Author: Lenlo

2022 Anime Awards and Top 10 List

by Lenlo, posted in Currently Watching:, Yearly Summaries

Amun: “Wait a second, 2022 was almost a quarter of a year ago?! Where’s our 2022 Year Post?!” Put down with your pitchforks, gentle reader, as we are here with what you need (albeit a little late). With Wooper’s retirement, that writer’s whip has been sitting gently in the corner – leading to some late posts. But, anyways, 2022! What a year for anime – we saw a new franchise born (Chainsaw Man) and one fan-favorite say farewell (Mob Psycho). In between, there were a handful of popular sequels (My Hero Academia, Kaguya, DanMachi (hehe)) and some unexpected highlights (Bocchi the Rock). In fact, the Fall season will go down as one of the best seasonals ever – can 2023 hope to match that? Join us as we discuss the best of the best…preceded by the year’s worst misfires!

Lenlo: P.S. I will never forgive the fact that my #1 show of the year only appeared as a runner-up on this list. Savages, everyone else on this team.

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Wolf’s Rain – 5/6 [Fallen Wolves/The Successors] – Throwback Thursday

by Lenlo, posted in Currently Watching:, Throwback Thursday, Wolf's Rain

Welcome everyone, to another week of Wolf’s Rain! This week we arrive at a new city, meet some new wolves, and see some dead dreams. All in all a pretty cheery episode if you ask me! But enough jokes, lets dive into the episodes.

This week I wanted to start off by taking a look at the music. After 6 episodes I feel like I have a decent idea what it’s like, of what the legendary Youko Kanno of Ghost in the Shell and Cowboy Bebop fam is going for. And you know what? I think it’s just as good as her previous work. She doesn’t restrict herself to any one style of music, picking and choosing what would work best for each track/purpose. In particular I love the sheer amount of vocal tracks in Wolf’s Rain’s OST. Stuff like this episodes “Strangers“, playing as they run in the snow past a train, or “Amore Amaro” as they all reconcile and recover from the night before. There were a few others in previous episodes as well, but I don’t want to look through the whole OST and spoil myself on anything coming.

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Vinland Saga S2 – 9 [Oath]

by Lenlo, posted in Currently Watching:, Vinland Saga

Welcome everyone, to another episode of Vinland Saga! This week is one giant gut-punch as it takes everything about Thorfinn, throws it on the ground, and steps on it for good measure. Is it the most healthy thing in the world? Probably not. But it makes for damn good television. Now lets dive into it!

First up, the visuals. Vinland Saga is not a particularly animated show. And it never needed to be! Action is nice, but this isn’t a battle Shounen, it’s not what is important. But that doesn’t mean it isn’t nice to have when it steps up, and that’s what happened this week. Just the entire visual experience of Thorfinn’s “Valhalla”, the way the warriors moved and fought (When not CGI at least), the color direction and detail on Thorfinn’s hands. It was beautiful. In a dark, deeply traumatic sort of way. Now was it particularly subtle? No, not really. Vinland Saga has never been very subtle with its themes. But is it still effective? I would say so. Sometimes punching someone in the face leaves a better impression then politely asking asking them. And that’s what Vinland Saga did here.

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The Fire Hunter – 8 [Garden of the Gods]

by Lenlo, posted in Currently Watching:, The Fire Hunter

Welcome everyone, to another week of Fire Hunter! This was an interesting week, lots of lore drops, and a possible shake up of the status quo. Was it good? Will it save the series? I don’t yet know. But at least I have plenty to talk about. Now lets dive right into it!

Starting off, credit where it’s due, Fire Hunter has some incredible lore. We learned so much this episode. From the Flickering Flame being a satellite in space put there by the previous civilizations to the Treefolk being experiments created by the Divine Clans, with only the “successes” being sent out into the forests to act as benevolent helpers to the villages. Meanwhile the failures are left to rot inside the city, unloved and uncared for by their creators. There’s even some backstory regarding how humans came to be this way, along with the Flame Fiends! It’s all pretty interesting stuff. Which makes Fire Hunter’s ability to deliver it in the most dry, uninteresting way imaginable all the more egregious. Despite the lore being inherently interesting, all I could think of while watching the episode was if I could get away with skipping forward or not. And that sucks.

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Kaina and the Great Snow Sea – 8 [Lost at Sea]

by Lenlo, posted in Currently Watching:, Kaina and the Great Snow Sea

Welcome everyone, to another week of Kaina and the Great Snow Sea! This is a slow week all thing considered, which is weird when you realize it’s also the week of their great escape. Still slow doesn’t mean bad, just that it was nice and relaxing. So without further ado, lets dive into the episode! And apologies for the delay, I had some computer troubles this week.

Getting into the episode, this week was a bit of a disappointment for me. As far as escapes go, it was barely an escape at all. Resolved almost immediately, they used a small raft already made by those they had befriended. While it was sweet seeing them come to an understanding and inspire the downtrodden, it wasn’t the most engaging way to leave Valghia. It becomes even more disappointing when you see what they give us after that: Recaps. A bunch of recaps. Well I say a bunch, it was more like 5 minutes. But 5 minutes of recaps in a 22 minute episode is still a sizeable chunk. Regardless of specifics, it simply wasn’t the most exciting way to spend the episode for me.

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Wolf’s Rain – 3/4 [Bad Fellow/Scars in the Wasteland] – Throwback Thursday

by Lenlo, posted in Currently Watching:, Throwback Thursday, Wolf's Rain

Welcome everyone, to week 2 of Wolf’s Rain! This week sees our intrepid heroes band together and set out on their epic quest. No doubt there will be many trials and tribulations along the way, disputes over territory, Tsume being a tsundere and Toboe having no idea how to do literally anything, but I’m sure it’ll be a good time. Now without further ado, let’s dive into the episodes!

Starting off, this week I wanted to talk a bit about the backgrounds. Don’t worry music fans, I plan to talk about that next week. I just want to give it a bit more time to settle and hear a few more tracks before I start talking out of my ass about it. Atsushi Morikawa is the Art Director for Wolf’s Rain, with Tomoaki Okada and Shingo Takeba doing Art Design. And while I don’t know the specifics of what goes into these jobs, what I can say is that the backgrounds that are coming out of their pipeline are stunning. In particular the natural expanses and variety of locations once our group leaves the city in episode 4 are just beautiful, as well as the war-torn city they pass through. I’m curious about how diverse the world seems to be for only 3 days travel, but hey its pretty.

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Vinland Saga S2 – 8 [An Empty Man]

by Lenlo, posted in Currently Watching:, Vinland Saga

Hello everyone, and welcome to another week of Vinland Saga! This week continues Einar and Thorfinn’s quest to grow wheat, as well as delving a bit further into how they both feel about this whole “slavery” thing. Sound fun? Good, cause it is. Now lets dive into the episode!

Starting off, a fun fact for everyone. The opening scene of this episode might feel like it comes out of nowhere to some, shoving us into the end of one of Thorfinn’s nightmares. What might surprise you to learn however is that this is the last moment of a 2 minute short released on Youtube, for free! From what I heard it was because they animated it but couldn’t figure out how to fit it into the episode. Whatever the reason, it’s a small bit of action and a longer look into exactly the kind of stuff Thorfinn dreams about. Becoming his old self again, how many families and people he killed for no reason, his usual sort of PTSD. I recommend you go take a look, I’ll link to it here for you!

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The Fire Hunter – 7 [Chance Encounter]

by Lenlo, posted in Currently Watching:, The Fire Hunter

Welcome everyone, to another week of Fire Hunter! I’ll admit, I wasn’t looking forward to much to writing this post, as Fire Hunter has done little of praise recently. And that hasn’t changed this week either! But I can’t just not write whenever the episode bad. If I do that this season will take forever. So lets dive right in shall we?

Before I get to negative, I will give Fire Hunter some praise. This week sees our leads finally meet up and get together, and it’s great. Not just because there is some payoff in watching these two storylines intersect, but also because it cuts down on the number of black-screen cutaways. I can’t understate how much I hate these cutaways. Not only do they completely break the flow of the episode and ruin transitions, they are just downright lazy. So seeing those start to peter out as Touko and Koushi intersect, cutting down on the number of different groups, was really nice to see. Hopefully as Fire Hunter progresses these groups continue to intersect, until they become one smooth narrative.

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Kaina and the Great Snow Sea – 7 [Fortress Nation]

by Lenlo, posted in Currently Watching:, Kaina and the Great Snow Sea

Note: Turns out, I forgot to hit post on this earlier this week. Um… Oops?

Welcome all, to another week of Kaina and the Great Snow Sea! This week sees our heroes explore Valghia, make some friends, and maybe even begin a resistance movement. How do they do it? Well lets dive in and find out!

Immediately, I need to say that Valghia as a location is just awesome. Everything about it, from its construction to the people, is just inspired. It looks so massive and monolithic from the outside, this enormous titan of a ship. Yet the inside is a rickety strung together mess of wood, filled with small crevices and barely holding rivets. It’s clear how the inside has slowly been built up over the years, as there’s no uniformity to plan to the layout. Just people building what they can where they can. And this is all reflected in the people as well! All of them survivors and refugees of other nations huddled together in the bowels of the ship, no true comradery or national identity among them. Just like the ship itself, the very nation of Valghia is this hastily constructed “thing” that could shatter at any moment. I love it.

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Wolf’s Rain – 1/2 [City of Howls/Toboe, Who Doesn’t Howl] – Throwback Thursday

by Lenlo, posted in Currently Watching:, Throwback Thursday, Wolf's Rain

Welcome everyone, to the next season of Throwback Thursday! This edition? The 2003 Studio Bones piece, Wolf’s Rain, directed by Tensai Okamura of Memories and Darker than Black fame. Is it any good? Or will it be the anime equivalent of Twilight? Lets dive in and find out!

Starting off, lets talk visuals. I really like how Wolf’s Rain looks! It’s very animated, lots of character movement and effects, snappy designs and cel animation. It’s all very… 90s. Like the last call of a dying breed, Wolf’s Rain feels like a show that doesn’t belong in the modern era. Which makes sense considering how much of its crew is made up of the Cowboy Bebop team, and fits the premise of the show well. Now I do have some concerns, as during my preparation for this season I learned about the 4 recap episodes (Which we will be skipping) as well as the finale being knocked back to the OVA (Which we will be watching). I’m curious just how long Wolf’s Rain can keep this kind of production up, what with SARS and all. Personally though? I really hope it can, because it looks great so far.

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