Review of Bakemonogatari

Story First and foremost I do not speak or understand Japanese, so a lot of the dialogue went right over my head. For the most part, I did not try to understand each and every small aspect of the on screen notes. I do understand the general gist of the story however, there are several girls that need help in their daily lives and it is up to the protagonist to help them with theri troubles. Each one of these mini arcs has its own opening title. Some are better rounded than others. In the more boring ones, I found myself falling asleep. I do notconsider this series to be something that is easy to get into at all. I feel it is one of the more experimental anime I ever watched in the same lane as Serial Experiments Lain. What I understood was a rather average story similar to Clannad, but done better and with more entertaining characters.

Art

Definitely one of the high points of the series. Slick animation and beautiful art style. You can tell the production values are quite high. The frequent power point presentation on screen blurbs happen more frequently than not.

Sound

Ending theme is quite good, Openings can be hit or miss. Backround music is quite good as well.

Character

Probably not a strong point of this series. I found the main male lead to be rather bland and the girls that round up the supporting cast are okay abeit only slightly above average. They do not really have super discernable personalities and I had trouble remembering their names. There is not a huge cast, the series seems to have no cast other than than main character, the girls he helps and his advisor. Where did everyone else go?

Enjoyment

Before i started this series, I heard all about the acclaim. There is no English dub, I do not think the series translates well to other languages. Found the series to be too experimental and lacking in mainstream appeal. The tone of the series is all over the place as well. Of all the animes I ever watched, I felt this and Serial Experiments Lain were by far the strangest. The odd aspect of the series did not contribute too much to my overall enjoyment. The dialouge went right over my head and I will say near the end, I stopped caring and tried to finish the show. I will most likely not try to rewatch the series to make sense oif everything, I was not throughly entertained

Overall

I think this is a strange experimental anime that does not translate well into English. The production values are excellent, but the story and characters or least what I can make sense of was not overly compelling. Hard to recommend this series unless you want something really offbeat.