Review of A Lull in the Sea

Nagi no Asu kara has many of the tropes present in adolescent romance anime, but it is a shining example of why these tropes exist in the first place. If you were to go down a checklist of tropes, Nagi no Asu kara checks most of the boxes. Standard moe, shounen, and straightman characters? Check. Fantasy or supernatural powers and/or setting? Check. Romantic love triangle, or more? Check. And yet, not once did I ever feel that any of the characters of situations felt like common tropes. The world, characters, and personalities all felt very fleshed out and well developed. The characters wereactual characters, not soulless cardboard, plain and simple.

The story moves at a fairly quick pace in the beginning, but only if you pay attention to the timestamps. While watching the show, the pacing was excellent, and I never felt as though the story was progressing too quickly or slowly until the very last episode. The latter half of the show does slow the pacing down a bit, but it works very well for character progression, which is by far and away to main focus of Nagi no Asu kara.

The production values are quite solid, with great art and good sound. The voice acting is fantastic. I did not watch Nagi no Asu kara with English dub, but I can't imagine any dub comparing to the Japanese voice acting. As for the music, it was decent and fit the tone of the show very well, but the soundtrack isn't really anything special. The OPs and EDs are nothing to write home about, though I did quite enjoy the first ED.

All in all, Nagi no Asu kara is a fantastic watch for anyone looking for an emotional story. The world that is presented is beautiful, but the characters and the relationships between them are what make Nagi no Asu kara truly shine.