It's kinda hard to explain what I felt watching this show because, as I said, it's really weird (both in positive and negative ways).
First of all, I'm not an Idolm@ster fan, for long time I've not been interested in idols anime. Then I found out about "Idolm@ster Xenoglossia" and I was kinda intrigued. I mean, something like idols with big badass robots in an action anime? Who wouldn't be interested in? Also, I've never heard anyone talking about this series, and that made me even more curious. Lastly, Yuka Iguchi is the main protagonist's voice actress, so I just couldn't not check this one out.
What is an idol?
Actually, this show is not about idols, it's about iDOLs, which are battle mechas, not cute girls singing and dancing. Our protagonist, Amami Haruka, wanted to become a normal, regular idol. She is instead hired as mecha pilot by the Mondenkind agency, which is protecting earth using iDOLs.
What actually is an iDOL?
Now, this is a harder question. Yeah, at first sight they look like giant battle robots, but... iDOLs do have feelings (they can't talk tho). This is one of the most important thing in this series, because depending on their feelings they can stop working and even reject their own pilot. If you want to be their pilot, their Idolmaster, being skilled is not enough: you have to understand them, you have to give them love and respect.
Why is this show weird?
This show starts with a giant iDOL out of nowhere, named Imber, choosing his own pilot (that is our protagonist Amami Haruka). These two rapidly grow feelings toward each other... in a weird way, indeed. I don't know, maybe it's just me, but Haruka and Imber literally have a love story and it feels weird. Haruka totally starts to think about him like a boyfriend, to love everything about him. They have intimate moments definitely like a regular couple, with lot of sweetness.
Spoiler, click to viewclick to hide
Haruka literally shows herself in a swimsuit for the first time to Imber and not to her friends, talking about lovely dovey relationshipsSpoiler, click to viewclick to hide
Yeah, Imber takes pictures of Haruka and saves them in his memory. When Haruka finds out about this she actually blushes.Slow start and other issues
It's not just about this weird (but sweet) relationship, this show starts reeeeeally slow: episodes 1~16 are dull as hell. I understand, there are lot of things the viewer needs to know, so it just can't go on with our protagonists fighting villains, but this is really boring. In short, iDOLs have to destroy big rocks coming from outer space before they fall on the earth, so we're just watching lot of episodes about robots giving literally one punch to a rock and that's it, that's the "action" content. Even when we get to see some proper mecha fights it's just punching and kicking very slowly. Animations aren't great either, so it's not really satisfying to watch. There are lot of slice of life moment, mostly Haruka bonding with other characters but, even though characters do have proper stories and backgrounds, I found these episodes pretty boring.
First opening is totally fire tho, I won't lie it helped me a lot to continue watching this show.A sudden improvement
Episodes 17~26 are actually great, I liked them so much I couldn't believe myself. At this point I was thinking it would ended like some trash anime, I didn't have any hope about Xenoglossia getting better, but suddenly it actually got better, a lot better. There's a plot twist in episode 17 which I could never have predicted, everything changed and we even got some better animations. It's hard to explain without spoilers, but somehow those 16 episodes pay off. Our protagonists finally have to face harder difficults, stronger enemies and personal developments. That weird romance between Haruka and Imber got deeper, but surprisingly in a good way: they support each other, they fight until the end together, they both improve themselves. Before I could realize it Xenoglossia really got all of my attention, I was totally into this show and I was even worried about characters' lifes.
Xenoglossia's ending theme is the only thing I can't say absolutely anything bad about, I love itVerdict
I don't know what I expected, but boy for sure I wasn't expecting this. I mean, I was on the verge of dropping Xenoglossia, I continued expecting a trash series and it actually ended in a great way. I always give scores according to my personal feelings, but even though I loved the last part I just can't say it's a great show. If it had improved before I would say even a 85/100 or 90/100, but sadly this is what we had.
Do I recommend it? I'm not sure, if you really have lot of patience give it a try, but this is just an opinion of mine. Should you get bored and stop watching it I won't blame you, nobody would.
