Spring 2022 Summary – Weeks 2-3

Wooper: New season, new weekly recap column – except I doubt I’ll get around to writing one of these each week. As a matter of fact, this may be the only one I do all spring, but I figured I’d make a post since there were a couple shows that aired too late for our First Impressions. Plus, Lenlo wanted to express his approval of the new P.A. Works show, and who am I not to provide an outlet for anime appreciation? Read on to see what we’re watching this season!

Summertime Render 1-2

Wooper: It’s silly to pick a projected AOTS after two episodes (especially when the series in question is slated for 25), but my money is on Summertime Render nevertheless. Ayumu Watanabe has been stretched thin over the last few years, splitting his time between envelope-pushing features at Studio 4°C and TV projects at multiple studios, but he still found time to direct one of this spring’s best premieres – and followed it up with an equally strong second episode. The broad strokes story is engaging, of course: a murder mystery involving shadowy doppelgangers set in a small island town. The tone is eccentric, eerie and gruesome in equal measure, and protagonist Shinpei’s ability to return to July 22nd after death gives the show a big hook. Moreover, he makes smart choices about how to spend his limited time within each loop, which can’t be said for some other characters in similar situations. But the show gets a lot of little things right, as well, especially visual metaphors like water droplets on an air conditioner preceding a character’s tearful grief, or the town being framed within a spider web just before Shin finds himself in peril. (I also love the bespectacled Hizuru, whose peculiar demeanor and habit of recording voice memos put me in mind of Dale Cooper from Twin Peaks.) If Summertime Render weren’t so solidly put together, I might not have the patience for its central mystery, but it is, so I do. Bring on the next episode!

Paripi Koumei 1-4

Lenlo: Not checking out Kongming when it first aired was almost one of the greatest mistakes I’ve made this year. I thought it was just a stupid gag series, how can a show about throwing a general from the Three Kingdoms period into modern Shibuya be anything else? But there’s so much heart, both for music and history, character and legitimate history that it has quickly become one of my favorites for this season. You just don’t get scenes like episode 3’s “Soldiers and drink” without the creator being passionate about the subject, nor the references from the manager without the knowledge. My god, the manager. He might be my favorite character. Also it has a banger of an OP.

Kaguya-sama S3 2-3

Wooper: As this season’s OP would suggest, there was a big emphasis on side characters in these episodes: Nagisa, Maki, and especially Hayasaka. It took me a minute to mentally catch up with Shirogane and Hayasaka’s history (the second season was a full two years ago), but once it came back to me I was able to enjoy their encounter at the karaoke mixer… sort of. Calling back to Hayasaka’s previous seduction attempt gave the story legs to stand on, but the fact that 1) she’s assuming an alter ego and 2) she appears at least somewhat genuine makes me unsure how to feel about the whole thing. The ambiguity wouldn’t be a problem if the karaoke segment had been funnier, but the climactic dick joke wasn’t even close to landing – how would Kaguya have failed to hear Shirogane’s horrible singing voice through the door if she could make out Hayasaka’s protests about its “size”? I preferred episode 3 overall, since Maki’s proper introduction as a branch member of the Shinomiya family could go in a lot of different directions, and the back-and-forth trickery during the student council’s Ten Yen Game was vintage Kaguya-sama. I’ll never tire of Kaguya and Shirogane outsmarting each other, especially when their scheming rubs off on everyone else.

Onipan 1-2

Wooper: I wrote a little blurb on Onipan for our Spring Preview last month, but I doubt I convinced a single soul to try it out – kid-friendly half-length comedies tend to escape people’s notice, especially if they’re chiefly concerned with Anime Discourse. Onipan is pretty good, though, so unless the yet-unseen idol aspect gets too repetitive, I’ll be following it for its full run. A trio of oni girls attempting to rehabilitate their species’ image among humans is already a noteworthy premise, but two other things make this show worth a look: its unique approach to voice casting and its amusing gags. The main actors attached to the project are all brand new seiyuu, and their unpolished performances are good fits for their characters, who have been thrust into ambassadorial roles without any training. Listening to Onipan is a much less heightened experience than you get from most anime, and while I wouldn’t call it naturalistic, it’s definitely refreshing. These girls have got it where it counts, though – in the delivery of the series’ gags. Whether they’re acting bewildered by human misconceptions or good-naturedly ribbing each other for their foibles, the comedy is consistently winning (if a bit mild). Will I ever write about the show again? Probably not, but I’ll enjoy watching it to destress once a week this season.

Kakkou no Iinazuke 1

Wooper: Kakkou no Iinazuke, or “A Couple of Cuckoos,” got a late start this season, so it missed our First Impressions window. I figured I’d write it up here for completion’s sake, but man, I didn’t find a lot to enjoy in this premiere. It’s another in the recent glut of ‘high schoolers pretend to date and/or get engaged’ series, a trend with which I’m not particularly familiar, so I can’t say whether Iinazuke is better or worse than average. It’s certainly competently produced, with ultra-cute characters taking precedence over serviceable animation and backgrounds, but the whole setup is just an excuse to surround the male lead with busty potential girlfriends. Be it the airheaded social media star with whom he was switched at birth, the klutzy genius at the top of his class, or his overly-attached sister (not biologically, of course), the female designs and personas here take such transparent aim at a particular audience that it’s kind of embarrassing to watch. But that’s just one man’s perspective – if you can stomach the script’s trendy lingo and the scene of the main character punching his fiance’s Instagram stalker, you’ve got a two-cour romcom to sink your teeth into.