Call of the Night
a review by charl0
a review by charl0
Everything written in this review must be considered from the perspective that I took while watching through Call of the Night. While our main human characters are canonically fourteen and in middle school, a fact that I am loathe to recognise, the character designs and the speech patterns of the characters indicates nothing of this beyond the occasional fetishistic mention. When viewed through the lens of the characters attending university and being university-aged, the entirety of the show is far more palatable.
Which is why it is a shame that the original author chose this particular avenue for his characters. While I can view the other categories through a lens that ignores this fact, the mere choice to have the main love interest be under-aged and in middle school in a show that provides just shy of enough fan-service to not be considered an Ecchi is one so poorly made that it tanks any potential credit I could provide to the author for their character work.
I am providing three stars in this category due to the interest I had in seeing characters develop.
It is difficult to judge a show like this based upon its plot, but I would say that it changes from one genre to another midway through the season. For its complete lack of tonal awareness, and the fact that it blindsides the viewer with a plot shift without any true payoff, I found the entirety of any overarching story to be lackluster at best.
My immediate first comment on Call of the Night was its fantastic use of post-processing effects, as well as the unique variable line weight carried by each character. The skies are far more beautiful than just about any you can see within miles of a city -- a testament to the philosophy regarding night's beauty, I'm sure. Rim lighting throughout is masterfully added, and there are scenes where the artists play with colour palette in a way I have not seen in quite some time.
If there is one thing I can say about Call of the Night, it is that it has stills that would rival static illustrations.
For all of the beauty in it, however, Call of the Night sacrifices fluid animation, using snappy editing, panning over stills, and mouth movement to distract the viewer from noticing the fact that three characters in a scene with four have not moved a single centimeter in the last five seconds.
The saving grace are the moments where honest-to-goodness masterful character animation is shown for fractions of a moment; there is an animator somewhere in this studio that knows what they're doing, and, by God, I wish they had worked on more pieces of it.
The musical score provides a chilled lo-fi ambience to the montages of a city in midnight, and to the escapades of our protagonist. There are some choices in regards to the sound effects used, especially the exact same stock sucking sound that is used each time Nazuna drinks Kou's blood, with which I disagree fairly strongly.
With the caveats mentioned, I will say that Call of the Night is a truly beautiful show, and I did find myself invested in the characters, if disinterested at moments, as the story progressed. I enjoyed my watch, but only after changing facts within the canon and pushing through. Because I could not enjoy the piece as it existed, I cannot with any good conscience provide a better score for enjoyment than four out of ten.
While the average score for Call of the Night falls just above a five out of ten, I do not recommend anyone watch it. It is middling at best in every way except for visual design, and there are far better things to spend your time watching.
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