Review of Frieren: Beyond Journey's End

I don't like anime, I haven't since I was a child. I've gone 30 years of my life avoiding it, occasionally watching the more popular stuff out of curiosity and regretting it very quickly. I few years back I stumbled into Critical Role and I really enjoyed watching their journey every week. When they created an animated version I was fairly let down since they decided to follow the same path as most anime tropes. Recently I stumbled into this show. I was immediately blown away by the sense of nostalgia it gave. I'm not talking about nostalgia for something I've personally experienced, but nostalgiaas a concept itself. It has a deep emotional depth to it that I've never seen in any other of the popular anime that I've come across. Not only that, the character development, the world building, the dialogue, even the action sequences and humor all really fulfilled me in a way I didn't see coming from an anime. It even reminded me in many ways of the early days of watching Critical Role without the immaturity.

I won't spoil anything but I'll say that this isn't a slow burn or slow but intentionally paced in a way that allows the emotional depth to really resonate with the watcher. It's so good and so different from anime I'd previously come across that I've spent the last 3 months binging literally every popular anime since I realized I probably hadn't given them a fair shot beyond the fan service/edginess that turns me off so much.

tldr; This show turned me into an anime watcher somehow.