KOKORO TOSHOKAN

DESCRIPTION

CAST

SPECIAL ComedyKokoro Toshokan: Communication wa Kiru
MANGA ComedyKokoro Toshokan

REVIEWS

• 

  Reldio

  80/100
  A bit of a fairy tale, that preaches agreeable messages of community and goodness in a saccharine package.

  Kokoro Toshokan is a slow-paced, relaxing anime that invites viewers to an idyllic location; a peaceful and isolated library up in the mountains surrounded by nature, where three kind girls live and look after the surrounding gardens. It's described as a place where small miracles happen, and sure enough lots of saccharine sweet things occur through this one-cour. There's an immediate fairy-tale feel to the whole thing. This anime isn't rooted in reality at all, set in an unclear alternate time period with retro cars and computers yet at one point featuring a librarian robot, and featuring things like standardized tests for librarians and practically-magical world-renowned thieves. These things all work in service of the anime and aren't worth thinking too hard about.

  Each episode or two tackles a simple problem like not enough librarian users or going on vacation, inevitably runs into some kind of problem, and then follows the three sisters (though primarily protagonist Kokoro) as they earnestly try and fix it. The characters themselves are nicely varied and don't overlap. Kokoro is the innocent and naïve, yet kind and well-meaning lead that wants nothing more than to work at the library with her sisters and make people happy. I could see people being annoyed that her naivety never has any real consequences, but it simply isn't the kind of show where things go horribly wrong. Middle sister Aruto is the level-headed one, whilst eldest Iina is the doting, almost maternal figure in the family. The relationship between the characters is convincing with a lot of care put into the little ways they look after each other. Things tend to always work out happily in the almost-episodic stories, further cementing the saccharine fairy tale quality the show has. The mileage you'll get out of these stories will vary wildly depending on your reaction to such sweetness. Those seeking realism and deeply layered characters should stay far away as they aren't found here at all, but the storylines here are more than capable of making one feel good.

  The feel-good feeling permeating most of the runtime (though it's worth noting it can be rather melancholic until things work out) is aided greatly by a pretty great soundtrack, certainly standing above your average anime OST. It's dominated by soft piano music and, once again, has that somewhat fairy-tale like quality to it. Voice acting is decent, though nothing special.

  The area where the anime might fall in the eyes of many are the visual aspects. It's only available at a low resolution and isn't particularly well-animated and the art-style itself isn't anything special. It is at least colourful and has the occasional beautiful shot however. There are also small aspects of the writing I could see turning certain viewers off. Eldest sister Iina has a bit of an obsession with the youngest Kokoro which is played for laughs and I could see others seeing it as creepy. However, these flaws are relatively minor in an otherwise solid anime.

  Kokoro Toshokan wont turn anyone that dislikes sickly sweet shows or slower-paced relaxing shows into fans, but I think it's a solid forgotten entry for those that do enjoy such content.

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