Fireworks

Genre(s): Romance, Sci-Fi

Age-Appropriateness: 13+ (Crude humor, mild violence. Language)

Platforms: Netflix

Episodes: One 1 hour 30 min. movie

TheAwersome Rating: 7.3 / 10 (Interesting enough, not an Experience™)

Premise: It’s summer, and Norimichi Shimada and his friends want to know if fireworks look round or flat from the side. They forge a plan to find the answer at Moshimo Festival’s fireworks display. However, Norimichi finds himself conflicted when his classmate, Nazuna Oikawa, plans to run away from home and wants Norimichi to join her. When things go awry in their attempt to escape, a strange orb in Nazuna’s possession gives them another chance at staying together.

TheAwersome’s Thoughts: Remember that thing I said about music getting to me to watch anything? I picked this one up because it had a great music video, and oddly is for sale in every “Anime” aisle of every store everywhere, despite it lacking that “je ne sais quoi” magic unique to anime movies that make it big stateside. Animation quality is stellar, it was interesting to see a lot of SHAFT’s (Monogatari, Madoka) signature styles in play but without the bizarre and abstract visuals. As for the content of the movie itself, it really felt like “that cool episode that stood out from Season 4 of that Sci-Fi show you like” rather than a standalone movie. The focus of the movie felt more on the situation than any of the characters, and in such channeled a strong “Twilight Zone” vibe, especially with the ending.

There wasn’t anything that really stood out as Bad, but I feel they easily could have done some more with the development of the characters.

TLDR: An interesting, mysterious show that feels more like a stand-out episode of a Sci-Fi TV series than a movie.

And here’s the music video which uses clips from the movie that I had seen years before watching the movie that made me say “Hey, this looks beautiful, I’ma watch this movie sometime!”