Review of Tsukigakirei

This anime is super cute. It's a realistic little story about a middle school romance, and although the plot is nothing revolutionary, it's very innocent and adorable and I really liked it. Like I said, the story is nothing revolutionary. It has basic development and conflict points as many other romance stories, but the way this one handles them is different. It stays true to the middle school setting and resolves problems the way that young and well-meaning children/pre-teens would, making it refreshing to watch. No typical drama here, folks! In addition to the main point of the story (the romance), this anime does agood job showing and integrating various aspects of middle school life and the interests of such a demographic, as well as the common problems this demographic shares. I missed my youth while watching this!

The characters also well reflect their age, in terms of their behaviour, speech, and interests. Not only this, but the characters are pretty well developed. Character development wasn't a huge part of the story, so they didn't dive deep into this aspect, but they did flesh them out quite well. One of the ways they did this was by showing the behaviours and scenes around them. For example (and this isn't a spoiler), the main character Azumi likes boxing. We're very obviously introduced to his love of literature, but boxing is an interest that comes more subtly. It is introduced to us from how his friends act around him (tackling him, for example), from how he mock-boxes with this thing on his lamp (you'll see if you watch the anime), and from the Muhammad Ali poster in his room. I found this method of introducing character to be super cool.

The only thing is, I wasn't a huge fan of was the art. The cut scenes were by-far the worst, with poor 3D animation done, but if you skip those parts it isn't that bad—just not my cup of tea.

So, in conclusion, it's a pretty sweet show. If you're craving something innocent and cute, this is definitely something you should check out.

PS—I LOVED THE ENDING. Very well executed.