Tag: episode 6

Scum’s Wish – 06 [Welcome to the X-Dimension]

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

If there is one thing that I really respect about Scum’s Wish, it’s that they commit themselves all the way to that tangled web of broken desires and love, instead of chicken out half-way. As a result this show gets much harder to swallow, but leaves you a big emotional impact. This week in particular we follow Hanabi and her descending to hell AKA her path of becoming another bitchy bitch, trying to beat Akame in her own games. If there was ever a doubt that Hanabi wasn’t a “scumbag”, she sure is becoming one now. In this show, characters do realize a lot of things, they all aware that they’re straying in the wrong side of the road but keep pushing forward anyways until everything broken apart.

“I will pretend with you as much as you want. Then you can fall for a fake version of me”

There she goes. Heartbroken after hearing that Narumi-sensei had slept with Akame, Hanabi wants the attention the boys have for Akame, so she determines to use any mean necessary to beat Akame. Everyone knows that Akane is hardly a role-model; she’s a fake. All her worthiness comes directly from the desires of those followers so as long as she isn’t desired anymore; she’s a done deal. Hanabi herself knows that it’s a pathetic decision, but when all the people she have connection with got stolen away by Akame, I can totally see her urge. Starting with Mugi when she decides to take his attention back by suggesting that they should date for real. She then meets Takuya, in this show served as a pawn for both Akame and now Hanabi – Akame’s prey who Hanabi personally connected to the least- in order for Hanabi to test out her own game. The result of course is as painful and pathetic as it gets. There is no real love involved, even no genuine moments together, it’s just plain body heat. All Hanabi does is to fake herself to please Takuya, and this guy isn’t either sensitive or care enough to realize. It’s the win-win game anyways. Takuya gets some comforts behind Akame, Hanabi learns and masters her game. They all basically get what they want.

“Every time I’m touched, I realize that I’m so empty inside”

But by pushing herself for physical means to lure the guys, she simultaneously has to lock her inside up in order to not falling apart. It’s not that Hanabi doesn’t aware she is attractive. I wouldn’t call her character attractive to be completely frank, she just knows how to use her body to seduce boys. It’s pathetic. The attractiveness, after all, should come from the inside and Hanabi’s inside is confused and empty. Feeling sick, feeling unworthy. Feeling empty. Feeling like scum. She’s experiencing a lot right now but expect things to get worse later on, when she uses her fake charms to seduce both Mugi and Narumi. The true question now is when she reaches the breaking point of feeling explode, how would she react then? The child version of Hanabi both present in the best and worst part of this episode. On one hand, I enjoyed the sequence of her conscience fighting with her current dark self tremendously. The visual styles really capture the dark mood of her battling with her head, and look how ironic that is when the child version of her that is more mature and critical, calling her current self “brat”. On the other hand, the flashback of her and Narumi again feels awkward. Here goes daddy issues again and Narumi seriously drags everything down with him.   

“I love you enough that I can live with that”

That’s when the idea of “accepting your love ones exactly the way they are” becomes problematic. And yes I’m talking about both Ecchan and Moca in this context. Ecchan becomes more and more dangerous, a crucial factor to manipulate Hanabi to her corruption and she enjoys it. As much as Hanabi desperate to hook up with any guy connected to Akame, she’s still sensible enough to cut-off Ecchan, because she just couldn’t see Ecchan as lover. But that red-hair girl knows all about it and content to be just that: a substitution. She loves Hanabi for both her good and bad sides so she has no problem to exploit Hanabi’s dark side so that she can embrace her even more. That girl is getting even more tricky when she even informs Mugi about Hanabi just to wreck that couple apart (and intend to leave another hickey soon, sly girl!). At the same instance, Moca and Mugi finally have a date so 1) it’s gonna be Mugi descending to hell next week and 2) I will have a chance to discuss my personal favorite theme “the loss of innocence” next week. Will it be embracing the person as they are, even their darkest side, a wise solution? Normally I’m in a camp that say yes but it’s clear that the show proves me the other side of the coin here.

Lastly, it got me thinking so I figure I will address it here, about the emotional response we get from this show. Normally, why would you watch shows that produce negative feelings to you? What’s the quality those shows have that frankly are quite addictive than normal, harmless, feel-good shows out there? I understand shows like “Now and Then, Here and There” or “Grave of the Fireflies” depressing nature because the audience have a chance to get emotional connect to the characters before the shows broke us apart with a hardship of nature (tragedy). Then you have those exploitation medium in which their main purpose is to rape your mind and make you feel disgusting and sick. For example, think of alleged “snuff” film from Japanese movies in the 80s, early 90s (don’t mean to knock them off, as I think they still have their merits). And then we have the ones like Scum’s Wish or Flowers of Evil that fall into the middle of those two (provocative). Here in Scum’s Wish we aren’t really supposed to root for the characters (unlike the first one), as they are pretty unrelatable from the first minute and make more and more extreme behaviors later on. It’s more about we project ourselves to the situations that make us engaging and gripping along with the characters. Everyone has to go through teenage phase, all of us have to go through the uncertainty of self-worth, lust, “true love” at some points in your life so your own experience will reflect greatly to those kinds of shows. I know for sure that If I were in the shoes of Kasuga in Flowers of Evil, I would have turned out just like him, and that feeling cuts me deeply. So my point is this, don’t think of this show as an entertainment piece, think of it as an experience you could’ve gotten, and I think your thoughts on this show would differ greatly. But then again who would want to watch shows that just make you feel depressing?

p/s: I normally just keep my blogging here in this sites as strictly anime-related, but since I’m a movie-buff at heart, I might as well recommend you readers to films that shared the same theme as this series. If you enjoy Scum’s Wish then by any mean check this one out: Breaking the Waves (1996). This movie won the Palme D’or back in ‘96 about a wife that after her husband was bedridden and asked her to have sex with other guys to heal him spiritually, thus come her journey to become a nympho by the public’s eyes and a martyr in her husband’s eyes. I know it sounds devastating to say the least but well, I hope… you “enjoy” it if you check it out.

ACCA: 13-Territory Inspection Dept. – 06 [Where Pride and Train Tracks Lead]

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

Now we’re clear why Lotte looked so worried last week upon hearing Jean was riding a train, turn out that their parents passed away due to train accident when they were young, 13 years ago. The meeting of Jean and Grossular is rather an unexpected exchange, as instead of questioning Grossular if he’s involved to the coup d’etat, Jean outright confirms that he believed Grossular isn’t. Grossular was the ACCA brand chief back when the rail accident happened and he further helped to reduce border conflict by taking full responsibility and then put “safety first” to the transportation system, resulted in steep decline in number of accidents. The point being Jean put his complete trust to Grossular. But this guy is sharp as tack. When Jean tells him about his tail, he knows exactly who leak the source. Speaking of accident, there appears to be another tragedy that happened 33 years ago. Get that? Underneath this peaceful nation there have been lots of repressed uprising, accidents, tragedies that might or might not come from the same cause. That world IS DANGEROUS. And with the TV announcement that there have been no accidents for 2 years, could it be a foreshadow for the plane, that Jean was in right before the end, will get crashed and burn? Hmmm, it’s likely, very likely indeed.

Jean finally had to report his audits back to Mauve and of course it was a failure as he spilled nothing. He’s hiding details from her about what happened in Suitsu (what happens in Paris, stays in Paris) but she knows it right away. She even summons the other investigation team to check back on the situation. I am actually starting to think that the rumor upcoming coup is actually a combination of several minor coups from each district and from our key members, as the way I see it many of our cast have their own agenda and purpose here. The president of Privy council is obviously the main suspect, as taking down the prince Schwann would be most beneficial to him. Lilium is also very unreliable as well. Each of the district was give autonomy for their land but if the prince Schwann take over he want control over all districts and that of course doesn’t ring well for those districts. All they need is someone who is the center of attention which can push the button to bring all the coup together, and Jean fits the bill quite nicely here.

ACCA sure loves to have party and eating cakes and this episode is no exception, cramming up a New Year party at Jean’s own apartment. As we all know, even Jean or Lotte don’t know the true landlord (but curiously Nini does) but the building is at centre of the town and all the general managers of big department stores live there. As of now I pretty much consider party, cakes and bread as ACCA’s identity so I don’t mind to get bread-porn once in awhile. In his next audit, Jean gets to the island of Hare that looks most similarly to Hawaii. People there are easy-going, have a high life expectancy and know more about the coup than even Jean, but again this district is cut off significantly so there’s not much else to talk about its characteristics. I love the fact that despite being blowed up the cover, Nino always stays exactly one step behind Jean and I really love the moments the three mains Jean, Nino, Lotta staying together. They carry such great chemistry.

Six episodes in, we still have little clue about the storms to come and what exactly is Jean’s position in this coup? Is he the one who find out and stop the coup? Is he the main factor for the coup to gain its threatening force or is he the cause for the coup to happen after all? I’m digging this deliberate pacing. Normally slow pacing with not too much happened means that they stretch the story too thin but for ACCA I’m confident that they know where they go ahead. Even if where they go next might get crashed and burned like a wrecked airplane.

3-gatsu no Lion – 06 [Child of God part 1 – part 2]

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

Okay, I think I need to let this out first: What is that screenshot right at the end of preview chapter? I know some other mangaka draw this (Like Miura did in the first episode), but this image of big boob Akira is totally inappropriate with the show. This is a total disaster if you ask me.

This episode takes an unflinching look into the mind of Rei again, but unlike last week where the events were already happened in his past, this episode concentrates squarely on his inner thoughts: on how he perceives the world. The main strength of 3-gatsu no Lion has always been the way the show dig deep in Rei’s insecure self, and this episode really takes a step deeper and darker. While his past is certainly tragic and compelling, if the show relies too heavily on his past to draw sympathy from us, it won’t go anywhere because Rei doesn’t progress. Instead, this episode focuses on Rei’s attitude towards the past and how it affects him even now. Kyouko abusive voice again lingers in his heart, basically devalued his self-worth, but the sad thing is he’s submitted to it. He’s afraid that he doesn’t belong anywhere, this again reflects on his complicated relationship with shogi. Last week, we learned that he chose to play shogi not because he loved it, but because he wanted to spend more time with his father, and later as a ‘contract’ to get out of his trapped life; this week he sheds another light to it: he’s into shogi as a place where he feels himself belong to. But does he really feel belonging? As he continues to swim over countless waves to reach its destination, he begins to lose sights on the big world around, on his next stop. He reaches the island, he reaches his goals but now too afraid to make any more move. That is one hell of depressing thought.

The introduction of Touji Souya, a current meijin (one of the most prestigious title in shogi) serves as a great reference to Rei. The two of them share many things in similar: they are both become shogi professional shogi player when they were middle schools (the 4th and 5th people who do so), and their playing styles are strikingly similar as well. All those players who became professional in middle schools would all later become masters (including Souya), and that made Rei feel pressure towards those “achievements” that the shogi world expected of him (curiously enough when you realize his adoptive father never really give him that kind of pressure). His recent losing streak certainly brings him down and that again made him afraid whether or not he’s worth it. Well, that kind of pressure is not what he needs to care, but thankfully the teacher Hayashida was there to cheer him up. He, along with the three sisters, are the friends that Rei really need to bring him out of his depressions. I am really amazed that the show goes this far to bring out the dark inside Rei, we get to know him better and better now and he becomes one of the most fully realized characters that I’ve encountered in recent years. Thank you Chica Umino!

Speaking of her, I think I need to address on the comedy of this show. Many people complain that the comedy is the weakest part of the show, but for now I interpreted it differently. When you really think about it, for a quiet, slow coming-of-age story, voicing over the cats (and dogs) don’t really make much sense, but here it’s working. The thing is those light moments aren’t supposed to be humorous, or to get chuckles from us, but they serve as a cute, light-heart moments to balance out the dark, heavy inner Rei. There are some comic relief moments, sure, but their main objectives are to contrast with the lonely world of Rei, not for comedic effect; thus to judge it based on its poor ‘comedy’ doesn’t really ring true for me, because it isn’t strictly a comedy.

Lastly, this episode is a perfect example to dissect how well Shaft adapting this manga. When you really look at it, Shaft is one of the most unlikely studio to adapt this story. Of course Shaft is talented enough to bring the right pace and feel to the story, but being Shaft, sometimes they have to make somethings stand out. And stand out is the worst enemy for this kind of slice-of-slice show. With this episode, their marks are all over the place with varying degrees. When Shaft dwell into the mindscape of Rei, the visual language is easily the most striking 3-gatsu no Lion could ever have achieved. A small figure swimming in a dark red ocean, or the very next scene when Rei arrived in a blue island, are Shaft at their finest and those choices fit the theme perfectly. The close-up shots while in a conversation between characters and the head-tilts, on the other hand, are distracting the flow of the story and standing out too much and that were rather mediocre choice. All these cutesy moments are hit or miss at the moment: sometimes it works; sometimes not but I especially enjoy the sound designs of those sequences (like the part when Hina says something unintelligible “Zumomomo” and then run off). All in all, this episode got to be the darkest episode of 3-gatsu no Lion, as it never afraid to show the dark depressing side of Rei and for that I really appreciate it. Rei is a very flawed kid, but that’s exactly why he feels exactly like a human.

Flip Flappers – 06 [Pure Play]

by SuperMario, posted in Currently Watching:, Flip Flappers

This episode was magnificent. I always know that Flip Flappers is capable of being inventive, but I’d never have thought that they can pull an episode that emotional satisfying, while never swing away from its main adolescence theme. Moreover, the execution is both awe-inspiring and ambiguous. Seriously I think this series is like a stairway to dreamland, with each step we reach a new high bar and the ambition is getting higher and higher. What’s await us in the destination then? Hell if I know but I am enjoying in every steps they made so far.

First, I actually think it’s a very good idea of Flip Flappers to use its transformation sequence as a transition between the real world and Pure Illusion worlds. We don’t really follow their every Pure Illusion world either so the creators have more freedom to put on whatever they like. In this Pure Illusion for example, Cocona and Paprika have to fight with the multi-eyes spider-inspired monster with its colorful threads, but the important bit is what come afterwards. For the first time, there is an abnormality in this Pure Illusion world – there is an entrance to someone’s memory (So, what exactly is Pure Illusion anyway? Someone’s streams of consciousness? And the fragment? Their memories?); and the rest of the episode goes to completely different fashions than previous ones, instead of seeking for the fragments, they digging deep into someone’s consciousness.

The theme of identity again is apparent in this episode, as the two girls both play the same person: Iro the kid and the plot involves her trying to get her name remembered again. That kid doesn’t have an ideal family life to say the least. Her parents just plainly neglect her, she’s confined in her room, where she keeps drawing as passing time. They even go too far as commenting her drawing “weird”, discourage Iro to paint. She finds herself happy with another parental figure: Obaa-chan (hmm, I can draw a line between this Obaa-chan and Cocona’s grandmother here), who spends the time with her, cares for her and teaches her happiness. The fear of losing someone dear to you because they forget who you are (the theme of insecurity) is pretty poignant. The symbolism of nail polish is pretty dominant in this episode. Nail technicians need to be familiar with nail salon terms. Nail polish, apart from being closed to oil-painting; is also a part of growing up, when at that stage one start to grow self-esteem and attractiveness. I say this episode’s main message is about kid’s development through family issues and the story about Iro and Obaa-chan alone is solid enough on its own because of its emotional resonance.

But the execution is what make this episode stand out. By making Cocona and Papika keep changing roles (but we mainly followed Cocona’s narrative), this episode both maintains its dreamlike structure, and speak well to the theme as well. There are always two versions of young Iro life: an orange-heavy, happy life with Obaa-chan and the blue, almost empty world in her house. Whenever she feels blue, herself painted in blue, as did the world around her (the world has consumed her). The highpoint of this is when she realizes that Obaa-chan forget about her, she turns into blue while the surrounding is still orange bright, stressing her confusion and sadness. The sequence that show her parents in a really trippy, Masaaki Yuasa-inspired art style with very rough, scratchy designs is another highlight of this episode. God, apart from the show usual experiments with colors, this episode shows their willingness to experience with the art styles as well, and boy how it paid off.

Overall, I had believed that the show could never top last week’s quality but it succeeded. This episode has to be the most heartfelt moments Flip Flappers ever commit itself to. Paprika and Cocona’s journeys proved to be everything I could ask for in an adventure: inventive and ambiguous but never forget to be fun and entertaining and always stay true to itself. Remember I said that I have my title for AOTY? Well, at this rate Flip Flappers has a real shot to challenge that top spot.

Magical Girl Raising Project – 06[Get the Super-Rare Items!]

by AidanAK47, posted in Currently Watching:, Magical Girl Raising Project

Looks like this show has taken my previous advice and decided to up the kill count. This time we have two casualties.(Yes, two. Not three) The first is Shou, Koyuki’s protector who seems to have underestimated the fight he was in for and Cranberry has killed him. The fight itself I think could have had more flash to it which is something of a problem with all the fights in this series. Either poor direction or lacking animation make these fights less exciting that they should be but even then maybe the reason the fights are not engaging is that the characters just don’t have enough to them to make the fight exciting. In all honestly I seen this kids death coming the moment he swore to protect Koyuki but it really is a shame that he died just when Koyuki was considering him boyfriend material. If it’s one trait that this show needs to get rid off it’s showing flashbacks of characters who will die in the episode. Today’s episode had two flashbacks showing just who was going to die. The end of the episode showed that it would be to this shows benefit if the deaths were more unexpected as shown by hardgore Alice’s decapitation which really did catch me off guard. Still it looks like Alice lives up to her name and can survive having her head chopped off, making her a zombie magical girl. Well…it’s was bound to happen sometime and the sad thing is she isn’t the first one if you take Mahou shoujo of the end into account. But the ability to heal from wounds like that would be a serious boon in this battle and she should make for a good ally for Koyuki if that is her intent.

So Magicaliod was a homeless girl who just so happened to become a magical girl by using a second hand phone. It’s a pity she died this episode as I was just starting to like her but I guess that is a big fault in this show. Whoever gets developed also gets the axe. it’s nice to see Koyuki break out of her no violence policy and move in a more interesting direction. The girl needs to break out of being a dull character and start getting more interesting. Carnberry at least seems to have gotten more development as we learn that this elimination round was due to her and some contract she has with Fav. It’s possible she works at the company that makes the game or the game itself is some sort of magical construct. Either way it does seem like Fav’s intent is to raise strong magical girls and this whole ordeal is some kind of spartan training for something bigger. Overall I find his methods highly questionable as Snow white is at the top of the charts and she certainly isn’t what I would call powerful. Though Fav seems to be more interested in entertainment that his objective. I did like when he stopped adding pon to his sentences and his voice took on a layer of malice. Overall it seems this duo will prove to be the main antagonists for this particular arc but with Swim Swim still around that could change.

Speaking of Swim Swim, their group looks to have nabbed Fav’s latest offerings of special items in exchange for lifespan. These weapons are likely to give her team the edge while giving Koyuki a nice moral dilemma. It is interesting that she did in fact press the button to exchange five years of her life for weapon. If Swim Swim’s group hadn’t grabbed the item first she might have regretted that choice. But damn Swim Swim when for the 25 year one without hesitation. There is something seriously wrong with this girl and even she herself mentioned that it wasn’t that she wasn’t scared of losing what could be a quarter of her lifespan. Again it was her weird sensibility of following Rulers example. This is getting more interesting but this show does lack something to make it truly good. At the moment it is passable but the action scenes do lack impact, the characters don’t have enough development to make the situation compelling and the story so far has been a bit too predictable.