I can't defer to the average of all my episode ratings, as I usually do, because I did not rate all episodes of this season. Since I've already seen them all at least twice by now, either when I was watching reruns on cable or during my 2014–present long-term project to properly watch the whole series, I'd rather forge ahead.
Maybe I'll return at some point to the episodes I didn't rate—but for now, I just know this was a superb season…so 9/10 it is.
Episode average: 7.9166666…
I'll round that to an 8. I really enjoyed this season, for the most part. It went in a lot of interesting directions, character-wise, even though there were parts that I thought could have been done better.
Mean episode rating: 7.85333…
Adjusted for enjoyment of the season arc: 8.5
Rounded down because 1/3 of the season (first & last two episodes) was kinda uninspiring: 8
This season started out a bit shaky, still finding its feet after the changes from the end of season 3. Then we got a solid 8 episodes of great stuff…followed by two more shaky episodes to round out the season. It's like the writers were fishing for ways to end the season on a cliffhanger after tying Islamabad up with a bow.
I'm going to miss Fara's character, though. She deserved more screen time, even if she did die to show what kind of man Haqqani is…which we already knew. He killed his own nephew, for fuck's sake.
Arithmetic mean of my episode ratings: 8.25
Sounds about right. It's a solid season. I've lost one of my reasons for watching now that Damian Lewis's character is dead, though. I can only hope the next season continues to be solid with the casting shakeup that seems to be inbound.
Average rating: 7.3
This is a pretty solid first season. Feels pretty episodic until the last couple of episodes, when a larger plot arc really develops (and leads up to a nice season-ending cliffhanger). Hopefully the arc continues. Episodic sci-fi is so 1990s, right?
Rating average: 7.46153846
I see great strides here from the studio that inflicted Sora no Method on the world. There are echoes of the same writing problems—the story's pretty convoluted, and you'll be lost easily if you miss any details—but less pronounced than the previous series. (Dimension W, I can't speak to…it's still on my watchlist.)
Flip Flappers has a lot to recommend it, even if it's only for the visuals. Papika will worm her way into your heart if you let your guard down even a little, and you'll get to visit a number of fantastical worlds with Ichimichi Mao's voice to guide you and Cocona along. While I don't know if I would call it "Superb" (a Trakt 9) or even "Great" (8), it's definitely a solid "Good" (7) plus—if Trakt allowed half-points I'd be giving this a 7.5.
Episode rating mean: 7.447
Episode rating median: 8
Final rating: 7
The first half of the season is pretty great. It holds up until the Interhigh arc starts, and entire episodes begin to be devoted to characters from rival high schools' cycling teams. Some of the most boring episodes are these studies of characters we, as the audience, have no reason to care about. In fact, we're predisposed to dislike them because they're competing with Souhoku.
I docked several episodes' ratings for spending far too much time letting Midousuji run his f*cking mouth. We get it: He's an asshole. He also gets much, much more screen time than he deserves… And I'm not entirely sure what's up with his character design. It's like whoever was in charge of designing him thought YowaPeda was going to be a horror anime…
Honestly, I probably would have dropped the show if not for my nephew, who got pretty obsessed with it. (We just finished the last 12 episodes in a 4.5-hour marathon today.) I'm probably stuck continuing, so I hope Midousuji gets the boot (though since he's a first-year, like Onoda, I doubt he will).
There are some great moments in this show, but they're buried in so much boring crap that it's a chore to watch.
Episode rating average: 7.333…
The show feels kinda slow for most of the season, like more should be happening. For the pacing, I'm knocking the score down a point. Would be more, but the ending ties it up nicely enough to make up for some of the slowness.
Episode rating average: 7.0
How did that happen? I don't know. But I do know that character development was too little too late for me to bump up the score any, so I'll stick with 7.
Episode rating average: 7.333…
Enjoyment: 9
Yield: 8.1666…, rounded to 8
Penalty: -1 point for over the top, out of place fanservice
Not completely solid, and not quite up to the expectations I had for it at the start of the season, but still a good show worth watching. Alternate history is always enjoyable, though I question some of the writing choices (like the slice-of-life episode in the middle that did nothing for the overall plot, or having Bergmann and Izetta both be still alive despite heavily implying that both died).
I would probably watch a second season of this, but I'd hope it had less fanservice and more solid writing (with fewer "coincidences" than used this season).
Average rating across episodes: 6.5
Subjective rating based on enjoyment: 3
5 it is, then. Had its good parts, but was far too bloody overall and didn't give any characters any depth. Not even the protagonist, really. Tried to be another Madoka, but fell far short.
Arithmetic mean of my scores for the season: 8.2727…
What I think the show as a whole deserves: 9.8
10 it is. What a stunningly beautiful series.
9.5/10 (if only trakt supported that)
By rights, I should give this season an 8 (my per-episode ratings average out to 8.41). But I enjoyed it a lot more than that. I don't feel like a 10 is completely justified, since I did have a few bones to pick with the narrative, but a 9 is a bit shy of what the show deserves.
I feel ambivalent about rounding this season's raw average of 8.6 up to a 9, but really…all that keeps me from giving the series a 10 is the Bermuda Triangle nonsense and the somewhat weak writing at the very end. The rest of the show is very strong, and it deserves the 9.
There's clearly a lot of substance in here, and it would have behooved the producers to greenlight a two-cour season to cover everything. Viewers unfamiliar with the source material, like myself, were no doubt pretty lost for most of the season because very little is explained well, if at all. I may or may not give the second season a chance when it airs in January. It was enjoyable, yes—but I don't feel like I would have missed anything if I'd dropped the show after only a couple episodes, as I was tempted to do.
Strictly speaking I should give this a 6 (episode ratings average out to 5.5 exactly)…but nah. It's too "Meh" to get anything higher.
I refuse to round my mean episode score of 4.91 up to a 5. This wasn't even "Meh".
By way of averaging my episode scores, this season should get a perfect 7.0, but I can't quite give it that. There's a long slump in the middle where the writing kinda goes to shit and nothing really interesting happens. I can take that kind of thing from a show if the characters are interesting or likable, but that's not particularly true of this cast.
My rating average for the season comes out to 6.61, which is good enough to round up to 7, I guess.
I still think this season was poorly paced, and too often written (and produced) to pander as much as possible to µ's fans. For details, see my comments on the individual episodes.
I watched the first half of this season in 4 days, and then stalled out for 5 months. Something shifted in the tone of the show that made it suddenly a lot less interesting around halfway through. There's a bit of a resurgence during the Awa arc, near the end, but it's still a mixed bag at best.
I'm not sure if I'm interested in a second season, should this get one, or not. It's certainly scripted to set up for continuation—and there are plenty more manga volumes to adapt—but the anime might or might not continue. Maybe it will, and maybe I'll watch it. Dunno yet.
