Review of Bakemonogatari

Monogatari is one of those series that people often praise as a deconstruction of its genre. Well, that's what it may look like to some, but when I watched and analyzed Bakemonogatari, I realized that it doesn't have anything that sets it apart from any other series of its genre beyond superficial elements. Since I have very few things to say about it and I want to make this review as short as possible, I'll just name the two biggest flaws I found in Bakemonogatari right away. 1. Uninteresting story. It has no main objective, no main conflict, no message, and no overall plot. The entire seasonfeels like nothing has happened since most of the time is wasted on fanservice and pointless conversations. In other words, it lacks content.

2. Terrible characters. To begin with, the main character does not have a personality or a goal to make him interesting (as you would expect from a generic harem lead). If that alone weren't enough to make the entire show a waste of time, there's also the fact that all the girls are harem archetypes with nothing particularly interesting about them. Their backstories are basic as hell and their interactions are simply boring (especially those pointless conversations that have nothing to do with the nonexistent plot). Not to mention that the girls are also used in many fanservice scenes (and no, just because those scenes have visual symbolism doesn't mean that they aren't just fanservice scenes).

In conclusion, if you're just looking for interesting visuals, cute girls and pointless conversations, you may like this show, but if you're like me and you care more about the story and characters than anything else, you should stay away from it.