Enjoy this terrible yet awful dub
Before I get too far, I should preface this by saying that I love Gainax to death. I’m supposed to though, and so is everyone else. They’re a “for the people by the people” kind of company, a collection of otakus who got together to make better giant robots than anyone else and succeeded in making some of the medium’s most respected movies and shows (Neon Genesis Evangelion, FLCL, Wings of Honneamise). But even the Kings of Fanservice aren’t invulnerable to missteps or moe trends, and This Ugly Yet Beautiful World frustratingly proves that.
Story
It’s a sci-fi romance, I guess. Alien girl comes to Earth, has no body, uses “ideal girl” image from first person she meets on the planet, who happens to be a boy with a troubled past. I haven’t specifically seen this plot before, but for some reason “original” was not the word that came to mind. I can’t go as far as to call it dumb, the writers never insulted my intelligence. But unlike Gainax’s best work, they didn’t reward it either. The story takes a a different and more epic (but not entirely unexpected) turn halfway, but I really have no urge to say anything positive about it. I certainly can’t explain it without “spoiling” it. The comedy is overdone and typically ham-fisted, whoops-boobies-in-your-face style. The tragedy isn’t particularly tragic. And the romance is stilted and unrewarding, even for an anime.
Characters
I finished this series yesterday, and I’ve already forgotten the names of the characters. Hold on while I look them up.
Back.
In the middle of looking, I realized I didn’t care.
Does it matter, they’re all shallow archetypes — even the mains, “tragic Shinji hero kid with parental issues” and “magical/space girl.” Other than that, you have the old “reliable buddy with advice,” “loud and stupid duo of male friends,” “inexplicable cousin crush,” “older perverted beer-drinking lady (flip 50-50 for American),” and “pointless girls just there to show you how much in love with the magical girl you should be.” Characters wear the fuck out really fast when you know them from the first second of the first episode. And seriously, I heard the “Magical Girl Purupurin” song (“Little girls… can’t be satisfied… with just a text message”) from Welcome to the NHK every time the main space girl was onscreen. So I guess that’s some entertainment factor.
Animation
Animation and art from this Gainax/Shaft pairing are high quality stuff for the most part. The few action scenes are nothing original but well drawn, well paced, and exciting. Character designs aren’t great, but they do their job. Typically Gainax, the monsters have a somewhat Angel-like look to them, and the lone robot is very cool looking in a comedic sort of way. What surprised me is the extreme moe-factor of the space girl designs. It’s so kawaii ^_^ they look like they walked out of the drawings for Kanon, although sadly they lack the same visual appeal.
Tragically, fanservice really seems to be the driving force behind this show. Until the last couple episodes, it’s pretty rare to go a whole 24 minutes without an ass shot, a naked pair of breasts, or a hyper-slutty outfit on the American scientist-lodger-lecher character Jennifer. So, if you’re into fanservice enough to let it carry a whole series, you’ll freaking love this.
Dub
I’ve been waiting 5 or 6 paragraphs to lay into this thing, only to find that there’s nothing to really say about it other than holy shit it’s bad. The script is OK, sure, but ADV’s second-string actors are just terrible. I seriously feel bad for these people because there must have been something horribly wrong. Cynthia Martinez (Martian Successor Nadesico) in the space girl role apparently mistook “breathy” for “smoke all day until you sound like Bonnie Tyler after a knife to the throat.” I’ll give her some credit though for not dropping dead while delivering lines like “Look at all the colors!” Shelley Black as the American scientist is a terrible attempt at crossing Air‘s Aunt Haruko with Evangelion‘s Misato. She should have actually been drunk, it might have taken the Wood Factor down to “Pine” at least. And the lead, Braden Hunt, just hurts me. The only good delivery in the whole thing comes from Paul Oddo as the robot. Take this guy off the bench and put him in a dub you care about, ADV.
Bottom Line
Other than the dub, there’s nothing terribly offensive about this show. It was somewhat entertaining but never engaging. I didn’t care about the characters, excepting the times when I wanted to smack the Dragonball hair right off the protagonist. But mostly, it went by in a pleasantly forgettable display of fanservice, weak jokes, and weaker romantic tragedy.
