See last paragraph for TLDR.

As a show almost entirely consisting of people sitting around somewhere and talking, what it does to keep the viewer's attention as the protagonist goes on ten, twenty minutes long monologues episode after episode can make or break the show. As another mystery show, Hyouka resolves this problem with its creative use of visual metaphors. While Kyokou Suiri does try the same visual metaphor approach, it is repetitive and feels uninspired. Another way it tries to avoid long monologues is to have a second character that forms a Watson and Holmes dynamic to share the expositions between the two characters and to make their dialogue feel more natural. To its credit, protagonist Kotoko's interactions with said secondary character Saki does occasionally add humour to the story, but such intermittent sparks are not sufficient to cover for the show's monotonous directing.

The animation was mostly unremarkable, with the exception that the colors are so over-saturated that I thought there was a computer problem when watching episode 1. The occasional action scene looks nice for a mostly talking anime, but that's not what I'm looking for in a mystery show.

The thing that originally attracted me to this show was the witty banter between the male and female leads best known in recent works by Bunny Girl Senpai. However, the male lead Kurou was quickly side-lined as the plot thickened and the spotlight became entirely focused on Kotoko. As the type that mostly silently take up the grunt work, Kurou did get his chance to shine in the last episode, but it does not make up for his inactivity throughout most of the show. Characters' in the show generally feel one-dimensional. For instant, all we know by the end about Saki's personality is that she is afraid of ghosts, and the gag got old quickly. This seems like a natural limit considering how much of the screen time has to be focused on the mystery itself, so I consider it another sacrifice to the seasonal TV broadcasting format that dictates shows must be multiples of twelve or thirteen episodes.

The series' main gimmick is a magic system where the power of supernatural beings are proportional to how much humans believe in them. This is by no means original, as it is featured in many stories involving Japanese folklore like Noragami, Rise of the Youkai Clan, A Certain Magical Index, or even Toilet-Bound Hanako-kun which was airing in the same season. The twist of this series is how it incorporates this concept into a deductive mystery. The show slowly spirals into a meta-narrative on what makes logical deductions persuasive in a way that will likely disappoint anyone who was looking for a fair-play deductive mystery, but it does provide a nice twist at the end that makes it a worthwhile story for those who can appreciate it for what it is.

This story felt naturally unfit for the anime medium, and it did not have a sufficiently talented director that can do what needs to be done to push it along. You should just go watch Hyouka. Perhaps the manga would have been a better experience, though I've not read it myself.