Over 10 years has Date A Live has survived. It is very difficult for modern viewers to understand how big Date A Live was when it aired. It had the fastest light novel to anime adaptation ever. By volume 3 or so they already decided on the anime. Now it didn't have the insane production values that something like Sword Art Online has had. I want to mention this is not an exhaustive discussion. You can probably write a mini novel as review of this series and still not cover every topic. And this is only a spoiler free review.
I was initially going to delay a series overview based on what came after but judging by recent articles on the production committee, I felt it was imperative to write the review now. Since the series is approaching its end. Even tho 10 years feels like a long time, especially since most light novel series try to run on for very long but usually get cut short. But Date A Live aimed to follow the continuous story. By focusing on an overall grand narrative. This allows one season the novels to fluidly connect to each other. I feel around 20 or so is the best length. Anymore is simply too long. And I don't want it devolve into something like the fate series that has way too many spinoffs for its own good
Date A Live is a very difficult series to write a review for. This is because it does so much things right, so much things new, it would be a very very long review. You know a show is simply amazing is when it is difficult to write a review for. Vs when a show has a ton of problems, you can quickly pinpoint what it did wrong, and make a pretty concise review.
In short, you can call it a masterpiece. This is because Date A Live broke so many boundaries of what is genre can achieve. Not only did that, but it that under some of the hardest conditions. You cannot just outlast AOT these days, and still be relevant. People grow older, go to school, get jobs, aren't online. New shows come out as publishers want to create a cycle of pump and dump but never follow through. Publishers usually pick shows based on genres and the anime will scale depending on how big the publisher is. Like a manga publisher will tend to really stretch the show to fill all tv slots. They will adapt it slowly, put a lot of fillerish episodes effectively turning into a cw series. But a light novel publisher would try to keep it somewhat concise, but chooses to aim to promote a ton of light novels over a few. Date A Live But I would like to go in depth of what Date A Live has done.
Date A Live is a jack of all trades but MASTER of all. It has done that by completely subvertly everyone's expectations of when they see the show. You expect a nice relaxing shows with girls and some fighting, but as soon as you get in, you get introduced to a grand narrative with an amazing unique world, mysteries, villians, foreshadowing all of it towards a grand, epic, emotional finale.
Every season we have a new girl. This prevents the show from getting or feeling old. It makes the show refreshing, unique. Also by focusing on a new girl each season, it gives us time for But in addition it is overall adding more and more layers to the overall conflict. Especially season 2 onwards when the major villians appear and get involved. As these two things compound together thereby adding towards the greater conflict and thus a grand finale. But not only that, there is a ton of mysteries across the entire show. Including the origins of the conflict, villains, overall lore.
The overall lore takes a mix of things from mecha, biblical references, as well as just general aspects of life. It eventually feels unique enough where you can immerse yourself. From all the unique and beautiful locations. The soundtrack thus adds to the legendary
But while the cast of Date A Live is big, it still never loses its main focus from Shido, Tohka, Origami and its main villain of Westcott and Ellen. And by focusing on the primary villain as well as it how connects the origin of the conflict and the cast. And thus the narrative is coherrent. This gives Date A Live incredibly rewatchability. This is phenomenally rare for a series of its goofy genre. And this is largely thanks to the overall combination of foreshadowing, humor, action, storytelling, gradual crescendo, and emotional impact.
As you just continue, there is honestly not much you can complain about this show season 4 onwards. Season 3 clearly hampered but poor animation. The general consensus it is a masterpiece, incredible, at worst okay. It is pretty much just doing a lot of things right. If the only criticism of the series is it is a harem, calling the fandom names, saying you didn't watch it, ur series is pretty much doing everything right.
For the character designs, they are almost certainly some of the most beautiful, vivid, unique desisn I have seen. All have elaborate dresses, cute designs that tie into their individual quirks and powers.
As for the production of the anime itself, you can see that they heavily focused on adapting series above else. Goodshow puts its company on the line to finance the show after Kadokawa wanted to drop it in season 3. They weren't one of the companies that chose to Production values shot up. A lot more merchandise. Even tho Date A Live may end, you can never really replace a series that lasted 2013-2024. Since effectively a lot of stuff that aired that time isn't here anymore. The anime bubble completely burst several years earlier in 2008. We were effectively in an almost anime recession. Ultimately Date A Live is a series fans are especially grateful for. One of the few light novel series that nearly managed to nearly completely adapt the entire story. A story that under all odds managed to give a massive satisfying payoff. It will a remain a memento that cannot be replaced of the early 2010s anime. It is a common joke that the community's favorite anime changes every season, and picking their one they value above all else would be like picking their favorite child. Anime industry is ultimately something difficult to keep up with as there is just too much coming and so much you can spend.
