Attack on Titan:
The Final Season Part 2
Short Synopsis: Some show about large naked people who get really steamy.
Armitage: See, at this point, the fact that you’re even reading this means that you’re fully committed to seeing this hype-train to its final station. I don’t need to sell you on it and I sure as hell am not gonna bother trying to change your mind if it’s not your thing. To each their own. This premiere by itself is pretty standard fare. Doesn’t come close to being as bombastic as S4 Part 1’s or as shocking as the very first season’s premiere but it serves as an adequate setup for the carnage that’s about to follow. I know that the manga chapter everyone is most looking forward to being animated will be adapted around episode 3-ish of this cour. I don’t know what happens in it but I have been led to believe that, colloquially speaking, shit hits the fan. And I am waiting eagerly in anticipation of it. I also dislike the new ED. The OP is cool though, very extra-edge like the first Vinland Saga opening. But yeah, other than all this, I don’t have much to say about this episode. Though, really, this is the final season of the show that almost single-handedly got non-fans into giving these Japanese cartoons a chance in the last decade. It’s anime history, it’s the end of an era. By now, you’re either in or out. I am very clearly in the former group. The lot of us love this story, subtlety be damned.
Potential: B(i)ased.
Wooper: The first few minutes of this episode nearly tricked me into thinking Wit Studio was still involved with Attack on Titan. The look and sound of the rain falling where Levi’s body lay broken, the rich colors that appeared as both the sun and Zeke emerged from their hiding places… I allowed myself a moment of optimism that this final season (part 2) might recapture the visual gravitas of the franchise’s earlier years. Then the OP happened and everything afterwards fell much more in line with my actual expectations, but I hardly need to spell those out for you, as fans have been airing their grievances with the show’s new look for a year and a half now. What’s really important at this point is the story, which is where this episode excelled. Two scenes in particular made this a strong reintroduction to the world of Titan: Gabi’s catchup session with General Magath and Onyankopon’s plea to save Eren. Both conversations made the informational playing field a bit more even, while still leaving room for surprises down the road. The uninterrupted presentation of that second scene did distract from the action-heavy middle section, but it also created plenty of room for Connie to vent his righteous fury in a hair-raising performance by Hiro Shimono. Attack on Titan may sport a different coat of paint these days, but this episode proves that it’s still got plenty of drama left in the tank.
Potential: 70%
Kaijin Kaihatsu-bu no Kuroitsu-san
Short Synopsis: Salarywoman struggles through impossible office work for an evil organization that can’t defeat a local hero.
Amun: Evil organizations are hardly anything new in anime, but it seems they’re getting more popular. Last year’s Combatant’s Will be Dispatched reflected the general quality of such shows, but every now and again, something like Devil is A Part Timer comes along. One episode in, Kaijin Kaihatsu-bu feels shockingly like the latter. The juxtaposition of the mundane salaryman life against grandiose schemes of evil, dynamic (albeit a bit too much fanservice) characters, and an unexpected real-world tie-in makes this the most interesting new show I’ve seen this season. I’m dying at the chief of staff who has to make everything run for a leader who randomly comes in and causes tons of unnecessary work. The animation isn’t anything to write home about, but I’ve seen worse. Plus, I’m VERY interested in the revolver wielding chicken. Now can everything fall apart halfway? Absolutely. But in a season as sparse as this one, I’ll take any ray of hope I can get. (Bet Lenlo hates it, since you could view it as a slapstick SSSS.Gridman).
Potential: 67%
Lenlo: And Amun would be correct! Take everything good the SSSS franchise had going for it, interesting story boards, dynamic cameras, decent animation, good editing, and throw all of it in the trash. Then add in a sprinkle of slapstick and you have Kaijin Kaihatsu. It’s just so… so bland. Even in a season like this there are better shows. Attack on Titan, Bisque Doll, Kimetsu no Yaiba, Vanitas S2, Leadale, I don’t care! Just… if you’re really hard up for some kind of super sentai show maybe you’ll enjoy this? But I’ve never enjoyed super sentai much to begin with, not even Power Rangers when I was a kid, so there’s nothing here for me.
Potential: 0%
Baraou no Souretsu
Short Synopsis: Two kings of England, one present and one future, have a fateful meeting without the knowledge of their warring families.
Wooper: This premiere got hit hard with the ugly stick, which in the anime world may as well be called “the stick of indifferent production.” Most of the characters look completely vacuous, the show is rarely animated, and the art is oppressively gray. We’re only given a reprieve from this bleakness whenever Joan of Arc’s ghost appears to protagonist Richard III in garishly colored visions, but these are no better to look at. It’s not as though Baraou no Souretsu takes place in the Dark Ages, either – we’re in 15th century England here, observing the Wars of the Roses. (“Observing” is a major overstatement, since in this show war is fought off screen, but there’s the setting, anyway.) Richard is part of the York family, who have enough influence to make a bid for the crown, so I doubt they lived in the sort of dismal conditions the show presents – not until their capture by the Lancasters, anyway, an event that the episode didn’t bother to portray. To be fair, all of the premiere’s political and military developments were equally neglected, since the show is interested solely in Darkness. Richard is tormented by hallucinations and despised by his mother for his intersex biology, but the show’s lack of sensitivity and relentlessly grim tone make it difficult to empathize with him or anyone else, so I’m not going to waste time trying.
Potential: 0%
Mario: Adapting Shakespearian material to the screen is hard, and it’s even harder in anime. Half of the time the self-seriousness of the source will clash with the looseness of animation, and the plot and setting will function as mere vehicles for tragedy. Baraou no Souretsu suffers from both these issues. I didn’t get a sense of the war’s progress at all here, and the cast were similarly vague except maybe for Richard and Henry. I guess it’s fine that they’re in focus since the show will likely follow their paths to the crown and their interweaving fates and failures, but here it overwhelms everything else about the show. The production is flat, the narrative is incoherent, and the themes are overtly heavy – all in all it’s a pass for me.
Potential: 10%
