3-gatsu no Lion – 14 [Blinding Darkness – Just a Little Water]

January 24, 2017 by SuperMario, posted in 3-gatsu no Lion, Currently Watching:

This week in 3-gatsu no Lion, we again witness another one of Rei’s depression, which is fine I guess because this is what the show does best anyways; but seriously it didn’t leave much of an impact on me, both because those depression thoughts start to wear out on me, and this section drags out for too long. Here lies the issues: the way Shaft decided to adapt every double chapters per episode mean that sometimes we suffer the disconnect in tones between two chapters like last week’s, or we have to go through their lesser materials like this one. In manga medium, this is totally acceptable because one volume has multiple chapters, so it doesn’t distract the flow of the story as severe as in adaptation form. This episode is where its deliberated pacing doesn’t benefit the story at all and if they speed up a bit to the next chapter the story would flow so much smoother.

I have to note that this is the first time ever that we witness him lost right in front of our eyes. Kudos for the sharp writing that building up the big match to come between Rei and Gotou before crushing that anticipation from Rei and us apart. We’re pretty much in the same mind as Rei expecting an easy win for him. Except it isn’t. Rei loses and he loses hard. The loss strips Rei down pretty hard that he loses faith in his own ability and even looks for job hunting. It’s pretty understandable for someone his age; young and talented but inexperienced; misjudged the capability of his opponent. This isn’t come from his own arrogant though, but more like he hasn’t give much thoughts about his opponent and he certainly paid his price. The very solid depressing visuals (as expected from Shaft) were conveyed through water bubbles again, and through his own dehydration. If there is one thing we certainly learn after this episode, it’s Rei is even bad of being depressed.

It’s tough to carry all these self-doubting thoughts on his own, so what does he decide to do next? Go to school and keep carry on of course. But kiddo, if you don’t feel okay from the inside, carry on with life like normal won’t do you anything good. He feels like he doesn’t belong at school, so he’s even more depressed and cries out of solitude. Thankfully, there are lights of hope at the end of the road, in the name of Hayashida-sensei who give him a much-needed advice and the workshop by Shimada which will help him improve his game. In a way, Rei needs to take 2 steps back before moving few steps forward, and this loss is something that someone his age need to realize the sooner the better; thus I get the narrative. But the episode lacks the final punch, moreover the male casts can’t handle the atmosphere or carry the emotions as good as the female counterparts (call me sexist. I’ll take it.), as a result this episode is a big meh. Give me more Kyouko, give me more of the 3 sisters please. In the end, characters-wise, the show still rocks (how it gives much personalities to Shimada despite a very unremarkable introduction for example) but I really hope the show doesn’t waste its time for some minor chapters like this and end up not having enough time to cover the main thread.

Saga of Tanya the Evil – 03[Deus Vult]

January 24, 2017 by AidanAK47, posted in Currently Watching:, Saga of Tanya the Evil

This series really has started to shine since episode two and I admit that Tanya is carrying the show all by herself. The first episode shows what this series would be like without her character background and while that was serviceable, it’s on a much better footing now. Tanya’s quest to land a safe job out of the frontlines and God screwing her over at every point makes for a far more entertaining story than your standard magical girl anime. The cushy job testing a new magical device turns out to be even more dangerous than the front lines due to a crazed inventor. Thanks to divine intervention, Tanya ends up with a magical device far more powerful than anything else but as a tradeoff, she is forced to praise God every time she uses it. In the source material, the praising of God was involuntary and often came out of Tanya’s mouth no matter what she did. While the animated series depicts Tanya begrudgingly praying on her own accord, which certainly makes it all the more cathartic. After all, this device is likely to push her on to more and more battlefields where her life is in danger. In order to survive she will need to make use of the device and pray, which in turn forces her into even more battles. God has literally forced her on a path where the only way she can survive is praising him, which amounts to cheating when it comes to developing Tanya’s faith.

As I said before, God in the anime is treated differently from the source material. Originally, there were dozens of gods and Tanya’s Type 95 device was something that landed in her hands by coincidence. Originally it was intended to help inspire faith in the gods. I find the anime version to be more poignant and interesting as I’m not certain if God is working in his mysterious ways or if he is genuinely unreasonable. After all, God is being a bit of an jackass if you take the time to read the Bible. Honestly, I only managed to make it ten pages into the bible before it started putting me to sleep but within those ten pages, he seemed rather trollish. It is a question of whether this game he has with Tanya is a matter of God punishing an arrogant man or if he is using her to promote faith in others. Tanya’s actions do seem to encourage piety within the army and Tanya herself seems more or less oblivious to this fact because she’s too focused on proving being X wrong. The idea of Tanya doing god’s work while under the impression that she is rebelling against god is the kind of irony I find most amusing.

I was worried that the dreaded school setting was coming into the story, which is an aspect I detest when it comes to anime shows. But from the way things are looking, God is sure to have plans that will ensure that Tanya doesn’t get too comfortable. It also helps that this is a war college rather than a typical high school but still I get worried when any show tries to cram in a school in a story that doesn’t need one. However, if there is one thing that Tanya needs right now, it is strong side characters. So far, Tanya only has her girl subordinate acting as a foil but she could really uses a character to bounce off and interact with. She doing an admirably good job in carrying the show but a great lead needs others to work off. All the signs point towards the series is heading towards World War One with Tanya being at the very center of it all. I appreciate the level of quality that has gone into these past few episodes but numerous war scenes have a tendency to drain budgets and animation quality. Considering this is Studio Nut first work, the last thing I want to see is the quality of the show taking a nosedive.

2016 Summary

January 22, 2017February 25, 2021 by AidanAK47, posted in Yearly Summaries

Aidan: Considering how 2016 has been in other areas, in regards to anime it wasn’t that bad. But let us not dwell any more than we have to on the past year and get the show on the road.

Worst of the Worst

Worst Show

Aidan: Occultic;Nine

This is one of those shows which baffles me on just how it was even made. There can be good reason as to why some truly terrible anime were made. Production troubles, over ambition, lacking studio experience, poor source material…but this is an example where the only explanation I can think of as to why it turned out so terrible is the sheer incompetence of the writer and director. I am long tired of speaking about this show so I will just round this up. Horrible direction that speeds up exposition to make it look like an episode of Bakemonogatari and even be visually nasuationing. A story which makes no sense and has a huge middle portion which is entirely pointless. No likeable characters and a girl with a chest so big that it rivals that of Mina from Air Master but the difference being that Mina’s huge knockers are meant as a joke when Ryouko’s are supposed to be attractive. This show is horrible, horrible trash and hope these two never work in this industry ever again.

Runner up: Musaigen no Phantom World (for killing the last bit of respect I had for KyoAni)

Mario: Kabaneri of the Iron Fortress

And with this Kabaneri takes the crown jewels. Well, first off, I don’t really mind popcorn action flicks, to put it another way I can endure it but what turn me off the most is when those shows take themselves too seriously. This one had this problem and then some. The action is over the top, which is fine, but then moments like pregnant-woman-turn-zombie got stabbed deliberately by “our people” just to prove the point (that doesn’t matter who you were before, when you got bitten by the zombie your humanity is over), it became rather tasteless. The plot itself is full of holes and overpowered characters that the more you think about it, the more it falls apart. In the second half the show did fall apart and it became exactly a train-wreck. For runner-up, let give a big round of applause to Occultic;Nine for its utmost intention to keep confusing us and make us feel uncomfortable till the very end. I’m not as pissed off about it as Aidan of course, but really this show was a mess which made very little sense.

Runner up: Occultic;Nine

Biggest Disappointment

Aidan: Erased

It is a point to be made that just because a show is disappointing, does not mean that it’s bad. Erased is by no means a bad show but it did manage to build peoples hopes to the degree that before the shows end people were declaring it a masterpiece. I offer this to Erased as I expected Berserk to disappoint but Erased I was well on my way to declaring one of my all time favorites. It really is evidence as to how much an ending can effect a show as while watching it the show manages to capture you but when all’s said and done and you look back, you realise the journey wasn’t as special as it was promising. Erased’s biggest crime is delivering a well done character drama when it was gearing the audience up for a mystery thriller. Thus I can fault the show for that, even if the end product was still good in it’s own right.

Runner Up: Berserk (2016)

Mario: Berserk (2016)

Arguably one of the most anticipated title last year, coming off from a 10 years plus high-regarded anime and even more prestigious (but endlessness) manga from Kentaro Miura. The long wait from us fans was not satisfied though, as the way the show handled the source material was just wrong. First the use of CGI animation failed miserably here, as the effect the CGI has was jarring and clunky and immediately took your attention away from the story. Then the pacing was off and the story was very newcomer-unfriendly. This series achieved something that I thought was impossible for Berserk: that maybe the manga isn’t that special all of us fans hyped up to be: maybe it’s just a story about the killing, revenge and all ugly natures of human and nothing else. Second place goes to Joker Game that it started out incredibly solid for the first two episodes, then the episodic nature really killed the show as it became predictable (guess who will win in the end?), the stories that crammed up into single episode resulted in pretty much half-baked outcomes.

Runner up: Joker Game

HelghastKillzone: Kabaneri of the Iron Fortress

As the writer who covered this show over the spring 2016 season, I remember buying into the hype and singing its praises for the first half of the show before it fell off a cliff in its second half. With the same staff behind Attack on Titan, it had the animation, action, setting and music to potentially become the anime of the year but veered off into a shitty direction with the introduction of the main antagonist. To this day, I would recommend the first seven episodes as the shining example of what anime has to offer in the action department but its latter half is something to be avoided at all costs. My only solace is that the series is reseted by the end of the finale and that the recently announced second season will have a clean start.

Runner up: Dimension W

Continue reading “2016 Summary” →

Scum’s Wish – 02 [I’m here for that warmth]

January 21, 2017 by SuperMario, posted in Currently Watching:, Scum's Wish

Welcome to the roller coaster of the emotional manipulative anime of this season, are you with me on this ride? Scum’s Wish has the exact opposite issues with ACCA in that it tries to overwhelm us with lots of raw feelings that sometime it touches the line of manipulation. This episode, fortunately, still pretty much gets away with that problem, but at the same time I’m not satisfy with it. In my first impression, I have mentioned that the show explores two interconnected themes, first is the hard truth about one-sided love and keep pressing their heads into thick wall (which I kinda have mixed feeling) and the second theme is about sharing the pain together through physical and destructive relationship (which I find myself really invested in). Unfortunately, with the introductions of those “third-girls” from our mains – themselves a third person on their own love –the story heads itself towards the former and pretty signals that things will go pretty heavy and unsatisfied later on.

As I said earlier, to make things even harder to unknot, we are introduced with the new threads of this web’s relationship, Moca and Ecchan, the person who secretly love Mugi and Hanabi, respectively. These are as doomed a relationship as you would get, but it’s actually interesting to see how similar yet different those two hopeless obsessions progress. Both are described as childhood crush (which actually the same with the mains), but while Moca’s crush towards Mugi is framed as childish and somewhat light in tone, Ecchan secret love towards Hanabi is framed as sort of hidden and forbidden love. While Moca is always very vocal about her love, Ecchan’s love is silent and concealed. Hanabi actually sees through all the efforts Moca’s trying to make to pull Mugi off her, thus she harshly shrugs the girl off. As Hana says it to Moca, as much to herself; “Don’t go around clinging for what aren’t yours”; it’s never fun to see your ugly sides through the mirror. Well, as for Ecchan, I give it a point for how the show actually portraits a yuri crush, a love from a girl to another girl that feel realistic and true to life.

The show doesn’t give us much the actual relationship between Mugi and Hanabi in this episode, but when it does, it’s still remarkable and brings the emotions forward. They rely on each other physically in order to take away their pain and frustration towards their true love, and in one of flashback of Mugi there was another blond, short hair girl who seem to sexually abused him before? I’m not really sure but if that’s the case then… *smirk* bring it on. Talking about remarkable, I’m very impressed by the ED of Scum’s Wish that is done in the style of the Rorschach inkblot test and is very risqué in presentation that very, very fitting to the provocative nature of the series. It might be just me but I see this ED full of female private parts, naked characters (because those feelings are pretty much naked too) and the music really brings the melancholy tones home. Good stuff.

But on the other spectrum, in terms of story, even with its already complex web of doomed relationships, the show still feels the need to cram in a side love story from Hanabi’s friends asking for her advice on which boys she should pick. I get the point of this little story that meant to point out that her friend’s love isn’t true love at all, but I can’t help but feel that side story is totally unnecessary. Those relationships are already complicated as it is, there is no need to stuff in more doomed love from someone else’s. All in all, this is the direction that I’m a bit worry whether the show can pull it off. Now that all the main characters are introduced let see how they manage to use them to full potential. I’m pretty much in for a ride anyways so come at me with all you got Scum’s Wish.

ACCA: 13-Territory Inspection Dept. – 02 [The Partner in Crime’s Name is Nino]

January 21, 2017 by SuperMario, posted in ACCA: 13-Territory Inspection Dept., Currently Watching:

I admit that although I think ACCA is one the most solid show this season and I in particular like how they set up the settings and the events to come, the first two episodes didn’t grab me that much personally. As a result, in prepare for this post, I went ahead and watching them again, and I picked up a fair amount of new details this time and the show did grow a bit on me. Many of our characters seem to have hidden agenda, heck, nearly all of them have, from our main character Jean Otus, his sister, his best friend Nino, Mauve, and the five heads of ACCA. There is an uprising about to come and the higher-up suspects Jean has a vital role in the middle of all this, which whether it’s true or not remain to be seen.

The kingdom of Dowa remains one of the most intriguing settings this season have to offer. Dividing up into 13 states where each of them have their own authority and maintaining peace for 99 years after a vicious civil war ain’t a small feat at all. So exactly how did the king managed to unite all these bastards to create peace? At the moment, I guess there are some conditions the king promised back then, and those conditions have to do with 100 years and the upcoming coup d’état. ACCA is created to supervise the day-to-day operations of other districts; and how their propaganda put it; a symbol of peace itself. There’s still so much details hidden underneath the surface but at this moment the show quite succeeds on hinting these bit by bit. No, I don’t trust everything that I’ve seen in this world. That Dowa kingdom is like an old expired cake, beautiful from the outside, rotten from the inside.

But the way the show tells its story marks how confident they approach the material. The show follows Jean who perform his everyday job and we get to see him doing his jobs, smoking, and meeting with everyone around his circle. Jean himself is a question mark because most of the time he doesn’t say much about what he thinks or even express his feeling at all, but I say he’s quite an interesting lead. As of now, the five heads of ACCA suspect he’s involving in the upcoming uprising so they decided to have him monitored by his best friend Nino no less. For everyone thinking he was ratted out by his best friend, I say that it’s not always the case because first, they are close friends from way back, even to the point now that Jean really relies on Nino for gathering information (the anonymous tips on episode one was likely from his source, as was as Jean’s lighter incidents), and second, the true motive of Nino is pretty much unclear. In fact, except from the obvious crush from agent Rail to Lotta which I see as genuine, I don’t trust any other characters of ACCA either, even Lotta seems to have something hidden underneath her cheerful personality.

And that might be the show’s most distinctive feature and might be the show’s greatest weakness too. It keeps the audience at arm’s length. I don’t trust what I see so far, be it the façade of this peaceful world or the character’s motivations, thus now I can see why I have a hard time personally connect to it. Everything so far is intriguing and fascinating for sure, and Madhouse approach this series with confident pacing and styles, but its emotional distantness will keep the audience more admiring than outright loving it. The character designs are attractive, although many supporting characters like the ACCA representatives in Jumoku have a Tintin-esque styles that completely out of place. I’m sure things will get greyer and darker as the story moves on, and I suspect that is when the story really get interesting. For now, I’m totally fine with its rich worldbuilding and Jean smoking and buying/eating breads. There’s a whole bread culture in there.

Shouwa Genroku Rakugo Shinjuu – 15

January 18, 2017 by AidanAK47, posted in Currently Watching:, Shouwa Genroku Rakugo Shinjuu

It was inevitable that Yotaro’s past with the Yakuza would come back to haunt him but boy did it really bite him in the ass. I was wondering as to how the show would work with Yotaro and give him conflict but then this episode comes along and gives him plenty to worry about. He’s having trouble finding his old style and is mimicking his masters and acting as a surrogate father for Konatsu’s child when the father appears to have returned at episodes end. Yotaro’s performance in this episode was hard to watch but I really love how Rakugo never has someone on the sidelines to inform us that the performance wasn’t going well. Just by watching and listening, even though I don’t know Japanese, made it clear how well it was going. Helped by showing the audience’s reaction and Yotaro’s own panicking nervousness. Rakugo seems like a temperamental art, much like comedy.

The mood of the audience can kill a performance and in Rakugo’s case, bore them to death. You can tell Yotaro is really trying with his performance but as the audience loses interest his moves grow all the more desperate. Even changing the voice of the housewife character mid performance as Yakumo complained about it earlier. When Yotaro unwittingly reveals his Yakuza tattoo in front of the audience he knows right away that he made a bad move. Still as painful as this is I certainly remember a fair share of Yakumo’s terrible performances. Though what certainly isn’t terrible is the new opening and boy if it isn’t a unique way to start this show. I am a little on the fence over the song but the visuals are fantastic. I love the imagery of Sukoroku opening his shirt to reveal a ribcage. I originally thought this season was going to be primarily about Yotaro but the opening puts Yakumo in the spotlight and shows his worries and the things that haunt him well. It worries me though as the opening is not very happy and could foreshadow this season being quite depressing. All things considered I would prefer a more heartwarming end to this story and more moments like Yakumo consoling Yotaro over his past.

Speaking of which Yakumo is not doing so well either. He’s not doing much to help out Konatsu with the child and it’s clear that he has long grown tired of his life. His cold attitude towards Konatsu and disinterest in the child is somewhat understandable. As I doubt Konatsu wants him anywhere near him. Konatsu is still just as hostile to him which is sad as Yakumo at least tries to throw some kindness her way. The scene with him reciting one of Sukoroku’s old bits that put her to sleep. I almost believed that this could be the start of them at least growing closer together as a family. Though Konatsu burns that bridge fast by reminding him that he lead her parents to their death. All things considered I think Konatsu isn’t really being fair. After all if anyone is to blame for what happened it would be her mother. Yakumo then reveals his desire to die and to take Rakugo with him. So in that regard Yotaro may have saved Yakumo’s life when he declared to be taking up Sukoroku’s name. So in one episode we have essentially declared the problems the protagonists will be dealing with for likely the majority of the season. And here I thought that the end of season one only signaled a rise for Rakugo in the future. Life truly is never that simple.

Little Witch Academia – 02[Pappiliodya]

January 18, 2017 by AidanAK47, posted in Currently Watching:, Little Witch Academia

I may regret choosing to cover this series as what makes it great is a quality that cannot really be held up to professional scrutiny. Much like Triggers other works, it’s not what’s being presented that matter but rather how it’s presented. You can make the argument that Trigger doesn’t necessarily innovative but rather take old tried methods of storytelling and polish it with great animation. Though one has to wonder if that might be actually enough as to capture the feeling of the old and perfect it is no easy task. It’s difficult to call their works original but there’s no denying that they are fun. I like to see them as the Nintendo of the anime industry in that they stick close to old sensibilities and in doing so keep the simple enjoyment and wonder that seems so rare nowadays. Little Witch Academia so far still has the magic and with hope they can keep it for it’s full 25 episode run. The opening of this series was mixed for me as it is a much more mellow tune when compared to Triggers other works. However it’s growing on me and I happen to like the starting buildup and imagery. For a series like this it is rather suitable that the opening is more easygoing.

I often see Little witch compared to Harry Potter which does seem like a flimsy comparison. Sort of like that joke where you say it’s like Skyrim with witches. Harry Potter is the obvious popular example for comparison but the two actually hold not much in common. Really both have a wizard school and if you ignore actual personality and gender you could compare Diana to Malfoy. This is more a feel good magical adventure when Harry Potter was more written like a mystery with the three often trying to figure out some incident going on at Hogwarts. If we want to play the comparison game then Little Witch Academia holds much more in common with a book series called The Worst Witch. Admittedly I primarily know it from the TV series that aired in 1998 but it certainly is surprising the parallels the two have. Also before you go saying the Worst Witch is a knockoff of Harry Potter it’s important to note that the first book was published in 1973 so if anything Rowling took inspiration from them. This may be a moot point but I wanted to point out that just because Rowling popularised the idea of a wizarding school does not mean she invented the idea. I seem to remember before Little Witch that people referred to Familiar of Zero as anime Harry Potter too.

Based on these past two episodes it does seem like there will be a certain formula which I hope doesn’t become stale. My biggest fear for this series is that it’s predictability could water down it’s charm. The big issue would be the deus ex machina stick, Chariots wand, which can do pretty much whatever the plot requires it to. It does seem to have conditions for its activation which look to involve being charged with magic but I say that later episodes shouldn’t rely on it’ too much. Though it might not be a detriment as Gurren Lagann essentially solved all its battles with fighting spirit and yet didn’t become stale. Diana so far has been made a lot more reasonable as in the OVA she was a lot more confrontational but here she was a lot more reasonable. Still prideful and standoffish but not obnoxious. Her lackeys took to be filling in that role. I particularly like how she noticed Akko’s hair that Susy cursed with a potion and while showing off with the bringing the statue to life she uses it to dispel the magic on her hair. As well as trying to admit that she wasn’t the one who saved the tree. Akko and Diana’s relationship in this show could have a lot more to it here and really could become quite interesting. After all I believe Diana is still a closet Chariot fan and I wouldn’t be surprised if she has the last card Akko was missing from her collection.

Some quick first impression: Winter 2017 Edition

January 18, 2017 by psgels, posted in Some Quick First Impressions

If you ever get the opportunity offered to install Windows 10 on your PC: don’t do it! My computer got more and more unstable until it finally decided to give in and crash completely and I had a lovely beginning of 2017 trying to recover the files I hadn’t backed up only with a small success. That’s the reason this post is a bit late because I also had to rewrite my impressions of the earlier episodes I watched.

As usual this is a list of just my impressions and impressions alone, they’re not meant to be reviews, just to put my thoughts on paper and perhaps help those who are in need of a biased overview of the latest season. I did not look at any previews or information beforehand, so these are purely my first impressions. This season is not as good as the previous autumn season, but it might contain a few keepers:

Ai Mai Mi – Surgical Friends

Before I started, a little voice in me knew that I shouldn’t bother with this, that you shouldn’t judge anime by its cover, even positively. And yet something in me kept gullibly hoping that with a title as “surgical friends”, there would at least be SOMETHING about a hospital in this. Well yeah no, this is just a school show about cute girls. The premise of this one is that it tries to be a comedy (emphasis on “tries”), and there are a bunch of weird blob-like girls that the rest of the characters have to take care of and interact with. It unfortunately is another one of those series which never seem to have had a 101 on basic storytelling so the entire episode was jumbled up from scenes that just kept jumping into each other without any proper buildup and jokes just come from nowhere. The creators are pretty much hoping that if you yell hard and fast enough, the audience won’t notice your jokes are actually terrible. No.

Akiba’s Trip The Animation

Last year I had the fortune of visiting Japan, and while there I also paid a visit to Akihabara. And look, I get it. How crazy the the area is, I can see a series that celebrates it work. It’s gonna have a ton of fanservice because hey, it’s Akiba. However, even with that, you need good characters. This show doesn’t have that. The male lead is really badly acted and not fun to watch at all and his antics really scream trying too hard to be in on the joke, like this middle aged executive producer was desperately trying to be part of the “cool kids”. Beyond that, I also don’t really think that this show was that good at really showing what Akiba is like. There are some shows here and there, but there’s nothing really abut the history of the street, why it became the way it is, and the first episode proceeds to just destroy everything around it, more in the way of a disaster movie that picks famous landmarks to destroy just because of audience familiarity (although granted, this series does score points in trying to maintain its continuity). When I realized that, then this isn’t really a show that celebrates Akihabara anymore, and this turned into one of the most pandering shows I have ever seen. Like seriously it has everything: Snarky NEET Otaku main character who is surrounded by sexy characters, Akihabara, a younger sister for the lolicon crowd, a ditzy girl, a tsundere, lots of inconsequential fighting, the main character dying, the main female reviving him with a kiss with which he suddenly has these crazy superpowers that are for some stupid reason dependent on him stripping everyone to their underwear. Pure and utter wish fulfillment. Next!

Masamune-kun no Revenge

Series like this are the reason I try to give every single series at least the chance of a first episode. This is the kind of series that I would never have given a chance otherwise, and yet this episode impressed me. It looks so much like your generic harem, and yet every time it went into just another direction from what I expected. The show loves to toy with the normal conventions of the genre, in a way that feels fresh, and every time where I found myself thinking “oh god, not again”, it proved my fears wrong by going into a different direction. Now it obviously needs to keep this for the entire series, but I dig the idea of a series about a guy who Neville Longbottomed his way through middle school and now is at the point to take revenge, and the main character succeeds in not being a Gary Stu: he has his own weaknesses and the series makes it very clear that while he thinks that his revenge will be glorious, there will be massive downsides to it. It has struck that balance so far. Now, show. Whatever you do: DO NOT DEVOLVE into a generic will they won’t they after this!

Fuuka

Dear creators of anime: for the love of god, could you please stop trying to introduce female characters by their underpants? This is getting ridiculous. With this series, I’d also like to add another thing to the list of overused tropes that should not be used anymore: the three sisters. First 3-Gatsu no Lion came with its Minami-ke clone, and now this show too: show some creativity dammit! In any case about this show, it’s not THAT bad. It’s basically your first romance show about two awkward teenagers discovering that they might have feelings for each other, and while not that interesting, the cast also isn’t that annoying. What this show did really well was portraying that awkward feeling of first love: instead of glorifying it with lots of hearts and flowers and sparkles like what most series usually do, this is ugly and weird and nobody really knows what to do; I felt awkward along with the characters. But here’s the thing: was it really worth it to make a show about this? Don’t we already have enough romance shows? Ultimately this episode was just dull, nothing really caught my attention, it just adequately went along like the lowest common denominator. If it were a school grade, it’d be a 5,5; passable, but only barely. I see no reason to continue watching, especially how this episode hinted that this is going to be a love triangle and that a locally famous idol is going to enter the ring, so this show is pointless.

Minami Kamakura Koukou Joshi Jitensha-bu

Remember the previous season’s All Out? Well, they’re doing it again! Cute girls on bikes! Although this one seems to be more casual, like K-on with bikes. The lead female may not be as ditzy, but she’s getting there. Note that none of that is positive, although I do have one very big compliment for this series: the backgrounds! For some reason beyond me the creators decided to hire some really good background people, and it shows. I mean it’s no Porphy, but the lush background of the Japanese coastlines, mountains, oceans, it’s all amazing, and they actually move subtly, with a use of CG that actually feels perfectly natural for once. Apart from that, this show thankfully isn’t that bad. My main complaint really is how generic it is: this has all been done many times before, but in terms of execution, the characters are decently written and not trying too hard to be cute. There are a few bits here and there where the characters have an interesting chemistry between them, so if you’re dying for something light-hearted yet heart-warming, I think that this will actually be a good pick, provided that they do the cycling scenes better than what they did in the OP. Seriously that was bad.

Ao no Exorcist – Kyoto Fujouou-hen

Ah, Ao no Exorcist, that’s a long time ago. The premise seems rather annoying, why did I like this show again? Well, the answer to that question came in the second half of the episode: the side characters. That’s where the show got a bit down to earth again, and there you could see some very interesting character dynamics between the main character (who is the son of Satan) and his classmates. Before that though, he was pretty annoying and I related more to his twin brother for having to keep up with this brat and his antics. It’s weird to see how much I myself have changed ever since I watch this, but Rin is still the same brat he ever was. But thankfully the second half used his struggles in an interesting way compared to his powers that tend to go out of hand. But that’s also the problem: why does this show have to keep finding ways to distract from this guy’s antics? Can’t he just… be a good character right from the start? Naruto had the same problem: sure when it comes down to it he’s a good guy and all, but do you really want to watch this brat being a brat for most of the time to get there? It works for side characters because they don’t have too much airtime, but a main character?

Youjo Senki

I… um… yeah… okay, let’s start with the beginning. Remember Izetta of the previous season? Set in an alternative version of WWI Europe, but with slightly different countries and a mage lead character, folling a German-ish country on its way to victory. This show does that too. However Izetta was very well made: the common soldiers who were fighting were given a personality. Izetta had her flaws, so it really drove home that even though mages are incredibly powerful in a war setting, the common people are still incredibly important, and it’s a situation where death really sucks, yet is unavoidable. And while it took many liberties, you could still see the alpine influences. This show though, holy god. It has some MAJOR tonal differences. War! Murder! Death! Officers missing limbs! Cute girls! Really, what is this kid doing there? And don’t give me that “it’s magic”-schtick, the creators knew full well what they did. Every single soldier is ugly and gritty, and there she comes with her shiny hear and pupils looking extremely out of place. That other girl looked out of place too, but at least she wasn’t such a blatantly insulting Mary Sue for most of the episode, I hated her. Also, on a side-note: nice job on using chess pieces on a strategical war map guys! I see what you did there, that’s very advanced symbolism you have there! In any case though, what surprised me the most is how I found myself reacting to the end of the episode. Like, is she supposed to be the villain? Are we meant to hate her? Is she supposed to be this ridiculously powerful demi-god and will they use that against her in the future? Why the hell am I invested in this? Why did that finale hit me? What’s going on!?

Seiren

Oh god no! The hentai game adaptations! They’re back! I finally thought they were gone, but here Seiren comes yet again with a show featuring six girls and a generic spineless guy. Especially the OP: couldn’t they at least try to not make it so obvious there? Anyway, after 20 minutes of watching yet another horny teenager navigate through high school, I’m having a bit of trouble evaluating what this series really is going to be: will it go Clannad, pick one storyline and simply ignore the other girls, or will it spend a few episodes per girl in a wishy washy love triangle that makes no sense? It can go either way at this point, but if I had to be pressed, then I’d say that Fuuka had the better episode here between the two. The reason is that while both deal with awkward teenagers, Seiren had characters pull really weird leaps in logic that I’m still trying to puzzle out. One moment it’s trying really hard to be realistic, and then the next we have the main character staring at the main female’s butt-print after sitting on a desk. One moment it tries to show a teenager trying to find his place in life, the next there is this really weird misunderstanding about his crush and a middle aged guy. It just doesn’t fit, it’s like this uncanny valley of awkwardness that just feels so unnatural. Like a bunch of aliens pretending to be humans or something.

Urara Meirochou

Judging a book by its cover again: when this episode started, my thoughts were overall positive: it wouldn’t be my kind of series, like at all, but I could see this have appeal for the people who like series about “cute girls doing cute stuff”. It seemed to have the right ingredients, it was more colourful than usual, it had a nice selection of cute animals around, I could see it have a legitimate audience. When I started watching however, this turned into one of the worst first episodes of the season so far. Most other episodes so far were mostly just boring; this was painful. A lot can be written down to how the lead character is one of the most dim-witted characters I’ve seen in a long while. Really, to be THIS air-headed is a skill, and she just keeps going on and on. The cute animals could just as easily have been stuffed, that’s how much they actually did here, and it also has the dumbest excuse for fanservice so far, and that includes the stripping superpowers of that Akiba show. Like showing your belly in order to apologize? Really? It’s obvious what you’re doing there, there’s no need to be all cute about it. The rest of the cast basically is one giant straight man for this lead character, but even they are just completely annoying whenever they open their mouth. It’s the result of everything trying waaaay too hard to be cute. If it’s just that for the entire 20 minutes it’s obviously going to lose it’s value. Remember to balance dammit!

Spiritpact

A Chinese show with a Japanese dub, Korean OP, English title and ED. Quite the international production here, and it shows. This series looks incredibly cheap, but at the same time this show is not bound by the cliches that plague modern Japanese productions. I’m not against that though. The big disadvantage of modern productions is that they put budget over everything, and you hardly ever see the series that try to creatively use their limited budget to do really good things anymore. This is a fine attempt: the acting is very wooden, but it actually made me laugh quite a bit. It wasn’t amazingly funny, but it was consistently sharp throughout this first episode. Due to its simplicity it could offer a lot of time to just the chemistry between the two main characters, and it works: the two work quite well together. The whole premise that when you turn into a ghost, the version of you where you were the most happy is the form you take. I like that! It has a lot of potential for interesting stories. But yeah, the creators need to do something about the wooden acting. They made the mistake to main character depend too much on his quirks: he just keeps goofing off and off to the point where it gets annoying. But in that way I see this series as more something for the future: this is the product of an emerging industry that’s still trying to find itself next to its gigantic cousin. This is valuable experience into the right direction. With the right people, who knows what they’ll make next?

Demi-chan wa Kataritai

Yes! When it comes to “cute girls doing cute stuff”-series, this definitely was the way to do it right. I genuinely enjoyed this episode, rather than trying to find silver linings here and there like what I usually do. The key here is that for once, I felt like I was watching characters with actual life breathed into them. The entire series is set up with the basis of wanting to get to know each other more, which is such an important detail which often is just delegated to one of the side-issues even though it literally makes or breaks characters. It’s a bit like a character study in that way. I mean normally I’d cringe about a show that has half-monster-half-girls, but here they created a whole believable setting around it: they’re all just living alongside regular people, and you run into them once in a while. They receive their own government benefits, and apart from that they’re just regular people with a few quirks here and there. This show has a ton of post-discrimination themes which also were very interesting to watch, and yet it remains fun and light-hearted. The characters really play well off each other, great chemistry. My only complaint so far is the complaint I seem to have for most things nowadays: did you have to make it sexual? But yeah, here it actually does fit in a coming-of-age theme. It’s not the annoying kind of fanservice thankfully, but did you have to make one of the teachers a succubus? Out of all the legendary creatures and monsters you could have picked…

Chain Chronicle – Haecceitas no Hikari

Ah, I remember the good old days of game adaptations. They were either incredibly good, with interesting premises, twists and a lot of creative freedoms, or incredibly bad, the kind that gets so bad that it’s hilarious. This is more than 10 years ago at this point. After a while though, things just started to get generic, rather than anything else. The golden age is unfortunately over. Here comes Chain Chronicle, and with this series I’m seeing a new development: they take the generic format, but try to do the best they can with it. The result is a generic storyline (remember, one of the difficult things of animating a game is that it’s impossible to take the quicksave feature along with you!), but with well acted characters, it really tries its best to seem epic, and not skimp on any of the characters of the huge cast. It actually kills off characters with character-designs, and it also spends a bit of time on what the war means to the regular peasants just living their lives. It doesn’t take any risks but it just wants to tell its story. While I’m not happy with how save it is, it is a step into the right direction. It will stand as a foundation for the series of the future, who can build further upon the execution of this series, but actually do something interesting with it!

Idol Jihen

Idol Jihen is the product of oversaturation. It happens when there’s just too many people wanting to do the same thing. The obvious ways to do it have been done, the parodies and subversions are also out of everyone’s system, every single normal angle has been already explored, so what now? That’s the point where you get to the stupid stuff, and that’s why this joke of a series got made. In an attempt to one-up the stupid idol shows that already exist, it brought idols to a place they totally do not belong and we now have idols in parliament. This first episode still had the chance to turn this into a parody, but it played things completely straight, so that’s also off the table. If you want idols to pwn politicians you also need to be more over the top. Because there has already been a series in which idols fight aliens with music, it’s just not special anymore, it’s just another day in the life of an idol. Also, dear translators: “Idol Dietwomen”?! Couldn’t you really come up with something catchier? Idoliticians! There, it’s not that hard!

Nyanko Days

Crazy Cat Lady: The Anime! Really, this is just silly. The episodes are just two minutes long so even for a short episode series this was nothing. But really, I’m glad. Unlike the onslaught of series that we were bombarded with during the past Autumn season, this one actually isn’t bad. It’s just a girl and her cats who in her mind are like chibi cat blob imaginary friends. It’s nothing more than that, but for what it is, it’s cute. This would have been a welcome change back then!

elDLIVE

And another series that I would not have given a chance if I didn’t give every series a chance. This show looks terrible on paper: it’s the same old show of a normal kid with hidden superpowers meeting up with some sort of organization, this time with aliens, and the kid himself is of the wimpy variant. Pointless fanservice here, annoying characters there. I really thought that I would find this mediocre at best, and yet I really enjoyed this episode. The build up was a bit long, but things came together surprisingly well at the end, and I think the reason for that is the supporting cast: this series has a really big collection of colourful characters to work with, and they do their job of “support” incredibly well. They really bring home the message of “aliens are fun!”, even though they sometimes make some weird leaps in logic, do things that don’t make any sense, not to mention that the whole back-story behind this series is pretty stupid. But I guess I found that okay because of what an enjoyable bunch they are. The main character is also not that bad. I guess he’s one for the schizophrenics out there, sort of. At the end of the episode he did demonstrate that he can think on his own, despite being a kid. The question of course is if the creators can keep this up. I can see this very easily fizz out after such an episode, so the creators have the challenge of keeping this show fresh. Show us the wonders of the world you have in mind!

Little Witch Academia

Aaah, so they managed to make a TV-series out of this. This is an excellent way to get the more artsy series off the ground, Kyousogiga did the same: first make a bunch of pilots, then a bit more, until you have enough to actually get your full length off the ground. It’s a great way to ensure creative freedom, because after all, if it’s not enough like the original pilot, then people will be disappointed and the execs are smart enough that that’s not the best idea. As a note: I have not seen any of the previous versions of Little Witch Academia, so I do not know how redundant this episode was. I also have yet to finish any series produced by Trigger. I mean, I definitely see the potential in them, but I still haven’t found a series of theirs to actually “grab” me. Little Witch Academia could be the one. With its grounds in the Young Animator Training Project, it is a really good marriage between the old and the new. The old generation has made sure that this was a solid production, with solid direction, and a ton of tricks to make it more engaging: this show for example really knows how to use scarcity. Everything is a challenge in this series, and the characters are portrayed in such a way that you feel the struggles along with them. The new can be seen in all of its ideas and energy. This really feels like a passion project that everyone involved wants to make work. Plus, you can really see that these people grew up with Harry Potter. This episode featured tons of small details that paid homage to it. Of course it’s not like this is a bad fanfic of course, it really has its own story to tell that has nothing to do with its British cousin, and that’s how a homage should be done: little hints here and there, without ripping off.

Gabriel DropOut

One thing I haven’t seen in these first episodes yet is character development. Granted, it is hard to pull this off within just the first 20 minutes of your series, but it has been done before. Enter Gabriel DropOut, who actually does it by having its main character pull a complete 180 in terms of her personality. Normally I’d congratulate a series for that, but unfortunately that is about the only positive thing I can say about this series. The rest… is bland. It’s another installment of the “cute girls doing cute stuff”-genre, and this is about middle school hi-jinks of a bunch of angels and devils who have to live in the human world, with the twist that the angels are horrible people and the devils are actually quite innocent. Yeah, it’s another series that turned a half-minute joke into an entire series, and this episode didn’t really do anything interesting with it. It mostly was just predictable set-ups for jokes that ultimately just weren’t funny. It never really got really bad. Just one big meh.

Shiruran – Nibun no Ichi

Shiruran: 2 minutes of Shinsengumi chibis trying desperately to look cool! Yeah, it’s not good. This series makes the mistake of thinking that making characters yell and overact is enough to make it “funny” and “quirky”. Characters get mad for no reason, characters behave like assholes for no reason. I know you only have 2 minutes but that is no reason to forego basic storytelling rules dammit!

ACCA – 13-ku Kansatsu-ka

This series definitely has the best OP and ED of the season so far. Inspired, artistic, fun to watch. That also is an insult to the rest of the shows this so far though, because until now every other OP and ED has been bloody generic. And really, this show in general is exactly what I’ve been waiting for. Regardless of whether this series is going to be any good or not, this is the type of anime that we need more of: it creates its own world, setting and themes, makes a point of going into its own direction rather than what is popular at the moment, and it does so with a cast of varied and colourful characters. Future creators: use the philosophy behind this series and build further upon it! SCREW THE GENERIC! *ahem* About this episode, do not expect anything amazing or exciting here. What you can expect though, is very good build-up. This episode did a fine job of alluding that something big is going to happen, while at the same time introducing the world, its rules, the position of the main character, why he’s important, what he’s like, the people he has to work with – both his subordinates and his superiors. This was building the foundations. I enjoyed it a lot, it’s interesting and mysterious, and the creators also avoided an entire episode of introduction by still having some things happen. Plus, at a certain point it was just fun watching the characters play off each other, or just themselves, or the heaps of food that they manage to wolf down in these 20 minutes. Seriously the amount of consumables in this show is astounding!

Hand Shakers

Oooh, GoHands is trying something new again! More please! Again, even if the story of this series turns out to be absolute bollocks, this is the type of series we need more of. Here we actually see creators taking a risk! Compared to all of the generic moe or bishie shows about nothing we have each season, I’d much, much rather have many series like this. They may not always work. They may crash and burn spectacularly, but this kind of ambition is what anime is made for, instead of the way too safe crap that has flooded the market for many years now. I’m not denying that Hand Shakers won’t turn out to be a bit of a bummer in the end because honestly, storytelling has always been one of GoHands’ troubled areas, but I actually liked this episode a lot so far. I mean for starters the animation was incredible. There was so much movement everywhere! And while the use of CG is obvious, they did it in a way I have never seen before, and they also did it in a way where it gets hard to actually pinpoint which parts are done in CG and which are traditionally animated. The music also is the best soundtrack of the season so far, which makes this a real orgasm for the senses. The story is a standard “boy meets girl”-story, but I like it so far. It’s got a main theme of hand holding, which is actually really cute when just about every other series seems to think that the only way to flirt with a girl is to stare at her underpants and grab her by the boob. It also uses this vague type of storytelling, where a lot of stuff is just implied, we’re just expected to assume some convenient plot devices and a lot of time is spent on showing, instead of telling. But yeah, Gohands… have you found enough actually decent writers in the meantime? Let’s avoid people stupid enough to mistake a fighter jet for a crow, mmmkay?

Kemono Friends

Look, I am a completionist. I really try to give every series the benefit of at least one episode, and with every show I at least try to complete their first episode. Even the bad ones, and the really bad ones. Even that show with that annoying fox girl, I finished its episode in its entirety. Kemono Friends though, is the one that broke me. Right from the start, every fiber in my being started screaming to turn it off. There would be no way I would manage a full 20 minutes of this thing, everything just rubbed me the wrong way. It’s another “cute girls doing cute things”-series, but to make matters worse EVERYTHING is in this horribly awkward CG thing and trying to watch the characters emote is actually exhausting. They all move so incredibly awkward and jilted, and the voice acting is absolutely horrid! The worst of the season. The main actress just keeps yelling and yelling, even when she’s supposed to be mellow. Combine that with how everyone in CG has these really awkward botox faces… make it stop! Turn it off! No more pain!

Kobayashi-san Chi no Maid Dragon

After retiring and being tired of being summoned all the time to wish people back to life, the dragon from Dragonball Z found himself a new calling in life: being the maid of an office worker in Tokyo! Oh Japan…. Also props to the OP. Finally we’re getting some creativity again in that area. Kobayashi’s maid dragon is a sitcom where the gimmick is dragons that transform into dim-witted people, like pets really, and all of the antics that come with it. As a comedy, it did its job here: it made me laugh quite a bit, and I’d at least recommend the first episode for people looking for a quick laugh. However at the same time, this is a pattern I’ve seen many times before: after a while all the dragon jokes got a bit one-sided: there’s only so much death and destruction after things get boring, and they still need to fill eleven or twelve episodes with this. Good comedies fill this with a wide variety of characters, good and engaging main characters, a bit of variety, but that was all just too basic here. Even though the next episodes will introduce new characters, I can already predict that episode 1 will be the best episode of the series, or at least one of the best, surrounded by a lot of duds. All the signs are there, unfortunately.

One Room

This is just a fucking dating sim! How thinly veiled can you be!? Heck, it’s even worse because in a dating sim you have to press space every once in a while to get to the next dialogue, even that is done for you in this way. What do you hope to achieve with girls that act as wooden as they do here? I mean at least dating sims are excused because they don’t have the budget to really animate everything, so they have to get by with just a few pictures and dialogue. What the heck are you doing emulating that style?! Also, I’m not sure whether the camera is supposed to be the guy she’s talking to, because it keeps shifting positions. One moment we are looking into the girl’s eyes as if she’s talking to a mime, but the next show we’re focusing directly at her butt. At the very least pick one option!

Piace – Watashi no Italian

Another mini-series and – gasp! It’s not bad! The ratio of bad shows thankfully is much lower than last season with its onslaught of terrible short episode series. And it’s not like this is really good or something, but it’s enjoyable enough not to get on my nerves. It’s a cute story about a girl who starts to work at an Italian restaurant, and while she is an airhead the rest of the cast is actually strong enough to make it work. They play well off each other, and what also helps is that the creators actually read a bit into Italian cooking. If you want quick slice of life then this is actually a pretty decent choice.

ChaoS;Child

I was never one of the people who hated the Chaos;Head anime. For what it was, it had its moments. I liked how it actually portrayed a NEET as a mentally unstable shut-in, compared to how they usually get glorified (ever since NHK ni Youkoso finished this topic kept returning every now and then) It wasn’t great or anything, but I enjoyed it and I don’t regret watching it, I had many more problems with Robotics;Notes and Occult;Nine. Nevertheless, Chaos;Child doesn’t make a very good case for it by starting with a very bad recap of the entire series before it goes on with its own story, but when it gets going it has its moments. It’s trying to be less edgy and more edgy at the same time, it seems. The container seems to have made ways fr just another high school club, but on the other hand it really tries to kill people in creative ways here. And by god did a lot of people die in these 50 minutes. I suspect that part of the target audience was people who just laugh at horror movies, because while I do laud creativity, some of these murders were just completely ridiculous in how they were carried out, like they got a 14-year-old to describe them or something. Also while usual horror series build up for the gore scenes, especially in its first episode, there was nothing of the sort here. It jumped right into the gore and death without really seeming to care about its atmosphere. It’s an interesting approach, and at this moment I cannot say yet whether it’s going to work or not. There are no big red flags yet, so that’s good, although I will say that the acting in this series isn’t that good. Character animation is a bit awkward and cheap, and isn’t really that good at emoting. But hey, Chaos;Head was the same so points for consistency I guess.

Marginal#4 – Kiss kara Tsukuru Big Bang

Giving Marginal 4 a fair chance was really difficult due to the utterly abysmal CG performance scene with terrible singing and dancing, but I survived. But even if that scene would not have been there, I don’t think I would have been impressed by this show, because it really is scraping the bottom of the barrel here. On top of being yet another idol show, halfway through the episode it took a break from the idol stuff to focus on high school hijinks. The only thing that set this apart is that the four characters were slightly more ditzy and feminine than what you usually get with these kinds of series. It’s pure fanservice. I’m also surprised that the award for most annoying dialogue of the season doesn’t go to a “cute girls doing cute stuff”-series, but instead to this “cute boys doing cute stuff”-thing. Seriously especially that red-haired kid just would not stop yapping! Next!

Kuzu no Honkai

“Okay, Noitamina! The final new show this season! Hit me with your best shot! Make it count! No, don’t start at a high school, you’re not the timeslot for that! Oh, okay, this does seem more solid than usual. Oh. What? WHAT?! WHAT!?! No! The abysmal incest trend has finally died, don’t you dare and bring it back, Noitamina!” – Like seriously, even if you wanted to take a serious look at incest, we have Koi Kaze for that. The only other reason I can think of that would warrant that is that while Koi Kaze was told from the male perspective, Kuzu no Honkai is from the female perspective. Okay, fair enough; fine in theory. But there is one very important detail it misses here: realistically incest can only happen if brother and sister didn’t grow up together, otherwise healthy brother and sister relationships develop the Westermark Effect, in order to prevent inbreeding and stuff. Koi Kaze makes it a point that both grew up in totally different circumstances. Kuzu no Honkai’s characters had a perfectly normal childhood. And I’m not saying that in extremely rare circumstances it couldn’t happen, but that takes me back to that incredibly annoying period in anime where it was more likely for a brother and sister to have the hots for each other than not. Any kind of shock value you want to have with this kind of twist is completely lost at this point if you want to do it this way. And this is a real shame, because aside from that little detail, this is an incredibly honest series about romance. And I really mean exceptionally honest. I know very few other shows that are this willing to get down and dirty, to deal with all the terrible feelings that come with unrequited love. Obviously all taboos are in, even the subtle ones (I mean, when was the last time anime portrayed main characters in an actual relationship that was actually realistic? I can name Fune wo Amu, but apart from that? And Fune wo Amu’s was like the complete opposite of the relationship in this series). So why the incest? This show could have worked just as well if they weren’t related dammit!

So, that’s the season. A little tl;dr summary:
Maybe: Masamune-kun no Revenge, Youjo Senki, Spirit Pact, Ao no Exorcist, Hand Shakers, Chaos;Child, Kuzu no Honkai, Piace, elDLIVE.
Good: Demi-chan wa Kataritai, Little Witch Academia, ACCA
Great: Uhmm… Classicaloid from last season? I may want to go and marathon that Shouwa series’ first season quite quickly…

3-gatsu no Lion – 13 [Black River (part 2) – Beyond the Door]

January 17, 2017 by SuperMario, posted in 3-gatsu no Lion, Currently Watching:

This week we have 2 disjoined chapters, which are different in tones and more importantly in their point of view. We go through the first section from Smith-san perspective detailing his own thoughts towards the match against Gotou, and the latter part Rei took the stage, being on his way to challenge Gotou in next match, except things weren’t go according to plan either. If there is any mutual theme out of these two chapters, it’s this: know your own place in the shogi world.

3-gatsu no Lion sure has a very slow pace, and it’s most apparent here in the first 6 minutes when all the actions can be displayed in one brief sequence in other anime, but the show goes on and on, both in a good and bad ways. Look, for a show that relies heavily on building up and tender atmosphere, it makes sense that some scenes they need to drag out a bit longer to provide the mood; but truthfully, I don’t get the recap here. We don’t need that, tell me something else instead. The latter part, in contrast, followed Smith-san having breakfast (eating fresh, whole tomato!) played like a gif animation with its jerky movement and upbeat music and I’m digging it very much. If you decide to go off the track, then make it with styles. Thank you Shaft.

But to be honest, spending an entire chapter focused on Smith-san feel like a filler, side story because at the end of the day it doesn’t add up much to the mother narrative. Smith-san has never been anything other than Rei’s shogi-mate before so it’s hard to relate to him more than that. Telling the story in his point of view, however, still has its purpose because one-part of 3-gatsu is still stories about the life of shogi profession players anyways, and Smith-san’s perspective provides a more mature look at shogi than Rei’s, as he’s now in the middle of his career path. It’s true that when one becomes a professional, the only thing he knows best is his own ability comparing to others. This isn’t simply the lack of confident, but more in terms of actual level, the actual talent that separate those great players and the rest. Here in this chapter, Smith-san went all he got despite knowing full well that gap; but in the end what he found really was that he still has a long way to reach to the top, to perfect his style. It’s fine though, since not only he found these things, but a black tray cat in need of aid as well. Kudos for the show’s consistency of providing the world full of cats. Hungry cats, stray cats, owl cat, warrior cats, you name it.

It’s Rei, on the other hand, who needs to learn a hard lesson about knowing his own place in this shogi world. As his mind was occupied by the provocation of Gotou, he steps into the match against Shimada the 8^th dan with his head in the cloud. The show smartly conveys that sense of thoughts as we see Shimada as a shadow, unimportant figure until Rei pays full attention to him. I love the smart storytelling that later fleshing out Shimada in his best possible way in just few details, both underlines how he truly cares about the kid Harunobu (“I want you to split Rei’s head in half”. What a great friend Harunobu is), and how good he’s actually is in shogi (well, he’s in 8^th dan for a reason); leading Rei all the way to his destruction without him realizing it. Rei does need something like that (I don’t mean that splitting head in half metaphor. Too graphic! I’ll go with slapping in the face) for him to know that he isn’t that talented to underestimate other players and there is a long way for him as well to be ready for that fateful match. This is a minor 3-gatsu episode, but even so there’s still plenty good moments to recommend.

Saga of Tanya the Evil – 02[Prologue]

January 17, 2017 by AidanAK47, posted in Currently Watching:, Saga of Tanya the Evil

As I initially thought, this series becomes a whole lot better when you can see the disparity between the main protagonists thoughts and how those around her view them. The first episode jumped ahead in the story to where Tanya had established herself somewhat and I believe the intent was to mislead the audience with her character. This episode takes it back to the beginning and truthfully would have made for a much more engaging start to the series. We see now that Tanya was a Japanese salaryman who managed to annoy god enough for him to throw out some cruel and unusual punishment. The animation studio seem to have taken liberties with the meeting god scene as both the manga and light novel frame it in more comedic light. There god is represented by his standard look of an old man with a bread in a white gown.

God in that seems more exasperated and annoyed with the salaryman’s outright dismissal of him. Admittedly there is some value in that version but I find the version in the anime to be far more compelling and interesting. There time stops and the god that questions the salaryman feels more mysterious and authoritarian. It even doesn’t outright admit itself to being god and in some ways makes it seem like he was purposefully pushing the protagonist to give him a reason to punish him or prove his own theory on why people no longer need faith. It’s one hell of a way to start a series which makes it all the more questionable as to why they didn’t just go with this instead of the actual first episode.

Not that the last episode was bad at all. But I think this series really benefits from the dry tone of Tanya’s inner voice when contrasted with her psychotic tendencies. It goes to show that the truly evil do not think of themselves as evil. In Tanya’s case she’s just doing what she can to get a cosy desk job in order to spite god. A smile just comes to my face seeing her lying in the hospital bed putting up a front with everyone who’s impressed with her while in her mind she’s saying “Oh crap, I impressed them too much.” For Studio Nut’s first work this is a remarkably well animated show so far which could put them on the map.

Though reason for this may be due to the staff being made up of former Gainax/Madhouse employees, though that does need confirmation. At least that’s what I heard. The female character designs take some getting used too though I have grown accustomed to Tanya and her delightful crazy smiles. Her subordinate on the other hand I don’t think I will ever get used to. The soundtrack isn’t quite to my tastes either but it is suitable for the show. If it can manage to keep things interesting this could well be another great show in what looking to be a strong season.