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Delibird

Garfiel

from Re:Zero (he is also a big orange cat, too)

NFUN posted...

cyberpunk is a multimedia series from the 80s

Shows how much I know about it, I wasnt aware of that!

Anyway, since we're past the deadline for recommendations, this is all I have left! As for Monster, I'll see if I can track down the second half of the series some other way if Netflix continues to be lame. Crunchyroll doesn't have the Kaguya OVA, but it does have one for Mob. I'll also watch the Evangelion movie if it's available on Netflix, I forgot to check. As you can see below, I've already started everything except for the Funimation ones, which I'm doing last. Thanks again for your patience everyone. This will guaranteed be done by the end of January (ideally a week or so before that).

REMAINING: 265 episodes
Neon Genesis Evangelion (2/26)
Monster (16/74)
Searching for the Full Moon (6/52)
Cromartie High School (8/26) *eps are half length
Code Geass (11/25 S1, 0/25 S2)
Mob Psycho 100 (1/13 S2, 0/1 OVA, 0/12 S3)
Kaguya-sama: Love is War (6/12 S2, 0/13 S3)
Sakura Quest (0/25)
The Tatami Galaxy (0/11)

(Airimg shows awaiting write-ups)
Raven of the Inner Palace
The Little Lies We All Tell
Bocchi the Rock
Chainsaw Man
Mobile Suit Gundam: The Witch From Mercury
My Master Has No Tail

The final ranking, not counting movies or dropped anime, will be a total of 292!

Deli-bird

(This came out in September so I think it counts as an airing show)

BONUS. Cyberpunk: Edgerunners
https://myanimelist.net/anime/42310/Cyberpunk__Edgerunners
Summer 2022 (10 episodes)
My Score: TBA, MAL Score: 8.64/10
Best Character: Rebecca

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OifiVCnFKzM

Premise: A young man named David Martinez is struggling to find a path in life in the cyberpunk dystopia that is Night City. He winds up being drawn into a group of edgerunners, cyborg criminals willing to do any job.

The Good: Cyberpunk: Edgerunners is a sci-fi action anime. It's set in the same universe as the video game, but I should state up front that I never played it. I know absolutely nothing about it. I never even watched a trailer. This anime just got such a good reception that I decided to check it out anyway! I hoped it'd be a pleasant surprise like Arcane (which isn't an anime, but is another Netflix show based on a controversial video game). Edgerunners sadly wound up falling a bit flat for me, but it still had good parts.

The production values were undeniably fantastic. It crafted the look and feel of the cyberpunk setting really well, and the animation was great the whole way through. I also enjoyed the soundtrack enough to find and listen to one song in particular over and over. The action scenes all had good tension. They were full of interesting cyberpunk abilities and gore. On a technical level, I cant complain about anything. As for the story, I liked most of the characters. David and Lucy had a good dynamic when they were together. In such a hellish setting, I appreciated that they didn't let it constantly weigh on them. There were lots of scenes where they were just having a good time, even when they were slaughtering goons with cyber powers.

The Bad: My big problem with Edgerunners is basically a nitpick. I tried to take this in stride and look past it, but it wound up souring me on most of the story. (Fair warning, I'm only going to talk about something that's pretty central to the setting even from the very beginning, but the fact that it bugged me this much might hint at certain events even though I won't mention any particular plot points. I guess minor spoiler warning). I straight-up don't like the idea of cyberpsychosis, which is when people with too many implants break down mentally and go insane. On a meta level, I hate it when neat settings arbitrarily limit themselves like that. Here are all these cool implants, but don't you dare use them! It just feels lame. Beyond that, on a narrative level, the story of Edgerunners dealt a lot with cyberpsychosis. They fought some high-powered goons, and it was always a looming danger the more implants the characters received. Despite that, I never felt like the story gave it the focus it deserved. Everyone seemed to think they could just make it through with willpower alone, even after seeing multiple times that it doesn't work. The way they nagged each other about having too many implants felt more like they were talking about quitting smoking and not, like, you might seriously go berserk and need to be put down like a rabid dog. It's one thing to have characters who are numbed to the horrors of their reality. Edgerunners had a lot of that and I liked it. Cyberpsychosis, however, is essentially an occupational hazard, yet no one cared about it enough to have a plan for dealing with its inevitable effects. It just felt stupid to me. I know this one complaint is kind of petty, but lots of big moments trace back to this and all of them fell flat for me as a result.

Overall: Like I said, I don't know anything about the Cyberpunk video game. I don't know if cyberpsychosis is gameplay mechanic in it. I'm guessing it isn't, though, because nothing sounds less fun to me than having a bunch of cool cybernetic implants only to arbitrarily limit how many the player can safely use. Edgerunners had lots of good things, including great production values, a well-realized futuristic setting, and interesting characters. I just couldnt get past how much I hated cyberpsychosis. It wound up being too integral to the plot for me to ignore. I'll still likely give Edgerunners a middling rank because there were large parts of it I genuinely enjoyed. Sadly, sometimes a relatively tiny nitpick is enough to ruin the larger whole.

Kris

Trading for Bonestorm auto

Bonestorm.

Bonestorm

Delibird

Happy New Year everyone! This is the last day where I'll accept recommendations, so if anyone still hasn't made one, now is the time.

I'm seven episodes into Monster, which I'll try to finish as fast as I can just in case Netflix does pull anything with account sharing. Then I'll do Evangelion right after. I'm off work on Monday, so the next write-up will be Cyberpunk: Edgerunners on Tuesday, then probably airing anime for the rest of the week until I finish Monster.

Noelle

Offering a free save

Delibird

Yule Man

Bonestorm

I'm depressed that the year is almost over and there's still no word on an official release for Summertime Rendering.

BONUS. Vinland Saga
https://myanimelist.net/anime/37521/Vinland_Saga
Summer 2019 (24 episodes)
My Score: TBA, MAL Score: 8.73/10
Best Character: Thorfinn
Recommended by: @NFUN

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7U7BDn-gU18

Premise: After the death of his father, a young boy named Thorfinn joins a band of Viking mercenaries. While most warriors simply try to survive the war in England or secure the best plunder, Thorfinn is focused on revenge.

The Good: Vinland Saga is a historical action anime set during the Danish invasion of England. This approximate era has been popular in fiction lately (I've never watched the TV show Vikings, but I know it was successful). It was neat seeing an anime interpretation of it. I enjoy historical epics, and the Vikings are always a fun bunch. Their warrior culture is interesting, and they're usually boisterous badasses who enjoy plunder and battle. That attitude is nicely contrasted by the more dour Thorfinn. His goal is getting revenge against Askeladd, the man who killed his father, but the situation is a lot more complicated than that. Due to various circumstances, Thorfinn needs to work for Askeladd in exchange for chances to duel him, which was a unique dynamic. I mostly enjoyed the bigger picture historical stuff, but Thorfinn's story was a nice driving motivation. Otherwise, the production values were all solid, and the battle scenes especially were great. I tried watching another Viking TV show once, The Last Kingdom, but I didn't get very far because the whole thing felt so cheap. I was thankful that Vinland Saga created a believable setting.

The Bad: My biggest problem is that the story didn't get as far as I would've liked. For something called Vinland Saga, Vinland wasn't exactly a big part of it! From what I've read since watching it, though, this whole first season is basically a prologue, so I guess that makes sense. The second season is starting soon, and I'm glad I won't need to wait as long for it as other people did. If I had to complain about anything else, I guess the last few episodes were a bit of a letdown. It set up what could've been an interesting situation filled with political intrigue, but then it threw all that aside and rushed to a brute-force conclusion. It didn't ruin the show or anything, but it was definitely a letdown.

Overall: Vinland Saga was a solid anime. I enjoyed the historical context and setting, the characters, and there were lots of well-animated battles. I'm glad this is getting another season, too, because hopefully that will resolve my biggest complaint by carrying the story further! Thanks for recommending this, NFUN. It'll probably end up near the middle of my final ranking, but that isn't a bad spot to be. I'd put this alongside a few other high-quality and beloved action anime, shows like Claymore or Attack on Titan. Those usually don't resonate enough with me to get a super high ranking, but I enjoyed watching Vinland Saga and I can definitely see how other people would love it a lot more. I hope either next season or future seasons actually reach the part of the story where they go to Vinland, because I think those early explorations of North America are really interesting!

Finished Vinland Saga, write-up for it coming tomorrow. While waiting for Monster to come out, I started Full Moon wo Sagashiteru/Searching for the Full Moon. Aside from watching it on YouTube in 360p, it's pretty good so far!

I often go to the anime board and search for opinions of old shows. The only post on there about Full Moon is from nine years ago, made by our very own MacArrowny! He called it the best idol anime of all time. I wouldnt go quite that far yet, but after six episodes it is surprisingly charming and has a lot of heart. (Also in fairness to Mac, the two actual best idol anime didn't exist when he made that post in 2013)

Delibird

Yule Man

Aru

PlasmaKappa posted...

Aru

auto for Aru

For SCP

Bonestorm

BONUS. Record of Ragnarok
https://myanimelist.net/anime/44942/Shuumatsu_no_Walk%C3%BCre
Summer 2021 (12 episodes)
My Score: TBA, MAL Score: 6.66/10
Best Character: Brunhilde
Recommended by: @GavsEvans123

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9FsffPTIL74

Premise: The gods have decided to destroy humanity, but the mortals still have one last chance. During Ragnarok, the thirteen strongest humans from throughout history will face off against the thirteen strongest gods in a duel that will decide the fate of humanity.

The Good: Record of Ragnarok is an action anime about historical figures dueling gods. I'll have some complaints about this, and since I haven't read the manga I don't know if this was poorly executed there too or if this is just a bad adaptation. It's disappointing in either case, because I think this is a really fun idea! Historical figures having over-the-top battles with mythical gods is great. The first battle is Lu Bu vs Thor, I mean come on that's awesome. I liked how it delved into the history of each fighter, and gave them all cool abilities. Looking at the list of fighters, there are a lot of unique choices that I'm excited to see. Conceptually, Record of Ragnarok is really cool.

The Bad: Unfortunately, I thought the execution of this cool idea was mediocre at best. It has a good art style, but the animation itself is really bad. Lots of scenes are mostly still images of characters talking or reacting. I saw a lot of comments elsewhere calling this a slideshow, and it's hard to disagree. Even when the characters fought, the battles were rarely impressive. Aside from the animation, I didn't like the pacing. There were too many reactions from the crowd, and after pretty much every attack the action paused to examine it from every possible angle. Between that and the flashbacks, each ten minute fight was stretched across four episodes. I think this would be less of a problem in manga format where the reader could read all of that without pausing the action in their imagination, but I don't think it worked very well in an anime format.

Overall: I still enjoyed Record of Ragnarok, but it was solely due to the strength of the idea. Historical figures with unique battle skills duking it out with gods is just such an inherently fun concept. Sadly, the anime itself was poorly paced and poorly animated. It made me think of The Junji Ito Collection, another anime where good ideas were held back by shockingly poor animation. Thankfully, Ragnarok wasn't anywhere near as bad as that. The art itself looked good, and the voice acting was solid. I just hope the upcoming second season handles pacing and animation a bit better. This will probably end up in the 3/10s of my final ranking, but I could easily see that rising if the next season is an improvement! In any case, thanks for recommending this, GavEvans. Watching Lu Bu battle Thor was a lot of fun, as were the other fights, and I'm genuinely excited for the duel they teased at the end of this season.

SCP-4666 Yule Man

Aru

PlasmaKappa posted...

811

Kris

auto for Aru

For SCP

Scott Calvin

Bonestorm

Trading for Bonestorm auto

BONUS. Cowboy Bebop
https://myanimelist.net/anime/1/Cowboy_Bebop
Spring 1998 (26 episodes)
My Score: TBA, MAL Score: 8.75/10
Best Character: Ein
Recommended by: @Celo

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EL-D9LrFJd4

Premise: Set in the near future, Spike Spiegel and Jet Black are bounty hunters. They travel the solar system in their ship, the Bebop, and try to catch enough bad guys to pay the bills.

The Good: Cowboy Bebop is a sci-fi action anime. It's episodic for the most part, usually involving them tracking down a bounty or dealing with a personal problem. Still, I liked how the characters and their growth/relationships always carried over between episodes even if the individual plots did not. They picked up new crewmembers along the way, including a mysterious woman named Faye, a genius child hacker named Ed, and a cute scientifically enhanced dog named Ein. The crew of the Bebop had a fun dynamic most of the time. I was pleasantly surprised at how funny a lot of episodes could be! The episodic nature of the series meant I could watch each one as its own little fun adventure. Some episodes were obviously better than others, but there were only one or two that I outright disliked. If I had to pick a favorite, it'd probably be Toys in the Attic, the one where they battled a nefarious slime loose on the ship. It was tough choosing a favorite character between Ed and Ein. They both excelled at doing fun things in the background even though the plot rarely focused on them. In the end, I decided I liked the smart dog the best. I really enjoyed how fun this anime was overall.

The Bad: I'm guessing this will be controversial, but the more serious episodes were my least favorite. Anytime anything related to Julia or Vicious showed up, my enjoyment took a noticeable dive. I liked Spike the goofy yet competent bounty hunter, not Spike the guy haunted by his past. It all felt very vague and melodramatic, so I didn't really care about it. I wanted more episodes like Ed and Ein wandering around looking for food and less like Jupiter Jazz or the finale.

Overall: Cowboy Bebop was a lot more fun than I expected it to be. Most of what I'd heard about it over the years made it sound like a gritty crime drama, and the few episodes that were like that weren't my favorites. I wasn't expecting to have so many fun stories like Spike battling a showboating killer in an amusement park, or one episode spending significant time just trying to figure out how to play an old video tape. Thanks for recommending this, Celo! I'm not sure when I'd have gotten around to this otherwise. It'll probably wind up falling somewhere around average in my final ranking, but that isn't a bad thing. I'm glad I finally watched it.

Yule Man

Aru

Reminder that January 1st is the last day I'll take recommendations, and thats coming right up.

I also just learned Sakura Quest finally moved to Crunchyroll! Now only The Tatami Galaxy is stuck on Funimation. Still, most of my remaining recommendations are on Netflix. They announced getting rid of password sharing in early 2023. Since I'm a leech on my brother's account, I'm focusing on finishing those as much as I can. Hopefully there will be enough time for me to finish Monster without having to pay for a month on my own (though I will if I have to). I also watched Cyberpunk: Edgerunners because it came out recently enough to count as airing, and it was one of the few remaining Netflix anime I really wanted to watch. I'll do a write-up for it at some point and count it in the final ranking too.

I hope everyone is having good holidays. I'll be back with more write-ups on Wednesday.

SCP-4666 Yule

Aru

Bonestorm

Trading auto

(I mostly did airing anime this week, but now I have four days off work! I'll spend some time with family, but I'll also work on finishing some shows. I'll be back on Wednesday with some actual recommendations. Have a good Christmas, everyone!)

BONUS. Akiba Maid War
https://myanimelist.net/anime/52193/Akiba_Meido_Sensou
Fall 2022 (12 episodes)
My Score: TBA, MAL Score: 7.71/10
Best Character: Mannen Ranko

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jxN-HbcE0XQ

Premise: Wahiru Nagomi follows her dream and moves to Akihabara to work at a maid cafe. However, it turns out that the life of a maid is a lot more violent than she was expecting.

The Good: Akiba Maid War is an action comedy that takes a story better suited for a hardened yakuza gang and uses cute maid girls instead. It's an undeniably fun and unique idea. The first episode especially left me with high hopes, it had flashy action and the contrast of cute maids and gang violence was great. Maid cafes all have unique twists (the main group is modeled after pigs, but there are a bunch of different animal or alien mash-ups). The setting gave me a similar vibe as the old movie The Warriors with its themed gangs. One of the main characters, the older maid Ranko who had just gotten out of jail, really impressed me early on. It really felt like AMW would be the easy choice for anime of the season.

The Bad: Sadly, Akiba Maid War never lived up to its full potential. Of the seven characters in the pig cafe, only two of them feel fleshed out. Ranko and Nagomi get most of the screentime. Everyone else still has a unique character and a few neat moments, but mostly it felt like they were just there to fill out the scenes, which was a huge letdown. As for the main two, I mostly just found Nagomi annoying. Her innocence didn't fit in the violent maid underworld, and it was never satisfyingly explained why she stuck around after her first brush with death. Ranko was still easily the best girl, but even she had moments where her central character changed in an instant for reasons that weren't adequately explained. Basically, none of the characters were great. Even more disappointing, the setting and overall story were both half-baked too. This kind of gang story would've benefited from clear power structures and realistic retaliation whenever one faction crossed another. Instead, it never felt like anything mattered or built into anything bigger. Whether the pig cafe was fine or in trouble or being actively hunted changed on an episode by episode basis, often by the literal whims of some higher-ups. Eventually I just stopped caring because it didn't feel like the characters were actually influencing anything.

Overall: I'm glad that Akiba Maid War exists. My favorite thing about anime is that it can have off-the-wall genre mashups like this. Sometimes the result of mixing, say, cute girls and counterterrorism, results in a fun story like Lycoris Recoil. Then other times an idea that seems like a winner, yakuza maids, winds up falling flat. I didn't like any of the characters by the end, and the plot was all over the place, but Akiba Maid War was still a fun experiment. I'll most likely end up ranking it somewhere in the 3/10s, but I'm glad I watched it.

Koopa

Fluttershy_Pony posted...

Offering standard trade for Koopa, if anyone's interested.

For Bonestorm

SCP-4666 Yule

BONUS. Do It Yourself
https://myanimelist.net/anime/48542/Do_It_Yourself
Fall 2022 (12 episodes)
My Score: TBA, MAL Score: 7.55/10
Best Character: Suride 'Purin' Miku

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vOBr0jcqnZo

Premise: Yua Serefu, a clumsy daydreamer, decides to join her school's DIY club. Even in an era of technological advancement, there's still a certain charm in making things by hand!

The Good: Do It Yourself is a cute girls slice-of-life club anime with a focus on woodworking and other hand-crafted things. It's a comfy show with a similar vibe to something like Laid-Back Camp, which is always nice (though I didn't think DIY was anywhere near as good). I enjoyed watching the girls decide what to make, gather materials, and then put it all together. All the characters had fun personalities, and, while they were relatively simplistic, they each got at least a bit of depth. My favorite was Purin, Serefu's tsundere best friend who acted aloof but was secretly always caring and supportive. I also really liked how they built and sold smaller trinkets to raise money for a larger project. That was neat to see, and gathering funds is something I think a lesser anime would've skipped.

The Bad: DIY just didn't resonate with me as much as other laid-back anime have. Everything about it was comfy and fine, but that was it. I can't pinpoint anything terrible, though. Serefu's clumsiness was charming at first but also got old over time. That's about it.

Overall: Do It Yourself was a show I looked forward to watching every week because it was overall a nice and happy anime. It'll likely end up ranking a low 6/10 overall, very close to exactly average, but theres nothing wrong with that! I liked all the characters and watching them build things was fun. It didn't become a huge favorite, but not every anime needs to. Sometimes average is enough!

Bonestorm

Reg posted...

It's a yakuza show, where all of the gang members happen to be (cute) girls.

I understood that (and nothing in my post indicated that I didn't). It was just a disappointingly bad yakuza show. Multiple episodes were basically the same plot the girls get into trouble at another cafe and then wipe them out happened three times with zero ramifications and the characters were either boring or did things that contradicted their entire characterization Ranko was best girl, so I was so disappointed when they ruined her. Everything about her was focused on wanting to be a maid at the cafe with everyone else, but then she was willing to run away from that the second a dude proposed to her, ugh. Aside from the fun visual of maids doing yakuza things, this show was just really poorly put together on almost every level.

Finished Akiba Maid War. I liked the first episode quite a bit, but once the show had used its twist, it got really bad really fast. If all you want is violent maid cafes, this has that. I just wanted that aspect to build into an intelligent or satisfying story, and Akiba Maid War never did. The setting never came together for me. It focused more on edgy shock value than anything interesting or coherent. Oh well.

PA Works is now zero for four on creating a good anime original about a shitty workplace.

Jingle

SCP-4666 Yule

The cookie is gone on my phone now and I haven't blocked anything

Aru