Given strikes the rare balance of being openly gay - none of that maybe he is, maybe he isn’t crap - while not indulging in over the top eroticism to pander to a niche viewership. This is a vanilla, realistic, down to earth romance that can be watched by anyone open minded to love that exceeds conventional desire.

It is fairly unconventional for a single cour romance to have convincing characterization...yet Given makes this a strong point. Each of the band mates are given practical goals, motivations and fleshed out backstories that are sprinkled into the narrative as the episodes progress rather than forcefully crammed read more

Art -
They are doing a really good job at translating the story from book to screen. The direction, shot compositions and the lighting are so noticeably good, it's honestly so impressive. It's not just "animated" manga panels - they really put a lot of thought into the pacing and flow of the scenes. The character animation is also pretty good (which is usually notoriously bad when it comes to BL anime). This is a music anime too, so I was a little worried about the performance scenes, but (holy crap) the instruments' look (and sound!) were rendered so well and the CG for the performances were actually impressive! Not to mention, even the background art for scenes are very detailed and beautifully done too. I for one love the character designs. They managed to keep the same feel/personality of the characters from the manga, while also adding their personal take on them.

Sound -
The sound design for this anime is so damn impressive (I can't believe how blessed we are) especially for scenes with instruments in them. The strumming of an unplugged electric guitar by a complete newbie... the sound effects of the amps and other equipment... it is incorporated so well, you can believe that the sounds truly come from those moving pictures. And I'm not even talking about the band's actual performance scenes yet! That being said, the actual musical performance on episode 1 is SO good - it truly fit the image I had of the band while reading the manga. The background music is also really nice and makes use of band instruments so I thought that was really cool. Plus the OP and ED are really good. The ED reminds me how perfect Shougo-san is for the role of Mafuyu - both in speaking and singing. This is a truly blessed anime adaptation.