Disclaimer: This review does not contain spoilers. Do you want an action packed series that will make any shounen fan cry from excitement? Are you looking for a comedy that will make you piss your pants laughing? Well NANA is none of those things. But if you are looking for a realistic romance drama series with rock music vibes NANA is your jam. Forget all your 13 ep school romcoms with the love triangles and a kiss on the cheek or handholding as the peak of the series. Forget all your predictable drama shows that build up towards an ending that you can guess from the first 34 episodes. This show closely follows the life of all the characters for prolonged periods of time so you can see all their happy moments and them succeeding but also their dark and sad ones. The basic synopsis is simple and you can find it in any anime page or wikipedia so ill be short about it 2 girls named NANA happen to meet on a train one of them is a talented musician vocalist and she is coolcalm and collected and the other one is childish and wants to leave a rose coloured life with her fiance in Tokyo. Eventually the 2 girls grow pretty close and Nana Osaki the vocalist forms a rock band with other lovable characters you meet throughout the show Lets break the show into the basic interesting things that make it different to other shows and state their pros and cons: Music: Classic Jrock with a female vocalist and some english lyrics borderline hard rock im not that well educated on music to explain it better than that but i can give you an example: Click here to get a music video of one of the most characteristic song of this anime.This video has disabled comments to avoid spoilershttps://www..com/watch?v=SYtLk2GwLLs. Personally its my favorite type of music so its a big plus for me but its not the only thing this show has to offer. Drama: There are a lot of heavy dramatic moments spread evenly throughout the anime so its not the classic format of everything setting for a dramatic ending to get the viewers high rating cause of feels at the end Romance: Now we enter the most interesting and unique aspect of NANA for me. The adult cast makes for a show that isnt afraid of breaking taboos and the classic mold of romance anime meaning its not afraid to show sexual relationships without being ecchi a thing i found surprisingly uncommon in most of the anime i watched even when the cast was age appropriate and it differs a lot to most American TVshows. The romance feels very realistic cause it shows a lot and the bad aspects of romantic relationships too. Characters: Now we are getting to a very divided subject among the NANA watchers. Be warned the show isnt afraid to make its characters take wrong decisions sometimes or not be a perfect person. You may or will most likely dislike some of the characters in the proccess but thats life. If you cant handle the realism and want Mary Sue and Gary Stu characters NANA is definitely not for you. Arstyle: Classic shoujo artsyle with big eyes and eyelashes and skinny af bodies that might not be everyones taste. Its unique but i wouldnt say there are ugly frames or bad animation in any part of the show especially for a show that isnt that recent. I personally loved the artstyle and though it fit some of the more bubbly moments of the show without ruining the impact of the sad moments TLDR cause this is getting long NANA is one of my favorite anime and that becomes especially apparent when i watch anime that are supposed to be of similar type/genres Pros: realistic romance banger music a breath of fresh air for romance in anime one of the best shows about realistic friendship through easy and tough times Possible cons also consulting nonfans of the show too : length not the length of One piece but for a romance show 47 eps are not a few some stupid character decisions shoujo artstyle that isnt the most mainstream one.
100 /100
89 out of 96 users liked this review