Winter 2021 Summary – Week 12

Wooper: March is nearly in the rearview mirror, so it’s time for one last recap post before we flood the blog with our first impressions of the spring season. Allow me to go over a few housekeeping items before we commence with winter’s last rites:

–  Spring 2021 is massive, so we won’t be giving our thoughts on all ~45 premieres, just the 30 or so we’re most interested in. Apologies in advance to fans of SAO clones and ikemen showcases.
–  Armitage will be joining us for those first impressions (and hopefully covering a full series starting in mid-April, but don’t quote me on that second part).
–  For Wonder Egg Priority fans, we’ll finish covering the show one way or another. If Mario doesn’t continue with his writeups, I’ll do a mega-post on episodes 8-12 in the coming weeks.

That’s about it! Let’s get this winter wrap-up on the road.

So I’m a Spider, So What? – 12

Amun: Spider-Hero (yes, I’m going to call her that from now on; no I don’t care that it’s a bad pun) concludes her epic battle with Mr. Earth Dragon Arba. By the way, thank you to the kind reader who pointed out that she killed a bunch of people last episode with some rather flimsy justifications of self defense. I think it’s a little unsettling that she’s more upset about Arba than killing a bunch of humans, but whatever. The animation this episode was….meh. I think CG limitations are painfully obvious during these large fight scenes. I don’t think you can avoid them, but they’re not a selling point by any means. Looks like the next season will take place outside the Labyrinth, which will be nice – I’m expecting more credit’s girl and probably that Spider-chan saves the world or something. I’m still having a good time, and if you’re watching it – I hope you are too!

 

Attack on Titan S4 – 15-16

Wooper: This was a crucial pair of episodes for AoT, and not just because the series relies on earth-shaking finales to maintain its massive audience from year to year. The most important thing for the show to nail was Zeke’s point of view, because until this point, we had lacked the necessary information to comprehend his betrayal of Marley. Episode 15 was forced to bear this responsibility almost single-handedly, and its knees nearly gave out in the process. Catching a character up to speed by having them eavesdrop on a private conversation is an effective writing technique, but if you overuse it, your story will start to feel highly artificial. Attack on Titan did it twice in a single episode to engineer Zeke’s betrayal of his parents, which sucked much of the air out of what should have been a horrifying decision. In addition, we spent very little time with his mentor Ksaver, whose affection for Zeke was supposedly based on his resemblance to his murdered son. That piece of information arrived so suddenly after Zeke proposed his Eldian euthanasia plan, however, that their connection left something to be desired. I wish we’d gotten two episodes with Ksaver, as we did with Kruger toward the end of season 3.

Attack on Titan’s story is a complicated one, so I understand its need to compress information. Thankfully, episode 16 spent more time on its characters and less on filling in narrative gaps, leading to some excellent confrontations. My favorite was Yelena’s visit with the captive Scouts, which saw her decry anti-Eldian racism while explaining her boss’s plan to end the Eldian race. Shooting a man in cold blood, then sitting down to calmly discuss her involvement in Zeke’s scheme with her prisoners, and ultimately proclaiming the Jaeger brothers to be divine agents of peace? Yelena spoke with such conviction that I couldn’t help but admire her, despite how fucked up her worldview is. Meanwhile, Pieck’s standoff with Eren wasn’t quite as absorbing, but Titan let it play out at length, which was a smart choice. As a character who’s not beholden to any grand scheme or philosophy, Pieck is a genuine wild card, so even though her betrayal on the rooftop was telegraphed, everything that preceded it was suitably tense. And hey, episode 16 ended with a hand-drawn titan cut – perhaps the only one this season – so it got to conclude on an exciting note, as well. Now I just have to resist reading the manga before the show resumes in nine months. Piece of cake, right?

Tatoeba Last Dungeon

Amun: We’ll keep this brief. Tatoeba Last Dungeon started with – I felt – a good premise and something original. It did not succeed in fulfilling its vision. What had a chance for some quality visual and situational comedy devolved into one of the shoddiest harem shows I’ve ever seen. There were really no redeeming qualities here, unless you liked the character designs. Which were pretty bland, honestly. The most original part of this show was the Universal logo at the beginning; I’ve never seen that before at least! If you watched it – I’m sorry. If you haven’t watched it – you didn’t miss much.

Back Arrow – 12

Wooper: At last, we’ve reached the inevitable ‘mecha fusion’ stage of Back Arrow. I took a bunch of screencaps of Kai and Ren’s combination Briheight (named Gigan Reppu) during this week’s episode, as its holographic wings and dynamic poses made for the show’s flashiest mecha battles thus far. All the developments that led to Kai and Ren’s reunion were crammed into the first half of the episode like a lopsided sandwich, but delicate plotting has never been Nakashima’s strong suit, so whatever. With Arrow suffering from an arm injury and unable to face Gigan Reppu alone, I expect that he’ll fuse with Elsha or Atlee next week so we can go full Super Sentai – hopefully the new mech’s design will be as good as Kai’s should that come to pass. As a side note, I got a chuckle out of Arrow’s skeptical question about his signature move: “It needs a name?” It wouldn’t be an episode of Back Arrow without parodying decades-old mecha tropes, I suppose.

Mushoku Tensei

Amun: With a couple of unreviewed shows ending this week, I thought I’d chat about one of the most controversial: Mushoku Tensei. I’ve seen quite a few anime try to shock with nudity or violence (or in Elfen Lied’s case – why not both) – but Mushoku Tensei is the first that I’ve seen use “utter disgust with the MC” approach. I wouldn’t be surprised if someone revealed this entire anime was an exercise in seeing if excellent writing, animation, and world building could overcome a repulsive lead. So what’s the verdict? This show is quality in every regard but personal antics and ethics – which is an understandably hard pill to swallow for some viewers. For others though, watching brilliantly animated fight scenes in a beautiful world is enough to keep going (and hoping the MC gets reincarnated as a pig – I thought the point of karma was reincarnation to a deserved station?).

Yuru Camp S2 – 12

Wooper: Yuru Camp’s second season still has one more episode to go, but this is probably the last time I’ll write about it (unless it sneaks into the AOTY post next January). I enjoyed this episode a lot, though, so it’s a good note to close on. If I’m not mistaken, the girls’ current camping trip in Izu is the longest they’ve ever done, but the series found plenty of fresh stuff to do this week, including a unique geospot visit and a “surprise” birthday celebration. And who could forget the moment that three of the main characters temporarily morphed into shrimp? Not the part of my brain responsible for producing nightmares, that’s for sure. Aoi’s little sister was more involved than usual, too, which may signal that the series plans to utilize her more often in the future – her gullible streak and general excitability make her a natural pairing with some of the sillier characters. The quieter ones are still my favorite, though, so it’s nice that Nadeshiko and Rin got to chat for a bit before another beautiful Yuru Camp sunrise. Here’s hoping for a similarly comfy season finale in a few days.

Cells at Work: Black

Amun: I’m a fan of the Cells at Work franchise. I thought the personification of individual worker cells in a human body was fascinating – mapping of the cell’s function to a character archetype? That’s talent. So imagine my surprise when the entire happy-feel-good-working-environment is flipped on its head to a horror show of a dying body. Tone perfect animation (with sleezier depictions of formerly pristine characters) in a darkening, dangerous world makes Cells at Work: Black shine. Even the medical situations encountered (some very awkward diseases) land well – this isn’t a healthy, happy body. Dark and edgy. I loved it. That said, I’m legitimately going to exercise more and eat better – who wants to make their red blood cells sad, you know?!