Review of Tsukigakirei

Spoilers ahead. Interesting premise, interesting characters, a serious plot about teenagers having to overcome certain difficulties in life to succeed in whatever they want to succeed in. All in all, it’s a very interesting anime. It’s one of those slow paced anime titles where they go into intricate details about characters and show things instead of dumping exposition in the viewer’s face. An amazing experience to say the least or so I thought. Most of anime titles nowadays are often bloated with needless fan-service, redundant storylines and overall boilerplate characters which you’ve seen a dozen of times in other titles. Tsuki ga Kirei stands outas an anime. It stands out because of the uniqueness it introduces and because you actually get to see things as they unfold. The premise is quite simple. The story is about middle school romance and social ineptitude. Boy meets girl, girl meets boy and they fall in love. There is, however, a twist to this and it’s that the boy and the girl are both socially inept meaning they have it difficult with other people.

The message of Tsuki ga Kirei is unique, as I’ve encountered very few anime titles which actually have a message to its viewers. You have to read behind the lines to understand the story and to get the message. The message is something along the lines of “don’t give up your dreams and hopes for you have only begun your path”. Let me elaborate on this more because it’s an interesting message. It is an interesting message because of the premise. When you’re in middle school, you’re around 14-15 years old. Your life hasn’t even begun and nor are you close on reaching anything in life. You’re far from the truth and the harsh world. Adults know this and know what’s to come for you but you don’t. Your parents often set pressure on you, because they know that you’re capable of reaching anything in life; and the rest of the world also sets pressure on you, or so you think. You have to decide what you’re going to do in life when you’re only 14-15 years of age, in some cultures at least. This is a very difficult decision to make, as you’ve not experienced enough and haven’t done anything but studying and learning new things. This is exactly the case of Tsuki ga Kirei.

The main character Azumi Kotarou loves literature and aspires to become a writer in the future. He’s still a beginner in writing though and has a lot to learn. He doesn’t give up and continues to follow his dream despite being letdown by others. He’s an interesting character and we get to know him more by his actions, rather than what’s told to us about him. He’s incredibly shy and doesn’t really know how to talk with girls. He likes Mizuno Akane who goes to the same class as him and manages to overcome his shyness to confess his feelings for her. This leads to him having a weird relationship with Akane. Both of these characters are socially inept and are really shy.

Mizuno Akane is the love interest of Kotarou. She’s a sprinter and loves running more than anything else. She’s incredibly shy as well and has a hard time of telling what’s on her mind to other people. It later becomes a problem for her and she tries her best to deal with difficult situations.
There’s unfortunately not much to say about Akane, she likes sprinting and is extremely shy but tries to battle it in different ways. It isn’t really elaborated as to why Akane is Kotarou’s primary love interest and the one he wants to date.

What makes these characters interesting? They become interesting because we actually get to know them, we see how they interact with each other. We see how difficult it is between them to have their relationship as it’s not really an official one, or rather none of the parts have made it public to others. This is what is interesting about their relationship. This particular aspect raises a lot of questions, questions like why didn’t they openly admit to everyone about their relationship, what is the reasoning, and so on and so forth. I think that most of it succumbs to their shyness. They both seem to have a lot of problems in communicating with others and openly talking about their feelings. This sort of peculiar relationship is what makes this anime stand out even more and makes it unique.

I cannot say that this is a masterpiece of any kind however. Stories like these have been told since the day of dawn, some bad and some better. The problem I have with this sort of story is the fact how over serious these characters are portrayed as. They behave and act like adults despite being in middle school and being 14 to 15 years of age. They have complex relationships which any sort of teenager wouldn’t be able to understand fully. The main problem I have is how the show is subverting expectations. They introduce these characters as basically adults in a middle school setting however when something goes wrong or not in their favor, they start acting like children. These characters fail to live up to the expectations.

Kotarou is surely an interesting character but he’s also very lackluster. He aspires to be a writer and is shy. That’s his entire character summed up in one sentence. He doesn’t have any sort of charisma or anything particularly unique about him, yet he somehow manages to spark interest of several girls at the same time. He isn’t a very well established protagonist either because you cannot distinguish him from a random character in the very same show. He likes literature and often quotes famous Japanese poets which honestly comes off as pretentious.
The rest of the cast and other characters are unfortunately not so prevalent in the show. Side characters barely get any screen time and when they do, it’s only for a scene or two in the episode. I would honestly expect more development on the side characters, because they are equally important if not more given the premise.

This whole premise and the seriousness of characters would be more suitable in a high school setting where characters are finally finishing high school and have to be prepared either for the real life and what’s about to come or university. This high school setting could also potentially introduce other problems that some people experience, as in moving out from your house to study, student loans and debts, saying good bye to your friends which you’ll probably never meet again or ever have the same relationship with again. That premise is grounded in realism. That’s what Tsuki ga Kirei tries to establish itself but falls short almost immediately due to the entire premise not making much sense from the very start. In my opinion, this story would have been told a lot better if it were in a high school setting.

Another thing that is sort of not relatable in this show is the overemphasis on high school and how much of an important role high school takes in one’s life. I will have to agree to disagree. High school is definitely a shifting point of your life, you become more mature and more prepared for the real life so to speak. What I can’t understand is how they set high school as this unachievable goal which you have to strive and give everything up to make it. When in middle school it’s important to make the right decisions, the decisions you make, make you who you are. This show tries to be grounded in realism but simply can’t due to the set premise.

The best way to describe the story of the show is to divide it into two parts. The first part of the show establishes the characters and builds up relationships between said characters. It is where Kotarou decides he likes Akane and wants to date her. Akane likes Kotarou. They eventually end up together but have difficulties communicating with each other. Their shyness problem creates a lot of issues and ends up burning bridges between certain characters. Many of the mishaps could have been avoided by simply telling your close friends what’s on your mind. It is not that difficult and you don’t end up in a weird situation with your close friends, they are your friends after all. Communication is key in many situations but two socially inept people do not seem to understand that.

Most of the conflicts essentially boil down miscommunication and misunderstandings. There isn’t anything advanced and this goes on for the first half of the show which is quite disappointing because there was much more potential in the show.

The second part of the show is where Kotarou and Akane finally start dating and getting closer to each other. Many quintessential parts of their relationship are skipped. In one episode they can’t even talk to each other and in the next it feels like they’ve been dating for more than ten years. This sort of inconsistency and no development feels lazy and could have been done a lot better.
Because this is an anime about middle-school romance, there will be drama. That was exactly what I was looking for in Tsuki ga Kirei but I understood that I was wrong. There was barely any drama in the show and when there was, it amounted to nothing. It honestly felt pointless to even have it in the show, because nothing was changed and no lesson was learnt. The characters are exactly as they were before the incident happened as they are after the incident. This doesn’t leave any room for character development or growth which is exactly what you’d want to see in a show about making decisions that have impact on one’s life. You want to see how characters constantly grow, develop and learn from their previous mistakes.

This show lacks comedy which is a shame. There is absolutely no comedy, jokes or anything remotely humorous happening in 12 episodes. It is truly a shame because comedy could have made the viewer feel a bit more relieved and at least have a laugh. The over serious tone this anime sets doesn’t feel genuine, it feels forced and unnatural many times.
The pacing is too slow and the show quickly becomes boring and unwatchable at times. I started skipping certain parts of episodes because of how slow the show was but managed to still fully understand the story. It’s because there is very little substance to the plot and most of things happening are very predictable.

The production value of this show is another hot topic as I’d like to point out that the animation isn’t perfect. The usage of CG in this show is utterly horrendous and made want to drop the show on several occasions. They’ve used CG to populate certain scenes with people and make them feel more realistic, which is quite a shame to be honest. Not all places have to be crowded and with the given budget, they should have probably not wasted any time or effort on doing what they did. The animation is decent when there isn’t more than 2 or 3 people in the scene. The sprinting animation was splendid though and I have no complaints about that. I wouldn’t say it’s unwatchable due to the animation or anything like that, you just have to get used to the really weird art-style and budget of this show. I only got used to it after 3 or so episodes.

The music wasn’t anything special. Nothing memorable. It was as generic as it could get.

I didn’t really enjoy the show. It was lackluster, it was boring and it was honestly a waste of time. Watching 12 episodes of this felt like spending 10 years of my life in agonizing pain. I really do appreciate the message but ultimately it amounted to nothing. As everything else to be frank. Characters didn’t grow. The story wasn’t there. The animation was most of the times utterly horrendous due to the usage of CG. The art-style was an insult. It felt like they used the same template for Akane as they did for Kotarou. They look absolutely identical, except for the minor changes to the body parts and hairstyle. I feel like this show lacked proper execution and some clear direction. These two things are unfortunately difficult to achieve, especially when your show has a low budget. What could have been an interesting premise turned into complete and utter dog shit.

To wrap it all up, if you have a lot of time on your hands and want to watch a show that ultimately amounts to nothing with a magical happy ending, watch Tsuki ga Kirei. This show isn’t for everybody. It isn’t completely terrible and isn’t amazing by any means. I’d say this show falls under the “watchable” category. Watchable as in, it is possible to watch but you wouldn’t feel satisfied. Similar stories in other titles have been told a lot better. You have to be a masochist to watch this show from start to end.