Ever since KOns success there have been a huge surge in both sliceoflife anime featuring cute girls doing mundane things and anime where boys or girls try to get into the music scene. They say imitation is the greatest form of flattery. However this isnt always a good thing as theres a lot that can go wrong such as companies making ripoffs or copies of said show focusing too much on fanservice and doing what KOn did rather than actually having a decent story characters and conflict or standing out on its own merits. If creators try too hard to copy other works they wont be appreciated for their own merits and if a piece of media cant stand on its own merits then itll just fade into obscurity. But even shows that stand out and are able to stand on their own merits arent always good and sometimes the show that inspired so many ripoffs may not even be that good Despite its problems Show By Rock definitely stands out and knows what the heck it wants. Unfortunately its being held back by many problems that if rectified could have made it so much better had the creators been given more leeway with it. A young girl named Cyan pronounced Shion Hijirikawa wants to be a rock star and join her schools music club but is too shy to do it. But when shes at home she gets an app on her phone that suddenly takes her to this magical world called Sound World particularly one place called Midi City. Its full of halfanimal halfhuman people called Myuumons and music is par for the course. There are popular bands such as Trichronika Criticrista ShingancrimsonZ and another band she joins called Plasmagica. She receives a sentient heart shaped guitar named Strawberry Heart that tells her she needs to defeat dark monsters that are threatening Midi City. Dark monsters are created when someones Melodisian Stone is corrupted by negative feelings or outside forces. Cyan joins Plasmagica and gets the chance to fulfill her dream along with saving Midi City from the dark monsters. Yeah...as you can tell by the summary the premise is admittedly very convoluted and cliche. Random kid gets taken to another world by someone or something is the chosen one and has to defeat evil villain via insert macguffin here make friends etc. Theres too much to deal with and it doesnt help that the show is only twelve episodes long. It could have benefited from being a lot longer like 26 episodes or even 39 for a variety of reasons that Ill get into. Sound World itself doesnt really get expanded upon nor do we learn all that much about Melodisian Stones the villain behind the scenes what made him what he is why certain people are so important how and why Midi City is the way it is etc. I do find it interesting that Sanrio Yes this was made by Sanrio the people behind Hello Kitty. Just go with it named a city after a midi file. Heck I remember when midi files were especially popular on places like Neopets waaay back in like 20032005 or something. However having an interesting setting doesnt matter if you cant expand upon it or use it to your advantage. Same goes for the characters. Theyre not bad but theres loads and loads of them and theyre all very under developed and bland save for one character Cyan getting the worst of it which is actually lampshaded in the final episode. She begins and ends the show being the exact same person. She doesnt do anything she gets scared she doesnt do anything by herself shes shy and insecure she just gets dragged into things without actively doing anything about it shes never directly affected by anything that goes on around her...shes just not very interesting as a character. Not only that shes constantly told that shes the one who absolutely has to defeat the dark monsters but its never stated why she of all people has to do it. Others could have very easily been better candidates and they never state the actual reason why SHE is the one that got picked which makes the whole chosen one plotline very superficial. Give us a reason dag nabbit Sakura from CCS was made to be the cardcaptor because she accidentally released the cards from the Clow Book. Sasami from Sasami Magical Girls Club was born with her powers. Hitomi from Vision of Escaflowne had a pendant from Gaia that she inherited from her grandmother who received it from a dying man whose son becomes her friend later on. They all start off one way and end the series having grown and learned from their experiences. Cyan doesnt. Therefore shes not interesting. The other characters are no better. True some of them do get expanded on but its all very predictable and none of their backstories are actively fleshed out save for Chuchu. Retoree is shy Moa is a cheerful alien who misses her home and its quickly forgotten about Chuchu wants to be the best etc. I have to admit though ShingancrimsonZ is the best band in the entire show. The guys in that band are not only hilarious but charming and are often the comedic relief despite being crazy gothic punk rock bishounen who scream a lot. Theyre just as bland and underdeveloped as the others but their antics are funny enough to steal your heart. Criticrista on the other hand is the worst of the bunch. Were told that theyre best friends who love each other but we never see them interact much unlike with Plasmagica. It doesnt help that theyre all annoyingly cute moe girls with obnoxiously high pitched voices one of them being voiced by Rina Hidaka one of my favorite new VAs and as much as I like her her work as Rosia really isnt one of her best who are there to pander to creepy guys etc. Everyone else is just there for eye candy or doing stuff nobody really cares about. But there are these two animal high schoolers who appear at the end of some episodes who go to school and constantly complain about wanting to go to Midi City with one of them always saying Sorrrry X is the pits Why are these Myumons here? What purpose do they serve? Nothing Theyre never used for anything so theyre just a waste of animation and broadcasting time The producers should have ditched them and used their budget for oh I dont know actual world building and character exploration? Also Moa also has an annoying voice actress who tries way to hard most of the time coming off really shrill in the process. Animation wise the show is decent albeit way too flashy especially with the way they draw the characters eyes. Too many sparkles and diamonds in them Its so distracting and completely throws you off. But the character movements are fluid the character designs are relatively decent albeit a little too over the top for some the water band and Criticrista being two such examples the cosmopolitan look of Midi City is very beautiful and it kinds resembles modern day New York as the biggest tower in the city kinda looks a lot like the Empire State Building complete with flashy neon colored lights etc. Also the CGI. It is beautiful and I do not mean that sarcastically. Im serious. The CGI in this anime is the best Ive seen. Its actually fluid the animators actually put in effort to make it relevant to the story and since the characters are all rendered into their animal forms during the CGI scenes they dont fall into uncanny valley territory and considering how anime CGI is usually REALLY bad a lot of the time thats saying a lot. I also appreciate that the show likes to parody various animation styles especially when ShinganCrimsonZ is involved like having the characters go all buff and beefy a la Jojos Bizarre Adventure or giving them girly 70s shoujo faces complete with exaggerated faces and long eye lashes and sparkles a la Rose of Versailles. The way its used for comedy is actually pretty cool. Since the shows about music obviously the music has to be the best part of the show right? Well...yes and no. Pretty much everything by ShinganCrimsonZ Trichronika and that other band called Tsurezure is awesome but all the other songs are mostly just bland cutesy moe fare that grates on your ears Criticristas song obviously being the worst one. The opening and ending songs are no better. Its nice that the show uses a rock and roll music style since the show is about bands and the music is actually relevant to the story albeit used in a ridiculous stupid and deus ex machinausing way. However if the songs have cutesy high pitched voices singing them then all they are is annoying if said voices arent in tune with the music. So yeah. Show By Rock isnt great but its not bad. Cliched yes but not bad. Its pretty fun if you want something good to watch and the fanservice is pretty mild for the most part. But if youre looking for more serious fare then give it a miss. Also ShinganCrimsonZ is awesome. Why couldnt the show be about them?