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[wonzo]

Studio: Zexcs
Director: Hiroshi Nagahama (Mushi-shi, Detroit Metal City)
Background Art: Studio PABLO (Mawaru Penguindrum, Sengoku Collection)
Original Author: Shūzō Oshimi
Streaming: Crunchyroll (Mondays, 9:30 am PST)
Trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=agNACZm_J7U
Website: http://akunohana-anime.jp/

Plot Synopsis

Kasuga Takao is a boy who loves reading books, particularly Baudelaire's Les Fleurs du Mal. A girl at his school, Saeki Nanako, is his muse and his Venus, and he admires her from a distance. One day, he forgets his copy of Les Fleurs du Mal in the classroom and runs back alone to pick it up. In the classroom, he finds not only his book, but Saeki's gym uniform. On a mad impulse, he steals it.

Now everyone knows "some pervert" stole Saeki's uniform, and Kasuga is dying with shame and guilt. Furthermore, the weird, creepy, and friendless girl of the class, Nakamura, saw him take the uniform. Instead of revealing it was him, she recognizes his kindred deviant spirit and uses her knowledge to take control of his life. Will it be possible for Kasuga to get closer to Saeki, despite Nakamura's meddling and his dark secret? What exactly does Nakamura intend to do with him?

Manga

Buy the manga here. (Thanks pizzaroll)

Characters

Takao Kasuga (Shinichiroh Ueda)

Sawa Nakamura (Mariya Ise)

Nanako Saeki (Yōko Hikasa)

The Town

Words from the Author and Director:

In short (note that this is a quick & dirty summary):
- At first Nagahama (the director) refused the offer to direct the adaptation, because he thought that simply turning this manga into a pretty, clean-looking anime would be pointless. He says that he believes that when the mangaka draws this story he's seeing something "else" which he expresses as a manga. So there would be no point in simply presenting it in animated form, at that rate you might as well just read the manga and be done with it.
- He thought if it was to be adapted at all, it should be done as a live drama. When he was offered the job the second time, he pitched the idea of using rotoscope. He was aware that the result would be different from the manga.
- Oshimi (the mangaka) says Nagahama is right about the way he creates the manga: the original story is something that exists in his head, and he draws what he sees in his mind. So basically the anime and the manga are two different versions of the story that exists in Oshimi's head. By the way, he was also aware that due to the rotoscope the anime would look different from his work, and he thought it was an interesting idea.
- Oshimi also says that he thinks Nagahama has a very deep insight into the story, and firmly believes that he's taking it in the right direction. He also very much approves of Nagahama's wish of the anime leaving the viewers with a scar.
- Oshimi was pretty much "in" on the whole thing, they tested the rotoscope method on him.
- The interviewer asks about the impact the visuals would have on viewers, and Nagahama says he's well aware that a lot of people will go "what the fuck" and "this is gross," "I hate this, I'm not watching this." But he's pretty much okay with that, too, because he thinks it's fine as long as it leaves an impact on people. Viewers may dismiss it right away, but some may check it out later and find it interesting, or they may come across the manga, recognize the title, and read that.
- Oshimi says that he once got a fan letter from a high school girl who wrote that when she read the manga in middle school she thought it was stupid, but she tried to read it again when she was older and she found it very good. Nagahama says that this is what he's going for, to leave an impact, even if it's negative. He's trying to create something that one can't just ignore or dismiss.
- Oshimi also says that the anime has many scenes that he wishes he would've drawn the way they are in the anime, for example a scene with Kasuga and Nakamura in the classroom.
- Also, he confesses he's writing the manga with the intention of murdering the readers with it (metaphorically, of course), thinks the anime is doing the same, and relishes the idea of the viewers getting slaughtered, jokingly of course. (lol #1)

They leave the following messages to the fans:
- Oshimi: He guarantees that those who feel very strongly about Aku no hana will enjoy the anime. However, chara-moe types, those who go "Nakamura-san, unf unf" will probably feel betrayed. (lol #2)
- Nagahama: Since it's so different from the usual anime, he can't say that everyone will love it. But those who watch the first episode and think "I want to see more" will not have their expectations betrayed.

(Source)

First Impressions

Flower of Evil

This should be just a original anime so they wouldn't got negative response, its not like they give too much damn to the story with the super slow pacing because too busy showing off the retoscope with stickman animation,

The background and OST are awesome.

Aku No Sales Episode 01

Wow. So ignoring the "unique" visual choices, this was like what 18 or so uneventful pages of the first chapter of the manga stretched to fit the length of an entire episode. I can understand the artistic intent behind reusing certain scenes that invoke the feeling of a mundane, rudimentary lifestyle (and this first episode alone does it several times) but it's hard to take it seriously when it looks so lazily implemented. The background art looks gorgeous despite almost being ruined by having those unfortunate character designs juxtaposed against them. I like the music, however minimalistic it might be, and I legitimately like the ED song and how it leads into the credits.

Fleur de Mal AKA Flowers of Evil AKA Aku no Hana 1

This was worse than I could have possibly anticipated. There are pretty much only two good scenes in the entire episode, and they're both just montages of Studio Pablo backgrounds set to music. Even the backgrounds wear out their welcome when they just keep lazily reusing them over and over. The "acting" is horrifically abysmal, featuring monotone J-drama actors droning out their lines set to jerky, ugly rotoscoping which doesn't succeed in evoking any kind of mood or emotion except revulsion. It's impossible to feel empathy for the characters because they just look like bizarre blobs of color and they discuss trivial matters with all the excitement of a CSPAN commentator. Nothing even happens until 18 minutes into the show. I'd rather rewatch all of Sword Art Online than keep watching this. This feels like some kind of awful practical joke, in the final three minutes the show descends into some kind of awful art-house parody with the worst song I have ever heard in my entire life; but the real joke is that it's not a parody, it's deadly serious.

RIP Nagahama. RIP anime.

I didn't hate Aku no Hana.

Sorry!

I mean, I don't think it's very good, mind you. It's a really boring first episode where virtually nothing happens, and shooting it in a live action, "realistic drama" fashion robs it of the melodramatic impact that it's presumably supposed to have when Nakamura utters the "shit eater" line. We get little sense of what the point of the whole thing is at this stage.

The rotoscoping is pretty much what I was expecting, I guess - maybe that's why I don't despise it as much as everyone else seems to. Of course with the drop in frame rate (because that's how anime rolls, I guess) and the lack of detail to the drawings it's not particularly attractive, and of course the manga has the benefit of everyone looking relatively pretty and completely unlike the actual facial structures of Japanese adolescents, but it's not totally hideous.

Also I really liked the animation of the actual flower of evil, so... there's that.

As I say, don't get me wrong, I don't think it's great. But as usual, "not very good" on the Internet seems to equal "A CRIME AGAINST HUMANITY", and I don't think it deserves that level of hyperbole.

Aku no Hana 1
God, what a clusterfuck. I didn't want to hate on it for not being generic anime designs and it's an interesting idea, but it just looks cheap and crap, even in motion. The lack of basic details in most shots is terrible. It has video game like pop-in. The Last Express, an adventure game from 1997 did it better than this, in some areas.

It was also incredibly boring. The characters had nothing interesting to say. I guess perhaps it's supposed to be more "true to life" or whatever but they should be using this time to develop the characters. I didn't actually finish the episode though. Got further than duckroll but not by much. When other anime have boring characters they can rely on their visuals or fan service to keep an audience, but this...

Aku no Hana - 1

The good:
- I actually like the aesthetic of rotoscoped characters. It's like that Kanye West music video.
- The background art was sublime. I hope they keep it up throughout the show, and show much more of the town. The way the town looked dirty felt real. I feel like if I'd pick a random town in Japan I could expect to see things like they were presented in this show. Maybe.
- The pacing. I like too slow better than too fast. The scene where he walks to school was charming to me because in real life walking to school alone is indeed a slow process.

The bad:
- Too little music and whatever music there was, it wasn't dynamic enough. A show with this atmosphere needs fantastic music to accompany the scenes. Thoughtful little tunes to encadre the silent moments.
- Boring episode, but I'm willing to forgive it for being the first. The basic character set has been introduced.
[- Maybe it's me and my HS experience, but the characters feel very immature for their age. They're more like middle schoolers. Literature is dumb? I expect that from edgy 13-year olds.] EDIT: Complaint dismissed.
- Ugh I hate the ED. The OP was needlessly melodramatic, but the ED was downright annoying. Fuck.

I'm willing to go along on this series' trip. I wanna see where it leads.

Aku no Hana

I will say, if nothing else, the girls actually look like girls and not the paper-thin waifs we see in traditional anime design.

I didn't either, although I seem to be less ambivalent about it than even you are. Of course, I'm the asshole who thought "wow, this almost feels like it was directed in a real space" when I was watching the episode, only to learn about all this live action stuff when I decided to check the thread today, so maybe that's why I'm okay with how it looks and so forth.

Do I wish it was a jdrama instead of an anime? Maybe. The problem there is that jdrama production values just can't match anime production values, because they can't afford to spend 3-5 million on an episode like the grownups do, let alone spend the time to do all the post-pro to fix an episode after the fact. So maybe this is a decent compromise given the limitation of the Japanese industry.

I wonder if I'll be the only one watching this next week, but I know without a doubt that it's better than any anime I watched yesterday (and I watched all of them ).

ANH

I don't hate rotoscoping, I hate really shitty rotoscoping.

Aku no Hana 01

Specifically speaking about the art+animation honestly it didn't offend me. I kind of like the look of it. Reminds me of some old cartoons and animation. I don't like that half the time characters don't have a face but the animation itself is fluid and interesting due to the technique used. Compare it to most anime outside of sakuga scenes and its much more lively and interesting. But man they could have really done better work on those faces, or any work at all. Musically its minimalist/ambient which is OK. The whole episode gave off a really weird yet strangely familiar vibe somehow. Very interesting.

Aku no Hana - Episode 1

This time I made it through the entire thing. I guess I'll talk about what worked first, since the natural reaction to the show is negative. The direction is very good. It nails the atmosphere they want to go for, and really highlights the unpleasantness of daily life felt by the main character in a very subtle but yet effective way. When the visuals work, the show is very engaging even though nothing at all is happening.

Well, okay, there. Now I can talk about why I feel all the good is wasted - The production process is completely unsuccessful. While there are benefits to rotoscoping, especially for an industry with a lack of good character animators, the level they have taken it here is just too distracting. It is too difficult for me to just appreciate what works for the show when every moment something sticks out or draws attention to itself when it shouldn't. Scenes where characters have no faces, scenes where only the upper teeth are visible, awkward movements, etc. It's everywhere and it is very jarring.

Visuals aside, the disconnect between the acting and the dialogue also bothered me a lot. It really does come off as a cheap dub of a foreign film. The voices don't match the characters or the actions most of the time, and its completely bizarre that the scenes where talking characters have no faces feel more natural than the ones where they do, simply because of that disconnect. Truly awful.

I think the biggest problem here is that the experiment they embarked on is something too costly and complex for a TV anime. The production scale and budget of a late night TV anime not based on something popular and mainstream is not going to cope well with this process, and it shows. A pity because the direction is good and the director's heart is certainly in the right place, even if his common sense wasn't.

Oh and the lead character's voice actor is clearly the male Omigawa. Such a "unique" voice. Lol. I guess that's what we can expect from newcomers who have no experience in voice acting.

Aku no Hana 1:
I quit anime.

Aku no Hana 1

Why? Why would you do this? Why would anyone do this?

They turned a perfectly entertaining trainwreck of a manga into an ugly, boring mess of blobs and poor lip-syncing. The disappearing/reappearing facial features is also pretty jarring.

This isn't anime. This isn't even A Scanner Darkly. At least that was oddly alluring in its visual style. This is just a failed amalgam of the 3rd and 2nd dimension that if it existed in reality, I imagine would be purgatory.

Aku no Hana

Wow character designs that actually look asian for once!

aku no hana - 01

Yeah, rotoscoping sucks. I think there's a problem when the characters look best without motion, when the 'advantage' of rotoscoping is the translation of live movement into animation in a more . . . direct way. The characters just look unfinished at times; facial details popping in as they approach, the odd lack of detail at times during close-ups, etc. It's jittery and there's a sense of unease about the whole thing, which might be intentional, but this is anime so it's better to have low expectations. I wonder at the thought that went into going with this approach.

That said I do like how ugly everyone looks, when they're actually drawn fully. It's a nice (and purposeful, I suspect) shift from the appealing art of the manga, and the sheer revulsion of what's to come is going to be amplified with the 3D pig disgusting designs.

Despite that, though, I kinda liked it! Haters gonna hate. Wonderful background art that might suffer from too much recycling as we go. The repetitive, monotonous, bgm. And Nagahama as a director still has it. Some wonderful cuts, with the mirror--even if they reuse it twice in the same episode--being the most striking of them all with the framing of the amigos in their exit and their parting. The representation of his awakening as the seed trembling, reaching out, opening its eye. It's kind of depressing because there's a good show buried underneath the more than justified backlash.

Flowers of Evil 1

Man, the rotoscoping's really weird with how it's all so jittery and the way in which details pops in and out in a really inconsistent matter. I guess it's intentional given how unsettling it all is which is a perfect fit for the source material but I can see myself warming up to it. I will say the ugliness of everyone really adds to the overall tone of the show and I'm expecting great things from certain future events if they cover them and keep this kinda look up.

That aside, the background work in this is probably the best stuff Studio Pablo's worked on yet, it gives the town a great sense of decay with all the beaten up signs, warn-out buildings and the rust, oh the RUST. I do like the constant repetition of all the locations as it really helps give this that much needed sense longing for more and the destructive boredom of rural living. It's far more bearable than usual thanks to just how beautifully expressive they are.

The third thing that really stands out is the use of music as it's incredibly subdued and picks up to give this an incredibly disturbed and uneasy tone to just how mundane everything is, doubly so with the glimpses of the flower slowly blooming. I must say I'm definitely looking forward to the next episode.

Oh and the OP and ED are fucking brilliant. I can't wait to hear the other three openings and the transition in at end was perfect, completely dethroning JoJo EP2.

Aku no Hana 1

I could almost stand the rotoscoping, it was the terrible sound/voice acting/lip syncing that broke me. I don't think I can survive another episode. What a waste of that background art.

Flowers of Evil 1

Going by that interview someone posted some pages ago it seems like both the director and the original author fully intended this to be an incredibly pretentious piece of hipster garbage operating under the guise of being experimental and divisive and ART. Taking that into account I have no choice but to qualify this first episode as a resounding success.

And so, with my curiosity sated and my eyes damaged from the horrendously implemented animation techniques on display I shall now proceed to watch some JoJo in the hopes that it'll wash out some of the taste of all this shit I just ate.

By far the biggest crime here is that this is at least the second time now that Studio Pablo is featured in a show I would rather avoid like the plague. What a waste. Hopefully some kind soul will take it upon themselves to post some of the more impressive-looking backgrounds on display from time to time.

Aku no Hana - 01

Geez, I've seen better draw distance in GTA San Andreas... the PS2 version.

Unfortunately, the still background character derp face, the seemingly low framerate, and terrible lip synching, all distracted me far too much to pay attention to what's going on in the show to jog my memory of what I've read in the manga.

I'll applaud it for being different, even though i feel like throwing up now.

[Aku No Hana] - 1

You know, if you sit back from the screen and kind of squint it look okay.

Oh yeah, I forgot to mention that I thought this was really, really good. I guess this means I'm now a member of some camp that's diametrically opposed to some other people.

Aku no Hana 1

Hmm.

I'm glad that I got to read some other impressions before I watched it. If I walked into the show without being aware of what the rotoscoping would look like, it would have been really distracting. As it was, I was able to kind of get used to it by the end of that opening montage.

The production process can't help but define the whole production. It doesn't feel like they have the budget to do it justice, so they cut corners wherever they can. And some of their cost-cutting tricks are only more noticeable because of the rotoscoping. The rotoscoped animation looks jerky because of the limited framerate. The show makes the most of each of its (beautiful!) backgrounds with long, static takes, and those backgrounds occasionally get used multiple times. Faces get omitted, and background characters often aren't animated at all.

Despite all that, Aku no Hana still grabbed my attention. The naturalistic direction and realistically decrepit backgrounds convincingly portray the protagonist's boring life. It's not a world full of possibility and adventure. It's a place slowly sliding into decay, and he tries to use literature to imagine himself overcoming his mundane surroundings.

His obsession with foreign Western poetry and his insistence that it's too deep for his friends makes him far more realistically chuunibyou than anyone in Kyoani's show. I haven't read the manga, but between the protagonist's neurosis and Nakamura (who says "make a contract with me" in the episode preview), this is sort of like the anti-Chuu2.

No guarantees that the direction will hold up. I can remember a certain spring show from a year ago made by a relatively unremarkable studio that had fantastic direction and a convincing sense of decay and melancholy, which rapidly went to shit a few episodes in. But I'll keep watching until it starts letting me down.

Flowers of Evel Knievel 1 (of 13)

A show that shatters weeaboo dreams and presents Japan for what it is, a place with ugly run down buildings and ugly people. No wonder people like Mr. Mongo started crying over it. Rather refreshing really.

I suppose knowing what to expect visually meant it wasn't so jarring for me. Also I had no expectations of the show to begin with since my knowledge of the original material is zilch. I may actually give it two more episodes before making up my mind.

Aku no Hana - 1

I wasn't too sold on this at first, but then I read through the manga after watching and now I want to keep watching to see certain scenes in this style. The ED was awesome.

 

[Akahige]

(Mushi-shi, Detroit Metal City)

you had me at this

 

[Dedication Through Light]

Wow based on all those impressions I guess I need to check this out to see the story underneath these innovative visuals.

If Monday would get here already for Crunchyroll.

 

[Risette]

The manga is also being released in the US, so read it, shitworms.

 

[Tomat]

I liked the first episode more than I thought I would based on the reactions posted in the AnimeGAF OT. I don't deny that the character animations aren't great, and the characters themselves are pretty ugly because of how the rotoscoping was handled, and that the re-use of animations wasn't great. The background art is great though.

There's something about how mundane the whole thing is that I appreciate (perhaps the re-use of the "Going to school" scene was trying to portray this? I Know they cut costs with it, but maybe they had that in mind when they went ahead with reusing animations). The characters seem like they could be real people based on what they say and how they act/react, which is an oddity (not a bad thing) compared to a lot of the anime I have seen.

I can't say if I'll enjoy the entire series, and maybe the animation will start to bug me at some point, but I kind of like it so far.

Also worth noting is that Aku no Hana has the best guest appearance of the year so far:

He's look like Freddy Wong.

 

[cosmicblizzard]

Ahahahahahaahaha

 

[BlazingDarkness]

I really like the art there
I also loathe 90% of what is popular these days in anime, so it might work for me
Will check it out

 

[Reknoc]

Potentially ED of the season (pretty sure it's the only episode I've watched this season so far with an ED)

 

[Tomat]

I thought the ED was the worst part about the show, I had to turn it off. Why does everyone like it so much? Should I go back and listen to it again? It was like someone was pooping in my ears.

 

[Dresden]

Lovely, lovely bg art.

 

[Metrotab]

Someone should post some gifs, to get the real experience.

 

[LordCanti]

This thread needs the ominous music from episode 1 that built to nothing and left me feeling unsatisfied.

Lovely, lovely bg art.

The BG art was my favorite part of the episode.

 

[darkside31337]

crossposting my thoughts from the anime thread

Aku no Hana 01

Holy fucking shit, everybody should be watching this. The backgrounds are gorgeous, the direction is absolutely amazing across the board, the story was really interesting and the actual art and is honestly really cool. It adds a ton of atmosphere to the show. If this is the future of anime then sign me up. The rotoscoping really adds something to this show that traditional animation can't do.

The only gripe I have is that its hard to tell who is speaking at times. This is only relevant during the group shots with a lot of people but I can imagine this being a common occurence in the series since most of it (so far) takes place within school. Not animating mouths (or faces) for that matter means you really have to nail it home with either visual or audio cues and at times its hard to keep up with. I'd imagine its less of a problem as time goes on when I can associate a voice with a character.

But seriously this was great. Really great.

-----

some more thoughts:

the op is terrible, the ed is cool.

overall I haven't enjoyed an anime this much after 1 episode in a long, long time.

thanks wonzo for the rec

 

[wonzo]

Updated the Op with the Manga cover's and a link to buy it. (Thanks pizzaroll)

This thread needs the ominous music from episode 1 that built to nothing and left me feeling unsatisfied.

Oh it's definitely building to something.

thanks wonzo for the rec

I'm glad you enjoyed it!

 

[LordCanti]

Oh it's definitely building to something.

Oh I don't doubt it. I just meant that it didn't build to anything within the episode. I'm going to keep watching.

 

[Jenga]

you guys just gotta remember about those harsh anime OT reviews

they watch anime

can't be trusted

 

[wonzo]

Oh I don't doubt it. I just meant that it didn't build to anything within the episode.

True, though the

Spoiler

cut at the end is where everything begin.

 

[BlazingDarkness]

Just watched it.

Everything about it was unusual.

I fucking loved it.

I'm surprised at the negative reaction, I've never even heard of the manga but I can tell from the episode that much of what people are complaining about (the slow pacing, the repetition, the small injection of music, the off-kilter rotoscope art style) is all very much done in a way to create a specific atmosphere, and I think it does it exceptionally well. The only thing I could see an argument for is the voices/performances - but this is fucking anime, 95% of it is crap anyway. Maybe I'm just jaded, but this was more intriguing than anime I've seen for a while.

If it can stay away from anime tropes (the 'form a contract' thing worries me a bit) it might just be something really special.

 

[Jake.]

i haven't watched any anime in at least 7 years...but i kinda want to check this out (how can i?).

 

[trejo]

As I said, super pretentious hipster garbage disguised as experimental and divisive art.

I'm expecting a large amount of people are going to fucking love it.

 

[BlazingDarkness]

The episode has a Junji Ito vibe to me, which is really unusual considering this appears to be a drama and not a horror, but I like it.

 

[Tomat]

As I said, super pretentious hipster garbage disguised as experimental and divisive art.

I'm expecting a large amount of people are going to fucking love it.

Well if that's what you want to call it, you're entitled to that, but I didn't get that vibe from it really.

 

[Risette]

Just watched it.

Everything about it was unusual.

I fucking loved it.

I'm surprised at the negative reaction, I've never even heard of the manga but I can tell from the episode that much of what people are complaining about (the slow pacing, the repetition, the small injection of music, the off-kilter rotoscope art style) is all very much done in a way to create a specific atmosphere, and I think it does it exceptionally well. The only thing I could see an argument for is the voices/performances - but this is fucking anime, 95% of it is crap anyway. Maybe I'm just jaded, but this was more intriguing than anime I've seen for a while.

If it can stay away from anime tropes (the 'form a contract' thing worries me a bit) it might just be something really special.

Read the manga so you know it'll be something special. The anime and the manga are definitely two different things given how the director chose to go the route he did instead of simply making the manga animated, so I see no harm in indulging in the manga and watching the show as it airs.

 

[BlazingDarkness]

As I said, super pretentious hipster garbage disguised as experimental and divisive art.

I'm expecting a large amount of people are going to fucking love it.

Not really. And even if that were the case,

super pretentious hipster garbage disguised as experimental and divisive art > moeblob anime #56467574575745746747999

Truth!

 

[cosmicblizzard]

Not really. And even if that were the case,

super pretentious hipster garbage disguised as experimental and divisive art > moeblob anime #56467574575745746747999

Truth!

Moeblob makes up only a fraction of anime, even today. Have you really been keeping up with the medium?

 

[Tomat]

Read the manga so you know it'll be something special. The anime and the manga are definitely two different things given how the director chose to go the route he did instead of simply making the manga animated, so I see no harm in indulging in the manga and watching the show as it airs.

I was sorta wondering about this too. I read the first few chapters of the manga and noticed things didn't seem to match up all that well until late in the episode.

 

[cosmicblizzard]

i haven't watched any anime in at least 7 years...but i kinda want to check this out (how can i?).

It's in the OP.

I don't know if this is the first anime you should watch after 7 years, but hey, good luck.

 

[BlazingDarkness]

Moeblob makes up only a fraction of anime, even today. Have you really been keeping up with the medium?

Last anime I watched completely were Kids on the Slope and Tsuritama, they were awesome!

 

[cosmicblizzard]

Last anime I watched completely were Kids on the Slope and Tsuritama, they were awesome!

Well, guess I can't say you haven't been keeping up if you watched shows that recent.

Anyway, I'm still of the opinion that this would have been a lot better if it was closer to the manga's art style with a more over the top direction. I might be a bit biased though because I like the manga's art while I find this incredibly ugly.

 

[Branduil]

Fleur de Mal AKA Flowers of Evil AKA Aku no Hana 1

Why did you willingly participate in this farce, Studio Pablo?

This was worse than I could have possibly anticipated. There are pretty much only two good scenes in the entire episode, and they're both just montages of Studio Pablo backgrounds set to music. Even the backgrounds wear out their welcome when they just keep lazily reusing them over and over. The "acting" is horrifically abysmal, featuring monotone J-drama actors droning out their lines set to jerky, ugly rotoscoping which doesn't succeed in evoking any kind of mood or emotion except revulsion. It's impossible to feel empathy for the characters because they just look like bizarre blobs of color and they discuss trivial matters with all the excitement of a CSPAN commentator. Nothing even happens until 18 minutes into the show. I'd rather rewatch all of Sword Art Online than keep watching this. This feels like some kind of awful practical joke, in the final three minutes the show descends into some kind of awful art-house parody with the worst song I have ever heard in my entire life; but the real joke is that it's not a parody, it's deadly serious.

RIP Nagahama. RIP anime.

Am I cute uguu?

 

[Risette]

^your impressions are already in the OP breh

 

[trejo]

Last anime I watched completely were Kids on the Slope and Tsuritama, they were awesome!

They were pretty awesome indeed!

This, however, is a failed attempt at rotoscope animation and a waste of amazing background art. On the bright side, it made me curious to check out the manga at some point, at the very least.

 

[Risette]

They were pretty awesome indeed!

This, however, is a failed attempt at rotoscope animation and a waste of amazing background art. On the bright side, it made me curious to check out the manga at some point, at the very least.

Failed?

The interviewer asks about the impact the visuals would have on viewers, and Nagahama says he's well aware that a lot of people will go "what the fuck" and "this is gross," "I hate this, I'm not watching this." But he's pretty much okay with that, too, because he thinks it's fine as long as it leaves an impact on people. Viewers may dismiss it right away, but some may check it out later and find it interesting, or they may come across the manga, recognize the title, and read that.

Looks like they succeeded.

 

[BlazingDarkness]

They were pretty awesome indeed!

This, however, is a failed attempt at rotoscope animation and a waste of amazing background art. On the bright side, it made me curious to check out the manga at some point, at the very least.

I really don't think it failed at anything though, I sincerely think that it's designed in a way to create a specific atmosphere - so where people say 'it's ugly' I can't agree, sure it might suffer because of the budget or whatever, but artistically I think it's really on-point.
The whole episode has an odd vibe to it, the art direction is a part of that IMO.

 

[trejo]

Oh right, sorry.

This, however, is an extremely successful attempt at intentionally producing incredibly awful rotoscope animation because fuck all y'all this is ART!

 

[Jake.]

does it have terrible lip-synching (especially in the last 10mins), or is it just where i'm watching it?

 

[Risette]

Oh right, sorry.

This, however, is an extremely successful attempt at intentionally producing incredibly awful rotoscope animation because fuck all y'all this is ART!

No, you're checking out the manga. They succeeded.

 

[Tomat]

does it have terrible lip-synching (especially in the last 10mins), or is it just where i'm watching it?

Sometimes their lips sync up with one or two words out of an entire sentence, so I guess it is still technically lip syncing in a way. But yeah, it's done that way on purpose I guess.

 

[SDBurton]

Aku no Hana - 01

Will continue watching to see how it develops. Very interesting pilot episode, and the transition to the ED was both brilliant and creepy at the same time.

 

[LordCanti]

Sometimes their lips sync up with one or two words out of an entire sentence, so I guess it is still technically lip syncing in a way. But yeah, it's done that way on purpose I guess.

Sometimes it sounds like they dubbed the episode underwater with tin cans.

No, you're checking out the manga. They succeeded.

They got me too. I had to know which direction it was going, and I'm hopeful that it's going in a (this isn't a spoiler because I'm not that deep, but I'll mark it anyway)

Spoiler

super kinky sexual direction. Anything else would kind of be a waste. I'm not going to read any more of the manga, so here's hoping.

 

[BlazingDarkness]

Just bought the manga

 

[Necrovex]

This art style reminds me a lot of Lain. Which reminds me that I really need to start on my rewatch of Lain. I'll certainly give this show a watch when it hits CR on Monday. I cannot recall the last time I read so much polarizing reviews on a single show.

 

[Instro]

Zexcs should have been all you needed to know about this show.

 

[Branduil]

^your impressions are already in the OP breh

Wonzo told us in the anime thread to post our impressions, so I did.

"Awful rotoscoping" is redundant.

I disagree, it can be used well, like in Kids on the Slopes' concert scenes. But they had a defensible reason for using it there, and the framerate and detail level weren't awful like they are in this.

 

[trejo]

No, you're checking out the manga. They succeeded.

Guess so.

"Awful rotoscoping" is redundant.

Rotoscoping doesn't necessarily have to look awful.

 

[Bubble Metropolis]

Love the visuals. They remind me of Kuchuu Buranko (Trapeze in English, I think?) which has been the only recent anime I've watched and really enjoyed. I will definitely make sure to catch this.

 

[Tomat]

"Awful rotoscoping" is redundant.

I hope you at least watched A Scanner Darkly before saying that. I really liked that movie.

 

[XANDER CAGE]

The synopsis and summary made me really want to check this out, but then the impressions happened.

Now I have to check it out. I have to know.

 

[Apath]

That was 22 minutes of my life I will never get back.

 

[Branduil]

I've been known to be wrong before, often with aplomb, but usually when what people call rotoscoping looks decent it has been "massaged," or even just copied from afar, to the point where it isn't really what I would consider good ol' ugly line-traced rotoscoping anymore.

Well I agree you need to massage rotoscoping for it to be good, but I don't know that that means it's no longer rotoscoping. I guess my view is that if you can tell it was rotoscoped, it's rotoscoping, even if they've altered the details. And it generally is easy to tell since real movement looks very different from planned animation.