I heard good things going into 2015's anime "Punch Line," but for the most part was blind to the story. It's hard to guess what the show might be about based on a short description or looking at the key promotional art on the front of the DVD box. It doesn't help that the story it one of the most ridiculous I've seen in recent memory, and seems to keep changing every few episode on a whim. This is part of the joy in watching "Punch Line," but it can also be a bit misleading and hard to pin down exactly WHAT it is.In the first episode, we see a bus hijacking by a gang of gun-wielders. A female super hero calling herself "Strange Juice" flies in and beats most of the enemies, but when about to be shot by the final enemy, the main character (Yuta) gets a hair color change from black to orange, and jumps at the terrorist, flying with him out the window and into the river below. Yuta is revived later, but we discover the event caused his spirit to be kicked out of his body, while a new and unknown spirit continues to use his body without the knowledge of the rest of the world. Yuta's ghost gets a tutorial by a spirit cat about what is happening, including the fact that he gets superhuman powers whenever he sees a woman's panties, he looses conciousness when he sees panties twice, and that a large meteor will destroy the human race in about a week. It sounds like this will be a fan-service-packed action show, and the first couple of episodes suggest this is the case. But much of the fanservice is actually rather tame (let's be honest... how many anime can you name that DOESN'T have a panty shot of its leading female characters?). And the show shifts to pure comedy, then drama, then science-fiction conspiracy. New plot twists occur in almost every episode. If I had to pin down what "Punch Line" is, I would define it in two parts: it's a typical anime featuring an eccentric cast of girls living in a dorm house together, and its a story about time travel. Even though it isn't a clear part of the story until about halfway into the show, time travel is a huge part of the plot.If nothing else, I can't say the story was ever boring. However, while the frantic plot twists are initially played for comedy, it wears itself thin. Sure, in the first three episodes, when the mentor cat spills random rules at convienient times ("you can take over a person's body, oh but only for seven minutes" or "you get higher spiritual energy when around cinnamon"), it was funny. When character histories reveal plot twists regarding their relationships to each other for dramatic effect, and they don't have any effect on the plot at all, then I start to get annoyed. It's a miracle that the show is able to bring together a coherrent ending, but even that is built to be open-ended enough to allow for any number of new seasons (despite no anime continuation, there was a game and manga that continued the story further). 
The story probably came about by having multiple writers and directors contribute to individual episodes, writing up the plot as the episodes aired. That certainly makes sense for the animation quality: the first and last episodes have some pretty fantastic action scenes, but most of the show in between is barely passable, as limited as possible to convey what a scene requires, which is typically just characters talking. This was animated by Studio MAPPA, who is typically known for a much higher quality of output, so I suspect "Punch Line" was made by entry-level animators as practice and as a venue to let their creative juices loose before working on a real project. The character designs are stylized and colorful, but strangely the style doesn't come across well, and while it's difficult to find other anime that look like it, "Punch Line" feels like it looks average (it doesn't help that nearly all of the show takes place within the dorm building the five main characters live in). I would give a slight nod to the Japanese dub (no English dub exists), which can be a bit annoying at times, as the girls are all exaggerated and cute, mispronouncing phrases on purpose as part of the joke. But those voices give the show most of its personality.If it looks like I'm hating on "Punch Line" at lot, don't misunderstand; while it is a strange experimental mess, it is still fun to watch because of its experimentation, and some of its animation and comedy is worth watching through. There isn't much else like it... it's just a shame much of it turned out to be more average then intended.