[Yuri!!! on Ice] - 10
To avoid becoming a completely negative a cynical old codger, let me start my review with some positive points:
- This episode had some really nice background art!
- The rest of the art for this episode looked pretty decent as well, probably helped by the fact that this wasn't back-to-back-to-back skating scenes.
- Speaking of which, we finally get an episode which is focused on something other than endless skating routines. Instead we actually get a chance to spend some time with the characters. This is a good change!
See, I can be slightly positive sometimes. As for my, er, negatives:
- About 5 minutes of this episode was essentially wasted time. Most of that time was dedicated to a voice over narration re-introducing us to characters we already know and there was also a few brief flashbacks. When we're 1 episode away from the finale of the series this is both pointless and bizarre.
- Speaking of narration, this episode really abuses narration on several occasions. It seems like the writer(s) realised that they need to get several of the characters to a particular emotional place in the story by the finale but they didn't know how to get there. The solution? Narration! It seems like every other seem used narration to move the story along in very clunky, hand-waivey kind of way. Not only is this clunky but it also boring because instead of allowing the audience to observe what's happening and draw our own conclusions we are told how everyone is feeling and thinking at all times.
- I would have really preferred it if the last several of the episodes could have done a better job splitting their time between actually developing the characters and showing us cool skating rather than almost exclusively focusing on skating and a bunch of side characters who, by the way, mostly get about 1 second of screentime in this episode.