DESCRIPTION

CAST

ONA Slice of LifeArtiswitch Picture Drama

REVIEWS

• 

  RTryptophan

  72/100
  Diving deep into a good psychological anime composed of music videos and a story.

  Do you want to dive in deeper?

  excerpt from bokujou-gif.tumblr.com

  Artiswitch is a 2021 original internet anime produced by studio Sunrise targeted to millennials and Gen Z people. The series revolve around a certain shop that makes its customers look deeper in themselves, telling that they should be true in themselves. While this didn't gain traction while it was airing and never got the Odd Taxi effect (where the popularity boomed after airing its final episode), this series still needs to be noticed.

  

  The story talks about the shop owner, who is shown in the first gif of this review, named Nina, a witch who owns the store and is visited by customers who have problems within themselves. The story in each episode is focused on whoever the customer is, and how it affects Nina.

  excerpt from pierochan.tumblr.com

  The story loves to put metaphors and symbolisms all around the series and at times it is used creatively. This series was meant to become relatable to the audience, however the connections between the show and the audience don't seem to be strong enough. I'm guessing it's because there are scenes in which the viewer just couldn't relate with it. Asking myself, I felt highly relatable watching the third episode, and I don't even know why.

  excerpt from melchess.tumblr.com

  The customers help in making this series good. While they went through the same thing, each one of them lead to new stories in their life. Some had a better life, some had better hopes in themselves, and some failed. Character development is obviously present because they're reflecting and changing themselves, presented like an animated music video.

  excerpt from pttcomics.com

  This is where Artiswitch stands out above most series this year-- the amazing insert songs and breathtaking art. The studio really made the design of the anime as aesthetic and attracting as possible, and it is no lie that they didn't fail in doing so. I feel like the purpose of this series is to make a music video of 6 of their featured songs, 1 from each various artist. The way the anime presents these music videos greatly enhance the entertainment.

  

  Personally I enjoyed this series. While I was watching this along with seasonals, I honestly felt like watching this ONA more instead ofthe others. Watching and waiting for more episodes of it was completely worth it, and tbh I wish they make more. luckily there's a picture drama I could look forward by Winter 2022.

  excerpt from jisatsual.tumblr.com

  In conclusion, the series talks about being true to yourself, presented in an aesthetic music video. While the shining aspects (the music and art) give traction to the series, the stories remain good and appropriate within each episode, even though it lacks a bit. This series is recommended for people who watch for art, for songs, or for somebody who wants to dive deeper (in terms of analysis).

  And yes, I want to dive in deeper.

  excerpt from c4psule.tumblr.com
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• 

  EveThePuppy

  30/100
  Vapid cheap and borderline misogynistic lesbian-bait that doesn't deliver anything of worth.

  Content Warning: Lesbian Fridging, Suicide

  __- - - Intro - - -__

  I don't like calling stuff vapid. I understand that even the slimiest gooner isekai doujin is made with some level of care, and that the worst anime out there is still someone's creative darling. But I can't think of a more fitting term for this anime. "Artiswitch" feels like a tech demo, and I mean that as an insult. I genuinely don't know what this show was going for. With a scarce six episodes spread over less than an hour, telling a compelling story would be difficult for even the best writers. But "Artiswitch" comes out feeling cheap, pointless, and confused.

  __- - - The Spoiler-Free Review - - -__

  The premise sounds great on paper. "There's a magical witch named Nina, people stumble into her store, they have an awkward three minute long music video sequence, and they leave with their wish fulfilled." That's fun. Exciting even. But beyond that I don't have much nice to say.

  The first thing that set me off was the visual style of the show. It feels...wrong? The 3D character models - while lovely in their design and beautiful at times - come off as weird and janky. It honestly looked like rotoscoping at times, with how jittery and low frame-rate it was. It was genuinely distracting, and the rest of the show doesn't fare much better. Everything is bright and poppy. Even the somber scenes feel saturated with color. Which is, again, fine in concept. But the "real world" visuals are just dull enough to look odd, and the music video segments are blindingly bright. All-in-all none of it really worked for me, beyond the visual spectacle that was the character designs.

  The story is bare-bones, and I can't comment on it much without spoiling it. Suffice to say that, while the premise hooked me for the first episode or two, I think it fell off over time.

  And lets get into the real meat of why you're here - the lesbian content and the misogyny. It's very oddly handled in a way where I genuinely kinda despise the anime over it. Spoilers below:

  __- - - [SPOILERS] The Lesbophobia and Misogyny of Artiswitch - - -__

  From the very first episode it felt weird. "Tall lanky boyish woman learns that it's okay to like makeup and dresses :3" felt reductive, like one of those shitty Ao3 fanfics where a tomboyish lesbian is "fixed" by a man. But the show only got stranger the further in I got. The first customer felt like gender non-conformity was pushed onto her. Meanwhile the second felt like general non-conformity was impossible to realize. Meanwhile the fourth and the fifth customers both felt overtly lesbian.

  The fourth customer proclaiming that she liked Nina, begging her to "touch her," it all felt intentionally charged. And then she uses her wish to kill herself (sorta). The fifth customer is an explicit lesbian who's crushing on a girl, and her wish is to make her crush happy. And the entire wish sequence is her realizing that her crush never liked her, that she was using her, and she needs to be talked down from killing her crush right then and there.

  Is it a coincidence that both of the explicitly lesbian customers both suffer in their wishes and hurt the main character? Maybe, but it feels gross. Furthermore, I'm less inclined to see it as a coincidence once I realized that every woman in "Artiswitch" is inherently shallow.

  This is admittedly probably a fault of the rushed format, but it still sticks out to me. It's difficult to explain, but none of the women in this show feel like characters or even caricatures. They feel like children. Every lesson learned here is something you'd tell an eight year old. "It's okay to be yourself," "don't worry about what others think," "it's okay to move on." Even the climax of the anime is resolved via Nina getting a head pat and being called a good girl. I admit I may be overreacting, but it feels reductive! Especially when combined with the earlier weird treatment of lesbians.

  __- - - Gen-Z Pop Psychology - - -__

  I found this anime after I'd watched "Welcome to Irabu's Office." It was one of the top recommendations on that page, and both are startlingly similar. Patients/Customers come to a magical office/boutique where their issues are solved through over the top methods and self-growth. Both are stylistically experimental, neither got a full 12 episodes, really it's kind of bizarre just how similar they are.

  Which is terrible for "Artiswitch," because watching "Welcome to Irabu's Office" beforehand let me realize just how shallow "Artiswitch" is in comparison.

  "Artiswitch" is soaked in modern pop psychology bullshit. There is this grandiose presentation. Customers are treated like patients who need to be fixed. Their "treatment" is to be wished better, walking into a psychologists office and leaving a better person immediately. But the issues Nina fixes are overwhelmingly social issues. Someone is rude and Nina teaches them that being rude is bad so they stop being bad. Someone is unconfident so Nina tells them to be confident and suddenly they are. There's no granularity, there's no human element to any of it. Change is quick. Change is easy.

  If you can't change or if you have a significant issue, then that's a moral failing.

  In my review of "Welcome to Irabu's Office," I highlighted how well it put a focus on accommodation and gradual change. The episode revolving around a guy with obsessive thoughts surrounding sharp edges isn't solved by telling him that sharp edges won't hurt him. It's solved via giving him eye protection, letting him change his environment to be less threatening, and slowly working towards a point where this fear is no longer debilitating. Healing is a process, and changing yourself takes time. Whether it's the fast pace or the "Artiswitch" being disinterested in change as a whole, I can't say. But it really does feel shallow in comparison.

  __- - - Final Thoughts - - -__

  I don't think "Artiswitch" is worth your time. Yes it's only forty-five minutes total, but I was annoyed enough that I spent an hour writing out my thoughts on those forty-five minutes, and I'll probably waste more time ranting about this anime to whoever will listen. If you read it as a metaphor for psychology and healing, it's vapid and shallow. If you're interested in the lesbian content, it's lesbophobic and kind of misogynistic. And if you're here for a sparkly over-animated style fest, then you're better off watching a few vocaloid music videos.

  All "Artiswitch" offers is a premise far more interesting than the actual show and a few nice outfits. You'd get more enjoyment out of reading the description and looking up Nina's reference material than you would actually watching "Artiswitch."

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• 

  planetJane

  82/100
  In a shop on a busy street....

  

  ---

  All of my reviews contain __spoilers __for the reviewed material. This is your only warning. __A small note:__ This review was originally written in January of 2022.

  ---

  Over the past decade, an artistic movement has emerged in anime that values perseverance and centers the stories of young women. If this movement has a name–or is even a cogent scene as opposed to a simple undercurrent–I am unaware of it. But one would have to be fairly oblivious to not at least feel it in the air. ___Artiswitch___ was not the most prominent example of this lineage to come out in 2022, but with the benefit of hindsight, it might be one of the best from that year. And it’s certainly among the most inventive. My only regret with this series is that I didn’t cover it when it was new. (I actually didn’t plan to cover it at all, assuming I’d have nothing of note to say about it. Arguably I still don’t, but, hey, these things have a way of sneaking up on you.) In terms of “literal plot,” there isn’t much to _Artiswitch_. Our protagonist, Nina (__Utano Aoi__, in what appears to be her first-ever anime role), is a witch who maintains a mysterious shop somewhere in Harajuku, Tokyo. Customers find their way to the shop, and when they leave, they take with them an item that changes their lives. This premise is not a unique one, and in particular fans of forever-underrated CLAMP classic ___xxxHOLIC___ will find the general idea familiar, but _Artiswitch_’s format (a series of shorts, only totaling to about 45 minutes in all) prevents it from preoccupying itself with the sort of sprawling story that that series eventually develops. Instead, we get a lot of symbolism, compelling imagery, and sharp direction. _Artiswitch_ is all mood and atmosphere. Which isn’t to say there are no points being made here, but anyone who requires their anime to have an easily decipherable linear Point A–>Point B plot should check out now. The first two episodes establish the format. A customer (a tomboyish athlete in the first episode, and a shy, follow-the-leader sort of girl in episode 1 and 2 respectively) makes their way to Nina’s shop. They pick up an item, prompting the witch to deliver her catchphrase (“would you like to peer deeper?”), and from there things dissolve into full-on music video territory. Quite literally, since these segments, which take up the middle third of each episode, are set to songs and feature little to no dialogue. Going into detail about each of these would be tantamount to spoiling the series, but the first episode’s already gorgeous conceit of the tomboy Haruka rediscovering her repressed feminine side by donning fire-red lipstick and dress is where things start. They ramp up exponentially from there, with the remaining episodes serving to twist the formula in various ways. Artiswitch clearly has a lot on its mind, and were I forced to come up with a single flaw I thought were present in the series, it might be a lack of clarity. But at the same time, that feels fundamentally misguided. And it would require ignoring the final episode, where Nina’s wish-granting capabilities are turned back on themselves, and it is she who must dive into her own mind. We see why she entered this magical line of work to begin with, and the sight of her past self comforting her present with the affirmation that she is moving forward and is doing her best, despite her own doubts, is why I decided to write this short review in the first place. Fundamentally, art resonates with its audience based on shared thoughts, experiences, and feelings. Those things change from person to person, but taking special note of when a series has successfully struck a chord with me is the entire reason I write at all. Leaving _Artiswitch_ without comment just didn’t feel right. I have to confess, I am in fact worried about doing this series justice while simultaneously trying to avoid pinning it to a corkboard like a dead butterfly. But I probably shouldn’t be so concerned. It flits and flies free. On a practical level, I am excited to see what director Kazuma Ikeda (who seems to have an extensive background in design, something that really shines through here) does next. But beyond that, this is the sort of thing people will keep discovering as the years roll by, and even now the comments sections below each episode are crowded with testimonials, in a plethora of languages, from those to whom the series already clearly means quite a lot. The shop stands waiting, all one needs to do is step inside.

  ---

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