What’s it about ?
Our protagonist has been plagued by bizarre nightmares where he’s assaulted by cats for years… until today, when a bizarre girl fall on his lap and he finds himself transported in a dream world where the cats’ leader tries to take his body over. The girl rescues him.
Characters
Yumeji, our protagonist, has the weird ability of guessing what the person he looks at will dream about the next night. It’s neither very precise or accurate, though. It does work on himself if he looks in the mirror, though (“Sigh, I’m going to have this nightmare again…”).
John Doe, the bad guy. He hails from the dream world and wants to move into the real world, but that can only happen if he takes someone’s body over. Yumeji will do, thanks.
Merry Nightmare, the not-really-human girl, is in the opposite position : she’s amnesiac and wants to go back to the dream world (John Doe implies she must have taken someone over…). Will Yumeji help her, please ?
The supporting cast is rounded up by a few friends of Yumeji’s, including a childhood friend he lives with… for some yet-to-be-disclosed reason…
Production Values
I quite like some of the background work in the dreamworld, and they’re obviously trying for atmosphere. The problem is that it pales in comparison with Madoka, and never manages to reach the same level of creepy. (I blame the colours, too flat and naturalistic.) It’s truly unfortunate that both shows compete in the same season.
The OP is okay stuff, and certainly sets the tone of the show. ED is decent too.
Overall Impression
This, on the other hand, is much better than it sounded at first (a girl falling into a guy’s arm ? seriously ?). Again, it’s all the atmosphere, and it works out pretty well. It’s also nice to have a bad guy whose goals are crystal clear and make complete sense. And it succeeds in suggesting there’s a lot more going on than on face value.
Sure, it’s not as good as Madoka, but I’m sure this can be said about most of this season’s shows. It’s quite enjoyable so far, and I’m interested in seeing where it goes from here.
via [In which I review] New anime, Winter 2010-2011 – Page 6.
