Nanatsuiro Drops review

 

Nanatsuiro Drops

Story: 8
Nanatsuiro Drops is the example how a simple story can make you all warm and fuzzy inside. Endearing, cute and innocent are keywords here. The story isn’t deep, not unique, yet it has something that simply works. You can probably best compare it to Card Captor Sakura, it has the same combination of a magical girl on a mission on one hand and a story of first love on the other. While with Card Captor Sakura the magic aspect was their main focus, with Nanatsuiro Drops both aspects are more in balance. This series is also aimed at a slightly more adult audience since there is some minor fanservice present.

With its twelve episodes, this series manages to tell a heartwarming story about romance, overcoming hardships, rivalry and friendship. The pacing is good and it has some unexpected plot twists that complicate things for the main characters. Each episode is used to expand the story and there were no fillers included.

Animation: 8.5
With a cute and endearing story like this series, a matching drawing style is a must. Bright colors, sparkles, extravagant magical girl uniforms and big eyed kawaii looking characters are the key to meet this required style. Yet it is not over the top to make it more realistic. The romance part is accompanied with lot of blushes to state the innocence of this first love and the inexperience of the characters.
Backgrounds are very detailed and also the use of shading and lights add to the atmosphere of the series. All in all the animation really made my watch more enjoyable. I know I’m biased because I really like this kind of drawing style, therefore I might have scored the animation higher then someone else, yet in my opinion it is well deserved.

Audio: 7.5
All though the audio isn’t bad, it is the weakest point of the anime. The voice acting is ok, but nothing really special. A funny part is that Haru does have a different voice in his human and sheep form. The only real point of annoyance is the voice of a classmate of Sumomo and Haru, it’s very high and it kind of felt like unnatural.
As for music and sound effects: there is plenty. Orchestral music is accompanying various scenes throughout the anime, like magical battles but also conversations. The start theme is a light hearted upbeat song which fits perfectly with the series. The ending song I didn’t find that appealing though.

Character development: 8.5
All though the characters are a bit stereotypical as we could expect from this genre, but I found them very loveable. Because they bring their feelings are genuine, I was able to feel with them every step of their journey. Sumomo, the female lead, started out as a very insecure but cheerful girl. On the other hand she is a crybaby and that is why she is easily mistaken for being weak. However nothing is more further from the truth then that. She has to overcome a lot of hardships during the series, especially near the end, and she turns out to be a lot stronger then everyone would have expected.

Haru, the male lead doesn’t develop a lot in his personality and seems pretty much the same during the series but his feelings for Sumomo grow as he spends more time with her both in his sheep and human form. Even though he doesn’t seem much different through out the series this doesn’t mean he isn’t an interesting character. He has his own problems but he cares deeply for Sumomo’s feelings as she helps him collecting the stardrops. This makes it easy to warm up to him.

Next to the two main chars, there are of course the typical side cast figures. Like Sumomo’s best friend, her rival for the stardrops and her teacher. Even though the roles are kind of cliché, they are still fun characters and especially Nori, Sumomo’s rival develops a lot her self in the last few episodes. Sumomo’s parents play only minor roles in the series and figure more as a part of the background of the story then as actual parents to Sumomo. It seems that the teacher has the father role in the series, except for one or two scenes.

Overall: 8
Yes this is another magical girl series and therefore it might not be for everyone, nevertheless its one of the better ones out there. Due to the length the series is perfect for a boring afternoon. It will bring you a mix of magical girl, innocent romance, friendship and hardships without being too predictable. In combination with its cute animation and great character development I find it a great watch and I really enjoyed myself.

March 2, 2008 :: Magical girl, Reviews, Romance :: No Comments »