It's so damn close to being truly great instead of simply visually excellent, a high bar in Hosoda's quest to outdo himself visually with each progressive film in his journey. Mise en scene is beyond accomplished. Character work is good, too. It's the screenplay proper where things fall apart once it all "comes together" in the final stretch. It attempts to tackle subject matter it has done no prep work for and does it with an overdose of fluffy anime charm that lands like the Hindenberg.

Not bad, but hobbled most certainly by many miscalculations.