Mononoke – 12 [Goblin Cat, Finale] – Throwback Thursday

by Lenlo, posted in Mononoke, Throwback Thursday

Welcome one and all to the finale of Mononoke, and the close of another season of Throwback Thursday. This week Mononoke pulls a strong finish, I ask you some questions, and we start a poll for the next run. Let’s get into it!

First up, the poll I mentioned for the next Throwback Thursday will be at the bottom of the post. Please check it out! If you want to suggest a series to go on the poll, just leave a comment and it will get added next time. Now, onto the episode. For me this really worked as a finale. Both narratively and visually. Narratively, Mononoke left a lot of the ending open ended. Normally this would be a sequel signal, but we all know Mononoke isn’t getting that. Here though it implies that there is more story, both before and after, the series. Which ties in well to its episodic nature. Visually as well, this week was just less cluttered than the last. The whole thing was more grounded in the murder mystery, and it paid off I think.

Continue reading “Mononoke – 12 [Goblin Cat, Finale] – Throwback Thursday” →

Chihayafuru S3 – 01 [May It Be That I Find]

by SuperWooper, posted in Chihayafuru, Finished Series: Sports

It’s back! The sports/school club/romance hybrid has returned for a third season, and it hardly missed a beat in the six years it was off the air. I rewatched the second season a few months ago, and apart from the new voice actor for Harada-sensei (more on that in a bit), the show felt like its old self. It had the same traditional soundtrack, same sparkly backgrounds, same clever use of on-screen text, and same single-minded Chihaya. Sure, there was a single shot of CG karuta cards being shuffled, but what’s a little 3D animation next to your main character receiving an accurate TV transplant across more than half a decade? This episode was a definite success in my eyes, but I do wonder how season 3 will be received by an audience whose expectations (both for this series and for anime in general) have changed over time.

Continue reading “Chihayafuru S3 – 01 [May It Be That I Find]” →

Vinland Saga – 15 [After Yule]

by Lenlo, posted in Vinland Saga

Another week, another episode of Vinland Saga with a dash of murder and depression. This week, Thorfinn catches a rabbit, Ragnar gets into a fight and Canute becomes Best Girl. Let’s dive in!

Starting off, this week continues Vinland Saga’s theme on fathers and parents in general. As we start to really dive in to Canute’s character and circumstances. We see this in one of the opening scenes, as the Priest, Canute and Ragnar pray for the villagers Askeladd killed. With the Priest starting to doubt God. Without even getting into the religious themes, the focus here is clearly on Canute and his sort of dependence on God. The substitution of God as a loving father in place of Sweyn, the sort of unconditional love he apparently never grew up with. Combine that with Ragnar, Askeladd and Thorfinn and you now have enough different examples of fatherhood in the series to write an essay on it.

Continue reading “Vinland Saga – 15 [After Yule]” →

Fall 2019 Summary – Weeks 2-3

by SuperWooper, posted in Weekly Summary

Wooper: Setting aside the three sequels that have yet to air (two of which we’ll be blogging), the fall season is in full swing. We’re giving regular coverage to a lot of continuations and sequels at the moment, so we’re bringing back the Weekly Summary feature as a way of broadcasting our brief thoughts about everything else. Some of these series will show up here every week; others may appear in some posts and not in others. The unlucky ones may be dropped, never to be mentioned on Star Crossed again. Which series will still be standing come the end of December? Keep checking back to find out!

Mugen no Juunin: Immortal 3

Lenlo: I have to say, Immortal really stepped it up this week. This was really good. From the fights to the direction to the new character, I think it nailed them all. Sure the animation was rather limited at times, but they really did their best with what they had and I think it worked. I loved the progression of 2 plots side by side with Maki. The odd sort of parallels between the two, her growth, and the actual defeat of Manji. The continued use of flower imagery, and our leads budding relationship with Manji. I sort of wish I had blogged it for my full length posts right now, but boy would that be a lot of work. As is, I will have to settle for some surface level praise about how good this week was. That said, still worried about pacing. This one episode was like… 200 pages of manga content. That’s almost an entire volume, in a single episode. There is no way all the episodes will work as well as this and I can’t imagine how much was skipped over.

 

No Guns Life 2

Amun: Alright, so NGL’s second episode wasn’t quite as hype as episode 1. And you know what, that’s 100% okay. What we got instead of the bikini battle was a good guy (girl actually) introduction, bad guy introduction, and a bit of worldbuilding. And apparently these cigarettes are a major plotpoint, can’t forget those. One of the things that I am absolutely respecting the ever living gunsmoke out of, is how they’re making their MC an actual bad, bad…gunhead. Lots of shows try to do a tough guy (I’m even looking at you Trigun) and tend to make a mockery of it. NGL, so far, has actually made a real wiseguy. The other respectable point here is a villian actually acting (semi) intelligently – buying up all the cigarettes was a nice move. NGL enters their third week with the hype train still going strong – unlike the one that ole’ Revolver head just broke.
 
Continue reading “Fall 2019 Summary – Weeks 2-3” →

Fire Force – 13 [The Trap is Set]

by Amunchet, posted in Currently Watching:, Fire Force

So this is the finale of the first half of Fire Force…and it doesn’t really feel like a finale at all.  But that’s okay!  It’s one of the better episodes we’ve seen from our 8th brigade so far – mainly because it feels as though some of the fight scene animation demons have been (partially) exorcised this week.  Let’s go!
Continue reading “Fire Force – 13 [The Trap is Set]” →

Dr. STONE – 15/16 [The Culmination of Two Million Years/A Tale for the Ages]

by Lenlo, posted in Dr.STONE

This week of Dr.STONE is a double feature, courtesy of my inability to write! Here we cover the conclusion of the Grand Bout, finish the Cure-All and then dive into the history of Ishigami village. So without further ado, since we have a lot to cover this week, let’s dive in.

Starting off, first an apology for missing last week. I simply had no inspiration for the episode. Nothing that I really cared to focus in on or write about. Episode 15 was just rather dull across the board for me, it was pretty dang straight forward. The fights/action for instance lacked impact, which makes sense considering it isn’t an action series. Unlike episode 14, there wasn’t really any sort of interesting science behind it. Meanwhile a number of the scenes in 15 just lacked the impact of the manga. Turning the page to some of Boichi’s best scenes. Take for instance the Cola scene with Gen, I don’t think it worked as well in the anime. Whether that be the sound effects or something else, I don’t know. But it, and others, simply didn’t stick with me. Resulting in no inspiration to really write about Dr.STONE.

Continue reading “Dr. STONE – 15/16 [The Culmination of Two Million Years/A Tale for the Ages]” →

Beastars – 02

by SuperMario, posted in Beastars, Currently Watching:

Furry anthropomorphic animals animals are in fashion now thanks to the onslaught of countless isekai settings, but Beastars is here to offer something fresh and different. Indeed, there are many elements from Beastars that we can feel optimistic about. The manga source is penned by Paru Itagaki, which recent news reveals to be the daughter of Keisuke Itagaki, author of Grappler Baki. The manga has gained solid fan-base throughout its release and even won the Manga Taishou award (along with the greats like 3-gatsu no Lion, Chihayafuru, Umimachi Diary). In addition, all eyes and anticipation level keeps rising up into the sky when Orange, the studio that was behind THE only CG show that done right, is behind the project. On that, I actually feel that it’s a big overstatement to regard Houseki no Kuni as such, especially when it has been only 2 years –  and that comes from me, one of the biggest supporters of Houseki no Kuni. 

Continue reading “Beastars – 02” →

Hoshiai no Sora – 02

by SuperWooper, posted in Finished Series: Sports, Hoshiai no Sora

Hoshiai no Sora picks up where Mix left off in terms of character-driven sports dramas. Between those two and Kaze ga Tsuyoku Fuiteiru at the start of the year, we’ve had a strong representative for the genre at all points during 2019. Though it’s just two episodes old, Hoshiai has the potential to be the best of the lot, thanks to the steady pace of its character writing and the lack of shortcuts in its athletics animation. While this episode didn’t have a bombshell ending to match the final moments of the premiere, it pulled its weight by deepening the show’s cast, among several other improvements. This was one of my most anticipated series of the fall, and things are looking good so far, but to put it in tennis terms, it’s still early in the first set.

Continue reading “Hoshiai no Sora – 02” →

Mononoke – 11 [Goblin Cat, Part 2] – Throwback Thursday

by Lenlo, posted in Mononoke, Throwback Thursday

Welcome one and all to the penultimate week of Mononoke! Apologies for the lateness of this, life is busy busy right now, much like Mononoke itself. As this week we dive into the mystery at hand, our suspects start to talk and the series gets… weird. Let’s dive in!

Starting off, what do I mean by weird? Well personally, I wasn’t a fan of the direction and such this week, a first for the series. It actually went so hard on some scenes, that it started to feel obnoxious. What with both the audio and the visuals just hammering away at the senses, some scenes were unpleasant to watch. Don’t get me wrong, some were fantastic. Mononoke tried really hard to sell the horror aspect of the series. And it succeeded a number of times, more so than many other arcs. However in its effort to really finish, it comes off to strong. My big example of this for me were the “Don’t see, don’t hear, don’t speak” murals near the end, which while interesting just kinda slammed into you. Harsh cuts and sounds accompanying them and everything. I just think Mononoke needed to tone this down a bit.

Continue reading “Mononoke – 11 [Goblin Cat, Part 2] – Throwback Thursday” →