Review of Time of Eve

The creation and use of robots has been a debating subject for decades. Many ethical issues have emerged concerning whether these machines should dominate in the production line in factories, the health sector, engineering and so on. Many assume that they carry off the jobs of thousands of unemployed people, they cost a lot in electricity, maintenance and sources in general and cause accidents due to their automatic and inflexible settings. So, when the creation of artificial intelligence androids is brought up, the reactions vary from hesitation to upright denial. How can we pretend to be God and create human-like creatures? What if they try tomanipulate us or harm us? What will happen if we get attached to them and substitute relationships with real people?

Well, in this anime, the androids are programmed according to the three laws of robotics: robots will never hurt humans and obey them in the first place. But what about relationships between humans and robots and how to handle and behave to a robot? Is it inferior or better than you, given it is programmed to think and behave without complexes and spite?

Story : 8
A boy whose family possesses an android starts to get concerned about its behaviour and eventually finds out that it goes to a certain place on its own free will. This place is a cafe that imposes a rule to everyone who visits it: Humans and robots must be treated equally while they are there. Rikuo - the boy mentioned above and main character - accompanied by his friend Masaki, become frequenters and meet many people (or maybe androids?) and pry into their backrounds and reasons to be there.

Art : 7
Art was fine, I found the slow-motion parts to be quite original. The only thing that bugged me was the occasional CGI. Animation was fine too, it made the robots very convincing and distinguishable when they were in their "obedient" mode.

Sound : 7
Nothing special, the episodes didn't even have opening theme. But the voice acting and effects were ok.

Character : 8
That was the best part. Every character develops nicely, both humans and androids. That was the main purpose of this anime anyway: to show as the feelings of the humans towards robots and vice versa. Rikuo is prone to feel sympathy for the androids, although he can't accept that they can act on their own. He is very curious about them though and tries to fully understand them. Masaki seems to be very strict and keeps reminding Rikuo that he shouldn't empathize with them so much. I can't say more about them, because there will be spoilers.

Enjoyment: 8
A thought provoking anime with which I passed my time very pleasantly. I also recommend it to those who like futuristic themes.