zantids

[zantids]

Review #155: Mobile Suit Gundam

Gundam! After watching Gundam: The Origin I was invested in Char and decided to jump into the main series to see more of the characters in action. And wow! It’s old! And goofy!

If I judged Mobile Suit Gundam based on “how good is this story/animation/experience”, it, for me, would score a pretty low score. It’s old. The animation isn’t great. The voice acting isn’t great. It’s dramatic. It’s pretty bad, in terms of what I like to get out of an anime. But it’s hilarious, and an absolute blast to watch. And on top of that, it had 5-6 actually really good moments! Overall, it’s not something that would be my first pick. But it was fun. Also, I watched the movies, not the actual series. From what I heard, the regular series has a TON of filler so I opted for the 8ish hour experience opposed to the 17 hour one. I just listened to what my Gundam-expert friend told me, if I could do it all again I might have opted for the entire show because I really liked the characters, but it’s all in the past now... One last thing, the movies were really confusing and they jumped around a lot, but I understand that that’s due to the fact that it had to cut a lot out. So I won’t take off points for anything like that.

So… Gundam. The grandpapa of mecha. This is the series that started it all. Basically, a lot of Earth’s population was sent to space. And now the space people want independence from the Earth people (who are pretty overbearing in their rule). Somehow we’re mostly on the side of the Earth, I guess, even though I kinda agree with the space people! Well, it’s more of “both sides are right and wrong because war is bad” but for the most part a lot of the space people are bad guys. Anyways, mobile suits, basically big space robots, are becoming commonplace. But the Earth Federation is one step ahead as they’ve created… THE GUNDAM!!! It’s a mobile suit that’s OP as fuck. We follow the story of Amuro Ray, who is the son of the man who created the Gundam. He accidentally crawls into the cockpit all anime-style, is kinda good at piloting it, and now that’s his job! He’s accompanied by a bunch of random other children who escaped onto this ship called “White Base”. Then it’s children trying their best to do war! On the other side, we have Char Aznable, who is fighting for the Zabi (main space baddie family), but he has a lot more issues than we’d ever think…  War is more complicated than it looks, there’s a lot of clashing of different ideologies, Amuro going “war bad, I’m depressed” over and over, lots of poorly animated space fights, and the beautiful Char Aznable. LET’S GO!

Category 1, Plot: Like I said, I watched the movies, not the full series. 17 hours to about 8 hours. I felt it a bit! I’m not gonna hold this against the series since I made the choice to watch the condensed version, but just wanna talk about my viewing experience. It never cut out anything major, you could still understand what was going on at any given moment, but there’s a lot of sudden jumps into fights or sudden jumps away from fights without any in-between. We’d be chilling with Amuro and Fraw around White Base and then it’d suddenly cut to them preparing for battle. It was just jarring sometimes. As for the regular plot of Gundam… it’s generic. Kid jumps into a mech that he’s never explored before and suddenly he’s the best pilot they’ve ever seen!! A lot of the plot is very “monster of the week”, but thankfully the movies condense that down a lot, I imagine that the full version is just filled with more of that stuff. Onto the good. The plot was a lot darker than I expected. I assumed it was gonna be super fluffy and silly but people died, a lot, and a lot of our characters got backstory exploration that really made you feel for ‘em. While half of the show didn’t fully retain my interest (the mecha bits), the stuff with the juicy plot was really interesting. Most of all, it was fun to watch. Fun to laugh at the bad animation. Fun to laugh at the bad voice acting. Fun to laugh at the dumb characters be dumb and do dumb things! It was a lot of fun to watch. I think watching The Origin before this, even though it was confusing, helped me get attached to the series. I don’t have much to say about the plot because it’s not too complicated or deep… I’ll talk about a few other interesting things in the ending section but for now- it’s just a goofy fun time. 1/2

Category 2, Characters: Characters were definitely one of the highlights, mostly because character interactions were the best bits of the show. While Char is an obvious favorite due to The Origin, he didn’t really do anything outstanding in the series that made me like him a lot more, which was a bit of a bummer. It was really stagnant throughout. Lots of the characters didn’t really do anything but repeat their one joke over and over, which wasn’t anything more than slightly annoying, but still annoying nonetheless. But I liked them, generally. Amuro was a bit of a psycho though. I’ve watched a few episodes of Zeta before writing this and Kamille is also a little psycho… is a qualification for being a Gundam protag to be a little freak child? They scare me. Amuro is so absorbed with piloting the Gundam and being depressed (and hating Fraw) all the time, it’s goofy. I love how cliché and bad it is though, don’t get me wrong. The complaints are all surrounded by love and laughter. The others characters didn’t really leave a mark. There weren’t any deep character talks, not really much time to get to know each of them personally, it’s really just about the mechs. So, while I did enjoy the little interactions they did have, they weren’t too common. Lots of “get in the robot” and “oh god get out of the robot”. Fun stuff. Char’s side of things was a lot more interesting, mostly because I knew his whole crew from the movies, so seeing him and the Zabi family interact was really fun to watch because I knew them so well. And Garma… oh Garma… you were done so dirty. I’m sorry little Garma. 1.5/2

Category 3, Plot Issues: Of course there were issues. But I don’t want to look at this too closely from a “is it good” perspective because it’d be scoring a lot lower than it is. I’ll buff it just a bit. 2/2

Category 4, Emotions:  A lot darker than I thought it would be! Char is out here blasting peoples heads off, Amuro is actually depressed, and a lot of the people I met in The Origin die because they’re the baddies over here… sad. It was a lot! And then the ending, which I’ll get into later, with the newtype psychic stuff- a lot weirder of a direction that I thought it would go! Gundam didn’t go too far out of the boundary of being a simple sunday-cartoon mecha show, but given that I had absolutely no expectations for it to do ANYTHING out of the ordinary, seeing it do some cool stuff now and then was really nice. 2/2

Category 5, Tropes: Every character is basically their one line stuck on loop over and over: Amuro is pissy, Char wants to fuck with people, Bright is always yelling at Mirai and being the dad of the group, Sayla is always confused and running off somewhere, Kai is an asshole, Mirai is worried, and those two little kids are always running around wrecking shit. I basically just described all there is to White Base. Sure, we have moments like Kai running away but coming back because of his sense of duty, Amuro getting growth, Sayla does some cool stuff, etc etc… but it really didn’t care about the characters that much. So it was pretty stagnant, which was a little disappointing. 1/2

Category 6, Art: What do I even do here… I love old anime style… but it’s also so bad… I’m gonna give them full points just for that newtype scene with Lalah alone, that was cool and outta the blue so 2/2

Catetgory 7, Ending: The ending! Newtype stuff! That was really cool! Basically, the space people who were born in space are becoming this new type of human, and some of them classify as what's called a “newtype”. It’s REALLY UNCLEAR what this means but they sometimes have little powers, similar to the ability to use the force. But the biggest thing about the newtypes, at least at this point in the Gundam series, is that they can connect to each other and sense the feelings of the other. Amuro is a newtype. Char’s girlfriend, Lalah, is a newtype. She’s sent out to battle, and her and Amuro eventually meet face to face. WOah! It’s pretty cool actually. Try to look up the scene if you want. It’s end of Evangelion looking, albeit on a smaller degree. All I wanted to say is that I found it pretty cool. It makes me excited for the future of my Gundam experience, now knowing that they can pull trippy stuff like that. It was cool. 2/2

Mobile Suit Gundam scores a 11.5/14. WOAH, I’m letting this random 80’s show score higher than _____? Yes. Because it was so bad it’s good. And it’s also just kinda good. I do and don’t recommend Mobile Suit Gundam. It’s not for everyone. Some people won’t get the haha experience that I did out of it, and it’ll just be boring. I watched it with a friend which made it a lot more enjoyable, I recommend watching with people it’s fun! If you like mech you’ll probably like the series, so just disregard everything I said. I’m not a mech fan so I had to look at it from a different perspective. 

Final Score: 7.5/10

Get in the robot Amuro

#mobile suit gundam #AnimeReviews

[zantids]

Reviews #155-160

Wahoo, we’re back! I hope everyone reading had a nice December and early January, I had a nice month-ish break. But it’s back to school for me which means plenty of time to post my rambling reviews. I just posted review #154, Horimiya, so give it a read if you’re interested. Here’s everything coming up.

Review #155: Mobile Suit Gundam

Review #156: Inuyasha

Review #157: Houseki no Kuni

Review #158: Bishounen Tanteidan

Review #159: Nana

Review #160: Rilakkuma to Kaoru-san

Very excited for all of these... good shit.

I definitely watched a TON of anime over my break, yes. Currently trying to finish everything I started and then abandoned before starting anything big in 2022- oh yeah I also started Bleach! Fun time. I’m still VERY early considering it’s a 300-ish episode journey but I’ll try my best to finish it within the year. Hopefully sooner!

Will be posting more consistently once I get this semester figured out, see y’all then!

-zantids

[zantids]

Review #154: Horimiya

Long time waiting for this one! I’ve known about the Horimiya manga since forever and it finally got a proper anime… was very hyped going in. Massively hyped. Maybe too hyped. Let’s get into it.

Want to start off by saying I’m not a massive Horimiya fan. Not in the way where I’m already saying that I don’t like the anime, but in the sense that I went in and out of this very casually. I don’t know all of the characters like the back of my hand and I don’t completely blame myself- I’ve heard that they cut out a lot of the deeper dives into a lot of the side characters/the anime only got a little bit into the story (and then jumped straight to the end, apparently). I know there are some people that are diehard for this story and I never became one of them, so forgive me for looking at this from a very casual perspective.

Horimiya is an anime about high school girl Hori and high school boy Miya(mura). We watch them meet for the first time and eventually get into a relationship with each other. That’s about it. It’s a romance anime. If I have to go a bit deeper than that, the whole “gimmick” of the show is that Hori and Miyamura both have “hidden sides” to themselves that they don’t let show to anyone else. At school Miyamura is a long-haired glasses-wearing silent and studious kid, but outside of school he’s a man-bun tattoo-riddled free spirit. Hori’s “hidden side” is a lot less interesting IMO, basically she’s... a normal girl in high school (I guess you can tag her as “preppy” but she kinda just screams normalcy) but at home she has to take care of her brother, and has a bit of a temper. I think we’re supposed to get angry housewife vibes from her or something. Either way, they open up to each other about their secret selves and eventually get together. We also meet a lot of their friends, and they all start to get into relationships with each other as well, further complicating things… there were so many characters… so many… 

Category 1, Plot: Romance anime! It’s all about romance! I really enjoyed the main couple. While the show generally lost me over time, which I’ll get into throughout this review, I still really enjoyed the titular couple throughout. It’s kinda hard to talk about plot and characters separately for a romance anime, huh? I guess I’ll talk about my main gripe with the series here and get into the romance aspects in the next section. First of all, way too many people. We started so many different storylines to finish what… one of them? Aka Horimiya couple? Did anyone else finish their little romance plot? It was kinda a complete mess. I assume the manga takes its time with each of the characters, sharing the little moments that build up and make them who they are by the end… but the anime was too quick. We didn’t get to spend that much time with any couple in particular because we were so busy with 20 other ones at the same time. To put it in perspective, we have 9 ‘main’ characters? And then on top of that, a bunch of side characters as well? And idk, maybe you might think 9 isn’t a lot, but when you have a show that’s only 12 episodes… and you’re trying to develop these deep storylines… I’m mostly talking about the Tooru/Sakura/Yuki situation. Just not enough time put into them… it felt weird. That’s my biggest gripe with the show, I’m sorry to shove it right at the start, but too many people. This is overall how the plot felt to me. Crammed. I promise I’ll have some more positives later, not a total hater. 0/2

Category 2, Characters: Now we can get into some more positive stuff, sorry about that. Way too much side cast. Now to the main couple. I really liked Hori and Miyamura at first. They were generic, but cute, although nothing special… I was happy to see an anime couple get together so quickly, as most romance anime are all about the chase. Total change of subject, but I gotta talk about the biggest complaint this show was getting when it first aired. I’m not a fan of Hori’s S&M kink. No kinkshaming! But you can’t make your partner into it if he’s not into it… Miyamura has to go to Hori’s Dad to plead “hey PLEASE help me, I don’t want to HIT your daughter”. And then she makes him do it in public… not everyone wants to be a part of your roleplay. Not a huge issue with me but everyone was sharing their thoughts on it so I thought I’d chime in. The other hot topic was “Hori’s biphobia”. I don’t think Hori is biphobic. Basically Miyamura is comfortable with his sexuality and is open enough to say other guys are attractive or that they’d date guys etc. etc. but Hori is NOT having it, which was honestly a little weird. Not biphobic though, just unsupportive, haha. I feel like her aggressiveness, which was supposed to be her “hidden trait”, was meant to come off as cute and charming but it just felt weird. The entire reason I stopped watching Toradora was because the show thought it was “cute” for her to beat up her boyfriend and it’s just the same stuff present here. If the tables were turned, this would be abusive. I don’t find hitting your bf/gf very funny. And yeah, I get that it’s an anime and it’s overdramatic, but it makes me uncomfortable so that hinders my enjoyment of a show. Ack I said I was getting into more positives huh? Well… all of that aside- on a surface level I really like them still. They’re a cute couple. And while these things I mentioned above do bother me, not to the level that they seemed to bother everyone else, it didn’t ruin the show for me. I just felt uncomfortable frequently. The other characters were cute too! I liked them all! It was just a shame that they were all shoved into the same tiny show with not enough time for all of them to have moments. I did like Hori and Miyamura, just some of their quirky traits were a bit much. 1/2

Category 3, Plot Issues: I feel like I already covered all of the issues I had with the show up until this point, so it’s a bit repetitive to go at it again. Aside from the tiny issues with Hori and the excessive character problem- nothing else. I won’t absolutely kill Horimiya. 2/2

Category 4, Emotions: Couple moments were cute! But there were also a lot of cringe moments too. The S&M stuff... Hori berating Miyamura… and then a lot of the scenes with like Tohru and Yuki/Sakura were hard to sit through. There was a lot of awkwardness in the air. But when the cute couples were being cute couples it made my heart all warm and happy, so 1.5/2

Category 5, Tropes: I feel like all of the characters weren’t overboard with their respective anime tropes. And with the whole “hidden face” thing they were going for gave every character an extra layer to them. It was nice. 2/2

Category 6, Art: Very pretty! A lot of effort put into the animation, it looked really great. I feel like most shows are heading in the direction of “wow, that’s really good” so I can’t give points every time it’s smooth and has nice colors. Still has to be inventive for that perfect 2/2. 1.5/2

Category 7, Ending: I like and hate the fact that it was shoved into one season. I was a bit disappointed at first, and I’m still disappointed we didn’t get to see many of the character relationships come to light, but I appreciate that they were able to fast forward to the ending in a relatively smooth manner. It was a bit rocky, especially seeing all the characters who barely got to do anything suddenly poof into the void, but they were able to end it pretty well… just felt so speedy. And it’s amazing how they totally shut off any chance for a season 2 by skipping right to the end of everything. Oh well, I guess it’s nice to let things end at one season for a change. 1.5/2

Horimiya scores a 9/5/14. It was nice. I was really hyped… and then it didn’t spend time on the one couple I wanted it to spend time on. Of course Miyamura and Hori got the most screentime out of everyone, but it just sucked having a lot of potential screentime given to 100 different people I didn’t care about. It was nice, the main couple is cute… I guess you could say I was a little let down, but overall I liked it. It’s a solid romance anime, it was cute, wasn’t terrible… just nice. People absolutely hyped it to infinity so I guess it’s a little bit of my fault for trusting the anime community to have normal levels of excitement for something that was just “good”. Feels like if an anime is anything above decent people start hollering AOTY and making sure EVERYONE knows how good it is. Never trust the anime community... but I’m sure the manga is a bit better ;)

Final Score: 6.5/10

OP is a bopper

#horimya #hori-san to miyamura-kun #hori-san and miyamura-kun #ホリミヤ #AnimeReviews

[zantids]

Review #153: SK8 The Infinity

Sk8 is about sk8ing. Skateboarding to be specific. To be even more specific, skateboard racing! The main plot centers around this underground skateboarding race organization called “S”. Basically, you start from the top of a hill… and see who can get down the fastest. There’s all kinds of goofy skateboarding tricks, lots of stuff that defies the laws of gravity, and LOTS of slow-mo jumps… because anime! We follow the story of a boy named Reki Kyan and his new transfer student friend, Langa Hasegawa. Reki is a skating pro, doing it ever since he was little, and Langa is an ex-snowboarder. Reki teaches Langa how to skate and he’s pretty much immediately really really good at it… so good that he’s caught the eye of some of the top racers from “S”... They climb the ranks of “S”, Langa becomes some kind of skating prodigy, and we meet a lot of the other top skaters there that all have very... unique… personalities. We also have a “villain”, named ADAM, a man who sits at the top of “S” and is a very aggressive and competitive skater. You’re pretty much guaranteed a ticket to the hospital if you race against him. Here we go! Also it’s kinda gay! HERE WE GO!

Category 1, Plot: The plot was honestly really gripping. I was interested and invested right from the start. I don’t know what it is about Sk8, but the vibes are just… so good. It brings me a lot of joy. It’s very lighthearted, fun… a really good time. The races were really fun, we had a wide array of characters, and Reki and Langa… such a wholesome relationship. Even if you don’t sense any romance between them, their bromance is off the charts. It was extremely cheesy in the best possible way. I wasn’t bothered by how goofy it was, it was just plain fun. I think Reki’s arc was extremely well done, maybe a little over the top with the dramatics, but it was really realistic and interesting to watch, it made sense why he felt the way he did and why how was able to rise above his issues. I like that they didn’t try to do too much with the show. No skating to save the world from an evil demon king, sure we had the “S” tournament, but “S” itself is a little dingy underground skating ring so it wasn’t too unrealistic that Reki or Langa could qualify. It was grounded, it knew what it wanted to do, and IMO… it did it well. 2/2

Category 2, Characters: The characters were incredibly charming and fun to watch. Reki and Langa were a great main duo, and I also appreciated how it felt like they shared the screen time. I don’t think I’ve seen something do a dual-mc deal as well as it was done in Sk8. We got a lot of personal time with both of them, and saw issues from both of their perspectives, neither was the “bad guy” when they went separate ways for a while. It was neat. The others were fun too. Lots of kinds of characters, I think everyone can find someone they like here. Cherry, Joe, MIYA, and Shadow were all so goofy and cute, it was like a big skating family. Now… ADAM… I have some issues with ADAM… I honestly feel like his whole character was too much? And his whole character arc was weird? I didn’t really care about his backstory or his dumb evil aunts, we spent way too much time with them. He was cartoonishly evil, which is fine, but they then try to make him some tragic hero… but also not really? I assumed they’d try to do a 180 with him but instead they just revealed his tragic past to make him… stay the same. Not that I’m mad he didn’t have a redemption arc, it was just weird. Loved the whole cast, I feel like they could have spent less time on ADAM or at least framed him in a different light, so 1.5/2

Category 3, Plot Issues: I just have to talk about how their skating defies the laws of gravity. There were a few moments where I was completely taken out of the show because of how ridiculous it was. Whatever! I don’t care that much, but I really just… it needs to be punished for this. 1/2

Category 4, Emotions: It was a pretty deep and interesting show! I got attached to these little silly skating bitches! The people I liked, I really really liked, and the people I hated *cough* ADAM *cough* I really really hated. I always like having strong emotional connections to shows like this, so good job Sk8 for making me care about your characters. I think they were really neat. 1.5/2

Category 5, Tropes: I appreciated how they let most of the characters step outside of their tropey bubbles and have moments outside of the goofiness. Especially people like Cherry, Shadow, and Joe, it was really charming seeing them in their natural settings and being… very very normal. I also liked the camaraderie of it all. Sometimes sports anime gets SO aggressive for no reason so I like to see it more realistic: everyone is just having fun, doing what they love. No need to hate. 2/2

Category 6, Art: Very nice animation! Nothing that inventive, but wow it was VERY polished so I’ll give it a 1.5/2

Category 7, Ending: I liked the ending a lot. As much as I would have liked to see a race between Reki and Langa I feel like, of course, the ending had to be with ADAM. I won’t fault them on that. Like I commented on in a previous section, it was a little weird how they tried to wrap up the ADAM stuff, but I didn’t care about him so I’m not gonna let it bother me too much. It was a nice and cute end. I liked it a lot, I think the finale was fun and a blast to watch. 2/2

Sk8 scores a 11.5/14. Very good score! I was (and still am) VERY surprised by how much I liked Sk8. I saw clips, thought it was just gonna be another silly yaoi bait sports anime that would eventually disappoint me, but it was just a blast. Even outside of the “romance” aspect, which was what initially drew me in, this show was just… so good. It was fun! I don’t think I’ve watched a plain ol’ fun anime in a long time. Sometimes you just need good wholesome vibes, and Sk8 delivered that 100%. Thank you Sk8. 

The OP is a bop

Final Score: 8/10

#sk8 #sk8 the infinity #skate the infinity #AnimeReviews

[zantids]

Review #152: Wonder Egg Priority

So… We all know what happened to WEP. The ending was a garbage fire. I wrote this review before the final OVA aired as I wanted to keep my thoughts fresh, and I also didn’t think that my opinions on the show would change too much after the finale. Hahah…. yeah. They changed a little bit!

The way this review is structured is that categories 1-6 (everything but the ending category) is pre-finale thoughts. Which I think is pretty appropriate, given that the finale has a category on its own. Until the finale aired, this show was great. You’ll see my thoughts in a bit. The finale section is written after seeing the OVA, as it’s the “true ending” of the series. Here we go, my thoughts pre-finale:

Wonder Egg Priority! An anime that surprised many fans, like myself, with how beautiful and meaningful it appeared to be. Amazing animation, careful touching on subjects rarely talked about in anime like self-harm, sexual assault, trans and gay experiences, it was all around promising and great. What’s the story though? Wonder Egg Priority is about a group of girls who have all lost someone to suicide. Our main character named Ai, while on a midnight stroll, stumbles upon a gacha machine that dispenses eggs. After breaking the egg a girl stumbles out, and it all begins… Basically, all of our main girls are attempting to bring their lost friends/family back to life by helping other girls (the ones who come out of the egg), who have also committed suicide, come to terms with their death. It’s really confusing to explain and it took me like 3-4 episodes to actually get what was going on so don’t worry if you’re lost. They hatch these eggs, the suicide girl comes out, they have to protect her from some traumatizing figure from their life (usually the person has to do with the reason they committed suicide (ie: one girl’s rapist appeared, one girl’s abusive coach appeared, etc etc)). The main characters are told by these two mannequin men (who reside near the egg machines) that the more girls they save the closer they get to bringing their deceased friends back to life. Here we go!

Category 1, Plot: The plot was fantastic. I’ve never seen an anime tackle this many important issues in one go with such precision and care. There’s no jokes… there’s no gags… it’s all treated seriously. It also takes it slow. We don’t speedrun through a bunch of issues, it feels like everyone is treated with care, every main girl is given her moment. It even feels like the girls who come out of the eggs are all given time in the spotlight to share their stories and trauma, the dialogue is really powerful and careful… it’s really good. It did start to get a little messy over time… We had to get lore on the eggs eventually, and it wasn’t easy to understand. I’ll talk about this more in the final section when I talk about the ending, but the buildup at least… very promising (...). Frill’s story, a late character, is absolutely terrifying, and Acca and Ura-Acca’s story (the mannequins) is really heartbreaking and depressing. They’re able to step outside of their normal plot- suicidal girls- and jump into a heartbreaking story about raising a child and finding a family… It feels like so much is crammed into the show but it’s so spaced out and all of it is done so well, it doesn’t feel rushed. I really enjoy the plot. The issues they tackle aren’t talked about in anime nearly enough, and it’s not just a 10/10 just because they talk about them, they also talk about them well. At least, in my opinion. There’s millions of opinions on the right way to tackle issues about weight, self-harm, gender identity, sexual assault, and it’s valid for someone to say they don’t agree with the way it was portrayed- but I liked it, and I thought it was a good representation of these issues. 2/2

Category 2, Characters: The characters were a joy to watch. Ai is an incredible protagonist. She’s strong, determined, level-headed, and damn that design is so fucking cute. I love all of the main characters in WEP… extremely original and really quirky looking! One of the most diverse main casts I’ve seen in a while. Neiru is a little lost on me, she was really unique and interesting but I feel like I can appreciate her character a little more. Rikka was also incredible, probably the most complex character of the main cast. She’s extremely flawed, but for reasons that make her understandable and tragic. Momoe is great too. Probably my personal favorite, especially after the final episodes. Really complex, she has a lot of issues with her gender and sexuality, but she’s still so understanding and kind to those who need help. I really enjoyed the cast. They’re all so complicated, diverse, and they all represent or connect to different issues that a viewer might be going through. I really love to see it. 2/2

Category 3, Plot Issues: I understand some of the egg lore, like Ura-Acca and Acca’s research, but it still doesn’t quite connect fully in my brain. I don’t want to say they could have explained it better as an anime just straight up telling you the answers isn’t really fun, is it? Buttttttt, I still feel the need to take off a smidge for the complexity. It’s okay to be complex, but make it accessible. Just a little smidge… I don’t like having to read the wiki after every episode because I’m confused. 1.5/2

Category 4, Emotions: Very emotionally grabbing. I was drawn in from episode one and my interest only increased as I got deeper. Every episode gave a new horrifying story, a new detail about a character we know, or a look into someone’s tragic past. Lots of emotional damage in this one! And like I said, it was treated with care. It wasn’t a gag or shofor shock value, it was done in a careful and considerate way… 2/2

Category 5, Tropes: No issues here. Wonder Egg Priority is up there as one of the most original anime I’ve seen. Right up there with stuff like Tatami Galaxy… and several other things I’m forgetting. A completely new and unique experience. 2/2

Category 6, Art: It looked beautiful. Full points here! It looked like movie-level animation for EVERY single episode (except the finale... lol). Not a single bad moment. Looked like Your Name and Weathering With You… so good. So good. 2/2

Category 7, Ending: Well… now we’re here. Here’s my thoughts post-finale. Sighhhhh. It was shit. They took everything that WEP built up and… didn’t do anything with it. Instead we got some strange Neiru AI plot, everyone had their memories erased for one reason or another, all of the characters were acting very OOC, the animation was garbage, and so many questions were left unanswered. What was up with Frill? What happened to Kyoko? What happened to all the talk about the warriors of Eros? What did I just watch???? Some people have told me there’s a lot of weird symbolism but it really gets lost in translation and it doesn’t come out in the show. I’m sure there’s ways you could look at the ending and get something out of it, but for me personally I thought it was a total trainwreck. Leaves a bit of a sour taste in my mouth. WEP is the kinda show where even if the journey is good, since it carries such a heavy message and had a lot of mysteries, the ending is a big part of the experience. So… yeah, WEP is kinda ruined for me. I still think everything pre-finale was really meaningful, pretty, and had potential… but if it ultimately comes out to nothing… I dunno. What a waste. -4/2

WEP scores a 7.5/14. Kinda a weird situation… I think the ending ruined the show for me just a bit, I can’t look at it without getting a sour feeling, but I still appreciate what it was trying to do. There was a lot of interesting conversations, important representation, and it looked beautiful. But I can’t ignore the ending and say it deserves a good score anyways, hence why I gave negative points because of the finale. Sigh. Oh well.

Also, I know I said some pretty strong things about WEP in this review but obviously this is just my opinion. If you enjoyed the ending or you think the show is still great despite the ending, that’s great! I’m glad you were able to have a good experience with the show. Sadly, I did not. This is all just my personal opinion and experience with the show, and you had a different one that’s great :)

So much potential...

Final Score: 5/10

#wep #wonder egg priority #AnimeReviews

[zantids]

Review #151: Gundam: The Origin

A review I certainly never thought I’d be writing. Gundam! A series that every anime fan knows about, but few actually take the plunge into. First things first. I am not a Gundam fan. Not in the way that implies I didn’t enjoy watching the movies, but moreso that I don’t really know anything about the world and the larger series. Obviously I know more than I did before watching the movies, but I am nowhere near a master of knowledge about the Gundam universe. I still don’t really get the difference between a Mobile Suit and a Gundam! Big mech is big mech in my eyes! One thing I do know though is the story of Char Aznable… it’s a fun one. Here we go!

I will be explaining the plot in layman’s terms because that’s literally the only way I can describe it, hope you’re able to follow along. Similar to how Star Wars had Mr. Darth Vader, the original Mobile Suit Gundam series has Mr. Char Aznable. He’s not as terrible/villainy as Darth Vader, but he’s the main antagonist/anti-hero of the original series. And just like how we got movies giving us the details of how Darth Vader became Darth Vader, we got a series of 6 movies showcasing how Char Aznable became The Red Comet. He’s a fan favorite. A ladies man. The movies are just a bunch of Char fanservice. I love it! We follow the story of Char from babyhood all the way until he becomes the man that he is in the original series. Here come the layman’s terms, get ready. In the Gundam universe there are people living in space, called Spacenoids. It’s far into the future, there’s a bunch of space colonies, and it’s been long enough since the Spacenoid’s ancestors left Earth so they’ve kinda become a race of their own. Still human, but not connected to the Earth, which one could argue is a big part of “humanity”, ya know? So they live in space. And the Earth Federation is very overbearing in their control over the Spacenoids, so the Spacenoids want independence. Here comes Char! Char’s father is a very important political leader for the Spacenoids. He fights for their independence, he’s a big hero to the Spacenoids. Then he gets assasinated. Char is then caught in the middle of a political battle that he doesn’t have much say in. He has to fight to survive, and oh boy, he fights. You get to watch him grow into the “villain” that he is in the original series. It’s really interesting. That’s all I can really say without spoiling all of the movies! REVIEW TIME!

Category 1, Plot: I enjoyed these movies quite a bit. I will say, not shockingly, the mecha bits were my least favorite to watch. From what I’ve heard, this series compared to the rest of the Gundam universe is one of the most plot-heavy and least mecha-focused, and wowie if this is considered “light on the mecha” then... the rest is gonna be interesting!! I’m a big Char fangirl now, and I’m glad I watched this before diving into the original series as I feel like it’s gonna make me appreciate the rest so much more. Seeing a character in HD and falling in love with them makes it easier to watch them in shitty 1970′s style later! I appreciate these movies for that. The plot was interesting. I liked it. I liked the first few movies the most as they focused on plot more than fighting, but to be honest it was pretty enjoyable throughout, even with the robot fights. Overall, mecha parts… a little boring. Char... yes. 1.5/2

Category 2, Characters: Char Aznable. Casval Rem Deikun. Edouard Mass. A man of many names. Whatever you call him, he has stolen my heart. He’s kinda absolutely terrifying, but I love him anyways! It was a great experience character-wise. 100%. I loved a lot of the cast. Garma… Sayla… the original Char… Char himself… Hamon… all of these people. Also, Garma and Char were a little… sus?! Not really in canon but in my heart. I don’t have much else to say… I liked them all a lot. It’s gonna be upsetting when Char and Garma are the bad guys… oh no… 2/2

Category 3, Plot Issues: I know it’s kinda my fault for jumping into a series at a weird point, but I feel like the explanations could have been a little more new-viewer friendly. I got most of the important stuff, I think, but they jumped all over the place and didn’t explain everything in the best way… I know these movies are mostly for hardcore fans but ya know… I’m sure a lot of other people entered the series at this point too. A little more Gundam 101 lore please. 1/2

Category 4, Emotions: It was an emotional rollercoaster! Lots of shitty stuff happened that made Char the way he is, and lots of shitty stuff happened to the other characters that make them the way that they are… it’s all around shitty… WAR IS BAD GUYS. It’s bad and bad things happen. I was pretty emotionally invested. 2/2

Category 5, Tropes: I’m new to mecha so I can’t really say I know what’s overdone and what’s not! It’s a new world to me, so nothing seemed too unoriginal. And we have no fanservice? My sworn enemy… defeated. Except the Char shower scene. And I’ve heard from my Gundam friend that he has showers scenes like, all the time. Which I find hilarious. “GUYS WE HAVE TO MAKE SURE THERE’S A CHAR SHOWER SCENE IN THE NEW SERIES-” 2/2

Category 6, Art: It was nice!  liked the style of the eyes and the faces, it was bubbly and cool. They’re drawing 80’s-styled characters in a modern anime style, so it’s gonna look a little funky, but I liked it! Nothing special, but a good 1.5/2

Category 7, Ending: Welp… as I like to say… it’s not over! This is just the beginning! We saw a peek of the protagonist of the OG series, Arumo, so everything that’s in the main series comes after this. Since writing this review I have watched the original series (review coming soon...!) so I can attest that they did a good job leading into it. 2/2

Gundam: The Origin scores a 12/14. Not much wrong with it, so a very nice score! The mecha, which I thought would drag down my viewing experience, wasn’t too present in this one… leading to that great score. I really liked these movies. Kinda a shitty review IMO, it was more of me explaining my experience with the movies rather than an actual content review, so I apologize for that, it was a strange and new experience. But I liked it! And, like I said, I have watched the original series since finishing this review and I also enjoyed it! So don’t worry diehard Gundam fans, I know a bit more than I did when writing this (but I didn’t want to change too many things about my original review..!) 

If you take anything away from this review: please try it out! I was nervous to go into the mecha genre as I wasn’t sure how I was gonna like it, but the plot of these movies were great. Try it out. Even if it doesn’t make you want to watch Gundam, you’ll still get a really cool story on its own.

Final Score: 8.5/10

Char best boy in the universe!!!

#gundam: the origin #gundam the origin #AnimeReviews

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Upcoming Reviews #151-155

Finals....hahah...I’m dying...

Here’s some upcoming anime reviews!

#151: Gundam: The Origin

#152: Wonder Egg Priority

#153: SK8 The Infinity

#154: Horimiya

#155: Mobile Suit Gundam

I probably won’t be posting during my winter break so I’m going to try and get all of these reviews out before that starts (aka: all of these should be posted within the next week or so)! Should be fun B) 

Right now I’m watching a BUNCH of stuff... aside from rewatching Death Note for the 400th time I’m also watching some seasonals like Komi-san (SO CUTE), Platinum End (alright so far...), Aquatope (very good), and am very very excited to start the new Demon Slayer season which starts TODAY!!! I’m also watching Odd Taxi with some friends and trying to get caught up on Blue Period again... very busy! I’m watching more anime these past few weeks than I have in pretty much all of 2021 so I’m looking forward to finishing some new series and writing more reviews! 

Seeya very soon...!

-zantids

[zantids]

Review #150: The Way of the Househusband

A long-anticipated anime! I’ve heard of the manga for a while now, but as soon as they announced an anime adaptation I decided that I’d wait for that instead of going ahead and reading it. And then the first trailer dropped. It looked like shit! Power-point anime! It looked like someone took the manga panels, shittily redrew them in MS paint, and then made them shake around on screen for the “animation”. I went into the show with very low expectations… was I right, or did it surprise me? Hmm… let’s see.

First, I’ll go into the plot. Gokushufudou is an anime about an ex-Yakuza member who is now living a peaceful life as a househusband. Despite his attempts to have a normal everyday life, his looks, attitude, and history in the Yakuza get him caught up in a lot of sticky situations. This’ll be a very short review as it’s only five 17ish minute episodes, and there isn’t much depth to it. Here we go! 

Category 1, Plot: I didn’t hate it as much as I thought I would! The saving grace for this anime was the plot and the voice acting. The animation, which we’ll go into later, was absolutely dogshit, but I really enjoyed the plot. That’s just telling me to go read the manga huh? Even with the shitty shitty animation it still held its ground. The voice acting was 10/10, and of course, the plot was hilarious. Not to get too deep but showing manly Yakuza men doing normal chill things was really cute and wholesome, we love breaking those stereotypes!! It was really fun. The skits were cute, and I didn’t think the humor was too juvenile (which is sometimes a problem with me and comedies). It was a wholesome time. No  issues with the plot! 2/2

Category 2, Characters: The characters were great. Tatsu is such a great guy, he loves his wife and wants to be the best househusband that he can be. Miku, his wife, was adorable too. I loved her magical girl anime obsession (totally not PreCure guys), it was cute and charming. Masa was really fun too, he was Tatu’s yakuza “kouhai”, who wanted to learn from Tatsu how to be a good househusband. It was a really cute cast. We had some other recurring characters that were fun too, and honestly after all this I want to read the manga even more, because they’re so charming and I want to see more of them! It was a nice time. 2/2

Category 3, Plot Issues: Some of the pacing was really strange, some skits would end super abruptly or abnormally which was a bit off-putting. Nothing too bad, it wasn’t that distracting, but it was weird every so often. But other than that, no plot issues, we didn’t really have a full plot to begin with so 1.5/2

Category 4, Emotions: Basically… was the comedy anime funny? Yes. I had a good chuckle with this one. There were a few skits that were a little less funny than others, but overall it had a pretty high hit-miss rate with the comedy. It was a little annoying how many times they pulled the “Tatsu gets covered in red liquid right as someone walks through the door, omg blood?” joke but… not too bad. I liked it, I thought it was pretty cute and funny! 1.5/2

Category 5, Tropes: If anything, Gokushufudou was going against a lot of tropes that other anime present. I know it’s not supposed to be super deep, and of course this isn’t some big social piece on how men can be more feminine or WHATEVER, but I thought it was nice. I liked the message that its sharing. You can be manly with an apron! More of this please. 2/2

Category 6, Art: Ah… the art… here we go. It was absolutely garbage. It kinda made me depressed, not gonna lie. The voice acting and SFX were really great and I was constantly thinking “what if this was paired with great animation too?”... sigh… It was awful. Worse than awful. I’m all for experimental styles, but it genuinely looks like they took every panel from the manga and shittily colored it in MS paint. If you’re going to do that, at least color it well? There was a lot of colors going out of their lines, weird shading, weird movement, weird animation… I don’t HATE it, I don’t care that much to be honest, as I still had a good experience with the show. But if I’m going to be judging it critically like I am right now, it definitely deserves a shit score. I feel the need to go into the negatives here. I’ve never done this. But this was pretty awful. Sad. -1/2

Category 7, Ending: The ending was pretty normal. I like anime that end on a bang, not with a normal-type skit. This ended on a normal skit. Have the birthday skit be last! Have some cute thing with Tatsu and Miku be last! Why did we have a scene with Tatsu and Hibari as the finale? It was weird. The birthday skit was literally second to last… whyyy didn’t you flip it. So strange so strange. I guess maybe people don’t have the thoughts that I do regarding the “best way to end a series” but come on… ending it with a bang is just so much more fun! 1/2

Gokushufudou, or Way of the Househusband, scores a 9/14. Pretty good given the shit animation! I liked this one. Obviously, it has huge flaws… Huge flaws that you literally cannot look away from when watching the show. I guess you could ASMR it and just listen over the manga or something…? That’s actually a good idea- Anyways… a fun time. I recommend it if you’re interested, it’s pretty cute, and if you can look over some shit animation I really think anyone would enjoy it. 

The OP slaps as well

Final score: 7.5/10

#way of the house husband #gokushufudou #AnimeReviews

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Review #149: Kai Byoui Ramune

Kai Byoui Ramune (which I’m going to call Dr. Ramune because, easier) is a show that reminds me very loosely of Mob Psycho 100 in its structure and vibe. We have a wacky “shishou” type figure watching a younger “troubled kid”, who work together to solve oddity cases for clients that come to them for help. There’s a lot of differences, of course (and one of them is like 100x better than the other… sorry Dr. Ramune, MP100 top tier), but the vibe is similar. In Dr. Ramune, instead of ghosts, we have “mysterious diseases”, and it’s a lot wackier and less serious than MP100. I’m not gonna compare it to MP100 this whole review but you can’t look at it and say it doesn’t have a lot of similarities… anyways… Dr. Ramune is lighthearted, kinda weird, and I’m pretty indifferent about it in the end. But let’s get into the review!

Category 1, Plot: I liked this show the more I kept watching. I didn’t take it very seriously at first, the first mysterious diseases they solved were honestly really gross to watch (she had mayonnaise coming out of her eyes, I did not need to see or think about that) but as it went on it got a little better?? I wouldn’t say it became a great show or anything, it just bumped itself up from a 6 to a 7/10. Oops spoilers! The main reason I began to enjoy it more is that they actually gave some character to Ramune and his assistant, Kuro. I also really enjoyed the arc with Kuro’s friend, Shun. Everything Shun-arc and forward was really interesting and fun. The starting episodes were pretty weak, but I liked the latter half a lot more than I thought I would. It’s not an anime you can take very seriously, it gives me Iruma-kun vibes as it’s pretty kiddy and “safe”. But I won’t lie, there were some charming parts, and like I said, everything Shun-arc and forward was enjoyable. It was a nicer time than I thought it would be. 1.5/2

Category 2, Characters: I feel like they have to be going for some kind of Reigen/Mob vibe here. Ramune is just Reigen in a different font. I dunno, maybe there’s more way examples of “wacky mentor” and “stoic strong assistant” out there but it just feels a bit too similar. Anyways, onto Ramune himself. He was alright. Like a lot of things in this show, I liked him more over time. He got less obnoxious the more you got to know him, which I guess is common for those character types to be honest. Kuro was nice too. Once we learned about his backstory he was a lot more charming and fun to watch, at the start it was just kinda like “ah… there’s this random kid here? Who is he??”... But then they share how they first met and all that, and it makes a lot more sense. The other characters were okay, I liked Shun and his whole arc, but none of the other ones really stuck out to me. An lot of one-off characters that didn’t come back, it was a pretty episodic show so makes sense. 1.5/2

Category 3, Plot Issues: Not really any plot issues. It was very simple, they didn’t get too complex with it. While they didn’t try to explain the oddities at all, the rules they laid out were simple and made enough sense. 2/2

Category 4, Emotions: The biggest thing this show lacks when looking at it through my personal scale is emotional connection. I don’t connect too closely with shows like this to be honest. It’s a little too goofy for me, if I’m going for a wacky/serious vibe something like MP100 is the perfect fit. This one leaned too heavily towards the wacky side, and wasn’t that funny, so it didn’t land that well. Not much emotional connection for me and Ramune. 0/2

Category 5, Tropes: Since it just feels like a young-teens kinda show at its core, I wasn’t expecting any fanservice and luckily didn’t get any. Was a chill PG time. I would have cut off some points if Ramune never broke out of his wacky shell, but he had a charming personality that peeked out at times that I appreciated. Was a bit typical in terms of “generic anime humor” but that’s the worst of it. 1/2

Category 6, Art: Art was very typical, nothing special. 1/2

Category 7, Ending: The ending was nice. If you’re a continuous reader of mine you’ll know that I enjoy when a 1-cour anime tries to do something “special” for the final episode, it feels nice. Dr. Ramune did a good job of that. They did one of those classic episodic anime “everyone comes back for the final episode for some reason”, which is always cute. It was a little weird how they just shoved a Ramune-arc into the final episode and then sped run past it but… wasn’t too bad. Poor guy, they gave his assistant more backstory than him. 1.5/2

Dr. Ramune scores a 8.5/14. Not bad, not bad… it was a chill show that I didn’t connect with on a personal level, probably will never recommend to anyone, and probably won’t watch or think about for a long long long time. But I don’t really regret watching it either. It was a cute, while childish, kinda charming story. It felt like it was really playing it safe and staying inside the PG barriers, which just isn’t the kinda show that I connect to. Give me heartbreak, horror, and blood! I wouldn’t dissuade anyone else from watching it, but it isn’t really groundbreaking or a “must-watch”. Just a chill little SOL mystery show. 

It’s fine, I guess

7/10

#kai byoui ramune #dr ramune mysterious disease specialist #dr ramune #AnimeReviews

[zantids]

Review #148: Tsurezure Children

Tsurezure Children is a short series about a bunch of different high schoolers figuring out romantic relationships for the first time. We follow the story of nine different couples and their journeys with young love. There’s childhood friends who can’t seem to get romantic, a guy who is too insecure about his looks to get hints from a girl who likes him, a girl who teases a guy about liking him so much he’s not sure what’s real anymore, a girl who won’t take any hints, the student council president and the class delinquent, and a self-proclaimed love master just to name a few. Review time!

Category 1, Plot: As you might have been able to tell from my description, there’s a whole lot going on in this anime. We have nine different love stories going on at the same time, with only 12 12-minute episodes to cover them all. Not every couple gets the same amount of screen-time, which can heavily impact viewing pleasure depending on which couples you like the most. The screen-time isn’t fair. The entire last episode was spent on the same three couples for an overwhelming majority of the episode.... it was clear who the author liked better (or anime director, it’s manga source so mayhaps they changed around pacing who knows). Screen-time tangent aside, it’s just a bunch of shorts about kids in love! I enjoyed it. The fun thing is you never really have the time to get bored, even if you’re bored with a particular couple you only have to sit with them for 3-ish minutes until they move onto another one. I like shows that are like this, while they might not compare to other titles “plot-wise”, they’re quick short entertainment, which is fun. It’s different, which makes it hard to compare to other things, but I think it’s really good fun. 2/2

Category 2, Characters: There’s a lot of different characters to choose from, it’s likely everyone will find someone they’re interested in. Honestly, I think aside from the ‘texting-trouble’ couple, I loved every single pairing. The texting one was so painful to watch that it wasn’t even funny.  It was horrifying from an anxiety perspective. Chills every time they came on screen. And they didn’t even really make up by the end! Which just made it so much more painful! The astronomy club couple was kinda meh as well, mostly because they didn’t get any screen-time and I was more interested in the president of the club’s relationship with the former-president more than whatever was happening with the new members. I think my favorite pair was the “childhood friends who can’t take their relationship to the next level”. They were really cute. I also really liked the guy who was insecure about his face, his whole gimmick was really adorable and his friend made me laugh a lot. I liked all of them a lot ! I think shows like this are really fun, there’s (hopefully) someone for everyone. It was fun. 2/2

Category 3, Plot Issues: Not really any issues. Only bad thing is I feel like the story really abandoned some couples which was kinda sad. I feel like the balance could have been a little better. Not a huge issue though so 1.5/2

Category 4, Emotions: It was funny, and it’s a comedy, so yay it did it’s job! I had a lot of fun watching this one. Quite a few strong exhales from the nose! It was only “hard to watch” a little little bit of the time (texting couple... shudders), and the ratio to hits and misses on the jokes was pretty high towards the hits. I had a good laugh. 1.5/2

Category 5, Tropes: Nothing too bad- it’s a pretty tropey anime at its core, and I’ve already mentioned that the characters are pretty one-dimensional, but it worked out alright. It was generally wholesome, and not afraid to get a little PG-13 at times, which surprised me at times. But no weird fanservice or anything too bad to handle. 2/2

Category 6, Art: Nothing special. It wasn’t the best quality but it was cute. Had a very nice light vibe to it. 1/2

Category 7, Ending: I really enjoyed how as the story went on more and more of the couples started to interact, especially in the finale with the big sports festival. It was almost overwhelming seeing them all on screen at the same time. Who do I focus on AHH?! It was cute. One bad thing though... so much was left unfinished!? We had some couples still in shambles when the credits rolled, that’s super depressing! This definitely need a second season. I wish they had finished on the beach episode instead of just TEASING it, I bet that was the very next chapter of the manga… they could have planned that a little better… it would have been such a nice finish… why tease a big event on the final episode to not even include it… bad planning. You hurt me. 1.5/2

Tsurezure Children scores a 11.5/14. A little higher than average, good job! I liked this one. It was short, quick, never felt bored watching it, and I 10/10 recommend it to someone who needs a cute romance fix. If I was more into manga I’d definitely go read it, sucks that I can’t read, but maybe in the future I’ll get around to it. I’ll forever pray for a season 2 but I kinda doubt it at this point… still praying though. 

Never sending a text ever again

7.5/10

#tsurezure children #tsuredure children #AnimeReviews

[zantids]

Review #147: Otherside Picnic

Otherside Picnic is a shoujo ai about two girls named Toriko and Sorao who make a living off of venturing into the “Otherworld”, getting goods, and selling them to Toriko’s Otherworld-obsessed friend named Kozakura. The Otherworld is filled with urban legends and other strange monsters, making it very dangerous to explore. They’re not venturing in just for the cash though- Toriko is looking for her missing friend Satsuki, and Sorao agreed to help her as she is well-versed on the monsters that reside there. They go back and forth between the Otherworld and the normal world, see weird shit, get to know each other, and make a few bucks. Here we gooooo!

Category 1, Plot: So… this show was a bit weird. I really liked the vibe. Urban legends? Love it! Cool main characters? Great! Shoujo Ai that’s not baitey/the pure focus of the show? Give me more! But the plot? What. According to fans this wasn’t a great adaptation… I could feel that while watching the show. It felt all over the place. I feel like I still don’t completely get what the hell the Otherside actually is. It felt rushed, not much was explained, and by the end not much was answered. I could have put a little more effort into trying to understand it, but I also want to be able to sit back and watch a show without feeling like if I blink I’ll miss the entire plot. But, all that aside… there were still enjoyable parts! The bonding moments with Toriko and Sorao were very cute. Their budding romance/partnership was cute and fun, and the entire Satsuki plot, while I’m upset it never concluded, was interesting too. The vibe was nice, but the little details were confusing. .5/2

Category 2, Characters: My favorite part of the show was 100% the main characters… doesn’t mean they were great though. It feels like we knew everything about them within the first 5 minutes and then… nothing changed. I also wish they did a little more with Shoujo Ai… it was obvious Sorao liked Toriko but it didn’t go anywhere, ever. Even though they were cute they were still pretty bland… I feel like we needed more information on both of them. I liked Toriko’s backstory with her military background, that was cool, but we didn’t get much else. We know Sorao goes to school… I guess? It feels like they just sit around, we never see them do anything else. Was weird. They’re cute but bland. .5/2

Category 3, Plot Issues: Aside from my general disconnect from the plot, there weren’t that many issues. I feel like they didn’t try to explain the world we were exploring, and we just got random bits of lore or information at random times. Not that every show needs to perfectly explain the lore of the secret world they teleport to, but it would help to know anything. 1/2

Category 4, Emotions: I don’t want to drag on about it… but yeah didn’t feel that connected to the show. The horror wasn’t scary, I couldn’t feel connected to Toriko and Satsuki if I didn’t get the context of their relationship, the romance(??) was cute but didn’t go anywhere. They never got close to being in any kind of danger, very low stakes. .5/2

Category 5, Tropes: I love Shoujo/Shounen Ai that isn’t JUST about romance, it’s normalizing having non-het stories that aren’t just about the fact that they’re gay. I feel like I wouldn’t recommend Otherside Picnic to someone if they were looking for a Shoujo Ai though, as it barely goes into it. But, it’s still there, so thank you for that representation. But yeah, no bad tropes. I love the subversion of the usual Shoujo/Shounen Ai though. 2/2

Category 6, Art: Pretty decent, nothing special. I honestly thought it looked kinda nice. 1.5/2

Category 7, Ending: I was hoping that the ending would wrap things up a little but… nah. None of that. No conclusion for the romance, about Satsuki, about what the Otherworld is, etc… Weird vibes from this show. It felt like we were missing a lot of details. I hear the novel is better, sucks that this adaptation was kinda iffy. Maybe I’ll give it a read~ .5/2

Otherside Picnic scores a 7.5/14. Oops. I appreciate when I give out a score lower than my “average” (about a 10.5/14) because it makes me feel like I'm not just blindly handing out decent scores to everything, and that I actually have different “tastes” and “preferences”... imagine that. Yay low scores! I see quite a few people praising Otherside Picnic but the general consensus seems to be “?”... Kinda scuffed. I enjoyed it… I guess… I was really tired of it by the end. 

Total Score: 5/10

OP is a bop though

#otherside picnic #urasekai picnic #AnimeReviews

[zantids]

Review #146: Jujutsu Kaisen

This is a very exciting one. What can I say, I’m a sheep, I love Jujutsu Kaisen.

Jujutsu Kaisen is an anime about a boy with a big appetite. Our main character is high school student Itadori Yuuji who was in the wrong place at the wrong time. He gets in the middle of a big jujutsu fight between his soon-to-be fellow classmate, Megumi Fushiguro, and a cursed spirit. Megumi was attempting to keep the cursed spirit from eating this super rare super powerful cursed item, “Sukuna’s finger”, as whatever eats it will gain massive cursed power, and possibly be possessed by the evil dormant spirit of Sukuna himself. Through a series of very unfortunate events, Itadori eats the finger. Oops! Sukuna awakens inside him taking over his body… except Itadori hasn’t fully lost control. Two people in one body at this point, although Itadori is mainly in control, so that’s good. Normally, according to jujutsu code, Itadori would be executed ASAP. But a powerful sorcerer, Satoru Gojo (Itadori’s future teacher) explains the benefit of keeping Itadori alive: he can find and eat the other fingers and be killed once he gets all 20. Easy! Itadori enrolls in Jujutsu Tech, meets his classmates, learns about the world of jujutsu… and eats some fingers! Review time!

Category 1, Plot: I loved it. This is the next big one. Jujutsu Kaisen is great. It looks amazing, sounds amazing, and the plot is amazing too. Jujutsu world aside, the whole “Itadori x Sukuna vessel” concept is really interesting, and the whole looming threat of “we’re gonna kill you once you eat all the fingers” is a depressing thing to think about too. I love it! Then there’s the jujutsu. Even if I don’t completely understand it, it looks cool as hell. The individual powers are really fun, I love how creative the different special moves are. Each fight is so wacky as they each have their own powers and conditions they must meet to fight- it reminds me a lot of Nen fights in HxH, which I also love. I also appreciate the balance between the serious and silly atmosphere. I feel like JJK and Kimetsu no Yaiba both do a REALLY good job of keeping this nice balance. Both shows give me very similar vibes- dark looming plot hanging over everyone but there’s still cute and charming moments that peek through. It’s charming and fun and the action is sick. I’m also a certified manga reader, and all I’ll say is that it gets even better from here on out. I’m really excited for more to air. 2/2

Category 2, Characters: WOW, the characters are weirdos in the best way possible. One of the characters pointed it out, saying something along the lines of “there’s no such thing as a ‘normal’ jujutsu sorcerer”. They’re all a little wacky! The entire cast is great. Itadori is a charming and positive (but not overly positive) protagonist. Seeing him and Sukuna, who is the bitchiest of bitches, interact is really fun. Megumi and Nobara are great too. I love their powers and they’re both really unstable and kinda insane, it’s really fun to watch. I love seeing female characters that aren’t afraid to be strong, I love you Nobara. Then there’s Gojo... I can’t say much because most of the reasons that he’s like, one of my favorite characters ever now, is stuff that happens in the manga, but just know that I love him. He’s incredible. He’s a vain asshole because he can be a vain asshole. He has the right. 2/2

Category 3, Plot Issues: Jujutsu is kinda complicated sometimes. I can’t say that I never had issues understanding what was going on in terms of somebody’s powers. It’s not a major issue, just a little 1/2

Category 4, Emotions: There were a lot of emotional moments in this anime. They don’t hold back... all the deaths we saw felt meaningful and important, people aren’t forgotten easily, and with the main characters’ big “thing” being that he cares about the value of human life, it all felt very heavy. I also had a lot of fun. The baseball episode was just… so good. I got attached to a lot of the main cast, and a lot of the side characters, I love when a show has a main cast of like 50 who are all developed or individual enough that everyone seems to have a different favorite. I care about these little dudes a lot. 2/2

Category 5, Tropes: Absolutely no issues here. Everyone cries it’s generic shounen but I do not care!!! I like anime that I like, and this one felt original and cute and I had no problems with it 2/2

Category 6, Art: Yes I’m about to give Jujutsu Kaisen full points on animation. Certain shows, while maybe not doing something completely original, are still too beautiful to not score full points. This show looked incredible. Watch both openings if you haven’t already, it’s a perfect example of how gorgeous the animation is. It’s great. And they’re gonna animate CHAINSAW MAN TOO... sniff... I’m so excited. 2/2

Category 7, Ending: And, the ending. It’s not over, not close to being over at all, but season 1 did a great job of wrapping things up and leaving it in a good spot. Already getting a prequel movie so more is to come!! I think the ending arc was short and sweet and fit right in. Wasn’t unpacking too much in the last few episodes and it felt like it ended naturally. I already know what happens next, and while I’m very excited... am I ready to cry? We’ll see. 2/2

Jujutsu Kaisen scores a 13/14. Jujutsu itself is just too big brain though, please dumb it down for me? But wow. Jujutsu Kaisen blew me away. I love this anime. It feels fresh, adult, very original, I love it. Cannot wait for more!!

E ve you need to make more anime openings I need more

Final Score: 9.5/10

#AnimeReviews #jujutsu kaisen #favorites

[zantids]

Upcoming Reviews #146-150

That (approx.) month long hiatus was completely accidental, I’ve found that October is kinda hell month for college students... Midterms...

Anyways, I’m trying to “be back”, so here’s the upcoming reviews~

#146: Jujutsu Kaisen

#147: Otherside Picnic

#148: Tsurezure Children

#149: Kai Byoui Ramune

#150: The Way of the Househusband

I wish I could say the month break gave me time to watch a bunch of new anime and now I’m not running out of anime to post but alas... not the case.

I’ve finished a few new ones and have started some seasonals but overall I’m still scrambling to find time to watch anything. I can’t even really say what I’m watching at the moment... there’s like 10 different shows. I’m a mess!!!

Looking forward to posting again~

-zantids

[zantids]

Review #145: Cells at Work! CODE BLACK!

Another Cells at Work! series! This time we’re in a shitty dying body instead of the normal healthy body that the other Cells at Work! series takes place in. Besides the body condition, this one is also mostly genderbent: red blood cells are now guys, white blood cells are now girls, and if the rest aren’t genderbent they’re just different, like the platelets being moody teens instead of cute kids. It’s also very dark and gritty. The owner of this body doesn’t take care of himself, leading to a lot of issues. They’re all fighting for their lives in this “CODE BLACK” environment! Just a heads up, this review is going to be heavily comparing it to the original Cells at Work! series, so if you’ve only seen BLACK this might be a little confusing. Here we go!

Category 1, Plot: I really enjoyed the dark atmosphere in comparison to the lighthearted tone of the original series. It let the series feel more realistic. Health issues in the other series had to come out of nowhere and were rarely the fault of the person: suddenly having cancer cells, a sudden random cut/bruise, a cold, etc… in this series it featured a lot of long term behaviors that led to the shitty environment, making it all feel a lot more dark and despairing. A lot of the health issues that the BLACK series were issues they could never cover in the original… smoking… masturbation… hair loss… fat all over the place… heart attacks… it was pretty out there which surprised me. I was expecting a darker environment given the title but I wasn’t expecting it to be at this level. Of course, Cells at Work! CODE BLACK isn’t the grittiest anime to ever air, but for a Cells at Work! show I was surprised! We had character deaths, depression arcs, a lot of sad moments. While this show didn’t resonate or stick with me personally, and I’d probably never watch it again, I feel like the idea is really cool and I liked the concept a lot. So props to that. Just a smidge off because I was so damn ready to be done with it, it dragged a lot at the end. 1.5/2

Category 2, Characters: The characters were nice. Seeing them in shitty situations fleshed out their characters a lot more compared to when they were just hanging out having fun most of the time. Red Blood Cell went through a lot of shit in BLACK. I feel bad for the little dude. White Blood Cell wasn’t really present as much as the original was in the OG series, the biggest characters in BLACK were RBC and his little pal. They’re in despair! It’s sad. I liked it. RBC’s friend was also a neat character on his own, he shared the darker side of not being all gung-ho about the shitty work environment. A cool perspective! There isn’t much other characterization, but it was alright. About as much character detail as the original, so not very much. 1/2

Category 3, Plot Issues: Not many plot issues, not that I understand the inner workings of the human body so I can’t exactly test the show on its accuracy. Besides me losing interest pretty quickly, I liked it… in general. 1.5/2

Category 4, Emotions: Like I’ve been saying, it got a bit boring over time. Not because the plot slowed down or anything, I just wasn’t that into the content. I think the plot is interesting, the darker environment compared to the original was really cool, I was just not that into watching it for that long. Cells at Work! isn’t my thing. 0/2

Category 5, Tropes: I don’t think anything was too tropey. I thought the male RBC would be super gung-ho the whole time like his female counterpart, and I was completely wrong, so that was a nice surprise. A lot of my predictions and assumptions about the show were completely wrong, a lot of surprises! 2/2

Category 6, Art: Pretty typical animation. Nothing special, mediocre at best. 1/2

Category 7, Ending: Pretty happy ending until the post-credit scene, where they get isekai’d into another body or something?! Ok...? It was generally okay, we got some final-ep bonding with everyone good stuff… then it all goes down the drain to start off season 2. Which I’m not going to watch (probably). .5/2

Cells at Work! CODE BLACK scores a 8/14. It’s not a bad show, it’s just not my cup of tea. I mostly watch Cells at Work! for the background noise/it’s a nice simple show and that’s sometimes what you need, so it makes sense it scored a mediocre score. Moving onward…!

White Blood Cell really isn’t in the show that much I swear people just gif her a lot-

Final Score: 5.5/10

#hataraku saibou black #cells at work black #cells at work! code black! #AnimeReviews

[zantids]

Review #144: Mushoku Tensei

Mushoku Tensei is an isekai about a otaku-pervert NEET who was reborn into the body of a baby in another world. The ultimate chance to start over, you’re just baby! The plot is kinda hard to explain, there’s a lot of intricate details and it moves very quickly. It’s basically about this reborn baby/man, now named Rudeus Greyrat, and his new life in this new world. You meet his family, get to know his friends, there’s family drama, he grows up and learns magic, etc. Rudeus is also kinda a major asshole (pervert) but fortunately a lot of the show is about his growth as a person so that helps. It’s surprisingly simple but complex at the same time, it does a lot of things I’ve never seen anime do before in terms of grittiness and realism… let’s get into it.

Category 1, Plot: The plot was pretty good. There were some big issues with it which we’ll talk about later (don’t worry I’m not ignoring them), but for now I want to focus on the part of the show I liked the most, which is the plot itself. I love shows that feature completely original worlds, it’s really fun. I absolutely adore settings like Fullmetal Alchemist and Mushoku Tensei where completely everything is brand new. I also love that the focus is completely on Rudeus’s little life. We aren’t thrown into a big political battle within the first 3 episodes, he’s not planning on saving the world, he’s just a kid growing up and doing his own thing. It’s super simple. I’m not sure how else to describe it but I really enjoy the simplicity of it. I don’t want to spoil anything/so much happens that I can’t even begin to explain it but I really enjoyed it. The world is cool, it feels like there’s a lot of effort put into the story, it’s a really great fantasy show. It gets surprisingly real, there’s obviously a lot of effort put into the lore, and I’m really excited for more. It feels like we’re just getting started. 2/2

Category 2, Characters: Here’s where the complaints begin. So, Rudeus. We don’t know his old name so I’ll just call him Rudeus even though I think Rudeus Greyrat himself isn’t… the worst. It’s mostly his mind that’s the problem. I wish this show wasn’t an isekai. I guess as the show progresses it becomes less of an important part of the story, so I’m happy that we’re leaving that behind. It’s just... why the hell do we need some ugly pervert otaku ruining the nice time with his dirty thoughts. It makes me very sad. It’s like the show had to do 1 really bad thing so it couldn’t be perfect. He’s getting growth, sure, but he’s really just am overall POS. I’m not a fan. The other characters are great, at least they’re purely from this new world so it doesn’t feel like they have that extra baggage. I like the grittiness and realness of the story too, they aren’t afraid to make the characters do bad things but still be good people. But fuck you Paul. Asshole. Everyone but Rudeus was fine. I liked all of the girls a lot, they were all sweet. It’s a good time. I just wish that it didn’t have to be an isekai... Btw, I completely understand if you can’t “forgive” the show like I did for its complicated character. That’s extremely understandable and I respect that! At this point, I just realize that sometimes I have to ignore these problematic elements in order to get around to a really good story. That’s just my view on it. 1/2

Category 3, Plot Issues: I didn’t want to take full points off of characters because I think the other characters are really fleshed out and well written and I wasn’t gonna let Rudeus ruin that… so we’re carrying it over to plot issues! I don’t understand what’s so satisfying about watching an asshole be an asshole.  If they all universally hated Rudeus’s behavior this wouldn’t be as much of an issue, like in Konosuba. But he doesn’t get punished for it, both inside and outside of the show. Thanks for telling me that I’m “triggered” for not wanting to watch a 30-year old man reincarnated into a child fuck another child. If there was any kind of retribution from the other characters I’d be more okay with it but it’s just uncomfortable to watch him continue to be a jerk. 0/2

Category 4, Emotion: Okay, a break from the Rudeus rant. They did a great job of getting you invested into the story. Every death we see is portrayed horribly and in the most gruesome way, the consequences of every action they make are real, it’s really gory and gross and bloody and heartbreaking. Like I said, I’ve never seen an anime tackle a lot of these issues in this way before... deaths that aren’t just pushed away an episode later, dealing with the heartbreak of cheating and being cheated on, the topic of consent, consequences of kidnapping… sure it’s been done before but I just want to praise MT for having a lot of gritty realness, and tackling the issues in a real way. It doesn’t feel good to watch, in a good way?! 2/2

Category 5, Tropes: Well, as much as I’d love to rant about Rudeus again I’ll save it. The characters were great, I wouldn’t say that any of them are unbearably tropey. They’re all fleshed out and have what feel like real personalities. I also like the small cast, it makes it feel more personal. 2/2

Category 6, Art: Absolutely stunning animation. Nothing inventive but it really does look beautiful. 1.5/2

Category 7, Ending: We ended the season with the start of a new arc and I’m really enjoying it so far. I really like this anime more and more every episode, it feels like I’m watching a really well written universe unfold piece by piece. There’s so much to do and see, so much that’s been teased, I love how we’re watching everything through the eyes of Rudeus. There’s no big bad guys, this feels like a real world, I’m really enjoying it. I can’t wait for s2! 2/2

Mushoku Tensei scores a 10.5/14. Not because it was average, like most shows with a 10.5, but because they’re making me watch some really weird shit which I’m not enjoying at all! But every other part of the show is incredible. The plot is solid, it looks great, it sounds great, and I love that they’re taking it slow, it’s all one step at a time. If we actually continue to watch Rudeus from day zero all the way into his young adult life I’ll be so happy. We’ve spent so much time with him and they’ve taken it so slow, it feels like we really know everyone around him. I’m hype for s2!! It’s coming soon!

Season 2... soon!!

8/10

#mushoku tensei #jobless reincarnation #mushoku tensei: jobless reincarnation #mushoku tensei: isekai ittara honki dasu #AnimeReviews

[zantids]

Review #143: Golden Boy

No idea how I got here.

Golden Boy is an anime about a college dropout named Kintarou Ooe who travels Japan in search of part time jobs, hoping to get more “education”. Every episode we follow him to a new part time job where he basically: finds a hot lady, really messes things up at the job (but really tries), then after a series of convoluted events he dips from the part time job, and she’s all like “KINTAROUUUU!!! I LOVED YOU!!” as he rides away into the sunset on his bike. That’s pretty much the show. It’s extremely graphic in terms of nudity (a lot of actual not-censored boobs), Kintarou is kinda an asshole when it comes to women, and it’s a 90’s anime, so that’s cool! I watched it because it has a super high score on MAL (sometimes... that means good things) and it was pretty short, only 6 episodes. Was it a waste of time? Do I regret this experience? Probably. Here we go!

Category 1, Plot: I walked into this one not expecting a lot of what it was gonna give me. I’m really conflicted on how I feel about this show. Adult themes aren’t a bad thing. Nudity isn’t a bad thing. I’m not trying to say “EW!! BOOBIE BAD!!”, but damn the way they portray all the women and how Kintarou acts is just not great. So I’m conflicted. It’s cool that it’s more adult, I like the style, and I really like the plot, but really dislike Kintarou himself and the sexual turn that it takes in every episode. To get into more specifics… Golden Boy had a really nice concept. A guy who dropped out of college (for being too smart, we learn) goes around doing a bunch of odd-jobs so he learns more about the world, that’s a really cool plot. But then we have Kintaou. Who licks a toilet nearly every episode because a hot woman has sat on it, gropes someone at least once an episode, usually fucks everything at whatever company he joined up to an unsaveable degree, ONLY for at the last second to turn it all around and the women go swoon over him. More than anything else, it’s really just depressing to watch these girlbosses suddenly become obsessed with a guy who’s such a sleeze. Sure, he has a little good in his heart. His motivation, overall cheerful attitude, sense of responsibility, and ability to learn quickly are really charming, but the groping and toilet licking and trickiness of it all is really gross. I’ll talk about that more in characters but basically the plot is super solid… and then they add all this shit. Again, it’s not bad for boob to be out, guy to be horny, girl to be horny for guy, but did they have to make him such a creepy guy? I wish he was more charming and not so sneaky, I think I’d like this show a lot more. I REALLY enjoy going to a new location every episode and learning about these different jobs as they actually go into detail to explain some of the work he has to do, but damn Kintarou himself just sucks. It’s sad. 1/2

Category 2, Characters: Oops, I’ve kinda said everything I need to say. Kintarou is a real mess. He has so many charming traits so I get why the girls swoon over him I guess, but his sleezyness and sneakiness are just such big turn-offs to his character. It’s not even like Denji or Miroku where it’s kinda harmless and endearing it’s just… gross. Licking a toilet??? I don’t even wanna list some of the other stuff he does but it’s not great. Each of the women are pretty one-off so I won’t really take my time to explain any of them in detail but DAMN I really really liked all of them. It’s an old anime so there aren’t any weird anime tropes, the people feel really authentic. I love how there are so many girlbosses. They’re all so badass. Lots of female CEO’s who aren’t taking Kintarou’s shit (until they do, ofc), it’s fun. I wanna give millions of points for these great and cool female characters, but they all get ruined by the end when they end up simping for Kintarou. Very sad. The characters in general were nice, I can’t say I completely hate Kintarou but he’s a total ass sometimes. 1.5/2

Category 3, Plot Issues: Plot issues… nothing really. There was a lot of dumb anime logic but nothing that bothered me that much. He was riding a bike on telephone wires… and survived a drop down a cliff... I could take points off here “it’s not realistic!!!”, but it didn’t really bother me so no points taken off. 2/2

Category 4, Emotions: I was pretty shaken by this show... with how disturbed I was of Kintarou each episode. But in seriousness, I really liked and got into the plots of each episode, especially the final one, that was really fun. I’ll give it a 1.5/2 for getting me sucked into his part time jobs.

Category 5, Tropes: Tropes. Well we all know what I’m gonna say. Very unrealistic for these girlbosses to be simping over a man like Kintarou. Why world, why. This is not it. I’ve already vented enough about it so here’s a 0/2, all my anger about this aspect of the show.

Category 6, Art: Gonna pull a classic zantids move, throwing out 2/2’s for art to all shows that were made before the 2010′s! I really do enjoy old art, it does help me enjoy some shows more than others, so it makes sense to give a higher score because of it... trust me. If this was in a modern art style I guarantee I would hate it 10x more. And that’s bias baby!! So here’s a 2/2.

Category 7, Ending: The ending was actually really good. It was a big final moment where all the girls from the previous episodes came back to help Kintarou help this animation studio, it was super cute. I wish they didn’t add the entire chase scene where they’re all trying to find Kintarou because they’re SIMPS but everything else about the final episode was really good and felt like... the entire show was worth it? I really really liked it. I’m a sucker for big final episodes: everyone coming back to work together, festival, big performance/competition. It’s just such a great way to end a series, and ending a series on a normal note is so bleh. It was really cute watching all the girlbosses interact and work together, warmed my heart. 1.5/2

So… Golden Boy. Scored a 9.5/14, I feel like that’s about right. Right below a 10, usually my threshold for a show being “pretty good”. It’s not bad because it’s adult, it’s not bad because it’s graphic, it’s bad because of Kintarou’s weird antics. But still, I liked Golden Boy. Would I EVER recommend it personally? Absolutely not! Please don’t watch it!! Just like I can’t suggest the Monogatari series to people in my personal life, I could NEVER recommend Golden Boy. But on this anonymous anime blog I’ll just say this: it’s not a bad show. If you can look past a lot of groping and fanservice and sexual shit and want a 90’s show where a guy does a bunch of odd jobs, just go for it. I’m also not overhyping the ecchi-levels here, take a look at the first like 5 minutes of the first episode and I think you’ll understand. But it’s not bad. It just had a rotten part of it. Still worth a try if you’re like me, and fanservice can’t hit you anymore (because we’re so used to it... T-T).

H..hello Madame President...

Final Score: 7/10

#golden boy #AnimeReviews

[zantids]

Review #142: D4DJ: First Mix

While slugging through Love Live Nijigasaki, an anime idol enthusiast friend popped up and told me about another idol anime that was airing soon after, D4DJ (Dig Delight Direct Drive DJ… brain hurts). I was thrown off a bit by the fact that A) the series was airing on YouTube (not a bad thing I’ve just never seen that before…) and B) It was entirely CGI, like Beastars. Again, not a bad thing, just… strange? I was going into completely uncharted territory here. Regardless, I dove right into it and was shocked by how much I liked it. What’s D4DJ about?

D4DJ is a show about DJ’s… nice. Our main character Rinku has just moved back to Japan after living in Africa for many years. She hears a song she really likes on the school radio during lunch so she rushes up to the PA room to find Maho... a DJ! Basically this school is a breeding ground for DJ’s and they pay for concerts and stuff so… lotta DJ students, it’s not very out of place. Maho tells Rinku that she’s a DJ, Rinku gets super into it and wants to perform with her, performance goes so well that they form a group, eventually more members come and then they form Happy Around!. There’s rival groups, big concerts, lots of drama, let’s get right into it.

Category 1, Plot: The plot was pretty solid. Most of the starting episodes were gathering the members of what would soon become Happy Ara and meeting the other rival groups, who in the anime were Peaky P-Key and Photon Maiden. Side note, all of these groups' names are super sick. Especially Peaky P-Key. I want to applaud whoever came up with that, it rolls off of the tongue so nice. Anyways, it was pretty much the same vibe as a Love Live/any other music show. They’re always SOL but also slowly building towards some big final performance, which in D4DJ was the Sunset Stage. It was a fun time. I think what drew me to like D4DJ the most were the characters, the visuals, and the performances. I’ll talk about the characters and the visuals in the later sections but I can talk about the performances here, as I guess that’s a big part of the plot. Like other idol/music shows, a big part of the show are the performances. D4DJ did not disappoint. An aspect of DJing I didn’t know that much about was VJing, which is basically… the visual effects that go on during a performance? There were a lot of aspects about DJing that I didn’t know about until now, which is super cool! I like when I actually learn stuff about a special interest from anime, it feels good. One thing that felt cool was it wasn’t like Love Live or other anime where they get teleported to another planet to perform, instead D4DJ felt authentic. That’s a big thing I liked about this show, sometimes in music or other special interest shows they throw away core information about the hobby (like Free! did to swimming…) because sometimes those shows aren’t about the hobbies they’re about the characters. Which isn’t bad, but it sucks if you’re going into it hoping for authenticity. But I saw a lot of comments from people who DJ who said it was really authentic to how actual DJing works. Only thing I haven’t touched on yet are the “everything besides DJing” moments so I’ll touch on that before wrapping it up. I was a little thrown off by the crew at first, especially Rinku’s weird seashell thing (it reminded me of the star stickers from Bandori... chills) but it wasn’t bad at all, and the show slowly built towards a balance of like 80% DJ-talk and 20% SOL stuff? They seemed to prioritize the DJ plot over the SOL plot which I thought was neat. And, even in those 20% SOL moments, I still had a lot of fun with the characters. 2/2

Category 2, Characters: I was a little worried at first but the crew grew on me a lot. I’ll be honest, none of them really stuck out to me, and I wouldn’t say I like the show for the characters more than what they’re doing, but I was able to enjoy their presence. Nice, but nothing to write home about. One thing I do like about how they handle the characters is that we got a lot of focus on the girls from the other groups too. I feel like shows don’t do this enough, sure we see tidbits and clips of other teams goofing off in something like HQ, but in D4DJ we spent a whole episodes with characters from Peaky P-Key and Photon Maiden. Obviously Happy Ara was the main spotlight but it felt like the show really tried to humanize the other groups. Not much else to say about the characters, more than their personalities I really liked all of their designs, I thought they all looked really unique and nice. I think the CGI added to that too, it looked very crisp and clean. 1.5/2

Category 3, Plot Issues: Just reiterating how I enjoyed that they took the time to actually explain modern and real DJ information to the audience, I think that’s really cool. Like 3-gatsu, I think when a show actually takes time to sit down and explain the rules of whatever they’re sharing in the show it’s really cool. Thanks D4DJ. 2/2

Category 4, Emotions: I do wish I connected with the show a little more. I liked it a lot, but I hoped (like with Love Live Nijigasaki) that I would become a big fan of the music and the group and fall into “idol hell” and I just… didn’t. Kinda letdown that once again I didn’t get that experience that I wanted, but oh well. I just don’t think it’s my genre. 1/2

Category 5, Tropes: I’ve never seen a DJ show before so it didn’t feel overdone at all. I liked the CGI too, it made it feel fresh and different from other music and idol shows. Good job. 2/2

Category 6, Art: Cool, let’s talk more about the CGI! I really enjoyed the CGI not only because it made the characters look crisp and shiny but it was able to translate all of the DJ equipment and performances to anime really well. The sound boards (or w/e they’re called, sorry Maho T_T) looked super realistic, the dancing wasn’t unfortunate, and the VJing aspects of the performances looked super clean. It probably was a lot cheaper too, so I understand they didn’t do this out of “bravery” or “passion” but I still wanna applaud that good choice. Clap clap clap 2/2

Category 7, Ending: The last episode was great. We got to see the outcome of the Sunset Stage competition and it all ended with a big collab between the three main groups; Happy Around!, Peaky P-Key, and Photon Maiden. It was great. I love that they showed how close all of the groups were, it made me all happy and warm inside. It was super cute. I love friendship-rivalry, it’s so fun. I won’t spoil the results of Sunset Stage for you but the final performances from all three groups were great. I had a blast watching this show. 2/2

D4DJ surprised me, scoring a 12.5/14. Woah. An idol show, aired on YouTube, that’s CGI, scores a 12.5/14? yes. It did a great job portraying the actual experience and equipment of a real DJ, the performances and songs were sick, and the characters, while they were nothing to write home about, were fun. I had a great time watching D4DJ, it’s definitely my favorite idol show at the moment. Go watch!

“Hey Yo! Let's Dance with D4DJ!”

Final Score: 8.5/10

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