This is more like a complaint than a review. Major spoilers!

General

I will start by saying that this anime is rated 18+ but it’s only for the sexual content, suicidal ideation, religious topics and maybe the little bit of gore. I’m saying “only” because this is not an adult story at all, everything from the setting of the story, values of the characters, scenarios of predicament, etc. is very children’s show worthy. Actually, if it weren’t for the “fanservice” (oversexualization of underage female characters), constant mentions of suicide and the heavy critique of religion, it could easily be adapted to be suitable for all audiences.

The action is pretty entertaining, even if the blatant use of CGI is annoying. I particularly liked the Mirai vs. Metropoliman battle in Episode 7, it was pretty fun! Little did I know that it would be the last time I would have fun watching this.

I was actually enjoying the story up until there, but this anime misleads you to believe that it has substance and will develop in a coherent way – it doesn’t. After Hajime Sokotani appears (in Episode 12 iirc), so do other minor characters and the mess starts building up. Then, every antagonist including Metropoliman, who was explicitly pointed to be the main villain this whole time, dies in a painfully anticlimactic way at a like 3 episode long battle, and then the mess becomes even worse. So much worse that I don’t feel like entering in too much detail about it.

Multiple new underdeveloped characters appear, none of them leave too much of an impression. Characters that were so important before, such as Mukaido’s family or Kanade’s sister, are completely forgotten and never considered again. Mirai doesn’t get much character development, nor do the rest of the cast. There’s Gaku Yoneda, whose existence tricks you to believe that he’s changed the plans of the main cast but in the end they do as they planned from the beginning. Too much unnecessary trouble.

I don’t think the whole ending is worth summarizing, but it ends with some cheesy lines about life and its value or lack thereof, etc. etc. that is just cringe. Many things are left unanswered, like what was Nessa before becoming an angel, or how does Heaven really operate. I guess that the lesson here was that the questions the viewer has do not matter because nothing really matters and we’re all eventually going to die, but it’s really annoying to leave it like that.

Characters

As expected from Tsugumi Ohba, there are not women nor girls in this story, only loose concepts of them. But it’s not like there are good male characters either. All characters are shallow, even those who pretend to have backstory and justifications.

Mirai Kakehushi, the main character, was annoying at best and unbearable at worst. He’s a weak crybaby that refuses to see reality for the sake of his childish ideas, and he’s not even like that in a likeable way, he’s just too bland to like him.

There are some that I was starting to like, such as Revel, who seemed to be evolving and got ascended. But the show is presented in a way that doesn’t let you like the characters, because after he got that little bit of development, he was pushed to the background and barely got any lines again. This issue of forgetting characters is a constant topic throughout the series, it didn’t only happen to him.

I had really, really high hopes for Kanade Uryuu and Meyza. I mean, can you blame me? Beautiful designs, and just look at the Ending. So angelic and dramatic, you can’t tell me that there wasn’t a strong character with a great tragic backstory to be expected.

▶~~~~~~

He’s crying tears of blood, for fuck’s sake. But as everything else, it was deceiving. He was just as bland as the others, devoid of personality, his backstory was not even portrayed in a way that makes the audience feel sorry for him or his sister, it’s just evident that they didn’t put too much thought into him. Even after he was revealed to be extremely shallow, I was still curious about Meyza and her reasons to choose him, but she ended up being the same.

For the designs, Kanade Uryuu and a lot of the angels are very pretty to me, Mirai and Saki look like an average MCs which is ok, there are other side characters that are acceptable, but the rest look like mere extras. Some designs that really bother me are Hajime Sokotani (I know he’s supposed to be ugly, but it’s way too exaggerated), Tonma Rodriguez, Mimimi Yamada and Kohinata Fuyuko, their color palettes are pure eyesore, and the designs are very out of tune with the rest of the characters.

I will not even comment on the shameless misogyny of the female characters’ outfits.

Conclusion

Keywords: edgy, deceiving, frustrating. I only kept watching in hopes for it to get better, or at least have a decent closure, but none of it happened in my opinion.

Ah, but I liked the music! The Opening and first Ending are engraved in my mind now, both were prettily animated, too, and the lyrics are fitting for the concept. I didn’t feel like adding a separate section for this since it’s so brief, but yeah. That’s a good thing that I took out of this, at least.