Girls' Frontline, along with Azur Lane, is the most popular Chinese-made gatcha out there. Naturally, with this success, comes the inevitable jump to animation. How well did it turn out? Well this series is the story of two halves.
Healing Chapter comprised the first half of the series. Something that stuck out was the sheer amount of great character interactions and heartwarming scenarios. For example, in one episode, M4 SOPMOD II creates a miniature replica of herself via the flesh of her enemies. The bond between this replica and M4A1 is surprisingly genuine for a short-form anime, and this replica ended up making a cameo later on. The humor is relatively simple but quite well done, with a charming artstyle and surprisingly good voice acting.
The second half, known as Madness Chapter, is a bit of different tale. Based on 4koma comics that were released as fun little stories, these segments are far more fast-paced and humor-focused. And there are more of them. But naturally, the platitude of "quality > quantity" comes into play. The shorts are far too hit or miss for me. Some, such as the one with the plant fairy, are charming little snippets. Others devolve into "geddit dakimakuras" or "OOPS the cats ate the food". It comes off a bit too childish for me at points. The animation here also wildly ranges, quite a few times stuff barely moves and in other times there are weirdly fluid motions of cat people. Character interactions are present but barely explored in favor of the previously mentioned quick gags. The voice acting is still pretty solid though.
The characters themselves are in general likable but fairly one-note. I can sum up some of them as "cat", "lazy", "drunk", and "crazy". That's unfortunately the problem you get when you focus on too many characters. Healing Chapter made up for this with bouncy dynamics, but as mentioned before Madness Chapter half-assed that part.
Perhaps I'd get this more if I liked the game enough, but I don't gamble on jpgs and as a secondary to the franchise, this unfortunately couldn't get me on board. If you want absurdly short, silly cartoons I could cautiously recommend it, but just know you won't be getting the most consistent experience.
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