Japanese Title: Haibane Renmei
Similar: Kino’s Journey
Watched in: Japanese & English
Genre: Slice of Life Psychological Mystery Fantasy
Length: 13 episodes
Positives:
- Nice atmosphere.
Negatives:
- Symbolism over substance.
- Useless cast.
- Dull world building.
- Thinks open-ended = depth.
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Not again. Not another empty series. I feel like I am on a roll of mediocre anime (thank Nodame Cantabile for being a temporary sanctuary!). Please get me out of this Purgatory.
Speaking of Purgatory, Haibane Renmei is the story of amnesiac angels living in a walled city, trapping all but a select few in this limbo-like world. Rakka, newly born angel or Haibane, has visions of falling from the sky. As with all Haibane, the vision each sees before birth holds the answer to their purpose in life.
It takes the entire first episode for Rakka to hatch from her egg (looks like a giant veiny testicle – cannot unsee), grow her wings, and get clean. It’s like watching a twenty-minute birthing scene. Bloody hell is this a boring start. It doesn’t get better soon after either. Not until the seventh – seven out of thirteen! – does the plot kick into gear.
Before then, Haibane Renmei is a test of endurance to stay awake (perhaps this is my purgatory trial). Rakka and her friends wander around the walled town of Grie doing menial jobs as we learn of the “rules” for Haibane. They can only wear second-hand clothes – why? They can’t handle money – why? They can’t touch the outer wall – why? They can only live in abandoned places – why? Rakka was born as a teenager, yet there are infant angels as well – why? They have wings that can’t do anything – why? I am watching this anime – why? Why seems to sum up Haibane Renmei. It gives a whole lot of questions and few answers in an effort to appear deep.
Symbolism replaces substance. To make matters worse, the symbolism is so obvious, so on the nose with the abundance of Christian symbols, parallels to limbo and the state of purgatory. Symbolism isn’t enough to make a great series. Just as a great twist cannot save a bad story beforehand, symbolism needs a backbone to hold it up.
In such a story, characters would be the backbone. Haibane Renmei does not have those characters. The supporting cast in particular feels like dead weight in this already thin anime. You would imagine that the first six episodes with no content could have gone to justifying these characters’ places in the story. And Rakka, she has some strength, but not enough to carry the team.
There is a reason no reputable writer would recommend an amnesiac protagonist unless you truly know what you’re doing. When a protagonist doesn’t know anything about themselves, we don’t know anything either, giving us little reason to care for them. Writers usually resolve this by giving us a flashback thread with information before the amnesia, or through a parallel thread of a third-party view on the protagonist. Unfortunately, either of these would give away Haibane Renmei’s mystery, which leaves one solution: action. Not guns and swords action, but ‘doing something’ action. This is what finally starts in episode seven, when Rakka drops the dead weights and tries to solve the mystery of Grie and her vision. I can’t say much on this, as it would give away the anime’s best element. Honestly, Haibane Renmei should have been a movie with only the second half of the series.
A greater effort into world building would not have gone amiss. In a blind rush to be as symbolic as possible, the author left his world bare, fearful that developing anything would undo the symbols. The opposite is true: a strong world creates stronger symbolism. This angel lore is so dull – I honestly can’t discern what the author was going for with them. They’re like having demons with nothing demonic about them. They only seem to be angels to hammer that symbolism harder into your nose. Could have made them fairies, mermaids, humans, whatever, and it’d lose naught.
Despite Haibane Renmei’s few good elements, I am so glad this is over. I know this series has a small but hardcore fanbase, but this wasn’t for me.
Art – Medium
The visuals look nice technically, but they are all so boring, forgettable.
Sound – Medium
Average VO in both languages. This script has little to say. With so little going on, the ordinary dialogue needs to stand out with sharp wit or insight. The soundtrack is effective.
Story – Low
An angel tries to solve the mystery of her walled town and the vision in her head. Haibane Renmei prioritises symbolism over its plot and characters to subpar success.
Overall Quality – Low
Recommendation: Try it. If you like slow ‘up in the air’ stories, Haibane Renmei will be your soulmate.
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Awards: (hover over each award to see descriptions; click award for more recipients)
Positive: None
Negative:
Nefarious Reviews 
Wow. This is an interesting take. Most of what I’ve heard paints this series as a near-masterpiece. I’m excited to see how I think myself!
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Hope you enjoy it more than I did. For similar, you may be interested in Serial Experiments Lain as well (same style and creator).
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I’m usually not the type of person to say this, but… the show completely and absolutely went over your head. The show’s drab and quiet presentation, its art and use of color, its abstract nature, the way Reki’s story plays out from the first episode to the last one. The supporting characters being left out in the 2nd part (which was also hinted at in the 1st episode) in order to emphasize the MCs’ struggles that mainly stem from selfishness. The show is vague and ambiguous, but it makes sense thematically speaking, is embraced and capitalized upon by the series since this is what primarily fuels the drama which shows that there is a specific purpose behind that approach. Conveying meaning through symbolism, motif, tone, and theme as well as relying on emotions and thematic overtones instead of plot and action. There is substance in Haibane Renmei, but this anime is basically a character drama with symbolism fueling it instead of plot points. They skipped one step in order to offer a poetic and personal experience. Haibane Renmei is a show that inquires but doesn’t resolve.
You can be completely hermetic to this, which is completely fine. But as a reviewer you should’ve made an effort to understand why the show decided to adopt this relatively bare-bones, drab and quiet style instead of condemning the whole package for seemingly shallow reasons, mainly because it didn’t match your unbendable expectations. There is a reason it has stood the test of time and is considered by many people to be one of the best animated works ever made and in the Top 3 of the best anime of the 2000s along with Mushishi and Monster.
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Did you just reword my review? Everything you mentioned I have covered. It didn’t go over my head – it simply wasn’t good. Trying to be deep, meaningful, and symbolic does not mean it was deep, meaningful, and symbolic.
Using the populist stance also further weakens your argument.
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To be honest, this is one of the very few times I have seen a negative review about Haibane Renmei which really surprises me. I can’t lie to you, but this is actually one of my favorite anime series, so we’re going to have to agree to disagree. I thought the concept was very unique, the soundtrack certainly was one of Ko Otani’s best works as a composer, and I was fine with the more understated aesthetics of this series. I can understand why you might not like the open ending in the last episode which is fair. I didn’t think the symbolism was that bad. Then again, I’m certainly known to bash things that are popular or critically-acclaimed like various Disney movies, The Rabbi’s Cat, and I thought The Garden of Words was extremely overrated (this is coming from someone who likes several Shinkai movies!).
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Everyone has different tastes, so there is nothing wrong with anything you have said. No point in lying about what one likes or dislikes!
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Gotcha, and thanks for understanding. There are times where I wonder about people attacking me for my reviews like when I did posts on the documentary Hate Crimes In the Heartland since it deals with some uncomfortable racist American history or Kimba the White Lion because of THAT plagiarism controversy, and I’m surprised when I didn’t get that backlash (or death threats) and when people actually liked my thoughts on them.
Very true about not lying about what one likes or not.
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