Personally I like it when Precure takes it's time to introduce all their characters but I've seen a lot of people being frustrated with late debut for cure on the starter team so:
I had this discussion with my friend about how willing Walpurga was to take over Elise's life.. but did she ever think about the work that she has to do to feed herself.. like.. Elise pretty much had to work 9-5... so she will be there to annoy her and haunt her about it
ALSO I always liked imagining Elise with her eye pecked out by the crows.. something about her being one-eyed is very.. teehee
I just finished the entire series, and I am speechless. It's rare that a series catches me so off-guard and satisfies me without one major-ish part irritating me a ton. But this series? It nailed everything.
Since reading Yona of the Dawn, I've been craving some more feminist manga, specifically of the fantasy variety, but there's such a shortage. Some will have a strong female protagonist, but she constantly gets rescued by a love interest. Others focus too much on the romance and seem to forget that there's needs to be a plot or that the characters need to develop on their own without each other. I've been so sick of reading these that stumbling upon Basara completely shocked me.
Yes, the art is old-fashioned, but the story is brilliant. Both Sarasa and Shuri are equally matched as both enemies and lovers. Each has to overcome many trials without the other, and their personal growth is never solely dependant on one another. And no matter how amazing and brave they are in battle, in the end, they are human. They break down, they make mistakes, and they can't do everything on their own. In fact, the allies they gain along the way (and there are many!) are vital to their success.
The plot takes center stage in this series - the constant political battle of a revolution, coming up with different strategies, gathering allies - that's more important to both characters. The series does not dumb down the brutality of war even - horrible things happen. Blood is shed; characters die. But one thing that surprised me was that whenever there was sexual violence, it was never sexualized; the author ensured that you see as pure torture instead of some sort of "hot" torture like I've seen in other media (I despise it when this type of violence is romanticized).
I cannot stress enough how much I love this series. Not everything is black or white - sometimes people are both good and bad despite their intentions. There are a few nitpicky things that I would've wanted to be done differently (there's one character I wanted to know closure for that I never got - grr), but otherwise, this manga is utterly brilliant. Please go check it out - you will not regret it!
Falin's chimera design is so good I was mesmerized by her every time she showed up. Then I reached the part where Laios explain how absurd she is because she has a way too small mouth to feed such a huge body and I felt so guilty... I'm sorry miss Falin I was so engrossed by your glorious form that I didn't notice you were ill bred just like a little pug... Please forgive me..
I was going to make a jokey little post about how it's funny that to achieve a good ending in Little Goody Two Shoes you just have to say "Fuck this I'm out" but it actually fits the "sunken cost fallacy" theme of the games. All the girls feels like they are trapped in their own life and decision, but you can always leave..
I spent my entire playthrough of Little Goody Two Shoes wondering if the devs were into Touhou and then I started their previous work and was almost immediately hit with a Flandre reference.