Category: Finished Series: Action

Jujutsu Kaisen – 19 [Black Flash]

by Lenlo, posted in Jujutsu Kaisen

This is it, it’s here, Kimetsu no Yaiba Jujutsu Kaisen episode 19! I would call that a joke but Jujutsu Kaisen really tried to pull out all the stops this week. From big flashy fight sequences to some emotional moments, it tried. But does it succeed? Well lets talk about that.

Starting off, production was all over the place. The animation was incredible of course. From Itadori’s kick sequence to Hanami’s flowers and tree growth. It’s all very dynamic, moved well and looked great. The problem is that the composite was complete shit. More often than not the characters didn’t look like they belonged in the world. Whether it be the utterly terrible splashing water or CGI forest once again standing out, it was bad. Of special note is the running sequence atop Hanami’s branches which just feels like an inferior version of Yutaka Nakamura’s work on the first My Hero Academia movie which you can find here. I don’t want to criticize Keiichiro Watanabe to much. The vines/trees and the actual character animations are fucking incredible as you will see in the clip below. But they don’t fit together well, with Itadori’s run seeming to float above the environment.

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Jujutsu Kaisen – 18 [Sage]

by Lenlo, posted in Jujutsu Kaisen

This is it, this is the week Jujutsu Kaisen kicks it into gear! At least I hope it is. Between Hanami breaking into school grounds, Gojou getting locked out and one last flashback it better be. So with all that to talk about lets skip the preamble and jump into it!

The big one, the most exciting bit, is that the raid is happening! I can’t tell you how happy I am to see these curses because the first half of this episode was everything wrong with this arc. Once again Jujutsu Kaisen is shoving in another backstory/fight combo for one of its side characters whom I don’t even remember the name of. I get why it’s doing it, Jujutsu Kaisen wants to establish everyone’s powers and motives before heading into this big conflict. That’s good practice, you want you audience to know these things. But you can’t just introduce 5 new characters, info-dump their entire personality, and then expect us to care when you launch into a huge conflict. You need smaller arcs focused on each that build up to this big event. And it’s not like Jujutsu Kaisen can’t do this, because it did so with Toudou.

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Jujutsu Kaisen – 17 [Kyoto Sister School Exchange 3]

by Lenlo, posted in Jujutsu Kaisen

Welcome to Girl Power, sponsored by Jujutsu Kaisen! This week the production is back in force and the narrative is back on the interesting characters. So without further ado lets dive in!

This is an interesting week for Jujutsu Kaisen, and for Shonen in general, because its almost 100% female lead. Why is this special? Well to put it simply, most Shonen female characters are absolute trash, they are terribly written. Its clear that most Shonen authors either don’t know how, or are not interested in, writing female characters. So to get an episode where they are not only the spotlight, but the sole focus, was rather novel. It’s a bit sad though that they were all still restricted to only fighting each other. The “female empowerment”/Strong Women narrative gets a little smudged when they are locked in their own box, not allowed to fight the male characters. Hopefully that changes as the event progresses though. I would love to see Maki or Nobara actually get a shot against Toudou or perhaps the other Kyoto student.

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Jujutsu Kaisen – 16 [Kyoto Sister School Exchange 2]

by Lenlo, posted in Jujutsu Kaisen

Another week, another episode of Jujutsu Kaisen’s token tournament arc. I imagine it’s tough to follow up Yoshino’s arc, that was both emotional and hype. But I was hoping for something a bit more… poignant from Itadori’s return. Still, this week Toudou gained some depth and Panda got a backstory, so not all is lost. So without further ado lets dive in!

Production wise this week was an improvement from the last. Along with the fights being overall better choreographed, Jujutsu Kaisen also brought back some of the sakuga. It’s still a far cry from the series highs, but it makes for a decent time nonetheless. The continued use of the CGI environments for rotating camera shots is interesting, but the forest is proving to be a challenging location for it. Unlike the sewers or the highschool, a forest is a natural location. It doesn’t have the same rigid, geometric style to it as man-made locations. So when you start trying to render it in CGI, to rotate around it, the fake becomes very easy to spot. I think it has to do with the trees, their leaves and the general spread of color through the scenes. It’s not great, but Jujutsu Kaisen makes it work well enough.

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Jujutsu Kaisen – 15 [Kyoto Sister School Exchange Event 1]

by Lenlo, posted in Jujutsu Kaisen

Everyone knows what time it is, its Jujutsu Kaisen time! I have an interesting week for you here. From Toudou making a friend to maybe, possibly, but not guaranteed, the beginning of the MAPPA melt. Don’t know what that is? Well read on and find out!

Starting off, what do I mean by “MAPPA meltdown”. Well if you were here when I blogged Dororo, review here, you have a pretty good idea. Its when Studio MAPPA falls apart production wise in the second half of the series. When their schedule and working conditions finally give out and the series can’t sustain itself anymore. I wonder this about Jujutsu Kaisen this week because it was… a bit rough, to put it kindly. Composites were all over the place, as if they were trying to replicate Ufotable’s CGI environment style, and general animation wasn’t what we were used to. There was some decent choreography between Itadori and Toudou yes, but outside that this is one of the worse looking Jujutsu Kaisen episodes. Hopefully this is just a one off before their big showcase, but I can’t help but be… hesitant.

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Jujutsu Kaisen – 14 [Kyoto Sister School Exchange Event 0]

by Lenlo, posted in Jujutsu Kaisen

Welcome back to Jujutsu Kaisen everyone! We had a pretty sizeable break after a pretty emotional arc and its time to see what’s in store for us next. So without further ado, lets dive in!

Starting off I want to talk about what’s new this week, the OP and ED. Both were always going to be difficult to follow up, with the ED especially being one of if not the best of 2020. Rather than fight a losing battle with style thought, MAPPA has gone for something more heartwarming and it works. I like the use of the vertical camera and phone recording to really immerse us in Itadori’s perspective. Meanwhile the actual shots themselves are lit and animated beautifully, with Nobara’s reaction on the beach especially standing out. As for the OP, it once again has some stunning lighting and water effects. Its not as great as the first, with the song especially not doing much for me. But all in all I think it’s a perfectly fine OP for a new cour. But enough about that you want to talk spoilers.

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Akudama Drive Review – 75/100

by SuperWooper, posted in Akudama Drive, Anime Reviews, Finished Series: Action, Reviews by SuperWooper

On the surface, Akudama Drive is far from my cup of tea. It’s a spectacle-first production that operates on the fringes of sanity, working with characters so thin that their names and occupations are one and the same. There was fun to be had in its early episodes (particularly the never-ending parade of carnage that was the premiere), but its adherence to heist and escort mission templates made it feel safer than such an otherwise-daring series should have felt.

That all changed in the series’ sixth week, which doubled as one of the year’s best action showcases and a statement on the futility of violence. From that point on, the show raised the stakes with each episode, quickly fraying the fabric of its dystopian setting and treating its characters’ decisions as major milestones. Akudama Drive was headed somewhere important – a belief that was justified by a finale that managed to be both catastrophic and hopeful. There were bumps in the road along the way, and we’ll talk about those, but overall the series gets a definite recommendation from me.

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Akudama Drive – 12 [Akudama Drive]

by SuperWooper, posted in Akudama Drive, Currently Watching:

Before I get into my thoughts on this episode, I want to note that what we saw this week wasn’t its final form. There’s an additional five minutes of footage that was cut for the TV broadcast, which will be part of the director’s cut on the eventual Blu-ray release. Summaries of the missing content are floating around online, but I haven’t read them – given the excellence of this finale, I may rewatch Akudama Drive at some point, and I want to save a few surprises for myself. Even if you put aside the added footage, this show will benefit from a BD watch more than most, since the censorship will be toned down and its worst-looking moments are likely to be touched up. And who knows, maybe an enterprising sub group will save us from Funimation’s shit translation once the physical release drops. That’s not a likely prospect in the age of simulcasts, but a man can dream, right?

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Jujutsu Kaisen – 13 [Tomorrow]

by Lenlo, posted in Jujutsu Kaisen

Merry Christmas everyone and welcome to the last post of Jujutsu Kaisen for the year! What a bloody episode to end on eh? We had action, we had murder and we even had a bit of self-reflection, and I loved it. So without further ado lets dive right in!

Starting off, god damn that action looked good. I continue to love how malleable/expressive Mahito’s body is and Hironori Tanaka did a fantastic job working with it. It helps that the man was also the episode director as I understand it, but still. The fluid movement, the sharp lines and heavy blacks. The man made even still shots look dynamic and captivating. And none of this is even mentioning the more surrealist bits that Jujutsu Kaisen continues to incorporate. All in all, this episode looked fantastic and made for an incredible finale. About the only thing I can really nitpick here is that the CGI used was very noticeable. There was a bit about halfway through where the blood/Mahito’s body was done in CGI and it sticks out like a sore thumb. Still, 20 seconds amongst this beautiful production isn’t enough to bring it down.

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I watched Black Clover so you don’t have to: The 151 Episode Shonen Check In

by Lenlo, posted in Black Clover, Currently Watching:, Finished Series: Action, Reviews by Lenlo, Special Articles

Bleach. Naruto. One Piece. The Big Three, a legendary trio of Shonen anime/manga that dominated the community for over a decade. Properties so successful that they continue to inspire creators to this day. However all things must one day end and only One Piece remains in its original form. The mangaka Eiichirou Oda is still chugging along to this day. As Bleach ran its course, My Hero Academia rose to fill its shoes. And as Naruto: Shippuden wrapped up in 2017, the manga ending 3 years prior, the question became: What would take its place? Running for over 150 episodes straight, there is one series that has clearly made a play for that position. But does it succeed? This is the story of Black Clover, its first 151 episodes and the troubled production found within. Is it worth it? Should you give it a shot? Let’s find out together.

Welcome to the first, and possibly only, edition of Shonen Check-In. How’s that for a pretentious start eh? Had to get people hooked in early. Don’t worry, this isn’t that kind of post. The long and short of it is that, for various reasons, I decided to catch up on the first 151 episodes of Black Clover. Like many I dropped it early back in 2017, in the first cour in fact, maybe even the first episode. Between Asta’s screaming, the questionable production and the almost… blatantly generic plot, I had 0 interest in another new Shonen. But over these last 3 years Black Clover has somehow survived and the fan base has only grown. They sing its praises, they keep saying “It gets good, it gets good!” Well I am here to check that assertion. I watched Black Clover so you don’t have to. But maybe… maybe you should.

(Disclaimer: This is not a review, there is no number score, I just wanted to talk about Black Clover damnit.)

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