It's difficult to recommend.Originally Posted by Fox
When the OVAs were originally released, they were out of chronological order in order to create an illusion of mystery, but it actually works better when told in chronological order. They were trying to pull a Haruhi, where it doesn't make any sense no matter what order you watch it in, but they kind of failed.
In comparison to SAC or the first movie, it's considerably less philosophical. The Major spends less time contemplating her own existence as a fully automatized person. As such, the other characters spend less time considering their relationships with the Major, in turn, which is kind of bad, because she ties everyone together. As a result, the people who liked the cyber-punk-philosophical aspect of SAC or the first movie will find ARISE lacking.
Where ARISE does succeed is the considerably higher screentime for action sequences. Despite the plot being a mess when told out of sequence, there is slightly more suspense to accompany the action. I can say it'll at least keep you engaged while you're watching it, even if at the end of the experience you wind up not being a fan. That also means zero filler (even though all of the "filler" SAC episodes wound up tying back to the final three episodes of each season anyway).
Also, the original OVA releases came without the final episodes (9 and 10), which tied the series together. If you watch the TV re-release, Alternative Architecture, it has everything in proper order, which is how this should be watched anyway, in my opinion. The movie that goes with this universe is the 2015 movie, which was a little more well received.
I expect the live-action movie to resemble the 2015 movie the most, now that I think about it.
Reply With Quote