This review contains mild spoilers for Takt op.Destiny I'm surprised by how big takt op.Destiny ended up being. It didn't fly under the radar like I assumed it would when I added it to my "Planning" list this Summer — the fourth most popular anime of the season is nothing to sneeze at. I guess I really didn't stop to consider the draw of the studios attached — MAPPA and Madhouse.

Whether you think MAPPA is shit or think it is the shit, it's hard to deny that it’s the Next Big Thing when it comes to anime studios. And what better partner for the Next Best Thing than an Old King? Nowadays, Madhouse's claims to fame are largely Overlord and One Punch Man, but during the day, they were a prolific force to be reckoned with. They were known for both artistic and commercial success. This was the Studio of the great, late Satoshi Kon. This was the studio of Death Note, the studio of The Tatami Galaxy, the studio of Legend of the Galactic Heroes, of Monster, of Hunter x Huner, Metropolis, Trigun, the list goes on and on. I'm not usually one to gush over studios, but after a cursory glance at their filmography, I can't help but show respect towards Madhouse. If that didn't pique your interest enough, MAPPA was founded by Madhouse co-founder, Masao Maruyama. I'm willing to bet that, for a lot of people, the behind-the-scenes narrative was a better hook than the anime itself, especially since there's reason for many to be wary of the anime. takt op.Destiny is part of the {tákt: op.} mixed-media franchise, with a gacha game, takt op.Destiny in the City of Crimson Melody coming out sometime this year. Multi-media projects always make me scratch my head. It's an exercise in extreme presumption — counting all of your chickens in one basket before they've hatched. Before audiences so much as spend a second with your work, you're assuming they'll love it enough to engage with it across multiple mediums. Raise your hand if you remember Hamatora. Still, with a duo this dynamic, viewers were willing to give it a shot. What would it be, would MADPA be the dream team or would they be partners in crime?

If reviews on Anilist are any indication, it would seem to be the latter. 2.9/10, 2/10, 5.2/10 5/10, .5/10. That's a yikes. On the other hand, we have an 8.5/10 and a reviewer I respect had it in their honorable mentions for their Top Five Anime of the Year List. I fall somewhere in the middle. I'm not one for hyperbole and with that in mind, takt op. Destiny is nowhere near the worst anime I've ever seen. For an anime to be lower than a five for me, it practically has to try to piss me off, and as harsh as it sounds, I don't think takt op.Destiny tries to do much of anything. Or, at the very least, it doesn't succeed at much of anything. I'm easy to please, yet takt op.Destiny generally failed to do so much as that that. The sum of takt op.Destiny's parts is an average whole.

First, I should address the elephant in the room — the that the anime is tied to a gacha game. The second review really has an axe to grind with the fact that takt op.Destiny was made to promote the game, saying that, "everything gacha touches turns into sludge." And I can't help but find that a bit unfair. Yes, takt op.Destiny is a glorified advertisement. Yes, gacha games are predatory and should be criticized. But takt op.Destiny's issues feel independent of the property it’s meant to promote. It doesn't fall into the traps I'd expect of a gacha advertisement and, in fact, it manages to be a quite tasteful teaser. Funnily enough, Warlords of Sigrdrifa feels more like a gacha game advertisement than this, even though it doesn't actually have a game attached to it. The review in question said that takt op.Destiny was "all [...] cute girls but nothing else," when that's not very true. Sigrdrifa has more cute anime girls with shallow personalities than you can shake a stick at while takt op.Destiny shows more restraint. In terms of Musicarts, the anime introduces Destiny, Titan, Heaven, Hell (both of whom combine into Orpheus), and Valkyrie. As far as I can tell, only Destiny and Valkyrie will be in the game. Assuming the Musicarts are the gacha elements, then the anime could have stood to shoehorn in a lot more of them. While Valkyrie may essentially be in the anime just to advertise her presence in the game, the rest of the Musicarts feel like they actually belong in the plot. Plus, the ending sets up an intriguing hook for the game. I think takt.op Destiny serves as a decent-enough hook for the mobile game and I actually might check out the game if it comes out in English.

All this isn't to say that the anime is particularly good, it's just that its status as an advertisement isn't the reason why it’s whelming.

The world of takt op.Destiny is infested with violent creatures known as ~~D12~~ D2 that are drawn to the sound of melodies, leading to music becoming taboo. The only things that can repel D2s are Conductors who form pacts with Musicarts, women of supreme power and agility. takt.op Destiny follows Takt, Destiny, and Anna. Takt is the aloof son of the great, late (literal) conductor, Kenji Asahina, and aspires to be a renowned musician like his father. Takt is friends with sisters Cosette and Anna Schneider. Cosette is bubbly while Takt is cagey and she finally speaks his language when trying to get him to come out of his shell by asking him to play the piano with her at a fair. Their cute, twenty-finger piano performance is cut horrifically short when D2s attack and kill Cosette. Not long after, a Musicart with Cosette's appearance named "Destiny" shows up and with Takt serving as her Conductor, they make short work of the D2. But where one problem was solved, another shows up in its place. While Destiny looks like Cosette, with her robotic, taciturn personality, she certainly doesn't act like her. In hopes to find out if they can get the Cosette they knew back, Takt and Anna decide to travel to New York to reach the Symphonica — the organization that Conductors and Musicarts answer to — in hopes that they can "fix" Destiny. Along the way there, the trio grows closer.

I'm aware that comparison is the thief of joy, but takt op.Destiny is in a niche genre, so comparison is inevitable. takt op.Destiny finds itself in the "Beat Battle" or "Rhythm Warrior" or "Song Striker" (if you have a cooler name, let me know) genre — an anime in which battles are waged with the power of music. As far as I can tell, Macross 7 largely started the genre while Symphogear is the most notable example in the 2010s. Whether you love or loathe the genre, you have to admit that defeating the forces of evil with music is a bit silly. Thus, these shows live or die by how much fun you have watching them. Yes, Macross 7 is ridiculous, but it's so much fun that I can't dislike it for even a moment. 8 times out of 10, Symphogear takes itself more seriously than 7 and as a result, I like it a bit less. Still, Symphogear has a lot of heart and it does still have fun with its concept, so it's a hard show to hate.

takt op.Destiny has even less fun in its execution, making for a hard show to love. It ends up being a much more somber show than you might expect. The odd thing is that I'm not sure takt Op.Destiny even realizes it's not fun. It's ostensibly a "Song Striker" show, but music doesn't really doesn't play as much of a part in battles. The music is largely understated even though it should be one of the main draws of the show. While yes, for someone like me, it's hard to muster as much excitement for classical arrangments as I would THE POWER OF ROCK or J-pop songs, it just doesn't feel like takt tries enough. Beyond that, it certainly has good animation, the fights can certainly be flashy, but I don't know, it's just not...daring? Like yeah, it does looks like the guys at MADPA know what they're doing, but it could stand to have more pizazz. MAPPA's own The Idaten Deities Know Only Peace makes this animation look boring. Do you see what I mean? takt Op.Destiny wants to be fun, but it seems to not know how to have fun.

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Fun is a smokescreen; when you take it away, you start to harp on imperfections you'd otherwise ignore. The villains are consistently one of the weaker parts of Symphogear but I can largely look past them. Here, the villains are one of the only things you can look at and they're not very compelling. They're not very charismatic, they have head-scratching motivations and there're two of them in a 12-episode anime, making things feel a bit cramped.

The plot similarly isn't much to write home about. It's fine, but it doesn't feel like we've achieved all that much — you could blame it on being the first part of a larger narrative, but I just blame the writing not being there. Thankfully, it’s short. I've heard some people complain that the anime needed to be two-cours. It didn't. If it was two cours, this would be a slog and I'd actually hate this thing.

The world-building also leaves a lot to be desired. We really don’t get a clear sense of how society works or sensitive D2 are toward music. The entire plot is essentially kicked off by playing music in public, but why would someone do that if these horrific monsters are drawn to music? Later on, there’s a whole-ass concert that isn’t attacked. It’s also revealed that the initial attack on Takt’s town was due to the D2 being commanded to attack the concert. All this just makes me question how this world works.

With the plot, villains, and fun factor all being weak, there's only one thing left for takt op.Destiny to rely on: its characters. Your enjoyment of takt.op Destiny lives and dies by your reception of the characters.

They're fine, I guess.

While the showrunners made Takt unique, he falls flat for me. Takt is someone who's obsessed with music, someone who constantly sees empty stanzas that he must fill with notes — if it's not about music, he's not interested. On the face of it, this would make for an interesting character, but he lacks one thing that someone like Nekki Basara has in spades — energy. Takt's standard state seems to be "bored out of his goddamn mind," with "mildly annoyed" being a close second. He just isn't an interesting character to follow. His passion for music doesn't translate to a passionate presence on the screen.

Destiny is arguably worse in this regard. She's a kuudere. That's it. Her entire schtick is being nigh-emotionless until she undergoes some development in which she becomes mostly emotionless. If I'm being fair, there’s at least a reason for the trope of Destiny’s personality. It shows the difference between her and Cosette and serves as a decent call-to-action for Anna and Takt. Do I like her personality? No, but it’s more than I can say for Irina and it feels as if there was at least thought that went behind it instead of just grabbing some things that looked cool from your last TV Tropes visit. Either way, it's something you've doubtless seen before if you've even watched even a bit of anime.

Giving credit where credit's due, the characters are where takt op.Destiny shines, even if it doesn't shine particularly brightly. Episode one tries to lean in on the "fun" that the show doesn't know how to have, leading it to fall flat. Episode 2 (which I derived my synopsis from) focuses on the characters while still having a decent action setpiece and is one of the best episodes of the show. When takt op.Destiny focuses on its characters, it's kind of decent:Lenny's relationship with Titan and Takt's father is touching. The anime tries to develop its characters, whether it’s Destiny learning what it means to be human or Takt learning about the power of music and how much Cosette meant to him. Things still feel a bit rushed, though, such as having both Destiny and Anna kiss Takt even though neither felt like they had feelings for him.

So takt op.Destiny doesn't do anything great and barely does anything well, why is it getting a D?

Because it doesn't do anything bad.

Whenever I score something an F, I can pinpoint at least one thing and say "yeah, they fucked up here." I cannot do that with takt op.Destiny. The D range is essentially a borderline — Ds are always punching way above the weight class of an F (by the simple virtue of not failing) while I’m almost never able to recommend a D anime over a C anime. While there are cases of some animanga getting here by having one terrible element doing its damndest to drag the entire work down, the D range, in general, is supposed to be the realm of averages — works that aren't very notable either way and takt fits the bill perfectly.

While I can't take much issue with someone scoring this a 5/10 (as that's often a score for "average"), I do scratch my head at people scoring this a 4 or lower when it's just average.

And that's an insult as much as it is a compliment. As much as Fs suck, they’re at least memorable in their lack of quality. Assuming I don't play the game, takt op.Destiny is the type of show I'll forget in a year.