Epimondas

First impressions of this series after several episodes leave me wondering when does it come alive?  The lead character, Tsukasa, has more in common with a zombie or a empty shell lifeless robot than a human character with any sort of story, appeal, character, or emotions.  He is about the most boring, lifeless, dead weight character I have ever seen in any media so far.  I keep waiting for something to wake him up and make me, the viewer, take any sort of interest in him, but so far I am constantly disappointed.  It should not take this many episodes for a character to feel or project some sort of life and interest.  The story itself is pretty bland, lifeless, and boring.  No character seems to do much more than stand or sit around and chat about their problems with each other, the game, or the lifeless interloper, Tsukasa.  Treatises on this show talk about it having a mystery appeal but, if there is never a life line to pull you into the story, how can there be a mystery let alone a interest in it?  They drag on the whole, what is going on with Tsukasa, episode after episode with no character taking a serious effort to resolve it beyond whining and idle banter, and usually with each other and not Tsukasa.  Tsukasa himself seems to have no interest in life, the game, or anyone anywhere, so where is his appeal?  I get the whole "I wanna be alone thing", but this is dragging on too long and too slow to appeal to anyone who wants to stay awake.  However, it presents a problem, if he never takes an interest nor effort in anything then how can he ever hope to help himself or solve his problems?  I am not seeing anything yet to draw a viewer in nor to identify with him or understand him.  When he is alone, even, he never says or does much of anything so there is really little more but seeing his body walking around to even suggest he is really alive or a character at all.

Usually when people, even loners, have issues, you might hear their thoughts or them talking to themselves or seeking answers, not wandering around aimlessly like a hopelessly lost puppy with no personality or ability to speak more than a half a minute to any other life form.  They made his character so far, a bit too aloof and disinterested in anything or life itself.  Not only that, but the way he behaves and treats everyone else, especially those who try to help or befriend him comes off as rude, arrogant, bad behavior, negative appeal, and general jerk qualities.  So if anything, so far there is more to turn viewers away from him or taking an interest or identifying with him.  Now, I can be pretty aloof and isolated myself, but to be such a rude jackhole on top of that is pretty bad.  You are more likely to drive people to anger or hostile behavior and stand out more and in negative light with such a bad personality.  And this so called lead character has one of the worst, rudest, and dullest personalities I have ever seen in media.  I am having real trouble even rooting for him at this point let alone understanding, liking, or identifying with him in anyway.  Usually aloof loners do not like to make waves, it makes them stand out more and worse, in a negative light which in fact can draw more attention.  He plays the loner very poorly and makes loners in general look bad.  

So far also, all I hear in the show are the questions that he is disrupting the game, but no one, not even Tsukasa himself, seems to have any thoughts or concerns about what is keeping his so called real body alive after a month or more of being stuck mentally in a game world.  I do not consider this a spoiler statement since it is revealed what happened to him within like the first 5 minutes of the first episode.  We never really get an idea much about the game world itself, skills, quests, what drives people to play really, nor their real life selves, which kind of counters the whole concept given the main character is stuck.  Instead of aid, he gets accused of hacking the game or disrupting others.  He seems to have the arrogant belief that nothing he does matters.  Perhaps he gave up way to easily and early for any hope and takes it out on everyone else like the pathetic looser he is.  Not only is he not helping himself, solving his own issues, or actually putting effort into being alone, but he actually draws attention to himself by his negative bad behavior and actions.  In fact, it is more like, HE is the opposite and is really an attention seeking jerkwad bent on getting in everyone's face and ruining everyone else's existance as much as possible.  It is clear he is also very selfish and self centered.  It is a miracle anyone tries to help him or gives a crap about him at all.  So for a guy trying to be left alone, he sure sucks at it by doing everything he can to ensure he is never left alone and is even hated by all but the most guilable simpleton characters who still think he is a nice guy that needs help.

The fact also that the so called question if his own real life existance is dragged on so long without any hint of what is happening other than he is stuck in a game is also a big negative.  For a show that pretends, it is about drama and mystery, it is doing a pretty poor job.  Drama and mysteries rarely are so boring nor take so long to get things rolling.

PS.  If things change as I try my hardest to watch the show despite the intence boredom at least for a few more episodes, I will adjust the review, however, the issue remains that so far it is taking too many episodes to get things rolling.