Angel Beats!

After my friends and I got out of our Full Metal Alchemist and Fruits Basket obsessions, we needed a new anime show to watch. So while I was on Netflix searching the anime section, I came across a show called Angel Beats!. I turned it on, thinking it looked okay, and was immediately sucked in. The story had lovable characters and a good storyline and it was perfect. After watching the first three episodes, I noticed that there was only 13 episodes in the entire series! I thought, 'This sure isn't long enough to finish this story!' But continued to watch anyway. And after the 9th episode, the story almost completely changed and I was left confused. They got it back together in time for the final episode, but I still think that the story ended too quickly. It was a perfect ending though, if you're willing to stick through the entire episode. And don't forget your tissue box, it'll come in handy through the whole series! And I'm normally really tough and don't cry easy, but there were tears rushing down my face the entire last episode, especially the final sequence before the credits. I still think that I could have lasted longer, like Full Metal Alchemist or had a fuller and more clear storyline like Fruits Basket, but it was good in its own way.

Angel Beats is my favorite anime of all time. It has everything that makes a great story. I'd definitely recommend watching a subtitled version as opposed to the dubbed version, as the dub has all sorts of mistakes and the voices do get on your nerves.

Otonashi Yuzuru wakes up in the afterlife with no recollection of how he died. He can barely remember his own name. He meets Nakamura Yuri, the leader of the Afterlife Battlefront, a group of young people in the afterlife who are rebelling against God for giving them cruelly unfair lives. Their main target is "Angel," a girl who they believe is, as the name suggests, an angel created by God to watch over and enforce the rules of the afterlife (which takes the form of a huge boarding school). Abiding by the rules results in disappearing, supposedly due to being erased by Angel and/or God. Otonashi joins the Battlefront, and so the story begins.

Several flashbacks are placed throughout the series to give some of the characters' backstories. Each flashback is very emotional, very real, and, most importantly, human. You can relate to each character incredibly well, because they are presented as human beings, and this sucks you completely into the story.

The musical performances by the fictional band in the anime, Girls Dead Monster, are really exceptional. The animation is spot-on (they even go so far as to match the actual chords that are being played) and the songs are very catchy, even if you don't speak Japanese. They provide a very nice soundtrack to some scenes.

My only problem with this series is that it should've been twice as long. It was originally intended to be 26 episodes, but for some reason was cut down to only 13. They could have done so much more with another 13 episodes. However, the episodes that were made are still more than enough.

Angel Beats makes us ask ourselves, "What do you want to do with your life?" Everyone wants to die without any regrets. Angel Beats explores this theme with a story that is hilarious, emotional, action-packed, tearjerking, human, and, ultimately, beautiful. I've watched it several times, and it never gets old, because the themes are timeless and universal. I highly recommend this anime to anyone.

"Angel Beats" was at best an average show. The show had potential to be really great, but was severely flawed in character development.

The supporting cast was far too large and had too much presence throughout the series. This left little room for developing the three main characters (Yuzuru Otonashi, Yuri Nakamura, and Kanade Tachibana), and led to the inevitable let down at the end of the series where we see the emotional climax. It was difficult to feel emotional at this part because the series did a poor job making the viewer develop an emotional connection to the characters. With more time spent developing the main characters, this could have been much, much better.

For my concluding point, the main problem was that the series tried to accomplish too much in a short amount of time, and this caused each arc to feel very mediocre. Perhaps if the series was longer it wouldn't seem so rushed, but a good 13 episode series is absolutely doable. Take "Anohana" for example. There were two main characters (Jintan and Menma), and a small supporting cast, which left plenty of room for strong character development and made the ending so much better.

Overall a decent series. 6/10, would recommend.

Before I begin I must clarify something: I am not very familiar with anime. I've watched the entirety of Death Note, Angel Beats, and am in the middle of Sword Art Online. So I'm reviewing this show in terms of its quality, not how it compares or conforms to other anime.

Word of advice, ignore all the complaints about this show, because when there's so much about a show to hate and so much that shouldn't work, and people everywhere still love it anyways, there's definitely something special about it.

Here's a quick sypnosis. A guy wakes up on a school campus, which he soon discovers is something like a purgatory. He eventually joins a resistance formed by a dozen or so other fellow "students" with the goal of resisting the mysterious Angel. Things get even crazier from there.

Couple this mind-blowing concept with some unforgettable characters, crazy amounts of action, lots of Japanese rock music, crazy gore, buckets of blood, cute comedy, seriously depressing backstories, and the most detailed cartoon guns I've ever seen and you get something that's unforgettable. The ending is breathtaking, too.

Now here's what everyone complains about: the pacing is bad and it's too short. No thirteen episode show should be able to bounce back and forth continuously between these different styles and genres continuously like this one does. Yet it does. And it works. Because when you have so much awesomeness going around, you barely notice until you're done crying over the last episode... for the third time.

As for other complaints made about the series, most of those don't hold much water in my opinion. There's really nothing else working against the series besides its length.

So if you haven't watched much anime this is worth watching. If you're very familiar with anime and have a higher standard, I still recommend you give this a go. It's only thirteen episodes and I'm sure you'll find something you'll like.

Why won't I give the series a perfect ten. Simply because no matter how much the flaws never hindered my enjoyment, they still mean the show isn't perfect. That and the baseball episode which I really just didn't like cause it nearly turned me away from the series. It's probably not so bad now, but at the time there's was just something about it that I didn't like.

Last word of advice: the episodes incrementally get better, so don't worry if you're having second thoughts before the midpoint. Or on the baseball episode :)

I don't want to see a "SPOILERS BELOW" tag here so I'll just keep things from a general review.

The series hits all the beats it needs to make you love characters, to enjoy the ride they go through and to root for things. Its heart wrenching in places and it doesn't pull any punches.

And does all this while pretending to be a shounen battle military anime.

Amazing show and one of my favourites of the early 10's