Psycho-Pass Season 1 - Overall Series Impressions & Total Series Rating

[monir]

This thread is to be used for discussing the entire episodes of Psycho-Pass ... your thoughts about the show, overall impressions, expectations and hopes about Blu-Ray/DVD-exclusive footage etc.

A few subjects you might want to ramble on about:

• General impression of the series.
• Opinions on the overall story, writing & plot devices.
• Thoughts about the animation quality.
• Characters/Character Design
• Voice Acting
• Which kind of footage (Blu-Ray/DVD-exclusive) you feel you'd really like to see.
• What the show meant to you.
• What could the creators/animators/writers have done better.

And so on.

The poll represents your total series rating. In other words, how you would rate all the episodes combined (1-10)? If you'd rather rate the whole series by technical/artistic merits, you can do so. An example:

Animation Quality: 1-10
Voice Actors: 1-10
Script: 1-10
Soundtrack: 1-10
Editing: 1-10
Enjoyment: 1-10
Emotional Involvement: 1-10

Average = Total Series Rating

Or a combination of the two. Or your general gut feeling.

Feel free to discuss and more importantly, have fun

[Akka]

The serie as a whole was very good. The first two thirds were simply genius, dissecting a dystopian society hiding behind the mask of an utopia, and the ethical disaster created by a deshumanized system applying purely mechanical checking without regard to actual human values.

The background is very rich and detailed, the scenario has incredibly consistency. I tend to be a nitpicker, easily annoyed at unrealistic events/behaviours or plot holes, and it was a joy to NOT be disturbed by them and to see that each time I thought "hey, did they forget that... oh no, actually the author thought about it !".

The last third, though, saw a change of focus that weakened the show, reducing itself to a chase and losing the scale and depth of reflection we had until now. It never becomes "bad", but it makes for a somehow disappointing ending, especially as in the end, nothing is really settled.

Still one of the best series I saw in years, refreshing with its grim, uncompromising and believable settings and story, especially amid the sea of shallow moe without substance that the anime scene seems to have become.

I kinda hope that a second season will be able to take the central problematic head-on once again, and this time brings it to an actual conclusion.

A solid 8/10, which would have been an upper 9/10 if the last part had been as good as the first two.

[MisaoFan]

I really enjoyed most of the series to be honest. Psycho-Pass is a detective drama whose themes are heavily influenced by old school sci-fi stories of the cyberpunk and dystopian environment, has a solid writting but the pacing between the arcs varies. The first half was very enjoyable, it begins with Akane's police training and her meeting with the Enforcers as well another Inspector : they begin working on the investigating cases with the new Inspector for the first time. Akane suddenly grow as a heroine of justice, is capable of changing the heart of Shinya Kogami, an enforcer flagged as a latent criminal because of the "unresolved" case that happened 3 years ago. Most of Akane's conversations with the teammates are somewhat difficult but gives a lot of progression. However, things get worse when

Spoiler for Spoiler:

Yuki, one of her best friends gets killed by Shougo Makishima, Shinya's old enemy, as an excuse to test her "abilities" and confidence towards the Sibyl System.

Sibyl System is still an imperfect system from what I see, but has a lot of ups and downs in its convenients. However, what's appaling to me is when they flags people as latent criminals at very young age such as Kagari, which results in some plotholes half-way. The second half of the story has a promising beginning but keep falling down after Sibyl's attempted shutdown. The last half of the show becomes nothing more than Shinya trying to get revenge against Shougo once more so it is up to Akane arresting them but has trouble trusting her faith towards the Sibyl System. The ending felt pretty underwhelming but also above average at the same time for various circumstances.

The characters appear to be very likeable and actually does have some sort of personality, even though some often appear to be underdeveloped, such as Kagari and Yayoi. I really liked Akane's character and I find Ginoza/Masaoka's relationship to be touching as well. Shinya, despite being overly obsessed with his revenge, learn the change of his heart thanks to Akane, and he finally get his advantages from her. While I didn't like what most villains behave, the criminals' hidden motivations were well portrayed, and Shougo proves to be one of the entertaining villains I have faith with, despite being indifferent with some of his aspects.

The artwork was excellent, even though it gets stiff and awkwardly placed at times. Akane's design leaves me hesitated at first, but once I got over it, I simply loved it a lot ! I don't know why, but her cute face, her unusually short hair and her general looks are awesome. I also liked the rest of the main cast as well Shougo's. There is some scenes that are grotesque with some blood, but nothing too scary or disturbing, even though I was somewhat troubled by Yuki's death in episode 11.

The voice acting was also beyond good and is conveyed with a wide range of necessary emotions and proves to be believable in some moving parts. The music was also good and fitting in a cyberpunk setting, the way it transitionates between scenes with a musical score was astonishing, plus the editing was decent. My average enjoyment for P-P was very strong and the same goes for my overall emotional investment.

Even though it's not a perfect series, it was pretty realistic and has some grim parts to complement with. I'll give this show a 9/10, not as good as Madoka Magica but still manages to be one of my favorite anime of the last two seasons.

[Reincarnated]

Animation Quality: 9 (i hope eps 18 get fixed well tho)
Voice Actors: 7 (some characters are not appealing or maybe it's just me)
Script: 10 (urobutchi ftw)
Soundtrack: 10 (i'll give 20 if I can. the OST is pure epicness)
Editing: ( I dunno what this means tho)
Enjoyment: 9 (every single episode feels so short to me ^_^; )
Emotional Involvement: 9 (akaneeee )


Average = 9
one of the best animes I've ever seen. Yes there's some aspect lacking, but it worth to waste my time watching it ^^

[Mandarake]

Notwithstanding few minor nits to pick, I thoroughly enjoyed this show. I think the show succeeded with me because I was not looking for any kind of object lesson on good governance and justice. I never believed that was the purpose of this series. If you are looking for a lesson in civics, you won’t find it in this show, and Urobuchi is not the guy to give it to you.

I think Psychopass was, among other things, a creative thought exercise. Urobuchi started with the premise that society had deliberately and voluntarily abandoned the subjective process of conventional morality and replaced it with ruthlessly applied objective criteria in order to achieve order and stability. There should have been no debate about whether Sybil was immoral because, duh, it was a given. Sybil was the product of the bargain that society made with the devil. The real debate, if there needed to be one, was whether choosing Sybil was a rational choice. Yes, it worked, but at what cost?

Even then, I didn’t think Urobuchi was ever interested in resolving that debate. For the purpose of the story, we just needed to understand and accept that society chose Sybil so that we could continue with the next step in Urobuchi’s thought exercise: imagining how rational people would behave within such a morally devoid context.

I think it’s an exercise in futility to pass any kind of moral judgment over any of the characters here using our conventional values. None of the characters in the story had the benefit of any kind of ethical or moral frame of reference that we, the audience enjoyed. Urobuchi thoroughly stripped the landscape of all ethical signposts and set the characters adrift. We can’t expect them to figure out good or evil the same way we do because they were never taught good or evil the same way we were. How else could we have accepted that it was the protagonists’ job to defend Sybil and then root for them notwithstanding our own moral objections to what Sybil stood for? But we did, because it made perfect sense from the characters' perspective.

The final step in Urobuchi’s thought exercise, in my mind, was figuring out whether a rational person’s basic good human nature could thrive within such an environment, and if so, how would it respond. The test is rather simple: in the end, can we feel any sort of attachment or sympathy for the protagonists, and do we care anything about what happens to them?

If your answer is yes, then you can’t deny that Psychopass had met the goals it had set for itself. This was a story about people. Nothing more, but certainly nothing less. It didn't matter that they were stuck in a strange and repulsive milieu. We still connected with them on a human level. I feel Urobuchi stayed true to his thought exercise and still managed to spin a ripping good yarn in the process.

[justsomeguy]

* Psycho-Pass depicts one hell of a dystopia. With so much social control and aversion to stress, people have become unambitious and even stupid, to the point of not knowing a murder when they see it. Yet considering the riots that broke out, people's true natures of fear, anger, and violence were not changed by Sibyl at all. Nevermind that holograms are prevalent and most food is flavored fakes created from a single grain, representing what that society is on its way to being.

* The Sibyl System seems to actually believe that it is doing good for society. Pretty good representation of the self delusions and lies that real life dictators tell.

* Having the Sibyl System turn out to be composed of criminals' brains undermined the theme of security vs freedom, transforming it into order (under an evil despot) vs supposed chaos (but having freedom).

* Not showing the circumstances of Sibyl's implementation nor the outside world limits the amount of understanding and sympathy one can have for the system. Since we were never shown those, the only comparison would be the real world, and we know that we're not doing too badly without such a tyrannical system.

* Oddity: Makishima states that human lifespans have been shortening, but Masaoka being around shows that Sibyl could not have been around too long. So how can Makishima have enough data to make such an assertion, unless Sibyl itself is not to blame?

* Yayoi got next to no attention nor development outside of her single episode, and her former friends who rebelled against Sibyl were never seen nor discussed again. She and Shion feel as if they were written in solely to have more female characters and eye candy.

* The cyclical nature of the ending was frustrating. Makishima, despite all the focus he got, turned out to be a mere criminal with no lasting effects on the world, and Akane as the only person left with knowledge of the truth decides to do nothing and leave the true antagonist Sibyl be.

Score: 8/10

[NoemiChan]

Animation Quality: 9

Voice Actors: 7

Script: 9

Soundtrack: 5

Editing: 7

Enjoyment: 7

Emotional Involvement: 7

Overall Rating 7.25

[4Tran]

Psycho-Pass has some potentially interesting ideas and it's always nice to see more anime move towards cyberpunk. However, it ends up having little to say about the characters and its setting. The writing, or maybe story conception, really lets the production down.

[custardpie]

I dropped the show after watching the first two episodes, and picked it up again and watched the whole thing in about two days. I did enjoy watching the show (or to be more precise, about two-thirds of it), but it turns out that my initial impressions of the show were correct. I dropped the show because 1) I did not like the character designs and 2) I found the background set-up to be shallow and unconvincing. Well, I got used to the character designs, and I thought the background details would become more intricate as the show progressed.

Wrong. I could not think seriously about the implications of the Sibyl System simply because I could not take its premises seriously. The whole story isn't very effective without having established the Sibyl System as at least somewhat justifiable. As more and more spoilerish information were revealed, I found it more and more ridiculous. Therefore, it was difficult for me to consider Akane, Kogami, and Makishima's problems to be worth pondering over.

More detrimental, in my opinion, was character development. There was hardly any except for Akane, and even that was quite disappointing - what was her development for, may I ask? 22 episodes is too long a length to be about bittersweetness and despair over the cyclic nature of life and systems. Well, the last sentence could be just my personal opinion. But moving on to the other characters, I could never swallow the supposedly fateful relationship between Kogami and Makishima - why is Makishima that interested in Kogami anyways? And given separately, the two are quite underdeveloped, flat characters. The minor characters fare no better - that standalone episode about Yayoi was quite confusing. It added very little to her character and even less to the show overall.

All in all, I enjoyed watching a decently made show in a sci-fi setting, but both the world and the characters need to be more solidly built to be taken seriously and to become more engaging imo.

[Archon_Wing]

Overall, I thought the ideas were really nice but too shallowly explored for a 22 episode series and that randomly quoting philosophers made Gen look super pretentious. (Unless Makishima's doing it, because he actually is a pretentious asshole). The characters were acceptable, but I can't really say they were particularly deep either. It's kinda like Sword Art Online in that sense, but much cooler.

In with that, I think Psycho Pass has a distinct similarity with Ghost in the Shell:SAC-- also done by IG. The philosophical backdrop is merely the background for seeing cool shit happen. Ghost in the Shell also didn't have particularly deep characters but they definitely played their roles and were memorable. And most importantly, it was flashy and cool.

And that, is where Psycho Pass fits in its niche. Honestly, it would have fit well in the late 80s/90s because the style of that anime is very much like that, filled with over the top violence, fast paced action, and stylish anti-heroes. Certainly, this is one series that would work great as a comic book series, or been next to the shelf next to the likes of Robocop and the Terminator, packaged with excellent production. Visuals did drop at certain point, but that soundtrack really got you into the scenes. 2nd OP/ED are definitely rated highly for me.

Though the stylized violence didn't really sit too well with me at times. The assault on that bystander while everyone did nothing was there to prove a point, but for a second I thought I really was watching some ridiculous 80s cyberpunk movie. The show really does stretch its suspension at times. On the other hand, cynical stuff like those cute little robots scraping chunks of people proves that Gen is not only a sick fuck, but a funny one.

The main theme of Psycho Pass is the concept of free will and what it had to do with survivability. One overlooked aspect of the series is that it actually did delve into the very concept of psychopathy/sociopathy-- a lack of emapthy for others, personified in the Sibyl system. It also can be associated with any Darwinist perspective that prides survival of the fittest. So we might try to cleanse such aspects and traits out of our systems. But in cleansing it, what do we sacrifice? Sometimes a little violence and aggression is necessary. It's no doubt that the show went out of its way to portray Makishima as an alpha male of a sorts. Kougami gets a little of this too. Of course, Makishima's also batshit and not suitable for human society either, so there you go. But it is scary to think that this unfeeling, cold, and sick bastards like Sibyl and Makishima actually have logic to back them up. What do you have to stand on?

And then we have Akane. She's mostly a bystander of this but evolves the most out of all the characters via perspective. Although one would want her to "pwn" the system, such a conclusion isn't particularly realistic. So we live with the notion that you can't just overthrow a system because you feel it, and that the path to change is much more subtle than that. That wasn't cool, but let's go back to earth.

That last arc was sorta lolwut, but the ending was surprisingly mellow and refreshing. It was nice to have some subtlety at the end.

I give Psycho Pass an 8/10. It's just well packaged enough as a whole to get it through.

Oh, and Kana Hanazawa, of course. I am glad that IG made something akin to Ghost in the Shell, as opposed to Guilty Crown.

[LightningZERO]

Animation Quality: 8
Voice Actors: 10
Soundtrack: 9
Editing: 8
Enjoyment: 10
Emotional Involvement: 8
Overall: 8

A very interesting premise and very good ride. I really like police investigator series set in a dystopia future. The series shows very interesting technology in a rather possible future, showing what the over reliance of technology will bring to our life. The world of a Psychopass is a sad one, where our protagonists, labelled as criminals , yet still tried to fight for their own justice.

The main casts are very well done, voiced by great actors. Everyone has his/her own voices, although it is a shame that outside of the core few, the remaining didn't get much spotlight and sorta there. Enjoy Makishima as antagonist. He's just awesome.

As for the plot, I enjoy the case of the weeks format as these always explore various sides of people living in Psycho Pass world and the rules, which are very fascinating. The main plot with Makishima was interesting, but the overload of philosophical debate sorta derailed it, and the final act was rather anti climatic. There was also the random Kunizuka episode which wasn't needed at all....

Despite this, it is one of my favorite anime series and I am loving the news of second season!

[JiCi]

I give it an 8

Spoiler for reasons:

+ good story, setting, action, plot twist and characters
- poor character development (for Kagari, Yayoi and Shion, especially) and obvious death flags

Kagari could have put up a better fight, or even an actual fight against the hacker before getting screwed and Shion's backstory could have been explained like the others' were, that includes the relationship between Yayoi and Shion which could have been properly explained. Adding a scene where Shion becomes interested in Yayoi in episode 12 would have worked... or even adding scenes where she teases Yayoi into breaking her blank stare would have worked too. I don't know how: Yayoi's working on something at her computer and then Shion brings her some documents and wraps her arms around her neck before leaving, or while both Yayoi and Akane meet Shion so she can explain something, she takes a moment to tighten up Yayoi's tie and give her a seductive look, or even for comedy purposes, Akane surprises both Yayoi and Shion kissing (and really going at it), which causes Akane to lose all composure, blush, cover her mouth and freak out, only for Shion to say: "Oh, sorry about that. Our psycho-passes were getting too high, so I needed something to back them down a little. Wanna give it a try sometimes?"... and Yayoi takes her leave as if nothing happened... and Akane tries to calm herself afterward. P.S. If Akane almost surprised Yayoi and Shion having sex, I don't see how having her surprised both ladies while simply kissing would be a problem.

I can actually theorize on the sexual aspect of their relationship though: sexual activities reduce stress. In a world where anger, stress and panic can make your brain spike, I could see both ladies doing this to keep it low, not much simply to "express their love".

On another subject, I would have loved it better if Akane's partners got rotated more often, like being paired with Kagari and Yayoi more often, and even possibly have Shion directing her during a mission.

Otherwise, pretty good series.

[kache]

Finished.
Extremely interesting anime, with an incredible world, a very compelling story, and a good emotional charge.
The topics presented spark a lot of thinking and consideration, so I am not really able to process everything as of now, need a few days (and perhaps weeks) to reach my own conclusion regarding all that information.
In the meantime, I give it a 9. There is really very little (if anything) for me to complain about regarding this anime, so it would probably deserve a 10, but it lacked emotional charge, the capability to engage me emotionally to the point of me obsessing over it, to the point of me forgetting the real world for the time it takes to watch it, so for me it misses a critical part of the reason I watch media.
Either way, my decision is only temporary, and I'll probably reconsider it a lot until the S2 hits.

Only thing that worries me is that the S1 was very brutal in it's depiction of violence, so I am worried about heavy censorship for S2, which would mean that I'd have to wait at least 1 more year for the series to be fully out in BD to watch it as intended by the director.

Oh, regarding releases: I was really disappointed by the fansubber's choice not to use linked OP/ED for the MKV files, which increased the file size of the series by over 6GB, with more than 25% of the total size being taken by the OP/ED, whcih was a honestly pointless waste of space, an issue that linked files for mkv was implemented to avoid in the first place.

[Akito Kinomoto]

Psycho Pass is the best disappointmnet I've ever watched. Urobutcher is intent on exploring, essentially, the themes of free will, society, justice, and all that happy jazz, and he actually does it pretty well. We can thank that to a solid cast of characters, the most impressive one surprisingly being Akane. More than heat, she's packing some noticeably subtle character development throughout the show. The rest of the characters don't change in a traditional sense, but they are well realized for a crime of the week plotline early on. But that's the thing. What stops them from being more than solid is just a lack of realization on a lot of them. I certainly felt the intensity when certain things to happened to them, but the only one who really leaves a lasting impression is Akane and, ironically, most of the 'antagonists.'

There's just enough of a human element here to make Psycho Pass' themes worth musing over, but I'd hold back the trigger on calling it anything more than good.

[Wanderer of Suzaku]

Just finished watching season 2 and I will say that I freaking loved season 1!
Season 1 was full of awesomeness and the characters were great. It's true that the coolest characters, IMPO, died, which pissed me off, I mean I loved Kagari and Masaoka, and it pained me to see them go, but this is that kind of series anyways. The character who steal the show is definitely Togami, whom I am greatfully is alive. I mean this guy kicks ass! I loved watching Tsunemori, who at one point I hated, grow and become more mature. I do understand the reason why she agreed to keep the system as it was, it is reasonable, but I hope to see further seasons that may depict a true act of reform to this system. In regards to the other characters, in Season 1 I didn't like Ginoza too much. I found him so uptight and his handling of the enforcers was so bad that it made me angry at times, but he grew also. Its true it took his dad dying to make him snap and grow but I like the fact that he, as an enforcer, is way more humble and laid back. I often said the the Enforcers were what made the series interesting; it was the Enforcers who actually make the Investigators be their best and grow as people and Investigators. That being said this is the reason my fave Enforcers were Kogami, Karanomori, Masaoka and Kagari. I can give two damns about Yayoi. She is like in a trance and never provides useful input unlike Karanomori and the rest. But for me Season 1 was a 10. I like how much of the Human condition is exposed and all the philosophical stuff too, yeah, I am not going to go in depth here, but I liked it a lot.

Now on to season 2! I was depressed to find that Kogami was out and even though my predictions of him dying were wrong (Thankfully!), I wanted to see more of him. But to see Tsunemori imagining him at least that made me feel better. I hate Shimotsuki, I wanted her to be removed from the series at all times. This character is totally unnecessary IMHO. I can't stand her . I was actually celebrating when that nut Togane found her out but then they used her and i was definitely convinced that this character is full of shit. The best addition? Jouji Saiga! I loved this character from S1 and to see him take such an important role was so awesome! Him along with the new Ginoza Enforcer, Hinakawa and Tsunemori made the series worthwhile. But for some reason I just didn't think this season was so great. This season kept me on edge yeah, it was intense, ok, but there was something that kept bothering me and it was the fact that if only a year had passed by how come they were reacting so casual to this situation when Shogo had made a fucking riot not so long ago? I thought that the only one who was awoken was Tsunemori everyone in her Division (Ginoza I love you but...) were in a trance! I was more frustrated at times than on edge because of what was going on. The Mental Facility situation made me so angry because they were all useless. But then the end made me happy . I would say s2 is a 7.

But I can't complain, I enjoyed the heck out of this series. I ravaged S1 in 1 day and s2 in 2, it would've been 1 if I hadn't been doing stuff though

One thing I can say though, I am super pumped for the movie!! I have seen 3 trailers and I cannot wait man, it looks awesome and THE MAN is in it! What I want to know though, if anyone knows btw, is there gonna be a Season 3?? I wish there was a Season 3