Author: Lenlo

Henjin no Salad Bowl

Short Synopsis: The 7th Princess of a royal line is hunted down, only to flee to our world where she ends up living and working with a detective named Sousuke.

Lenlo: It’s true, the Reverse Isekai is, on average, substantially better than the classic Isekai, if only because it’s easier to write someone being new and amazed by our modern world, making it seem interesting again, than it is to write a rich and engaging fantasy world. And so far, Salad Bowl continues to prove that true by being better than any Isekai I’ve seen so far this season. Not by a lot, it still has a lot of the same tropes and pointless ecchi scenes, and Salad Bowl feels like more of a weekly “feel good” show rather than something with a more long-term plot. Its “Princess from another world facing persecution” quickly devolves into “Young girl playing games and doing cute things”. Still, it is watchable! The girls have a bit of personality, and Livia ending up with/as a homeless person was actually kind of funny. I could see Salad Bowl being a solid pick for folks looking for a more wholesome, relaxed weekly anime. It’s not for me, but I think it’s good enough to be for someone.
Potential: 30%

Astro Note

Short Synopsis: A down-on-his-luck chef accepts a part time job at a boarding house full of quirky residents.

Wooper: First things first: if you plan to watch Astro Note, you should grab the [Okay-Subs] release, which fixes an aliasing issue present in the official stream. I downloaded and compared both versions, and the former is indeed much easier on the eyes. With that out of the way, let me just say that I really enjoyed this premiere. Astro Note won’t be a hit with wide audiences – both the speed of its presentation and its florid color design are too in-your-face for that – but as an homage to past anime romcoms, it’s tons of fun. The “beautiful widowed landlord” trope from Maison Ikkoku is the most obvious touchpoint here, as protagonist Takumi falls for the aproned Mira-san just as quickly as Godai fell for the similarly-costumed Kyoko-san in that classic series. Takumi and Godai even share a room number across the two works, but Takumi is thankfully less pathetic than the character who likely inspired him. He’s a great cook, immediately winning over the boarding house’s breakfast-obsessed lodgers, whose physical appearances and personalities are so far outside the box that I already want to know more about each of them. There’s a sci-fi twist here that I won’t spoil, though the intergalactic cold open (which not-so-successfully mimics the look of analog production) serves as a massive hint, so it’s not as though it’s some big secret. Still, the scene where it falls into place is fun for other reasons – and speaking of fun, the 80s-inspired ED (which I assume will become the OP going forward) is a total delight, with sugary female vocals and bouncy percussion playing over a plethora of playful character animation. I can’t wait to rewatch it at the start of each new episode this season.
Potential: 70%

Lenlo: I’m so confused, how did we go from space epic cold open to small quirky breakfast cooking show? And then back to a space epic? What even is Astro Note? Wooper does his best to answer up above, he’s pretty on the money. The cast is quirky and fun without being annoying, the designs are surprisingly expressive, the visuals call back to an older era of anime, and even with the aliasing problem Wooper talked about I found myself enjoying my time with it. The only issue I can see is that Astro Note strikes me as being in a similar vein as last seasons Torture Princess. Something that’s fun weekly, well produced, has a lot of good ideas, but eventually gets stuck in a rut and isn’t able to evolve or keep my interest for the entire season. I’d like to be wrong, maybe it commits to having an actual plot enough to slowly evolve the premise, like maybe Takumi figures out what’s going on eventually and helps out, or the cast each get their individual unique stories, I don’t know. Astro Note has a lot of potential there. But it needs to act on the potential or else it will grow stale, just like Torture Princess. Anyways, for now at least I’m going to keep on watching it each week and see where it goes.
Potential: 65%

WIND BREAKER

Short Synopsis: A highschool full of delinquents search for purpose in a society that rejects them, using their strength to defend those who cannot defend themselves.

Lenlo: I was pleasantly surprised by Wind Breaker. I went into this expecting nothing, surely after Bucchigiri wouldn’t get two decent delinquent shows in a row. Yet right away it comes in with this strong opening scene on the pressures of Japanese society, of the struggle to fit in and suppress your true self. This sets the tone for the entire episode, which is only furthered by our lead’s sort of crisis of identity where he sees himself as a delinquent unworthy of trust or friends because that’s how society sees/treats him. Of a guy trying to find value and purpose in his life through fighting, proving he’s better through force, the only thing he’s any good at. It worked surprisingly well by the end, showing how these delinquents carved a place for themselves while staying true to who they are. I appreciated how the MC didn’t try to hide anything, Wind Breaker made it clear what he wanted and, when presented for a chance at it, he leapt for it immediately, no “Will he join?” bullshit.. And you know what? The fights were actually pretty good too, I liked the full-body continuous shots where we actually got to enjoy some choreography. If Wind Breaker can keep this up, if it can avoid falling into the basic Shounen bullshit trap, I think it could become pretty good. I’m not guaranteeing it, maybe this was just a one-off and it falls into the gutter later. But as far as premiers go, I’ve enjoyed it a lot.
Potential: 75%

Bartender: Glass of God

Short Synopsis: A hotel seeks out a Bartender capable of making the perfect drink. Can they find such a man?

Lenlo: Bartender is in a weird place. I was really expecting a more episodic, “People come in and talk about their problems and the bartender basically gives them therapy via conversation and alcohol” kind of story. However instead it seems to have an actual… plot? With goals? And challenges? The thing opens on a bloody exam arc as employees at a hotel seek out a suitable bartender for the bar, failing every applicant because they can’t make the “Glass of God”, only to stumble upon our lead who is useless at everything other than bartending. And you know what? It kind of works. I don’t drink, so a lot of it flew over my head, but I enjoyed the detail that went into selecting and putting together the drinks. Making something light for someone who hasn’t eaten yet? A low alcohol Highball using hard ice so it isn’t watered down despite having less whiskey? The care that goes into every action? It feels like whoever wrote this is passionate about their drinks, because they put a lot of care into this stuff. Now sure, the animation and everything isn’t great. It has a few shots here and there that look decent, nothing amazing. But I would say Bartender is good enough to be worth checking out if you’re interested in passionate niche hobbies like bartending. Maybe it will go somewhere unexpected!
Potential: 60%

A Condition Called Love

Short Synopsis: The hottest guy in school falls for a plain-looking girl after she uses an umbrella to keep the snow out of his hair.

Wooper: There’s been a miniature wave of good romance anime released in the past last year – Skip and Loafer, Yamada-kun to Lv999, last season’s A Sign of Affection – and I thought A Condition Called Love (Hananoi-kun to Koi no Yamai) might continue that trend. Despite my optimism, however, it seems Lenlo did the right thing in excluding it from the season preview, because this was a poor start to what feels like an ultra plain high school romance. “Plain” applies to nearly every aspect of the show: the character designs (especially the female lead), the animation (the brief lap-running scene was pitiful), and especially the premise (pretty boy falls for girl he’s never spoken to because she was nice to him one time). That ‘romance ex machina’ criticism is one that got lobbed at a lot of shoujo romcoms back in the day, but I’m not sure I’ve ever seen a series that deserves it more than Condition. After the protagonist shields Bishounen-san from the snow one afternoon, we cut straight to him asking her out the very next day, and it only ramps up from there. He continues inserting himself into her life at every opportunity, cuts his hair and stops wearing earrings to please her, and even goes back to school at night to sift through the snow in search of her missing hairpin. The second he said he could “die happy” if he got to see her smile, we passed the point of no return. Even hardcore shoujo fanatics should skip this one – leave it for the kids just getting into the genre.
Potential: 1%

Lenlo: Let this be a lesson Wooper, I’m always right. Maybe not immediately, but eventually time proves me right. And that’s exactly what happened here. I could tell by looking at the studio and staff behind Hananoi-kun that it was going to be mediocre. And here we are. Being serious for a moment, Wooper sums it up well. Everything about the lead is kind of just creepy. Dude completely changes his life, everything about himself, and forces his way into a girl’s life, all because she held an umbrella over him once while it snowed. That a healthy relationship does not make! On top of that, it also just doesn’t look good. As said above, it’s plain in every sense of the word, never doing anything to try and stand out nor catch the eye. As someone who was surprised by Yubisaki last season, pleasantly so, this does not measure up at all to what we just got done watching.
Potential: 0%

Yuru Camp S3

Short Synopsis: Rin goes on yet another solo camping trip, while back at school, the other club members plan a minor outing of their own.

Wooper: I did a little bit of Yuru Camp blogging in early 2021, and since this sequel has an all-new staff behind it, I figured I’d pop in either to encourage or warn off fellow fans from watching the new season. Happily, the transition was a seamless one, as this premiere felt like coming home – or more appropriately, returning to a favorite campsite. We’ve got the same well-lit backgrounds, the same talking pine cones, and the same rustic soundtrack as before (musician Akiyuki Tateyama is one of the few key staff members to have made the jump between seasons). New director Shin Tosaka has no prior experience with the franchise, but he made a great first impression, smoothly linking one of Rin’s present day Mt. Fuji viewings with her memories of her first camping trip with her grandpa. The DIY alcohol stove experiment in the second half provided the opportunity to show off the series’ new character designs – if I had to make a comparison, I’d say they make the girls look a smidge younger and more naive than before, but they’re so similar in motion that I can hardly count it as a negative. There’s also a post-credits scene where Nadeshiko’s childhood friend Ayano can be seen texting Rin from within her own tent, promising a future meet-up between the two sightseeing fiends. Oh, and the OP has some truly excellent shot transitions, making use of a borderless art style that’s quite refreshing – I’d recommend checking it out, even if (for some reason) you’re not a fan of this soothing series.
Potential: 60%

Re:Monster

Short Synopsis: Man dies and is isekai’d as a lowly goblin, proceeds to level up Slime Isekai style only worse in every conceivable way.

Lenlo: Look, I get it, you want a “Reincarnated as a monster” Isekai. It’s a slightly interesting twist on the usual OP MC Isekai power fantasy. But just… Go watch Reincarnated as a Slime instead. Seriously, Slime Isekai is better in basically every way. Production, OST, power system, world, civilization-style-advancement, everything. And I don’t mean it’s just a little better. Slime Isekai has Re:Monster beaten by leaps and strides. I swear, after a full episode I don’t even know what the MC’s character is meant to be. He’s just a hyper competent emotionless slab of cardboard. Seriously, don’t bother with this, it’s the most nothingburger Isekai I’ve seen in a long time.
Potential: 0%

The Banished Former Hero Lives as He Pleases

Short Synopsis: Random person is Isekai/Reincarnated as a Duke’s son, sandbags his abilities to get disowned, proceeds to live the life of an explorer building a harem and defeating monsters with his OP abilities.

Lenlo: I swear to god anime can hear what I’m saying and is actively trying to prove me wrong. I started watching this right after I finished watching/writing up Re:Monster above, so these are back to back impressions for me. And boy god have I just hopped from one mediocre, lifeless, creatively bankrupt Isekai to another. At least Re:Monster is trying to follow in a better Isekais footsteps, Banished Former Hero is just a basic ass Isekai in every way that doesn’t even pick a subgenre of Isekai to dive into. The MC is OP from the start, misunderstood by those around him, and instantly pulls three Waifu’s into his harem within 5 minutes of getting kicked out of his home. With Re:Monster I said to just watch Slime Isekai instead. Well with Banished Former Hero, just watch Re:Monster instead, and follow that chain up until you get to something not shit. Dear lord, this season is not looking good. Maybe Spice and Wolf can save me…
Potential: 0%

Spice and Wolf: Merchant Meets the Wise Wolf

Short Synopsis: Remake of Spice and Wolf, Lawrence is a traveling merchant selling various goods from a horse-drawn cart. One day, he arrives at a village and meets a beautiful girl with the ears and tail of an animal! Her name is Holo the Wisewolf and she brings bountiful harvests. She wishes to return to her homeland, and Lawrence offers to take her. Now, the once-lonely merchant and the once-lonely wisewolf begin their journey north.

Lenlo: I can’t quite figure out whether or not I like this Spice and Wolf remake. Visually it’s both better and worse, the modernized character designs losing some of their charm and the colors feeling flatter. At the same time though, it moves way better than the original did, actually feeling animated for most of the episode. Similarly, it feels like it’s suffering from the Brotherhood issue a bit where it tries to blaze through the early story a bit to get to the new shit. It’s of course possible that it’s just a first episode jitters and it will settle down as it goes, that it will figure out its rhythm. That would be nice! Plus I do enjoy hearing Holo’s voice again, I could listen to her whisper to me forever. Anyways to make a long story short, I’m not sold on this Spice and Wolf remake yet but I’m interested enough to keep watching.
Potential: 50%

Welcome all, to the start of the Spring Season! And would you look at that, we have Wooper back to suffer with me help me report on all of these shows! Such a great guy. Gonna get these out as fast as we can for you. We are skipping some, whether they be sequels to shows neither of us have watched or so creatively bankrupt we don’t even need to watch them to know. For the most part though, we’re going to hit all the big ones, so look forward to it. Now lets dive in!

One Room, Hi Atari Futsuu, Tenshi Tsuki.

Short Synopsis: A highschooler living alone wakes up one day to find a hot angel girl on his balcony. What else is he to do but have her move in and get plenty of panty shots?

Lenlo: I dunno, One Room seems cute enough? It’s a pretty standard ecchi-romance built off of an absurd premise that takes every chance it has to either sexualize the lead girl or drop some ecchi jokes like with the magazines. There’s nothing particularly interesting or unique about the series. Could you find some value in it? Sure, probably. Maybe. It’s not terribly produced, and the girl is cute enough, so if all you want is an ecchi rom-com for the season this will probably do you fine. For me though? An easy pass. There’s no substance to One Room. If I wanted ecchi, I’d just go watch porn. Or better yet, use AI and make whatever I wanted that day. Suffice to say, I won’t be watching this.
Potential: 1%

Gods’ Games We Play

Short Synopsis: A goddess recruits a promising rookie gamer to aid her in returning to the immortal realm by clearing 10 straight challenges from the gods.

Wooper: It’s been a while since I’ve participated in a round of Star Crossed first impressions, and shows like Gods’ Games We Play are a big reason why; there are simply too many premieres each season that suck major ass. But I made my bed by offering to pop in for a couple weeks, and now I have to lie in it, starting with this game-themed light novel adaptation that’s heavy on exposition and light on everything else. Gods’ Games is set in an alternate universe where virtually all of humanity is fixated on clearing challenges issued by the gods in the hopes that their wishes will be granted. We’re given glimpses of contestants fleeing alien creatures down tiled runways and being whipped by giant salamanders’ flaming tails, but they merely burst into holographic triangles when they “die.” There’s no risk of such a mild fate befalling our protagonist, of course, because he’s such a famous God Gamer that he has to wear glasses in public to prevent people from recognizing him. He’s swiftly tasked with watching over a goddess (who bears a striking resemblance to his childhood gaming mentor), and they play the world’s most needlessly complicated memory game as an icebreaker. Meanwhile, the show drops something like eight poorly phrased rules about the godly challenges they’ll soon take on, killing any excitement about the competition before it can even begin. After slogging through this premiere, the only game I want to play is one that carries the risk of blindness, so that if I lose, I never have to watch a turd like this again.
Potential: 0%

Lenlo: As always, I greatly appreciate Wooper stepping in and returning so I don’t have to watch shit like this alone. At least with him on board I have someone else to bitch too about it. Plus, he actually writes justifications and long-winded reasonings for why something sucks, freeing me up to be an asshole and make vapid jokes about how lifeless, uninspired and poorly produced the series is. Seriously, does this show even have an AD? I swear to god the characters look different in every scene, and the colors look washed out and dull. Anyways, suffice to say that Gods’ Games is the first completely unoriginal washout of the Spring season. Thanks Wooper, you chose a fun one to return on.
Potential: 0%

Shuumatsu Train Doko e Iku?

Short Synopsis: The invention of 7G cellular service shatters reality as we know it and plunges the world into a dystopian future. Will 4 girls be able to traverse this weird and possibly dangerous land inside an old train to find their friend?

Lenlo: Train Girls is… weird? I don’t actually know, or understand, what is happening in this show? And if I’m being honest, I’m not sure Train Girls knows either. On its surface Train Girls seems like a basic Cute Girls Doing Cute Things kind of show, though definitely on the weirder end of them. It’s rather light hearted, colorful, the girls are color coded for your convenience, and the whole premise is built to remove adults from the equation by turning everyone over the age of 21 into animals. At the same time though… There are moments where it gets creepy. Where a bear tries to seriously eat a little girl, played straight, or shots of bloody handprints peppering a dented and beaten armored truck, or the sight of all the different planets in the sky against a blood red backdrop. I could easily see Train Girls turning into another Gakkougurashi. Or, barring that, an advertisement for trains. If nothing else though, it’s clear it isn’t just your bog standard CGDCT anime, though that will definitely have its place. I’m not convinced it’s worth watching in full yet, but I’ll definitely be keeping an eye on it and may pick it up depending on what people say after it gets a few episodes in. Oh, and it also happens to be the best looking thing I’ve seen this season so far. Not that that’s saying much.
Potential: 40%