There are no words.

Actually, that's not true, but shortly you will wish it was.

I watched the latter half of Narutaru sober. Bad move on my part.

The review:

This anime is like a solid element, if someone were to take potential, and turn it into an ore. Pure potential. Unfortunately, it's raw, unrefined potential. So many things could have been done right. So few actually were.

Technically sour points:

They introduced dozens of plot-threads that seemed relevant, and were inexplicably dropped towards the end of the anime. This is not a case of 'personal plots get dropped for the save-the-world arc', it's 'the save-the- world arc got ignored to pay attention to a personal plot'.

The intro is misleading. You have no. Idea. You see everyone running around and smiling in chibi-form, while upbeat and genki music plays. All. Lies. I can't say more without giving spoilers.

A good number of characters appear for only one episode, and then vanish. Why bother? Especially when they make vague references to events which have no relevance, ultimately.

Non-technical sour points:

Looped cliffhangers on eye-catches and episode beginings. They repeat about up to a minute of footage after some eyecatches or when begining a new episode. My main problem with this (and with the extra characters who pop in to be irrelevant) is that these things are wasting valulable time in the anime that could have been used to, I don't know, answer the questions they left hanging. They never really explain how anything works in the story regarding Hoshimaru or the other critters like him. Given that they have (ultimately) almost no impact on the story, couldn't this anime have played out better as a drama without any sci-fi fantasy elements?

And yet ... and yet ... this anime could have been great!

There's only one slightly redeeming quality, but I can't explain that without a spoiler.

So be aware.

There is a spoiler here: (hilight to read)

So, when the anime ends, you find out that evidently Sakura Akira was raped by her father, but instead of commiting suicide, she kills him. So, Shiina's father makes a comment about wondering if they'll ever find Hiroko (or whatever her name was).

Then we see Shiina running around in the uniform of the school Hiroko tried to get into, and we hear a voice from behind her, and she turns to look behind her, then smiles, and laughs, and we don't see who called out to her.

What a fucking cop-out. They want us to figure out if it's Hiroko or Akira. That's kind of a no-brainer.

The only good part about this -- the ONLY good part about this -- is that Sakura Akira didn't kill herself. So she overcame her suicidal tendancies.

However, this is a very, very dim light, at the end of a very, very greasy tunnel.

So ultimately, I ended up feeling like I wasted enough hours of my life that I feel the need to urge anyone out there who's interested in watching the anime to avoid doing so.

And if you must, please, please in the name of all that is good in this world: watch it while drunk. I got some fucking kick-ass vodka (rubbing alcohol), and will provide moral support if you wanna stick it out.

But friends don't let friends watch Narutaru alone.

Actually, friends wouldn't let friends watch Narutaru.