Media Anime and Manga Thread MK3 - Beware Spoilers

maid dragon is an enjoyable SoL/comedy, 3-gatsu no lion and shouwa genroku S2 are both pretty solid but require you to watch one cour from last year
 

RODAN

Banned deucer.
seirens only good as an irony watch. ACCA and Onihei are good if you like more slow moving adult shows. Gabriel DropOut and Demi-Chan are both really cute SoLs.

on another topic: Youjo Senki; what the fuck. This show is approximately 1000000000x better than it should be, its art is godawful and so is it's premise. But the theism themes in the show and Tanya's character are compelling and well executed. This show is dare i say it; actually pretty good. Kudos to studio NUT (im comming lmfao)
 
Little witch academia is definately my feel good show of the season. I enjoy all the characters immensely. Also lotte was just too adorable for life. Apparently the novel talked about in the show is basically twilight which is pretty funny.
 
got a rather long and boring Dark Beasts task so I typed up some opinions, remember to Like and Subscribe for more.
ACCA - 13-ku Kansatsu-ka
this is just a really nice show that I hope continues to live up to what its been doing so far. it's cool to see something with such a laid back attitude manage to be so gripping at the same time, but the latest episode and how it handled conflict being brought into the equation didn't fill me with the greatest amount of hope. really want it to not just flop out but I trust madhouse to handle things well and keep things consistent. also would like to recommend another anime based on a work by the same mangaka, ristorante paradiso, because it's really good and has a similar focus on the locational aesthetic and the food of the region.

Demi-chan wa Kataritai
the way this one handled itself was actually pretty unexpected. I went into it expecting something that would never even hope to live up to the Might of monmusu quest (play it now) but it seems to be going in a more interesting direction than a simple shitty harem (as of ep 3, 4 was iffy about that). not a fan of how absolutely stupid the lore behind the world is. there's no way that so little is known about the demihumans and that this chucklefuck high school teacher is the first person to consider an academic study of them considering that it says that they've basically always been around. but suspending that disbelief ain't hard when this is just a cute girls show. headless is the best girl, teacher is the worst. hope it doesn't descend into stupid pedo harem territory like the latest episode made it feel like with that dumb please hug me scene.

elDLIVE
it's pretty bad, but it's a nice kind of pretty bad. there's no ill intent or anything, seems to be an obscure ass manga with some really classic shounen tropes going on. mc is a beta loser shithead, main girl Mizusu Sonokata is my #2 girl of the season and she's hot as f*ck and none of the other characters have any real personality that I've picked up. the one thing they do have is cool designs that bring a slight smile to my face whenever they pop up, like the black guy, the moon, and manaphy. wouldn't recommend it to anyone, wouldn't watch it if it wasn't airing, but I'm happy enough when it shows up each week to sit down and take it on.

Gabriel DropOut
I avoided watching umaru when it was airing/after it was airing because it looks terrible and this show seems to have picked up some of those aspects. it's kinda mean to its characters and I don't particularly like how the main cast just seem to be jammed in together without really sharing anything in common apart from their superficial backstory. the jokes come in at a rate of knots and it's pretty obvious that this is a 4koma/gag adaptation. I normally like that sort of format buuut this show seems to make less effort than many others to pull those individual jokes into consistent structure. still nice, cute girls, but feels more mean spirited than the dogakobo shows that I've liked in the past. gab is unpleasant, silver hair may as well not be there, blue hair is straightman and satania is worse nenecchi.

Hand Shakers
this one is a real ride. the first episode is some New Wave Art psychedelic shit and then the second.third are some boring ass slice of life where the mc has to wash the cute girl because she's about as useless as companion characters come. I'd definitely recommend that you watch the first episode simply for the experience that it brings to the table, but I can't really say anything about where it'll go from here.

Kuzu no Honkai
this is shinsekai yori if you take out all of the cool plot stuff. it's got the bonobo hypersexual teens and the two main girls look pretty similar. apparently it keeps getting darker? not sure, and I don't really like the way it uses straight up panels instead of actual animation shit man just use the medium you're in like a decent work instead of being lazy. gonna keep watching it because the scene where the two girls were making out was super hot.

Little Witch Academia
way worse than I was expecting. nothing that's happened has really done anything at all. main character is an annoying little shit and looks to be the worst kind of blunders through everything and lucks her way to success. the main plot should probably kick in soon and I really hope that the stuff that has happened so far ties into it in a decent way (read: not just mister miyagi teaching potentially useful skills for no apparent reason) and that it's not as predictable as its lining up to be.

Masamune-kun no Revenge
dumb stupid show, but Adagaki Aki is my #1 girl of the season oh me oh my. what I would give. there's no real decency to the show and it's not going to go anywhere conclusive during the first and likely only season unless it does a rushed anime only ending, but I'll enjoy it while it lasts. fan of the main character being dense in a good way rather than just being a little pussy b*tch like the one from tlr.

Nyanko Days
it's three minutes of little japanese cat girls a week what am I supposed to say????

One Room
kantoku's character designs and artwork make me cum uncontrollably and so not even my usual distaste for shorts will scare me away from this terrifying self-inset experience.

Onihei
shows with premises like this normally end up being absolute dogshit made on a tiny budget and I'm glad to find out that only one of those assumptions is true. people seem to really hate the "animation" in this show but maybe I'm just too distracted to actually notice? only thing I picked up on was the reuse of drawings and the heavy usage of horizontal tracking shots to save actual animation frames. other than the not-so-great production aspects of the show it's turned out not so bad. this is the kind of thing that I wanted Joker Game to be just in how it handles the characters and the episodic stories that take place. no signs of it going south anytime soon. don't like how it takes half an episode for me to remember which generic looking Japanese Man is the main character.

Seiren
looked up the character profiles for the next two girls and I'm excited about what's to come. it's basically a collection of fetishes smashed into something that barely resembles a budding young romance (at least the first arc was) with terrible characterisation and some awful contrivances to push to story along. not good at all but I'm watching it because at least it's not as bad as photokano was.

Urara Meirochou
honestly preferring this to GAB at this point. it's just a lot nicer in how it presents the characters and their interactions. they actually seem to be friends that enjoy each others' company and the humour/goodness comes from that rather than people just acting stupid because they do. the other main thing that it has going for it is that it is the best tummy-related show to come out since henneko and I believe that it will go on to beat that in terms of the quality and quantity of tummy shown. cute girls doing fun things.

also still watching:

3-gatsu no Lion
if this didn't have such a strong reliance on narration it would be seriously good in my opinion. really nice to see a show tackle a matter like this in a non typical way. people seem to get mad about the fact that the mc loses a lot of matches without really progressing his game even though that's not really the point. it's not a shogi shounen show about the mc being epic and BTFOing his opponents, it's about a youth dealing with depression. also his stepsister is hot.

All Out!!
while my initial reaction was that this was simply another homoerotic sports show (which was true for the first chunk) it's developed some true Rug spirit and I'm proud of it.

Tiger Mask W
fuuuuuuuu that Tiger Mask v Tiger the Dark fight was so good. continues to elevate itself and continues to make the most of it's presentation to tell a truly great story.

not watching:
maid dragon because FUCK kyoani
fuuka because of that scene in the first episode where they walk around the statue; one of the dumbest things I've ever watched in my life
that chinese show because it's chinese
chaos;child because I just can't deal with that franchise anymore
akiba's trip because it didn't interest me
idol jihen because it somehow manages to be even worse that the plot summary + stupid cgi idols
youjo senki because it looks terrible both in my impression of it based on promotion material and the actual presentation

super unremarkable season at this stage with nothing really all that good but somehow I'm watching like 15 things
 

Martin

A monoid in the category of endofunctors
is a Smogon Discord Contributoris a Forum Moderator Alumnusis a Community Contributor Alumnusis a Contributor Alumnus
Midori no Hibi
You know a show's gonna be EPIC when the first line of its synopsis is this incredible:
There isn't a single person in Sakuradamon High who hasn't heard the legends about Seiji "The Mad Dog" Sawamura's demonically powerful right hand.
In all seriousness though this is a show that I am unironically considering watching 'cause it genuinely looks very entertaining from its synopsis.

Also just take a moment to consider that there is a spinoff from it's source manga called "Aoi Destruction!"
 
By the way guys. If you care, there is finally a pretty decent quality 720 rip of kimi no na wa. Still not as high quality as it could be but definately much better than the 480 Chinese screening rip.
 
kuzu no honkai is staying pretty strong and stuff is actually happening, which is a breath of fresh air. from the content alone I expected sort of a slow-burn drama but it's been pulling out all the stops since episode 1. it's also nice that it's a show with an actual gay girl as opposed to the sea of bait we've had recently. she's a horrible person, too, and the relationship is doomed to fail, but i'm more pumped that she exists than anything else

also finished baccano earlier today, thoughts below the cut:

the good:
  • the soundtrack, my god. wonderful soundtrack that'll be stuck in my head for a while, and a great OP. in 16 episodes of this show I must have listened to it 20+ times. the OP is amazingly done in general, and I love how the episode recaps were incorporated into the OP itself. it was also a fantastic move having most characters show up with their names in the OP, and definitely helped me get to know the cast a little more easily in the beginning.
  • the voice acting was spectacular (I watched dubbed, glad I did). Firo is probably my favorite character of the entire bunch based solely off of his VA.
  • the storytelling was unique, and a fair few transitions were really well done; the cut of Czeslaw getting tortured in the past to him face-to-face with Claire on the train is one example. seeing the different storylines interweave and come together is the best part about any nonlinear story, and it was satisfying to see here too.
  • the characters were at times hit-or-miss, but most of the main cast were likable and/or memorable - Isaac/Miria/Ladd being the best examples of this
  • the atmosphere was also amazingly done, partly due to the soundtrack and voice acting, obviously. the set design and the coloring in the series was strong throughout.

the not so good:
  • the storytelling, which I loved at times and was certainly the riskiest part of this series, was also sloppy and could have been done better, I feel. in particular, the first episode is nigh-incoherent for first time watchers in terms of the sheer amount of disconnected information it throws at you, almost none of which is actually valuable to know this early on. I felt like the reveal of Isaac and Miria as immortals this early on was also a disappointment, and that the first episode could have been done away with entirely, apart from:
  • Carol and the Vice President, who basically justify the non-linear style of the series within the first 5-10 minutes and then are never heard from again until episode 16. if anything I would have liked to see these two utilized more, especially if they somehow tied into the plot as opposed to being narrators. given how many characters there are and how many things happen, some kind of overarching commentary from these two to recap things every episode or every few episodes would have been welcome from me
  • aside from those two, a lot of the characters are kind of flat - they exist, and that's about it. a common criticism of Baccano is that the characters are static and never really change, but I'm fine with that since (like Carol and co. say during the finale), we're witnessing parts of a story starting from the middle, and we don't really need to see any character arcs begin or end for the story to be good. That being said, a lot of the more minor characters (the Gandors, all of the "henchmen" type side characters, half the people on the boat in 1711) have zero personality and are entirely forgettable, whereas many of the main characters are honestly kind of interchangeable. Isaac / Miria are basically one person, Luck/Claire and even Dallas to an extent are all different breeds of psychopath, and the women in this show are more or less riffs off of the same theme, each typically playing second fiddle to some guy in the show with pretty much the only arguable exception being Rachel.
  • non-linear storytelling can't be the only good thing about a show, and the plot needs to stand up on its own. for the most part, this was the case, except I felt like the entire post-1931 plot could have been done away with entirely without the show losing anything meaningful

despite my criticisms I definitely enjoyed it overall, though. much thanks to everyone who recommended it in the last thread!


I won't have time to do any of the bingo challenges, most likely, but I do plan on continuing the slog through my PTW. next up is probably either Oregairu or Spice & Wolf, and I'm leaning toward the latter, but suggestions are always welcome
 
aight I changed my mind cause so many people are doing it, the ensign challenge is pretty short, and a fair few of them are movies

here's mine, free space is gonna be Oregairu S1

probably gonna do a cumulative writeup like RODAN when I'm done, probably not gonna go in any order either. pumped to watch a lot of stuff on this list

temp.png


edit: hey looks like I have overlap with everyone else of at least one other show
there's a lot of us in here watching hellsing ultimate for the first time
 
Last edited:

Martin

A monoid in the category of endofunctors
is a Smogon Discord Contributoris a Forum Moderator Alumnusis a Community Contributor Alumnusis a Contributor Alumnus
Challenge 02 - Watch a movie - Howl no Ugoku Shiro (Howl's Moving Castle)
Overall Rating:
★★★★☆
I watched this the other day and I feel that I went into this with my mind somewhat pre-blown by things I've heard from people both IRL and online. Maybe it was just because I watched the dub as opposed to watching it with subs like I normally do, but while it was certainly a good movie I think that this left me feeling a little... well, underwhelmed in places when you consider that it's a Ghibli movie. The voice acting in the dub had a lot of big names and yet it felt very flat in a lot of places, and the OST was way too similar to Spirited Away for my comfort (seriously, it sounds literally identical in a lot of places). The end of the movie was schmaltzy, with the MC kissing literally the entire cast of protagonists, and it was also somewhat generic in the respect that it is very much a matter of curing through a true love's kiss following after a pretty typical "dissatisfied and/or self-loathing girl gets rescued by a Prince Charming, one of the two gets cursed, and in the quest to get the curse reversed they fall deeply in love" story. I've seen better from within the "true love cures all" genre of fairy tales, namely Beauty and the Beast.

That said, it was still a good movie for a number of reasons. The characters felt real and well developed, with me rooting for them for reasons other than because they were the protagonists that we are meant to like, and while it was certainly very generic in a lot of aspects it really did an excellent job exploring the concepts it laid out to the viewer in an interesting way. The moving castle was a touch I liked, both from its creative exterior, its role as a plot device towards the end and the good central hub that the interior formed: allowing for fast movement around the world in a manner that felt neither forced nor convenient. It also gave a lot of opportunities to look deeper into the personalities of the primary cast. However, something that really stuck out was its presentation of the curse. She went through mood swings related to Howl with her age fluctuating alongside it, and this led to a few interesting scenes and character interactions later on while also presenting us i a range of different appearances for her character (the prettiest one being when she had a young appearance with grey hair before the ponytail was burned off).

Challenge 03 - Watch a short anime - Inferno Cop
Overall Rating:
★★★★☆
This is a classic case of Trigger being Trigger. They present us with a concept and deliver it in as quirky a way as possible with a completely unique art style, and Inferno Cop is no exception to this. When I first saw that it wasn't properly animated I wasn't that big on the art style, but it very quickly grew on me and is definitely memorable to say the least. It was spontaneous and entertaining and over the top, and it is exactly how a good short should be made. That said, I think it would have been better if I had watched it week by week, because binging it took away a lot from my experience of it in that that there were a couple of things which should have left me in anticipation for the following week but simply didn't because of the fact that I was watching them back to back. All in all, I enjoyed this.
 
Last edited:

RODAN

Banned deucer.
I never even thought of doing mini reviews for the stuff I'm watching for the challenge. But good idea.

copying martins formatting because im Bad and Gay (should i post these on moda? open to the floor)

Challenge 73 - Finish an on-hold or dropped anime - Arakawa Under The Bridge X Bridge

Score - 8/10

Arakawa is a show that I started in 2014. That's 3 years ago. Back then I finished the first season, which I immensely enjoyed and then for some reason never watched the second season. I'm glad I picked it back up because it's damn funny, all the characters are amazing and the increased focus on Ric and Nino's relationship is welcome. All the same funny characters are still there, and they even flesh out some of the lesser used characters from the first season; such as Last Samurai, Billy and Jacqueline. They even introduce a new character, Amazoness, who is just absolutely fucking hilarious. I wish Shaft would get its head out of Monogatari's ass so we can get more shows like this out of them.

 
Last edited:

Martin

A monoid in the category of endofunctors
is a Smogon Discord Contributoris a Forum Moderator Alumnusis a Community Contributor Alumnusis a Contributor Alumnus
Challenge 73 - Watch an anime that you can finish in one day - FLCL
Overall Rating:
★★★★★
The OST is incredible; the ending is creative; the show looks incredible; the action is well choreographed; the premise is abstract, gripping and unique; the characters are likable and subtly complex; the execution was flawless; it is very, very entertaining as a whole. I am honestly immensely hard pressed to point out flaws in this show, and it just left me completely in awe at how good it was. I'm very big on experimental shows, and this is a perfect example of how to do one well. What quiet moments we got felt meaningful, and the entire rest of the show achieved everything that it set out to do in spectacular fashion while being meaningful in a different way to the quieter moments.

As an aside, I've expanded my challenge to Emperor because the past few days have reminded me of exactly why I love anime so much.

upload_2017-2-5_22-36-10.png


The most likely one to be changed at some point is Go! Samurai because quite frankly if a show lacks reviews then it's probably virtually impossible to stream online. If anyone else is able to find a reviewless show that they can actually stream please hmu with its name
(should i post these on moda? open to the floor)
It's up to you if you want to write an article after every few shows, but I personally think that a better way to do it would be to put your mini reviews ITT and to do a sort of "highlights" thing on Moda, either at the very end or after notable benchmarks have been attained (e.g. halfway point and completion point), where you go over some of the best/worst bits of your Anime Challenge experience; I say this because it leaves room for a more focused/detailed article than if you are doing lots and lots of mini reviews of shows, which would probably make for a better read.
 
Last edited:
(◕‿◕✿) So I decided to try this out myself because it seemed fun. Emperor challenge because why not (◕‿◕✿)

upload_2017-2-5_22-21-50.png


(◕‿◕✿) It's not updated yet but I've already finished sword of the stranger and started 2 other shows iirc. Will be posting thoughts on stuff everytime I finish like 8 of those, totalizing 6 posts. (◕‿◕✿)

(◕‿◕✿)29/50(◕‿◕✿)
 

Pilo

uses walther
is a Smogon Discord Contributor Alumnus
Just posting my thoughts/first impressions on a few shows this season.

Gabriel DropOut
This show is great, the whole angel devil motif when juxtaposed with the slice of life plot is pretty absurd and the show's characters play very well into each other interacting in funny and interesting ways. Episode one also does a good job of establishing the show and its characters which is a huge plus for me but I was a bit irked by a few scenes which to me felt a bit lazy (I don't understand why they couldn't devote 30 seconds of the episode to Gabriel discovering an MMO she gets wrapped up in instead of just having it open on her laptop with zero explanation.) Otherwise I found the show to be very well written and humorous with lots of cute and funny moments like this one:


Masamune-kun no Revenge
Surprisingly not as bad as some people are saying and as someone who watches very few romance anime I sort of liked the show's "gimmick" if you will. That said, throughout the first few episodes of the show I kept catching myself thinking "get on with it" which is something the show doesn't seem too content with doing, Most of the show or at least most of what we have so far is just unnecessarily lengthy setup that I'd be more inclined to label as filler. I might pick this show back up later when there's less on my plate but currently I'd rather watch other things

Kono Subarashii Sekai ni Shukufuku wo! 2
I'll admit that I was a bit afraid that season 2 wouldn't live up to my expectations but after watching episode 1 of s2 all those fears completely disappeared. Season 2 opens where the first season left off with Kazuma being arrested and thrown into prison, so in an attempt to break him out Aqua comes up with a bunch of hair brained and frankly stupid escape plans. There's so much that's funny about the prison scene that I can't even point to what I like the most, it's probably best if instead of me describing it you just watch the show if you're not already doing so. The show also demonstrated its amazing continuity once again by making jokes relevant to some certain memorable events from season 1 which genuinely cracked me up. On a different note it seems the show might be a bit more story driven this time around rather than just following the episodic misadventures of Kazuma and his party which is something I'm looking forward to. All in all this show looks very promising and I can't wait to watch more of it in the future


I've also recieved recommendations to watch both ACCA and Dragon Maid so I'll probably post my thoughts on those once I get around to watching them.
 
Martin for reviewless shows, you can just go with most shows when they begin airing, usually they don't have reviews after just 1 episode.

Haven't been able to start any shows due to being really busy with IRL stuff but glad to see people picking out Azumanga Daioh and Nodame Cantabile. Also surprised that a lot of you guys haven't seen Bakemonogatari yet.
 

RODAN

Banned deucer.
Challenge 47 - Watch a show tagged as Shounen or Seinen - One Outs

One Outs is a pretty cool show, its been on my plan to watch forever. I love high stakes gambling as a concept and combining that with baseball was an inspired decision. The main character Tokuchi Toua is best described as Light Yagami but if he was a baseball pitcher. Everything is always according to keikaku for this guy, and that sort of detracts from the tension because you just know he will never really fail at anything. But that also is what makes it so alluring as a series, its fun as fuck and the main character is unrivalled. Sometimes stuff like that is pretty cool, like in One Punch Man (which follows a similar format to this honestly). Every baseball game is like, Tokuchi does something unexpected and his team is like WTF despite him doing this every day. And sometimes he doesnt arrive to bail people out until the last possible second. Extremely fun show, extremely unique and im totally glad I watched it for this challenge.

9/10

 

Users Who Are Viewing This Thread (Users: 1, Guests: 0)

Top