Going into Shabake I was quite conflicted. On the one hand, the cover and synopsis marketed a great period anime with traditional Japanese fantastical elements, primarily youkai. On the other hand, the show is rated at 60% on Anilist and below 6.5 on MAL. But after reading a review on MAL which stated that the shows quality would only be apparent after watching the whole thing and that viewers shouldn't drop it after just 3 episodes, I decided to bite the bullet and give it a chance, despite that review giving it a score of 6 in the end, under the MAL average of the show. And I'm really glad I gave it a chance.

The show's general atmosphere and vibes managed to pull me in from the very start. I generally have a bias towards anime which depicts historical Japan, but even then I thought the world of Shabake was charming. Despite the youkai, the world and the characters in it felt believable and natural. The supernatural elements were also interesting, it is written in a very traditional fashion, not majorly overstepping the boundaries of the Japanese mythos, at least from what I could tell. This historical focus gives the show a certain charm that only exists in similarly historical anime in my opinion, like Hyouge Mono.

The characters, except for a few which are written to be too blatantly villainous, are likeable and well written. The main character is arguably a bit too much of a goody two shoes, especially in the final confrontation, but there are actual story reasons to justify why he acts that way. His best friend Eikichi is kind of a silly dork, but also quite dependable and has a realistic, almost harsh outlook on life. His two supernatural servants, Nikichi and Sasuke, have the generic cool headed vs hot headed contrast, but they get along quite well despite that due to their shared respect for their master and his family, and it was a nice dynamic to see. But my favorite character was probably the snarky but well meaning Byoubu nozoki. I won't mention every character one by one but the point is that the vast majority of them feel like real people with real desires, concerns, and worldviews, even if they are quite minor characters. Also I looove the Yanaris. So adorable.

As for the story, it is hard to talk about it without spoiling it. A lot of the subplots and minor details which can be very easily overlooked weave together in order to create a coherent and concrete 13 episode story, tying everything together and answering almost every question. Although I feel we could have had an additional episode delving into Sasuke's backstory, which is much less expanded upon compared to Nikichi's. The murder mystery the show begins with in episode 1 was funnily enough perhaps the least interesting mystery by the end for me, as episode 10 really gave everything that was happening a new perspective, but it was still good enough, if only a little underwhelming that it had the climactic focus. Again, really hard to talk about this stuff without spoiling major elements, you will have to watch it for yourself.

As for the direction of the show, I think it will be dependent on your personal taste. The show is quite slow in its pace, although I don't mean to say it is boring or that the episodes don't flow into one another like a chill slice of life. I finished the entire anime in a day. I think it would be best described as slow burn, the tension rises continuously but slowly. There is also practically no "anime" flair, as in stuff like chibi gag sequences and similar anime cliches, instead it is more like a literal retelling of an actual story just using an anime artstyle... which thinking about it is quite literally what the anime is considering the original material is a historical fantasy novel, not even a light novel. To me this made the show feel a lot more grounded and I appreciated the unconventional style it had achieved by ironically being quite conventional, but maybe others were off put by how "unanimelike" the anime is.

Overall, Shabake is a great historical fantasy filled with all sorts of different mysteries which tie together, with a slower pacing focusing on the day to day lives of our characters as they navigate through these different mysteries and secrets. It manages to wrap up everything it has started neatly in its short 13 episodes, and supports a cast of characters which are very human and natural in how they act and think. Although it is not genre defining or groundbreaking or anything like that, I was completely baffled as to why the show had such a low score, which put me off when I was first thinking about giving the show a try. So, I'm writing this review kind of as reassurance for others who want to check it out. I don't know whether I saw something in the show most didn't, or our attention spans have been fried to the point where no action or fancy shining colors is reason enough to drop an otherwise well written show, but I think this show is very underrated.