What Anime are you watching?

[B E C K]

Holy crow, Tubi also has this dubbed in Spanish! ¿QUE? Who went so far for this film? It's not even a good gateway to The King's Avatar as Ye Xiu and Su Mucheng are the only characters of note to be significant part of the main story. This movie is a prequel. This is like the Phantom Menace getting dubbed into a different language for another country but then not touching the OT. Who would do this? I can't even right now! I'm trying to listen to how they pronounce names but, tbh, I don't know the majority of the characters as most of the ones present here are not part of the main story. I think I heard "Sumuchiya" for Su Muqiu like in English. Weird.

[B E C K]

Aggretsuko Season 4.  What the fuck did I just watch?  I knew I wouldn't like it but gave it shot because I was bored and curious.  Gosh, what do I say? 

tldr: And after seeing half of S4, I realized something. It's not that I don't like this show. I actually do like this show but Haida—this single character—is making the show BAD.


For context, Haida was my favorite character in S1. He was the laid-back, helpful, and chill co-worker who had a crush on the main character Retsuko. Yeah, he never told Retsuko his feelings for, like, five years. Fine, that's not a crime. At the end of S1, he bit the bullet, told her, and took the L with grace.

Then X-Mas special onward has just been a one-way rocketship to Planet Simp. He continues to be there for Retsuko, sometimes bending over backward for her. S2 made him get all weird about Retsuko gettin' a boyfriend to the point of stalking her; S3 made him reject a nice girl for Retsuko, the latter who still showed no interest in him; and now he's literally acting like a 12-year-old ashamed of his first kiss (but without the kiss part).

In S4, he walks Retsuko home every night but won't come in for coffee when she continually invites him to do so. Even though he STILL likes her! And he tells her the shittiest lies ever to decline coming in. He bails on dinner with her to the point where he actively loses money because he cancels the reservation. Even though he's STILL interested in her! He has not one, not two, but at least three solid wingmen in his corner cheering him on.  But, no, he's all 'waaah, I'm not good enough for her, mee-maw mee-maw!' 'She rejected a hot rich guy and became a failed idol who nearly got shanked! She's incredible and I'm just a normie!'  WTF?
 
Almost every time he's on screen, the show is bad. Haida has no chill anymore. The show just hyper-focuses on his creepy desire for Retsuko and his inability to move on with his goddamn life. His best scenes this season were his interactions with people he doesn't fixate on love with: repairing a co-worker's computer; hanging out with his punk friend from highschool; working out with the interim company president.

What this show has done to Haida is just so frickin' weird.  I have the feeling the idea was to do a will-they/won't-they type romance. I think the writers or whoever wanted to make Retsuko/Haida endgame but keep the viewer in suspense as to whether or not it'll actually happen. I also get the feeling this likely was not the plan at first but in response to positive reaction to the pairing from S1.  Maybe how they've done this """romance""" flies in Japan but, man... 

Retsuko's not a perfect character. I would say she's actively dislikable and this makes her interesting to watch. That said, this makes it even more puzzling on why Haida even likes her. She spends so much of the show being indifferent to him. It would've made more sense to have Haida hook up with the girl who actually liked him and have Retsuko seethe. It'd be in line with Retsuko's shitty luck and seeing where the grass is greener. But instead, they have this whiny guy constantly pedestal her to the point of mega-cringe.

I wish this series would go back to being weird inter-office politics and zany work hijinks that were more present in S1. S1 was a good balance between those and Retsuko's dating life. More Resasuke and Manumaru? Nope. More Anai and cute gf? Not really. More Kabae and Kabae family? Nope. More Manaka and Hyodo? Some but not enough. Finding out more about Fenneko or seeing her outside of her interactions with Haida and Retsuko's love life? Nope. Gori and Washami bouncing off one another? Nope. Retsuko's mother interfering in her life? Nah. Maybe something new from Tsunoda? Yep, she gets to be Haida's cheerleader now. Everybody gets pushed aside and sidelined for the stupid Haida x Retsuko storyline.

MEH.

See you S5, I guess. Apparently, there's going to more of this anyway. I still like the other characters and look for chances to watch them.

But MEH.

[B E C K]

Okay, so I was convinced to watch the Aggretsuko S4 eps I skipped and those were the better part of the show. Still... find the main relationship fucking tiresome. Miss when this show was "angry OL venting on office hijinks." Even the angry metal segments are just her being a YouTube content creator. Like, man, she's not a YouTuber or an idol, she's a damn OL. People related to her because it's about her hidden and extreme reactions to mundane everyday wage slave bullshit like having to make her boss tea or dealing with a copy machine going haywire. Her boss wanting to throw himself in front of a train and her co-worker getting depressed because office-mom was forced to quit were like the only real moments in this show. Truly a case of something that had soul morphing into something completely soulless.

[Rodent of Unusual Size]

I just found out that one of my more liked shows of recent days (Bunny Girl Senpai...the banter between the mains always cracks me up) won't ever get a second season (figured that, though), but it did get a special, like, two years ago. So I got that, but now I find myself rewatching it again. Given how very little anime I've watched over the past few seasons, going back to one from 3 years ago is kind of odd. But it was entertaining all over again, as I'd forgotten most of it already.

[jonhammstein]

I just finished Super Crooks on Netflix, and it was pretty damn solid. Like, who would have thought an anime based on Millarworld would be any good?

Nice animation, nothing fancy, just consistent throughout. Also, it has one of the more unique openings I've seen in a long while.

[B E C K]

Ugh, I'm trying to slog through the Fate/Grand Order Camelot movies. I'm continually impressed at how the Fate franchise has one of the most interesting concepts (heroes of old being summoned to fight to the death, which is what keeps me coming back to it) but tends to circle around the worst protags: Shiro Emiya from Stay/Night; Sieg from Apocrypha; generic male protag in Last Encore (don't remember his name).

Japanese Boy #1 is so boring. He drags everything down. Yeah, he was in the last one (or OVA or whatever) but he was somehow tolerable there where he isn't here. (Honestly, Cu Caster and white-haired tsundere saved that thing.) This movie's clearly another character's story (Bedivere) but, you know, we have to be faithful to the, uh, mobile game or whatever.

I thought I wasn't going to like Jugs DaVinci (gender-bent Leonardo DaVinci) but she was fun. Seems really cool. And I'm always down for more Red Angry Saber, I mean, Mordred. I thought I'd love Ozymandias because I dig cool Egypt shit but he seems kinda lame and he lives outta a fucking tomb. He's got one of my favorite seiyuu, too. (Takehito Koyasu.  So everybody's gotta comment "Dio!" and "Za warudo!" on every other YouTube video with his voice in it.) But he seemed kinda bitchy and unreasonable and his haircut is like an edgy fourteen year old's.

Big Boob Chinese Lady is whatever. Persian Hero is hot but who cares? Other knights are meh. Nitocris has a nice design but she made me roll my eyes a lot. But to fair, that was a lot of characters. But Nitocris's design is cute. I can't figure out the ears though. It reminds me of the Egyptian god Set but when I googled it, they're supposed to be jackal ears like Anubis... or something.

Maybe I'll try to continue tomorrow. Part 2 seemed to be the really interesting one.

[jonhammstein]

That's what your girl is from! I think I asked that before, but forgot.

Gotta be honest, I don't really Fate. I played some Melty Blood: Type Lumina, does that count?

Jesus, another Saiyuuki just started; who could have imagined that series would enjoy such longevity?

I even watched the first episode and felt the nostalgia wash over me, because I remember the original from 20+ years ago. How fucked is that? I didn't even care that much for it back then!

[B E C K]

She's specifically from Fate/Apocrypha. The Fate version of Queen Semiramis.

I've actually never played any Fate or any other Type Moon works. I just like lots of the characters, designs, and the concept of interconnecting lore so I'll watch a bunch of the various anime. Heresy among Fate fans supposedly, along with my opinion that Fate/Zero is the best one. A lot of times, even if the shows or movies themselves are garbage, it'll have some cool fight scenes, music, and character concepts. Even the Prisma Illya series with its uncomfortable lewding of underaged girls still had cool fights and music. Honestly, I wouldn't mind the lewding in the franchise so much if it wasn't almost always an underaged girl. But, ya know, Japan...

[jonhammstein]

Sukebei!

[B E C K]

Re: Cutie Honey. I had no initial interest in this because it was associated with the live-action movie (all of this circa 2004-2005) but I saw a clip of it and gave it a try.

The tight budget really shows but it sort of adds to the humor.  Lots and lots of titties in this thing btw, even for Cutie Honey who runs around wearing strings for a bunch of the episode. Her main outfit as Cutie Honey has extra cutouts, a butt window, batman nipples, and everything (to match the live-action version). First ep even has a cock and balls but it was the funniest part of the show imo.

Weirdly enough (or perhaps not), this project was co-produced by Gainax and Toei with Hideaki Anno as chief director of the series. The first episode is directed by freaking Hiroyuki Imaishi, co-founder of Studio Trigger, who directed Kill la Kill and Panty and Stocking with Garterbelt.** It really shows in the first episode of this series. It's the strongest episode with the most humor and the feeling of having a beginning, middle, and end. Inspector Girl ("Na-chan," I don't remember her actual name in the show) is this super cool police lady and the reporter guy is almost that sort of trickster archetype of a person that I sorta have a soft spot for.

The other episodes have other directors but aren't as good. Apparently, the individual directors on each ep were given some autonomy so they each have their own directorial style. But different directors or not, this was probably most hampered by having to be a movie tie-in and stick closely to that plot. This involves weird faux drama and the fun steadily getting sucked out into nothing. The main villain appears and I just want her to go away.

As the last episode closes with a repeat of the opening theme, it just occurred to me: a huge part of the fun for me is all of the different honeys. These are like the different versions of Cutey Honey. Some of them have names like Hurricane Honey, the cool biker chick, who's my favorite honey. Or Misty Honey, the idol, and Fancy Honey, the model. The OP shows her in a bunch of outfits and personas and this is barely used. We did get a good portion of Nurse Honey and lots of Hurricane Honey, but still.

Only the first ep really has any fun at all with this concept and even that was half-assed. She appears as a police officer and literally just has the hat and a baton. Like, it was funny but why couldn't she be in a sexy cop outfit? The cue card girl or whatever also felt lazy but, again, at least it was funny. I don't even recall what else she changes into in the other episodes besides wearing armor for a few seconds.

Giving a full 5/5 to the first episode. You can skip the rest if you feel like it.



**I actually rewatched some of Panty and Stocking recently and have some new appreciation for it. You can feel every penny being stretched and used to maximum efficiency. So many scenes so simple and cheap and then going all out in a weird fight. The music is still a blast after all of these years.

[B E C K]

Watching some of My Dress-Up Darling. I see the underpinnings of a cute show. The leads have quirky hobbies. Marin is pure 11/10. But the need to see pieces of her is gross. I don't mind so much that she's a freer sort of person and wears a bikini or wants to cosplay as a sex-maid or whatever. But the whole "lol, an ass cheek" "whoa-ho-ho, tit shines!" (Okay, I just hate tit shines.)

The male lead is pathetic. I don't care the guy like dolls. But own your damn hobby. Instead of being so consumed by his hobby that he doesn't have friends or having such a bad personality he doesn't care for or can keep friends, he's so afraid that he's so consumed in his hobby that others will keep judging him for being so consumed in his hobby. It's very convoluted. He's so afraid for being judged about his dolls that he brings a fuckin' doll head to school. Nope. Nope nope. Don't buy it. And whoever that little girl is that mouthed off on him, she's living rent-free in his head. Like, damn.

And the "humor" is supposed to be all "HA HA DOLLS" "HA HA MARIN HOT. HE CAN'T _not_ LOOK AT TITTY"

Too bad because I love the whole design, aesthetic and the cuteness of Marin but this weird dude is ruining everything.


ETA - Okay the scene at the end of ep two was funny. That's the sort of character I was hoping the male lead would be instead of the mess he was for the majority of the episode.

[jonhammstein]

I really liked the first episode!

I'll probably wait until it's all out before I continue, though.

[B E C K]

I plowed through all four available episodes. The fourth episode saw some nice growth for the male lead. I also read ahead in the manga and it's just... oh, no. It has one of those characters: the senior year girl that looks like a middle schooler and is fucking angry all the time. Like Taiga from Toradora. I guess that's a tsundere. I don't know anymore. And this one is sexualized. But it's okay because she's not actually a little kid. She just looks like one. She's a high school senior. Almost an adult, you know.

The way she was introduced was hella pervy but I can't deny it was funny with the flashback to doll hair. I would've enjoyed it if it had been an intro to an adult character instead of a pseudo-child. They could've at least aged her up so she was no longer in high school.

[Rodent of Unusual Size]

It's okay. If you hated the loli senpai just wait until her middle-school titty-monster sister shows up

[Rodent of Unusual Size]

Hoyl carp....Bastard!! is getting a Netflix adaptation.

[jonhammstein]

Fuck me, those character designs! Look at how much aesthetics have shifted since Bastard! was just a humble Heavy Metal-esque manga. I actually kind of dig the art, other than Dark Schneider being a little on the svelte side.

[B E C K]

 Don't care for that Arshes Nei and I'm confused about what Tia's outfit is supposed to be.

Was reading some of the Dress-Up Darling manga and got to the titty monster....

[B E C K]

Started Fantasy Bishoujo Juniku Ojisan to. It's kinda funny, I suppose. Would probably just stick with this one if only because I'm relieved these two aren't children. And I like the type of male character Jinguuji is. But man, two thirty-two year olds being called old men sorta stings. Ngl.

I looked up a trailer for that new Saiyuuki out of curiosity. I just wanted to see a bit of it because, honestly, unless they've reached the west or something special was done with the new series, I had zero interest. I actually like the characters--at least generally speaking--but S2 and S3 (Reload and Reload Gunlock) were fucking bad and I don't trust anything coming out of this franchise. (Basically one of those shows where only the first season gave me any sort of enjoyment.)  Sure enough, this looks like dogshit. Those outlines on the characters trigger me and the designs are so exaggerated from the mangaka's art style. And soooo many things are NOT moving. The camera is panning and zooming in to try and trick the eye but this all looks terrible. BTW, this dogshit is produced by Linden Films. These are the same people who did the 2016 Berserk anime and the same ones who will be working on the new Bastard!! series.

In this trailer are the same zooming and panning tricks with barely any actual animation.  Big Yikes.  I don't like most of these designs either.  But it'll be on Netflix so I guess I could give it a shot and see.

[B E C K]

Ousama Ranking is decent. Sorta like watching a storybook. (The mangaka has done storybook stuff so makes sense.)  I'm 10 1/2 episodes through right now.  But I gotta say, I still can't stand that goddamn beakface.  Even Marin from Dress-Up Darling does that beakface.  :>

:>

:>

Stop with that fucking face. :>

Jesus Christ.  I think what makes this worse is that this is the main character's default face. It reminds me of the protag from Big Wind-Up who would make fucking beakfaces all of the time (second pic here of him and one of his one hundred different wacky-ass beakfaces). I guess I should be thankful this expression isn't Kakegurui levels of awful but my God...

[B E C K]

So I finished what was available of Ousama Ranking. There's maybe, what, around six episodes left.

Don't get me wrong. It's still a decent show. Some of its early eps in particular are outstanding. But there's a noticeable quality decline. To the point that this show doesn't feel it's really about the protag kid anymore or even about ranking any kings.





*** SPOILERS, BUT NOT REALLY. JUST LETTING YOU KNOW IN CASE YOU CARE ***







It's getting tiresome that nearly every character evades death. Some I understand living but several others are just... like... WHY ARE THEY STILL ALIVE?  WHAT ARE YOU, SHOW?  A MARVEL MOVIE? DOES EVERY CHARACTER HAVE A NINE FILM CONTRACT OR SOMETHING?

We're at the point that this one enemy has immortality but who the fuck cares? You're not killing anyone. Who cares if one of them can't die? (He'll probably be the one to die. That or he gets a magic cure.)

And every character has some tragic story--which is interesting--but for the fact that it's clearly being done so we'll forgive the show for not killing off that character.



I know I'm whining. It's still a pretty good show. Otherwise, I wouldn't have blazed through all 17 available episodes today. But man... At first I was happy characters escaped death but it's gotten to the degree that a lot of the fighting feels pointless. And the biggest sin is saving some of these characters just for the show to toss them on a bench later. Looking at you, snake man.

[B E C K]

Shit, I double posted? (Sorta, cause I quoted myself.) Wild.

:>

[B E C K]

Saw Belle. It was pretty good. I did find myself getting impatient at the beast parts. I preferred the story we had in the first thirty minutes of the movie. I know the beast stuff was supposed to be le cool action and fights or whatever. But it just subtracted from the story I was actually interested in. I'm not sure how Suzu fixed things with these kids' dad. If she had at least said she (and her family and friends) would be watching out for the boys and the man needed to have some shame for his treatment of them, I'd understand that it's helped those two not get beaten anymore. As it was, he just weirdly cowered and went to go hide and now everything's fixed. Meh. Loved the songs and a lot of the visuals, design-wise. Animation was... hmm, like maybe they ran out of money so it got very, very stiff at times. Even for an anime. The irl river bothered me. But those was minor gripes. Movie's still very solid.

[B E C K]

So as much as lots of characters in Ousama Ranking evade death, I was happy to see the Big Four of Bosse Kingdom fighting together. Makes up for the death fakeouts they've all gotten individually.

[Rodent of Unusual Size]

The Genius Prince's Guide anime has been much fun. I was wondering which I'd prefer, this or second season of Realist Hero (which is also good), but the latter has seemingly throttled down and hasn't been as much fun this season. This show hasn't let up yet. I'm now reading the light novels, so I reckon I'll be finding out soon enough.

[B E C K]

word vomit incoming
    tl;dr is Ousama Ranking getting worse. It only has three eps to go so I'll probably still finish it.


Poor Ousama Ranking keeps getting worse with each episode. Last week's episode was full of suspense and characters on the edge of the death. Last week, Antagonist #1 heals a good guy.  She's having some sort of crisis so whatever.  But now Antagonist #2 pops up and just straight up heals the rest of the good guys!  I like these characters, I really do. But these asspull heals make the stakes feel utterly worthless.  There's nothing wrong with the healing powet itself but it's abused to hell and back. Then Antagonist #2 just smashes Immortal Bad Guy into a ball of foil and crammed him inside of a giant rock. So now all the good guys are all "Well Immortal Bad Guy's taken care of but now Antagonist #2 is here.  OH NO.  WE'LL DIE AGAINST HIM."  And it's like, dudes, Antagonist #2 just healed all of your asses a second ago AND took care of the Immortal Nut Job FOR you.  How would you even read him as a threat anymore?  I'm barely sure we even have antagonists anymore.

But worst offense of this show: the MC just stopped developing as a character entirely. They gave him a technique to make him strong several eps back. I should've realized we were in trouble when they there was no true rhyme or reason as to how this skill or why it works. (It's basically clumsy acupuncture with a sword.) And he is legitimately the strongest character in the world even though that should not be possible because of his curse.  All of the characters now collectively circle jerk him. I thought we'd be getting a rug pull but we have three episodes to go with no indication this is happening.

The MC's whole gimmick was being a weak, cursed little boy who is deaf and mute and nobody understands him in both the literal and figurative sense. He makes a best friend with some sort of shadow person who is also misunderstood and this guy helps MC save his kingdom. It's such a strong story hook. And now that I really think about it, the decline of this show was turning its back on all of this.

I'm struggling to think how this show could've been fixed while still telling the story it wants to tell. All I can think of is that maybe this show should've just have been made shorter. Tuning in week after week to another asspull is frustrating. Where as if this show hit the viewer with these same asspulls in a couple of episodes, perhaps the battle would merely feel extremely frenetic instead of outright disrespectful of the viewer's time and emotional investment? I dunno.

It's a pity because the first dozen eps or so really build up to something. The second OP is just full of feels.

Currently this show on MAL is: 8.81 rating, ranked #30, popularity #632.  I'm curious on if this will eventually drop. A lot of the reviews on MAL indicate a review after seeing less than eight episodes. Plucked some comments from the MAL thread:

neoncowboy said:
I have seen a lot of positivity around this ep but I just no longer understand this show. The only characters that seem flushed out to me are kage and boji. Everyone else has these mismatched motivations that flip flop every single episode. I still don’t understand the motivations reply of a single character in this show and just want to acknowledge the absurd amount of plot armor that it utilizes. Like why is everyone just dying and being revived. The stakes are so low and the characters actions don’t feel important. I wanted to love this show and did for the first 13 episodes but I just can’t anymore.

Gabisu said (in response to the above):
If you understand Neon Genesis Evangelion, you easily be able to understand a simple shounen like this, just think about each character for more than 1 minute and connect the plot points, it's easy.

I know Squirrel and Faye really like NGE. I never got a huge amount of the appeal for it personally but I've still seen some it. I don't see how this show would in any way be comparable to NGE. If this show were NGE, we would've gotten Kaji's full redemptive backstory, seen who shot him and gotten that person's backstory, and then Kaji would've been asspull-healed.

from BetaMaleUltra: Ugh. I loved Kage as a character before, but now he's just a useless commentary-spitting machine and its so annoying. And I'm sorry for being a party pooper, but them celebrating after they all got healed was just really cringe. In that moment this really was a kid's show.

Oh my God, that was sooo cringe. Characters literally dancing around in a circle at being healed while the Immortal Bad Guy wasn't even defeated yet.

I'm writing way too much on this show. Maybe I'll do a post on my dead blog. Whatever. I still really, really do like these characters and this world. I wish it all had a better story to go with it.

[B E C K]

Ousama Ranking is wrapping up.  Honestly, it's still sloppy but it is attempting to neatly put together loose ends.  I don't recall the last time I've seen a show with a 5/5 first half and a 2/5 second half.**  A lot of promise with this show.  It felt very fresh and original. It just unraveled way too much at the end.  One more episode to go and I almost think we're getting a cliffhanger. Something's actually happening plot-wise and I don't know if there's any time to resolve it. It'd actually be disappointing if it was concluded to be honest. There's not enough time to do so satisfactorily.

Still watching My Dress Up Darling and Fantasy Bishoujo Juniku Ojisan to.  I'm surprised I'm actually on track to finish all three shows I've been watching.  Past seasons I'd watch a few eps and dump the show.  Even though I didn't really dislike Jujutsu Kaisen and Kemono Jihen, I never actually finished what was available.  I think it's been a while since I finished anything.  Other than Odd Taxi.  (I'm also re-watching some of the dub for that show.)

I did look at bit at Sasaki to Miyano (gay schoolboy show) but dumped it after, like, a minute.  Is it homophobic to say something gay is just too gay?  If so, uh, sorry. 



** EDIT: How could I forget Aldnoah.Zero! That fell harder on its ass than Ousama Ranking ever did.

[jonhammstein]

I had initially dismissed FBJOt due to the promo image making it look like an absolute cookie-cutter isekai harem show, but I watched the first episode and it was alright.

What do you call it when a show does the bare minimum to justify its existence as animation? Like, hey this comic book is cute, let's have it move and make sounds! Okay.

[jonhammstein]

Good counterexample: Demon Slayer. Original manga's art can be downright questionable at times, sometimes intentionally for comedic effect. The show elevates the source material tenfold. Holy shit some of those fucking fights. Like, God damn.

One thing that will always bother me about that show, however, is that the default height for characters seems to be about four feet tall. Why's everybody so squat-looking? I know it's just inherent to the art style, but it bugs me a little bit.

[B E C K]

I actually have still never tried Demon Slayer yet.  I do sort of get dismissive these days with the character designs.  Especially with the protags.  The Demon Slayer protag just looks obnoxious to me.  And I'm honestly not too wild about "girl biting on a tube in her mouth" girl.  I get the 'why' of it and I'll give credit that it's unique but I don't care for it.  The other characters don't really hold much visual interest for me either.

Yeah, Fantasy Bishoujo isn't harem at all. Maybe that's why I haven't dumped it yet.

[jonhammstein]

Maybe I'm just a fucking asshole, but the Spring lineup looks DIRE.

At a glance, I mean. I haven't actually watched any trailers. I just like to try to gauge a show's quality based strictly on promotional images.