Star Crossed Anime

Oshi No Ko

Short Synopsis: Doctor meets his favorite idol who is secretly pregnant, then gets killed, and is reborn as her kid like that day.

Amun: I, uh, yeah, this ain’t for me. One of my absolute non-starters for the “reincarnation” (I guess this isn’t technically an isekai?) is the restart from a baby and all the infant activities done with an adult mind. It’s a bit messed up (there’s a reason your memories wipe around 3). Getting to this behemoth of an episode, the animation is fine and the characters sure do sparkle. Unfortunately, the idol genre is a dish I very rarely enjoy, so it has to be something truly special to keep me interested (pretty much just “Zombie Land Saga”). Full disclosure: I only watched about 25 minutes to where there was some children feeding, but that’s about the length of a single episode, which is all I’m really willing to give this show. I just wonder what the target demographic here is: you need to enjoy reborn shows, but also shows about idols, but also shows about little kids. Seems a fairly small intersection – I guess “Spy x Family” for idol fans? Just a very strange premise. You get the stalker otaku, some murder, some intrigue, bunch of scummy entertainment people, whatever. “Oshi No Ko” just didn’t leave a good taste in my mouth, so I’m sure not coming back for seconds (or even finishing this first gigantic plate).

P.S. I’m no conspiracy theorist, but has anyone else noticed a bunch of anime getting greenlit that involve child-rearing and how great it is? I can only think of “Beelzebub” from back in the day – there couldn’t possibly be an agenda to try and help out the herbivore Japanese population, could there?
Potential: 0%

Mario: Now, this is unusual. Oshi no Ko’s first episode turned out to be a feature length affair, and after going through it, I don’t think it deserves its long, long runtime. Well, the exact phrase should be: it doesn’t deserve 80 minutes of my time since I would normally drop it after 20 minutes. The episode takes a critical look at the idol industry. It’s clearly established how our idol girl/mom Ai is “made of lies.” It also goes to great lengths to hit the point home that the idol industry is an unforgiving place where talent alone isn’t enough. Those are critical observations, sure, but the issue I have with the episode is that it’s also a wish-fulfillment fantasy about a fully-grown adult reincarnated as that idol’s son. That is why he gets a free pass to act in a film, and there are many other instances where I feel like I’m watching a scene from Boss Baby. The writing is blatant at times. There’s a scene where our main guy, still in his adult body, is confronted by an obsessive fan of Ai’s, and his very first reaction was to admit that she’s staying at the hospital where he works. I also don’t get why the show keeps his twin sister’s real identity a secret from him. They are together like… all the time. This review is running long so I’ll cut it short here – despite spending time with these characters the longest, I have very little interest to find out more about any of them or the true killer’s identity.
Potential: Not deserving of its length

A Galaxy Next Door

Short Synopsis: A desperate mangaka hires a proficient assistant who turns out to be a princess.

Wooper: You know how the old saying “write what you know” has resulted in a lot of novels about English professors contemplating adultery? Well, A Galaxy Next Door is cut from a similar cloth, only it took the adage less literally – it’s about an (unmarried) manga artist named Ichiro falling in love with his female assistant Shiori, but she’s also a princess, and also not human, and also her tail acts as a portal to another realm. The show gives her a convincingly human appearance in order to save all these reveals until the last few minutes, and in my opinion they constitute the only interesting part of the episode. Much of the rest of its runtime involved Ichiro fretting over the deadline for his next chapter, talking to his boring family, and passing pages to Shiori or telling her she’s allowed to take a break (she naturally refuses all such offers, this being a Japanese production). I know it’s hard to make a meticulous process like drawing manga seem entertaining, but Galaxy Next Door takes such a grounded approach that it doesn’t even attempt to tackle that issue. The show looks remarkably plain, as well – every single interior shot made me doubt Ichiro’s compositional skills, given the drab state of his building (did I mention he’s also a landlord?), and the character designs are some of the dullest of the season. It’s a shame that one of the few adult romances we’ve received in recent years had to end up this way, but at least last season’s Koori Zokusei Danshi fared a bit better on the production front.
Potential: 10%

Amun: By the way, in case anyone else got confused, this is NOT the anime about the kids with insomnia and the observatory. I also did not realize this was a reverse-isekai either. This premise is weird – but I do appreciate how wonderful it is to find a competent assistant. I also liked how straightforward the characters are here….and then things got a little bit weird. Overall, the visual quality does feel a bit low, but I didn’t hate the characters or the settings. Just kind of a very complicated setup off the bat – there could have been some slow playing all the various parts (landlord manga artist has to raise his two little kids and gets an assistant who is a star princess with a spiky tail who is a fan of his….hey, at least they didn’t use that as the title of the show). I might watch a few more, but since the little kids look like the primary supporting cast (and the inevitable other neighbors in the building), this doesn’t look like it’ll hold my interest for an entire season.
Potential: 40%

Ousama Ranking:
The Treasure Chest of Courage

Short Synopsis: Bojji and Kage get up to all kinds of hijinks…set in the middle of the first season?

Mario: This season is a batch of side-stories from Ousama Ranking, which also means that it’s more of Ousama Ranking without an actual arc. If you are already a fan of these characters (I am), or want to see more worldbuilding (I do), then this season should be a treat!! Well, that’s only partly right. If this first episode is any indication, it will tell heart-warming tales about our Bojji and Kage that should please the audience, but at the same time, it already feels repetitive. That feeling is not from the set-up (which is different enough), but more from its educational message. “Being kind” and compassionate is obviously a theme here, and it’s an important attribute for Bojji to be a great King in the future. I adore Ousama’s Ranking world and characters for sure, but I hope the season provides enough reasons for me to care beyond that.
Potential: 40%

Amun: The rarest of sequels – the mid-quel! I can only think of “Steins;Gate” as an example of this off the top of my head, although there are tons of spinoffs that tell the same story with different characters. And it was good! (well, the OP song was very not good, but the video was fine). This looks to be basically all the filler episodes that weren’t present in the first season – that’s fine with me, since we already know the larger plot. I don’t actually mind that, since it doesn’t interfere with the larger stories and can be all fun no stakes – “Reincarnated As a Slime” did that recently, and I thought it was great. Animation remains top notch, characters are still good, and we won’t have any of the weird Miranjo stuff to deal with (I hope). This may not win any awards, but I’ll watch this.
Potential: 75%

Why Raeliana Ended Up at the Duke’s Mansion

Short Synopsis: A girl dies and is conveniently reincarnated into the world of a novel she’s already read.

Mario: This series is yet another isekai where the isekai-ing itself doesn’t make much sense. Yes, Raeliana retains her knowledge from her past life to change her fate – in a concept similar to Hamefura, only 100% more serious, but the show glosses over the whole concept by her narrating: “… and I was reborn as a character in a novel.” It might sound like a good idea on paper to speed up the established tropes to get to the main points, but right at the start I wasn’t totally convinced on what the show tries to sell me. Raeliana, on the other hand, is an interesting female lead to follow. As she already knows how she would die, she tries her best, to the point of manipulation, to escape that route. That leads to somewhat intriguing conflict, but at the cost of other characters. It is amusing to see how the plot goes from there, now that she narrowly escapes her fated death but might get herself tangled up in a bigger scheme. But at the same time, the other characters are painfully plain at the moment given the fact that Raeliana already “knows” about their personalities, their past and their motives. How it balances that out will determine the success of the show, but for those of you who are already under Raeliana’s spell, there’s a lot to look forward to.
Potential: 30%

Wooper: Sometimes the best way to explain that a TV show is poorly written is to provide a scene by scene summary of a single episode, since every aspect of its script is a misstep of some kind. That’s the approach I want to take with this series, but then I’d end up writing a novel – though on the plus side, I’m sure it would be more entertaining than the novel within which Raeliana now lives. Suffice to say, this series is drowning in expository narration, with multiple scenes grinding to a halt so the title character can explain the political situation of her country, or some piece of court intrigue about which a competent author would write an actual story, rather than inserting a “the story so far” segment into their very first episode. For most anime fans this axe-blunt style isn’t a dealbreaker – I’m just an old crank, so if you enjoyed this premiere, please pay me no mind. I do want to draw your attention to one particularly humorous moment, though, where Raeliana mentally protests her fiance’s clinginess by thinking, “I even read a book for this!” Here she’s referring to “How to Break Up with Your Boyfriend,” a tome whose wisdom fails to produce a clean end to her engagement, leaving her hitched to a man she hates – and the worst part of the whole situation is that she had to read a boring old book, with words and everything. Oh, the humanity!
Potential: Not for me

Dead Mount Death Play

Short Synopsis: After being defeated in his own world, a necromancer known as the Corpse God flees to Earth and takes the form of a young boy.

Lenlo: I will admit, I am a bit curious about Dead Mount Death Play. I thought it was just going to be a standard isekai at first, and in parts it still is. An OP MC transported to another world. But the two things that make it stand out to me are that it’s the villain and that it’s bringing them to our world. Now both of these have been done before, neither are new. But they are both something I tend to enjoy at least a little bit. Combine that with a respectable production, nothing super impressive but definitely better then most of the shlock I’ve had to watch for these impressions. I’ve no idea if Dead Mount will actually end up being interesting, or if it will be edgy shlock, I can see it going either way. And while I would lean towards it just being edgy, as that’s the easiest thing for it to do, I’m going to give it another episode or two and see where it can go.
Potential: 20%

Wooper: You know an anime is in a dire spot when you can only think to praise it for avoiding the absolute worst tendencies of its genre. Backhanded compliments like, “At least this episode isn’t shitting itself with menu screens,” and, “The protagonist might not have a harem for once,” went through my mind as I watched Dead Mount Death Play. I certainly can’t dish out any unqualified praise for this episode, since its action sequences bit off way more than they could chew, and its dubstep/metal soundtrack was surely the result of an aging producer’s midlife crisis. The overreliance on digital effects, such as those used for spellcasting circles and scribbly-looking spirits, couldn’t stop this premiere from looking (and feeling) interminably gray. If this anime were a person, it would have multiple swords mounted on the walls of its living room, wear a cape to the grocery store, and use the word “epic” in conversation at least thirty times per day. The fact that this is one of the better isekai of the season and I still hate it makes me hope that it’s also one of the last ones I ever have to watch. I know that’s a highly biased thing to say, but I’m beyond caring about objectivity at this point.
Potential: 0%

THE MARGINAL SERVICE

Short Synopsis: People dressed as construction workers take down bad NOT “aliens”.

Wooper: The Marginal Service’s appeal lies in just how seriously it takes its dumbass premise, despite cribbing nearly every part of it from American police movies. It starts by ripping off a string of “rebel cop” tropes and applying them to its protagonist, Brian Nightraider (yes, you read that name correctly). He stumbles onto a case that’s way above his pay grade, gets fired for his loose cannon tendencies, refuses to turn in his gun, drinks straight from a bottle of liquor at his former partner’s graveside – the whole nine yards. Then he’s recruited by a secret government organization, where he switches roles and becomes the upstart rookie, partnered with a no-nonsense veteran who clearly resents his new position. Then we go full Men in Black and kill an alien with specialized weapons while keeping the general public in the dark – though in one of the series’ rare differences from its “inspirations,” the Marginal Service agents wear construction uniforms rather than suits (a clear upgrade, if you ask me). All this shameless retreading of decades-old plot beats coaxed a couple smiles from me, but then came the character intro cards at the end, including one for “Peck Desmont,” an angry-looking squirrel who appeared nowhere else in the episode. This caused me to laugh way harder than I had at any moment from the 16 other shows I previewed this season – that’s got to count for something, right?
Potential: 20% for my boy Peck Desmont

Amun: You know, I was willing to give some benefit of the doubt here to this rogue-cop-recruited-by-secret-government-agency show until the construction power rangers showed up. Like, what?! Everything else was pretty by the numbers (except the partner’s death, honestly – that surprised me) and then….might morphin construction time (I guess without the giant robot). I’m honestly kind of stuck on how weird the costumes are, but looking at the other merits of the episode….meh. This lacks the conflict between worlds that made a similar show “Cop Craft” at least interesting. “Marginal Service” instead opts to assemble a misfit ensemble of…anime foreigner stereotypes? To fight “borderlanders” (well, aliens). Huh. UH HUH. I guess the white devil is out of vogue, so we’ve got the black muscle man and the British playboy plus a token slut (those are the actual characters here, don’t judge me). I just sense a bit of message telegraphing with some mediocre plot and production randomly sprinkled with wack construction outfits that make no sense. This is a N-O-P-E from me.
Potential: No thanks.

Ao no Orchestra

Short Synopsis: A former violinist is conscripted by his gym teacher to teach a schoolmate how to play.

Mario: Adding to the long list of Blue-themed titles (on that note, which one is your favorite? Mine would be “Sweet Blue Flowers”), Blue Orchestra’s first episode, despite walking a familiar path, is a solid episode all around. What this episode did right was providing a main lead worth caring for. Anime is no stranger to portray listless bored male leads, but here he never comes off as boring. Hajime is occupied with his own thoughts throughout the episode, but it provides quite well his internal conflict between his love for violin, the hatred for it because it associates with his Dad. Even when he sees the practice room, he cannot shake his memories of his Dad. The show looks pretty decent, thankfully, but it’s appropriately the sound that makes an impact here. The violin sound from an unknown girl ticks him off and he lashes out at her, the only one time in this episode where he clearly shows his emotions. The ending is where it gets a bit too conventional but the premise where he can play again (this time in an orchestra) is compelling enough for me to follow more.
Potential: 60%

Wooper: I talked down this series’ prospects in the season preview post, but Ao no Orchestra’s premiere wasn’t too bad. It opened with an impressive musical sequence as Aono (first name Hajime) recalled a time when he still enjoyed playing the violin, and slowly provided hints as to what killed his motivation as it progressed. The trouble is, when I say “slowly” provided hints, I really mean it – the pace of this episode was ponderous, with around half the script being given over to Aono’s internal monologue. Director Seiji Kishi seems to have made a lot of good calls in shaping this series, as he punctures the gloomy atmosphere with humorous outbursts from time to time, and the leisurely speed of the story is necessary so as not to overwhelm the middling animation staff. But the tone is still highly dramatic, and I don’t know that Aono can carry such a heavy version of the show with just an Asuka clone and an adult sidekick for support. (I know more characters will be introduced soon, but the guy’s name is a pun on the series’ title, so it’s clear he’ll be the focal point.) Layouts like these also feel uncomfortably vacant, meaning the show has to fight an uphill battle on the visual front. I do want to stress that Ao no Orchestra is better than I expected, though – you may enjoy it more than I did.
Potential: 30%

Summoned to Another World for a Second Time

Short Synopsis: Isekai 2: Electric Boogaloo in Another World (Again).

Lenlo: I’m tired of impressions by this point, so let me just be upfront: This is taking the idea of someone being isekai’d, bringing their whole class with them, and turning them into the most popular and powerful person around. Except this time instead of just having one harem of anime women, now they have two to pull from! I’ll be honest, if this was trying to riff on the idea of Isekai akin to Isekai Ojisan, I might be able to have some fun with it. But I sort of just tuned out the moment the lead slapped a strong female character on the ass and turned her into a domesticated seat. Yeah, no thanks.
Potential: -100%

Amun: Ah you know, what’s a little masochism among old party-mates? Okay, in all fairness, that was a pretty strange (and a bit off-color) twist. However, I didn’t completely hate the rest of the premise – it feels like the isekai genre is trying to evolve, and these various mutations are the means to do it. Summoned a second time? That’s at least something slightly original, so props for that. Now, the implementation from the mediocre animation to the use of a hero as a chair leaves something to be desired, but I think there’s at least a glimmer of hope for an enjoyable show here (the use of magic for the promised haircut was a nice touch too). Now, mind you, it’s only a glimmer – more than likely this devolves into a power fantasy harem, but let me hope here. At least one isekai will exceed expectations this season, right?!
Potential: 15%

Kuma Kuma Kuma Bear 2

Short Synopsis: Wearing bear related attire gives an adventurer super powers, and there are lots of cute girls.

Amun: This show is a bit of a meme, but it’s a cute meme. Yes, it’s just cute girls doing cute things in a world seemingly devoid of men, but come on – who doesn’t love bear pancakes? There really isn’t too much to think about here, but it is interesting to see our loveable adventure bear getting pulled more into the world’s politics. Also, who knew that a bear’s weakness was fighting other bears? That’ll be interesting to see if Yuna ever has to face off against her own kind – fortunately, that wasn’t this episode. If you didn’t watch the first season, this probably isn’t for you, but if you don’t mind some nauseating cuteness and the bear motifs everywhere – Kuma Kuma Kuma Bear 2 is your ticket. I’ll be watching it, but I will certainly forgive anyone who doesn’t want to come along for the ride.
Potential: 60%

Insomniacs after school

Short Synopsis: Two sleepless kids meet at their school’s astronomy observatory.

Lenlo: Insomniacs… Wasn’t bad. Maybe it’s because insomnia is a bitch, and I myself find it difficult to sleep at night. I can connect with that. Two people bonding over it in their little clubhouse for day-time naps is kind of cute. And the show looks fine! The character designs remind me of I Am A Hero, a manga I’ve long enjoyed. Just enough realism to their proportions and structure to feel nice without being prohibitively hard to animate. For all intents and purposes, Insomniacs seems like a solid enough highschool romance. The real question is just if that’s enough. Will it be able to remain interesting during its run, will it hold my interest? Or will I check out by episode 3 because it’s just another highschool rom-dram? Only time will tell, but it’s enough to make me give it a shot. I have a bit of hope though, because the second half as they wandered around during the night was much better than the first half.
Potential: 40%

Mario: It’s interesting to see the differences in approach between this show and last year’s “Call of the Night”. While the vampire show provokes such a distinct feeling of roaming the street at night, “Insomniacs” doesn’t go to night time until the last 5 minutes. Its focus is entirely different, about two sharing the same secrets, that of they both can’t sleep at night, and that they find a place completely their own. At its best moments, “Insomniacs” successfully sells their unusual bond where they can sleep soundly together. But at worst, the show still has its romance / coming-to-age trappings that make it feels more familiar with other romance anime. In fact, “Insomniacs” reminds me more of “Let Me Eat Your Pancreas”, a film with a similar lead girl – hyperactive but sickly girl and a premise of them spending time together “as friends”. Overall, the episode is functional, the show provides good reasons for these two to know and spend more time with each other, but it doesn’t have the nuance that I found in better romance shows like say Skip and Loafer.
Potential: 50%

Magical Destroyers

Short Synopsis: Japan cracks down on Otaku-ism and carts them off to otaku camps. A resistance forms and is…surprisingly successful?

Amun: “Magical Destroyers” is one of the few original works this season, so not much was known about it coming into the premiere. What we’ve got is a “specialized dystopia” (a la Shimoneta or to a lesser extent Kill La Kill) where being a rabid fan of anything is punishable by incarceration. Seems pretty extreme to me, but Japan historically has not been known for public policy moderation. I just wasn’t enchanted so far – the main character designs felt more appropriate for supporting cast, and the enemies feel downright lazy. I do think some of the little jokes are pretty good, like the magical girl transformation where she has to change her shirt manually. This is pretty clearly going to be a love-letter to otaku culture, but I don’t think that’s really enough to carry a full season. We’ll see, but so far, I’m not just not feeling it (although that ED was quite a trip).
Potential: 5%

Mario: There’s just something missing in this premiere that doesn’t click with me. The episode provides a neat backstory of a “post-apocalyptic” world (not really!! But it feels like that to these otaku) where the world is against the otaku population. It also has a vibrant style and a clear love for the culture, which will obviously appeal to some fans out there. However, Magical Destroyers does a very poor job of establishing its characters and their abilities, so there’s a huge gap in-between “2008” and the present-day that I cannot cross. Take Otaku Hero, our… ahem… hero, for instance. He says that he’s tired of the ongoing wars and he wants to quit. Fair enough, except that we haven’t seen one goddamn thing he achieved beforehand. Every member in the resistance keeps saying that “we are totally dependent on him for everything” – but what is “everything”? I don’t see any of that here. The show then attempts to give us some brief slideshow-type flashbacks on how Otaku Hero enjoys fighting with everyone, but for me they function like implant memories because he did next to nothing up to that point from my perspective. Furthermore, we have Anarchy, a magical girl who… doesn’t transform for unknown reasons, and then she has these overpowering skills out of nowhere. I mean, if they stick with real life (2008’s flashback is the world we lived in), then adding anime-power just doesn’t gel at all.
Potential: 0%

EDENS ZERO 2nd Season

Short Synopsis: Guy who was raised by robots and a wannabe influencer with a robot cat are trying to find the celestial being at the center of the universe for fun or something.

Amun: One of my (few) complaints about Edens Zero is the weird non-linear temporal narration. We see it again here in the opening episode, and honestly, it’s just confusing. With Weis’ older/younger self situation, there are way more elements of time travel in this show than there’s any reason to be. Aside from that small complaint, Edens Zero is back to where we left off – the team is off to fight Draken Joe and looking space sexy doing it. It’s pretty straightforward what this season’s conflict will be, and that’s perfectly fine. As long as Edens Zero can avoid wandering into weird future/past paradoxes, I think we’ll be in for another fun ride!
Potential: 80%