Reviews Literature / Bakemonogatari

Good series but not for everyone.

I like the monogatari series. I've been watching the series for some years now and every time they announce a new season, I always expect quality and I usually get it. The art is almost always of high quality, showing great attention to detail. Seriously, monogatari to me is one of the most beautifully animated series around. You can see that the artists really put their all into it. I love how all the colors are so vivid and how everyone in the series looks distinct. You can tell characters apart and be amazed at how they look.

One of the things that makes monogatari one of my favorite series is the plots and the characters involved. The plots, to me, are very well-thought out and very complex. Just when you think that an arc is going to end a certain way, they throw a curve ball that changes the ending. Monogatari's biggest strength is how unpredictable the plots are and how things won't end the way the viewer expects it to end. I really love how the show takes the viewers' expectations and smashes it to bits.

The characters are another strength to this series. Their interactions with each other are sometimes hilarious, sometimes depressing, and sometimes disturbing. The way they play off of each is great and shows why I am a fan. The way they talk to each other is a mix of wordplay, obscure references, and just plain randomness. It's always a delight to hear these characters talk to each other.

While Monogatari has plenty of strengths, it also has a few weakness. It's not very action-oriented . The series rarely has outright action and instead makes up for it with lots of dialogue. This can turn off people who prefer something more action-packed. Another weakness that the show has a tendency to switch from comedy to drama to horror to romance at drop of a hat. One minute your watching characters making fools of themselves for comedy, the next minute your watching some get their intestines ripped out in very disturbing fight scene. This can be a bit disorientating to certain people, and again I can understand why some people might turned off by this.

While Monogatari might not be the most perfect series ever, it's a great anime series that should be experienced by as many people as possible. It does have its flaws, but to me the strengths more than make up for it. Give it a go if you feel like checking it out.