My first reaction to Sakurasou no Pet no kanojo was more along the lines of despair than anything. Despite its beautiful artwork, it looked just like harem/ecchi anime No. 13214. Yeah, sure, it said romance on the tin, but will it even be executed? Thankfully, it was. Despite my original distrust and even hostility towards Sakurasou, I was pleasantly surprised by a deep romance/borderline tragedy story. I can't really say that Sakurasou has wasted potential, but I can't really say it doesn't either. While it had a somewhat good execution, I guess it just wasn't _ my _ flavour of romance. Despite that, I can't deny that Sakurasou is by far one of the better romance series that you can find. I was actually glad that the harem didn't get pulled and that ecchi and forceful scenes were restrained and that things didn't go south. But I'll get to that in the story section, Let's go in order for now.

Artwork - (19/20)
The artwork is, without a doubt, one of the best things about this series. The sheer amount of detail and work is almost awe inspiring. First, let's start with the heart of the Slice of life genre - The character models. The character models were great overall, and especially the facial features were quite good. The best girl (Mashiro) was the very embodiment of cuteness, and won an overwhelming three spots in the internationalsaimoe community vote. That goes to show that she was -by far- one of the best and most detailed characters in 2013, and that in turn, is saying something. Still, it felt that as though the entire time was spent on Mashiro herself, since no one looks anywhere near as great as she does.

Moving on, the environment. Wait, I can't put it in words, let this sink in.

See, if you don't call that shit great, then I don't know what is. Of course, that is just an isolated example. While the rest of the series _ does _ look great, it just doesn't look that great constantly. The environment is good, if a bit sparsely detailed, but I'll take a beautiful landscape any day over a detailed one.

Now, the animation. The animation is pretty fluid, but its overkill considering that it isn't exactly needed as much. There aren't a lot of fast moving scenes to cover, but eh well, whatever. Can't really complain about things being too good, now can I?

And, how can I forget the fanservice? Sadly (or, thankfully) the fanservice is constrained. Its pretty loose the first 4~ episodes, with Mashiro constantly appearing in only a T-Shirt, but it fades away into obscurity as the plot picks up its speed. That may or may not be a good thing based on who is watching. For someone who has seen plenty of good shows completely wrecked by fan service, its a good thing, but for the sexually repressed teenager, yeah, it sucks.

Sound and Music (18/20)

Let's start with the voice acting first. while the voice acting was almost flawless in the massive flagship of Mashiro (and to some extent, Sorata), it was faded at best everywhere else. Now, I'm no expert at japanese, but for me, the entire voice acting section is about how well the emotions are communicated - even to a different language. While Mashiro and Sorata succeeded in this, most of the other fell flat. The biggest example was Nanami. Her voice acting could constantly not keep up with the emotions and they seemed strained - almost forced. This was most pronounced in the "crying in the rain" scene, in which her emotions didn't convey worth shit. I felt nothing, and that was mostly because of how forced it was. It was all I could do not skim that part.

Moving on, the music. The OP01 wasn't exactly good, but I got used to it. The OP02 on the other hand was great -and to a lesser extent, so was ED01. ED02 was fairly bad though, and I never really played it more than one time.
Sadly all the music videos are fairly boring. The OP01 atleast has something in the AMV, but it gets boring after exactly one replay.

Plot - (14/20)
Arc based stories have a way of becoming too....predictable. And that is precisely what's wrong with Sakurasou's plot. Its too predictable for its own good. While it does have some good surprises, it never really seems to grip the viewer or take him for a ride. Which is, really, really bad. While the plot has some fairly decent (and shocking) surprises, it pretty
much follows a straight line, with most of the character actions resulting in no consequence.

That is not to say that the plot itself is bad, it just isn't engaging enough. But I'm focusing too much on the main storyline, see, one of the major components of Sakurasou is the romance, and as a sucker for Slice of life/Romance anime, I must say that its great. I was actually happy that after so long, a decent anime with a decent romance component aired, and my happiness only grew over episodes as the episodes ticked by. The romance picked up steam and I actually just adored the fact that it was a love triangle. Sadly for me, the romance put a gun on its head and then pulled the trigger. It didn't resolve. It could have, but it didn't. It replaced resolution with filler episodes, and there is no greater crime in the history of romance. You make a romance anime with great visuals and awesome pull, but then as you approach the end, you flip out and waste episodes on flashbacks? Why? The job was already done, all you had to do was end it. I suppose it was just a drive to make people go buy the novel to read what happens next, and that is just pitiful.

Another sad thing about the story was how it used plot devices EVERY SINGLE time. As I already pointed out in another review of mine, plot devices aren't wrong to use, they are almost necessary. But thinly veiled plot devices only serve to wreck the user experience, and no plot device is as thinly veiled as that of the rain. Almost every single time that someone cries or something depressing happens, the weather decides to start raining. EVERY.SINGLE.TIME. It isn't an isolated case either, it happens so often that I actually promised myself I would watch one episode of Boku no Pico if it didn't rain. I didn't get to watch it.

Next up, we have the comedy. But comedy has two sides, one is the side of intelligent comedy - stuff like Non non biyori.
And then there is random comedy, which is funny because its so RANDOM. I would have picked an anime example, but let's step towards the world of disgusting 3DPD - Hollywood. The hangover. Why was it funny? Because it was random. A naked chinese guy jumping out of the car trunk is funny because it is random, unreasonable and unlikely to ever happen because of how stupid it is. The same is true for Sakurasou, its comedic effect relies solely on randomness, and as such, it just might attract people who love that sort of stuff, but even worse, most comedic stuff pulled off in Sakurasou has already been done before. The guy waking up to panties-in-his-face, the girl acting like his wife for no reason whatsoever and the tsundere character. Still, I can't deny that laughed at it, some jokes were fair enough, but overall it was all forced.

But, I focus too much on the downsides to actually talk about the upside. While I make it sound like Sakurasou's plot is the worst thing since allowing furries on /b/, it is actually pretty good. The drama is great and despite its many flaws, the story actually progresses - which is more than I can say for most anime. Despite its predictable pattern of doing things, Sakurasou shows a healthy move towards a deeper story while created drama by shattering multiple bonds, which is commendable to say the least. Not a lot of series are able to break away from the 'tried and tested' formula that gnaws at the anime production today, but Sakurasou does a great job repulsing the pull and creating something quite unique. For that, I am eternally grateful, considering a new approach is something that is always neglected. Sakurasou also shines in the way of creating friction between characters. The logic is solid and the reasons understandable, all the while doing its best to swerve away from needless melodrama. The end result is something quite special, a story that actually progresses, new, deep, appreciates its characters and still not boring. Seriously, what more can a guy ask for? Despite all my nitpicking on its faults, I can safely say that Sakurasou has a good story, it just could have been better.

Characters (17/20) -
The characters are, by far, the most surprising thing about Sakurasou. I never, honestly, for even once believed that the characters could change, that they could become better. After all, it was all there in the first episode - MC wakes with his face in some pronounced canine teethed girl's panties who then says that she could become his wife and then MC asks her to stop being so annoying. What can possibly change? A whole lot, that's what. After the initial stupidity of the first four episodes died down, the characters started changing and the development took me by surprise. Despite its cliche start, Sakurasou's characters soon start branching out and as more and more of their past is revealed the characters become more and more lifelike. Most reasoning actually goes a long way in helping the viewer understand - nay, connect to the characters on an entirely different level.. Yeah, sure some reasoning is stupid, but that is what reality is - A lot of people just don't have a good reason to do the things they do. The character development also shines in the way of changing _ everything_. And I mean every single thing. If you actually sit down and compare things at the beginning and at the end, you will realize how much has actually changed, the atmosphere, the people, the relationships. But at the same time, you will never see the change at all in its watching order, after all it seems so....natural.

But, I do have my fair share of complaints about the support crew. It was neglected bad. Like, really bad. No character in the support team got even a teeny tiny bit of development. While some would argue that Ryuunouske did, I say he didn't. That is because his entire "development" is based on absolutely nothing, it lacks substance and it lacks reasoning.

Enjoyment (17/20)
While Sakurasou was an enjoyable experience, it could have been better. I constantly kept noticing little flaws and that ruined by experience. In fact, Sakurasou is a great series that just lacks polish, its great and all but it could have been a masterpiece, maybe even be something to look back on, but it didn't. Its own plot swallowed it and despite all its great artwork and characters, it was unable to stop making little mistakes. Hopefully though, maybe there will be a second season and maybe it will be able to improve on the mistakes of its parent, and if all goes well, it just might realize the true potential it had. Until then, I'll keep my fingers crossed.