Fircoal

Recently gacha mobile games have been taking up more of the video game landscape. With more gacha games being released each year and many of them getting their own anime, it should be expected that a show like Last Period would come along and decide to parody the whole system. What is more surprising is how well the show is able to do that. While there are a lot of gacha jokes that could be made, after all the system and its likeness to gambling make it an easy target of parody and jokes. Just look at any gacha board's subreddit and you will bedrowning in memes about the low return on value for spending their precious currency in order to get 1 star common trash unit. And while Last Period has those jokes, it actually has so much more than just that. The comedy is on point, and is done extremely well. Jokes are taken for all they're worth, but aren't over-utilized like with some other comedy shows. While Konosuba is hilarious most of its jokes end up around the same material. Last Period is able to cover a lot of different material with its jokes and finds numerous material to make fun of. Whether it be the tendency for gacha to have special units to increase the chance of players opening their wallets, or whether it be the fact that many NPCs are not distinguishable from each other, Last Period has a lot of jokes that are not overused. I also must admit that Last Period's humor style very much aligns with mine. There is a underlying silliness and stupidity to it that I very much enjoy. For example, the mayors of the villages they go to all have a pun gimmick that they use based off of the name of their town. And while that is already fun, the show likes to go the extra mile by willing it into existence no matter how weak those puns may be. So while one mayor will have their pun game on lock, another will be forcing a poor choice of words into the sentence, which I personally find quite humorous. And even with all of that, that's not all to their humor. There are also references, and not just light references but rather references where they go all in and continually make more and more references to the material they're referencing getting funnier with each reference that they fit into the work. While references are not uncommon I do like Last Period's style where rather than make a ton of references they make one or two but make so many to that one material and have it build on that throughout the episode. The characters of Last Period aren't special but they do a great job of being likeable and working for the comedy that it's going for. At large the characters are all pretty dumb and silly, just like the show. They're perfectly set up to not notice the obvious and to make themselves go down the wrong path. In a sense they are a cast of lovable losers. They may not be smart or skilled but they're fun to watch. Meme girl in particular is fun with her fourth wall breaking self. Her deadpan when blasting the show for it's weak jokes is fantastic. I personally love it when comedy shows joke about themselves. It's so much fun to see the characters of a work continually diss the work that they're in. It's a common trick of Pearls Before Swines, and is a big reason why that is my favorite comic strip. There is also a nice relation between the heroes and their rivals Wiseman. While the two are natural rivals and try to out do each other. It isn't one of hate or malice but rather a friendly one. They do show concern over each other when things go south. But what really helps with these characters are their fantastic character designs. Every single one of the characters is adorable and they look so dang good. Some of the best parts of gachas are the character designs that they create in order to get people into the game. And to have those on display here in animated form with actual personalities given to them is something I very much enjoy. It's like the best part of the gacha without having to roll for the gacha. It also helps that JC Staff does a great job with its art. While JC Staff may not be the best animating studio, it's art is always filled with effort and looks very pleasing. The animation isn't the best although when the situation demands it the animation chops are brought out and some fantastic scenes are brought out onto the screen. Last Period is pretty much everything I want from a comedy. Top tier jokes. An atmosphere of fun and silliness. Great character designs. Characters who have just enough to stand on their own. While it may not have the depth I love to get I do think it has its own moments and that does a good job of making those characters root-able and likeable. And considering how well it does its comedy I don't have an issue that it focuses on that. Considering the time of the gacha is now, it's quite well timed, and I completely get the experiences that they go through as I go through my own struggles with gacha games. Getting that experience down pat while also bring in the laughs makes this one of the best comedy anime I have watched, and my personal pick for anime of the season.

MozillaFennekin

[Disclaimer: This review was originally posted on May 4, 2018, after four episodes had aired. It has been deleted and then re-uploaded so that it doesn't get buried as a preliminary. However, no major changes were made to the review, as Last Period was consistent throughout its run, so no new points needed to be made.] If you’re ever unsure about watching something because it’s unpopular and has a low MAL score, here’s my suggestion: you should take one of your hands and quickly slap yourself in the face with it. Repeat this action until you have it burned into you that this is not agood way to judge anime. But, skepticism is always welcome, so if you’re just here to gauge opinions, here’s one: Last Period is one of the best anime of the season, as someone who tends to be a pretty big fan of comedies. I even thought Aho-Girl was funny, but maybe that was just me relating to cataclysmic autism. If you’re one of the many who love KonoSuba, or one of the few who watched Mahoujin Guru-Guru, then there’s no reason why you shouldn’t like this one too. Is it as good as either of them? In ways, no, but that’s not exactly the point. The point is, it’s very much like those anime: a comedic adventure with lots of RPG elements, weird and quirky side characters, and the occasional meta joke. Last Period has more of an emphasis on meta jokes. One of the main characters, Choco, is acutely aware of being in a late-night TV anime that probably sucks dick according to normal standards, and takes pot shots at it with no mercy. (“Cramming money jokes into a guy’s dialogue is lazy writing.”) She is literally referred to as “Meme Girl” by one of the other characters at one point. Lots of it is clearly obvious for the sake of the anime being more fun, but there are some more subtle jokes as well, such as gachas being complete bullshit. Also, the Higurashi characters make a cameo. No, really. It’s clearly an anime that just wants to have fun with itself and doesn’t really try to impress with any sort of plot or character development. And that’s completely fine, because it comes with a lot of heart. There’s a Team Rocket knockoff called Wiseman: a trio of girls with a talking mascot, who questionably serve as the recurring villains of the series. They show up, cause some hijinks, and suddenly leave without really doing anything. There’s not much of an explanation or reason for them to exist, but there’s something genuine and nice about how playful their personalities are--even if you can combine them all as one character (which is kinda the point). I can’t exactly sell you the character of Wiseman in the form of a written review; in fact, I can’t really sell any character in this anime because none of them have particularly strong personalities by themselves--with the exception of Choco, whose presence is almost always some sort of oddity due to her constant deadpan look and repeated memespouting. That doesn’t mean they’re bad characters, because they work perfectly well in this series. What they lack in development, they make up for in charisma. They bounce dialogue off each other well, everyone has their own quick, witty comments to make; they don’t feel awkward or dull despite their lack of depth, which is why I say they work for the anime itself. It also helps that the character designs are super strong--like, good god does this anime have some gorgeous women. It’s about an average J.C. Staff production, so it’s not spectacular, but they maintain a respectable level of quality. Said character designs remain crisp and well-made, similar to Amanchu and also Shokugeki before it turned into a grade school powerpoint. It also features some pretty cute monsters that look like Pokemon. Also the anime has music and voice acting so 7/10 sound please click helpful on my review. The ED is really, really good though because Wiseman sings (sing?) it and the one with the glasses is hotter than two fire ants fucking in a desert. IDK where I was going with this paragraph or this review because I fell asleep while writing it and don’t care anymore but it needs to be posted because I saw that Last Period was getting shit on for no reason and felt the need to give my objectively subjective opinion on why everyone but me is wrong. It’s a good show. Story - 7/10 Animation 7/10 Sound - 7/10 Character - 7/10 Enjoyment - 9/10 Memes - Unyu/10 Overall - 7.75/10 (Range: 7.0 - 8.75) Favorite character - Meme Girl Favorite episode - idk, that one with the smartphone was some real Twilight Zone shit tho Recommendation level - Medium-high