THE LABYRINTH OF GRISAIA

DESCRIPTION

CAST

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ANIME DramaThe Fruit of Grisaia
ANIME ActionThe Eden of Grisaia
SPECIAL ComedyThe Labyrinth of Grisaia: Takizono Basket-bu no Nama Cream Party!
MANGA ActionGrisaia no Meikyuu: Sanctuary Fellows

REVIEWS

• 

  qiwii

  70/100
  A solid expansion of Yuuji's story that makes Grisaia worth returning to, even if it lacks Fruit's impact.

  The Labyrinth of Grisaia is a strange sequel to The Fruit of Grisaia because it doesn't really feel like a normal second season. Instead of simply continuing from where Fruit left off and moving into another large overarching story, Labyrinth is more interested in expanding on the characters and, most importantly, Yuuji. Because of that, I think whether you'll enjoy it depends heavily on how invested you already are in Grisaia after watching the first season.

  Personally, I ended up giving it a 7/10 overall, although my enjoyment was higher at around an 8/10. It isn't as consistently strong as Fruit was for me, but I still enjoyed returning to this world and getting more information about characters I had already become attached to.

  The biggest strength of Labyrinth is easily Yuuji. One of the things I liked about him in Fruit was that he actually felt competent. He's not the typical protagonist who spends the entire story getting himself into trouble and relying on everyone else to save him. Yuuji is intelligent, capable, and usually has some idea of what he's doing, and Labyrinth gives us much more of a reason to understand why he's like that. His past is obviously a huge part of his character, and getting to see more of what happened to him makes his personality and behavior in Fruit make much more sense.

  This is probably the part of Labyrinth that I appreciated the most. Rather than simply telling us that Yuuji has experienced horrible things, the story actually gives us more context surrounding his past and the experiences that shaped him. It makes him feel less like the mysterious, extremely competent protagonist from Fruit and more like an actual person who became that way because of everything he went through.

  The rest of the cast is still enjoyable as well. I wouldn't say every character receives some massive improvement, but Labyrinth gives the characters more time to breathe and provides additional context for some of them. After spending so much time with the girls in Fruit, it was nice getting more material with them instead of immediately abandoning everything that had already been established.

  That being said, I think the writing and structure are where Labyrinth loses some points for me. The story can feel somewhat disjointed because it jumps between different periods of time and different stories. There were definitely parts where I was interested and wanted to see more, but there were also moments where it felt like the anime was jumping somewhere else before I had fully settled into what it was doing.

  I don't necessarily think this makes the writing bad. It's more that Labyrinth feels less cohesive than Fruit. Fruit had a much clearer progression because it was introducing the characters and gradually exploring their individual problems. Labyrinth already assumes that you know these people, so it can afford to be much more fragmented. That works in some places, but not everywhere.

  The animation is probably the least interesting part of the experience. I'd give it around a 6/10. It's perfectly watchable, but there isn't much here that made me think, "damn, this looks incredible." I wasn't watching Grisaia for its animation anyway, so this didn't have a huge effect on my enjoyment, but compared to everything else, it's definitely not one of the show's strengths.

  Despite those issues, I still had a pretty good time watching it. That's why my personal enjoyment score is higher than my overall score. Labyrinth isn't something I would call a masterpiece, and I don't think it reaches the same level as the best parts of Fruit, but there is something satisfying about getting to spend more time in the Grisaia world after finishing the first season.

  It's also important to go into this with the right expectations. If you're expecting Labyrinth to immediately become another Fruit of Grisaia with the exact same structure, you might be disappointed. It's much more of an expansion. It's taking the characters and especially Yuuji and giving you additional information that makes the overall story feel larger.

  And because of that, I absolutely would recommend watching it if you enjoyed Fruit. I wouldn't recommend skipping it just because it isn't as strong as the first season. There's enough important character material here to make it worthwhile, especially if Yuuji is one of the reasons you liked Grisaia in the first place.

  However, I definitely would not recommend watching Labyrinth without watching Fruit first. A lot of what makes these stories interesting comes from already knowing Yuuji, the girls, and everything that happened previously. Labyrinth isn't really designed to be an introduction to Grisaia. It's a reward for already being invested in it.

  Overall, The Labyrinth of Grisaia is a solid sequel that expands the world and gives Yuuji much more depth. The structure can be messy, the animation is nothing special, and I don't think it reaches the highs of Fruit, but I still enjoyed watching it quite a bit. It's not a sequel I'd call essential because it's perfect, but I'd definitely call it worthwhile if you already liked the first season.

  Characters: 7/10
  Writing: 7/10
  Animation: 6/10
  Enjoyment: 8/10
  Overall: 7/10

  If you liked The Fruit of Grisaia, watch it. If you didn't like Fruit, there's probably not much here that's going to completely change your mind.

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COMMENTS

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