Caligula

Caligula has receive a lot of critics from anime fans about their pacing and character development and all kinds of stuff. Sure it is not the worst anime to air in Spring 2018, it isn't near decent as far as I know.

The plot idea of trapping inside digital world had started long before Sword Art Online and whatever comes after that. However such idea still exist, mainly because of the psychological effect it creates upon the trapped characters and also the audience. We, as the audience who are psychological horror are interested to find out why are the characters being trapped in a digital world and how do they come out from it or will they? And that's why people are giving Caligula a chance. However, there are also people who fear it will disappoint them because the anime is adapted from a game and most of them do not end up well.

Personally, I find myself getting bored about the anime, I had stopped halfway to wait for the series to end (same goes with Darling in the FranXX). And I had read one of the episode review about ANN, well it is not as bad as it is said for the anime overall but looking at it episodically, sure it does. Only the last two episodes had me sit through the anime and think that, "it isn't that bad after all." Provided you complete it in one go.

Two most important things they have gone wrong in this anime that had it landed between 6-6.5/10 for me.

Characters
In a psychological anime, characters development is the most important thing as the anime has to display what, how, why causes the characters to be depressed and to fall to another side.

The most boring but useful way is to introduce each character for their background story one by one from the least priority to the most priority (especially for protagonist on the last episode) and link all the characters together along the way. However, the information are not given besides their surface level of suffering from pain in real life before escaping to Mobius.

During the fights launch from the antagonists, there are flashback about the characters but due to episodes constrain, even though I understand the situation, I don't find myself feeling sympathetic about their suffering.

And for the protagonist side? They sit around a room and start the healing session by talking out their darkest inner part of them. Again, due to limitation of screen time for each of them in a fairly big cast, I don't feel sad at all. More like I kinda forget what's going on.

And did I mention the missing linkage between each episode except the last 3 or 4 episodes?

Plot
Continuing from last sentence, skips and bad pace are the ones which affects an anime quality. Nobody had the time or patience to sit through every anime, especially when the genre is not their most favorite or they have not play the game, read the manga/novel beforehand?

First two episodes are the good to start the plot and attract people to continue but getting further, the skips are getting worst. New characters pop up randomly, no linkage between episodes and basically it feels like some characters gone through a complete change in personality compare to few episodes ago.

Last 2 episodes are the best and probably the most enjoyable to watch hand in hand, the things character go through in Mobius, realizing even though reality pains them, living in digital world does not necessary means happiness. But I appreciates not everyone think this way and still decide to stay in Mobius. This is what makes people think. What is real happiness, the anime brings out the most important question. Myu though that happiness is happiness but what if someone's happiness meaning other people suffering? What is a person's happiness is to bully and destroy a person's sanity and Myu can fulfill that wish, is that real happiness for everyone?

There is one more reason to watch the last 2 episodes, it's about real Ritsu. Watch and you will know.

By the way, OP/ED are good so here's a 0.5 add-on, total 6.5/10