Review of Saekano the Movie: Finale

tl;dr: A conclusion film that has some issues with it feeling like certain elements were skipped, but that does incredibly well once things settle and it really starts moving. *Note: This review has spoilers on the previous seasons and which heroine the protagonist ultimately ends up with.* This film, as should be pretty clear from its title, serves as the finale of the Saekano anime. It’s kind of weird how it relates to the original light novel series however. As far as I understand it, the first two seasons adapted the first seven volumes. This film adapts the last two volumes, volumes twelve and thirteen, and someevents in volume 11. As such there’s essentially a season’s worth of content that was skipped over. Surprisingly, while watching it really didn’t seem like there was anywhere near that much content skipped over. The film actually flows pretty well off of the second season which I suppose is a testament to how this is a really good adaptation regardless of the circumstances of what was required to be adapted.

Still, while it certainly as bad as could have been, it does feel like things were skipped over, glossed over, or just not built up as well as they should have been. The second season left off with Utaha and Eriri having left the circle after being recruited by the legendary creator Akane, and Tomoya and Megumi needing to find new staff members for Blessed Software’s second galge, a game with the same title and general story as this anime series itself. This film starts with them not only having already found these staff members, but them being integrated into the team and the game already deep into development. It was hinted pretty strongly at the end of the second season to that these members would be Iori and Izumi, so it’s not like this was surprising.

Still, skipping over the process of them joining feels like it’s leaving a lot untold. Tomoya and Iori had somewhat of a complicated relationship, and though that seems to be smoothed over in exchange there seems to be pretty strong tension between Iori and Megumi. Iori felt in this film like a character with depth, but it’s hard to get a read on him with just the information provided in the anime adaptation, which is kind of frustrating. With Izumi it’s less an issue of it feeling like there’s something missing, and more like a general feeling of there wasn’t enough surrounding her for it to even feel like something is missing. The same applies to Michiru. There’s a feeling in general that as they’re core members of Blessed Software that they should be fleshed out more or have stronger bonds with the other members, but it’s not quite there.

Still, in the end despite the circumstances being different the film is still laser focused on Tomoya, Megumi, Utaha, and Eriri as the previous two seasons were. Thus, while it feeling like content is missing is unfortunate, as it’s essentially skipped over completely and any possible connections to the core narrative are minimized to the point of being negligible, it largely doesn’t have much of an impact beyond how the fact that it’s missing feeling kind of weird at times, so the aforementioned issues aren’t that major of a problem.

The larger issue I had was with how I feel that relationship development between Tomoya and Megumi was also most likely skipped over. Their relationship at the beginning of the film felt a good deal advanced beyond where the second season left off, and thus it’s somewhat hard to follow the flow of their relationship at first. The relationship development between them, what causes it, and the effects it has on others, is the core of this film to the point that other aspects such as exploration of themes and topics related to being a creator are far weaker compared to previous seasons. As such, it being somewhat difficult to really get invested to the degree the narrative wants the viewer to be invested in their relationship from the outset is a pretty major issue.

Still, I feel like for the most part that Megumi would be the one Tomoya ends up with and the themes surrounding why she would be chosen instead of Utaha or Eriri were pretty obvious from the outset, so once things really got going at about half way through, I feel that the film had gotten me to where I needed to be in terms of investment. And from there the film is handled incredibly well, with very unique progression to the plot which ultimately builds up to a really strong confession scene that utilizes the unique aspects of Tomoya, Megumi, and their relationship really well, and thus hits a lot of really strong emotional notes.

I also liked how the film extended a good amount beyond that, and thus showed the two of them just continuing to live their lives while also in a relationship, while also showing the effect that them being in a relationship had on other characters, mainly Eriri and Utaha, though on that front I wish they did more with Utaha. I also appreciate how they went all in to deliver a final ending that feels like a fully complete perfect good ending that despite being well written is drenched in ridiculous amounts of sweetness and happiness to the point that it that may well be one of the most satisfying endings to a rom-com series I have ever seen. The contrast between that and the part before that, which was still somewhat painful despite it being incredibly obvious what the joke was going to be from the outset, I think also helped with that a great deal in hindsight though I was really iffy on it while actually watching that portion.

As for some general notes, overall this film I think had less comedic density than the anime series which shouldn’t be surprising as it was much more focused on faster paced story progression, though what was there was as solid as usual. As a side note, there’s been a bit of fourth wall breaking in previous seasons, but this film felt like it had quite a bit more which I think it was used pretty well. Also, I appreciated how Tomoya’s otaku merchandise continued to progress.

In terms of art and animation I felt that it was somewhat more improved in terms of quality, but it overall felt more restrained in terms of framing and such. The higher quality resulted in some certain key shots looking amazing, more amazing than any of the scenes in previous seasons, but overall I think the previous seasons were more pleasant visually. The soundtrack in terms of non-vocal tracks was only decent as with previous seasons, but there were A LOT of really good insert songs to the point that it feels like they essentially dominated the soundtrack, and resulted in the soundtrack overall being pretty excellent.