Charlotte - Reviews

One of the Best Anime that I've watched I keep recommending this anime to my friends not only because of the superpower genre it is because of the great story, You gonna feel the emotion of the protagonist there's a comedy that not gonna make you bored there's a drama and action its complete package it's awesome! I Love it

Charlotte was one of the summer series with the most hype, mostly associated with the name Jun Maeda, writer of Angel Beats! I did not share the hype, not being a fan of Angel Beats myself. It had a lot of potential, but didn't manage to execute it in a way I found satisfying. Still, Jun Maeda also worked on Clannad, which I do love. So I was willing to give his new series a chance even though there didn't seem to be much to it, going in, except "adolescents with super powers".

Unfortunately, after 13 weeks of love and hate for Charlotte, it seems that "adolescents with super powers" was the most concrete idea that Maeda had for this series. It's the only thing that remains consistent through the show. If you asked someone at random "what is Charlotte about?" the answer would be very different depending on which episode they had most recently watched.

They might answer "It's a show about High School students in a special school for teens with superpowers who seek out new power users each week to bring into the safety of the school." Which is why a lot of people early on were comparing this show to X Men.

However, if they had just watched episodes 6 and 7 they might answer that the show is  about two very different teenage power users and how they react to the tragic loss of a sibling due to the sibling's awakened power.

And yet again, if you asked someone after watching episode 10 they could answer that the show is about a family of adolescent power users who suffer unspeakable tragedy and their efforts to remake the world into a place they can live in peace.

If you asked them after watching episode 12 they would be likely to develop an eyelid twitch and start ripping out their hair while screaming "I don't even know anymore! What does it all mean? Is there any meaning left in the world at all? Isn't everything just futility and death?"

And if you had asked me what I thought the series was about after watching the finale I would tell you that Charlotte is an exellent example of a writer who was flooded with ideas and couldn't choose between them so he decided to use them all. Charlotte, then, is about many things. It's about teenage power users interacting with each other in a typical high school setting and it is also about the dark side of having a power that is a danger to you and those around you without really giving you anything in return. It is about loss of loved ones due to that power and coping with that loss in very different ways, it is about a group of adolescents who shouldn't have to have the weight of their survival on their shoulders having to bear it anyway because they can't trust anyone else. It is about desperately trying to create a world that they can live in peacefully and failing miserably time and time again. It is about sacrificing your humanity for your survival and the survival of those you love. It is about all of those things, but it is also about none of those things because it tried to shove them all into only 13 episodes of content when it needed at least twice that.

The events of the story felt badly rushed and compressed. And every time the story took a new direction it felt like Maeda was yelling "Twist! Bet you didn't see that coming!" in our faces and then laughing maniacally. Well, that works once, maybe twice, but this show tried to do it about 5 times in 13 episodes. It just didn't work for me, mostly because I never had enough time to become emotionally invested in any of the dramatic events. Yuu's descent into despair lasted for less than an episode and so felt more like a sideshow than an important character development. Supporting characters from the opening episodes are shoved to the side as the story goes in different directions and new characters never really feel integrated into the story.

In the final episode Maeda returns the focus to Yuu, but gives him a world spanning problem to overcome. After watching Yuu take on this Herculean task through a series of montages and very short scenes, a brief life-threatening climax ending with a Deus ex Machina rescue and then a sickeningly sweet "happily ever after" scene I was finally left feeling numb to this series as a whole. And yet... I found myself thinking that if that one last episode had been the entire series, preferrably with 2 cours, it would have been awesome. Cut everything else and make it all backstory. Make this the story of one lone young man's mission to change the face of the world, to protect all adolescent power users in a way only he can, pushing himself beyond the limits of the human body, gaining power like a god but losing his humanity in return, clutching the one memento that can lead him back home... and not having him resuced as soon as his mission is over by a freaking Helicopter. Honestly that just ruined the whole thing. That plus the unnecessarily fairy tale-esque happy ending.

I'm going to give this series a generous 5/10 because it had some good ideas and some good characters, it just didn't know what to do with them.

For a video review, check out my Youtube channel. Link on my profile page.

Winner JV Anime Award 2015: Best Animation

Winner JV Anime Award 2015: Best Ending Song (Yake Ochinai Tsubasa)

WARNING: SPOILERS!

Positive

*As a first positive point I want to mention the animation in Charlotte. I was expecting some good animation from PA Works and boy did they deliver. Charlotte's animation was awesome: detailed, precise, very good implementation of 3D, coloring, light and darkness and so on. From the first moment that I saw it, it instantly reminded me of the animation I saw in Angel Beats!

One special thing I want to mention is the opening sequence, I found that that was an excellent opening sequence which actually carried meaning. Not like many opening sequences which just present the characters. Charlotte's opening sequence was different, it was put together very well and I enjoyed it every episode. 

*Next up is the music more specifically the intro and ending songs. The opening song "Bravely you", I liked it from the first time I heard it, combine that with the excellent opening sequence I just mentioned and that was a golden duo. 

But even better than the opening song was the ending song: "Yake Ochinai Tsubasa". I am in love with this song, this is what I search in a good ending song: simple, emotional and pure. The ending song gave and gives me chills when I listen to it, Anant-Garde Eyes's voice was amazing and she captures the emotions of the song perfectly. Yake Ochinai Tsubasa is one of the best ending songs I heard this year so definitely expect a nomination for this song at my 2015 JV Anime Awards.

But next to the opening and ending song there were also the songs by Ziend, the band from Charlotte. Amazing songs just as Girls Dead Monster had in Angel Beats! and I expected nothing less from Maeda. 

And a special mentioning for Kimi no Moji, the song that’s played at the last scene. Just chills, especially when you read the lyrics of the song. But yeah just chills that’s all there needs to be said about that song.

*Third positive point were the characters and I want to talk more specifically about the main female character Nao. I thought that she was an amazing female character because purely based on her looks, she was waifu material but that's the catch with her. She is not your typical waifu especially with her personality. Her kind of cocky and sometimes rude behavior contrasted her looks completely and that's what made her character very layered and interesting.

*Going further on the characters: I also have to tell something about the brother-sister relationship between Yuu and Ayumi. It might not have been the most original and layered brother-sister relationship but it was always very sweet to watch them especially since the way the anime develops. I'm not going to tell spoilers here, that's for further in this video.

*Then we have last two characters: Takajou and Yusa. They were the comical duo of this anime and in the first half of the anime I enjoyed the comedy that they delivered. Takajou's obsession for Yusa and than the way he was literally thrown around by Nao gave this anime a lighter touch. Now the comedy in the second half of the anime, that's something for the negative section. 

*Point number 6 was the romance that we get in the final episodes. It was again not a surprise to anyone I think that Nao and Yuu eventually became a couple but the thing that made this romance very good was the development in the last two episodes. This is also linked with Nao's special personality. Without going into spoilers, the way the romance was concluded in the final episode was very heartwarming and I found it to be the perfect end event for the anime. 

*Then we have the shitton of Angel Beats! references in Charlotte. There were a lot of them so I'm going to mention some of them. The first reference was also the most obvious one. In episode 7, we see Yuu watching the television at some point and guess what was playing on the tv. Yep, Angel Beats!

Second reference was the whole set-up of the group in Charlotte, there were a lot off similarities with the SSS from Angel Beats! Both are groups who try to save and protect people and they're both led by a strong female character: Nao in Charlotte and Yuri in Angel Beats!

Another reference I appreciated a lot was the blind singer Shane who appeared in episode 8. She was a clear reference to Iwasawa, the looks were the same, the backstory and overall I felt like Shane was a commemoration to Iwasawa who was one of my favorite characters from Angel Beats!

But the reference that completely blew me of my chair was the following one. First have a look at Ayumi (see my video for this). Ok now I'm going to show you a screenshot from episode 6 from Angel Beats! look closely. Do you see the girl sitting next to Kanade? That's Ayumi, I just went insane when I saw this reference appearing on the internet. And it is true, I checked it myself as you can see here on the picture. This was an amazing and emotional reference. That Maeda did this proves again what a mastermind he is when it comes to drama. 

*So the drama, holy shit. I will specify this part on episodes 6,7 and 8 because these were the most dramatical in my opinion. The ending of episode 6 where Ayumi dies. Holy fuck, it had been a long time since I felt that intensity of emotions. It had been since Clannad. Her death just hit me like a freight train, I honestly felt sick after watching that episode. It was just way to emotional which was to be expected of a Maeda anime. Maeda is a genius but sometimes he's an asshole genius like that time.

Episode 7 than where we see Yuu's depression. This was the best episode of the anime, hands down. The way Yuu's depression was portrayed was so good, so realistic and so recognizable. It was an amazingly good episode.

And in episode 8 we had the moment where Shane sings one of her songs "Fallin" acapella to heal Nao's brother. Goosebumps, just goosebumps during that scene that's alI I can say about it. 

Negative

*Now Charlotte also had its problems starting off with the comedy in the second half. The comedy that came from Takajou and Yusa was good but in the second half they kind of disappear from the anime and when they do make another appearance the comedy they did then was out of place and extremely mistimed.

*Next negative point was the pacing and especially the pacing in the last episode. That episode could have been and should have been an entire second season on its own. Yuu’s adventure could have been so interesting to follow and also his negative development would have been worked a lot more in detail so that we would have had a more intens bond with him. 

Another solution would have been that some of the first episodes were skipped because they are quite repetitive but I still enjoyed them because I always found some new elements hidden in the background that made the overall story move forward.

*I found that the way Ayumi returned in the anime was less to my liking. When she died I soon realized that here role wasn’t played yet and I thought that the second half of the anime would cover Yuu’s quest to find a way to get her back. But that issue get’s resolved pretty fast and in a very predictable way. So that could have been a really interesting storyline for the second half of the anime.

*And the last negative point were some of the plotholes in Charlotte and I want to specify one that bothered me. At the very end of the anime we see that Nao’s brother has become sane again, so how did that happen. Because the event where Shane sings to him doesn’t happen in this timeline anymore. After that event in episode 8 Yuu time travels back to the past before that event. So he actually never meets Shane and Shane never healed Nao’s brother. That was to me the biggest and most annoying plothole.

Conclusion

So as a conclusion, Charlotte wasn’t Maeda’s best anime. It didn’t reach the level of an Angel Beats! or a Clannad. But it was still an anime that I looked forward to every single week. And that’s why I’m going to rate Charlotte at 4 stars. It would have been exponentially better if it had had 24 episodes in stead of the 13 it had now.

It was a great anime. I loved it so much!! 

It is quite rare for me to write a review but I think this anime is worth it CONTAINS SPOILERS

 

Charlotte starts off slow with fact that the mc has power and with his friends who also have powers look for other [people like them to make them join their high school for people, with abilities and so and so but then deep things like the fact his sister dies. The mc goes into a lot of depression that makes him go crazy and start to do very bad things which does not really happen in supernatural highschool anime because the mc had some type of power which can bring people back to life or something.

 

Then he then realises that some of his memories have been erased and the fact he has an older brother and the fact they were test subjects and the fact that the brother tried to save them by time travelling a lot of time but lost his sight in the process. and the mc ability is to actually be able to take others people ability and use them for himself. His older brother makes him travel back in time to save his sister take her ability explain everything to his brother in the past. Some stuff happens the girl he likes gets kidnapped (she is also a very important character). along with the person who can tell who has abilities or not he dies because the mc had gotten really mad so he accidentally used a very dangerous ability with killed the person who can tell who has abilities or not. The mc older brother goes into depression too and starts to be like him when he was depressed.

 

The girl/love interest tells the mc that there is a way to save all people with powers that is to go round the entire world and steal all their powers.They make a promise to become lovers once he comes back. The mc does that but because all the powers he starts going mad begin on able to sleep he starts losing it. He starts forgetting everything. The only thing that kept him going is this present that the girl gave him even though he does not remember her. In the end, he becomes known as the reaper. When he finally takes all the powers of everyone in the world he has completely forgotten everything and collapse because of all the powers he has his friends and brother come to save him and he wakes up with the girl he loves sitting on a chair in the hospital she starts to cry because he does bit remember to tell him about the promise they mad but he still could not remember. But, they still lived happily ever after with his friends beside him to help him move forward. and because he had past the time period which is till u graduate from high school he losses all his powers THE END *sigh* that took a lot out of me my fingers hurt. It is not happy neither sad not ur cliche "I somehow remember everything by looking at u or something" it is refreshing to see something new