Author: Lenlo

Hello everyone! Apologies for the delay on this, I’ve been playing a lot of Granblue Fantasy Versus Rising. I made it to A4! Woo! Anyways, this is a special week as Aidan is making a return to help cover Sengoku Youko! So if that’s a show your interested in, read to the end and see what he thinks. I’ll admit, I’ve heard a lot of good things about the second episode, so I might pick it back up again if that continues. Anyways, read on!

Dungeon Meshi- 3 [Living Armor]

This was easily the best Dungeon Meshi episode yet, and exactly what I was looking for from the series. The food stuff is still there, it’s relevant and we still get a bunch of unique monster dishes at the end. But the focus is much more on the characters, Laios specifically, their past, and conquering the unique challenges the dungeon presents. Starting the episode with his sword breaking only to wind up in a hall that had challenged him previously in his career, then ending with them not only conquering it but discovering something new about it and gaining a new sword, was great. And the design of the Living Armor? How it’s actually a bunch of mollusks inside mimicking human movement like muscles, and you have to deal with it like a shellfish? That’s an absolutely brilliant idea, inspired even, and so much more “magical” and interesting than just “The armor is enchanted”. This is the first time Dungeon Meshi has impressed me with it’s world building and monster design, it really was great. And of course to top it off, I believe this was the Kai Ikarashi episode we’ve been expecting for a while, the same guy who did Cyberpunk: Edgerunners episode 6. And surprise surprise, it looked stellar. Dungeon Meshi looks decent to good on a normal day, but this episode knocked it out of the park. All around a fantastic week for the show, I’m bought in now.

Continue reading “Winter 2024 What-I’m-Watching Summary – Week 2” →

BUCCHIGIRI?!

Short Synopsis (Anilist): Arajin Tomoshibi’s reunion with his old pal Matakara Asamine takes an unexpected turn when they stumble into a brawl with the toughest guys in town. And just when you thought things couldn’t get weirder, a colossal genie decides to drop in. Brace yourself for the ultimate showdown. It’s the clash of the cool and the magical!

By all rights, Bucchigiri should not be good. It’s over the top, garishly colored, and absolutely ridiculous. Every character is a caricature. It’s everything we’ve seen multiple times before in series like that delinquent harem show from a few seasons back. And yet… It’s so expressively animated that the over the top nature just works, it fits. Every scene, every reaction, every dialogue, is punctuated with these bold and exaggerated animations that I can’t help but love it. And color wise? Everything from the skin to the hair is saturated such that even bright green hair or yellow shirts don’t feel that out of place with the rest of their outfits or skin tones. I’m honestly shocked at how strong this episode is. Maybe this is just me overreacting to one of the few good premiers in a season of mediocrity, but I can’t help but love what Bucchigiri is doing. Even the MCs main desire, to lose his virginity, is played so straight as a justifiable reason to stand up and push back against abuse, that I can’t help but cheer him on. I sincerely hope Bucchigiri manages to keep this up, that the production doesn’t fall off a cliff, that the story doesn’t become just another weekly battle series with a braindead plot. Because right now? This is some of the most fun I’ve had this season.

Potential: 75%

Snack Basue

Short Synopsis (Anilist): The gag comedy manga centers on a bar in Sapporo’s North 24th neighborhood, five stations away from the Susukino business district. There, the bar’s proprietor, junior proprietor, odd regular customers, and its share of walk-ins recount their strange lives.

Something about Snack Basue just seems… off? Is this vector animated? All of the movement feels so… stilted. You kind of get used to it after a while, but it’s definitely not very appealing. And that sort of applies to the show as a whole. It’s trying to be this conversational, talk-show style of comedy, but it relies so much on the awkwardness of this first meeting, on the experience of going to a snack bar, and the absurdity of some of its cast, that I felt more weirded out than I did amused. Ultimately I leave this episode wondering what it was I just watched, and why it ever got animated to begin with.

Potential: 0%

Meiji Gekken: 1874

Short Synopsis (Anilist): By 1874, seven years have passed since the end of the samurai era. A former samurai, Shizuma Orikasa works as a rickshaw driver in Tokyo while looking for his fiancée, Sumie Kanomata, who went missing during the Boshin War. Shizuma thwarts an assassination attempt and joins the newly established police department, where he’ll fight to stop dark forces from overthrowing the government.

Look I love the Boshin war and the beginning of the Meiji era, it’s a fascinating time in history. Between westernization and industrialization, Japanese society changed so much so rapidly that large swaths of the country were left behind. And Meiji Gekken has some of that in its DNA, what with a former samurai MC trying to make a life in this new era. He’s fine! But where it falls short is in its conflict, its villains, the reaction to this new era. To show what I mean, think back to the recent remake of Ruroni Kenshin. There the villains meant something, even if they were only around for an episode. They represented ideals, past ways of life, specters of past deeds, men and women who couldn’t find a place in this new era and were shunned because of it. Here though… It’s this sort of bland “revolution”, like Meiji Gekken is banking on a classic “return to the old ways” sort of narrative. But it muddies the water by also introducing foreigners like the British to the mix, making it no longer an internal struggle for the identity of the nation? I’m reading a lot into it this early, but what I’m saying is that Meiji Gekken feels like its using this transitional period in Japanese history as an aesthetic for a classic battle-series setup, more than as a meaningful setting for its narrative. And that kind of turns me off, despite the MC otherwise being decent. Go watch the Kenshin remake instead.

Potential: 10%

Yuuki Bakuhatsu Bang Bravern

Short Synopsis: Modern Military Mecha crossed with Tokusatsu, will it be serious or jokey, who knows!

Bravern is… weird. It’s split between this “Modern military mecha against aliens” and “silly tokusatsu mecha”. On one hand, it’s kind of funny how straight it plays it. Characters have no idea what’s going on or why tokusatsu music is blaring from the speakers on the giant robot. That makes the finale work surprisingly well. On the other hand, the buildup to that point, the setup with aliens coming to Earth and killing a bunch of people, that all felt like it came from a completely different show. I honestly don’t think Bravern can balance these two aspects, I don’t think it can simultaneously be Eighty Six and a silly tokusatsu show. It’s going to have to pick one and stick with it. And if I’m being honest, I hope it sticks with the tokusatsu and only occasionally uses the “drama” to set up some jokes. Because there’s no way they are fitting a sentient giant robot that plays its own theme music on blast for the whole neighborhood into any sort of serious narrative. Anyways, while I expect it to flounder as it goes, for now it was kind of fun.

Potential: 40%

Delusional Monthly Magazine

Short Synopsis: Man joins magazine company, gets sucked into weird secret organization bullshit with magic animal people?

There is legitimately no other way to describe Monthly Magazine other than “Boring with extreme prejudice”. Absolutely nothing about this show works together. From the weird “MoPARs” magic items to one of our leads being the most garish tiger-man I’ve ever seen. It even has that thing where every character has a different hair color so you can easily differentiate them rather than giving them any sort of personality. This is one of the easiest skips of the season for me.

Potential: 0%

Saijaku Tamer wa Gomi Hiroi no Tabi wo Hajimemashita

Short Synopsis: Little girl born in a fantasy world has no special skills and must survive alone. Along the way she meets a little slime, and together they venture forth!

I was actually pleasantly surprised by how decent Saijaku was. It’s still a fantasy world with slimes, skills, healing potions, all that shit. But it’s not an OP MC isekai where the lead is teleported to another world and given a deceptively powerful ability that everyone thinks is weak. So it already has a step up there. In fact I was actually kind of surprised by how cute it was. Ivy talking to the audience, breaking the fourth wall to answer some questions, is obvious but it still feels better than a load of “convenient” exposition. And the whole scene with the weak slime, it being this smiling blob that’s really more of a mascot than a companion, was surprisingly emotional. I don’t know if Saijaku will take this “Weak slime and starless skill” thing and somehow turn it into an OP MC show, I really hope it doesn’t. Because if it can dodge that it might just be a solid and cute fantasy show for the season. For now though, I might stick with it for another episode or two.

Potential: 55%

This is the second of two Impressions posts today, so scroll down for the first!

30-sai made Doutei da to Mahou Tsukai ni Nareru Rashii

Short Synopsis: 30 year old virgin gains telepathy powers, discovers local chad in his office has the hots for him.

Oh the jokes I could make about this show… But for the sake of at least trying to be fair, I’ll refrain. 30-sai looks like a pretty straightforward BL. At the very least it isn’t trying to hide it or queerbait its audience by only implying it and never committing, it’s pretty upfront about the characters feelings from the first minute. For many I figure that alone will make it worth a watch, that community gets strung along a lot. What makes it even better for them though is that 30-sai is actually kind of… wholesome about it all? Like the magic telepathy power seems stupid at first but it’s really only there as a vehicle for the romance, letting the series skip past all the bullshit romance communication tropes of “I’m not sure” and “That comment could easily be misconstrued”. As someone that hates those, I’m thankful! And that’s basically my feelings on the show in a nutshell: I’m thankful that 30-sai is an upfront, no nonsense or weird fetishization, whole BL romance. I won’t watch it, because I’m not interested in BL. But I know that my friend who loves the stuff adores the show. So between that and how I actually finished the episode, I feel pretty comfortable recommending this to fans of the genre.

Also gaining wizard powers from being a virgin for 30 years is just funny, what in god’s name were they thinking with that title.

Potential: 50%

Sengoku Youko

Short Synopsis (Anilist): The world is divided into two factions: humans and monsters called katawara. Despite being a katawara, Tama loves humans and vows to protect them from evil, even if it means fighting her own kind. Her brother Jinka, however, hates humans, despite mostly being one. The siblings are joined by a cowardly swordsman named Shinsuke, who wants to learn how to become strong.

I don’t understand Sengoku Youko’s production. Most of the time it looks washed out, with weird gradients for hair or like someone took an airbrush to all of the colors. Then it randomly gets so much more vibrant, like the bright colors of magic in the action scenes, or that one scene at the river where the girls shirt went from a milky-burnt orange to a much more colorful vibrant shade. What I’m getting at is that Sengoku Youko’s production annoys me, as does its narrative. It really wants to be this fun naive action series with a quirky cast and jokes, stuff like the demon being the helmet the bandit was wearing, but most of it just comes off as annoying caricatures and bad jokes. I can’t think of a reason to watch this over going back to the early 2000’s InuYasha. That did this same sort of stuff but with a far more compelling cast and plot hook. What I’m getting at is that this is all a long winded way of saying Sengoku Youko bored me by the half-way point, and it didn’t get any better by the end. I want to be done writing these first impressions. Help me lord.

Potential: 5%

The Witch and the Beast

Short Synopsis: A mage and a beast hunt the witch who cursed them, seeking to undo it and get revenge.

It’s a little sad how weak Majo to Yajuu’s action is. Everything else feels good, the leads have good chemistry, the world isn’t a stereotypical isekai-style fantasy, it even flipped how I thought the title would go by making the female lead the Beast and the male lead the Witch/Mage. That was nice! I was engaged for most of the episode, the male lead especially pulled me in with his dialogue and VA’s delivery. It’s just the action is… Well between “pew pew” lasers, impactless punches and pretty bland magic (outside the crows, those were cool), it doesn’t look great. This isn’t the worst thing in the world, the action is probably the least important part of the show. But it is a damn shame that despite seemingly having everything else going for it, Majo to Yajuu tripped at the last hurdle. Still, I’ll keep up with it.

Potential: 60%

This is the first of two Impressions posts today, so keep an eye out for the second in case you miss it!

Villainess Level 99: I May Be the Hidden Boss but I’m Not the Demon Lord

Short Synopsis: A girl is sucked into her favorite otome game as the villain and must do everything she can to win the boy and avoid her fate!

I’ll admit, Villainess Lv 99 actually got me. I hadn’t read the summary and so fully bought into Alicia as our MC and the whole “I’ve been sucked into my favorite Otome game as the protagonist” thing. And you know what? While watching it, it wasn’t terrible. Rather dull, sure, but that’s mostly because this genre isn’t my favorite. But I was actually kind of impressed at the way it used its environment. Take for instance the rooftop scene, I fully expected them to just ignore the window, for it to not matter at all, when logically they should fall as they walk over it. And you know what? They did! That, along with a few others, felt nice to see. And the switch to our primary PoV character after we first meet her assuming Alicia would be our lead? I think it worked. Sure at the end of the day it’s still an Otome game OP MC isekai, lets not set the expectation too high. But if that’s your thing, Villainess Lv 99 seems like a solid choice.

Potential: 30%

Doctor Elise: The Royal Lady with the Lamp

Short Synopsis: Fantasy princess dies, isekai’s to our world, becomes a doctor, dies again, isekai’s back to her own world before her first death, and starts it all over.

Holy crap this is bad. Doctor Elise is an Isekai of an Isekai, where a fantasy princess dies, comes to our world, trains as a doctor, dies again, and then gets sent back to her world 10 years before she died the first time. If you want a story about a terrible person learning to be a better person, why not just… Do that instead of all of this convoluted bullshit? And to top it all off? It doesn’t look good at all. This one is a hard pass, there are better isekai this season. God doesn’t that feel weird to say.

Potential: 0%

Metallic Rouge

Short Synopsis: Mecha tokusatsu on mars. That’s all I’ve got, it really doesn’t explain much more than that.

This first episode of Metallic Rouge felt really really awkward. It’s stuck in this middle ground of being a mecha tokusatsu and a transhumanist think-piece on AI/Cyborgs on whether or not they are truly human. On one hand, it looks cool. That fight at the end was fun, looked great, the 2D mecha designs were fantastic, and the music worked well. On the other hand, this world feels like an amalgamation of many different ideas that don’t really fit together yet, from the “Immortal Nine” to AI being second class citizens basically and needing a special nectar daily to survive, but that nectar is also apparently worth a lot of money and humans can drink it too for some reason? How are these AI affording this while working menial labor jobs and such? And that’s not even mentioning the characters. Can you honestly tell me anyones motivation at any point in this episode? Rouge? Naomi? The weird and mediocre blonde villain dude who dresses like a jester? Because I can’t. Metallic Rouge feels like a show with a lot of ideas that, as of this first episode, it has no idea how to communicate. I’ll give it a shot for another few episodes, see if this was just a really awkward pilot. But I’m not expecting a lot from it.

Potential: 40%