Aired-July 4th 2016-September 19th 2016
Production Studio-TMS Entertainment
Hello and welcome to the first official episode of Anime Experience. The show where I review and rank every anime I see in a given year. 2017 has been a bit of a slow year, both for this blog and in terms of my anime viewing. It kind of says something when we're this far into the year, and this is the first anime I've seen completely all year. With that said I should begin the review. Sweetness and Lightning is a slice of life, cooking anime. I'll just say this right off the bat, t is good, and is probably one of the best slice of life anime I've seen. That said though there are some minor problems I have with it. Nothing too bad, but let's just dig into Sweetness and Lightning and maybe learn how to cook a few dishes along the way.
The anime begins with an assistant teacher named Kohei Inuzaka. 6 months before the series started his wife dies due to...uh, I'm not sure. Some sort of illness. Either way he was left a widow and a single father of his daughter Tsumugi. He doesn't cook a lot of food, he mostly resorts to microwaveable stuff and pre-made bento meals, because he's busy and doesn't have much talent in terms of cooking. One day they see one of Kohei's students eating by herself. Her name in Kotori. She was supposed to be eating with her mother, but something came up with her work so now Kotori's alone. Tsumugi takes interest in the home cooked meal she was eating, but unfortunately Kotori ate it all. She does decide to invite Kohei and Tsumugi to her family's restaurant though. Kohei doeen't seem interested, but then he sees Tsumugi craving a proper meal like her mother use to make. Kohei feels bad for neglecting to give his daughter a proper meal for so long, thus he decides to go to the restaurant. It's closed, but Kotori invites them in anyway. Again, she's alone. Her mother's a really famous chef so that's why she's always so busy. It seems Kotori doesn't know much about cooking either, but manages to put a decent bowl of rice together. The two love it. Kotori then suddenly asks if Kohei wants to join her more often and cook with her. Luckily this anime doesn't take place in America, cause I'm pretty sure a teacher would be put through some sort of hell from the school if he agreed. Either way Kohei is still unsure weather it'd be ok. He gets reassurance from the principal, and Kotori's mom writes a letter explaining it's ok. So with all that settled the group begins cooking together. Over the course of the series Kohei becomes a better cook, and is able to cook more meals for Tsumugi. He also grows as a father. Not that he was ever incompetent as a parent. He is shown to really care for Tsumugi. He's just not perfect. In reality no father truly is. The trick is to be as good as you possibly can, and improve in the areas where it's necessary. Which is what Kohei does, and it's really sweet to see him develop like that. Kotori meanwhile finally has someone she can indulge in her passion with. You see, like a lot of anime girls, she really likes to eat. She's not very good at cooking though and her mother's never around, so she's in a bit of a rough place. Like Kohei her cooking skills improve. Since her mom is a chef she does have the basic knowledge to get the group started, and access to her recipe's. In reality she could probably do the cooking by herself, but she has a huge fear of knives that keeps her from doing that. I'll talk about that later. Tsumugi also goes through some development, like learning to appreciate her dad more and not crying as often. Like most slice of life shows there isn't much to the premise. It's all in the characters, and I like the characters.
Kohei is a great father, not just to Tsumugi but to Kotori as well. Well...father figure anyway. He does end up giving her some pretty good advice in one episode. Most of his personality stems from wanting to care for Tsumugi, but I think it works. He's constantly developing as a father in a really well done manner so because of that he's enjoyable to watch. He's really polite and kind to just about everyone he meets as well.
Kotori is a loner. She doesn't seem super shy, she just doesn't really mind being alone. She probably got use to it considering how often her mother leaves her alone. She has only one close friend, who we'll get to later. I feel like eventually anyone gets tired of being lonely and so that's why she asked Kohei to help her with cooking. It's again really sweet that they're able to get together and she finally has someone to indulge in her love of food with. None of them can really cook, but they learn and grow together which is really nice to watch. I feel it helps develop their relationship.
Tsumugi, like her father, has some great development near the end. She probably has the most personality though out of everyone. She's highly energetic, doesn't like being scolded, and can be prone to feeling sad. She also has this vivid imagination. They could've just created this bland character to just be cute and attract an audience, and while she's kinda like that they did try and give her an actual personality. She never crosses the line into bratty or annoying either. I do have a high tolerance towards little kids though, so some might see her as that. Again though, she goes through some development.
These are the three main characters we are stuck with, and I enjoy watching them all. I know I'm saying this a lot, but it's really sweet how cooking can bring this group of different people together. They all have different experiences with cooking, but they all grow as chefs together. I'm always a fan of stories where characters, who otherwise wouldn't of met, meet up because of their love for one thing in particular. In this case it's cooking.
We got two other characters as well. Kohei's best friend named Yagi, and Kotori's friend Shinobu.
Yagi is a laid back, cool character. He's an actual chef as well. He helps watch Tsumugi when ever Kohei can't get her to daycare or get a sitter. It's pretty clear he cares for Tsumugi as well. In fact the only time he's unchill is in this one scene where Tsumugi was in danger.
Shinobu seems more like a tsundere-like character. She cares for Kotori, and other than that doesn't have much going on. She's bland, but she doesn't appear much so she doesn't bog anything down.
Honestly my biggest, and pretty much only, problem with the show is that I feel it needed more episodes to develop the characters and their relationships with one another. Kohei and Tsugumi's was good, but I feel like some of the other relationships could've been developed more. Especially Kohei and Kotori's and the one Yagi and Shinobu form. Not to say that the development we did get with the relationships was bad. No, it was good. I just feel like they could've expanded upon them more. Maybe if they had 24 episodes instead of 12. I feel like the manga this anime is based off of would have more development in that department. It's still ongoing and has a decent amount of chapters under it's belt, with 8 volumes total so far. If anything this anime does make me want to read the manga to see if and how they develop everything better. I also wanted some sort of resolution with Kotori's knife problem, or at least a sign that she gets better about it. Nope, there's none of that though. I understand it was mostly used for a couple of quick jokes, but it still would've been nice to see. Oh well, I can't really fault the anime for it. It's not like they never did anything with the plot point. With all that said though I still enjoyed myself while watching the anime. Every second of it. Even the cooking segments were fun. The characters were good, the music was ok., the opening and ending themes were great though. The animation is really good, and overall it's worth watching if you're a fan of slice of life stuff. If you want a heartwarming anime about people coming together to enjoy something this is the anime for you. Sure you might want some more development, but you'll still enjoy what you get. It's like vanilla ice cream. You may want more flavor, but vanilla ice cream is still really good.
Overall everything gets a check, except for music which gets a check minus as the opening and ending were really the only songs that were memorable.
So yes, this anime is highly recommended. So over the course of the year I'm going to compare every anime I've seen by ranking them from best to worst. Near the end of the year we'll see where everything stacked up. So since this is the only anime I've finished all year it gets the number one spot by default.
1-Sweetness and Lightning
And that's Sweetness and Lightning. If you took off the lightning part it'd live up to it's name. It's a really sweet and heartwarming show. Guess there's nothing else to say.
Thanks for reading and I'll see you later.
Peace.
Next up-A Little Snow Fairy Sugar
Other anime I plan on watching:
Charlotte
Big Order
Diabolik Lovers
God help me if what I heard about Diabolik Lovers and Big Order is true.
Oh and I also had a few test title cards for this episode that I wanted to share.
The anime begins with an assistant teacher named Kohei Inuzaka. 6 months before the series started his wife dies due to...uh, I'm not sure. Some sort of illness. Either way he was left a widow and a single father of his daughter Tsumugi. He doesn't cook a lot of food, he mostly resorts to microwaveable stuff and pre-made bento meals, because he's busy and doesn't have much talent in terms of cooking. One day they see one of Kohei's students eating by herself. Her name in Kotori. She was supposed to be eating with her mother, but something came up with her work so now Kotori's alone. Tsumugi takes interest in the home cooked meal she was eating, but unfortunately Kotori ate it all. She does decide to invite Kohei and Tsumugi to her family's restaurant though. Kohei doeen't seem interested, but then he sees Tsumugi craving a proper meal like her mother use to make. Kohei feels bad for neglecting to give his daughter a proper meal for so long, thus he decides to go to the restaurant. It's closed, but Kotori invites them in anyway. Again, she's alone. Her mother's a really famous chef so that's why she's always so busy. It seems Kotori doesn't know much about cooking either, but manages to put a decent bowl of rice together. The two love it. Kotori then suddenly asks if Kohei wants to join her more often and cook with her. Luckily this anime doesn't take place in America, cause I'm pretty sure a teacher would be put through some sort of hell from the school if he agreed. Either way Kohei is still unsure weather it'd be ok. He gets reassurance from the principal, and Kotori's mom writes a letter explaining it's ok. So with all that settled the group begins cooking together. Over the course of the series Kohei becomes a better cook, and is able to cook more meals for Tsumugi. He also grows as a father. Not that he was ever incompetent as a parent. He is shown to really care for Tsumugi. He's just not perfect. In reality no father truly is. The trick is to be as good as you possibly can, and improve in the areas where it's necessary. Which is what Kohei does, and it's really sweet to see him develop like that. Kotori meanwhile finally has someone she can indulge in her passion with. You see, like a lot of anime girls, she really likes to eat. She's not very good at cooking though and her mother's never around, so she's in a bit of a rough place. Like Kohei her cooking skills improve. Since her mom is a chef she does have the basic knowledge to get the group started, and access to her recipe's. In reality she could probably do the cooking by herself, but she has a huge fear of knives that keeps her from doing that. I'll talk about that later. Tsumugi also goes through some development, like learning to appreciate her dad more and not crying as often. Like most slice of life shows there isn't much to the premise. It's all in the characters, and I like the characters.
Kohei is a great father, not just to Tsumugi but to Kotori as well. Well...father figure anyway. He does end up giving her some pretty good advice in one episode. Most of his personality stems from wanting to care for Tsumugi, but I think it works. He's constantly developing as a father in a really well done manner so because of that he's enjoyable to watch. He's really polite and kind to just about everyone he meets as well.
Kotori is a loner. She doesn't seem super shy, she just doesn't really mind being alone. She probably got use to it considering how often her mother leaves her alone. She has only one close friend, who we'll get to later. I feel like eventually anyone gets tired of being lonely and so that's why she asked Kohei to help her with cooking. It's again really sweet that they're able to get together and she finally has someone to indulge in her love of food with. None of them can really cook, but they learn and grow together which is really nice to watch. I feel it helps develop their relationship.
Tsumugi, like her father, has some great development near the end. She probably has the most personality though out of everyone. She's highly energetic, doesn't like being scolded, and can be prone to feeling sad. She also has this vivid imagination. They could've just created this bland character to just be cute and attract an audience, and while she's kinda like that they did try and give her an actual personality. She never crosses the line into bratty or annoying either. I do have a high tolerance towards little kids though, so some might see her as that. Again though, she goes through some development.
These are the three main characters we are stuck with, and I enjoy watching them all. I know I'm saying this a lot, but it's really sweet how cooking can bring this group of different people together. They all have different experiences with cooking, but they all grow as chefs together. I'm always a fan of stories where characters, who otherwise wouldn't of met, meet up because of their love for one thing in particular. In this case it's cooking.
We got two other characters as well. Kohei's best friend named Yagi, and Kotori's friend Shinobu.
Yagi is a laid back, cool character. He's an actual chef as well. He helps watch Tsumugi when ever Kohei can't get her to daycare or get a sitter. It's pretty clear he cares for Tsumugi as well. In fact the only time he's unchill is in this one scene where Tsumugi was in danger.
Shinobu seems more like a tsundere-like character. She cares for Kotori, and other than that doesn't have much going on. She's bland, but she doesn't appear much so she doesn't bog anything down.
Honestly my biggest, and pretty much only, problem with the show is that I feel it needed more episodes to develop the characters and their relationships with one another. Kohei and Tsugumi's was good, but I feel like some of the other relationships could've been developed more. Especially Kohei and Kotori's and the one Yagi and Shinobu form. Not to say that the development we did get with the relationships was bad. No, it was good. I just feel like they could've expanded upon them more. Maybe if they had 24 episodes instead of 12. I feel like the manga this anime is based off of would have more development in that department. It's still ongoing and has a decent amount of chapters under it's belt, with 8 volumes total so far. If anything this anime does make me want to read the manga to see if and how they develop everything better. I also wanted some sort of resolution with Kotori's knife problem, or at least a sign that she gets better about it. Nope, there's none of that though. I understand it was mostly used for a couple of quick jokes, but it still would've been nice to see. Oh well, I can't really fault the anime for it. It's not like they never did anything with the plot point. With all that said though I still enjoyed myself while watching the anime. Every second of it. Even the cooking segments were fun. The characters were good, the music was ok., the opening and ending themes were great though. The animation is really good, and overall it's worth watching if you're a fan of slice of life stuff. If you want a heartwarming anime about people coming together to enjoy something this is the anime for you. Sure you might want some more development, but you'll still enjoy what you get. It's like vanilla ice cream. You may want more flavor, but vanilla ice cream is still really good.
So yes, this anime is highly recommended. So over the course of the year I'm going to compare every anime I've seen by ranking them from best to worst. Near the end of the year we'll see where everything stacked up. So since this is the only anime I've finished all year it gets the number one spot by default.
1-Sweetness and Lightning
And that's Sweetness and Lightning. If you took off the lightning part it'd live up to it's name. It's a really sweet and heartwarming show. Guess there's nothing else to say.
Thanks for reading and I'll see you later.
Peace.
Next up-A Little Snow Fairy Sugar
Other anime I plan on watching:
Charlotte
Big Order
Diabolik Lovers
God help me if what I heard about Diabolik Lovers and Big Order is true.
Oh and I also had a few test title cards for this episode that I wanted to share.
