Author: Lenlo

Kimetsu no Yaiba S2 – 14 [Transformation]

by Lenlo, posted in Currently Watching:, Kimetsu no Yaiba

Welcome to another episode of Kimetsu no Yaiba everyone! This week Nezuko discovers the power of family, Uzui shows us why he is the God of Festivals and we meet the true villain of the arc. Sound fun? Good. Then without further ado lets dive in!

Starting off I need to, as usual, praise Yaiba for looking good this week. Not just in the animation this time, though the blood blades, lighting and 3D camera work all looked good. Rather I want to praise it for something a lot of anime seem to ignore: Shot composition. There were some really good ones this week! I’m talking stuff like Daki sitting passively behind Uzui, always in the background after his entrance. Or the framing of her brother as he appears out of her back and takes up the whole frame. Uzui and the way he is suspended in the air while dodging blades and tossing out bombs. Yaiba usually looks good in movement, that’s what its known for. But I’m glad to see these slower, wider, epic shots like what we saw with the spider family last season make a return. They are the truly memorable ones.

Continue reading “Kimetsu no Yaiba S2 – 14 [Transformation]” →

The Vision of Escaflowne – 19/20 [Operation Golden Rule of Love/False Vows] – Throwback Thursday

by Lenlo, posted in The Vision of Escaflowne, Throwback Thursday

Welcome everyone to my weekly late post about The Vision of Escaflowne! After the action of the past couple episodes its time to slow down and reflect on how far we’ve come. To look at where we have yet to go. And also to wreck some homes, both literally and physically! So without further ado, lets dive in.

Starting off we have the section I’m sure many of you are tired with but I like talking about: Production. And while Escaflowne didn’t have much in the animation department this week, lots of stills and pans, those stills and pans looked really good. Like I’m talking some of the peak storyboarding, shot composition and coloring we’ve seen in Escaflowne so far. From the framing of the wedding to Folken’s little play. And how can I not mention the bridge in episode 19? I’m being vague here on purpose because these are spoilers before the break, but seriously these looked really good. They are proof that an anime doesn’t need bombastic Shounen sakuga to look good, to stick in your mind. That stuff just augments it. All you really need are scenes like this. Good job Escaflowne. I knew you could do it.

Continue reading “The Vision of Escaflowne – 19/20 [Operation Golden Rule of Love/False Vows] – Throwback Thursday” →

Kimetsu no Yaiba S2 – 12/13 [Things Are Gonna Get Real Flashy!!/Layered Memories]

by Lenlo, posted in Currently Watching:, Kimetsu no Yaiba

Welcome back everyone! Apologies for missing last week, I didn’t have much to say and combined with the new year just put it off until now. Is that lazy? Yes. But this is a hobby so I do what I want! That said, this week and episode 13 were pretty eventful. So lets dive in and talk about those.

First, we have a lot to talk about regarding the production of these last two episodes. Had this post just been about episode 12, I wouldn’t be very positive. The CGI models, and their compositing with the backgrounds and other 2D characters, is starting to become very noticeable here. It isn’t a massive drain on the enjoyment but sometimes I’ll see a scene and think “Oh yeah, that stands out”. But it seems that is only because Yaiba was saving a lot of its best for episode 13. Like seriously, just look at this cut by Nozomu Abe after the break. Do the CGI cloth strips stand out? Yes. Do the fire effects and Tanjiro’s quick movements look so good that I honestly don’t care about the clothing? Also yes. And that’s basically the entire episode in a nutshell. Highs so good they make me not care about the lows.

Continue reading “Kimetsu no Yaiba S2 – 12/13 [Things Are Gonna Get Real Flashy!!/Layered Memories]” →

The Vision of Escaflowne – 17/18 [The Edge of the World/The Gravity of Destiny] – Throwback Thursday

by Lenlo, posted in The Vision of Escaflowne, Throwback Thursday

Hello everyone and welcome to another week of The Vision of Escaflowne! This is wildly late, prepping the new season and our Yearly awards, along with snowstorms knocking out my power, take up a lot of time. My apologies for that. Feel like I’ve had a lot of those lately. Without further ado though lets dive into the episodes!

First up we have episode 17, “The Edge of the World”. Escaflowne did a lot of things with this episode, most of them I like! From answering questions and explaining the mechanics of the world to a clever twist on Hitomi’s power, there was a lot to love here. Take for instance the history of Gaea: The confirmation that this Atlantis is the same Atlantis from our Earth myth actually does a lot for me. I always suspected something like this. But I was never sure if there was a legitimate connection or if Escaflowne was just borrowing western myth and words without truly connecting them like so many anime do. So this confirmation that Gaea and Earth are intertwined rather than just existing parallel to each other is great.But the connection goes even farther!

Continue reading “The Vision of Escaflowne – 17/18 [The Edge of the World/The Gravity of Destiny] – Throwback Thursday” →

The Vision of Escaflowne – 13/14/15/16 – Throwback Thursday

by Lenlo, posted in The Vision of Escaflowne, Throwback Thursday

Welcome back everyone to the last Escaflowne post of the year! No doubt this is going to be late but considering we are covering 4 episodes, I think thats understandable on my part. Thats right, 4, welcome to the longest post I’ve made since Black Clover. So enough with the preamble! Lets strap in and talk Escaflowne.

First up we have episode 13, “Red Destiny”. This was easily the worst of the 4 episodes I’m going to talk about today. In fact I would go so far as to say it was the most awkward episode Escaflowne has had yet. The whole thing was just paced horribly. We skipped the siege of Freid, skipped Chid and Allen’s relationship, skipped Hitomi’s PTSD, burned through the second siege, and killed the Duke all in a single episode. This could have easily been 2 episodes of content with plenty of character work to break up the big fights. Instead Escaflowne just kind of… sprinted through it. This made for a really unsatisfactory end to our time in Freid even if the fallout of these events in future episodes were really good.

Continue reading “The Vision of Escaflowne – 13/14/15/16 – Throwback Thursday” →

Eighty Six S2 – 10 [All That’s Left]

by Lenlo, posted in 86 - Eighty Six, Currently Watching:

Hello everyone and welcome to the last Eighty Six post of the year. In fact this is the last Eighty Six post until March! That’s right, the production issues have gotten so bad that it can’t actually end this season and so has to somehow fit into the next. It’s Wonder Egg Priority all over again, except Eighty Six doesn’t look near as good. Enough about me lampooning the shows production schedule though, lets jump into lampooning its narrative!

By and large this episode felt like a giant “meh” to me. Like… like a waste of my time if I’m being honest. Yes yes, it’s the big climactic battle. Bullets are flying, mechs are running, Kiri/Morpho is being confronted and its hype! Except I don’t really give a shit about Kiri nor do I find this confrontation to be in any way interesting. It’s like… We all knew who was going to win. We always know who is going to win, thats how these things go. Yet despite knowing the good guy is going to win the entire Shounen genre has still found a way to make these things work. And the best ones do it by making us understand, by making us care about, the villain we are fighting. And Eighty Six just hasn’t invested me in this Shin-knockoff Knight of a character.

Continue reading “Eighty Six S2 – 10 [All That’s Left]” →

Kimetsu no Yaiba S2 – 10/11 [What Are You?/Tonight]

by Lenlo, posted in Currently Watching:, Kimetsu no Yaiba

Welcome back everyone to a special double feature of Kimetsu no Yaiba! Apologies for missing last week, I caught the Covid and surprise surprise, it fucks you up pretty bad. I’m back now though, feeling fine and ready to talk about some demons! So without further ado lets dive in.

Starting off like we usually do, lets talk visuals. This should come as no surprise but, by and large, Kimetsu no Yaiba still looks good! The entertainment district still makes great use of Yaiba’s lighting and bright colors. Sure the CGI can still be off in a few places, mostly the wide shots with full-body models. But for every shitty one of those we get a first person sequence through a house, so its cool. The only real complaint I have is with last weeks episode which felt like it cut a tad to much. We were switching scenes all over the place, constantly cutting between characters and shifting the tension. Yaiba had to tell 3 different character experiences, I get that. But maybe just… let them linger a bit longer rather than constantly jumping, yeah? Otherwise though, looked good!

Continue reading “Kimetsu no Yaiba S2 – 10/11 [What Are You?/Tonight]” →

Lenlo is sick! I’m sorry.

by Lenlo, posted in Uncategorized

Hello everyone! So I’m sure you’ve noticed but both the Eighty Six and Kimetsu no Yaiba posts have been late. Well I’m afraid to say the same is going to happen to The Vision of Escaflowne and the reason is simple: I’m sick as shit. I just do not have it in me to write up the posts, I’m laid out. Combine that with Christmas and well… Suffice to say there will be no posts this week. Hopefully I will be feeling better and able to do a double feature next week for everything. Until then though you will have to go without me.

 

And that’s it for my announcement! I figured you all deserved to know why everything was delayed so heavily. I hope you all have a merry Christmas and I’ll see you next week, or 2022 at the latest.

Eighty Six S2 – 9 [Together Unto Death]

by Lenlo, posted in 86 - Eighty Six, Currently Watching:

Welcome back everyone to Eighty Six! The shows been having a rough time recently, what with all the delays. In fact we won’t even be getting the last two episodes this year! What that says for the production I can’t say but odds are it isn’t very good. Anywanys, how about we hope into the episode.

Starting off, for all that the delays concern me Eighty Six gave us some good shots. From the time-lapse of the dragonfly corpse or Shin and Raiden’s talk on the bridge to the open vista’s and waving grass. The long panning shot of the mechs showing just how far away Shin was, mentally and physically, or Raiden and Shin’s shadows showing how he is alone only to reveal another person, etc. Eighty Six looked pretty this week. Of course there wasn’t much in the way of movement, the actual animation of Eighty Six seems to have taken a back seat. But if you ask me that’s fine! Fast paced action was never the main draw of the series, not visually nor narratively. So if we have to sacrifice it to get the snappy editing and scenic views back, I’ll gladly take that deal.

Continue reading “Eighty Six S2 – 9 [Together Unto Death]” →

The Vision of Escaflowne – 11/12 [Prophecy of Death/The Secret Door] – Throwback Thursday

by Lenlo, posted in The Vision of Escaflowne, Throwback Thursday

Note: This was supposed to go up Friday morning but the auto-scheduler didn’t work. So this time I have a legitimate excuse and know not to use it again!

Hello everyone and welcome to another week of Escaflowne! I’m writing this opening blurb on Wednesday and I can already tell its going to be late because I feel sick. So if you’re reading this on Thursday, go me! Anyways on with the show.

Starting off as usual, since I need to leave the spoilers for after the break, we have production. This was a pretty standard week for Escaflowne. Nothing terribly wrong with it, some reused liquid animation in both of Zongi’s big scenes but it looked good both times and the coloring differentiated them enough that I didn’t mind. Van’s fight at the end of episode 11 had some jank to it to of course. From sliding still frames to the rainbow distortion effect anytime they come out of invisibility. But these are only really an issue when you’re going back through looking for nice frames for screenshots, like I do. In the moment it’s totally serviceable and only minorly effected my enjoyment.

Now with production out of the way, lets head into the episodes proper!

Continue reading “The Vision of Escaflowne – 11/12 [Prophecy of Death/The Secret Door] – Throwback Thursday” →