Beautiful Bones: Sakurako’s Investigation (Sakurako-san no Ashimoto ni wa Shitai ga Umatteiru) 2015

I probably made a bit of a mistake by reviewing this series a fair while after finishing it – I forgot to take notes right after too, so I’m hoping I remember things clearly nevertheless.

Beautiful Bones contains a lot of aspects I enjoy; episodic mystery, slow-reveal backstory, a clever but odd-ball lead, a bit of drama and humour too, and of course, lovely visuals. I wasn’t watching seasonal anime back in 2015 and so this was an anime I’d heard about but not seen until earlier this year.

Okay, as I sometimes do, I’m launching into dot points now, starting with a random list of things I enjoyed:

• Sakurako and Shoutarou have a good dynamic, the mis-match adds both drama and humour with young Shoutarou having to be the responsible one at times
• I enjoyed the specific (if morbid, I guess) forensic elements about bones
• Gran is a stand out 🙂
• The source of the cursed painting was a great reveal
• Interesting to see the ‘beautiful but cruel’ character type in Sakurako softened by her obsession with osteological matters
• Features some tough themes
• Settings were detailed and lovely, as were objects (it’s always interesting to see just how much of budgets in other shows seem to be devoured by action sequences)

In contrast, I did have three quibbles to note:

• Because Beautiful Bones is only one short season, the main villain never quite goes beyond “lurking menace”. Excellent set-up for a future season though… should one ever occur
• Feels like the ED overcompensates for not being able to put heaps of fan-service in the actual show
• In regard to the final episode – I think I like it, even though I might not have been satisfied. Sakurako’s past and present were just about converging but without enough episodes not much came of it, and so the conclusion becomes about resolving a different problem. Without spoilers, I think it still gave a sense of closure to the season but I was expecting something different.

So, should you check this series out one day?

Well, if you like any of the things I’ve mentioned further above, and if you can accept an ending that doesn’t deliver many answers, then probably yeah 😀 I’ve not seen anything else from Troyca but to me everything looks great.

Beautiful Bones is hardly an old series either, and so it’d be easy enough to find. I will add that, despite the young co-lead, the anime is obviously not aimed at younger audiences.

4 Stars