Toy Adaptation…? by Shaft
Streaming on Funimation

Premise

In the near future, Earth is menaced by enormous creatures known as ‘Huge’. Humanity’s best hope is specialised squads of teenage girls known as Lilies, who train together in academies to defeat the monsters.

Zigg’s verdict: Like Toy Soldiers

This is a pretty bizarre thing – a line of dolls backed by the massive multimedia power of Bushiroad and animated by a studio better known for eccentric arthouse work. With that in mind, it’s perhaps unsurprising the result is something of a mess. There’s hints of an entertaining show in here – the cool transforming weapons and massive animation bumps during fight scenes suggest that at least some of the artists at Shaft were enthusiastic about the battle elements. Much less impressive are the incredibly unsubtle lesbian overtones and constant lavascious shots of legs and thighs, although I will give the show some credit for not being an out-and-out pervert fest. Least engaging of all is the colossally overblown cast of characters, each with cookie-cutter personalities and designs straight out of a mobile gacha game. Assault Lily is at least not actively offensive, which is amazingly something of a plus point these days, but it’s also deeply unoriginal and uninspired. Battle fans may find something in the action scenes to make them stick around but for anyone else I can’t really make a recommendation.

Iro’s verdict: I’m Not Into This

I’m sure there are subtleties I’m not privy to, but this seems to be the exact same kind of slush as Revue Starlight or Symphogear or whatever other Bushiroad franchises exist. There’s a cast of cute girls who all have one-note personalities, they fight monsters (and *gasp* sometimes each other!) with big honking weapons. Most importantly, they are lesbians. In case you forgot they were lesbians, they all attend the “Lily Academy” and the two apparent main characters are named “Yuyu” and “Riri”. Studio Shaft puts in an admirable performance in the battle scenes against the monsters – there’s some clever use of CG in wide shots that’s hard to tell apart from traditional 2D – and a less admirable performance regarding the sheer volume of thigh and boob shots. I suppose this means they know their audience, but I’m not in it.

Euri’s verdict: Fool Me Once

I ended up watching the entirety of The God of Highschool last season because of the well animated fight scenes. That was a mistake, and it was easily one of the worst shows I’ve actually finished in a long, long time. Assault Lily BOUQUET is, like, completely mediocre? But the fight scene looked dope and I haven’t learned my lesson, so see you in three months I guess!