Anime: Ef - a Tale of Melodies.

Critic's Log - Earthdate: July 31, 2012. Review #16: Ef - A Tale of Melodies



The Past can be hard to leave behind, because remembering it might be
pleasant, but remembering it can also be painful. But the best way to
leave it behind is to keep moving forward to the future, do you have
memories that you do not want to forget? Anyway, here is Ef - A Tale of
Melodies!





Ef - A Tale of Melodies tells two stories (like "Memories" did) one
takes place in the past where Himura Yuu meets a girl named Amamiya
Yuuko who seems to know him, but he doesn't know her. However, he soon
remembers that she was a girl that he knew from long ago. Yuuko then
tells him something which he never knew. He was her first love since
then and her first love hasn't ended yet. The second story takes place
in the present (after the events in "Memories") Shuuchi Kuze meets the
cousin of Aso Renji, Hayama Mizuki and spends a lot of time with her.
Unknown to Mizuki, Kuze had contracted an illness and has little time to
live. Kuze had decided to break all romantic ties, but things go for
the worse when Mizuki tells him that she loves him.









To be technical, this is a Studio Shaft production (obviously). This
is also a sequel to Ef - A Tale of Memories. This is also an anime that
had great potential for Studio Shaft but this show almost looks like
Memories but with some differences. The animation is almost the same but
it's starting to look a lot better than Ef - A Tale of Memories.
Melodies is also much darker than Memories. There are a couple of dark
moments in Melodies; The 6th episode of Melodies was a bit haunting.
Which I wasn't expecting.







I might mention that the story is full of dialogue with some
non-violent action. Like Memories, the dialogue rarely stops. Back is
the melodrama (which is a bit darker this time). The romance is a bit
believable this time. There is a bit of a lot going on and you really
have to pay attention to what's going on. This is also a bit less boring
than Memories. and I guess Shin Oonuma surprised some people with the
tone of this anime than its predecessor on the direction of this anime.





When it comes to voice acting, The subtitled version is very good,
the dub isn't bad at all. I prefer the subs here because of cultural
settings. Christopher Ayres was the ADR director in the first series and
the dub was good in the first show and the same applies here.

The music by Eiichiro Yanagi and Tenmon has a different tone than
Memories, which is good because the music fits the tone of Melodies,
especially on the 6th episode of Melodies. The opening for Ef- a tale of
melodies is really good



The characters that are shown frequently in Melodies are a bit more
interesting than those that were in Memories, but some characters don't
really get developed that well. But oh well... The story is Melodies'
shortcoming.







The Visual gimmick that Memories sorta overuses is present, but the
usage of each application of these visual gimmicks is tolerable this
time.



Ef - A Tale of Melodies is available by Sentai Filmworks. The Ef
video games never made it in the US and never will be, the Ef manga and
light novels have not been licensed in the US as of yet.



With that said, I really appreciate the dark elements in Ef - a tale
of melodies, I like the really haunting visuals but I really don't have
much to say about this anime. If you liked Ef - A Tale of Memories,
you'll really like Ef- A Tale of Melodies. I cannot guarantee that the
effect of Memories will remain in Melodies. There are indeed some flaws
present in Melodies, Memories had some flaws too, but that was not a bad
anime. Ef - A Tale of Melodies isn't a bad anime either. It isn't a
masterpiece by any standard. It is really a good work of art with some
flaws.

I give Ef - A Tale of Melodies a 6.8 out of 10, it is DECENT!



Feel free to comment below, and can you hear it? The Melody of Truth?

Ef - a Tale of Melodies: "Guess you're all through, huh? You've done a man's job, son."

Long ago in a distant land, I, AKU, THE SHAPESHIFTING MASTER OF DARKNESS… Errr… Sorry, got a bit ahead of myself there…

I… Grudgeal… reviewed a Japanese visual novel adaptation called Ef – a Tale of Memories. At the time, I found the anime quite less than satisfactory, the show being impressive in backgrounds and visual effects but having a cast I would charitably refer to as ‘utterly bonkers’ that the story apparently wanted me to sympathise with (in a ‘I’m so sad for your Tragic Backstory and hope for True Love to cure all your problems!’ sense rather than the ‘oh my that is quite a bad case of abandonment issues you have there young lady, may I offer you the telephone number to my therapist?’ sense).

As it turns out, you can’t keep a good franchise, or at least one containing cute girls and drama, down. Ef – A Tale of Melodies is the second season and part prequel/part sequel of the original A Tale of Memories, covering remains of the minimalist cast who went alone and unloved in the original series. So, will this new season bring something new, improved and more impressive to the table with its refocused cast and intention to cast light upon the murky backstory of the first season’s Magical negro Nun?

Animation and Graphics: 7/10 -- Good, I would say better, use of symbolism and ‘artyness’, but there’s still the botox clone brigade to pull the score down.

Like the first season, A Tale of Melodies is animated and drawn by Studio SHAFT, a studio known for a minimalist, distinct art style that leads itself naturally to the shows that are already quite eccentric, like Sayonara, Zetsubou-Sensei and PaniPoniDash!!. In this case, what we get is that this animation gets used on a love drama, which leads to the animators compensating for the lack of crazy stuff to animate by jamming all the eccentricity into the navel-gazing segments. I must say this, the symbolism looks lovely and is relevant instead of randomly added for its own sake, adding to an improved graphical presentation from its prequel. Colours are vibrant, and the animation is decent for the most kind, and again the graphics do help in making this show slightly distinct from its peers.

This is not to say it’s all flawless, however: There are still problems of the same kind that plagued said prequel. The characters’ designs still look very non-distinct even if the backgrounds and symbolism pieces do, the world is still completely empty apart from said characters, with no people, cars, or anything around that isn’t directly impacting on the plot (which do make the characters easy to remember, but makes the world feel dead and empty). Furthermore, the characters have a really poor sense of facial expression and expressing emotion: For the most part, all dialogue is merely that of completely frozen faces with some mouth-flaps, and apart from a few grins from the Manic Pixie Dream Girl, the facial expressions are sadly limited and, it must be said, not very expressive at that.

Audio: 6/10 – SHAFT should have done this silent-film style, like they did in that other show.

The audio aspect of A Tale of Memories is also much like its first season. The music is good and the effects are perfectly serviceable, but the problem, once again, lies in a truly inspiring choice of voices, if the casting managers were inspired by the concept of annoying my eardrums. Yes, I know, these are all the same voice actors from the prequel since there are (practically) no new characters, but that doesn’t make them much better to listen to: The females are nasally, high-pitched and tear at my old indistinct-gender ears, and the males are flat, uninspired and lack any distinction in delivery. This also makes delivering the emotions of the characters properly – which I for one would say is rather important in a love story – difficult, and may go some way to explain why I don’t really *like* any of the cast very much.

Story: 3/10 –- “Look, friendship isn't going to cure this man.” “Silence, non-believer! Go back to your leeches and your potions! The power of friendship and Tristan's beautiful singing voice will heal him!”

As I already alluded to in the intro, A Tale of Melodies follows up A Tale of Memories by shifting our focus from the original pairs to an additional two love stories: A past story involving the caretaker and the magical negro nun who played chaperones/moral support to the loons last time, and that of a violinist with Terminal Soap Opera Disease (ok, fair’s fair; it’s explicitly said to be a heart condition, but still) who attracts his very own Manic Pixie Dream Girl to help deal with his condition.

Since summarizing the entire plot of both stories would be a waste of space and time, let me just summarize what they stand for instead: Both stories are fairly standard soap-opera-esque love dramas, starting out as brooding boy meets cheerful girl with unnatural interest in him and the two instantly falling in love (even if the man won’t admit it), but then taking them in different directions. The negro nun story concerns a “I must protect you” plot of the vulnerable female from a cartoonishly evil stepbrother and dealing with the indelible stain on your soul left by ‘stupid things you did while six years old’. Meanwhile, the violinist and MPDG have a fairly standard MPDG love story: The boy angst and whines while the MPDG tries to break him out of his shell and make him love again with no real thought to herself or what drives her beyond her obvious attraction to him.

Then there’s the common plot points about twin cities with a weird symmetry, people living only for their loves’ sakes, childhood promises, ghosts, tragic backstories, drama and angst out of nowhere, and true love, miracles and dreams making everyone happy in the end: Fairly standard stuff for its genre, more or less – about the only thing I was missing was the Evil Twin, but the Japanese haven’t started getting into that cliché quite yet (which is a shame: That nun would look interesting with an Evil Twin Beard).

While the story is paced better than the prequel, the characters are *marginally* less insane, and we get some slightly better closure what with all the stories finally getting tied together, I still wasn’t impressed: Much of it was rather predictable. I have no doubt some people find this incredibly riveting and moving, but I think I’ve seen one too many soap operas, as well as too much of that thing called ‘real life’. And I find there’s a definite dissonance between the show’s core message of hopes and dreams when the characters constantly get random drama tossed in their laps that they don’t so much ‘overcome’ or work their way through as just go away by having the pair reaffirm their love for the nth time. Take as an example the way the prequel’s stories are presented here: Apparently, the girl who had physical brain damage/anterograde amnesia from a car crash is now all fine due to having found True Love… Somebody should call the medical journals.

Characters: 3/10 –- Hey writers, it’s called ‘subtlety’. Read up on it some time.

The core cast of A Tale of Melodies suffers from the same problems, albeit possibly not *as* badly, as the cast of A Tale of Memories: Namely, the ‘love story’ is more or less thrown in from day one without build-up, and the cast has a bit of a problem insinuating themselves in my heart as characters rather than just participants in the awkward love story. This is particularly noticeable in the violinist/MPDG pairing, where the characters are hurried together and she falls for him by the second episode: We’re given practically no way to define her as a human being *without* the context of her male counterpart around (said male gets off slightly better, but it’s still mostly angst and guilty love on his part).

And then of course there’s the main new character, the evil stepbrother who serves as antagonist for the backstory arc with the magical negro nun: I believed I used the word ‘cartoonish’ and I stand by it. He may have been intended to be a tragic-villain-dark-mirror-image-of-protagonist kind of thing, but to me he could only have been *less* subtle as a evil scumbag by having his name changed to “Dark lord Evilsmugjerk the child-raping kitten-eater”. The whole part where nobody can call the police on him either becomes a giant plot hole to my Western sensibilities, apparently to the Japanese getting help will spoil the poor victim’s honour or something and we can’t have that.

As I mentioned, the violinist/MPDG arc actually plays with the formula common to this show’s last season in making the girl the ‘support pillar’ for the male, but without changing the fact that it’s still the girl who’s defined by the man (like in the other stories) while it’s the boy who actually has an existence beyond “I love her”: The end result being that the girl becomes, in the words of Nathan Rabin, a “Manic Pixie Dream Girl”: A cheery, upbeat little bundle of energetic male wish fulfilment intended to drag the poor male out of his slump without getting much in the way of defining moments herself. In the end, I can’t bring myself to care for any of them.

Value: 3/10 –- If the prequel was Gingivitis, this is more like badly treated dental Caries.

In its core, A Tale of Melodies has exactly the same problems that its prequel/predecessor did. Take a bunch of unhealthy male wish-fulfilment assumptions about the nature of love vs. obsession and rationality, spice it up with a complete lack of snappy or imaginative dialogue or characters, and some character chemistry that really fails to interlock until *after* the characters are supposedly in love, and then boil in a broth made from the dissonance between the core message of the story – that dreams and miracles and happy puppies will solve all, and good people get their just rewards and the world can be a better place if you just believe – with random events that punish or fail to punish characters simply for the cause of elongating the drama out to 12 episodes in true soap opera fashion, as if set in motion by some vindictive or sadistic God.

The result is not a particularly tasty dish. It tastes mostly salty, like crocodile tears spilled at the altar of a story made for the sake of drama instead of for the sake of having anything to say by *using* said drama. This show is sorely lacking in any true originality, points of distinction (beyond the music and visuals, obviously) or other traits that would specifically endear the franchise to me in a world filled with telenovels and soap operas using much the same progression and plot points and Japanese moe anime using the same character archetypes, male/female relationships and the complete dissonance between cynically pushing stories that emphasise the complete *absence* of cynicism in its audience for quick moneys.

If you like this type of show, there’s the key visual works adaptations, Angel Beats!, Toradora, and pretty much *any* show, harem or otherwise, involving ‘cute girl meets teenage boy’ made for the male demographic for you to enjoy. If you’re like me and into the schadenfreude angle, I heartily recommend White Album for your viewing discretion.

Enjoyment: 5/10 -– Tragedy is when I cut my finger. Comedy is when stupid people burn to death unrealistically while babbling about their dead little sisters.

It was once said that comedy is like tragedy, the only difference being a lack of sympathy for the character. Put simply, things that are tragedy to a *character* can also become the focal point of comedy for the audience, simply because the show intends for you to laugh *at* them instead of suffering *with* them. Many ‘so bad, they are good’ shows also do this to an involuntary degree – how many here can honestly say they felt the pathos and drama intended behind Plan Nine From Outer Space?

What you, who have read the review so far, can probably guess I’m getting at is this: I have already noted the problem with the believability and build-up of the characters, their romantic entanglements, and the seemingly at random bad stuff that happens for little or no internally consistent reason. And without the sympathy, these events that should be tragedy, become comedy (or frustration at the plot holes and the inconsistency). I ended up laughing at a lot of things the show probably didn’t intend for me to laugh at. Apart from awakening fond (and less-than-fond) memories of White Album, these moments of sadistic laughter actually helped increase my enjoyment of the show, giving it a boost over its predecessor.

I won’t lie to you and say my viewing of this show did *not* involve a lot of facepalming and me getting bored or annoyed over the lack of consistency or innovation, or that I completely failed at getting at least somewhat immersed in the occasional tender moment, because both did happen. But while the original show was something of an 8-2 annoyance-immersion ratio, this season was more like a 6-2-2 annoyance-schadenfreude-immersion ratio, and it’s a difference I feel like highlighting. This, arguably, to you, may not seem like much. But it’s *something*.

Final Score: 4.5/10 -– An improvement, if ever-so-slight.

I really didn’t want to get involved in this franchise again (as seen in the delay between the review of the first season and this one), but I owed someone a review and I felt I owed the show a second chance. I have now done both. And was it worthwhile? My answer becomes a definite ‘eh’. This season *was* better done than the last, but more than anything I just feel relief of having finished with this story for good now and never having to lay eyes on it again.

If it’s a dramatic love story with cute teenaged girls you want out of your anime, I believe there are worse things to look at than Ef – a Tale of Melodies. But I wholeheartedly *know* there are better ones.

Ef- A Tale of Melodies is more of a continuation than a sequel to A Tale of Memories. It tells the tale of the older generation (Kuze, Yuko, and Himura) that seemed to show up randomly but at key moments in the first series to give the young couples words of advice. This series greatly deepens the meaning of the relationships in Memories and puts the whole "two cities" and other ideas in perspective. The story very nicely generalizes to the main story behind Himura-Yuuko and Kuze-Mizuki while still maintaining cameo appearances by the cast in the original Memories.

This series, unlike many other recent watches, attempts to carry a message to the viewer rather than just serving as a means of entertainment. On the note of entertainment, this series is VERY DARK. I would not recommend this series for those under 14. A Tale of Melodies is a very, very sad tale indeed. This series is not for the faint of heart as some scenes/stories verge on disturbing. However, the entire point behind the series combined (Memories and Melodies) is the theme of perseverance and hope.

Melodies did an outstanding job of uniting the stories of both series as well as bringing a satisfying sense of completion to the series. The ending is very well planned and executed (contrast with DCIISS) and left me very impressed. I had high expectations for this series after Memories and it did not disappoint.

Animation:
The animation quality is very high, making use of many colors giving the series a feeling of warmth or coldness when appropriate. Characters are well drawn and emotions are very apparent at times, basically expect what you saw from Melodies.

There are many stylistic points that are unique to the Ef series including halos around characters in dark environments and simple yet potent artistic animation sequences.

Many may disagree with me on the animation score due to the fact that many of the animation sequences seem cheap, such as having the characters be in just one color (not coloring them in) or other easily-animated "short-cuts". However, I feel that this is an artistic decision and successfully contributes to the underlying theme of incompleteness. If you pay attention to the OPs/EDs (as in Memories), the final one is different as now the story is complete and the characters have now been fully exposed (and thus no longer opaque!).

As I believe the animation decisions were key to the presentation and feel of the series, I felt the drawing style complemented the story and themes perfectly. As close to a masterpiece as I have seen recently.

Sound:
The OP is done by ELISA just as in Melodies. Though the song is not as vibrant as in the previous series, it still has the same general feel to it. It is in somewhat broken English but those watching this are probably already used to it from Melodies. There are multiple EDs as in Memories and those are fair in quality, comparable to Melodies. The BGM is very reminiscent of the first series. It carries a calm yet not quite friendly feel and compliments the atmosphere created by the artistic style and animation.

The voice actors are the same as in Memories though the main VAs have shifted. Those that had a supporting role in the Memories are now the main VAs (!). Yuko has a particular difficult role and the VA did an awesome job. If I had anything against the series it would be Himura's voice. He doesn't seem to have the enthusiasm that most of the other characters show, even more so than his character is portrayed as. There is a repeated theme that is played throughout the series. It starts as a fragment of a memory and develops slowly into a complete song by the end of the series, again a great execution decision that adds to the climax.

Story:
Yu Himura, Yuko Amamiya, Kuze, and Mizuki were all supporting character in Memories. Now they take center stage as their past and present are told in an intricate tale that also links to relationships in the original Melodies series.

As in the original story, the story takes place in two cities, one in Japan and one in Australia. The two mirror cities is a theme that will be exploited greatly and finally fully explained by the end of the series.

The two main stories are the history of Yu Himura and Yuko Amamiya and the present development between Kuze and Mizuki. Both stories are told concurrently in a similar fashion to Melodies, the difference being that Yuko's story is in the past. There aren't episodic cliffhangers, as the entire series as a whole is a cliffhanger in that each episode serves as a teaser to whet the watcher's appetite. Many of the characters have had a very dark past and/or present and these are explained in excruciating detail, giving the viewer a sense of the pain of the characters. As mentioned previously, some of these are quite graphic and may not be appropriate for younger audiences. However, the series then puts everything into perspective and finally leaves the watcher with a very philosophical message of hope at the end. The conclusion explains many of the happenings in both Memories and Melodies and gives a final sense of conclusion which is fitting for a series such as this.

Overall, the stories are intricate and well planned. Expect some surprises along the way that deepen the meaning of both series.

Character:
The development of the main characters takes the majority of the series as the viewer is brought to their thoughts. It is very difficult to say much here without spoiling parts of the story but suffice to say all the characters have had significant difficulties in their past that they are trying to overcome. The exposition of each character is wonderful (yet painful) and the main characters from the previous series also return to explain how their roles are actually related to the main stories in the present.

Value:
Melodies is a wonderful, yet painful, experience that explains many of the confusing aspects that were in Memories. It is show full of details and buried themes that the philosophical-minded viewer will enjoy. As many of the subtle points are buried behind animation sequences and hints, a rewatch will definitely reward the viewer. This series truly breathes life into a genre that I haven't watched in a while. Pick this up if you've watched Memories and liked the artistic qualities and get ready for quite an adventure.

Read this review only if you have seen the first season.

A striking yet, beautiful continuation linking memories to melodies.

After watching the first season it did not disappoint at all. I didn't really think that another season was planned so it did come as a surprise for me when this season came about. My first reactions to this season were mainly positive, however after a few episodes I suddenly lost interest. This season followed a similar structure to the first but just did not have the same impact when I first began watching it.

So after a long break and with the completion of the series I finally sat down and finished the series. When I watched the first season I did a full series sit through so it felt more comfortable as well doing the same again. Fortunately for me this was not the only redeeming quality of the series. At first I thought the series had little to do with the previous but as you watch the links become more obvious and really, at the end you feel that the series is done.

A tale of melodies follows two separate love stories just like the first that are linked together through various events and characters. In this season is broken into Himura and Yuuko as high school students Mizuki and Kuze in the present. All of them were minor characters from the first season but still played a significant role.

Animation
The animation gives the same look and feel as the first season. Thus it is no surprise that it is quite good quality and nice to look at. Of course it is not perfect and you do find some distortion in characters and background now and then. However when it really matters the scenery is beautiful and the emotions shown from the characters can be clearly felt. The only annoying part in the animation is when they fill the screen with words or random still pictures. That takes up some time I think that even if they shortened the scenes it would have the same impact.

Sound
The first season featured some top notch Ost and theme songs and fortunately this season followed suit. The only thing I can say is the opening song was really similar to the original one and that didn't appeal to me as much. Other then that the music definitely kept me going. Throughout the series you hear this one specific violin tune that stands and it really sticks in your head. Its not very complicated but it definitely captured my heart and pulled me into the anime. The voices and sound effects were also just as good if not better then the first season. All the voices were kept the same and it was well done.

Story
For a drama/romance I was surprised how well they linked the first and second season. Really it left me quite speechless but I think this was because the actual novel was written well and meant for it to be connected in this way. However the case the plot flows quite well and coherently. I think the only downside of both seasons was that every story always ended happy. They would always led up to very unfortunate and painful events but somehow make it happy again. I guess in a sense it was also the magic of the story, but if I had to compare this to real life I couldn't kid myself and think that any of this would actually happen.

Character
Its hard to describe really how I feel about the characters. In one way it felt that they made a great effort to create main characters that go through a 360 degree change. Then on the otherhand they are stretched in ways that aren't satisfying for me. It did hit the spot and it was really moving in many ways. It just that the extremity of the situations always made it a bit hard to relate to and actually get convinced. For me I always find characters that I can relate to the best and in this case I really don't see myself relating to any of them. But what actually bothered me was more the side characters. They did have main characters from the first season appear but all of them only came to aid the new main characters. I would of liked to see a little more struggle even if they did find "true" love.

Value and Enjoyment
The complete anime together came as a package and watching the entire thing does give you a nice message. it really tries show the watchers that hope can be found no matter how bad a situation can get and push the watcher to continue to struggle for what they dream of no matter what. I think that it is an important thing and from watching the series it does leave some impact. I will probably consider rewatching this in the future to see if I have still find the story and characters so unbelievable. With all that being said I did enjoy this series. It was a really refreshing watch since I've been mainly watching love comedies and action animes lately. I really needed a serious one to change up my mood. I would recommend this to fans who like serious romance and dramas. So if you watch it hope you enjoy it as much as I did.