The traffic light switches. A character walks across the street. The traffic light switches. A character walks across the street. Now, if this sounds monotonous to you, because it is, you will be surprised that this is the composition of one of the first shots of Beatless’ first episode, which is true to its name- beatless.
Moments in, I was overcome by the feeling of deja vu, and with a good reason- this show does indeed feel like Guilty Crown, and I am not just talking about the fact that both shows share the same character designer, but rather the overall premise and characters- Arato and Shuu are basically the same character (visually and personality wise), and the same can be said for Lacia, which is basically this show’s mascot and the clone of Inori. It doesn’t help that the show starts in the most non-unique place ever- high school, giving us a taste of school life, which by this point in anime feels like rotten spam, before introducing us to a couple of generic guys in a helicopter fighting other “hIE,” which are supposed to be robots who function as slaves for humans?
The world building is for this episode barely there, and what I found to be the most memorable is how the convenience store functions, which should serve as a sign of how uninteresting this world feels. This is not to say that it does not have potential to explore themes of relationships of humans and machines, which has been done before and more effectively.
Show’s art style is solid overall- redjuice again proves to the world that he is the God of female character designs, which look sleek, attractive and poster-worthy. Same cannot be said for the boys, which look rather meh. But, those designs look only good when they are not moving, because of the animation here, during action sequences especially, looks janky and rough. 3D CG animation, which this episode uses for the cars, is jarring as well, but it is fairly brief.
Overall, Beatless does not make a good impression in its first episode. It is not to say that it lacks potential, but its stereotypical delivery, underwhelming production values, and copy-paste characters make this questionable. I would sum this up as poor man’s Guilty Crown.
Score breakdown:
Story: C-
Does not make a great impression, despite the potential for some interesting philosophy.
Characters: D
Copy-pasted directly from Guilty Crown, which is a show you do not want to copy characters from.
Animation: C-
Action sequences lack fluidity and are overall very basic.
Art: B+
redjuice’s female character designs shine, but the boys not so much. The world feels a-ok.
+ Great female character designs, has the potential for some philosophical themes regarding robots.
- Feels like Guilty Crown clone, intentionally or not- its characters are stereotypical at best, underwhelming animation.
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