Gasaraki Review - 87,5/100
Right now, I’m going to be saying something that I never would have thought to claim a year and a half ago: Sunrise Mecha-series rock! Of course, I’m not talking about their cheesy Gundam or Code Geass series, but their lesser known works: I’ve seen quite a few of them by now, and time and time again they deliver an amazing series. Gasaraki is another one of Ryousuke Takahashi’s series. I was already a huge fan of him before I started watching, and this series made me an even bigger one. He yet again puts down an original series that takes both itself and its audience seriously.
Even though the series has a teen-age couple as its main characters, there’s much more to this series than just that. In fact, the most interesting part of this series is a huge political scheme to try and take over Japan, executed by the superiors of the male lead. The politics in this series are deep, imaginative and detailed, and a great watch for anyone who’s looking for a mature series with a lot of emphasis on dialogue. The teen-aged leads aren’t that bad themselves either. They’re nowhere near those annoying teen-aged brats that you usually see in the lead character’s seat, and they contribute really well to the mature nature of this series despite their age.
At its core, this is a series that combines action with politics. However, those who are merely looking for the former will probably be very bored by the latter. It’s because of this I guess that this series is very underrated: Ryousuke Takahashi’s series have always put a lot of emphasis on very complex dialogue to flesh out their setting, and with Gasaraki this goes more than ever. If you’re not interested in Japanese politics, you probably won’t find much enjoyment in this.
The animation in this series varies from standard, to absolutely beautiful. the frame-rate at times is so unbelievably smooth that it becomes hard to believe that this is a TV-series, made more than ten years ago by now. Especially the first episodes are incredibly well animated because of this, but even after that, the animation kicks ass at times. The music is also simple, but effective.
Overall, Gasaraki’s politics are incredibly fascinating and its action is gripping and down to earth. If I had to mention a flaw, then it’s that the characters lack a bit of spark and could have been more fleshed out and a few of the plot events could have been more explained, but the rest of this series really makes up for it. This is no series with good guys or bad guys, but instead it’s about people with different morals and ideals. I really enjoyed watching it, and the show closes off with a strong finale.
| Storytelling: | 9/10 |
| Characters: | 8/10 |
| Production-Values: | 9/10 |
| Setting: | 9/10 |