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thejpfdude-blog · 5 years

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FINAL UPDATE

Hey what up everybody -- I’m back! Well for now, at least. It’s been a while: I’ve been busy with both school and other stuff, which has kinda been keeping me from watching anime. In fact, I should be studying for finals right now, but meh. You know what they say: C’s get degrees. Despite this schedule I’m still keep up with the airing seasons, so it’s not like I’m totally out of the loop (doesn’t hurt that this season’s one of the best in a while too). A lot’s happened between the time I last posted and now, so think of this as kind of an update regarding me and this blog.

Let me start with some personal stuff. I remember mentioning internship search a lot in my previous posts, and though it took a while, I eventually found one that I still can’t believe I got: Crunchyroll. Yes my friends, I interned at Crunchyroll last summer and it was an amazing experience. With it I learned a lot about the industry and how Crunchyroll operates as a company, so hopefully I can bring some of that insight into my blog posts.

Starting with a tangent about the SAO censorship: recently it’s been a big thing on Twitter (follow me if you haven’t by the way @TheJPFDude) and because of it I had to unfollow a certain person who brings anime news who totally misunderstood the situation (a certain… squid). Basically if you didn’t know, Crunchyroll’s version of the most recent episode of the newest SAO censored a certain scene, which has people in an outrage (why is Crunchyroll censoring my anime, they can’t control this kind of stuff, etc.). Here’s my take on it: I’m not gonna go into the logistics of what did/did not got censored and whether it was “better” censored or not. All I’m concerned about is the misinformation spread, and that’s that people believe Crunchyroll themselves were the ones responsible for the censorship, which they weren’t. Crunchyroll was already given the censored version by the licensor, and so were other streaming sites like Funimation and Hulu. From what I’ve been reading, apparently there are a few different versions that were sent out to channels/streaming distributors, and it’s a clusterfudge in who’s been getting what.

Point being, Crunchyroll and other streaming sites cannot censor anime themselves without permission from the licensor. In fact, there’s a lot of things that you’d be surprised needs approval from the licensor. I can confirm as someone who saw the workings inside the company that there’s no way Crunchyroll would censor something under their own volition without permission from above. It’s kind of a pity that such information is being spread by somebody who I get my anime news from, but at least I have ANN for most of what they said anyway.

I say all of this not as a Crunchyroll fanboy, but as someone from the inside who wanted to get the truth out there.

Anyway, that was a huge tangent. Where was I? Oh, right, update on the blog... I was recently reading through some of the old The Week in Anime posts and I realized how much I missed writing them. Now you may be thinking, “that means you’re gonna start writing them again, right?” Unfortunately that’s pretty unlikely. I’m not watching as much seasonal shows as I used to, and it seems kinda pointless to have a TWiA with only 5-6 shows. The variety of shows was a big part of what keeps a weekly post fresh -- not having as much to “review” would mean I say the same things after a few weeks. But having said that, I still want to get back into writing about anime.

That’s why I’m thinking right now about what I want to do as a recurring series. I had a few ideas, starting with a lookback series. In other words, looking at my old TWiA posts from a certain season (say Winter 2016) and commenting on what’s changed, what’s the same, etc.. I think it might be a fun way to see how my tastes have changed while keeping my writing “fresh”, not restricted to a weekly deadline.

I’m also thinking of continuing my preview series, only this time extending it to most of the seasonal shows (not just the shows I plan to watch). Along with that, I also might potentially write an end-of-season “summary” post where I talk about the shows I watched from the season. A condensed TWiA post, in a sense. That way I can record my thoughts on a show while not being forced to write something weekly. Of course these are all dependent on how good a season is/what shows I’m watching, but that’s a general idea of some ideas I had.

Now here’s the biggest news I have in this post: I’m moving to a new site (thejpfdude.wordpress.com) and will not be using Tumblr moving forward. As you may know, Tumblr is changing their site policy to ban NSFW content (AKA goodbye Tumblr). Though I am not an NSFW site, I wanted to move anyway, so it’s a good time as any to do so. All the things I said above in regards to future posts will be done at my Wordpress site.

So TL;DR: I’m back… just at a different site! I have that itch to write about anime, and I’m still thinking of ideas about what to do/if there’s any way to do a weekly post that wouldn’t be tedious for me after a while. But possibly look forward to more in the future at Wordpress. Thanks for reading and I’ll see you in the next post in my new blog!

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thejpfdude-blog · 6 years

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Update: I’ll Be Back Soon!

Hey everybody, it’s TheJPFDude here with an update. It’s been a while, but now I’M FREE from finals. I’m currently sitting in my room back home, and am done with things for the next few weeks. That means it’s time for me to catch up on all of the anime, which is what I’ve been busy doing for the past few days.

My goal is to have a Christmas edition of The Week in Anime. Only I guess it’s the Month in Anime, because that’s pretty much how long it’s been. But for this special edition, I’m probably just gonna do it the old style where instead of giving awards, I’ll write blurbs for every show given that there’s enough material for each of them and it’s the end of the season (meaning some of the shows are ending/ended so I can give an overall impressions blurb about them). So look forward to an extra long TWiA post next Monday.

Other things to look out for: the traditional “Shows I’m Watching” post since the Winter 2018 season is coming really soon. And it’s looking like a good one: lots of interesting shows that are full of potential. That should be coming out within the next few days, definitely before the season starts in January.

I’m also gonna be putting out a little “Year in Review” post sometime in the next few weeks, depending on when I can finish the many shows I have on my On Hold list from the Summer 2017 season (AKA the “I’m too busy so I’ll put these 7 shows on hold” season). Well, those and the few shows I missed that I want to watch like Houseki no Kuni and maybe Made in Abyss. So I don’t expect this post to be made by the end of the year, but it should come out sometime early-mid January.

Finally, I might put out a new series soon. More details when it comes out... which should be soon.

So yeah, that’s it! Thanks for reading -- hopefully I’ll be able to catch up on all of the stuff soon (as of now, I’m almost caught up on shows from this season). But until then, I’ll see you in the next post!

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thejpfdude-blog · 7 years

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The Week in Anime (Week of 11/20/17)

Heyo friends and welcome to a sleep-deprived version of TWiA! Poor life decisions -> I’m not feeling too good right now, so this post’ll be a short one. Off topic, but thank goodness for the shows I put on hold last week, or else I would be more suffering than I already am. So let’s start this off with...

The News Corner

This week there was a piece of news that was very heartbreaking concerning a death, but (unfortunately) I can’t really say much about it, so I defer to this other piece of news instead:

Amanchu Season 2 announced

You thought Dagashi Kashi was the most unexpected season two? Well now there’s this show. Actually this show isn’t as surprising to get a season two, but still something that made me do a double take when I was browsing /r/anime. I.... didn’t really think the first season was that special, but considering it’s one of the those max comfy shows that I don’t enjoy too much, I don’t think my opinion’s the best in that matter. One thing that did interest me was that (SPOILER) there were apparently some supernatural elements going on that will probably be adapted during season two. And from the people in the comment thread on /r/anime, it looks like it’s not good. So that’s something interesting to consider for the second season. I’ll still be watching, because why not I guess, but like Dagashi Kashi I’m not expecting anything too special.

And now them rankings featuring show that had a break this week:

Rankings:

1 (0). Shokugeki no Soma S3 (9/10) [7/?]

2 (0). Juuni Taisen (8/10) [7/12]

3 (0). Just Because! (7/10) [-/12]

4 (+2). Pingu in the City (10/10 ANIME OF THE CENTURY) (6.5/10) [7/26]

5 (-1). Net-juu no Susume (6/10) [7/10]

6 (-1). Love Live! Sunshine!! 2nd Season (6/10) [7/13]

7 (+1). Animegataris (5/10) [7/12]

8 (-1). Blend S (4.5/10) [7/12]

9 (0). Osake wa Fuufu ni Natte kara (3/10) [7/13]

Awards:

Maximum Cheese Alert: Love Live Sunshine S2

Man, I thought last week was bad. This week was... worse. Where’s my character-focused episodes? Truth be told, this is what idol shows are about: the perseverance of going through impossible walls head-first and by miracles being able to solve the problem. So it’s not like I’m getting something I didn’t sign up for. But still... this is the type of cheese I’m not about. Yet I’m not thinking of dropping this show anytime soon. Funny how that works: shows are being dropped left and right, and this is probably the show I would least likely drop next to Shokugeki. Truly shows idol hell is a thing.

The “Red Flags” Almost Dropped Episode of the Week: Blend S

Yeah, so this show’s not getting any better with regards to its approach. This week was focused a bit more on the cafe, but the whole thing with Dino and Maika looks to be a main topic rather than just a side thing. Not my thing unfortunately. I actually dropped the show when the boob grab happened, but after looking at the discussion thread, I decided to give it another chance, and well I guess I’m sticking around for the next episode, because “Surprise” is coming, and I want to see how that goes even though I know what the “surprise” is... thanks /r/animemes. So this show’s on the shortest of leashes. A shame considering its first few episodes were genuinely pretty good.

Best Episode of the Week: Juuni Taisen

It’s around this point that shows are starting to show their true colors. Gimmicks don’t work anymore, and now it’s serious business to grab viewers’ attentions and show how good the show is (heh). So it’s expected that a few shows have started to fall off (like the show above). But there are two shows so far that haven’t fallen off the cliff yet, and that’s the top two shows in the rankings above. So for this week’s best episode, I’d like to talk about how Juuni Taisen’s done a good job of grabbing my attention at the beginning of the episode and keeping it until the end (since I’ve talked a bit about Shokugeki last week).

It’s predictable, yeah. We already know Rat’s gonna win because the end credits, and also because of the Zodiac story. But even with that, the whole process in how the killings go isn’t as predictable, and that’s the fun part. Well, that and the backstories for each character. It’s interesting to see the pasts of each character and how they made it to where they are. No show this season is able to grab my attention more than Juuni Taisen, and that’s all thanks to a certain someone who told me to give the show a chance. Because let’s be honest, I would’ve never watched this given it’s genre. And if I did, I would’ve stopped watching after the... edgy first episode. But I’m glad I stuck it out, because it’s been a wild ride so far. Can’t wait to see how it plays out.

And that’s all for this week! Thanks for reading and I’ll see you in the next post!

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thejpfdude-blog · 7 years

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The Week in Anime (Week of 8/14/17)

Hello friends and welcome to another edition of TWiA! There’s a lot to get through, but first let’s head on over to...

The News Corner

This week didn’t have too much in terms of shocking news. The one thing I do want to highlight that came out this week is:

Violet Evergarden PV2

Mmm that’s good stuff. Not as amazingly animated as the first CM, but that was more or less done for the light novel so I don’t expect the whole show to be that level of quality. And even then the PV had some dang good animation, complete with some more information about the show. From the translation done here, one might think it has a big focus on romance. And that’s what I thought too, that is until I read another comment in the same thread that mentioned light novel spoilers but had a TL;DR stating it’s a coming-of-age story and not a romance. Good to know, otherwise I probably would’ve had the wrong expectations for it.

I’m not gonna lie though, I’m pretty hyped for this show. I’m trying not to be, but ever since the CM came out (which was the first glimpse of the show), my first question was “when?” (which has since turned into “how many days until January?”). I’m excited for the potential pairing between KyoAni animation and a great story considering the light novel won the Grand Prize award in the same yearly award that other light novel-turned-KyoAni shows like Kyoukai no Kanata and Chuunibyou only got Honorable Mentions in. Well, only four months to go. That’s not that long of a wait honestly.

Now before I get onto the rankings and awards, I want to write some blurbs about some shows I recently finished. Now some of these shows aren’t ones I finished within the last week, but I think it’s a good time to talk about them after having them stew in my head for a little. So let me start by talking about a show I might have an article on in the future...

Love Live Sunshine

With season 2 of this coming soon, I was determined to try and finish this show. And I did. So that’s nice.

On a more serious note, Sunshine was a nice sort of spin-off to the main Love Live anime. I think one of the biggest complaints I heard was that it was too similar to the original anime, and I can see that. The whole school-closing storyline was a bit too convenient, though it actually didn’t get resolved by the end of the season, so that’s something to keep an eye out next season. Another thing was the similarities of the leaders of each group, which I strongly agree with. I mean I wasn’t a huge Honoka (Honkers) fan in general, and Chika to me feels sorta like a ripoff of her (hence the reason I call her Ripoff Honkers).

But some of the other stuff wasn’t as bad to me. Like other than Ripoff Honkers (and Dia to an extent) I feel like each character is unique enough to be their own person, rather than be a clone of a previous μ‘s member. Sure there’s some obvious parallels that can be made. Ruby/Hanayo for shyness (which is even eluded to in the anime), Mari/Nozomi for being the memester, etc. But when I think of, say Hanamaru, I don’t think of anybody from μ‘s in particular, but about her zuras and her eating habits. Same schtick for the rest of them (except Ripoff Honkers). If anything, I like Aqours a bit more than μ‘s so far, if only because my favorite character from the Rabu Raibus is in Aqours (though favorite group is still a toss-up as of now).

Story-wise, I liked Sunshine a lot more than the original, if only because there was a minimum of the “power of friendship” stuff that the original had (like the final scene from the last episode of S1). And before episode 10 when the third-years joined the group, I actually liked how the drama didn’t feel too cheesy. Of course, that changed when the third-years joined, but it still wasn’t as cheesy as the original show, which was nice. Add in the fact that the slice-of-life scenes added some nice snark (making it less /r/wholesomememes cult-like happy), and in the end Sunshine > original (at least anime-wise). 6/10 overall, and actually somewhat excited for the next season in 2 months-ish.

Free!

Funny story. Actually not really funny, or a story: I had this on my list for some time, but it wasn’t until I visited my friend last week that we ended up watching the first 6 episodes of this show. And then from there I finished it a few days later, and now we’re here.

This show’s pretty famous for its manservice (fanservice of the male variety), and I’m not gonna deny that. In fact, I’ll confirm it: there were a lot of shots of those muscular sculpted bodies, toned to perfection.

...

Uh yeah. But other than that this show was actually pretty fun to watch. I don’t know how much of that is the fact that there was at least one main girl character in the show, who ended becoming one of my favorite girls and now has a place in my Favorite Characters list on my MAL profile.

But it’s really because in it’s core it’s a sports anime, and not of the shounen type. Like there’s competition and hype sports moments with none of the shounen tropes like explaining every single ilttle thing. It’s actually... like sports with just plain competing, which as a huge sports nut I’m down for. The races were pretty hype, and the drama between the characters wasn’t too out there (though the whole thing between Rin and Haruka seemed very ship-friendly).

So overall, a surprisingly good show, manservice aside. I’ll definitely be watching the second season of this soon (once I settle in to my new place). 7/10 would recommend for swimming shenanigans.

Teekyuu

In my quest to have Nisemonogatari be my 200th entry on MAL, I watched shorts/specials that wouldn’t take too much time to watch. So why not watch the famed 2-minute short known for having faster pace than the Roadrunner? Generally I don’t like fast-paced shows, but I think that this short does a really good job with itself. Content-wise this show is so freaking ridiculous and doesn’t take itself seriously. But it works for the most part, and it’s pretty hilarious. Though it’s technically about a tennis club, I think they only have tennis in like 3 of the episodes, with the others focusing on some other random subject.

If there’s one negative to this, it’s the pace. Because as well as they use it, it’s still super quick, and sometimes an episode goes by and I go “what just happened?” Still, it’s a stupidly fun show: overall 6/10, and definitely will be watching the next 8 seasons (no I’m not joking, the ninth season is airing right now).

Nisemonogatari

So that was an adventure. This was an interesting case study, considering these were the stories that Nisio Isin (the author of the light novel) never intended to be released. As a result this show ended up being probably the most controversial entry in the Monogatari series. And it showed: this version of Monogatari really ramped up on some questionable scenes. Before I get into the infamous scene this show’s known for, let me get into some other stuff I wasn’t really about. First, the bath scene in episode 4. I don’t doubt it was an important scene: in fact it’s probably one of the most important scenes in the whole of Monogatari. But it’s the whole showing a naked 8-year old girl for the majority of the episode thing that made me pretty uncomfortable. It’s funny looking at the comments of the rewatch thread, and people trying to explain why it wasn’t that bad. The most common thing I saw was that it wasn’t sexualized at all, what with Araragi not being pedo like he is with the others and the fact that there wasn’t any zoom-ins of the naughty bits.

Yet the problem I have with that is that at it’s core it’s still... a naked 8-year old for the majority of an anime episode. And I’m not denying what the people in that thread are saying: actually it makes a hella lot of sense. But it’s still a naked 8-year old. I’m not about that life, even with the deeper meaning and all that.

And now that toothbrush scene. That... was a thing. Yep, a thing. Indeed. A. Thing.

Sigh... that was honestly the most uncomfortable I’ve been while watching anime. I’m glad I live alone or else I would have feared a roommate or something coming into my room and seeing me watch that.

Now before you start telling me “deeper meaning” and all that jazz, I’ll just say this: my least favorite subject was English. The reason? I always had to be on the lookout for some deeper meaning, some symbolism, etc., instead of just enjoying reading. Now with the Monogatari series full of its more deeper themes, symbolism and looking deeper into events is very necessary. But looking past the deeper meaning this scene is a guy brushing his sister’s teeth while she starts getting sexually aroused, almost leading to a kiss in the end. That’s... also not my thing. Big time.

Well, that rant’s out of the way. Not counting the above scenes (as well as some of the other questionable stuff like imouto boob touch), I actually did enjoy this show. Monogatari’s slowly becoming one of my favorite franchises, making what should like a boring dialogue-heavy show fun and interesting. And now that Nisemonogatari’s out of the way I’m excited for what’s arguably the best version of Monogatari, Monogatari 2nd Season (kinda misnamed don’tcha think?). Overall despite above statements still a 7/10 show, with hope for the future.

Now that that’s done let’s move on to the good ol’...

Rankings:

1 (0). New Game!! (9/10) [5/12]

2 (0). Princess Principal (8.5/10) [6/?]

3 (0). Kakegurui (7/10) [6/12]

4 (0). Tsurezure Children (7/10) [6/?]

5 (0). Boku no Hero Academia 2nd Season (7/10) [19/25]

6 (+1). Sakura Quest (5/10) [19/25]

7 (-1). Ballroom e Youkoso (5/10) [6/24]

8 (0). Centaur no Nayami (5/10) [6/12]

9 (0). Isekai Shokudou (4.5/10) [6/?]

10 (0). Nana Maru San Batsu (4/10) [6/12]

Awards

The Tangent Award: Centaur no Nayami

After 6 episodes, I think I have a general idea of why I feel like this show is off. Now, don’t get me wrong, I do like the show. Some of the scenes offer some nice commentary on the small issues that these people face (like the whole toilet thing) that some people may think is pedantic but I think is super interesting. Basically the stuff like the first few episodes of Demi-chan wa Kataritai (with the nice interviews and stuff).

The problem that this show has is that it goes through different scenes that seem jarring in transition. It jumps from one thing to a completely random thing, leaving me wondering how they even got to a certain point in the episode. Though in the end they’re able to show that the disjointed events are somewhat connected, the connection’s as fragile as Troy Tulowitzki (sports fan explanation: a baseball player who’s seemingly always injured, hence he’s called “fragile”). And in the end I continue on, wondering what I just watched for the past 23 or so minutes. I feel like there’s a better way to organize the episode, but I’m not really sure how yet. For now I’ll just continue watching, because despite questionable organization it’s still a mildly entertaining show.

The Not Comfy Award: Kakegurui

Yo but actually what was that episode. Return of masochist queen = return of fear for my life. This show isn’t high on my “comfy show” list, but after this episode it’s sunken even lower.

On a totally unrelated note, I’ve changed my opinion from slightly liking Yumeko to not liking her at all. In fact it’s kinda funny that my opinions of Yumeko and Mary flipped, and now I find Mary to be the better girl (if not best girl of the show). Seeing how she’s not just one of the crazies and actually seems kinda nice is reassuring to say the least (even if the crazy leaks out at times). The return of Suzui was also nice, considering he’s a good dynamic compared to the insane characters in the show. If anything, I’m curious to see how this ends, considering the pace so far and the fact that it’s one cour.

Best Episode of the Week: Princess Principal

After three straight weeks of New Game!!, we finally get a new show for best episode of the week. It was a hard choice, considering this week’s episode of New Game!! was very good. But Princess Principal wins out with a great episode about Dorothy and her life before being a spy.

I won’t go deep into the episode because I want to try to not have too much spoilers in these blurbs. But what I will say is that dang, these girls have good reason for being spies. Also that the end of this episode was pretty sad, especially considering Dorothy’s final line. Princess Principal’s been impressing so far, and I love the disjointed style of storytelling (with case 6 last week and case 18 this week). Next to New Game!!, this show’s been my favorite of the season. I highly recommend it even if you aren’t the biggest fan of CGDCTs or spy stuff.

And that’s all for this week! Thanks for reading! Just a quick announcement/notice: I’ll be busy next week preparing for school and moving into my new place, so I wouldn’t be surprised if I don’t have the time to watch the currently-airing shows. If that does happen I’ll mention which ones I didn’t get to, and if it doesn’t well then it’ll be business as usual. Anyway, thanks again and I’ll see you in the next post!

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thejpfdude-blog · 7 years

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The Week in Anime (Week of 8/7/17)

Hi and welcome to TWiA. Today is Day of Mon (sick reference bro). But before I get into the nitty gritty, I want to introduce yet another new thing to these weekly posts, which is:

The News Corner

This is where I’ll talk about recent anime news from the past week. If there isn’t anything interesting (which hopefully shouldn’t be the case), then I’ll just leave it blank for the week. But the reason I want to introduce this is mainly because of the surprising news that came out a few days ago, which is that...

Dagashi Kashi is getting a second season

I seriously didn’t expect this show to get a second season. It was an okay show, but it felt more like a candy infomercial than an anime show most of the time. Out of all the second season announcements for this year, this one is probably the most unexpected for me. But I guess it makes sense: apparently the manga sold really well after the show ended, which at the end of the day is what anime adapatations are really meant to do (advertise the source material).

One interesting thing to note is the studio change: instead of the studio feel doing it again, the second season’ll be handled by Tezuka Productions, a studio I never heard of. Under futher investigation, I learned that this is one of the oldest studios out there, founded by somebody regarded as the “godfather of manga”, a Mr. Osamu Tezuka. Apparently the studio mainly adapted works from Mr. Tezuka, and used to be pretty popular back in the 80s and 90s. Pretty interesting stuff, but also somewhat worrying considering the studio doesn’t have a great track record for shows from this decade (Kids on the Slope and Young Black Jack seem to be the only somewhat noteworthy shows). Even more worrying is that the studio and the staff don’t really have any experience with the type of show Dagashi Kashi is: a relaxed slice-of-life. Another thing is that with the studio change comes different designs for the characters, which kinda sucks in my opinion. I liked the designs of Hotaru and Saya, what with their crazy eyes. I thought that feel nailed their designs in the show, and changing it seems like it’ll do more harm than good. It’s still too early to tell (with only one visual) but Hotaru’s new character design seems kinda more relaxed compared to before, which apparently is supposed to be more true to what she looks like in the manga. Not sure if I like the change, but again it’s still too early to tell.

With all that said I’ll still watch the second season because it was still a decent show. Though I would be a bit wary given all the changes.

And now let’s move on to those...

Rankings:

1 (0). New Game!! (8.5/10) [4/12]

2 (+1). Princess Principal (8/10) [4-5/?]

3 (-1). Kakegurui (8/10) [-/12]

4 (0). Tsurezure Children (8/10) [5/?]

5 (0). Boku no Hero Academia 2nd Season (7/10) [18/25]

6 (0). Ballroom e Youkoso (7/10) [-/24]

7 (0). Sakura Quest (6/10) [18/25]

8 (+1). Centaur no Nayami (5/10) [5/12]

9 (-1). Isekai Shokudou (5/10) [5/?]

10 (0). Nana Maru San Batsu (5/10) [5/12]

Awards

The Tsurezure Children Couple Update

Welcome back to the Tsurezure Children Couple Update where I talk about high school couples in the least creepiest context.

This week we have three skits, so three couples to talk about. The first couple featured I think a new couple texting and stuff (though this may have been the couple from the first episode, I’m not 100% sure). This was my favorite skit of the episode: I was laughing pretty hard at how at the exact moment the girl confessed by text, the guy sent a text saying it’s pretty bad to confess by text. Truly some impeccable timing. And the whole time their reactions to each other’s texts was some cute stuff. Man I hope they resolve this though.

The second skit featured the return of the astronomy club, but this time with a childhood friend. And with the friend comes a classic LOVE TRIANGLE. I liked this one, though apparently it was pretty forgettable since I legitimately forgot which couple it was while typing this (which really shows that I shouldn’t type these blurbs days after watching an episode).

Finally, the third skit featured the return of nervous blue-haired girl and tall bad word-choice guy. At first it seemed like stuff was gonna go down, but in the end it’s classic bad word-choice guy with his classic bad word choices. Nice end to a somewhat tense moment, and nice end to another great episode of this show.

The “Rubik’s Cube” Boring Show of the Week Award: Isekai Shokudou

It’s just... gotten boring. The last few episodes have had storylines that honestly I didn’t give a dongle about, ranging from history of lizard people to the struggles of being vegan. Actually, I don’t even remember the storylines from the last episode (typing this on Thursday when I watched the episode on Monday). That’s how much I become invested in this show (not). Even the food isn’t really worth it in the end. It’s like I said to somebody a few days ago: when the food is better looking in a CGDCT (New Game!!) than it is in a show about food, you know something’s wrong. Though hopefully it’s looking like next episode will feature people from past episodes interacting with each other, which should be more interesting than a nature documentary (no offense to nature documentaries: I like watching them. But not in anime form).

Best Episode of the Week: New Game!!

Once again it’s Hifumi time this week in New Game!!. I’m starting to get the feeling that Hifumi is the main character, and not Aoba. Which I’m not complaining about, because Hifumi best girl.

But in all seriousness this week’s episode was, like the last few week’s episodes, top quality. Though there were some questionable inconsistency with the faces, overall it was still an enjoyable episode. The insert song was somewhat unexpected but well done for the brief time it happened, and the reaction faces were once again on point. A nice show to relax to overall.

One kinda cheesy thing I do want to mention is how this show’s starting to have an impact on my life. Seeing Hifumi working hard towards her goal of overcoming her social struggles kinda makes me work towards getting out of my comfort zone and trying new things. Whenever I don’t want to do something social or out of my comfort zone I just think “well this anime grill with crippling social anxiety is doing well for herself, why can’t you, a real hooman bean, do something like that?”. So that’s nice. It’s good that anime can be more than just an entertainment medium sometimes.

And that’s all for this week! Thanks for reading yet again! I anticipate that next week I’ll have a lot to say about shows seeing as I have a free week until I get back to school which I’ll spend binge-watching all of the shows. Anyway, until then I’ll see you in the next post!

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thejpfdude-blog · 7 years

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The Week in Anime (Week of 7/31/17)

Yo and welcome to TWiA! This week we have episodes, and stuff about said episodes. Before we get started though, I’d like to apologize. Because Princess Principal didn’t come out with their newest episode until really late, I couldn’t watch it in time for this post. I would like to say it won’t happen again, but it’s totally out of my control so I can’t promise anything.

Anyways, let’s start off this shindig with the rankings:

Rankings:

1 (+1). New Game!! (8.5/10) [3/12]

2 (+2). Kakegurui (8/10) [5/12]

3 (0). Princess Principal (7.5/10) [-/?]

4 (+1). Tsurezure Children (7.5/10) [4/?]

5 (+1). Boku no Hero Academia 2nd Season (7/10) [17/25]

6 (+1). Ballroom e Youkoso (7/10) [4-5/24]

7 (+1). Sakura Quest (6/10) [17/25]

8 (-7). Isekai Shokudou (6/10) [4/?]

9 (0). Centaur no Nayami (5/10) [4/12]

10 (0). Nana Maru San Batsu (5/10) [4/12]

Awards

The Tsurezure Children Couple Update

This is a new weekly thing I’ll be doing. With all of the couples in this show, I wanted to write some quick words about each of their shenanigans of the week, whether I enjoyed it or not. Four sections for each of the four skits.

So let’s start off with the first part, featuring my favorite couple. I loved the whole thing with the mom coming in not once but twice, which is something I replayed while watching the episode multiple times. Not to mention the chemistry between them is pretty great, and humorous as well. Like I said in my Initial Impressions post, a nice balance between romance and comedy with none of the frustrations.

Then we move on to the second part with the student council president and the delinquent couple. President’s pretty alpha, but I felt like in this episode he was a bit too forceful. It helps that the girl liked him, but I shudder to think of the results if she didn’t.

The third part featured one of the main couples in the class rep and the playful girl. I don’t really like this couple too much, especially since the girl is a bit too playful for my tastes. And the whole indecisiveness factor isn’t really my thing: I’m in it for the vanilla couple interactions. Anyway, the skit in general was all right: nothing too special for me.

Finally, we get the couple that’s been featured at the end of the past few recent episodes: the misunderstandings couple. I don’t like this couple because of said misunderstandings, but honestly this week’s episode showed some progression with the girl struggling with some feelings. It’s better than nothing I suppose.

The Roller Coaster Award: Isekai Shokudou

Just as quickly as it rose up in the rankings, it fell. And it fell hard. I think this was also apparent in the last episode, but this show looks to have a limited ceiling. In it’s core it’s a nice relaxing show about enjoying food. But because of that it’s limited in what it can do. And the approach it’s taking right now isn’t really the best way to tackle this sort of show. I loved the second episode of this show because of the emotional connections between the food and the people eating it. The last two episodes haven’t really offered that, and especially with this episode the plotlines have been a bit boring. This week was nature documentary + vegan with bratty attitude, both of which didn’t really resonate with me. If you like these types of shows than it’ll be fine but I think that generally for me I want more than just people enjoying food. Amaama to Inazuma is a great example of that. It was nice seeing them cook food and enjoy it, but they didn’t really do much beyond that and the show got stale as a result. Not saying it was a bad show: in fact I loved the cooking aspects. Just that it shouldn’t have ranked so high, because it’s limited in what it can do. Same with this show. And thus I’ll go into episodes with lower expectations, knowing not every episode can be episode 2.

The Excuse Me Award: Centaur no Nayami

Hmm... that was a thing. I was warned about the first half of this episode beforehand, and I have to say it was quite questionable. Fortunately after seeing some snippets of the manga I can gladly say it was done tastefully (however tastefully you can do a “hey let’s look at each other’s gooches scene”). Still, that was a whole half-episode about looking at your friend’s privates. I feel like there’s a lot more... better topics that can be discussed with a world like this full of strange creatures and stuff. Not to mention the episode was plagued with the same problems from two weeks ago with the weird pacing and sudden transitions to weird plot points (how did we get from studying to talking about Antarctican snake people?). Still, it was strangely... okay? Like I didn’t hate the episode, and I’m still planning to continue watching more of it. I don’t know, it must be doing something right.

Best Episode of the Week: New Game!!

Wow what a Hifumi-filled episode! Some great reaction faces and they even had the scene with the clothes shopping that I saw in the manga. Good.

And even more than that, I loved how there were a lot of relatable moments in the episode. For example the whole first scene with Aoba struggling to help the others reminds me of those times when I was silent during group meetings/discussions. Only that was more of a shyness thing (which is also relatable via Hifumi). Still, I relate to how you want to help but can’t do so, making you feel useless.

The second thing I liked were the programming scenes. Can relate given I used to be a CS major (until I dropped out because I wasn’t about the coding lyfe).

And finally, an overall thing that’s pretty relatable is Hifumi breaking out of her shell. I was never as bad as her in terms of social anxiety, but I was pretty bad in social situations. In fact, I still am somewhat bad, but I’ve been working on it. And it’s really through practice that you do it, and learning from the mistakes/cringy moments that you improve. It’s nice to see her improving in her communication skills, especially since the last anime I watched that had a character with social anxiety didn’t turn out too good (looking at you Kuma Miko...).

In short, New Game S2′s been a blast so far. Hopefully it continues to do so.

And that’s all for this week! Thanks for reading, and I’ll see you in the next post!

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thejpfdude-blog · 7 years

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The Week in Anime (Week of 6/12/17)

Hello and welcome to another weekly version of TWiA! There’s not much for me to write about this week, but I did finish a few classic shows, which I’ll talk about below in the section “Completed Shows”. Let’s start off then with...

Rankings:

1 (0). Boku no Hero Academia 2nd Season (8.5/10) [11/25]

2 (0). Tsuki ga Kirei (7.5/10) [9/?]

3 (+1). Sakura Quest (7/10) [10/25]

4 (+1). Aggressive Retsuko (7/10) [-/?]

5 (-2). Saenai Heroine no Sodatekata ♭ (6.5/10) [9/11]

6 (0). Nobunaga no Shinobi S2 (4/10) [9/?]

Completed Shows

Love Live! School Idol Festival (6/10): It’s official: I’m in idol hell. The one thing I told myself I wasn’t going to get into, and look where we are today. It all started... when I was born.

JK, it started when I played the mobile game. That was some good stuff. I generally like rhythm games, and it hooked me since it was rhythm game + cute anime girls. And then when somebody asked me who was best girl and I didn’t have an answer because I didn’t know them too well, that’s when I made the horrible decision to watch the anime. At times it was cringe, other times it was fun. That’s the basic summary of how I felt the anime was. Like the stories in the mobile game, there are some really cheesy moments when the good ol’ “power of friendship and hard work” was used to get the girls past their troubles. And none of the hard stuff was really shown in the anime: in particular, how they heck did the OG3 get a full song out of the piano tune that Maki made for them? And how did they get the merch so quickly? And how is popularity determined? A lot of unanswered questions that I guess ultimately weren’t too important, and more nitpicky than anything. Because overall, it was still a decent watch. I mean, I finished it. And I want to watch the second season (in fact I’m watching it right now). It had it’s fun slice-of-lifey moments that apparently are more prevalent in season 2. So yeah, a bit more hopeful that season 2 should be better. A decent 6/10 show, would recommend if you like idol stuff.

P.S. Nico best girl. So far at least.

FLCL (8/10): Wow was that an experience. I still don’t know what I really watched, but it was super fun anyway. I don’t really have much to say about this other than 1.) the abovementioned fact that it was entertaining and 2.) the art and soundtrack were really amazing. I loved the manga sections in episode 1 and 6, even if it was super fast-paced. Plus the action scenes were really well done and didn’t seem dated at all. And wow, that soundtrack. I think I found myself a favorite rock band. The soundtrack was A+, hands down the best soundtrack of any anime I’ve watched. No, of any medium I’ve experienced. In fact I’m listening to the soundtrack right now as I’m typing this out. Really added to the experience in a positive way.

Overall, I’m really glad I gave this show a chance, and I’m kicking myself a bit for waiting so long to watch it. I would very much recommend to everybody out there, even those who don’t like shows of this genre (though what genre it is, I’m not too sure). Strong 8/10, would watch again. And am a bit excited for the second season coming out soon.

Awards

Top 10 Anime Betrayals Award: Saekano S2

WTF was those last 3 minutes of the episode? This is... not what I expected from this show. Also the betrayal thing isn’t cool. But IDK, I kinda phased out of this show in the last few weeks: it’s gone full ambiguous. My opinion on all of the characters has lowered, either because of their actions or because they just haven’t even shown up in the show (hint hint a certain cousin). I guess this is a roundabout way of saying this show’s second season hasn’t been very good, or at least it hasn’t been as good as the first season for me. It’s like I mentioned a few blog posts ago: it’s like Oregairu with me. The first season was fun, had nice fun slice-of-life moments with some light drama here and there. But then the second season went full drama and unexplained stuff, and that’s when I kinda stopped enjoying it. Well, there’s still two episodes left to see what happens with this crew. But I feel like I can say with somewhat high confidence that this season has not lived up to my low expectations. Well, happens.

Best Episode of the Week: Sakura Quest

This week didn’t have a stand-out “best episode”: Tsuki ga Kirei was all right, Saekano was as mentioned above, and the shorts were either bad or didn’t even come out this week. Boku no Hero Academia was a pretty good episode this week, but I think looking back, Sakura Quest had the best episode this week. It didn’t do anything special, but it was an enjoyable 24 minutes and I had a good time watching. Which at the end, is all I’m looking for. Not much else to talk about, other than I’m looking forward to see how this arc goes especially since it focuses on the character I’m liking the most so far, Ririko.

Well, that’s all for this week! Thanks for reading, and I’ll see you in the next post!

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thejpfdude-blog · 7 years

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The Week in Anime (Week of 6/5/17)

Heyo and welcome to another edition of TWiA! It’s already June, which means next month a new season of anime is arriving (to which I say whaa?...) But it’s not July, so we still have this season to wrap up. So let’s talk about some of these shows, because there’s been some movement in the good ol’ rankings:

Rankings:

1 (0). Boku no Hero Academia 2nd Season (8.5/10) [10/25]

2 (+2). Tsuki ga Kirei (8/10) [8/?]

3 (-1). Saenai Heroine no Sodatekata ♭ (7/10) [8/11]

4 (-1). Sakura Quest (7/10) [9/25]

5 (0). Aggressive Retsuko (6/10) [59/?]

6 (0). Nobunaga no Shinobi S2 (4/10) [8/?]

Awards

The “Chocolate Bar” Worst Reason for Plot Progression Award: Sakura Quest

It wasn’t even a major plot point in the episode, but the reason why big chef dude and Shiori’s sister didn’t meet back in the day was pretty stupid. It reminded me of the time in ERASED when the girl’s dad left her family because he stole a chocolate bar (or something like that). Like it was probably a few years ago, so I’m assuming that they had cell phones that told them what day it was. A bit questionable then that she got the date wrong. But like I said before, sort of a minor plot thing, so in the long run it wasn’t that horrible. Still, it was enough to get my attention I guess.

Worst Megumi Episode: Saekano S2

I have to say that my concerns of stupidity didn’t get any better with this episode. Yes, it was a Megumi episode, which at first sounds pretty great considering the focus had been on a lot of other girls. But everything seemed kinda ambiguous and I had no idea why the characters were acting like they were. Sorta like real life... not. I would complain that Megumi suddenly changed way too much, but I think the whole idea of her being “human” (in the best possible way a fictional character can be human) is the driving force for the change, so I can’t complain about it too much. In a way, I guess I don’t like how “human” she is now: maybe I’m just too shallow, but I’m looking for something more easily understandable, something that I can grasp. That doesn’t mean relying on well-known character tropes, though. It’s a fine balance, and something that only a few shows I’ve seen do right. For now though, I’ll just enjoy the last few episodes of this.

Best Episode of the Week: Tsuki ga Kirei

Speaking of simple, there’s this show. Especially this episode. If I told you what happened this episode, I can distinctly sum it up to “the two of them went on a date”. Yet the way it was done was pretty refreshing compared to most romance stuff I’ve seen. I’m a simple man: I like the nice little interactions between romantic couples. It’s why Honobono Log is one of my favorite shows/shorts. Yet most anime just focus on the quest towards becoming a couple. It doesn’t really have much on the boring stuff after. And really, that’s why: it’s boring for most people. I understand that what Tsuki ga Kirei’s doing is safe compared to most shows: it doesn’t honestly do anything revolutionary or new in the romance genre. But it doesn’t have to: it can just do what a lot of romance fans want in a show. Nice little interactions that are cute and make you question what you’re doing with your life (oh is that just me? Nevermind then...). This show’s been doing a great job of that, and it’s quickly becoming one of my favorite shows especially since every other show I’m watching has been on the decline or stagnating a bit. Hope there’s more of these nice moments and none of the pointless drama I see in some shows.

And that’s all for this week! Thanks for reading, and I’ll see you in the next post!

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thejpfdude-blog · 7 years

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The Week in Anime (Week of May 1st, 2017)

Hello and welcome to another edition of TWiA! I’m gearing up for my finals coming up, but luckily my university at least gives us a week of nothing before finals to study. So the week this post corresponds to is that week and the week after that (the week of the 8th) is the start of finals. Almost there!...

Anyway, with that in mind my posts in the next two weeks may not be that great/might be short, so just a bit of a heads up! I’ll try and put a little “Initial Impressions of the Spring 2017 season” post soon as soon as I’m done watching the third episode of SukaSuka (more on that later). But for now, let’s start off this post with the classic:

Rankings:

1 (+1). Boku no Hero Academia 2nd Season (8.5/10) [5/25]

2 (-1). Saenai Heroine no Sodatekata ♭ (8/10) [3/11]

3 (0). Sakura Quest (7/10) [4/25]

4 (0). Aggressive Retsuko (6/10) [52-55/?]

5 (0). Tsuki ga Kirei (6/10) [4/?]

6 (NEW). SukaSuka (decent/10) [1-2/?]

7 (-1). Nobunaga no Shinobi S2 (5/10) [4/?]

Awards

The Sweet Show Award: Tsuki ga Kirei

I’ve kinda forgotten why I include romance in the genres that I like to watch. After all, I haven’t watched much romances to begin with and the ones from recent seasons have really been lacking. That’s why I’m glad I decided to stick with this show. Sure, it’s awkward and might feel a bit slow. But it’s really freaking nice to watch when the main characters actually interact with each other. And it was pretty relatable to an extent, even to someone who hasn’t had any experience in the romance department. The feeling of desperation and the “should I, shouldn’t I” conflict that arose from this episode was a good example of that. I don’t really know if they’re actually a couple yet, but I hope that doesn’t become a thing where their relationship is in a grey spot. Time will tell I guess.

The Questionable Scenes Award: SukaSuka

So this show was one of the few shows that was recommended by many, and I did give it a shot at first, albeit a bit of an unfair one. I gave it a second try, and well I guess it was okay. It was interesting enough to watch, though I have to mention the few questionable scenes that arose. Those scenes are the ones with the troll wanting to eat the main character dude and then the whole thing with the blue-haired one wanting a kiss and instead getting a “massage” (emphasis on the quotes). Those seemed... a bit unnecessary. Other than those scenes there was some nice world-building going on, and it’ll be interesting to see what’s the deal with the MC and the past events that happened. Actually, I’m actually not sure if I’m going to continue with this show, as I’m giving it a third episode to truly see if it’s something I want to continue watching. But for now, chalk me for the SukaSuka train.

The “Too Much Exposure” Award: Nobunaga no Shinobi S2

I think if this short was just one season, or even just one cour, it would have been something I really enjoyed. But it’s just been kinda eh lately, and I blame that on the new characters and the same jokes now falling flat. The newest character is kinda creepy to be honest, and his thing with teasing Chidori is kinda questionable. And the jokes: the ones that made me laugh before aren’t doing the same now because I think they’re using the same kinds of jokes, making it fall flat. And without the jokes, this show doesn’t really offer much else. I honestly hope this show ends soon, because I’m kinda forecasting the same trend I see with almost every long-running short I watch: good, great, decent, then meh, and sometiimes bad.

The “Insert Fast Food Restaurant Here” Mmm Good Award: Saekano ♭

Ah yes, the stable rock in a sea of sequels. Actually, that’s wrong: this season’s shows haven’t been too bad. Anyway, Saekano is still good. That’s all I really have to say. Though it’s looking like it’ll get a bit more drama-heavy for the season, there are still the classic moments of the characters being meta with their funny interactions. Except for the fact that Utaha pretty much screwed over the circle with her thing regarding the scripts... I was pretty impressed when I deduced that choosing script = choosing girl, and then of course Tomoda chooses option C: none of the above. Not that there’s anything wrong with that. Well, we’ll see how this affects them in the future.

The “Red Flags” Dropped Show of the Week Award: None

Just picking up new shows...

Best Episode of the Week: Boku no Hero Academia 2nd Season

Well, after watching that there’s only one thing to say (and yes I have made this joke several times, I know). That was hype, like really hype. I haven’t felt hype like this since Haikyuu with the Shiratorizawa match. But this time, it felt like I was really in the moment instead of just kinda watching the highlights. I think this show is a good example of execution done right: a show doesn’t have to have an amazing plot to be good. I’m pretty excited for the next few episodes, even if the next episode looks to be one of those “deeper” episodes.

And that’s all for this week! Thanks for reading and I’ll see you in the next post!

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thejpfdude-blog · 7 years

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The Week in Anime (Week of 4/10/17)

Hello and welcome to a very late version of TWiA! Also the first (and only) "Wednesday” version of TWiA! Yep, quick side note, I’m moving the TWiA posts back to Monday because I like the timing of how it starts in the brand-new work week. So I’m just gonna plan better, and hopefully I can start actually posting on Mondays again!

Anyways, it’s been a while, and during that time a season has ended and a new one has sprung up. So I’m dividing this post into two parts: the Winter 2017 show version and the Spring 2017 Show version. So let’s start off with some rankings and get this show on the road:

FINAL Rankings (Winter 2017):

1 (0). Kobayashi-san Chi no Maid Dragon (8/10 FINAL) [12-13/13]

2 (0). Kono Subarashii Sekai ni Shukufuku wo! 2 (8/10 FINAL)

3 (0). Kuzu no Honkai (7/10 FINAL) [12/12]

4 (0). Aggressive Retsuko (7/10) [50/?]

5 (+1). Nobunaga no Shinobi (6/10 FINAL) [26/26]

6 (+1). Demi-chan wa Kataritai (5/10 FINAL)

7 (-2). Gabriel DropOut (5/10 FINAL) [12/12]

8 (0). Sengoku Choujuu Giga: Otsu (5/10 FINAL) [12-13/13]

9 (0). Nyanbo (3/10 FINAL) [26/26]

Rankings (Spring 2017):

1 (0). Boku no Hero Academia 2nd Season (good/10) [1-2/25]

2 (0). Sakura Quest (good/10) [1/?]

3 (0). Aggressive Retsuko (7/10) [50-51/?]

4 (0). Hinako Note (decent/10) [1/12]

5 (0). Nobunaga no Shinobi S2 (decent/10) [1/?]

6 (0). Tsuki ga Kirei (decent/10) [1/?]

7 (0). Alice to Zouroku (decent/10) [1/12]

Awards (Winter 2017):

The Satisfying Ending Award: Kuzu no Honkai

If we’re talking pure emotion, this series’ last episode was a letdown. But I think even without all of that emotion involved, the show did a great job of ending the show. Sure, it wasn’t happy for all of the parties involved, but everybody learned something and at the end of the day, we avoided the nuclear ending similar to what happened with Kuma Miko. It was a nice satisfying end to a show that was a whole bunch of stuff from horrible characters (in a good way) doing horrible things in the name of love and pleasure. It wasn’t realistic like some said, but it was still an interesting take in a genre in anime that doesn’t really have too much going for it, AKA romance. Though I’m over the whole emotional swirl this show made me go through, I can still appreciate the journey that it took me, and realize that it isn’t just meaningless junk. Overall, a solid 7/10 for me: would recommend to those who want an interesting romance/drama.

The Stagnant Award: Gabriel DropOut

For the first few episodes, this show was pretty good with the gimmick that it had. The only problem was that once the gimmick got old, it stayed on course and eventually everything about the show got old. The same jokes were being played out, and the characters didn’t change at all from the first few episodes. Not saying that character development is required, but it would be interesting to see different sides of their personality or even other aspects of them different from what we saw in the first three episodes. Instead we have Gab being the same lazy bum, Vigne being the same nice girl, Raphi being the same sadistic weirdo, and Satania being the same annoying chuuni-like character. By the last episode, I was tired of the characters and their shenanigans, and just wanted the episode to be over. Hopeful at first, but at the end a 5/10 show: average CGDCT that I would only recommend to the hardcore lovers of CGDCT shows.

The “Oh My God It’s Over” Award: Nyanbo!

Hallelujah, there is a god after all! This show never got better, and by the final episode I was Rubik’s cube-ing my heart out instead of paying attention to our feline cardboard friends and their whatever toward space. I think this show along with all the other bad shorts out there taught me something, because from now on I’m not picking up a short just because it’s x minutes long, where x < 5. Lesson learned.

Best Finale Award/Best Episode of the Week: Kobayashi-san Chi no Maid Dragon

Oh my goodness, as if this show couldn’t get better. The finale featured life without Tohru, and it was a melancholy look which wasn’t hopeless but still pretty colorless. And then the whole scene with her father was pretty well done as well. A very nice ending to a very nice show. At the end of the day, though there are noticeable flaws (namely the fanservice), the comedy and heartwarming moments overshine them and make this into one of KyoAni’s better shows (which says something with the shows they’ve made). Every episode was at least good (most great), and I can’t say enough about all of the great things this show has from its animation to its characters to its art style. The obvious choice for AOTS for me, and a very solid 8/10, would recommend if you didn’t watch.

Awards (Spring 2017):

The “Best CG” Award: Alice to Zouroku

Hmm, that car looks... a bit off. But yeah, other than that abomination, this show has potential. Though which direction this show goes I don’t really know,

The “Shiniest Faces” Award: Tsuki ga Kirei

Wow, those are some shiny faces. In all seriousness though, this show looks to be interesting, though there were some cringeworthy moments when they didn’t talk to each other and hesitated, which I understand given they’re middle schoolers. I’m hopeful this doesn’t go the drama route and is just a nice wholesome romance. Don’t need no drama in my life.

The Hmmm... Award: Hinako Note

As the only CGDCT show of the season, I was obliged to watch this. And man were there some... interesting moments. Like the girl who ate paper. And the girl who was a scarecrow. Among others. BTW, I totally got the synopsis wrong: the show looks to be about a girl who was formally a scarecrow who moves to “Tokyo” (does not look like Tokyo at all, but okay), and wants to be in the high school’s theater club. Yeah idk either. Well, the first episode wasn’t horrible, and it’s a CGDCT, so I’ll keep sticking with this one for now. Hopefully it’s decently entertaining.

The “Red Flags” Dropped Show of the Week Award: Eromanga-sensei

Hmm... let’s compare this show with OreImo. Eromanga and OreImo have sibling love interests. Eromanga has step-siblings, OreImo has blood siblings. Eromanga has slightly less tsundere sister than OreImo (still tsundere though). After realizing this, I dropped this show midway through the episode. I wasn’t really about OreImo, and honestly this doesn’t look much better. Hey, maybe it might be better. But I don’t like the whole incest route. So pass.

Best Episode of the Week: Sakura Quest

Not necessarily the greatest first episode, but enough to keep my interest for the show. I got vibes of Shirobako through the character designs, and some Hanasaku Iroha for the shade being thrown at our main character Yoshino (if you’ll excuse my vernacular). So it’s a mixed bag, but I do like the potential the show has. Plus the last few minutes made it really interesting, so hey why not stick with it. If you’re not watching this show, maybe give it a shot?

And that’s all for this week! Thanks for reading, and I’ll see you in the next post which should be coming very soon!

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thejpfdude-blog · 7 years

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The Week in Anime (Week of 3/20/17)

Welcome to another edition of TWiA! Let’s start off this somewhat short version of TWiA right away with:

Rankings:

1 (0). Kobayashi-san Chi no Maid Dragon (8/10) [10/?]

2 (+1). Kono Subarashii Sekai ni Shukufuku wo! 2 (8/10 FINAL) [10/10]

3 (-1). Kuzu no Honkai (7.5/10) [10/12]

4 (0). Aggressive Retsuko (7/10) [-/?]

5 (0). Gabriel DropOut (7/10) [10/12]

6 (0). Little Witch Academia (TV) (6/10) [-/25]

7 (0). Demi-chan wa Kataritai (6/10) [11/12]

8 (0). Nobunaga no Shinobi (6/10) [24/26]

9 (0). Sengoku Choujuu Giga: Otsu (5/10) [10/13]

10 (0). Nyanbo (3/10) [24/26]

Awards:

The “I’m Too Tired To Watch This” Award: Little Witch Academia

It’s as the award title says. I usually get a lot of work done on Sundays, and by the time the episode of LWA comes, I’m usually too tired to want to watch anime. So in the interest of my interest in this show, I’m just going to watch episodes of this on Monday instead of trying to cram it in on Sunday nights.

The “Is It Me Or Is It The Show” Award: Kuzu no Honkai

I’m not sure if it’s me or if it’s the show, but the last three episodes have been somewhat boring compared to the first few. It’s probably the fact that the shock factor hasn’t gone up in the last few episodes, and so the other aspects of the show have to shine/step up. Unfortunately for me, I’ve found that the shock factor of what happens is the main reason that I enjoyed it so much. All of the other stuff the characters talk about is interesting as well, but it’s a bit much for someone who’s just trying to relax after a long day doing stuff. Things are looking interesting though, so let’s see how this ends up.

Best Episode of the Week Award: KonoSuba S2

Like last season’s finale, we get all of the things that makes KonoSuba so fun to watch. Nice comedy, actually good animation this time, and nice comedy. Sure, this series may not be for everyone, but for me it’s been a fun ride. Although this season wasn’t as funny to me as the first season, it was still something that I enjoyed every Wednesday. I’ll miss our four adventurers and their antics.

And that’s all for this week! Thanks for reading, and I’ll see you in the next post!

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thejpfdude-blog · 7 years

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The Week in Anime (Week of 2/6/17)

Hi, and welcome to another edition of TWiA! We got some more episodes of the shows I’m watching, and some more of my thoughts about them. So let’s get started with all that, starting with...

Rankings:

~1 (0). Demi-chan wa Kataritai (8.5/10) [5/?]

~2 (+2). Kobayashi-san Chi no Maid Dragon (8.5/10) [4/?]

~3 (0). Kuzu no Honkai (8.5/10) [4/?]

~4 (-2). Kono Subarashii Sekai ni Shukufuku wo! 2 (8/10) [4/10]

~5 (0). Gabriel DropOut (7/10) [4/12]

6 (0). Little Witch Academia (TV) (7/10) [-/25]

7 (0). Nobunaga no Shinobi (6/10) [18/?]

8 (0). Aggressive Retsuko (6/10) [-/?]

9 (0). Sengoku Choujuu Giga: Otsu (5/10) [4/13]

10 (0). Rewrite: Moon and Terra (4/10) [-/?]

~11 (0). Nyanbo (4/10) [18/26]

Awards:

The “I’m Busy With Stuff So I Forgot to Watch This” Award: Rewrite (Moon and Terra) and Little Witch Academia

Oops.

The “It Didn’t Get Subbed So I Couldn’t Watch It” Award: Aggressive Retsuko

See above.

The “Obligatory Beach Episode” Award: Gabriel DropOut

Hey, something I actually watched. This week’s edition of “Angels and Devils: Roles Reversed” took place mostly on the beach, a standard fare for most CGDCT shows (either that or a hot springs episode. Or both!). It was your standard episode, featuring the classics like watermelon smashing and all that. This show has been a fun watch: it’s not anything special, but it helps to keep me entertained on Mondays, and it’s something nice to counter the short known as Nyanbo.

The “Please Let This Be Over” Award: Nyanbo!

Speaking of Nyanbo, it’s not fun. I feel like I said this a lot the past few weeks, but it’s true. And the last few episodes haven’t helped with that: they’ve been either so boring that I distract myself with my Rubik’s Cube or so painful to watch that I subconsciously tune out. I don’t really remember what happened the last few episodes other than nothing significant happened, because really all that matters in the end, is that the finale is going to be something to the tune of “we’re not done with our UFO, but we’ll keep trying through the power of friendship!” Oy vey: I think my run with bad shorts is starting to a take a toll on me. I’m looking at shows next season and the ones that I normally probably might have given a shot a few seasons ago I just straight up am not going to watch. Speaking of the new season, probably not going to watch much. Maybe that new PA Works show, the new season of Saekano (I’ve been blazing through the first season and am loving it so far), and the obligatory CGDCT show. Next season looks great if you love action shows, but if you’re like me and you like those shows with slice-of-life or comedy or romance, it’s not looking as good as this season.

Wow, I went off topic. Conclusion: Nyanbo = bad, don’t watch.

The Best Reaction Faces Award: Demi-chan wa Kataritai

One of my favorite things about this show is the reaction faces, specifically from a certain blond-haired individual.

If I had the time, I would link images showing examples, but I’m typing this up at 11pm Sunday night and I need to go to sleep soon.

Actually, it didn’t take that long to find a GIF compilation.

I’m a huge sucker for reaction faces, which probably stems from my love for chibi faces. Or is that the other way around? Probably the latter honestly. They elicit all sorts of reactions from laughter to aww and so on. It’s a shame that I’m not finding the recent episodes as good as the first two episodes, but then again those episodes were really really fun to watch and were hard to top. Still a fun show, but not the 10/10 that it was for me after episode 1. Not that that’s a bad thing though.

The Lewd Award: KonoSuba 2

This week marks the return of Darkness, and with it marks the lewdest episode of the young second season. And I have to say, I’m not a fan. I never really was a fan of Darkness to begin with: sure she had her moments, but her masochistic nature was a bit too much sometimes even for someone who’s a self-proclaimed sadist (AKA me). And this episode sort of took that to the max. I’m not going to say it wasn’t funny, because this episode still made me laugh more in 24 minutes than a lot of comedies from last year did in 12 episodes. Yet it’s not the type of humor I like out of KonoSuba: the humor I liked was the meta stuff, the scenes where Kazuma subverted common tropes and proudly did so. Or the verbal berating, most of which came to the expense of Aqua, everyone’s favorite useless goddess. I hope the lewdness isn’t this bad in the future episodes, and that the animation continues the route of episodes 2 and 3 and not of episodes 1 and this one.

The Lewder Award: Kuzu no Honkai

Yay, more lewd. Except this is different from KonoSuba’s lewd: with KonoSuba, the lewd was mostly used to drive the humor. Yet for Kuzu no Honkai, the lewd was used as a symbol of all of the complicated emotions the characters are feeling as well as a tool to show just how messed up the situation is between Hanabi and Ecchan. As the scene develops on the bridge, it’s still somewhat normal: sure it’s a bit creepy that Ecchan pretty much stalked Hanabi, but eh it’s amore. Then the hug happens. Well, okay, Hanabi’s in a tough situation right now. That’s fine I guess. Then the setting changes to a room, and now it’s escalating a bit too fast. And then they start kissing, and now I’m making sure my door’s locked so nobody walks in on me watching this. And then the clothes start coming off, and I find myself wondering what I’m doing with my life.

But actually, it’s interesting. It’s uncomfortable to watch, but at the same time it’s something I couldn’t keep my eyes off. It’s a trainwreck in the best sense: a trainwreck of emotions and love all being tangled up into this scene. There are so many ways of looking at it, and I haven’t even mentioned the girl teacher’s whole way of life and how that’s fucked up as well. There’s a lot you can say about this show, but for me, as someone whose least favorite subject was English, I’ll just say that it’s a really interesting take on the genre of romance. And by something different that’s being executed well, it’s one of my favorites of the season so far.

The “Red Flags” Dropped Show of the Week Award: Nothing this week

Hooray?

Best Episode of the Week Award: Kobayashi-san Chi no Maid Dragon

This award was really close between Maidragon and Kuzu no Honkai, but with the Lewd Award in play, I couldn’t pass up an opportunity to one-up it with the Lewder Award. And so we get Maidragon with the best episode of the week. What can I say. This show is getting better by the week with more characters being introduced and their relationships being fun to watch. Kanna is becoming the poster child of /r/awwnime and for good reason (though it is annoying seeing like 10 posts of her on the subreddit’s front page). It’s the right amount of funny, heartwarming, and art style that really makes those Wednesdays worth living. That’s really exemplified with this week’s episode, especially with the end scene with Kobayashi giving Kanna the keychain. My goodness, that was cute. I love it.

And that’s all for this week! Thanks for reading for another week, and I’ll see you in the next post!

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thejpfdude-blog · 7 years

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Fall 2016 Shows Rankings and Write-Ups

1. Nobunaga no Shinobi (7/10):

Before I start with the write-ups, let me start by saying that I think this season is the weakest season of the year. When the number one show is a fringe 7-8/10 and I look at most of the shows with a tinge of disappointment, then it ends up being that way. Having said that, this is my “Underrated Short of the Season”, and basically became my AOTS. Basically this show is a historical short about a girl shinobi (an assassin like person dude?) working for Oda Nobunaga, and shenanigans ensue. The character designs are very much cutesie, but that’s the type of stuff I like, so I feel it’s fine. The best aspect of the show is it’s humor: even though it’s only 4 minutes, it’s able to make me laugh every episode with its fast paced call-and-response humor. At times it goes really fast, but that’s usually the case with these short shorts.

Now the negatives. With a historical short, there’ll obviously be historical references, most of which went over my head. However, that’s not a huge problem as prior knowledge of the subject isn’t required to enjoy the content anyway: they explain all of the things that are happening, so it’s not confusing if you’re out of the loop. Overall this show earns a high 7/10, low 8/10: would recommend.

2. Saiki Kusuo no Ψ-nan (7/10):

Now I loved Saiki as much as the next guy, and it’s a really good show. It’s clever and funny in its execution: I never know what direction it’s going to go and it almost always ends up making me laugh. It’s characters are great too: Saiki is your standard snarky protagonist with all of the superpowers, and the countless side characters help to create wacky situations for each episode. The only problem I had (and I feel like I’m the only one with this problem) is that the second half of the show was way less funnier for me. Maybe it was the new characters they introduced, maybe it was that they switched to a weekly format instead of the 5-minute short every weekday, but something about this season’s version of Saiki fell a bit short for me. If the first half of the show was a 9/10 for me, the second half is probably a 6-7/10. Overall a fun short that I would recommend to all, especially since it’s so underwatched for how good it is.

P.S.: The good news is that this show is getting a second season in the future, which means more Saiki! I’m excited that this show is getting a second season, but like all shows I’m cautiously optimistic.

3. Haikyuu!! S3 (7/10):

Yep, I have this show rated this “low” (low depends on how much you like this show). Now, a 7/10 for me is still a good show, just that it has a few flaws here and there. And the flaw for this show starts with the opponent of the match, Shiratorizawa. They were not what everyone on the show hyped them up to be: the all-powerful team to me felt really underwhelming. The main man Ushijima didn’t feel as intimidating to me as characters like Oikawa or even the tall dude from Dateko when Karasuno first faced them. He had his moments, but looking back he was just there most of the time to me. Everybody else on the team was fine as well, but there’s that one spiky-haired dude who I hated, and that was Tendo. He reminded me a lot of Betelguese from Re:Zero, and that’s not a good thing. He felt really out of place in a show about high school sports, and though I understand he was supposed to be a sort of enemy to rally against, I just felt uncomfortable watching scenes with him in it.

Another problem I had with this show was the formatting: the season was entirely based on one match, which did get a bit tiring after a while. They did the best they could with it by spacing out the match with flashback scenes, but like Shokugeki’s second season with the Autumn Tournament, there weren’t really any fun slice-of-life moments this season, which made the show kinda drag on a bit.

Other than that, this season was the classic Haikyuu we all know and love. There were some great episodes, like episode 4 and the last episode, especially with the final rally. The rise of Tsukishima was a bright point, and made me love him when I originally hated his character during the first season. Overall a solid 7/10, and excited for the next season of this show (whenever it may arrive).

After this point, I was too lazy to put my notes into full sentences, so because I want to put this out ASAP, here they are in full rough-draft mode.

4. Flip Flappers (7/10):

- Didn’t know what I was watching the first 5 or so episodes: not good or bad, just a thing

- Episode 6 was one of the best episodes of anime I’ve seen in a while

- Nice that the symbolism isn’t the only thing needed to understand the show: if you don’t want it, then that’s okay

- Animation very on point: great during action scenes

- Sometimes episodes could be hit or miss depending on whether you like what they’re parodying (Mad Max and mecha parodies weren’t really my thing); still though, fun to watch

- Whole arc with Mimi was a bit boring compared to previous episodes

- An interesting experience, decent show

5. Hibike! Euphonium 2 (6/10):

- Not as good as first season, and I think the multiple arc thing was the main reason

- Show felt very detached the first few episodes, especially with main conflict/source of drama coming from secondary characters

- Got better later through the season

- Yuri undertones are still not my thing, decide already KyoAni whether there is or isn’t going to be romance (doesn’t even have to be main ship)

6. Yuri!!! on Ice (6/10):

- Overall decent show

- Didn’t really care for the coupling of Yuri and Victor, and not because gay couple

- There were some fanservice-y moments that I didn’t enjoy (Swiss dude)

- Animation-wise was lacking other than first episode, but can’t really blame them as ice-skating hard as hell to animate

- Ending was a bit eh, everything felt a bit rushed

- Was a bit stale in the middle/end with the format of short performances one episode and free skate the next

7. To Be Hero (6/10):

- A decently done short

- Funny toilet humor, and scenes that were pretty emotional as well; did a nice job of blending both types of scenes

- Plot-wise was a bit confusing for finale until Reddit post mentioned what it was

- Actually pretty good animation during the action scenes

8. Watashi ga Motete Dousunda (6/10):

- Great comedy during the first few episodes, fell apart when they introduced Nishima (can’t blame them for that though, would get stale otherwise)

- Actually hated Kae’s character design, and the others as well

- The whole brother thing was a bit weird

- Still had some stupidly cliche stuff like the boob grab and the fall on the heroine stuff that harem anime usually have

- Ending was something I didn’t really mind, nobody was going to get chosen anyway

- Overall it was okay

9. Sengoku Choujuu Giga (5/10):

- Getting “second season”, should be interesting

- Some episodes completely flew over my head (like the singing one), but overall is a decently done short

- Comedy is very much improvised, but I enjoy it

- Animation very average

- Historical references once again sail over my head, only this time it is somewhat important to the show. Still entertaining nevertheless

10. Stella no Mahou (4/10):

- Good first half, horrible second half

- When it was just Honda and the three, it was mildly entertaining CGDCT

- Then they introduce new character to the club, and I HATE her

- My pet peeve of not believing someone when telling truth: annoys me so much

- Not to mention some questionable scenes, like Tamaki strip or the whole baby-making thing

- Overall a meh show

11. Nyanbo! (4/10):

- A two cour short that isn’t finished

- Yes, it’s made for kids, but still pretty bad

- Animation style is actually really nice, only good part of show along with opening song

- Female characters only exist to love the MC

- Other characters fit cliches to a T

- Somewhat dreading the second half of the show

12. Kiitarou Shounen no Youkai Enikki (3/10):

- Pretty dang cliche short

- Characters so bad, the only reason this show is bad to me

- Had some moments, but JPP hand joke (can count them on a mangled hand)

13. Okusama ga Seitokaichou!+! (2/10):

- Kept the lewd of the first season but left out all of the nice heartwarming moments with main couple

- Painful to watch, with every girl being either tsundere or airheaded, and Ui just looking on

- Went the harem route, which went about as well as you would expect

- Seriously though, only remember half an episode when main couple were doing romantic things; pretty bad

- Somewhat understandable as apparently manga at this time was going through changes (different magazine, guidelines, etc.), but still seems like they could skip to good part...

- Bad sequel to an okay show.

And that’s all for this week! Thanks for reading: sorry about the crude notes for most of them: I wanted to put this out as soon as possible. Overall, a pretty meh season, but had its moments.

Well anyway, thanks for reading, and I’ll see you in the next post which looks to either be the new TWiA post or the 2016 Awards post! See you then!

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