Shikis an interesting one. Before I watched it, I received a lot of mixed impressions on the series. Theres a fair-sized crowd out there who basically views the series as mostly buildup to a huge climax that (for some), makes it all worth it. However, my impressions were basically the opposite. I loved the buildup and wasnt as into the climax.
In anime (and other fiction in general), I often find the villains to be more sympathetic than the good guys, assuming its a morally grey series. Most of the time Im on the good guys side, but in a series like this, I was definitely with the villains. It was really cool seeing them come in and slowly take over the village, and I found a lot of the villains to be among the most likable/entertaining characters as well. Megumi is basically over the top ridiculously evil all the time, and every second shes on screen after she becomes a vampire is joyful, especially since her design is so good. Sunakos speeches are all great, and I liked her design quite a bit, too. The minor vampires are cool in general too, and I often found myself coming to like characters more after they became vampires. I dunno, they just didnt feel that evil to me? I mean, they werent super nice, but it felt mostly like they were just trying to get by (compared to something like Tokyo Ghoul, where most of the villains are super evil to humans - the vampires here a lot more like the good guy ghouls from that). Plus the good guys are kinda dicks in general. The slow way they take over the village is really interesting compared to a lot of other villain plans. Its not uncommon for villains to have plans that take a long time to come to fruition, but usually you dont get to see what those plans are until the end. Here we get to see it every step of the way. Salems Lot and Dracula have cool slow builds too, but we dont get to see as much from the villains perspective in those, and the villains feel more evil there, too.
The most interesting of the good guys here is Ozaki. Hes basically the one guy who realizes the truth, but no one believes him. He goes to all sorts of crazy extremes to discover the depths of the truth, and probably commits more acts of evil than anyone else in the show, but everything he does makes total sense, too. Hes kinda the star of the climax, which I did find mostly entertaining, despite what I said earlier. The spectacle of the villagers defeating the vampires is quite entertaining, and I do enjoy it thematically as well. Humans are the real monsters plots can sometimes feel silly, especially in fiction where the monsters are pretty damn evil, but it works here, since weve come to have so much affection for the vampires over the course of the anime (of course, Im sure some people enjoyed the ending purely for the catharsis of the vampires being slaughtered, which is fine, though its missing the point a bit). The kill scenes are often over the top and entertaining (Megumis death is hilarious), so that helps too, and Im glad that Sunako survived at least. Still, it wouldve been cool to have a bad guys win story instead, IMO. Anyway, the ending worked well enough for me that it didnt make me stop liking the series, but with an ending I liked more this couldve definitely been a good ten spots higher.
Also the hairstyles in the show are amazing I love em <3 ---