Currently Watching

[Bem]

Recently watched Cyberpunk: Edgerunners. A couple of short thoughts:

10 episodes is embarrassingly short for a shounen plot. The show follows the typical Kishōtenketsu plot structure, however the "development" (sho) arc happens in a breeze. Major character deaths feel entirely shallow despite clear intentions to hit the viewer in the feels, mainly because you can only give a character so much development within a 24 minute-10 episode season. Really only the MC David and his GF Lucy have any sort of proper characterization, and David is so recklessly stupid that I find it difficult to truly empathize with him. "I need to become stronger at the cost of my sanity because I'm Built Different" (he literally says this near verbatim) is a motivation that really just ticks me off.

That being said, some of the characters are fairly likable despite the lack of screentime, mainly just the aforementioned Lucy and Rebecca. They are the proper standouts of the show, and it's quite sad that Rebecca is pretty much completely overshadowed by Lucy in the end. She gets, perhaps 3-4 scenes to herself in the entire show. ALSO, they got Akira Yamaoka to do the music, which sounds super exciting, however ALL the actual show's music is just re-used from the game and it's radio. It seems he only was involved in the OP and ending track, which is incredibly disappointing.

Overall I think Edgerunners is pretty overrated. It suffers from 10 episodes being too little for frankly ANY anime, and it would be more forgivable if a second season continued the plot, however everyone's character arcs are very much wrapped up by the final episode, to say the least. The game is better, and probably always was tbh. Respect to Trigger for telling CDPR to fuck off when they asked them to remove Rebecca for being too loli. 5/10.

[Maypews]

I've been watching Clannad lately. So far it's solid. I'd say the biggest flaw is that it's basically a harem show but none of the girls are really all that memorable, though the protagonist is cool (truly subverting the genre, are we?). Pretty funny at times, the Violin scene at the end of Episode 10 made me laugh.

My main reason for typing this post is the whole Fuko subplot though. Minor spoilers but I'll tag it to be safe.

Spoiler

Basically the premise is that there's this girl in a coma and I guess her spirit left her body or something and she wants to have people attend her sister's wedding. But the sister cant see her and slowly over time all of the people she tries to get to come by giving them presents start to forget her. It's supposed to be this emotionally heartfelt sequence of events and I admit it did tug my heartstrings a little.

But the problem I have is that eventually Nagisa and Tomoya become aware of the fact that they're going to be forgotten because it happens slower to the people who knew her better. But couldn't they have like.. wrote it down on a piece of paper or on a computer or something before they forgot about her? Their memories and what Fuko was like and stuff. Documenting it basically. Idk it seems like an extremely obvious thing to think of. Kind of lessens the emotional impact.

Ah well, even in spite of some small issues I have it's still a nice little slice of life show. I am interested to see where the writing goes later in the series.

[Cammy4599]

I've been watching Clannad lately. So far it's solid. I'd say the biggest flaw is that it's basically a harem show but none of the girls are really all that memorable, though the protagonist is cool (truly subverting the genre, are we?). Pretty funny at times, the Violin scene at the end of Episode 10 made me laugh.

My main reason for typing this post is the whole Fuko subplot though. Minor spoilers but I'll tag it to be safe.

Spoiler

Basically the premise is that there's this girl in a coma and I guess her spirit left her body or something and she wants to have people attend her sister's wedding. But the sister cant see her and slowly over time all of the people she tries to get to come by giving them presents start to forget her. It's supposed to be this emotionally heartfelt sequence of events and I admit it did tug my heartstrings a little.

But the problem I have is that eventually Nagisa and Tomoya become aware of the fact that they're going to be forgotten because it happens slower to the people who knew her better. But couldn't they have like.. wrote it down on a piece of paper or on a computer or something before they forgot about her? Their memories and what Fuko was like and stuff. Documenting it basically. Idk it seems like an extremely obvious thing to think of. Kind of lessens the emotional impact.

Ah well, even in spite of some small issues I have it's still a nice little slice of life show. I am interested to see where the writing goes later in the series.

No way I've been watching Clannad too, though I've been watching it on a DVD I got from a local library. I recently watched episode 20 and the picnic baseball scene at the end of that episode was really cute. Overall it's been a fun watch and I love all the characters. I want Tomoyo and Kyou to beat the shit out of me. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MLI6hcaxuho

[Maypews]

Been going through Kaguya-sama S2. It's been a bit of a let down compared to S1 for me. The show initially presents itself as sort of a "battle of wits" take on the romcom genre where both Shirogane and Kaguya would try to outfox the other into confessing.

Throughout season 2 though, the only one of them that actually schemes anything seems to be Kaguya. I mean Shirogane has some moments, but the distrubition is really screwy. He usually ends up relegated to being the butt of the joke while Kaguya wins just about every engagement they have, ridding the show of tension. I didn't go into this expecting something like Death Note, but it feels like it really abandoned that unique premise which helped hook me to begin with.

I guess you could already see the cracks in the armour in this respect though, as even by season 1 this had begun to rear it's ugly head with the fireworks scene being played up as a joke coming to mind. It was just a bit less noticeable due to the goodwill accumulated from earlier episodes.

The show is still funny and has likable characters, though I really dislike the new one they introduced (Lino). Praying to the holy spirit that she gets less screentime in S3. Annoying, authoritarian and a total puritan, yuck. Also those pop culture references in the subtitles aged like absolute milk and whoever's responsible for that should feel ashamed of themselves.

[Maypews]

Went through a bit of an inactive period with anime, but lately I've been watching Watamote. I can see how it... filters some of a more normal disposition, but I've been quite liking it. Tomoko is probably one of the better takes on the whole shut-in archetype that I've seen, at times painfully relatable but she has some edge to her too which I like. Also I've been quite surprised at how good the direction is, in my experience a lot of newer shows tend to struggle with that but there are a lot of unique artistic frames and perspectives throughout the show. Really good piece of slice of life, definitely would recommend it 6 episodes in.

[Parzival]

Watamote is peak. Tomoko is literally me fr fr.

Anyways, I'm currently watching Tojima Wants To Be a Kamen Rider. Genuinely amazing. It's ridiculous in a really hilarious way, while being a genuinely heartfelt send up up the Kamen Rider franchise. I almost want to don the mask, Henshin! and fight off the evils of SHOCKER myself! Also Teddyloid fucking KILLS it on the OST. The OP and his rendition of Let's Go! Rider Kick are genuine gemeralds.

I'm also watching Frieren season 2. I know everyone and their mom sucks that show off but it deserves it. Beyond just being cozy with some great fight scenes scattered here and there and a phenomenal soundtrack by Evan Call, the depiction of the brutal and tragic passage of time but in a way that's still ultimately hopeful isn't something you get a lot of, in Western and Eastern media alike.

[Maypews]

I'm also watching Frieren season 2. I know everyone and their mom sucks that show off but it deserves it. Beyond just being cozy with some great fight scenes scattered here and there and a phenomenal soundtrack by Evan Call, the depiction of the brutal and tragic passage of time but in a way that's still ultimately hopeful isn't something you get a lot of, in Western and Eastern media alike.

Man I watched the first 2 episodes of Frieren some time ago and just could not get into it. Found those episodes very boring, I feel the whole passage of time thing has been done better by other shows and that the characters came across as being rather stilted and emotionless. I also don't like traditional fantasy settings that much. Should I give it another chance with all that in mind? I've heard the story picks up a good deal after and that there's a pretty big detour from the first 2 eps. It does look pretty visually which has me somewhat inclined to give it another go. :WatchingTV:

[Parzival]

Man I watched the first 2 episodes of Frieren some time ago and just could not get into it. Found those episodes very boring, I feel the whole passage of time thing has been done better by other shows and that the characters came across as being rather stilted and emotionless. I also don't like traditional fantasy settings that much. Should I give it another chance with all that in mind? I've heard the story picks up a good deal after and that there's a pretty big detour from the first 2 eps. It does look pretty visually which has me somewhat inclined to give it another go. :WatchingTV:

If that's not your thing then no, especially since I at least personally consider the opening episodes to be pretty exemplary of the high marks of the show. Most of what happens later has been done elsewhere, and if you don't like how those first episodes are handled you're probably gonna think those later events were done much better elsewhere as well. That is to say, they'll probably seem boring as hell.

[Duk3]

I'm currently watching Nadia.

I've been going through Gainax's backlog more recently. So far I've gotten through Otaku no Video, Gunbuster, Abenobashi, and Kare Kano. I think so far Nadia is my favorite out of them, granted I'm not at the infamous island arc yet. I'm really curious to who the main villain actually is and whats his real goal.

Spoiler

I'm kinda thinking that Gargoyle might be Nadia's father or something. I feel like that'd be a predictable twist so maybe not. I'm also wondering what his relationship to Nemo. It feels like their hatred towards each other is a bit to deep for it not to be personal, at least on Gargoyle's side of things. Nemo is understandable since Gargoyle has killed a lot of his crew, but from our knowledge Gargoyle doesn't have any feelings towards his goons.

Anyway, it's a shame that most of Gainax's other works don't get the attention of others like Eva does. I can see people liking the shows just as much or even more if they knew about them.

[Maypews]

I'm currently watching Nadia.

I've been going through Gainax's backlog more recently. So far I've gotten through Otaku no Video, Gunbuster, Abenobashi, and Kare Kano. I think so far Nadia is my favorite out of them, granted I'm not at the infamous island arc yet. I'm really curious to who the main villain actually is and whats his real goal.

Anyway, it's a shame that most of Gainax's other works don't get the attention of others like Eva does. I can see people liking the shows just as much or even more if they knew about them.

Karekano looks really good and I think I might try that pretty soon, the idea of a romcom being directed by the same man who brought us EoE is amusing to say the least. What is Abenobashi like? Never heard of it till now.