Lately, I've taken to watching anime with a few good friends of mine. Between getting to spend time together and watching anime, for me it is a win-win situation. We usually try to find stuff that is somewhat serious but also a good watch and that is entertaining. When I stumbled upon Kami-Sama Dolls, I was hoping this was the serious anime we were looking for, maybe with a bit of mecha and super natural thrown in. I could not have been more wrong sadly.
Our plot starts off with our main character, Kyouhei, moving into the city from a secluded small town in the mountains. In the small town, they have people called Seki, and they control these dolls that are revered as gods and sometimes use them to fight other people. While in the city, Kyohei and his friend, Hibino, come across a pile of bodies one night and immediately his childhood friend,Aki, shows up and Kyohei tries to blame the murder on him. As the plot progresses, it turns into a mess of trying to figure out who killed all of those people, as well a mess of back stories. Amongst the back stories, is the reason why Aki became exiled from the village and the beginnig of the story of a doll with no seki.
The plot for this anime has one major problem: pacing. You can clearly tell they wanted twenty four episodes but they were only granted thirteen. They crammed so much into one episode it felt like each episode was an hour long when in reality they were half that. Another issue was while they crammed so much in one episode it felt like it was just dragging on and on, it felt like nothing ever truely got accomplished.
The characters somehow are worse than the plot. Our main character,Kyohei, is hinted to have been a really powerful Seki when he held the title later in the series, but we never see evidence of that. He just comes off as every other male main character I have ever encountered. His little sister,Utao, took over his position as Seki, but while she should have been powerful, she just comes off as childish and gets angry over stupid things. Worst yet, she was so childish and innocent that everyone fawned over her to the point that i felt awkward watching those scenes. Kyohei's love interest, Hibino, had one the flattest personalities I have ever seen. Her character development began and ended in boobs. When she gets kidnapped, the Mahiru, Kyohei's stalker, just knows her as the girl with the boobs, nothing else. Aki, our main antagonist, is supposed to be this misunderstood supposed pyschopath, but he usually just end up being bland as ever.
The art was another pitfall for this anime. Our characters look bland and if I didn't know they were our main characters, they would have faded into the background. Another qualm my friend and I had was the fact that Hibino's boobs seemed to change sizes depending on the shot. Now I do understand angles, but they seemed to change sizes by the frame. The backgrounds them selves were nothing spectacular to be honest. The only redeeming quality about the art was the art and animation of the dolls, and even that was poor.
Over all,although usually when I watch a bad anime, I can enjoy it. However, with Kami-sama Dolls, the lack of enjoyment made this anime even more boring. It just took its self too seriously, making this anime even worse.
