What Current Anime Are You Watching Version v4.0

[Scyla]

It seems like Mononga continues with his „fake it till you make it“ path to world domination in Overlord S4.

Since I’m not watching anything else from this season I‘m looking into older anime.

Additionally I‘m planning to visit the ocean this fall, I know nothing about snorkeling and I’m giant weep, so I decided to watch an anime about diving.

I’m currently going through Amanchu! season 2 to find out more. I already learned some interesting things.

[Hikaru Ichijo SL]

I finished Uchuu Senkan Yamato 2205 and it pretty great.

[Stampeed Valkyrie]

19 hours ago, Hikaru Ichijo SL said:

I finished Uchuu Senkan Yamato 2205 and it pretty great.

I am waaay out of date on the Yamato Remakes..  I really liked 2199,  and I have 2202 but I have yet to watch it.    After that 2205..  lol

 

[Hikaru Ichijo SL]

2 hours ago, Stampeed Valkyrie said:

I am waaay out of date on the Yamato Remakes..  I really liked 2199,  and I have 2202 but I have yet to watch it.    After that 2205..  lol

 

Next is Rebel 3199

[Black Valkyrie]

 

https://www.animenewsnetwork.com/news/2022-08-25/mazinger-franchise-new-ufo-robo-grendizer-project-to-be-unveiled-in-2023/.188990

 

[Hikaru Ichijo SL]

I finished by the Grace of the Gods and it was a cute, calming show.

[Seto Kaiba]

Well, Overlord IV has ended... it sounds like we're getting a movie adaptation of the one story arc they skipped to get to The Witch of the Falling Kingdom.  We're gonna get a movie out of the Paladin of the Holy Kingdom.

 

The new season has some interesting offerings on simulcast.

Spy x Family part 2, Mob Psycho III, My Hero Academia 6, Uzaki-chan wants to hang out part 2, Berserk: the Golden Age arc, Jujutsu Kaisen 0, Legend of Galactic Heroes Die Nueue These 4, Mobile Suit Gundam: the Witch from Mercury, and Welcome to Demon School Iruma-kun 3.

No official word on Macross streaming from the major player yet that I can see, but still some good stuff on offer

[Seto Kaiba]

Trying to watch Birdie Wing... but this show is just on ALL the drugs.

It's almost trying to turn cute young girls playing golf into an edgy shounen anime.  It's so deep into "What do you mean it's not awesome" territory that it's actually kind of accidentally hilarious watching everyone treat golf like some amazing pulse-pounding high-stakes sport as dramatic as a life-or-death fight.

[Scyla]

12 hours ago, Seto Kaiba said:

Well, Overlord IV has ended... it sounds like we're getting a movie adaptation of the one story arc they skipped to get to The Witch of the Falling Kingdom.  We're gonna get a movie out of the Paladin of the Holy Kingdom.

 

The new season has some interesting offerings on simulcast.

Spy x Family part 2, Mob Psycho III, My Hero Academia 6, Uzaki-chan wants to hang out part 2, Berserk: the Golden Age arc, Jujutsu Kaisen 0, Legend of Galactic Heroes Die Nueue These 4, Mobile Suit Gundam: the Witch from Mercury, and Welcome to Demon School Iruma-kun 3.

No official word on Macross streaming from the major player yet that I can see, but still some good stuff on offer

Did you like season 4 of Overlord? I was whelmed. Not much stuff seems to happen while they were meddling with the kingdom.

I liked season 1-3 but I binged those while I watched season 4 on a week by week basis.

11 hours ago, Seto Kaiba said:

Trying to watch Birdie Wing... but this show is just on ALL the drugs.

It's almost trying to turn cute young girls playing golf into an edgy shounen anime.  It's so deep into "What do you mean it's not awesome" territory that it's actually kind of accidentally hilarious watching everyone treat golf like some amazing pulse-pounding high-stakes sport as dramatic as a life-or-death fight.

I really enjoyed the show. I have no deep knowledge about golf; so you are telling me it is not like this in the real sport? 

[Seto Kaiba]

13 minutes ago, Scyla said:

Did you like season 4 of Overlord? I was whelmed. Not much stuff seems to happen while they were meddling with the kingdom.

I did like it, but I am inherently quite biased in its favor as I am a big fan of Maruyama's Overlord light novel series.

It definitely had issues.  I'd say most of them were caused by where Overlord's fourth season landed in terms of adapting the light novel.  The previous three seasons all remained narratively very tight by adapting three-volume story arcs.  Season four had the misfortune of starting on not one but TWO single-volume "breather" story arcs with adaptations of volumes 10 and 11 ("The Ruler of Conspiracy" and "The Dwarven Crafter").  Those two tried to bring the tone down a bit before the two-part gut punch "The Paladin of the Sacred Kingdom", but for what I assume are runtime reasons they skipped over that arc completely and went straight to "The Witch of the Doomed Kingdom".  The writers did clearly try quite hard to smooth over its absence while leaving a little to tie into the movie, but without "The Paladin of the Sacred Kingdom" first there's a fair amount of context missing for why so many nations not only won't help Re-Estize but aren't exactly bothered by the prospect of its destruction either.

 

13 minutes ago, Scyla said:

I really enjoyed the show. I have no deep knowledge about golf; so you are telling me it is not like this in the real sport? 

I am enjoying Birdie Wing, but for all the wrong reasons.

It's not just that Birdie Wing is giving a relatively placid, humdrum sport like golf the Iwakakeru treatment and presenting it as the most exciting sport in the story's world.  It's that it takes that to an even more extreme place.  This is a world where golf - and more importantly watching golf - are apparently so exciting to these people that there is back-alley golf gambling with people betting thousands and thousands of dollars on single-hole contests and people getting scammed on rigged back-alley putting greens.  There is a MAFIA that seems to have little else on its mind besides gambling on golf and cheating at gambling on golf.  And to put the cherry on this methamphetamine sundae with adderall sprinkles, a protagonist that behaves like she's in a shounen battle anime complete with battle auras and calling her "attacks".

I don't know how you even begin to conceive a series like this.  It's so... I don't even have a word.  This is the Jojo's Bizarre Adventure of sports anime.  It should not exist, but here it is.

I want to see where this idea can go next.  What "sport" can be made ridiculously over the top?  Can we get a pachinko or pachislot anime with heavy Initial D vibes or something?

[Scyla]

1 hour ago, Seto Kaiba said:

I did like it, but I am inherently quite biased in its favor as I am a big fan of Maruyama's Overlord light novel series.

It definitely had issues.  I'd say most of them were caused by where Overlord's fourth season landed in terms of adapting the light novel.  The previous three seasons all remained narratively very tight by adapting three-volume story arcs.  Season four had the misfortune of starting on not one but TWO single-volume "breather" story arcs with adaptations of volumes 10 and 11 ("The Ruler of Conspiracy" and "The Dwarven Crafter").  Those two tried to bring the tone down a bit before the two-part gut punch "The Paladin of the Sacred Kingdom", but for what I assume are runtime reasons they skipped over that arc completely and went straight to "The Witch of the Doomed Kingdom".  The writers did clearly try quite hard to smooth over its absence while leaving a little to tie into the movie, but without "The Paladin of the Sacred Kingdom" first there's a fair amount of context missing for why so many nations not only won't help Re-Estize but aren't exactly bothered by the prospect of its destruction either.

 

I am enjoying Birdie Wing, but for all the wrong reasons.

It's not just that Birdie Wing is giving a relatively placid, humdrum sport like golf the Iwakakeru treatment and presenting it as the most exciting sport in the story's world.  It's that it takes that to an even more extreme place.  This is a world where golf - and more importantly watching golf - are apparently so exciting to these people that there is back-alley golf gambling with people betting thousands and thousands of dollars on single-hole contests and people getting scammed on rigged back-alley putting greens.  There is a MAFIA that seems to have little else on its mind besides gambling on golf and cheating at gambling on golf.  And to put the cherry on this methamphetamine sundae with adderall sprinkles, a protagonist that behaves like she's in a shounen battle anime complete with battle auras and calling her "attacks".

I don't know how you even begin to conceive a series like this.  It's so... I don't even have a word.  This is the Jojo's Bizarre Adventure of sports anime.  It should not exist, but here it is.

I want to see where this idea can go next.  What "sport" can be made ridiculously over the top?  Can we get a pachinko or pachislot anime with heavy Initial D vibes or something?

That makes a lot more sense why you have the story arcs with the coliseum and dwarf kingdom. Bur as a result the story of the arc feels disjointed.

I feel like it would have made sense having Ainz make preparations to  raze Re-Estize kingdom taking up all of season 4. To me it seems like a logical continuation to the end of season 3.

However with first half of the season having Ainz portrayed as someone who want to establish prosperous relationships with other nations and doesn’t want the humans under his reign to suffer the turn on the kingdom, the means deployed and the outcome seem a far too stark of a contrast compared to what we‘ve seen so far.

Regarding Birdie Wing I think you like the series for all the right reasons. Have you finished it already?

[Seto Kaiba]

19 minutes ago, Scyla said:

That makes a lot more sense why you have the story arcs with the coliseum and dwarf kingdom. Bur as a result the story of the arc feels disjointed.

I feel like it would have made sense having Ainz make preparations to  raze Re-Estize kingdom taking up all of season 4. To me it seems like a logical continuation to the end of season 3.

Oh, it 100% is disjointed... two largely independent breather arcs followed by skipping an arc to go to the shorter arc on the other side of it?  No way that was gonna flow well.

Having season four be all about Ainz's preparations to raze Re-Estize to the ground would have been difficult, as it really does almost come out of nowhere in the light novel the way that it does in the anime.  Some of the buildup to it is lost because they did not include "The Paladin of the Sacred Kingdom", but that's mostly WRT the Sorcerer Kingdom's previous intent for Re-Estize.

Spoiler

The Overlord TV anime glosses over it because it was mainly a point established in "The Paladin of the Sacred Kingdom", since the (mis)adventure in the Roeble Holy Kingdom was more or less a dry run for the Sorcerer Kingdom's takeover of Re-Estize.  Demiurge and Princess Renner's original plan was to capitalize on the mass casualties the nobles took at the Battle of Katze at the end of season three and have the members of the Eight Fingers manipulate the newly-minted minor nobles who'd recently become heirs after their siblings died at Katze (like Philip) into a new noble faction that they could use to destabilize the country and trigger a civil war.  Then Ainz and the Sorcerer Kingdom would swoop in, rescue the Royal Family, and make Re-Estize a Sorcerer Kingdom vassal state under Renner.

EVERYONE underestimated how very Too Dumb To Live the young Baron Philip was.  His ill-considered Get Rich Quick scheme led to a near-immediate declaration of war instead.

Spoiler

In the previous light novel story arc "The Paladin of the Sacred Kingdom", the Re-Estize Kingdom's neighbor to the south was invaded by a great horde of demihumans and grotesques under the leadership of Jaldabaoth.  The Re-Estize Kingdom was not only unable to send them any kind of assistance because of their recent crushing defeat at the hands of the Sorcerer Kingdom, they didn't even meet with the Roeble Holy Kingdom's envoy because the King was too preoccupied mourning Gazef and the nobles were unwilling to put substance over style and expedite a meeting with a (very important) commoner.  The only aid Roeble got was from the Sorcerer Kingdom, and it was Ainz himself who all but One Man Army'd the (manufactured) threat while his own people quietly replaced the heir-apparent to the throne with a Nazarick doppleganger and the squire assigned to serve Ainz during his time there got the wrong idea so hard she started a new religion based on him and became The Faceless One.  

(She does have a face, the title is because she always wears a visor Ainz gave her to hide her resting murderface.)

The war with Jaldabaoth's demihumans and grotesques decimated the country and left it dependent on food aid from the Sorcerer Kingdom, so they took it extremely personally when Philip stole an entire aid shipment.  Re-Estize's other neighbors found it pretty contemptable that a Re-Estize noble was stealing foreign aid meant for starving victims of a demon and demihuman invasion, and King Ramposa's grief-motivated attempts to avoid handing any of his people over to the Sorcerer Kingdom (even the obviously-guilty and unrepentant Baron Philip) ultimately leading to nobody coming to Re-Estize's aid because of their 0% approval rating.

 

 

19 minutes ago, Scyla said:

However with first half of the season having Ainz portrayed as someone who want to establish prosperous relationships with other nations and doesn’t want the humans under his reign to suffer the turn on the kingdom, the means deployed and the outcome seem a far too stark of a contrast compared to what we‘ve seen so far.

Yeah, without "The Paladin of the Sacred Kingdom" you kinda miss where those two meet up in the middle.

Ainz's position on international relations could best be described as "(Publicly) Do no harm, but take no sh*t."  Philip's actions and Ramposa's defense of Philip put him in the position of having little alternative but to declare war (or at least, that's how it's explained in the light novel).

 

19 minutes ago, Scyla said:

Regarding Birdie Wing I think you like the series for all the right reasons. Have you finished it already?

Halfway in... and it's just completely insane.

[Scyla]

2 hours ago, Seto Kaiba said:

Oh, it 100% is disjointed... two largely independent breather arcs followed by skipping an arc to go to the shorter arc on the other side of it?  No way that was gonna flow well.

Having season four be all about Ainz's preparations to raze Re-Estize to the ground would have been difficult, as it really does almost come out of nowhere in the light novel the way that it does in the anime.  Some of the buildup to it is lost because they did not include "The Paladin of the Sacred Kingdom", but that's mostly WRT the Sorcerer Kingdom's previous intent for Re-Estize.

  Hide contents

The Overlord TV anime glosses over it because it was mainly a point established in "The Paladin of the Sacred Kingdom", since the (mis)adventure in the Roeble Holy Kingdom was more or less a dry run for the Sorcerer Kingdom's takeover of Re-Estize.  Demiurge and Princess Renner's original plan was to capitalize on the mass casualties the nobles took at the Battle of Katze at the end of season three and have the members of the Eight Fingers manipulate the newly-minted minor nobles who'd recently become heirs after their siblings died at Katze (like Philip) into a new noble faction that they could use to destabilize the country and trigger a civil war.  Then Ainz and the Sorcerer Kingdom would swoop in, rescue the Royal Family, and make Re-Estize a Sorcerer Kingdom vassal state under Renner.

EVERYONE underestimated how very Too Dumb To Live the young Baron Philip was.  His ill-considered Get Rich Quick scheme led to a near-immediate declaration of war instead.

  Hide contents

In the previous light novel story arc "The Paladin of the Sacred Kingdom", the Re-Estize Kingdom's neighbor to the south was invaded by a great horde of demihumans and grotesques under the leadership of Jaldabaoth.  The Re-Estize Kingdom was not only unable to send them any kind of assistance because of their recent crushing defeat at the hands of the Sorcerer Kingdom, they didn't even meet with the Roeble Holy Kingdom's envoy because the King was too preoccupied mourning Gazef and the nobles were unwilling to put substance over style and expedite a meeting with a (very important) commoner.  The only aid Roeble got was from the Sorcerer Kingdom, and it was Ainz himself who all but One Man Army'd the (manufactured) threat while his own people quietly replaced the heir-apparent to the throne with a Nazarick doppleganger and the squire assigned to serve Ainz during his time there got the wrong idea so hard she started a new religion based on him and became The Faceless One.  

(She does have a face, the title is because she always wears a visor Ainz gave her to hide her resting murderface.)

The war with Jaldabaoth's demihumans and grotesques decimated the country and left it dependent on food aid from the Sorcerer Kingdom, so they took it extremely personally when Philip stole an entire aid shipment.  Re-Estize's other neighbors found it pretty contemptable that a Re-Estize noble was stealing foreign aid meant for starving victims of a demon and demihuman invasion, and King Ramposa's grief-motivated attempts to avoid handing any of his people over to the Sorcerer Kingdom (even the obviously-guilty and unrepentant Baron Philip) ultimately leading to nobody coming to Re-Estize's aid because of their 0% approval rating.

 

 

Yeah, without "The Paladin of the Sacred Kingdom" you kinda miss where those two meet up in the middle.

Ainz's position on international relations could best be described as "(Publicly) Do no harm, but take no sh*t."  Philip's actions and Ramposa's defense of Philip put him in the position of having little alternative but to declare war (or at least, that's how it's explained in the light novel).

 

Halfway in... and it's just completely insane.

Thanks, I appreciate you filling me in on the background of the Overlord light novel.

I’m curious what your thoughts are on Birdie Wing once you finished the first season.

[Seto Kaiba]

Just now, Scyla said:

I’m curious what your thoughts are on Birdie Wing once you finished the first season.

I am deeply concerned that you used the word "first" here.  There are multiple seasons of this acid trip in visual form?

[Scyla]

14 minutes ago, Seto Kaiba said:

I am deeply concerned that you used the word "first" here.  There are multiple seasons of this acid trip in visual form?

I thought season 2 was already announced. There is a trailer for season 2 on YouTube but it contains spoilers for the second half of season 1 so I would discourage you from watching it.

[edit:] I’m sorry if I spoiled the show for you by  mentioning that there will be more of the show. 

Edited October 5, 2022 by Scyla

[Seto Kaiba]

3 hours ago, Scyla said:

I thought season 2 was already announced. There is a trailer for season 2 on YouTube but it contains spoilers for the second half of season 1 so I would discourage you from watching it.

[edit:] I’m sorry if I spoiled the show for you by  mentioning that there will be more of the show. 

That's not spoiling it, that's like bringing out a second bag of magic mushrooms when everyone is halfway to Jupiter and wondering why they can taste time itself.

I'll probably finish the first season tomorrow.  

 

Uzaki-chan Wants to Play season two is off to an enjoyable start.  Belligerent Sexual Tension, the Series.  I'm not sure there's a distinction between trolling each other and flirting for Uzaki and Sakurai.

Mob Psycho 100 Part 3's first episode has dropped.  That should be quite interesting too. 

Some of this season's shows are really drawing a line under how creatively bankrupt the isekai genre has become though.  We're on like our fifth or sixth series about someone getting isekai'd and becoming a pharmacist in a fantasy world.

[Hikaru Ichijo SL]

I started Tensei Shitara Ken Deshita (Sword Isekai) and it is a fun show.

[Seto Kaiba]

Wow, Birdie Wing just never stops being completely insane.

This episode started out with underground betting on golf matches (already pretty weird) to city council members being assassinated on the freeway with rocket launchers over a casino construction project.

It never fails to blow me away how this whole series goes above and beyond the normal insanity of Japanese sports anime to treat golf not only like it's the biggest sport EVER but such serious business that drives a frenzy of gambling and an entire criminal underworld.  It's just so surreal, especally for someone who used to play the sport, to see it as a thing the world revolves around instead of entertainment for the elderly and one of the few public settings where it's acceptable for upper middle-class twits to go day drinking.

EDIT: Not to mention the occasional incredibly gratuitous plugging of Gunpla like they're highly valuable collectibles instead of relatively inexpensive plamodels.

EDIT2: A training montage that involves jogging and meditating with a stack of books on one's head... 

EDIT3: OMFG the bad guy's tee shot was so hard HER HAND FELL OFF AT THE WRIST!  What drugs is this show on?!

Edited October 13, 2022 by Seto Kaiba

[JB0]

48 minutes ago, Seto Kaiba said:

It never fails to blow me away

It didn't fail to blow the city councilmen away either.

[Seto Kaiba]

8 minutes ago, JB0 said:

It didn't fail to blow the city councilmen away either.

True that!

Had a "where do I know that voice from?" moment when Eve's teacher started getting actual dialog... he's voiced by Shuuichi Ikeda.  Eve learned golf from Char Aznable.

[Hikaru Ichijo SL]

I finally watched the SAO Progressive movie.  It is decent not a fan of MIto. I wish they stayed closer to the books. 

[Seto Kaiba]

Well, this season's off to a start... not a great start, but a start.

Welcome to Demon School! Iruma-kun has hit the point in the manga where it fully switched genres from a slice of life comedy with occasional shounen elements to a regular shounen anime series.  Unsurprisingly, that coincides with a sudden spike in the amount of filler so the first two episodes set up a plot point and then basically do nothing.

Uzaki-chan Wants to Hang Out! is off to a good start and staying close to the manga.  It's cute, it's funny, and it's finally hit the point where the two main characters are starting to notice they're into each other.

My Hero Academia is doing another one of its big arcs, and it feels pretty padded.  

I'm the Villainess, so I'm Taming the Final Boss is almost exactly what I expected it to be.  It's playing the tropes of its otome game villainess genre absolutely laser-straight with very generic characters and plot lines and the occasional obligatory talking animal.  Several of the events really don't fit the generic shoujo anime art style though and it's a bit odd that a villain gets away with so much.  The villainy was pretty petty up to the most recent episode, where the main antagonist thus far jumped off the slippery slope...

Spoiler

... by attempting to rape the main character, his ex-fiance, with the full foreknowledge of his retainers and his current fiance.

It comes off as too easily forgiven.

 

I finished Birdie Wing the other night.  It's... got a lot of Gundam references for a sports anime about golf.  Not just the gunpla-obsessed girl in Generic European Country... the main girl's golf coach is a blonde man who refuses to put his jacket on properly voiced by Shuuichi Ikeda (Char Aznable) and his rival/disciple is a coach voiced by Toru Furuya (Amuro Ray) who is even named Amuro.  It's also really weird how blatant the shilling for Gunpla in that series is.  It's not even tangentially related to the plot, but there are several scenes where they basically STOP DEAD and start talking about gunpla (with one character lamenting that she received an obscure HG one instead of a MG).  It's still very much on all the drugs and a sports anime conceived by a crazy person who has only a vague idea what golf is, but it seems to also be headed into shoujo ai territory at the end. 

Later I'm gonna throw a rewatch of Code Geass: Lelouch of the Rebellion into the mix since I still haven't gotten around to watching Lelouch of the Resurrection and Akito the Exiled.

[Seto Kaiba]

Well, that's fun... for the second time in under two weeks I've found a recent show that I really can't pidgeonhole.

Birdie Wing was hard to classify because it was a completely insane intersection between shounen anime tropes, an intense sports drama, garnished with a bit of organized crime drama.

The Raven of the Inner Palace is... ... ... ... ... ... ... I don't ****ing know.

I just watched three episodes of it in a row and I don't think I could even put a genre on it.  It's either set in feudal China or some fantasy world with feudal Chinese theming.  It's more or less entirely character drama, but with supernatural aspects and actual magic in play and a lot of emphasis on the court relationships in the Emperor's palace.  It's all drawn like a classic shoujo series but it's veered hard into mystery, horror, fantasy, and political territory a few times.  I can't imagine there'd be a lot of shipping going on for the shoujo audience in light of almost all of the male characters explicitly being eunuchs.

Whatever the hell it is, it's interesting viewing.  I only meant to watch one episode but before I knew it I'd seen all three currently-available ones.

[Hikaru Ichijo SL]

Wow, I was watching Noumin the farming show and the end of the last episode really shocked me.

Edited October 16, 2022 by Hikaru Ichijo SL

[Seto Kaiba]

Mobile Suit Gundam: the Witch from Mercury is certainly quite a thing.

The only thing that really gives it any semblance of a distinct identity is its main character being a painfully introverted girl instead of an emotionally extinct boy.  Otherwise, it's the love child of Reconguista in G and Iron-Blooded Orphans.

[kajnrig]

2 hours ago, Seto Kaiba said:

Mobile Suit Gundam: the Witch from Mercury is certainly quite a thing.

The only thing that really gives it any semblance of a distinct identity is its main character being a painfully introverted girl instead of an emotionally extinct boy.  Otherwise, it's the love child of Reconguista in G and Iron-Blooded Orphans.

I went with Macross Frontier, Gundam Seed Stargazer, and a bit of Revolutionary Girl Utena myself, for the first episode (well, first episode and prologue) anyway. Second episode was a bit aimless and general world-building, so I've reserved further judgement until episode 3... which I'll get to in just a second and get back to my updates in the MSG thread.

I admit I haven't bothered watching G-Rec, but somehow I know it's an apt comparison anyway.  IBO is a bit more... nihilistic... from what I remember, but the mecha designs are obviously similar (same designer IIRC), and the pacing maybe? I get some of the same nagging issues from WfM's storytelling as I did from IBO before I dropped it, which doesn't necessarily bode well...

[Hikaru Ichijo SL]

I finished Machikado Mazoku: 2-choume and it was so good.  Too bad Anr's mom never appeared.  But it is just my Satou Rina addiction again.

[Seto Kaiba]

Well, this season is coming along nicely... the shows I'm following (Uzaki-chan Wants to Hang Out!, Welcome to Demon School! Iruma-kun, etc.) are all sticking fairly close to the original manga and remain pretty consistently well-executed.

All in all, I'm quite happy... between this season's multitude of interesting offerings and Andor, I've got no shortage of things to watch.  

The Raven of the Inner Palace remains my stand-out title for the season.  It remains consistently hard to pin down but inexplicably compelling in terms of character-focused drama with some elements of mystery, fantasy, and the slightest hint of romance.  It's been a long time since a show grabbed me like this one and left me not just curious but genuinely impatient to see what happens next.

[Hikaru Ichijo SL]

Good news Yuru Camp is getting a 3rd season.

[Stampeed Valkyrie]

Enjoying my Netflix jaunt into anime,   Isekai Ojisan is great,   also started watching Cyberpunk 2077 Edgerunners..  totally a Trigger anime.    Lastly picked back up Bastard,  and I am enjoying that as well.

 

[Hikaru Ichijo SL]

I started Engage Kiss and it has been very good.

[Hikaru Ichijo SL]

This just works so well.

[Seto Kaiba]

1 hour ago, Hikaru Ichijo SL said:

This just works so well.

It does a bit, lol.

 

The Fall 2022 season kind of limped to the finish line without much interesting to say for itself.

My Hero Academia is still My Hero Academia... once it moved past quirky and self-referential hot takes on the nature of superherodom it kind of fell into the dispassionate void of "Too bleak, stopped caring".  

Mob Psycho 100 III managed to be pretty unremarkable.

I'm the Villainess, so I'm Taming the Final Boss had a strong first couple episodes but limped in to the finish line with a weak and disappointing storyline.

Welcome to Demon School, Iruma-kun! is doing a story arc that isn't filler, but sure as hell feels like it.

Uzaki-chan Wants to Hang Out! was consistently amusing, but they didn't get far enough with the story for the second season to have any kind of payoff unless you count the blatant reference to Jojo's Bizarre Adventure.

Mobile Suit Gundam: the Witch from Mercury seems to be on a mission to settle the dispute over whether Gundam AGE or Reconguista in G is the worst Gundam series by being worse than both.  From its totally phoned in story to the upsettingly toxic relationship the protagonists have, the series is just an endless parade of disappointment and halfassed writing.

Spoiler

FWIW, that somehow nobody notices that the Gundam that disappeared during the Volkfangr incident looks exactly like the allegedly-new Shin Sei Mobile Suit "Aerial"is quite shocking... considering the difference amounts to little more than a change of paintjob.  

The season's standout for me was The Raven of the Inner Palace.  It would've been the standout for its solid, character-focused drama even in a strong season... but in a weak one like this it feels like it won simply because nobody else put in the effort.

Never got a chance to get to Lupin Zero or the new Urusei Yatsura.

Peter Grill and the Philosopher's Time continues to be a shockingly low-effort short series except for one moment of absolutely dreadful, I-can't-believe-you-did-that, moment in which it parodies Goblin Slayer!.  

Bibliophile Princess is kind of a minimum-effort mockbuster mashup of Ascendance of a Bookworm and My Next Life as a Villainess: All Routes Lead to Doom! and not really worth the time it takes to watch it... and most of the rest of the season is full of isekai shovelware shows that are just increasingly derivative knockoffs of shows from previous seasons.

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Winter 2023 season has at least a little of merit.

A new Trigun series, Trigun Stampede, a second season of Bofuri, Don't Toy with Me, Miss Nagatoro! season 2, a continuation of the Sorcerous Stabber Orphen remake, and a second season of The Vampire Dies in No Time.  

[Hikaru Ichijo SL]

18 hours ago, Seto Kaiba said:

It does a bit, lol.

 

The Fall 2022 season kind of limped to the finish line without much interesting to say for itself.

My Hero Academia is still My Hero Academia... once it moved past quirky and self-referential hot takes on the nature of superherodom it kind of fell into the dispassionate void of "Too bleak, stopped caring".  

Mob Psycho 100 III managed to be pretty unremarkable.

I'm the Villainess, so I'm Taming the Final Boss had a strong first couple episodes but limped in to the finish line with a weak and disappointing storyline.

Welcome to Demon School, Iruma-kun! is doing a story arc that isn't filler, but sure as hell feels like it.

Uzaki-chan Wants to Hang Out! was consistently amusing, but they didn't get far enough with the story for the second season to have any kind of payoff unless you count the blatant reference to Jojo's Bizarre Adventure.

Mobile Suit Gundam: the Witch from Mercury seems to be on a mission to settle the dispute over whether Gundam AGE or Reconguista in G is the worst Gundam series by being worse than both.  From its totally phoned in story to the upsettingly toxic relationship the protagonists have, the series is just an endless parade of disappointment and halfassed writing.

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FWIW, that somehow nobody notices that the Gundam that disappeared during the Volkfangr incident looks exactly like the allegedly-new Shin Sei Mobile Suit "Aerial"is quite shocking... considering the difference amounts to little more than a change of paintjob.  

The season's standout for me was The Raven of the Inner Palace.  It would've been the standout for its solid, character-focused drama even in a strong season... but in a weak one like this it feels like it won simply because nobody else put in the effort.

Never got a chance to get to Lupin Zero or the new Urusei Yatsura.

Peter Grill and the Philosopher's Time continues to be a shockingly low-effort short series except for one moment of absolutely dreadful, I-can't-believe-you-did-that, moment in which it parodies Goblin Slayer!.  

Bibliophile Princess is kind of a minimum-effort mockbuster mashup of Ascendance of a Bookworm and My Next Life as a Villainess: All Routes Lead to Doom! and not really worth the time it takes to watch it... and most of the rest of the season is full of isekai shovelware shows that are just increasingly derivative knockoffs of shows from previous seasons.

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Winter 2023 season has at least a little of merit.

A new Trigun series, Trigun Stampede, a second season of Bofuri, Don't Toy with Me, Miss Nagatoro! season 2, a continuation of the Sorcerous Stabber Orphen remake, and a second season of The Vampire Dies in No Time.  

I agree this season was rather lackluster.  My favorite was reincarnated as a sword.  This Gundam series is a train wreck.

[Seto Kaiba]

31 minutes ago, Hikaru Ichijo SL said:

This Gundam series is a train wreck.

Oh, so much.  Sunrise apparently tailored The Witch from Mercury to a younger audience after being told that "Gundam is for old people" by a school tour group, and I've kind of started to suspect that they took it perhaps a little too personally.  There've been quite a few occasions in the story where I've been left with the distinct impression that their goal changed from "make Gundam relevant to today's youth" to "mock today's youth for not 'getting' Gundam".  

 

Spy x Family, on the other hand... this show's just a gem.  I'm getting caught up on it, and I honestly don't think there's been a weak episode yet and I'm into the second season.  It's funny, cute, engaging, quirky... the premise itself is out there enough to be distinctive.  That said, it really feels like a stronger term than "Mama Bear" is needed to describe Yor.  She has that same energy that made Fullmetal Alchemist's Izumi Curtis the thing that the toughest soldiers in the country told scary stories about, but she's even more superhuman and has an actual child to protect.  Even "Mama T-Rex" hardly seems strong enough.  She can scare trained attack dogs just by growling back...