Anime Secret Santa Review: ef – a tale of memories

In life there are but three certainties: death, taxes and late Otaku no Podcast posts. I tried, really tried, to get this post up in time for the great December 25 Anime Secret Santa reveal, but I just missed it, darn it all. At least it’s not too late!

I have spoken at length about my love of the two Key visual novel based anime, Kanon and Clannad. Give me half a chance and I’ll talk your ear off about the subject, extolling their virtues and emotional impact long into the night. Listening to me prattle on about it, you’d think that Key and/or KyoAni has the lock on tear-jerking, soul-wrenching emotionally-charged romance stories. As it turns out, nothing could be farther from the truth. Perhaps this is the reason why my Anime Secret Santa picked ef – a tale of memories as one of my choices to review. And I am glad that they did.

ef – a tale of memories is a 12-episode series animated by Shaft (they say that anime studio Shaft is a bad mutha – SHUT YO’ MOUTH!) and is based on the visual novel series ef – A Fairy Tale of the Two published by minori, which I honestly have never heard of before. (Then again I’m still a neophyte when it comes to visual novels.) It follows a cast of characters as they struggle through life and as their lives intertwine with each other. Hiro is an aspiring mangaka trying to juggle his work and school lives, and feels that his world is “missing a certain color.” Kei, his childhood friend, longs for Hiro’s affection but is unable to confront him with her feelings. Miyako, a cheerful, somewhat ditzy girl who Hiro runs into one evening, immediately becomes attached to Hiro, but underneath that cheerful exterior she is hiding some past sorrow. Kyosuke, a photographer and cameraman, seeks to capture true emotion in his work, but never feels like he has done this satisfactorily. Renji, a high school upperclassman, is faced with the decision of how he should go forward with his life; he has aspirations to become a novelist but is unsure of himself. Finally, there’s the quiet and mysterious Chihiro, who Renji encounters by chance one day; always cheerful if quiet, but who seems to be a different person every day. As the story progresses we see that these seemingly disconnected individuals’ stories do relate to each other.

So how does ef – a tale of memories stack up against my beloved Key/KyoAni properties? Read on to find out!

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