Two of my housemates have been obsessed with the Monogatari series for a while now, and they’ve been trying to get everyone in our friend group to watch it. Well, through a set of coincidental circumstances, they ended up getting their wish, and I ended up discovering just how right they were.

It’s hard to put into words exactly how Bakemonogatari clicked for me, but I’ll do my best (and I kind of have to, given the absurd amount of minimum characters needed to post a review here). The one thing that set this show apart from any other anime I’ve seen is the cinematography. I’m a big fan of when movies and TV shows tell a story from the way a shot is framed or how the camera moves, and if I’d have known that Monogatari did this kind of thing on the regular, I might have been convinced to watch it a lot sooner. For goodness sake, even the fanservice shots are meaningful. Since this entire season is told from the point-of-view of a horny teenager, it makes sense when the camera is panning up to reveal a girl, that the camera would linger on the crotch or chest area for a moment. I’ve been low-key frustrated with how anime these days constantly inserts fanservice shots in places where it’s totally unnecessary, so this is a breath of fresh air.

The story is very interesting. I like the idea of things like mental trauma and stress being manifested as beings that attach themselves to humans (or in this case, cute anime girls). Sometimes they can be exorcised, and sometimes they have to be dealt with like the mental illness it represents. It makes for some interesting character motivations that move the story of the episode forward. Speaking of characters, I can see why Senjougahara is everyone’s waifu (she’s the most nuanced tsundere ever), but we can’t discount the rest of the cast. Araragi is more than just a perverted teen, Kanbaru is more than just the short-haired peppy girl, and Hanekawa is more than just the smart student council president. Every character is more than the one-note clichés we see in every anime; every character feels more like a real person, just a little more exaggerated. And we can’t talk about Monogatari without talking about its stellar soundtrack.Yes, it doesn’t have any bad OPs. and the ED is a banger, but the score that plays throughout is some of the best anime music I’ve ever heard. These short sentences can’t do it any justice, so I’d highly recommend you go listen to it on YouTube or Spotify.

The style of this show is so intriguing to me. I want to know why it uses interstitial “animation” frames so frequently and so quickly. It seems like it doesn’t have to try hard to look so good, and yet it looks so good. I don’t care if it’s trying to look artsy, because it works for me. After episode 1, my interest was piqued. After episode 2, I thought, ‘Oh no, I think I’m enjoying this’, and after episode 3, I thought, ‘Shoot, I’m probably going to rewatch this show and read the light novels at some point’.

Congrats to my two friends, you got me hooked. I’m really looking forward both to what happens next, and I’m looking forward to what these point-of-view changes mean for future seasons.