Grimms Notes The Animation

Short Synopsis: A group of adventurers transform into fairy tale characters to do battle against an evil Little Red Riding Hood.

Aidan’s review:
What happens when your characters are so unremarkable that even the quirks you give to difference them make them only more trite?
What happens when your story depends on the legacy of other greater stories in order to carry it?
What happens when you write a plot twist that has no real clues yet one of the characters realizes the truth regardless? And even that cannot make your story interesting?
What happens when your animation is so bare and routine that nothing truly makes it stand out?
What happens when all of your world building is done by characters stating what should be blindingly obvious to them for the sake of the audience?
What happens when your anime is so forgettable that you can’t remember the characters names or even half the plot upon finishing an episode?
Well I don’t know what happens when this is the case. Sorry, what was I supposed to be watching again?
Potential: 0%

Wooper’s review:
Let’s examine what makes Grimms Notes one of the most forward-thinking debuts of the winter season. To start, the characters are a mix of Japanese tropes and fairy tale icons that should appeal to fans of uncomplicated heroes. Their banter is unlikely to surprise or offend anyone, which is an admirable goal in 2019. Their designs look like they were created after doing a Google search for “how to draw anime characters,” and taking heavy inspiration from the least distinctive results. This is an inclusive move, as it ensures that viewers with poor eyesight won’t be missing much of the fun. The overarching story isn’t clear yet, but it seems that our adventurers will be fighting against corrupted fairy tale protagonists each week, and trying to revive a thingamajig by defeating all the whatchamacallits. Leaving things so open-ended was a wise decision, since establishing the groundwork for a gripping story might be too demanding of the audience’s attention. If you’re going to work in the entertainment industry in this modern age, you have to keep your demographic’s reduced attention span in mind. Finally, the animation and background art are inconsistent, which indicates a lack of toxic perfectionism on the director’s part. A healthy work environment is key in the current year! In conclusion, Grimms Notes’ commitment to mediocrity makes it one of the most refreshing shows of the season.
Potential: 0%

 

Bermuda Triangle: Colorful Pastrale

Short Synopsis: There are idols who are mermaids…or Mermaids who are idols…or…look you don’t care.

Aidan’s review:
Hold the phone, how does someone drink tea underwater. Wait how does someone drink underwater period? How can you have a shop underwater that offers drinks? Wouldn’t it just get diluted into the seawater? How do you mix tea underwater? Sorry getting off topic so on to the mermaid idols. Well this episode was…wait a second did they say that was a cake shop? How does one make underwater cake? Wouldn’t that just be soggy cake and taste disgusting? How does that even…come on, the episode. The episode. Alright see…wait underwater letters? Wouldn’t the paper be mush? Wouldn’t the ink just wash…STOP, Logic does not belong here. So anyway this episode was about…sorry I was a little too focused on the mechanics of underwater food and devices that I kinda forgot to pay attention to the plot. Had something to do with some girl being born from a pearl, some tide blowing in some mansion and some movie in the mansion which inspires them to be idols or something. I just didn’t really care all that much.
Potential: 0%

Lenlo’s review:
I’m really not sure what to say here. It’s a mermaid idol show. In terms of water people, it is inferior to Nagi no Asukara in every way, and in terms of Idol shows it seems low bar there too. Everything from the production to the VA just seems cheap and flat. Like there was no effort put into any aspect of the series. Even had I been the kind of person to enjoy Idol shows, I probably would have felt like turning this off 10 minutes in. This is a hard pass from me.
Potential: 0%

Kaguya-sama wa Kokurasetai

Short Synopsis: Two student council members attempt to manipulate each other into confessing their love for the other.

Aidan’s review:
After the disappointment that was Grand Blue, I was fully worried that Kaguya being another quite comedy focused manga would be diluted in the transition. Thankfully to some great direction it seems this show has nailed everything that made the manga so enjoyable. I have a particular fondness for the opening which portrays Kaguya and the president’s battle for love like some James Bond spy thriller and the way the anime plays up their interactions as mind games like those between the worlds greatest detective and Kira is part of want makes things work so damn well. Coupled with the narrator hyping their misunderstandings or power plays into highly dramatic explosions make the overall idiotic nature of their dilemma all the more palatable. Provided this can keep up the fun and not let the premise grow stale then this could well be a show to keep an eye on this season.
Potential: 85%

Wooper’s review:
Non-manga reader reporting for first impressions duty. The thing that excited me most about Kaguya-sama coming into this episode wasn’t the series’ reputation, but the fact that it shared both a director and a lead writer with Rakugo Shinjuu, one of my favorite anime in recent years. I wasn’t expecting quite that level of excellence from Kaguya, but my hopes were still high, and this premiere actually met them. Shinichi Omata’s background with Shaft really shone through here, with comedic cutaways and exaggerated facial expressions heightening the ridiculousness of each segment. The idea of two hormonal geniuses trying to trick each other into making the first move is a novel one, but it’s not a golden goose all on its own – you need strong direction and editing for their monologues not to feel stupid or tedious. Just as important are the performances from the voice actors, who have to sell their characters as both prodigies and lovestruck teens. Plenty of praise will be paid to Aoi Koga’s Kaguya in the coming months, especially since she’s a relatively new VA, but everybody else pulls their weight as well. Yutaka Aoyama’s sly, almost paralyzing delivery is instantly recognizable in the narrator role, and Konomi Kohara strikes a perfect balance between likability and airheadedness, which mirrors Kaguya’s relationship with her character, Chika. If I have one complaint about the series, it’s the art style used for the furniture in the student council room, which seems to employ some strange combination of cell shading and thickened outlines that results in a highly unnatural look. One has to imagine that a lot of scenes will be set in that room, but if everything else about the show stays this good, I’ll have no reason to complain.
Potential: 80%

 

Endro!

Short Synopsis: A demon lord is sent back in time after being defeated by four heroes, and must work to sabotage their studies as their teacher.

Wooper’s review:
This was pretty cute! The animation was steady all the way through, the fantasy-inspired backgrounds had some care put into them, and the characters all have a sheen to their designs that kept me interested in how they’d look in the next scene. TV anime in general seems to have hit a point where even a solid, workmanlike production is big news, so congrats to Endro for looking like somebody cared about how it turned out. More important than its looks, though, are the series’ playful spirit and cheeky commentary on game mechanics. Not all of the humor worked for me, but there’s a streak of self-awareness running through the script that makes the on-screen text scrolls and discussion of RPG classes feel fun, rather than stupid. This season’s Shield Hero positively reeks of THIS IS JUST LIKE A VIDEO GAME-itis, but Endro functions a bit more organically. For example, it ties its main character’s wielding of a club into her obsession with heroism, which has left her classless and stuck with a suboptimal weapon; despite this setback, she cluelessly maintains that she’ll become a hero if she has a positive outlook. This is a lot more tolerable than a virtual display popping up and preventing a shield-bearing character from equipping a sword because they are a shield-bearing character, which they process with zero personality. There are a couple other jokes that earned a chuckle from me, but one of them in particular works much better if you’re not anticipating it, so I’ll cut things off here. If you like cute girl shows and game-inspired settings, consider giving Endro a shot. You might regret it, but you’re already watching seasonal anime, so how much worse can your life get?
Potential: 50%

Mario’s review:
In general, I don’t mind Endro. Watching this, I feel like it attempts to do sort of the same thing as Tantei Opera Milky Holmes. They both twist around the tropes while never really take these seriously. While Milky Holmes is more parody, this one just contents with the characters having fun time and going for an adventure all over again. It has that moe designs (even down to the cute loli devil), but so far it delivers its jokes with grace and I would say it’s a above-bar CGDCT offering of the season. The main concept seem to be the devil Maou tries her best to stop this hapless students from becoming heroes, but fall for their charms instead. I have no problem with that and if it still has that much wits (my favorite: the mage “predicts” the weather forecast) and maintains its bright settings, I’m all in to follow it.
Potential: 30%

 

Kouya no Kotobuki Hikoutai

Short Synopsis: A crew of female pilots protect their employer from enemy fighters in a frontier setting.

Mario’s review:
The most remembered aspect viewers gonna get out of this episode is its technical aspect. There’s not much narrative to begin with since a huge chunk of this episode concentrates on the aerial combat. On that front I’m quite happy with what I saw so far. The combats are mostly well choreographed that you can mostly follow what happening on-screen (I do have some troubles recognizing the planes though), there’s a great attention to piloting details, for example it spends proper time for us to see how they do a start-up procedure. The camera angle (which sometimes adopt first person POV like in a game) and the sound designs are other stand outs. The thing that I’m a bit worried about, is that these aerial combat overwhelmed the characters so far as we don’t know much about them. In addition, the characters’ CG models might be a hit or miss. I enjoy the quick, natural dialogues in these first few scenes and I do like the cowboy settings so I hope the show can give those justice in later episodes.
Potential: 40%

Wooper’s review:
This series missed my strike zone by a wide margin, since it’s all about planes. More than half of the episode is spent depicting a dogfight between 3DCG aircraft, with particular attention paid to sound design – the groaning of their metal frames as they make harsh aerial maneuvers, the pinging sound of bullets ripping through their bodies, and the sputtering of their engines come to mind. I was listening to the episode through a set of nice speakers, but unfortunately, even that level of immersion wasn’t enough to keep me interested. The decision to center the opening scene around a dude in the middle of a romantic dry spell is likely to blame for my lack of involvement, because his squad of freelance pilots is quickly wiped out in the dogfight. Getting to know the girls who are, y’know, the stars of the show might have been nice, but the only tidbit I picked up was that one of them really likes pancakes. I can admire the decision not to dump a ton of info about the show’s (seemingly alternate) universe in the first episode, but go too far in the other direction and you end up with something like this. Luckily, the closing moments of the episode seem to promise a more grounded second effort, so I might give it another try and see whether the characters make an impression in a different atmosphere (pun intended).
Potential: 40%

Dimension High School

Short Synopsis: Four students and their teacher are transported into a virtual quiz show world by a talking meteorite.

Lenlo’s review:
You know, I thought when I first saw the PV for this that we would be getting a meta comedy. Sorta like Pop Team Epic was last year. Something the blends reality and anime and makes you question just what anime is. Dimension sorta does that, but not in a good way. Dimension doesn’t make me question the foundation of anime, but rather why someone thought it worth animating at all. It’s not funny, the CGI is worse than Berserk (which if you know me, means a lot), story wise there’s basically… nothing. So the only question I really have for Dimension High is this.
Potential: Is this even Anime?

Mario’s review:
Watching this show reminds me how some of the tropes we can tolerate in anime becomes unbearable when it does in live-action. For example, we seem fine with character overacting in anime but when the Teacher does it in live-action it’s grating to watch. Dimension is also one of the worst production I’ve seen this season: the live action acting is terrible all around the clock, and the full-CG animation doesn’t even attempt to be anything near passable. Then we have a plot of talking rock (in a weird CG special effect) and riddles for Christ sake and you have a full package of bad-anime-please-leave-me-alone.
Potential: bad-anime-please-leave-me-alone

Wooper’s review:
Worse acting than The Room + worse CG than Berserk 2016 = comedy of the year
Potential: AHHHHHHHH

 

Domestic na Kanojo

Short Synopsis: A hot-for-teacher teenager moves in with his crush and her younger sister (who he recently slept with) after their parents plan to get hitched.

Mario’s review:
Boy, here it finally comes. A melodrama with contrived plots to squeeze out the most dramatic juice. Anyone here who doesn’t find the whole re-marriage affair jarring? It comes out of nowhere (to the main lead himself) and it happens way too quickly. And add that we have him living under the same roof with two cute girls whose 1) he has big crush of and 2) he happens to have sex with and guess what? After 20 minutes I honestly don’t care one iota about all three main characters. Okay, while I’m most certain won’t follow this because I know the direction it’ll ultimately go, there’s still some positive aspects in this premiere. I quite like the moody, heavy-saturated room where he and the little sister sleep with in the beginning. While the exterior scenes can be plain, the interiors feel live in (as appropriate given the title of the show is Domestic Girlfriend). Second, these characters do have some extra-multidimensional level as each other seems to carry their own weight/issues in their shoulder. The comedy bits, on the other hand, totally feel awkward. But it might works for this first episode’s benefits because it has full of awkward moments, from awkward first sex to adjusting themselves to a new relationship to all these awkward confrontations. Anyone who loves soap opera or tearjearker melodrama, this is a perfect healthy dose for you.
Potential: 20%

Wooper’s review:
The premise of this series reads like an elaborate porn setup, which it probably would be if the source material didn’t run in Shounen Magazine. Everything about the story is a ripoff, right down to the main character’s chubby best friend, who exists solely to react with shock to his pal’s sex life. DomeKano doesn’t even earn points for avoiding purity-related tropes, as the protag is the same type of dope that would star in a pruder version of the same show, despite the fact that he’s lost his virginity. The teacher’s character is just a male fantasy, and her little sister is the sexually-open tsundere that you never knew you wanted until now. There’s potential for this thing to go completely off the rails, which might make for an entertaining watch. Maybe the main dude will fuck his new stepmom, too. That possibility has to be worth a few percentage points, right?
Potential: 5%

 

Mahou Shoujo Tokushusen Asuka

Short Synopsis: After defeating an evil lord, a magical girl is dragged into being a spec ops agent

Aidan’s review:
This start isn’t as bad as I was expecting but this really is a story that takes its premise far too seriously. The big thing that I can point out as pretty terrible in this episode was the soundtrack which sounds like a cheap 80s b-movie. The whole idea of Magic girls acting as spec ops after the final battle is over is somewhat an interesting idea but it is rather contradictory to try and make your magical girls badass while making reference to the more cutesy side of it. It’s a bit hard to take PTSD seriously when shes getting it from a mascot costume. The characters are fairly bland with the main being a pretty basic emo whom is so deep and tormented and blah blah blah. It’s clear that the story is going through a number of hoops to try and justify the magical girl aspect which goes for naught when the girls could just be superpowered females without any Magical girl show references and the story to be the same. At the moment I would say this might be fine for some but it has high chance of going down the drain fast. The sunbathing pair of tits at the end seems to promise that.
Potential: 0%

Lenlo’s review:
Once more into the breach of “Dark Magical Girls”, my friends. Ever since Madoka Magica everyone has been trying to ape Urobuchi, and let me tell you, Asuka does not succeed, but it doesn’t entirely fail either. Basically, Asuka is… acceptable. It completely skips the starting point of girls getting powers, and jumps right into the aftermath. From PTSD to disillusioned Magical Girls, Asuka goes for it all. If it can manage not to jump the metaphorical shark, Asuka could be perfectly fine. The big fear here is whether or not it goes a bit too crazy and turns into a trainwreck. For some people though, even that might be fine. After all, I am never one to turn down a good dose of anime suffering.
Potential: 20%

Doukyonin wa Hiza, Tokidoki, Atama no Ue.

Short Synopsis: An unsociable mystery novelist adopts a cat, which takes better care of him than he does of it.

Aidan’s review:
I stick to my original assessment from the preview that this series is cute. Not the brand of cute that moe show try to peddle by making teenager girls act like five year olds. Instead the kind that warms the soul. Admittedly the first half of this episode from the humans standpoint was less interesting than the viewpoint from the cat but once it switched things got significantly better. This show manages a nice balancing act between being silly and cute with some small emotional gut punches thrown in. Animation and adaption both seem to be quite solid so no problems on that front. It makes for likely the best “healing” show from the season and might make for a good show to brighten things up after watching something more dark and intense, like Promised Neverland. If you are a cat lover it’s certainly a show to stir the soul and should prove for an enjoyable watch.
Potential: 70%

Wooper’s review:
Do you like cats? If so, you’ll probably dig this series; if not, you’re significantly less likely to enjoy it. There’s not much more to Hizaue (the portmanteau used by the official website) than that. The story is certain to incorporate a healing aspect, given the tragic backstories of both the human and feline main characters, and there are other people hanging about for the author to grumpily converse with, but the show is mostly about the relationship between a man and his cat. This episode had a neat POV-based gimmick, telling a simple story from the human’s eyes in the first half, then replaying the same events with the cat as the narrator. There was some reused footage during the latter segment, but not as much as I expected, which was nice. Despite that pleasant surprise, the visuals were plain, with much of their charm coming from stylized stills with thick outlines and exaggerated facial expressions. Still, the cat is cute, which is the most important element of a series like this. I’m in for at least another episode.
Potential: 50%

Mario’s review:
It’s a story about an exclusive writer and the cat and how they begin a relationship together. Well, I’m not at all kidding about what I just said because the show went there. It’s fluffy, but it’s the right kind of fluffy because these two characters are an unlikely duo. The writer’s negative patterns can get on the nerve from time to time, but his interaction with this cat is awesome. What makes this show “special”, is that during the last half it tells the story in the cat’s eye of view (with narration to boot) and that when we get a full picture of two individuals who try to understand each other. This one is a keeper.
Potential: 40%

 

5-Toubun no Hanayome

Short Synopsis: A boy is hired to teach a family of quintuplet girls.

Aidan’s review:
It’s fine. As far as anime goes this is a decent watch. As far as harem anime go this is above average as it makes much more of an effort besides putting some tits on a screen. What makes the concept work is that our protagonist is someone with an ego and bounces nicely the the varied personalities of the five girls. A snarker like Sakuto from bunny girl but a bit more on the savage and blunt side as he quite literally does not care what anyone has to think. Unfortunately the animation is lesser tier with the series itself not looking too impressive but at least being passable. The comedy of the manga has also suffered immense adaption decay making some of the witter lines fail to land an impact. I say for what it is this is a good show for those looking for something of an in between show that doesn’t really require much of a mental commitment. PS: Miku is still best girl. My Logic is undeniable.
Potential: 40%

Mario’s review:
It’s one of those cases where you don’t judge book by the premise. The concept of a boy and 5 harem girls might allure you to a basic eroge game, but so far it sells its concept with flying colors. The biggest strength of it is that the jokes keep coming at you, mostly based on how each girl bounces off with the main guy, producing endless snappy interactions and they all spark different chemistry to our male lead. The production is on the weak side and I heard the anime so far doesn’t translate quite well all the jokes from its manga source. I do feel the main guy needs to work more to be more than just a self-insert faceless lead, and we can all guess how this story is going to span out, but if it keeps this level of strong chemistry between its cast (and pray that the production value don’t drop significantly), we’ll have for ourselves a comedy of the season here.
Potential: 50%

 

Circlet Princess

Short Synopsis: A gamer girl enters the world of virtual Esports.

Mario’s review:
Surprise. Surprise. Circlet Princess is a sport show. Well, it introduces a new battle game as sport and it runs all the templates that we’ve seen before in other, better anime. A protagonist who has no idea about the sport who accidentally gets sucked in the game, but somehow she learns all the skills necessary like Mozart learns about music. A story about some students who try to revive a lost club which happens to be that same sport? A sport where these girls wear super sexy armor and a story where it starts right in the middle of random battle and feature many out-of-nowhere fanservice. It’s a textbook story and the characters never raise above their own established tropes. I give it points for some nice action sequences and the scene where girl adjusting her panty (it was really well animated).
Potential: 10%

Wooper’s review:
Watching this show seems to have altered my brain chemistry. Where once I possessed some tolerance for terrible anime, there is now an aversion so strong that I physically can’t sit through a full-length episode. If you’re going to attempt to view this trash, I recommend doubling or tripling the playback speed, as suffering for the full 24 minutes might be hazardous to your mental health. Circlet Princess was so bad that, starting next season, I’m not going to do first impressions for shows that don’t immediately interest me, just to avoid having another experience like this. There wasn’t a single second I didn’t hate, from the holographic arrows that literally pointed the protagonist in the direction of the plot, to the still images laced throughout a combat sequence that was supposed to be intense and fun. The female characters look like they were designed by a newly pubescent boy, and their implausible dialogue is aimed directly at the show’s audience. By the time the mid-episode timeskip rolled around, I was on the verge of giving up, but I pressed on, and my perseverance was rewarded with… nothing. Seriously, why spend time watching, thinking about, or writing about shows like this? Out of some compulsive need to sample every series from every season? That’s a waste of time. I don’t need to be an industry expert to understand that most of the talent is concentrated on a handful of projects each quarter, and everybody else gets the scraps. On balance, though, it’s not the amount of lousy anime getting produced that has me so pissed – it’s the fact that this one failed even to amuse me.
Potential: 0%