An Autist Reviews: The Cherry Blossom Ring (Mission: Yozakura Family Season 1 - Episode 1)

*This is a brand new review!*

*All Reviews Are Spoiler-Free Aside From Any Spoiler Sections*

*This is a bare-bones/lite review made after only a single viewing. (Hence there not being any replay rating)*

Taiyo lost his entire family in an accident and now lives a life of involuntary seclusion, too afraid to so much as talk to others. The sole exception to this fear is Mutsumi, his childhood friend who promised to always be by his side… and whose family is secretly made up of spies… one of whom has now decided to kill Taiyo… Don’t worry, there’s a way out, Taiyo! All you have to do is marry your childhood best friend with no warning!

Well this was a treat! So, I'm going to be honest, I don’t really like the first chapter of the Mission: Yozakura Family manga, I don’t think it does much very well, but this definitely improved upon it. Something about the way everything was done just made it feel so much more natural and it actually made me feel emotional at a few moments. Funnily enough they easily could have made this one or two minutes longer to really nail everything and fix a few issues such as the conclusion feeling too fast and Mutsumi’s giving in being too fast too. But aside from that I think this adapted the manga pretty much perfectly aside from some stuff I’ll talk about with the animation portion of this review. Now, I watched on Disney+, not that I’m really happy about that but for some reason the Disney+ and Hulu bundle makes it so you only can watch Hulu THROUGH Disney+, at least to my knowledge, so I kind of had to. As a result of this the subtitles were pretty small and I don’t think the translation was quite right in a few places, hence the Dialogue rating not being a 10/10 when the Dialogue in this episode was pretty much perfect. As far as exposition it didn’t do it poorly but Futaba presenting the marriage offer still feels too fast and there are some other points where it felt like the anime was reminding me of something told to me mere minutes ago. The ending, like with the manga chapter itself, is my biggest issue, just not feeling properly paced but really I don’t think it could be done much better all things considered. Adding a visual and auditory gag to it made it much more fun in my opinion, though. Still this actually got through the pain of Taiyo, especially with the flashes back to the funeral, and the backstory flashback for Kyoichiro and Mutsumi actually hurt to see and I’m glad they saved it for when they did instead of opening with it. The humor was also pretty good but it definitely feels like they toned down the comedy to focus on the emotional nature of this episode and I have a feeling they’ll do something similar for the next episode and some others this season since this series oscillates between comedic and emotional/dramatic pretty frequently and often with little warning, something that I adore but others dislike, and I feel like the comedy will likely be somewhat toned down throughout the series just to make it less jarring in general but I don’t mind that. This was a really fun first episode and while I have problems and didn’t enjoy it as much as I’m sure others will have, this has made me hopeful, cautiously so, lord knows I’ve been betrayed before, but still. Anyway, I’d prefer more comedy in the future but I’m sure we’ll be getting more comedy in the future since I know the manga. Now, with this out of the way… let’s talk the acting…

AMAZING. Like, I was hesitant hearing the voices in the trailers and such but after watching this episode I am sold. All my fears are drained away and I am just so happy. The casting is amazing and you would never be able to tell that Taiyo’s voice-actor is very new to the field, he does so amazing and that’s just the start! I could gush about everybody but I want to focus on Mutsumi’s voice-actress who does a godly job, as expected of one of the most popular voice-actresses in anime right now, but seriously I read about her trying to mix detachment with compassion to make Mutsumi fit her role in the family without seeming uninterested and she absolutely nailed it. Listening to her performance her description made so much sense and I can safely say it works perfectly! Kyoichiro was absolutely amazing, especially in his creepier moments, and everyone else was just perfect, as I was never bold enough to expect from the beginning! Presuming the quality of their acting doesn’t go down in the future this series is going to… well… bloom! Also the idea that Taiyo’s actor is going to be getting BETTER as the series goes on when he is already easily able to stand with his co-stars is absurd and I cannot wait to hear that!

Okay, the last place I have issues and some of them only came from when I checked the manga to see how exactly certain things went as a refresher. A big issue for me here is that the fights felt slow and yet too fast, they took too long to get going and didn’t last long enough, whereas in the manga they don’t take long to start and are over quickly which I think works better. The biggest issue I have though is the way certain scenes were animated or, in some cases, not. I would have killed to see a creepy Kyoichiro slice a glass into tiny pieces while staring down his family, I’d have loved if the joke of him just appearing was executed better, and I think a lot of the episode was just a little on the slow side animation wise and, to a lesser extent, pacing wise. Oh and the lack of over the top detailed panels kinda hurts me in the kokoro but I understand why they didn’t bring those to life and I think they did a really good job with them without doing the overly detailed lines that the mangaka will do at times to get across seriousness and such. Now with my complaints basically all out of the way, let me rant about how good this is and start with this: How the fuck did they get the lines and shit right? How the fuck are the lines as accurate to the manga as they are, like, the lineart in the episode looks exactly like the lineart in the fucking manga and it is blowing my goddamn mind. Aside from that the music was lovely even if I didn’t notice a lot of it, and the voice effects were perfect, with Nanao’s voice echoing in his bucket not bothering me as much as I was worried it would. The sound effects were utterly perfect, unsurprisingly, and the designs, as expected of an adaptation of a manga with as amazing designs as this one, are perfect. The set pieces are fantastic even if the action taking place in them wasn’t as great as I’d have hoped for it to be. I’m amazed at how detailed all the set pieces were and how much they felt like they were in the world and not, what i presume them to be, 3D renders or detailed background art with characters just drawn on top of them. The animation itself is so smooth that I can’t help but to smile just thinking about it even if I wish some of it were faster or something like that, so I can’t help but to call that 10/10 animation. Like, it’s not the animation’s fault that the pacing of it feels just a little slow, though Shion’s drones are definitely bringing down the effects rating some because while they look good they just really could have been done better. The cinematography was exceptional even if it did fail in some places or feel a little lazy/convenient at times, and because I need to emphasize this, the action WAS amazing. I just wish there was more of it, really and that it went harder. I’m expecting big things from the bigger set pieces to come, so this show had better hold up to my expectations, I’m not going to be generous to it! With all that said, though, the animation was spectacular, like this episode in general, and I’m frothing at the mouth for more!

Well that was certainly great! First episodes can be misleading but this doesn’t feel like a first episode that’s over delivering, it feels like this is just a well adapted episode that’s been done well, and that’s all this series needs so if this is even close to the quality of the rest of the season then I’m sure I’m going to love this adaption! I certainly want it to go a bit faster and use a bit more of it’s source’s humor but I expect that in the future we’ll see that as the show gets on its feet properly, after all most of what is being adapted is comedic slice of life stuff so I doubt the first episode is going to be setting the bar for the pacing and feel of the rest of the show, at least not beyond a certain extent. I want this episode to be better, but given that this is adapting a chapter I dislike, I think it did great and I’m cautiously optimistic for the future. That said, if things do continue to be too much like this episode it might drag down my enjoyment since this did feel a little too mellow for how bombastic this series really is. All in all though, great work Silver Link, I’ll see you next week so be sure not to disappoint me!

Total - 9

Plot - 8

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Story - 9

Pacing - 8

Dialogue - 9

Narration - NR

Exposition - 8

Adaptation - 8

Enjoyment - 9

Twist/s - NR

Resolution/s - 8

Ending/s - 7

Acting - 10

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MC/s - 10

SC/s - 10

BG/s - 10

Narrator/s - NR

Animation/Effects - x

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Music - 9

Voice Effects - 10

2D Animation - 10

3D Animation - 8

Set Pieces - 10

Designs - 10

Action - 8

Cinematography - 8

Sounds - 10

Replay - NR

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Re-Enjoyment - NR

New Details - NR

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