I was this close to starting up a full post on a certain character from Inuyasha before I flipped through some anime listings and remembered the rightful heir to this throne.
Heroine from Amnesia. I’ve mentioned a few times now that I don’t like Amnesia much at all, and I really need to get around to actually posting the review of it sometime (My backlog uploading is stupid), but I’ve come to realize that nearly all of my issues are centered on the main heroine…..Heroine.
If you’re unfamiliar with Amnesia, it’s a reverse harem anime with a premise that’s actually not bad. The main character is bumped into by a fairy named Orion, which causes her to lose her memories entirely. Not only does she remember nothing of herself or her life, but she skips through different versions of her reality. Each version has her dating one of several boys in her life. She has to pretend like she’s the Heroine from each reality while Orion tries to restore her memories and get her back to her reality.
So far so good. I actually mentioned in my review how this is basically a perfect reverse harem anime concept because one of the main problems with these types of shows is that they try to get all of the pairings shown with one main pairing being aimed for, but it either comes off as ridiculous or like the MC is playing everyone. With alternate realities, you can have the MC be with everyone and never shall the plots interfere with each other nor shall the MC look like a two-timer.
However, the only way to truly make this work to its potential is with two factors.
1 – The main character has to be likable, interesting and compelling. She is the one constant here, afterall.
2 – The varying realities should explore Heroine having different pasts and personalities as well as having each world be different enough for it to not just be ‘the world where she’s dating (blank).’
I’ll just let you guess whether the series hit these marks or not.
By far, the biggest issue Amnesia has is in Heroine because, as you can tell from her name (Heroine is her only name because she’s never given an actual one in the series) she is piece of cardboard. No wait, cardboard can sometimes be useful.
I have never seen such a useless, flat non-character of nothingness in my life. She always, ALWAYS, has this stupid blank look on her face and just goes along with everything that’s going on. She never has any sort of emotional reaction to anything (even being imprisoned in a cage by one of the love interests) or an opinion or anything. She’s always quiet, non-reactive and static.
She is the epitome of Mary S—You know, what? No. She’s not a Mary Sue, because they’re meant to be people that, while you can copy/paste yourself onto them, you’re supposed to want to be them. Why would anyone want to be ReverseHaremProtagonistBot model number 0000000000?
I get it – she has amnesia, so her personality is affected, but having no memories doesn’t mean you have no personality. Even if it did, that does not make for a compelling character at all to say the least.
You’d think she’d at least have some good personalities in the various realities to talk about and explore….Well, if she does, they never tell us. The best explanation we get of any of them is in one reality she recently took up singing and wasn’t all that good at it…..that’s it.
I can typically find some way to forgive a show for having such a terrible, poorly written lead if the story is at least good – at the very least, I try not to let it ruin a good thing – but the problem is that the entire story, damn near all of it, is fully centered on her. She’s the one with the lost memories, she’s the one hopping dimensions every week, she’s the focus of the attention of all of the guys, somehow, – she is the focal point of everything and she’s a character as weak as gas station toilet paper.
She’s infuriatingly boring and bland. I can’t even believe such a thing exists. She’s an anomaly.
Outside of one psycho instance, the rest of the show is perfectly fine, even pretty good, reverse harem fare. While the art’s a little too pretty (colors will sometimes punch you in the eye), the guys are all slickly drawn eye-candy (barring the outfits sometimes) and the environments are absolutely gorgeously detailed. It’d be a great indulgence to keep going back to….if she wasn’t around.
Runner-Up: The aforementioned Inuyasha character was Naraku. I really felt like he outgrew his welcome several times over, and his shtick was getting so old I quit the series about 30 episodes from the end only to pick it back up once Final Act was done airing. And really, I just wanted to see him finally die.
I considered Yuka from 11Eyes for this, but I’m trying not have repeats in this challenge.
The Anime Madhouse 