Lurker > Robazoid

I used to have a rule that I needed to watch three episodes before dropping something no matter how awful it was, but I stopped doing that last year. Yuri is my Job was one I dropped after one episode because I knew it 100% wasn't for me. I also tried watching The Eccentric Family, an older PA Works anime, but I got such bad vibes from it that I dropped it after one episode too. Like, these people ate the main tanuki guy's father and he didn't seem to care and was also very blas about them wanting to kill and eat him too. I nope'd right out of that one because I felt like it would just make me angry. Hated the main girl. I was proud of myself for stopping that show after one episode.

I doubt I'll ever be the type to drop a lot of anime, though. If anything, I might go back and actually finish a few I have dropped. Urahara, Beatless, and Psycho Pass deserve another chance. When I drop a show, I want it to be special. I want it to mean something! If I can slog through trash like Highspeed Etoile, that means dropped shows like Gantz are on a whole other level of bad.

But if I drop them, that means the anime defeated me!

Dennou Coil

More first episode impressions!

-Kaiju No. 8 was okay. Awesome production values, plus I'm a kaiju fan so the setting is cool. The worldbuilding aspect of workers coming in after to clean up the corpses is neat, and I'm kinda sad that won't be the focus of the show. As for the main dude and what the show will actually be about, this first episode wasn't enough to sell me on that yet. I mean he only just transformed at the very end, I feel like this could still go a bunch of different ways. I'll have to watch a few more to give it a fair ranking.

-Whisper Me a Love Song was good too! I have a bad track record with yuri anime. Usually I'm hopeful at the start but then they descend into shitty melodrama (I'm in Love with the Villainess, Citrus) or simply never go anywhere (Adachi and Shimamura). Still, I'm going to keep giving them a try until I find the one for me! The two leads in this are good characters and cute together so far. I'm taking the risk of getting my hopes up again.

Anyway, this is everything I'm going to follow (for now). I'm fully caught up on everything except episode two of Highspeed Etoile, I couldn't bring myself to watch it yet. I'll probably write more about each of the shows a bit further into the season when the ranking has solidified, but this is it for now.

Potential to be Great
Laid-Back Camp S3
A Condition Called Love
Jellyfish Can't Swim in the Night
Unnamed Memory
Train to the End of the World
Tonari no Yokai-san
The Many Sides of Voice Actor Radio

Fine I Guess
Whisper Me a Love Song
Mysterious Disappearances
As a Reincarnated Aristocrat, I'll Use My Appraisal Skill etc
Kaiju No. 8
A Salad Bowl of Eccentrics
Astro Note
Studio Apartment, Good Lighting, Angel Included

I Should Probably Drop These But I Won't
Oblivion Battery
Gods' Games We Play
Highspeed Etoile
Grandma and Grandpa Turn Young Again

7th Time Loop

Dark Gathering

Mushishi

OBLIVION WING
+3 Flareon
+2 Spiritomb
+1 Burmy
-1 Toedscool
-2 Hatenna
-3 Bewear

ELECTRIFY
+3 Veluza
+2 Phanpy
+1 Nidoking
-1 Dondozo
-2 Froslass
-3 Garganacl

The second episode of A Condition Called Love really solidified it as my favorite of the season (not counting sequels, Yuru Camp S3 is too good). It's, like, 80% a super cute romance and 20% a super creepy romance. Those two distinct parts are meshing surprisingly well and I am here for it. My reaction at several points was essentialy "Aww, how sweet... wait, what the fuck". It's great! Plus it's doing what I've always wanted romance stories to do. It's actually examining what it means to be in a relationship with someone. I know it's still early, but this is shaping up to be one of my favorite anime romances ever.

More first episode impressions

-Mysterious Disappearances was neat! I wasn't sure what to expect from this after reading the premise, but what it wound up being was weird in a fun and interesting way. Main girl has a relatable internal conflict with how she's growing older while her dreams remain unfulfilled. I also want to learn more about her mysterious coworker. He's clearly got a lot going on, to the point where I wonder why he's working at a random bookstore... though, my current theory is that he's there just to appreciate how hot the main girl is, and hey I can't blame him for that. I'm liking how it handled the supernatural stuff, at least so far. Not sure if the rest of the season will hold up, sometimes these weird mystery anime flare out by the end, but right now I'm excited for it.

-The Many Sides of Voice Actor Radio was pretty great too. I like the two main girls and their dynamic with each other. It's a relationship that seems difficult to get right. Both girls had to be likable in some ways to get the audience to care about them, but also unlikable in other ways so that it'd make sense for them to hate each other at first. I was kinda worried they'd screw it up, but so far I think they're doing a good job. There was a moment at the end of the first episode that really sold it for me. I guess I'll spoiler tag it if anyone cares about super early spoilers for this comedy idol show. After Yasumi tripped her to jolt her out of her nervousness, Yuhi threatened to lodge a formal complaint... and for a second Yasumi is legitimately freaked out because she isn't sure if Yuhi will really do it or not. Then it turns out Yuhi is just embarrassed and Yasumi goes right back to teasing. I really liked that hostile uncertainty they have towards each other, even as they're clearly growing slightly closer.

The other thing I want to mention about Voice Actor Radio is that I recognized who was voicing the two main girls instantly. They sound different in their day-to-day life, but when they're in actor mode, well, I've been hearing those voices for years! They also voice two characters in BanG Dream, Kokoro and Kanon. For those of you don't know BanG Dream, those two are in the same happy-lucky-smile-yay band and they're two of the sweetest, friendliest girls ever. My only worry now is that I don't know if I can suspend my disbelief to the point where I can accept that Kokoro and Kanon are enemies!

Watched the first episode of Oblivion Battery, a baseball anime about a superstar catcher who gets amnesia. When I read the premise for this, it sounded like a hardcore sports anime similar to Blue Lock or something. It turns out that it isn't like that at all. What it actually is, at least so far, is a terrible comedy. The amnesia guy has seemingly reverted to the mindset of a three-year old and spouts nothing but the most juvenile jokes. I lost count of how many jokes he made about nipples and none of them were funny. His friend, a superstar pitcher, also has the personality of a piece of cardboard. For good measure, they also threw in a boring normal guy. This is our main cast and I don't like any of them. I really hope amnesia dude becomes less insufferable as this goes on, and maybe they'll introduce a few characters to add some actual spice to this cast. I went into this thinking it couldn't be worse than Cinderella Nine, but so far it's way, way worse.

Anyway, here's my season ranking so far. Gods' Games We Play fell really hard after episode 2, Train to the End of the World had an amazing episode 2 and rose a bit, and Unnamed Memory debuts pretty high! For as much as I dislike the bottom four, this is still shaping up to be a decent season.

Spring 2024 Ranking so far
-Laid-Back Camp S3
-A Condition Called Love
-Jellyfish Can't Swim in the Night
-Unnamed Memory
-Train to the End of the World
-Tonari no Yokai-san
-As a Reincarnated Aristocrat, I'll Use My Appraisal Skill to Rise in the World
-Astro Note
-A Salad Bowl of Eccentrics
-Studio Apartment, Good Lighting, Angel Included
-Oblivion Battery
-Gods' Games We Play
-Highspeed Etoile
-Grandma and Grandpa Turn Young Again

TORMENT
+3 Venomoth
+2 Krokorok
+1 Porygon
-1 Nosepass
-2 Kartana
-3 Quaxwell

PSYCHO CUT
+3 Mareep
+2 Spectrier
+1 Clobbopus
-1 Xerneas
-2 Golurk
-3 Sawk

First episode of Unnamed Memory completed, it seems like it'll be pretty good! I didn't like the prince's whiny friend who contributed absolutely nothing aside from begging to turn around, but I have to assume he'll be getting less screentime from here on out. Both the prince and the witch were great, and I'm excited to see more of them together. This is the show I was most excited for going into the season, and it hasn't disappointed me so far.

MartinFF7 posted...

And also don't watch the "next episode" previews at the episode's end, not worth it ever and REALLY not worth it in a few situations. Some episodes don't have ending song so gotta be more prompt in the episode skip, lol.

Thanks for the tips, I'll try not to get spoiled! It looks like the episode thumbnails on Hidive are all the same picture of the two leads now, so at least I won't need to worry about that.

Mushishi

@MartinFF7 I started watching Legend of the Galactic Heroes after all. I figured out how to view more episodes on Hidive (with the jankiest workaround imaginable, god that website sucks now) and I confirmed they have the whole series. I'm pretty sure the second season they have listed there are the two Gaiden seasons, whatever those are.

Still, I started with the first movie, Legend of the Galactic Heroes: My Conquest is the Sea of Stars. It was conveniently uploaded to Youtube, as is the second movie which I'll watch tomorrow. My understanding is that the second movie is an extended remake of the first two episodes of the show. Everywhere I've looked said to watch the two movies, then go straight to episode 3 and continue from there.

The first movie was fine. I definitely like sci-fi space battles, and it had lots of nice looking shots of the fleets. The two main dudes are cool too, though at the moment Reinhard is significantly cooler. Yang is held back by his side's leadership being absolute morons. Yang kept going "hey do this really obvious smart thing or everyone dies" and then his dumbass commanders go "nah, we're doing the stupid thing instead". I hope that dynamic doesn't last very long into the actual series because I'm tired of it already. Reinhard's commanders are morons too, but he's at least mostly in charge of his own forces unlike poor Yang. I have absolutely no idea what these two sides are fighting for, but right now I'm Team Empire! Let's crush that lousy Alliance.

Anyway, I'm not sure how long this behemoth of a show will take me to finish or how often I'll post updates as I go. I just wanted to let Martin know that I have finally begun watching it.

After episode two of Gods' Games We Play, I sadly have to admit that I was giving it too much credit after the first episode. The first actual game was super mediocre. This is going to fall in my seasonal ranking quite a bit.

I only had time for one episode this morning, I should've watched the Train one instead!

MartinFF7 posted...

It's time!!!

I looked up LotGH on Hidive, but man this website sucks now. I can't even scroll over further than 20 episodes on the series page, it just stops loading new ones there. I also can't figure out why it has two seasons listed. Maybe it's just split arbitrarily in half or something, but the first episode of S2 is "The Hero of El Facil" and that doesn't appear to be an episode title in the series according to Wikipedia. They've made it impossible to tell if they have the full series or what that second season even is.

Tell you what Martin, I'll watch LotGH right away if Hidive ever gets its act together and becomes easier to navigate! I should've watched it earlier before they ruined themselves. If only I'd known.

On another note, Ghost Hound was my 400th anime! In honor of that milestone, I want to share some fun stats I compiled while I was bored at work. This is a list of the 400 shows I've completed at least one season of sorted by their debut year. I feel like I've watched a decent amount, but the anime from 2010 and earlier only adds up to 31 shows, or less than 10%. Clearly I need to diversify a little and watch more older anime.

1995 - 1
1998 - 1
2002 - 1
2003 - 2
2004 - 1
2005 - 2
2006 - 3
2007 - 4
2008 - 5
2009 - 4
2010 - 7
2011 - 9
2012 - 13
2013 - 17
2014 - 16
2015 - 20
2016 - 22
2017 - 33
2018 - 73
2019 - 16
2020 - 15
2021 - 17
2022 - 41
2023 - 62
2024 - 15

I finally watched one of the anime I downloaded awhile ago, a random horror/supernatural one I found while looking for stuff unavailable on streaming.

Ghost Hound was pretty good! It's about a group of teens in a rural town who start having out-of-body experiences, and it got really spooky and weird. It had lots of spirituality and pseudoscience to explain everything that was going on, which I enjoyed because it helped anchor the strangeness in the reality of the setting. I liked all the characters too. There was a main group of three who were each troubled in different ways. All of that was explored really well, especially the main guy Taro who had major trauma from a childhood kidnapping that killed his sister. There were lots of great side characters too, like the doctor lady or the psychiatrist. Everyone got a lot of development and contributed in interesting ways.

Still, the absolute best part about this anime was the sound design. I watch anime with headphones, which probably enhanced the directional noises. The first few minutes of the first episode featured a fly buzzing around a room. I could follow the noise moving between ears and all around the room. I've never seen that effect done so well, and that's just one example. There were lots of really harsh droning noises or an otherworldly grinding or a thumping heartbeat drowning everything else out. This anime used sound to set the mood of a scene better than anything else I can think of off the top of my head.

I got super invested early on and it held on all the way to the end... but, sadly, I thought the end was a bit of a letdown. I still have a few unanswered questions, and the answer for a couple of the big mysteries couldn't help but feel underwhelming. Still, this was a good anime overall. There was a moment in the fourth episode that was one of the spookiest moments I've ever seen in an anime. This show was worth watching for that alone!

Etoile is too boring to even be "so bad it's good", I don't think it'll get any kind of traction like that.

More first episode impressions:

-Grandma and Grandpa Turn Young Again was absolute trash. After reading the premise, I had hoped that it would be a heartfelt story about a loving couple who get to do things together again. The very beginning teased them finally going on the honeymoon they never got to have back in the day, and I can imagine lots of comedic possibilities from something like that! Imagine them at some trendy beach surrounded by hip young people, only their sensibilities are 70 years outdated so they don't really fit in. That could be funny, and them still being very much in love would be cute too. Instead of doing anything like that, though, this is a comedy about how everyone wants to fuck them. Literally over half the segments in the first episode boiled down to "they're hot now". The granddaughter really, really wants to fuck her grandfather. The daughter-in-law wants to fuck her father-in-law. All the old geezers in town want to fuck young grandma. Ugh, it was awful. Even the few segments that weren't about their hotness weren't funny. Let's watch five minutes of them winning at various sports, that's hilarious right? What if we have an old guy, in front of his grandkids, badmouthing his dead wife because he always wanted to fuck young grandma instead? Ugh ugh ugh. I also hated how they kept their exaggerated old people voices even now that they're young again. I didn't think anything would be worse than Highspeed Etoile this season, but here we are.

-As a Reincarnated Aristocrat, I'll Use My Appraisal Skill to Rise in the World was fine. It's still an isekai and has all the baggage that comes with that like stat screens and awkward infodumping. Did I really need to hear all seven of the former kingdoms if the bottom line is "they're all one empire now"? Still, the premise is interesting and unique enough that I'm still interested in it. The main guy's power to see people's potential is cool. The setting, a corrupt empire doomed to fracture, reminds me of the Three Kingdoms era in China. If this is going to be about the main dude being a Liu Bei-type figure, gathering people of talent to conquer the turbulent times, then I'm excited for it. The first episode definitely gave me some hope.

-Jellyfish Can't Swim in the Night was surprisingly great! I really liked the story it told with the one girl's mural and how it brought the two of them together. More than the story, though, was the way it was told. Lots of creative uses of flashbacks, lots of dynamic angles, and really high production values all around. If it can keep up this quality the whole way through, this could easily rise in my ranking and become the best show of the season! I wasn't planning to check this out at all initially, but I'm glad I did.

Spring 2024 Ranking so far
-Laid-Back Camp S3
-A Condition Called Love
-Jellyfish Can't Swim in the Night
-Tonari no Yokai-san
-Gods' Games We Play
-Train to the End of the World
-As a Reincarnated Aristocrat, I'll Use My Appraisal Skill to Rise in the World
-Astro Note
-A Salad Bowl of Eccentrics
-Studio Apartment, Good Lighting, Angel Included
-Highspeed Etoile
-Grandma and Grandpa Turn Young Again

I don't think I liked Arte enough to check out the manga, but that's good for the people who want a conclusion.

On the manga front, I've been busy reading The Family Circumstances of the Irregular Witch. I think I was the only one who cared about its anime adaptation last year, but it was hilarious and the manga has been equally great.

Today I watched Arte, an historical anime about a girl who becomes an artist in Renaissance Italy. I liked Arte as a character, she had a lot of fun moments and always pushed towards her dream. I also liked her mentor Leo and a few of the side characters, like Veronica. However, I wasn't a big fan of how much this focused on sexism. Women almost certainly had it rough back then, but it isn't especially fun to watch people mock and dismiss her over and over. It felt like half the episodes featured some variation of "lol you can't do this, you're a girl". Don't get me wrong, it was satisfying to watch Arte power through and prove them wrong, but I still would've preferred more variation in the storylines. It was a fine anime overall, but definitely not one of my favorites. Lots of the art looked pretty, at least.

Tonari no Yokai-san does feel like a show that could wind up being really special. It hasn't quite gotten there for me yet, but the potential is definitely there! As you said, the sound design was on point.

More first episode thoughts. I was going to watch the Jellyfish show too but of course Hidive fucked up one of its only two new shows this season, I guess I'll watch it later.

-Tonari no Yokai-san was pretty good! I definitely got Kamichu vibes from it, so anyone who liked that show should at least check this out. It's about a small town with lots of fantastical stuff like a cat turning into a supernatural creature or tengu wandering around, but it's all played for a slice-of-life vibe. I'm a sucker for this kind of world-building, like when a girl saw a gigantic mist creature wandering around so she knew it was going to rain later. I felt like they tried to introduce too many people early on, so I don't have a feel for most of the characters yet. I enjoyed it, though! Plus there were some hints of slightly darker elements, which is intriguing in an otherwise happy show like this. I'm curious to see where they go with it.

-Highspeed Etoile, hoo boy. If this doesn't wind up being the worst show of the season, I'll be surprised. The whole first episode was a race where they told us outright who the favorites for first and second were, and then those two got first and second with zero twists. I guess that would be fine if the race itself was interesting, but it really wasn't. I guess the animation looked pretty enough if you don't mind CGI, but there's only so much "car passed other car, then another car passed" that I can take, and the bland commentary didn't help. It's sci-fi, they could've at least added Mario Kart weapons or something. All they have is a limited boost, and this first episode didn't even use that in an interesting way. We're on the straight part of the course, time for everyone to boost, and since everyone's boost lasts the same amount of time it has no impact on the race whatsoever. Ugh. The only reason I have any hope for this show at all is that the actual main character wasn't introduced until the very end of the episode. I hope I wind up liking her, at least. Maybe she'll be a prodigy who can make this shit interesting.

Spring 2024 Ranking so far
-Laid-Back Camp S3
-A Condition Called Love
-Tonari no Yokai-san
-Gods' Games We Play
-Train to the End of the World
-Astro Note
-A Salad Bowl of Eccentrics
-Studio Apartment, Good Lighting, Angel Included
-Highspeed Etoile

Watched the first episode of Astro Note, the show about a chef who gets a job at a lodge and falls in love with an alien girl. It was... weird? Like all the tenants are complete weirdos, but that isn't what I mean. The chef guy went there after seeing an ad about hiring a chef. Then everyone starts apologizing because I guess the ad was fraudulent and they aren't hiring a chef? But they 100% need a chef, they just aren't hiring one? The whole first half of the episode was a weird back-and-forth of "we absolutely need a chef for a bunch of reasons, sorry we can't hire you though". Of course main dude is smitten with the alien girl so he moves in on his own, I guess to work there for free? She gives him a budget of 250 yen per person per day, but I know enough about what the yen is worth to know that isn't enough for a decent meal. I guess he's paying for their meals out of his own pocket, too? This guy better start getting sex soon, otherwise he's getting screwed.

Anyway, my massive confusion for the premise aside, it wasn't a bad show. I liked a few of the weirdos at least. Astro Note definitely feels like it'll be unique.

MacArrowny posted...

Worth noting that we thought Pon no Michi was unlicensed last season, but it actually got streamed and translated on Youtube.

Oh cool, I didn't know that. I should check it out sometime.

I miss the days when MAL had a big simulcast news post showing where everything went. It made things so much easier.

I've been watching that Crunchyroll list for awhile now, it used to have a bunch more question marks. I think it means they're only getting one more show.

Rinkai and Tonbo aren't going to be streaming anywhere either, as far as I can tell. A lot of shows are weirdly unavailable this season.

I finally finished the last of the Winter shows too. I might watch a few more someday like Mr. Villain or Solo-Leveling, but this is it for now.

The Witch and the Beast was fine, but it should've been better. I really liked the dark fantasy world, and the characters were all interesting. The main duo had a fun dynamic. Both their personalities and their specialties/combat styles complimented each other well. I also enjoyed the various story arcs they embarked on, whether it was hunting witches or some other supernatural threat. The production quality wasn't always the greatest, which held it back a bit, but I'm not usually one to care too much about that. In the end, I just felt like it didn't live up to its potential as much as it should have. I love so many of its individual components, yet for some reason the overall whole left me feeling kind of meh. This was hard to slot into my ranking because I could slide it up or down depending on how I'm feeling. Since the last episode was a big info-dump setting up their next adventure and there's no way this ever gets a second season, my final feelings towards this show were kind of negative.

Sengoku Youko wasn't for me. It was competent in most regards. The animation was fine, the characters were fine, and the setting was fine. I just didn't enjoy any of it very much. The only character I really liked was Shakuyaku, and she didn't get anywhere near the focus she deserved. Shinsuke was just a random hanger-on who added nothing... until he wasn't, but even then he developed instantly in ways I didn't like. The dynamic between Tama and Jinka mostly just annoyed me. I also didn't like how the story progressed, it never felt like it was building towards anything interesting. This is an adaptation of a work from the same guy who made Planet With, which I loved, so I'm kind of sad that Sengoku Youko pushed me away as hard as it did. I can see some narrative similarities between the two, but this one felt like it was missing all of the things I loved so much in Planet With. Sengoku Youko just wasn't for me, I guess. Maybe the future seasons will turn me around on it.

Metallic Rouge was really, really bad. The only good thing about this show was the animation quality. Everything else sucked. The characters were all bland and undeveloped, and their motivations rarely made sense. Part of me wonders if this could've been a good story told in the worst way possible. Certainly it didn't do itself any favors with bad pacing and the nonsensical way it provided information. However, now that it's over and I can look at all the pieces that built the story... this whole thing just feels random and uninspired. Even in the hands of competent storytellers, I think this anime would've always sucked. At least it wasn't as bad as Fluffy Paradise.

Winter 2024 Ranking
-7th Time Loop
-The Wrong Way to Use Healing Magic
-Frieren: Beyond Journey's End
-Ragna Crimson
-Villainess Level 99
-A Sign of Affection
-Doctor Elise
-The Witch and the Beast
-The Unwanted Undead Adventurer
-Hokkaido Gals Are Super Adorable
-The Foolish Angel Dances With the Devil
-Sengoku Youko
-The Weakest Tamer Began a Journey to Pick Up Trash
-The Apothecary Diaries
-Sasaki and Peeps
-The Demon Prince of Momochi House
-Metallic Rouge
-Fluffy Paradise

Three more first episode impressions!

-Laid-Back Camp S3 started great as expected. I was worried about it moving to a new studio, but it's been awhile since I watched S2 so any changes in the animation or art style went unnoticed. What I did notice, however, was that a pinecone went "cone-ichiwa". Perfect. That's all I needed! It was nice seeing all the girls again, and the flashback to tiny Rin was cute. I'm looking forward to sitting back, relaxing, and enjoying this comfy anime again.

-A Salad Bowl of Eccentrics looks like it's going to be this season's reverse isekai. It barely even bothered to set it up. Princess in a fantasy world was facing a rebellion, oh no. Better jump into the convenient portal to another world she had in the basement for some reason. Then she landed on a private detective and started living with him, despite the princess being thirteen and the detective being thirty. To the shows credit, at least it wasn't creepy about it. Instead it saved the fanservice for the lady knight who bathed naked in a river. I'm sort of intrigued about where this could go. I got some Hinamatsuri vibes from the way these superpowered weirdos are trying to fit into regular society. I just don't think this show will ever manage to be anywhere near as hilarious as Hinamatsuri was.

-A Condition Called Love is a romance about a handsome guy who finds himself drawn to a dorky girl. A tale as old as time. It kind of reminded me of Skip and Loafer from last year (the main girl in this even looks like the main girl from that). Still, I can tell this is going to be much more romance-focused. I mean, the main dude confessed to her five minutes in. In a medium where it usually takes two seasons before the couple even admits their feelings, that's gotta be a speed record. The crux of the show is that the main girl isn't sure what love is, like she strikes me as aromantic or demiromantic. Despite being so open and forceful about his feelings, it's clear that the main guy has no idea what love is either. He's self-sacrificing to the point that it's really off-putting.

It's a dynamic that I'm not sure most people would enjoy... but I kind of did! I think the most interesting part of a romance is what happens after the confession. So many stories (especially in anime) usually end at that point. It's like most authors have no idea how to make a relationship interesting, so they just trail off with a bland "I guess they lived happily ever after". There are still so many hurdles that a relationship can face, though! Simply trying to fit another person into your life can be a difficult thing even for the most well-balanced couples, and the couple in this show is anything but balanced. They're going to have to endure lots of struggles and lots of soul-searching. This show sounded like a bland romance when I first read about it. After seeing the first episode, though, I'm really excited for it! It's an interesting dynamic, and I'm looking forward to seeing how the story explores it. I just hope it doesn't get too melodramatic.

Spring 2024 Ranking so far
-Laid-Back Camp S3
-A Condition Called Love
-Gods' Games We Play
-Train to the End of the World
-A Salad Bowl of Eccentrics
-Studio Apartment, Good Lighting, Angel Included

If anyone is interested, I'm looking for a permanent trade deal for Dark Gathering.

I'm really trying to clear out my backlog, so I finally completed Stellvia, an older mecha anime. I thought it was pretty good in the first half. The premise is that a distant star exploded and nearly destroyed Earth with its energy shockwave, but humanity rebuilt in order to defend against a second wave of physical debris coming two hundred years later. So, although it was a mecha anime, it wasn't the kind to have flashy robot battles or anything like that. Mostly it was about a group of students getting to know each other and training so that they could defend Earth when the time came. It was an interesting sci-fi premise, and that first half of the show was neat.

Sadly, the second half of Stellvia really dragged it down. It went from being hyperfocused on a cool idea and instead got bogged down in a bunch of melodrama. I liked the main girl Shima overall, but her emotions kept hitting rock bottom over and over and it got really annoying. At one point she gave up and sobbed for six hours straight and it took several episodes for her friends to even begin getting her back on her feet. I'm fine with characters having to overcome adversity and whatnot, just not in this way or to this extent. I wanted them to focus more on the sci-fi stuff in that second half rather than Shima's self-inflicted relationship woes.

I was still glad I watched this, though! It was recommended to me a few months ago when I asked about mecha anime. On paper that feels like a genre I should enjoy, but quite a few mecha shows have found their way into the bottom of my ranking instead. I was beginning to wonder if the genre just wasn't for me. If nothing else, Stellvia showed me that this genre has more diversity than just the "defend against waves of monsters" plot in shows like Evangelion or Franxx. It has convinced me to give the mecha genre more chances in the future, and hopefully I'll find ones I love.

Snowman

Dark Gathering

Two new first episode reactions

-Gods' Games We Play was honestly pretty entertaining. I like what they've explained about the setting, though there's still a lot I don't know and a lot of room for it to turn to shit later on. The dynamic between the two main characters looks like it'll be fun, plus there's a weird mystery between them that I'm curious about. More than anything, though, the first game they played was what gave me hope. It was Memory but with a few twists that made it more entertaining to watch. It also served a purpose of helping them get to know each other. I'm not sure if future games will be handled with as much care, but for now I'm cautiously optimistic about this one! I enjoy shows about high-stakes games (such as Kakegurui).

-Train to the End of the World was... intriguing? The cause of the apocalypse being so goofy, and having such goofy effects, wasn't where I expected this show to go. I hope it isn't just nonstop goofy all the time, though. The main girl has a decent motivation in looking for her friend, and I like what I've seen of the other main characters too. I was really excited for this show, and I'm even more excited now that they've finally begun their journey! Having said that, I'm worried it's just going to be goofy nonsense the whole way through, and I'm not sure I'd enjoy that very much.

Spring 2024 Ranking so far
-Gods' Games We Play
-Train to the End of the World
-Studio Apartment, Good Lighting, Angel Included

Dolls

Today I finished Muromi-san, a comedy about mermaids. I found it by checking MAL for anime similar to Squid Girl, which I loved. Sadly, I wound up really, really hating Muromi-san. It was agonizing to finish even with half-length episodes. Most of the plots followed a boring main dude who was fishing on a pier as various mermaids of other mythological creatures came and bothered him. Muromi-san herself was never funny, but most of the side characters were somehow even worse. The bottom of the barrel was the big-boobed mermaid whose only character trait was lusting after Muromi. Most of her scenes verged on softcore porn, only somehow it wasn't remotely sexy. Just a bad anime all around.

Zombie Redneck Torture Family

I only remember that one where they added a show to everyone's watchlist that had infinite episodes.

It looks like it is an April Fools joke though! They definitely got me by doing it so early, plus it's a pretty low-key design change that I could see a clueless website designer thinking was a good idea.

MacArrowny posted...

pst check the date

I thought about that, but it's still March 31st and this is a terrible April Fools joke if it is one

Eww, MAL updated how it displays scores on show pages. High ones have pictures of a mountain and says "PEAK", lower ones have two thumbs-up and says "Okay" and one of the lowest ones I could find had an image of trash being thrown out and says "Uhhh"

I don't want MAL telling me what to think about scores! I preferred it before when it was just a number

UshiromiyaEva posted...

You really gotta check out some more Bones shows one day lol.

But, like, the big ones.

Don't get me wrong, I like AICO a lot too, but it being your go-to anime to represent Bones will never not be funny.

I've watched more than that! Here's my Bones ranking

1- AICO: Incarnation
2- Snow White with the Red Hair (wait they made this?)
3- Noragami
4- My Hero Academia
5- Carole and Tuesday
6- Mob Psycho 100
7- Dragon Pilot
8- Metallic Rouge

Picking between Dragon Pilot and Metallic Rouge for that bottom spot was rough and I didn't like Mob Psycho very much, but the top two are in my all-time top 10 and Noragami was amazing too.

UshiromiyaEva posted...

There appears to be 1 episode left of Metallic Rouge and discussion of it seems to have mostly evaporated.

After putting it on hold about 5 episodes in, I was hoping to hear about a triumphant finish, but it seems like it may be whimpering out. I was so vocal about it being my most anticipated series.....it's such a shame it ended up like it did.

I stuck with Metallic Rouge and regret it. Spoilers for my season ranking, it'll barely rank ahead of Fluffy Paradise, which is sad because FP wound up being weird pro-genocide propaganda. Then of course there's my own most anticipated show, Momochi House, third from the bottom...

At least Metallic Rouge's MAL score finally fell below AICO's! It feels like a show where the good production values would help prop up the rankings, but thankfully not. AICO deserves so much more than a 6.53, but MR having a (currently) 6.51 makes me feel less crazy. Hard to believe these two shows were made by the same studio.

CoolCly posted...

I was kinda into Ragna Crimson at the very beginning, but I really hated how they started off with the pair but then literally deleted the MC and replaced him with an entirely different character thats OP af with that dumb angry personality, then have him ditch his partner because she's too weak to keep up after carrying his ass so long, THEN add this entirely new character Crimson and is like "okay NOW the series starts"

I strongly disliked Future Ragna and Crimson incomparison to how much I liked Ragna and Leonica, so just discarding the first pair for this new pair really rubbed me the wrong way. What a convoluted way to get to your series premise....

Yeah, that double-length first episode was kind of a bait-and-switch. Definitely convoluted, too. I didn't mind it though! The premise felt fresher than it otherwise would've been, I feel like there must be plenty of other anime that play this monster hunting idea in a more straighforward way. Plus I really liked the dynamic between Ragna and Crimson. Crimson was such a piece of shit most of the time, but in an interesting way.

More Leonica would've been nice too, I'll admit. Still, there were plenty of other neat characters. Did you stick around long enough to see Starlia? She was super cool and really carried the later portion of the show for me.

Another seasonal anime completed.

Ragna Crimson was an interesting show. It was a super dark fantasy series about hunting dragons. I wouldn't have guessed that I could enjoy a show with so much wanton slaughter. In the end, though, I wound up liking it quite a bit! Ragna had an interesting premise, even if it was a bit convoluted. Crimson was an interesting, enigmatic character, and all of his minions were great. Evil Slime in particular was the best. There were also a lot of super strong dragons with cool superpowers, and the battles were enjoyable. If anyone is looking for a dark fantasy action series, you could do a lot worse than this.

The only downside is that you'll have to watch it on Hidive. They updated their website and video player a few weeks ago, but catching up on this was my first time watching something there since then. My god, it's worse than before! There was a fucking "cookie setting" logo onscreen that wouldn't go away until I right-clicked, inspected the elements, and deleted whole lines of code. The only subtitle color option available was an ugly, hard-to-read yellow. There's no display setting options anymore and sometimes the quality would nosedive into pixelated smears and I couldn't do anything about it. Why did they get rid of the dropdown menu that let me pick 1080p? What the hell did they do to themselves? Literally everything is worse now.

Winter 2024 Ranking
-7th Time Loop
-The Wrong Way to Use Healing Magic
-Frieren: Beyond Journey's End
-Ragna Crimson
-Villainess Level 99
-A Sign of Affection
-Doctor Elise
-The Unwanted Undead Adventurer
-Hokkaido Gals Are Super Adorable
-The Foolish Angel Dances With the Devil
-The Weakest Tamer Began a Journey to Pick Up Trash
-The Apothecary Diaries
-Sasaki and Peeps
-The Demon Prince of Momochi House
-Fluffy Paradise

The Spring 2024 anime season has begun! I watched the first episode of Studio Apartment, Good Lighting, Angel Included. I appreciated how it very, very quickly made it clear exactly what kind of show it would be. Within the first five minutes, main dude discovered a sleeping angel, spilled a bunch of sticky white stuff on her it was milk but still and then there were a bunch of bra and panty shots while she got cleaned up. This is going to be a fanservice harem show, 100%.

You know what though, I don't mind that every so often. It looks like it'll be the cute kind of harem rather than the dramatic kind or the creepy kind. The angel girl is fine so far, but based off the other girls shown in the OP at the end, she's probably going to wind up being my least favorite girl. Can't wait to meet the shy blue-haired one. Main dude also won points from me right away when, after running across a cat on the street, he first held his hand out and let the cat smell him. That's how you greet an unfamiliar cat! You don't just jump right into patting them, that would scare them away. Whoever wrote this understands cats and I respect that.

Decent start to the season.

GranzonEx posted...

If you get Roba hooked on vtubers he's going to quit his job and watch 10 streams every day...

I didn't even care when BanG Dream introduced some sort of vtuber group, and I love BanG Dream! I'm definitely not going to get into them anywhere else.

I don't know much about how vtubers even work, but I work evenings so it's tough to catch streams and whatnot.

Apparently he already has you unignored and unblocked so I guess this should work? If it doesn't then you might need to unignore him too for the duration of one topic.

https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/boards/8-gamefaqs-contests/80733037