What They Say:
Kaito and Misaki face off in a final showdown with only minutes left until the BHB rocket is launched.
The Review:
Content: (please note that content portions of a review may contain spoilers)
Six months ago, I was very excited to start watching Robotics;Notes. After all, it had been a year since Steins;Gate had ended, and throughout that year I was blown away more and more every time I thought about it or re-watched any of it. It only took six months from its ending to have the anime adaptation of its successor, Robotics;Notes, announced, despite the source material not even having been released at the time. I was looking forward to this more than almost any other anime in years, thinking it could rival its predecessor. Of course, I had to remind myself that Steins;Gate wasn’t the only property in this lineage. Chaos;Head came before that, and the greatest purpose it ever served was keeping me from expecting too much greatness only to be crushed by disappointment. However, I had assumed that these creators couldn’t go back down to that level after Steins;Gate, and while this didn’t get quite as many episodes, its episode count was much closer to that of Steins;Gate than that of Chaos;Head. Plus, while it unfortunately didn’t get the same team as Steins;Gate, the series composition was being done by the same person, unlike Chaos;Head, so I still had hope.
Now that it’s over, I can safely say that I was right to assume that it would be better than Chaos;Head. And I never actually assumed that it would be as good as Steins;Gate, just that it would probably be one of the best anime since it. From the beginning, I’ve been a little disappointed, noting that it was definitely better than Chaos;Head but nothing compared to Steins;Gate, and while I’m glad that it never got worse, only getting better by very small amounts, I’m sad to see that it’s stuck at that same status, hardly progressing at all to the very end. And no, simply not being as good as one of the best things ever does not make this worthless garbage; it’s just that expecting greatness and getting mediocrity can be worse than expecting mediocrity and getting garbage. I’d like to believe that this experience will keep me from getting my hopes up for another anime in the future based solely on its relation to another one.
As I may have implied in saying that the series doesn’t end up getting too much better than it was before, this final episode is nothing special. It’s certainly at the highest level of quality the series has reached and I’m glad for that, but that level isn’t all that high, relatively speaking. While many recent episodes have had some big revelations for its characters and the audience alike, this one is pretty straightforward; the series gave us a simple plot the finale was clearly going to follow and it does so nicely without necessarily stepping out of the comfort zone to try anything ambitious. Even if it may be a bit predictable, the battle is still plenty tense. Initially it’s unclear how the situation will be resolved, and even when the solution presents itself fairly easily, there are definite risks involved, and there’s no guarantee that everything will go perfectly as planned.
One thing that is somewhat unique and interesting is that, while there are plenty of series that end with a mecha battle, the issue has rarely been treated with such realism, even in the “Real Robot” side of the genre. That’s of course because this is not a robot anime per se, and a “robotics” anime could be considered something quite different. This keeps the battle from being as spectacular as the ones that stick to the norm, but that’s not the point, and while the plot may be reduced to something more cliché than what I’d like to see from a series so grounded in the real world, I’m glad it didn’t entirely forget itself in the excitement.
Well, that probably works better if you forget that the power source is the monopoles that fell from the sky. With the conflict at hand, there’s not really any time to dedicate to explaining away some things that really deserve it, and as a result we’re left with some unfortunate plot holes that may have been better articulated with just 2 or 3 more episodes.
In Summary:
Robotics;Notes has been an enjoyable series for the most part and it’s both nice to see it wrap up happily and sad to see it go. However, it always had some problems holding it back from being really amazing, and it was frustrating to see them continue to pop up when I wanted to love the series so much more. Some of this was self-inflicted, as I wanted to believe that its connection to Steins;Gate (which is made even more apparent in watching it, as they even share a major character) would guarantee a certain level of quality that it just didn’t. I always knew there was a chance of this because of Chaos;Head, and it definitely always stayed better than that, but it also never got especially better throughout its run. In the end the story and character drama wraps up nicely but doesn’t leave much room to address the plot threads left dangling, which causes that frustration to last to the end. But if you’ve seen Steins;Gate (if not, stop reading this mid-sentence and go watch it!), this may be worth watching. Nae’s presence makes it difficult to avoid thinking about Steins;Gate, but try to enjoy this as its own world, while also the final installment of the Science Adventure series.
Grade: B-
Streamed By: FUNimation
Review Equipment:
Toshiba Satellite L655-S5191 PSK2CU-1C301U Notebook PC.
Perfect review, mate. Love every bit of what you said. This series was just okay for me; nothing special.
I made the same mistake: expectations were high but delivery wasn’t there.
Waiting for the Steins;Gate movie now. And I’m pretty sure it won’t disappoint. =D