Wishes.
If you were in a competition in where you won, your wish would be granted, would you compete? Knowing that there are other people who may have a more important or dire wish? Is your wish more important than others? Is it less important?
Do you even have a wish?
Before going into this review, you will need to know what a Selector is. In this series, there is a popular card game called WIXOSS. Among the players, there are Selectors, people who are able to communicate with their LRIG, or the avatar of their deck. The point of this partner ... ship is for the LRIG to help the Selector become an Eternal Girl and have their dream, their desire or their wish fulfilled.
Story: 8
Wishes and desire and the dark undertone that comes with those two are used quite a lot in story telling. This story is fairly predictable when it comes to the concept of despair and wishes. Though, if you haven't expirenced much with this common story device, you will be in for a treat, as most people who see the dark side and consequences of wishes tend to enjoy the story.
Out story follows Ruuko, a standard character when it comes to these types of wish stories. She is a character is couldn't be separated from the crowd prior to being a Selector. By becoming a Selector and playing WIXOSS, she makes friends, she makes foes and she learns more about herself.
On a side note, do you need to know the rules of WIXOSS before watching?
NOPE. Not at all. The anime's main focus when it comes to card battles are the emotion of the Selectors and the ending result, who wins or who loses. The only concept you need to understand is that a deck is made to power up their LRIG.
Also keep in mind that this story isn't to surprising to those who have gone through stories related to the dark undertone of wishes. It's very predictable and isn't too unique compared to other stories with a similar premise. If you have not gone through a story that involved wishes and darkness, you will be in for a treat as WIXOSS is a great introduction to these types of stories.
Art: 8
Art outside of battles is quite bland, with a lot of use of pale colors and grey. All the backgrounds, all the foregrounds, use this type of bland coloring. Is this bad? Not entirely, as it gives a feel of emptiness, which does help deliver the dark undertone this anime has. Was it required? I feel like this coloring was a bit over done.
Art inside of battles were beautiful colors that faded into a never-ending darkness. I could be a literature teacher about this and pull meaning out of nothingness, but I rather not. I still enjoyed the art of the battles.
Animation was great during battles, standard outside of them. Hand to hand combat and the magical attacks that happened during battle all looked beautiful.
Character designs were pretty standard, though the designs for LRIGs were amazing. Loved how they would look when they would power up.
Sound: 9
What an amazing OP, killy killy JOKER is one of my more favorite OPs of this season and one of my favorites of all time. With an amazing chorus, it is hard not to get your head in the rhythm of the song, which is very similar to our main character, Ruuko. She does the same thing during battles, and gets caught up in the hype of them. The ED, realize -Yume no Matsu Basho-, is another beautiful piece that compliments the OP really well.
OST?
Well.. again, outside of the battles, the soundtrack wasn't all too impressive. It may have added to the feeling of emptiness, but again, it wasn't all that needed. Songs used during the battles were all great! Songs included DnB and dubstep, that all helped give the battles intensity without the songs being too absurd.
Character: 9
As I have said before, Ruuko is a very clean slate character, you will see her character develop as she meets other Selectors, as she wins battles, as she begins thinking of the questions I asked you at the beginning of this review. She is quite the enjoyable character to watch.
A great point in this anime is the relationship between our Selectors: Yuzuki, Akira, Hitoe and Iona. Some are friends, some are foes, all have a wish they want granted. These include some intense moments when we have our more important side characters battling each other knowing that their wishes are on the line.
The only problem with this are the super side characters.... the nameless ones. They are all terrible people with a terrible attitude and personality. These are mainly nameless classmates whose only goal in the series is to cause tension and drama. Sure it was enjoyable to see our main characters go through it, but the way they did it felt super forced.
Enjoyment: 10
Keep in mind, I was coming into this series expecting it to be about cute girls and card games. Boy was I surprised! I was looking forward to some dark anime series during the spring season, Gokukoku no Brynhildr, Black Bullet and Akuma no Riddle. WIXOSS blew all those series out of the water and another surprise series did the same thing this season. I never expected this series to get dark.
I love love love how they handle card battles. The no information needed to watch this show is amazing and I feel they handled that expertly!
Suspense and intensity.
The amount of suspense, the suspense in decision making, the suspense is revealing information, the suspense of wanting to know more, all of these add intensity to the series that keeps the viewer interested and wanting more.
Overall: 9
With a great ending that is an excellent follow up to a season two, the plot twists, the cute girls. This was a surprise series that was an amazing to watch show.
Some food for thought... what is girl backwards?
Alternative Titles Japanese: selector infected WIXOSS Information Type: TV Episodes: 12 Status: Finished Airing Aired: Apr 4, 2014 to Jun 20, 2014 Premiered: Spring 2014 Broadcast: Fridays at 02:49 (JST) Licensors: Funimation Studios: J.C.Staff Source: Card game Genre: Suspense Duration: 24 min. per ep. Rating: R - 17+ (violence & profanity) Statistics Score: 7.221 (scored by 63,606 users) 1 indicates a . Ranked: #32452 2 based on the top anime page. Please note that 'Not yet aired' and 'R18+' titles are excluded. Popularity: #1531 Members: 150,141 Favorites: 650 Available AtResources |
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