a number of times in my childhood and teens, I usually connect to characters who's out of their comfort zone and misses friends. But Futaba seemed to do nothing but sigh and play the straight man to Kohinata Hikari. Hikari. (random inarticulate mutterings) Again, usually I like characters like this but she found my last nerve and continually stomped on it. Every little thing just drove me up the wall: the way she acted, her personality, and that (several swear words) whistle! Oh my gosh, when she would just incessently blow on it, I thought I'd have to turn off the TV or break it. Whichever would be faster. The final nail (and a very big one) was the way she was often drawn. She looked like a frog and seriously freaked me out. The setting was admittedly gorgeous. The lovely water and town animation (especially when I learned that this was set in a real town and they drew actual locations) went a long way to keeping me watching this. This was easily the best part of the whole show. The story was...meh. I liked learning about diving but I could get this infomation elsewhere and even after five episodes I never could really care where it was going. I think this is a show where every person watching it is going tto have very different feelings about it. What didn't work for me might work for you.

huxley Aug 13, 2016

6

I want to like Amanchu! I really really do. I enjoy quirky slice of life anime. If you've watched any amount of slice-of-life anime, they tend to be dominated by characters and settings, not story or plot, but Amanchu! so far hasn't let me really connect with the characters and as for plot ... I don't see much of any, it is wandering. I need a bit more motivation from the characters and so far the odd couple connection and the love of the sea hasn't really done it for me. Maybe I should have waited to binge watch it and I could then appreciate it as a whole rather than the weekly episodes, maybe it would work then, but ... ugh ... I am getting close to giving up. PS Are there really school uniforms like that in Japan? I'm kinda hoping it's an authentic touch rather than a weird artistic choice.

RingoStarr1991 Sep 24, 2016

7.3

 ***THIS IS A VERY LIGHT SPOILER REVIEW*** I vividly remember watching a series called Aria in my earlier anime watching days. It had me mesmerized with its amazing visuals, music, and character interactions. It told the story of 3 young women working on getting better at their craft. For 3 seasons it developed into an amazing series that I wish we had more of. Amanchu is written by the same author that did Aria and while it does do a great job of hitting most of the marks laid by Aria I feel that it missed its stride in a few instances.Story: 3.5/10 What made Aria great was that almost 100% of the time you had character interactions while the craft building was going on. In Amanchu however a lot of the character interactions happen outside of the diving portion of the anime. In fact we do not see a complete dive until the last episode of the season which really disappointed me. Yes the show is mostly about general character building like in Aria but sidelining the main activity in the anime was not the best move in my opinion. If we ever get more seasons of this show then maybe I'll get what I want but for now we have to judge what we have. The characters do grow in this series (mostly Futaba) and the interactions are on point. I just wish we saw more of the diving aspect in action instead of being told about it. Animation: 8.5/10 Honestly breathtaking in some moments. For its time Aria had some of the best water animations in anime and in Amanchu it is so amazingly well done. The light reflections that beam off the water is impressive. The character models are drop dead gorgeous (as Digibro would say it's a new slice-of-life genre that focuses on super attractive women). The backdrops are so amazing they could be paintings on their own; just everything about the anime looks fantastic. I am however going to dock a couple of points for some scenes that did look lazy and simple. There were not a lot of them but some of the static dialogue scenes do look bad. Sound: 9/10 Just like with Aria the music for this show is simply amazing. It fits in with the very laid back tone of the story which is super important to get right in a slice-of-life show. The music that plays in the diving scene in the last episode is probably the best piece of music I have heard in an anime in the past 10 or so years. Voice Actors were top notch all the way through this season. Characters: 8/10 Again the chemistry is here; this cast provided a lot of great and fun scenes. Hikari in particular provided so many memorable moments that I will find hard to forget any time soon. It's just like I stated up above since the whole point of the show (diving) takes such a back seat I had a hard time enjoying this show like I did with Aria and you have to compare it to Aria due to the feeling of the show. This is a great cast; I just hope that in future seasons they mix in actual diving with character interactions. Overall: 7.3/10I snuck this point into the character section of the review but it has to be hammered home; you have to compare this show to Aria. They try to invoke the same feelings, use very similar music styles, background shots, and character quirks. Because of this I feel that Amanchu is watered down (no pun intended) when compared to Aria. It improves the visual presentation 10 fold but everything else is either on par or lacking. You should totally watch this show but watch Aria first. Enjoyment: 8.5/10 Thanks for reading my review! If you liked my writing style, would like to see some other reviews, or just want to talk, please stop by my page! Sincerely,Awesome Drummer