Review of The Ancient Magus' Bride

Well.... where to start.... This was an anime I was quite interested in judging by the prologue OVA they released before the full anime. I'll rate the good, the bad and the meh: THE GOOD. The artstyle is high quality, it is easy to see that a lot of work has been put in creating memorable characters and settings without going overboard, as a lot of fantasy anime tend to do. The series emphasizes a lot on atmosphere and strives to make the viewer feel the wonder of a child seeing something beautiful for the first time. In that regard the art does not disappoint, nor does thesoundtrack. Staying quite loyal to a classic sound of a piano that can be distinguished in the majority of the tracks, it fits the "beautiful fantasy" aesthetic pretty well. The OPs and EDs are also quite appropriate for the themes of the anime, Lastly the story.... the IDEA of the story is not a bad one. There hasn't been a lot of fantasy anime in this fashion lately: heavily borrowing from folklore and mysticism instead of Levels, Hp gauges and XP grinding.

THE BAD.
Now i previously wrote that the idea of the story wasn't bad. However the feeling i had watching the series was of an anime that had a story that it had to tell and that sometimes characters and events were railroaded HARD to follow that story. something along the lines of:
-"I am going to kill you!"
-"I won't let it happen"
-"Oh, i guess you're not ok with that... as an apology i'm going to help you get from point a to b in the story, thing you could have never done without my help. i'm so awesome!"
Clearly that's not the impression you want your characters to convey to the viewer.
Another thing that wrecked my nerves quite a lot is the pacing of the anime. It is heavily episodic, with a lot of cliffhangers and 1-2 episode stories. My issue with this format is the nonexistant buildup to a beautiful or tearjerking scene, which leads it to being overdramatized or simply cringy in some cases. I'm sorry but i'm not going to cry for an X character that died and that i knew nothing about, no matter how many shining lights or crying people or sad songs you put in the scene. It's forced, it's rushed and it's comparable to a kid punching me, expecting me to fall over despite having no weight behind the blow. It will also not apper again in the whole series if not for a cameo in a random flashback in the last episode during the typical "I tried so hard, I've come so far," final boss time.
Lastly there is, in my opinion, an overuse of tropes and characters that have nothing different than a standard character, for example the innocent little anime girl, and the show never even tries to make them any different despite giving them an important role.

THE MEH.
Anything that is worth noting that's neither bad nor good:

There was a little bit of humor sprikled in for good measure and i admit it managed to get a chuckle out of me a few times, but it sometimes scales down actual problems of the series that are not dismissable with a simple chibi scene.
As said before it is very single-story based, not a continuous flow. some people like it, some do not. Personally i belong to the latter category.
The whole controversy about her being a slave of a pedo monster.... just no. It's never intended this way, his reasons are clear and she is a bride because they wanted to put romance in the tags of the anime. It's not a very well developed romance and sometimes has facepalming situations, but it doesn't get too much in my way.

FINAL THOUGHTS.
This show tries to tell a story of a girl suffering from serious depression that embarks on a journey through a fantasy adventure finding friends and purpose in life. While it is good to see an anime tackle such serious issues and bring out a positive message, it felt very fake and forced, simply because of the sheer amount of "plot adjustments" and rushed storylines it has. I did still enjoy it to an extent but it's sad seeing a series with such potential ending up mediocre.
Hopefully this helped
Cheers!