Writer: orenio#1511
About a week ago, I sat down and rewatched one of my favorite anime movies of all time, Zutto Mae Kara Suki Deshita or “I’ve Always Liked You”. I’ll be honest, I was kind of scared when starting it up. I was really scared because I didn’t want to look like a crying fool in front of my friends who were there with me when I watched it. I did eventually end up crying but I also saw things that I hadn’t seen before when watching this again. Specifically the theme of always pushing forwards and not regretting that you could’ve tried even though things look rough.
Background and Plot
“I’ve Always Liked You” is a 2016 animated movie produced by Qualia Animation, directed by Tetsuya Yanagisawa, and written by Yoshumi Narita. The movie is based off of a project by HoneyWorks called Kokuhaku Jikko Iinkai Ren’ai Sires. It was released on april 23, 2016 in Japan distributed by aniplex.
A group of highschool students are going about their daily life, their highschool being the famed Sakuragaoka Highschool (Which is also the name of the highschool in K-ON). One day, Natsuki Enomoto confesses to her childhood friend Yu Setoguchi. Though sadly, this is just a practice confession for Natsuki, who wants to practice confessing so she can confess to the man she loves. We are then greeted by the opening cover which is an amazingly beautiful song. As we cut to the rest of the story, we just know we are in for one hell of a ride.
The Positives
First of all, the character design was on point. You could tell their personalities just by how each character looks. For me personally, character design is really important. If there’s someone that acts really shy but you make them look like someone who wouldn’t back down from a fight, that kinda ruins the character for me, but they did amazing with the characters for this movie.
Secondly, the emotions each character felt were really relatable and real. During the entire movie, when a character was feeling something after a situation or during a situation, I feel like myself and others would react exactly the same.
Finally, the plot. It was mostly copy and paste from the original project by honeyworks but it was so well structured and you could tell what was going to happen next if you thought hard enough. Everything that happened made sense as to why it happened, there was nothing at all that was out of place or that the audience didn’t have the resources to figure out.
The Negatives
Firstly, certain things that happened were pretty ordinary and cliche. When a scene started to happen, you could easily see where it was going and how it would turn out. If you are looking to see some new things, this isn’t for you.
Secondly, the amount of character development each character gets really differs. Characters that needed more character development didn’t get it, whilst others got too much character development in my opinion.
Finally, like I said earlier, the plot is kinda predictable and doesn’t have many twists. I really wanted more twists and things that surprised me, but sadly we didn’t get it. The ones we did get though aren’t extremely surprising which is pretty saddening.
Summary
All in all, I think this is a good movie if you don’t watch it really seriously. This is a story about taking the shot even when it looks like you’re going to miss. It has amazing character design, emotions that are relatable, and a not so bad plot. Overall, I would rate it a 7 out of 10, though this is a story that’s not for the faint of heart as you might want to cry throughout it. I definitely recommend it to everyone who wants to see a cute romance story about highschoolers trying to find their way.
nice
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