Key takeaways from Anime Recommendation – Date A Live:
- Date A Live evolves beyond fan-service, offering a compelling plot that improves significantly from season to season.
- Diverse and well-developed characters, with each having dedicated arcs that contribute to an interesting cast.
- While animation quality varies across seasons, the anime boasts good fights, intriguing interactions, and an awesome plot that makes it worth watching.
From an outside perspective, this anime will always appear as fan-service bait with no substance. While I do agree that Date A Live is a fan-service bait at times, it is an anime that has substance though. It starts pretty normal but in the later seasons, especially Season 3 onwards, it becomes so much more than a normal fan-service anime.
It is not really easy to see from the outside but this anime has a really good plot. And the plot improves significantly over time. Season 4 was a prime example of this. And that is the reason why this anime continues pumping out one good season after another.
So welcome back to another edition of our anime recommendation series. Today we are talking about Date A Live. So let’s get started.
Introduction
Date A Live is based on the LN series of the same name by Tachibana Koushi and illustrated by Tsunako. The LN is 22 volumes long and was serialized from March 2011 to March 2020. As for the anime, we have 4 seasons each of about 12 episodes with one canon movie, Mayuri Judgement that takes place between seasons 2 and 3. The first few seasons were produced by Production IMS, while the third season was animated by JC Staff and the fourth season was done by Geek Toys. A 5th season is also under production.
Plot
In a disaster called a Spatial Quake, almost 100 million people died 30 years ago. After that shelters have been built to safeguard people during these quakes. Our protagonist, Shidou Istuka is one day trapped in one of these quakes but he survives only to come face to face with a spirit called Touka. He is then taken in by an organization that aims to peacefully deal with the spirits. How is Shidou going to defeat the spirit? By taking her on a date!
I know that sounds ridiculous and it is ridiculous for the first few arcs but then slowly things get more serious. Some of these spirits are genuinely capable of ending the world. A lot of messy stuff happens down the line. So please give the plot a chance to kick into full gear before you reject it.
Characters
There is a good diversity of characters in this series. Each character has at least 2 arcs dedicated to them, one for their introduction and background and the 2nd one to flesh out their character more. Shidou himself gets steady character development throughout the series. Couple all this with some good character interactions, good antagonists, and side characters, you have an interesting cast to support the show.
Animations and Soundtracks
The quality of the animations in this series varies depending on the season, as it has been worked on by three different studios. Currently, Geek Toys has done the best job with the animations, making season 4 the best in terms of animation quality. While some of the opening and ending themes are fantastic, others are just average. The character designs are always awesome though.
Why should you watch Date A Live?
Quick pointers on why you should watch this anime:
- Awesome plot
- Lots of episodes to go through
- Great characters
- Good fights
Conclusion
That is all for now. Date A Live is better than most people give it credit for and you should check it out. With that said, I will take my leave here. See ya!!
Check out this week’s manga recommendation here!
