Blast of Tempest – Review

So yep, following up on my exploration of the first episode, I ended up marathoning Blast of Tempest and putting together a streaming review. The end result was frankly pretty unsatisfying – I know some people love this show, but it’s just such a messy thing that I could only rarely feel legitimately invested. It rambles and overtells and often feels like it lacks a strong throughline, failing in terms of storytelling fundamentals even as it impresses in terms of personality and creativity. It’s certainly an interesting show, and the cast is great, and I don’t regret watching it… but I can’t say it’s a show I’d actually recommend. Still, for better or for worse, I now feel like I’ve pretty much seen all the acclaimed 2013 anime. So I guess that’s something?

You can check out my full review over at ANN, or my copious episode notes below!

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Blast of Tempest – Episode 1

Blast of Tempest opens with three high school students – Aika, Yoshino, and Mashiro. Aika and Mashiro are siblings, and Aika seems to harbor some sort of resentment towards Yoshino. She immediately calls him a “con artist,” and then all three of them seem to turn to the same script, speaking of how “the time is out of joint.” Their dialect shifts from generic teenager to Shakespearian embellishment as the three alternate the final lines: “O, cursed spite. That ever I was born to set it right!”

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