Audience reviews
20 · Sample from the first available page, separate from the total number of ratings.
XOArama
This was a disappointment. Just finished my first rewatch after almost 3 years of first watching it and I didn't like it then and I don't like it now. The original FLCL was really just lightning in a bottle and they failed to capture it again. It feels like they go to the point of making fun of the fans of the original with how absurd the made Haruko, now don't get me wrong she was always crazy but they made her into some sort of cheap imitation of what they think Haruko is. The rest is also in the end just a copy of the original but worse in everyway. Maybe standalone this would be ok but you don't get that option once you slap the FLCL name on it.
Read at the sourceWhiteWolfKiba
Like many other fans of the cult classic OVA, I was very worried when I first heard there would be a direct sequel to FLCL, so much so that I put off watching it for a while. Well, I am happy to report that I enjoyed FLCL Progressive! To make a Star Wars comparison, I'd say Progressive is "the Force Awakens of FLCL projects," because it is a sequel and sort of reboot that very closely imitates the story of the original almost beat for beat. So yeah it gets no points for originality (more on that in a bit) but I'd say fans of the original will find a lot to like here.
My fears were assuaged a bit when I learned that Production I.G was handling this sequel, since I had to remind myself that the original FLCL was actually a co-production between Gainax and I.G, so it's not like the studio di…
Read at the sourceYouSuck00
Look it's a good show. 6 episodes. The pillows. Haru, Canti, that's enough. I was nervous that I wouldn't like it but the opening sequence pulled me right back to nostalgiaville and it was great.
Now the biggest complaint I have heard is about the main character Hidomi. She's anti and a loner which I think fits perfect. Of all the things that don't quite make sense in FLCL, an antisocial teenage girl makes all the sense. Takun was somehow likable even though he was obnoxiously immature the way teenage boys overtly are, but Hidomi seems way more mature on the outside, she's calm and collected, but she has daddy issues and doesn't know how to express her emotions. She just does not talk about anything with anybody, so when she kinda likes a guy, go figure she doesn't handle it appropriately…
Read at the sourceAnimeBW
*This is a joint review for FLCL Alternative and Progressive. No spoilers for either.*
The idea of making a sequel for FLCL is something that strikes me as a risky proposition right off the bat. Don’t get me wrong, FLCL was a damn great little show that’s earned its long and enduring legacy, but the way in which it operated made the idea of successfully telling another story in the same world seem, it not outright impossible, at least dangerous and uncertain. It was a show that operated on a thematic and emotional level, a chaotic whirlwind of unchained animation, batshit symbolism, and raw emotional sexuality to deliver a powerful metaphor for the journey of the male adolescent id on its quest to reach some ind of maturity. It was the middle key in Gainax’s male-coming-of-age-by-way-of-p…
Read at the sourcemuticere
I'll be honest, I came into this with fairly low expectations. If there is any series that basically is the definition of a one-shot, it's FLCL. The combination of talent, circumstance, writing, acting, all of it, were so perfect and really only could have come about at that one time. So when I heard there was going to be a sequel series, I was highly dubious. Honestly, I was somewhat disinterested. Sure, there were plenty of unresolved threads, like who really is Atomsk, what's the real deal with Haruko and what about Medical Mechanica? But like many great works of fiction, often the specific details of a story are less important than the themes that story is trying to get across. FLCL was about growing up primarily. It was also about a number of other things if you dig deep, but growing…
Read at the sourcechrissy_poo_too
Watching FLCL Progressive is like going to see a band you loved in high school on their reunion tour. They play some of the hits you remember, but a lot of the concert is new songs from their comeback album, and yeah, the songs definitely sound like they’re by the same band, but they’re missing that magic from back in the day. At its worst the new stuff sounds like the band was on autopilot, like music created for the sole purpose of having something to sell on tour.
The singer, bald now, struggling to fit into those tight leather pants from his youth, can’t quite hit the high notes anymore. The bass player refused to join in on the reunion, citing a lack of artistic integrity within the rest of the group, going so far as to say they’re “only in it for the money”. The guitarist, who long…
Read at the sourceEoussama
There's plain stupidly clueless, and there is FLCL clueless, those two very different sides of the same coin called cluelessness become very distinguishable when one first experiences FLCL and gets to enjoy it, but not necessarily fully understand the meaning behind it. That was probably the biggest aspect that made the original FLCL the loved piece of work that we've come to know. Although called a sequel, “FLCL Progressive” is a yet blunt and abstract on the surface piece of art made by kindergarten children that you'd expect from the hipsters of the era who have no sense of fashion (ironic) to call a revolutionary masterpiece, although it has nothing to do with the original OVA, and focuses entirely on its own made up story, with new characters, new direction, and a new premise. The maj…
Read at the sourceDRelish
Lol. All the haters on this thread failing to realize the original FLCL made as little sense as this. Never forget the goal of the original was an animation team blowing off steam with the combination of a dope soundtrack.
That's exactly what you're going to get here. The pillows + weird animation that shifts randomly and makes it exactly what I expected it to be. If you like something that's absurdist, has a cool rock soundtrack and is fun to watch but doesn't make too much sense you've definitely come to the right place. If you're looking for something deep and meaningful I suggest you look elsewhere.
Read at the sourceCodeBlazeFate
Ah, the tragedy as old as time. A popular piece of media comes out and proves to be a hit, both critically, and financially. Some odd years later, a sequel is made that exists solely because the first one was popular, rather than because there was something to add. It gets panned, financial success or no.
FLCL Progressive is yet another example of this tale. It’s what would happen if they tried to make FLCL in the current day -as of writing, of course- without any of the charm or passion that went into the original. Love it or hate it, FLCL is a distinct piece of work, one filled with little references and neat, temporary art-style shake-ups to add flavor to an already eccentric and visually stunning take on the coming of age story. Progressive is milquetoast at the best of times and dow…
Read at the sourceSpikeykoaLa
This is not the original FLCL. That seems like an obvious statement, does it not? Yet it would seem that many viewers were expecting a complete imitation of FLCL in FLCL: Progressive. So the fact that Progressive is tonally distinct from the original FLCL has been viewed as a failure to imitate the original. What this viewpoint fails to realize is that Progressive is a vastly different show than FLCL for a reason. Why bother merely imitating one of the best OVAs in anime history when you can work with the established world to create a new kind of show?
Story: 6
That said, the story is structurally similar to FLCL if not thematically. Haruko is wreaking havoc again on Earth, but this time we know her end-goal early on due to the context of FLCL, to capture the power of Atomsk. Hidomi and I…
Read at the sourceZingFreelancer
The beloved bastard child of anime industry from 2001 finally got a sequel and there is nothing progressive about. If anything, it has regressed and become a creative desert. Progressive is boring and forgetful.
For example, in the first 4 minutes of FLCL, we are introduced to the main characters. Their dynamic, their behaviour, they show enough to catch our interest to see what will happen to this ordinary pair, Haruhara shows up pretty quickly.
In Progressive, we are introduced to a walking corpse of a character, one that does not even say good morning to her mother when she meets her for the first time. Which helps little to make this character likeable and the show spends remaining time attempting to convince us to like this walking corpse of a character.
Read at the sourcesheller
If there's a thousand things Progressive got wrong about being an FLCL successor, there's at least one all-important thing it got right that most anime nerds don't notice:
It's about adolescence. Duh, right? Take teenage angst as a filter and suddenly a lot of the show has more punch and meaning, because like the original, it only means as much as you let it mean something.
The main character in Hidomi is interesting because, for once, it genuinely feels like it was written by someone who knows what it's like to be a teenage wallflower with weird feelings to cope with and bad vibes to endure in preparing for life. The zombie segments, for example, reminded me of pretty much every other weird teenage girl in high school secretly admitting to me they get turned on by violent, brutal shit t…
Read at the sourceVoidTheDark
Unfortunately, this sequel of a personally beloved work has met my negative expectations. I find it hard to interpret the validity of the critiques I have with FLCL Progressive due to measuring it up to the original series in my mind. With that said, I really don't see much value to this franchise installment that makes it stand out on its own. Where FLCL Progressive stands out is on some of the animation sequences and its quirky personality; unfortunately, I can't say either of these qualities are outstanding enough to outright recommend it.
While some sequences of animation were spectacular, the animation typically ranged from ok to lazily inoffensive most of the time. Reception of this quality of Progressive is going to be a bit mixed among viewers. I can understand why anyone else ma…
Read at the sourceNatureJay
Ah yes, the sequel that no one thought was necessary but we felt blessed to get... I wish I had something more to say about it but the process of eventually watching I can only describe as being akin to fanfic. They loved the original. They wanted to build on it. They didn't get how it worked.
I'm going to try to lay out some positives first before jumping in with the more frustrating aspects.
* The Pillows are back and provide the soundtrack. The main theme for Progressive, "Thank you, my twilight", with all it's silly Engrish, is great and I won't hear otherwise. Hearing it start up in the scattered episodes that it did was always a highlight.
* Hidomi's VA, Xanthe Huynh, I had literally never heard of before but she was legitimately talented in voicing a character that was emotionally…
Read at the sourcePhaetons_Folly
FLCL Progressive sits in an awkward position. It was an unexpected sequel to an anime that aired 18 years earlier. The original FLCL was a zany visual affair that still holds up today and helped define what anime is to a generation of Western fans who grew up on Toonami. FLCL is genuinely great and benefits from a tremendous amount of nostalgia. There is no way that FLCL Progressive was ever going to be better than the original, especially considering how anime production has changed dramatically since then. That said, FLCL Progress is a very good anime that I found more interesting and entertaining than most other anime that have been released in recent years.
A quick note on production, FLCL took 11 months to release six episodes, FLCL Progressive did that much in just over a month. If…
Read at the sourcebitchassdarius
It’s useless to discuss what FLCL “was about” and what Progressive “should have been” as this is an exercise in fanboyism and nostalgia. The majority of the fans in the West watched FLCL at an age where FLCL’s messages hit the most, and given the near two decade gap between the original and the sequel, there was no way Progressive was going to have the same effect. This much is obvious. Nor is it worth comparing the production (in terms of art and animation) between the two. They were made in different eras of anime by different staffs for different reasons (the original being a meticulously crafted OVA and the sequel(s) co-produced by Adult Swim as a TV series specifically with the fanbase in mind). However, there is value in looking at what FLCL did right fundamentally to have so much st…
Read at the sourcethesmore
Have you ever had that moment when you are in utter awe with how animation flows past your eyes with an interesting story? That's what I got in this wacky adventure. There has been a lot of complaints, but I will only address one of them right away. Its animation is creative and imaginative and it has the pacing like Gainax shows in the past. Where it falls, however, is that this animation is not consistent. What I mean by consistency is that at the start of every episode there is a dream sequence done by a new animator. SO I DO NOT SEE ANIMATION BEING A COMPLAINT IF IT'S DIFFERENT BECAUSE THERE IS A DISTINCTION BETWEEN A REALITY AND A DREAM. Ok now that's out of the way I need to explain why FLCL Progressive is worth checking out.
Story:
FLCL Progressive piggybacks the story from its pre…
Read at the sourcedontcome
Nothing amazing ever happens in this sequel. Every second we spend watching it is like a whole lifetime of dying slowly.
Hyperbole aside, I'll just be upfront: I didn't want this to happen. For years I was happy and confident that FLCL was seemingly sequel-proof. It's a perfect little character piece that crystallizes its particular time and place, celebrates all the excess and id-groping of the anime medium, and does it with heart and literacy. Nothing about it needed any elaboration. You can just ignore bad sequels, yeah, but they somehow make the original less "special." I wanted FLCL to stay special. Leave it alone.
Naturally, they didn't. I worked up some extremely cautious optimism and gave it a shot, anyway.
You can count me among the disappointed. Maybe Progressive isn't FOR us-…
Read at the sourcedomecity
I just want to start this with a disclaimer that this review was written after one viewing. I feel like FLCL is the sort of show that requires two or three viewings minimum to fully digest, so consider this tentative:
While (in my current opinion) Progressive didn't outshine the original FLCL I still feel as though it was a decent successor. I respect that the team behind it decided to create something different rather than just re-skinning Naota's story.
Progressive definitely has some interesting characters and relationships, but I feel like some of them are a little bit understated/one note. Fuyumi was easily the best character that the show has to offer. Like the original Prog thematically focuses on abandonment/loss (with a lot more focus on loss then in the original) and I appreci…
Read at the sourceKarhu
Matrix 3 was a masterpiece so why won't we give FLCL also a sequel it deserves.
- The team behind nu-FLCL, probably.
Our "sequel" is such an amazing piece that even its main character's personality is in contradiction with the point of the series. Naota wanted to be something somewhere else. He had several hard subject to deal with from love interests to his brother. His story was not only about coming-of-age, but a trip where he learnt to cope with himself and the world. In this nu-FLCL, Girl-whose-name-I-forgot is the epitome of emptiness. Person whose greatest merit is how little she cares about anything that is going on and how she never reacts to anything that happens. That's also pretty accurate way of describing myself when watching this anime.
The writing is utter nonsense. Ran…
Read at the source