Category: Seasonal Impression Roundups

Posted on in anime, Other Posts, Seasonal Impression Roundups

The Dream is Over – Brief Personal Reflections on THE AQUATOPE ON WHITE SAND

The two girls met in the ruins of damaged dream

When I was eighteen, I wanted to be a rap producer. In hindsight, with the self-awareness I now have nearly ten years later, it was a stupid idea. Like a lot of people whose ambition far outstrips their capability, I went to school for this doomed little fantasy. Perhaps predictably, I barely lasted six months, and a decade on the only thing I have to show for this part of myself that I mostly keep buried from public view is a lengthy bandcamp page of music no one listens to and a cloud of student debt that will loom over me for the rest of my life.

I bring this personal anecdote up not to needlessly self-deprecate, but to explain something about The aquatope on white sand, and how I find myself unexpectedly relating to it. Fundamentally, most popular fiction that deals with aspiration deals with fulfillment of that aspiration. It makes for an easy-to-plan story arc and it concludes in a satisfying ending. Your protagonist(s) want to become a dancer, or a singer, or an actor, or whatever. Across some amount of story-units, they struggle and fight, that distant mountain still in reach, and they eventually achieve their dream. In anime a common manifestation of this particular story-type is that of the idol anime genre (of which there is one airing right now), relevant here because aquatope‘s protagonist, Fuuka Miyazawa, is a former idol.

And that “former” is very important here. Fuuka begins aquatope with her brief career as an idol already in the past tense, her departure from the industry uneventful but bitter. (Its depiction in the first episode reminded me no small amount of one-off character Mana in Oshi No Ko.) She is adrift for much of the first two episodes, eventually settling in with the other lead, Kukuru Misatino, simply because the latter is willing to take her in. She’s hired by Kukuru’s aquarium, which is in financial tatters, and threatens to close at the end of the summer season.

At the tail end of the second episode, Fuuka realizes that even if she cannot fulfill her dream, she can help Kukuru with her aspiration of keeping the aquarium open. Where all of this will eventually go is not yet clear–aquatope is planned for a nowadays-rare two cours, so it has plenty of time to stretch its legs–but it’s clear that the series fundamentally understands that Fuuka’s renewed sense of purpose here is just as valid as her original goal to become an idol. That’s important, because the easy thing to do here would be to try to route her back into the industry, and treat that as the only valid form of “fulfillment”. That aquatope doesn’t do that is an excellent sign. (And gives me a lot more faith that its supernatural elements, which I haven’t mentioned up ’til now, will have some greater point, as opposed to merely being window dressing.)

Also, I suppose, naive as it may be, that I just see a commonality between myself and Fuuka. Criticism, or at least the mode of criticism I prefer to write in, is nothing if not the promotion of someone else’s dream. Uncountable hours go into any even remotely professional anime production, it is not a stretch to say that one making it to screen is the culmination of not just one dream but many. My approach makes for decidedly less interesting television, of course.

In its attitude toward Fuuka we find the first traces of what I suspect aquatope will eventually forge into its core thesis; the idea that in selfless lifting up of others’ passions one can find a way to rekindle, or reshape, their own. I am quite confident that by the series’ end, Fuuka will have found something new that fulfills her and brings her life meaning. And, yeah, I do relate to that, as someone who has turned this strange hobby that I picked up on a whim into a kind-of career without ever consciously planning to, I empathize with Fuuka quite a lot.

Beyond my own personal emotional mire; character writing this delicate is a rare thing, and while plenty of anime are good natured, not nearly as many can work in shades of compassion that are this subtle. aquatope is one to keep your eye on.

If you like my work, consider following me on Twitter, supporting me on Ko-Fi, or checking out my other anime-related work on Anilist or for The Geek Girl Authority.

All views expressed on Magic Planet Anime are solely my own opinions and conclusions and should not be taken to reflect the opinions of any other persons, groups, or organizations. All text is owned by Magic Planet Anime. Do not duplicate without permission. All images are owned by their original copyright holders.

Posted on in anime, Seasonal Impression Roundups

Raindrops on Lilies – What is BLUE REFLECTION RAY?

This article contains spoilers.

“It has to be you, Ruka-chan!”

Every few years there seems to come along an anime season that is ridiculously packed with well-liked shows. Spring of 2021 is shaping up to be one such example; long-awaited sequels, spinoffs, and reboots like Zombie Land Saga Revenge, SSSS.DYNAZENON, and Shaman King are competing for cultural real estate with fan-anticipated adaptions like Super Cub, Shadows House, Combatants Will Be Dispatched, Eighty-Six, and I’ve Been Killing Slimes for 300 Years and Maxed Out My Level, and even the odd compelling original like Vivy – Flourite’s Eye Song. There’s something for almost every kind of anime fan airing, and each series in turn seems to have found its audience with a consistency that is rare in the current anime production bubble, which often has more shows broadcasting per season than anyone really knows what to do with.

Among all of this is one notable semi-exception; Blue Reflection Ray.

BRR’s very existence is somewhat puzzling. It’s a spinoff of magical girl RPG BLUE REFLECTION, but BLUE REFLECTION did not exactly set the world on fire commercially when it was released in 2017. It’d be an odd choice for an anime adaption to begin with, but that it’s a spinoff and not a sequel (and thus features none of the game’s characters), and has been greenlit for two consecutive cours, is even odder. This is all evidently part of an effort to continue to expand the franchise; which now includes a mobile game and is getting two more console games. So it’s clear somebody really believes in this thing, but if you were to only glance at Blue Reflection Ray, that confidence might not make a whole lot of sense.

What does make sense is its place within the modern anime zeitgeist. Blue Reflection Ray will immediately make most viewers think of a few touchstones from the past decade of TV anime; namely Puella Magi Madoka Magica and Flip Flappers. Blue Reflection Ray is more traditional than either of those, but it explores some similar territory. It deals, at least so far, primarily in thematics of empathy and human connection coupled with a heavy dose of lesbian subtext. (Enough so that I wouldn’t be surprised if it turns into plaintext before too long.) That, and a particular pastel-y visual style that harkens back to classic shoujo.

Blue Reflection Ray‘s four main characters are simple, but well-used. Hiori is cheerful and outgoing, but tends to neglect her own needs. Ruka is thoughtful and contemplative, but reclusive and has trouble understanding other people. Momo is a half-reformed delinquent perpetually on the run from her past. And Miyako, rounding out the current four, is a neglected rich girl. Hiori and Ruka, especially, form the show’s main pair, and the bubbling lesbian subtext present here defines quite a bit of the series’ tone. Everything, as it often is, is about connection.

Its storytelling, meanwhile, is a curious mix of fairly simple and oddly cryptic. The high concept isn’t too hard to understand; there are (at least) two groups of magical girls called Reflectors, one of which can somehow transform negative emotions into phantasmal lilies called “Fragments” and steal them away for some purpose or another.

Opposing those Reflectors are our protagonists, who, well I’ll let lead character Hiori explain.

Hiori, one of the “Blue” Reflectors

The themes of this part of the series are pretty apparent; the Red Reflectors (The Bad Guys) want to simply lock peoples’ emotions away, whereas the Blue Reflectors (The Good Guys) defend the former’s victims. In turn defending their right to process their own feelings and deal with them. Unhealthy vs. healthy coping mechanisms, the importance of compassion (underscored by the rings the Reflectors use also being literal empathy machines); all stuff this genre has done before, but it’s rarely unwelcome. That’s the “simple” side of things.

The “cryptic” side is that, not unlike those touchstones I mentioned earlier, there is clearly more going on here than we can yet see. Some kind of system is in place that’s pitting the Reflector teams, who both think they’re in the right, against each other. And Momo in particular is in contact with a mysterious person via phone and clearly knows more than she’s letting on. I suspect, but can’t prove, that this will come to a head at some point around the episode 12 mark.

Nina, one of the “Red” Reflectors

So that’s the what of it all, but we’ve yet to answer the why. I’m just not sure how much appetite the broader anime fan community, at least in North America, has for anime like this. Blue Reflection Ray currently seems too “traditional” to appeal to fans of things like Madoka Magica and it is too adult-oriented to appeal to the hardcore Pretty Cure crowd. If someone is a general genre fan they might like it, but only if they can appreciate its slow pace. It struggles to secure a niche, which explains why it is being (or at least is perceived as being) overlooked. Why whoever evidently exists behind the scene has so much faith in it is another question, but one that it’s hard to answer only 4 of a planned 24 episodes into the series.

All works of art reflect, and are in turn, reflected by, their audience. Blue Reflection Ray‘s soft nighttime scenes, gaudy Windows 95 wallpaper otherworld, charmingly simple transformation sequences, and blushing gay subtext all, in the end, simply beg your patience. It is, quite obviously, a very slow series.

I think in the hustle and bustle of the seasonal grind, it may not stand out against more bombastic titles. (Or even those that are simply doing “slow burn” from a more approachable angle, like Super Cub.) But I have a sneaking suspicion that in the long run, it will finally find that audience it’s searching for. The rings may, so to speak, resonate with more of us yet.

If you like my work, consider following me on Twitter, supporting me on Ko-Fi, or checking out my other anime-related work on Anilist or for The Geek Girl Authority.

All views expressed on Magic Planet Anime are solely my own opinions and conclusions and should not be taken to reflect the opinions of any other persons, groups, or organizations. All text is owned by Magic Planet Anime. Do not duplicate without permission. All images are owned by their original copyright holders.

Posted on in anime, Seasonal Impression Roundups

When The Rain Breaks in WONDER EGG PRIORITY

Note: This article contains discussion of suicide and other potentially upsetting subject matter. Reader discretion is advised.

They really just don’t make many like this.

When I first wrote about Wonder Egg Priority some six weeks ago, I said that the only real potentially bad thing about its first episode was how high it had set expectations. Five episodes later, the very notion seems quaint. Among a great majority of the people watching it, Wonder Egg Priority is a frontrunner for the coveted “anime of the season” badge. For a smaller, but still significant portion, it may well be much more than that.

But just gushing about the show’s quality would largely be relating things people already know. Likewise, critics smarter than myself have pointed out that despite definitely being unique in this season, Wonder Egg Priority does have several obvious ancestors. Most notably Kuniko Ikuhara‘s work and much of what it’s subsequently influenced (your Flip Flappers-es and your Revue Starlight-ses) on one hand, and on the other, the Kyoto Animation school of stylized life dramas. These two schools of creative work together inform both Wonder Egg‘s look and feel as well as its general ethos, which I think is where much of the interesting work remains to be done on our part as viewers.

With most anime–and indeed most serial fiction–you can generally “figure it out” fairly quickly. This isn’t a bad thing, a lot of fiction gets its very power from conveying resonant messages through combinations of classic tropes. (Which are, after all, classic for a reason.) What makes Wonder Egg Priority feel distinct is that it falls into a slightly different category that I am increasingly fond of; anime that can be treated like something of a thematic puzzle box. This has vexed some of the series’ own fans. When an in-series bit of gender essentialism by the shadowy Acca went immediately unchallenged, the viewer concern was enough that the show’s staff felt the need to address it on Twitter.

That kind of commitment to “getting things right” is commendable–and very rare–but I have to admit that a small part of me was a bit disappointed that they felt the need to do so. At the risk of coming across as something of an elitist; Wonder Egg Priority demands that you engage with it critically and intelligently. While it would be unfair to say that most anime don’t assume you’ll do that, Wonder Egg seems to be inclined to much less signposting than is the norm. Things as basic as character motivation are implied instead of outright stated, and much of the series operates on symbolic logic. This can make it hard to get your head around what exactly it’s trying to do, and lest I come across as thinking I’m smarter than everyone here, I will completely cop to the very real possibility that I also don’t understand the show. But, fittingly for its halfway point, I think Wonder Egg‘s sixth episode gives us some indication of where it will go next, and what it wants to accomplish by getting there. Some indication, but not a crystal clear one.

I’m sure, for instance, that someone out there has figured This out. Not me, though.

Wonder Egg Priority‘s subject matter has consistently been heavy. Suicide is baked into the series’ very premise, and its only through its absolutely wonderful visuals and sound that it avoids being a drag to watch. Along the way, abuse, familial conflict, sexual harassment, and a million other things have been dragged along for the ride. At the heart of this lies Ai Ohto, our protagonist. Her guilt over the suicide of her close friend Koito Nagase has driven much of her action throughout Wonder Egg Priority. So too has the repeated housecall visits of school teacher Shuichiro Sawaki. Sawaki is a figure it is very easy to read uncharitably.

He’s older than Ai but seems to have some kind of fixation on her, and several shots throughout the show frame him in a way that gives off a decidedly sinister air. In this very episode, he and Ai’s mother broach the subject of entering a relationship, and co-protagonist Rika openly speculates that he might be a sexual predator using that relationship to get closer to Ai. Neiru (another of the main four) meanwhile speculates that Ai’s frustrated feelings instead stem from the fact that she herself has feelings for Sawaki.

I don’t know what the “easy way out” of this particular knot of character relationships would be. What Wonder Egg puts forward is that Neiru is, if not right exactly, at least in the general ballpark. The episode, despite its sinister title, ends on a happy note, with literal clouds parting and sun shining down.

In any other series it would be quite easy to take this at face value, and that might well be what Wonder Egg is going for as well. Yet there remain lingering doubts simply due to the show’s nature, and I would not be surprised if they remain right up until the finale. For some (and I’m kind of including myself here), there will remain a suspicion, perhaps a fear, that the other shoe is about to drop, even if it never does. I’m sure, too, that others will forecast a worst-case scenario: “Oh god, they’re not going to have Ai hook up with her teacher, are they?”

I would love to refute “well no, of course they’re not. Have you seen this show? It’s too smart to do that.” And indeed, I think it’s extraordinarily unlikely. But, Wonder Egg Priority‘s very nature encourages these widely divergent readings, and I honestly think that’s part of what makes it so special.

In the opening minutes of the episode, there’s a title drop. It feels just a little tongue-in-cheek, but not so much so that it feels in any way insincere. What has me so enraptured with Wonder Egg Priority is that very sincerity. Despite its heavy themes and despite how it plays with audience expectations, nothing about it feels in any way false. Nothing feels contrived, overthought, or half-baked. It is what it wants to be. No more and no less.

What I will say, is that I tend to broadly divide all narrative art into two sweeping categories; the diagnostic and the idealistic. The former showcases and draws attention to the ills of the world. The latter presents a vision of the world as it should be. (Neither, it must be stressed, is any better than the other. Though I suspect the categories resonate more strongly with different people.) It’s usually not hard to drop an anime firmly in one bucket or the other despite many anime obviously doing at least a bit of both. With Wonder Egg Priority, I’ve been unable to place it firmly on either side. Certainly, it is keen to the problems of the world we live in, but the sheer sincerity of it all, and the weighty metaphors of eggshells and paint, seem to gesture at a brighter future.

Is this when the rain lets up, or merely a lull in the storm? Who, really, can say?

“Please let those kids find happiness.”

If you like my work, consider following me here on WordPress or on Twitter, supporting me on Ko-Fi, or checking out my other anime-related work on Anilist or for The Geek Girl Authority.

All views expressed on Magic Planet Anime are solely my own opinions and conclusions and should not be taken to reflect the opinions of any other persons, groups, or organizations. All text is owned by Magic Planet Anime. Do not duplicate without permission. All images are owned by their original copyright holders.

Posted on in anime, Seasonal Impression Roundups

Seasonal First Impressions: You Really Need to See WONDER EGG PRIORITY

Note: This article contains discussion of suicide. Reader discretion is advised.

When Wonder Egg Priority was first announced last year, most attention went to its title, which undeniably is odd in a specific way that really catches the ear. Early trailers were sparse on much plot information. The (wholly incorrect) impression I got from the initial promotional materials was that this would be a youth drama of some kind, something in the vein of A Place Further Than The Universe or O Maidens In Your Savage Season. What Wonder Egg Priority actually is is still something of an open question, as we’ll get to. But its first episode “The Domain of Children” is perhaps the strongest original anime debut since Flip Flappers some five years ago. Wonder Egg is also similar to that series in some other ways, but we’ll get to that.

I normally like to kick off this sort of thing by explaining, broadly, what the series is about. That’s a bit hard for Wonder Egg Priority, so let’s instead tackle another aspect; the visuals. Wonder Egg Priority is the best-looking anime of the young year, and it has virtually no competition. CloverWorks make good-looking shows in general, but their collective talent pool has never done anything quite like this before.

The series’ backgrounds are rendered in hauntingly liminal laser-precision by what simply must be a crack CGI team. In the coming days you will probably see someone say that Wonder Egg Priority is denpa. There are a lot of reasons that this is true, but one is its recontextualization of a school building as a place of terror. Other anime have done this, but it’s been ages since I’ve seen it done so effectively. Every internal shot of the school looks like it’s had the air sucked out of it. Faceless figures stalk the hallways. When they attack, the windows are framed in paint-like blood.

Its characters are brought to vibrant life through gel-pen-esque digi-paint. Every single one shines. Main character Ai Ohto is the greatest triumph so far here; her oilslick hair, distinctive heterochromia (actually a plot point!), and yolk-yellow hoodie evoke the image of a cracked-open egg or a newborn chick depending on how she wears the hood. A cutesy nod to the show’s title and a nice bit of symbolism all in one.

May I offer you an egg in these trying times?

All this is a flowery way of saying Wonder Egg Priority looks amazing. I found myself absentmindedly tapping my “save frame as screenshot” key every few seconds. It is very rare that almost any given still from an episode could make a compelling screengrab, but it’s true here.

Four paragraphs about the looks and nary a hint of what the show’s actual subject matter is. As mentioned, explaining what happens in the first episode of Wonder Egg Priority is a bit difficult. The episode makes fairly heavy use of non-chronological order, and it becomes clear about a third of the way through that we’re dealing with a “real world / mental world” sort of divide. (Or at least something similar.)

The gist though is this; Ai is a hikkikimori. Why? It’s not directly spelled out for us, but we’re shown here that her only friend, a girl named Koito Nagase, threw herself from the rooftop of Ai’s high school. Which, yes, means you can add Wonder Egg Priority to the long list of anime that have a suicide in the first episode. A sad reflection of a despiriting reality.

Note also how the real world tends to be drawn in sepia and shadow. It’s not a happier place than the “Egg World”, but it is certainly more physical.

This heavy subject matter is contrasted by the series’ fantasy elements. Ai begins the show by coming into possession of a mysterious, titular “wonder egg”. The short version is that these allow her to enter….mental worlds? Afterlives? Other universes? It’s not totally clear, and rescue, or at least attempt to rescue, people from being pursued by mysterious, malevolent figures known as See-No-Evils. Ai’s only guidance here is offered by the apparent ghost of a beetle, a truly weird take on the “magical girl animal companion” trope if ever there was one. Towards the end of the episode, he implies but does not outright say that helping enough of these pursued people may somehow bring Nagase back.

He’s very trustworthy, I’m sure.

The details matter less than the emotional force. Ai is able to break through her own apathy (“pretending not to see”, as she, and others, phrase it) to help the person she needs to help, even before doing so to bring back her late companion enters the equation. The episode’s climactic emotional moment is hard to put into words. Basically; she goes full Pretty Cure on the See-No-Evils. It’s just, you know, much more violent and surreal. The lingering trauma of Ai losing her only friend, her own frustration with herself for failing to prevent it, her determination to never let it happen again, it all builds up to a single, powerful thwack. It’s the single most viscerally satisfying moment I’ve seen in an anime in ages.

And thus does the first episode of this denpa-action-mystery-fantasy-magical-girl??-thing come to a close.

Where does Wonder Egg Priority go from here? First episodes need to make a strong impression, and without a doubt this is the best I’ve seen so far this year. (With apologies to BACK ARROW, which must now settle for second place.) The simultaneous benefit and curse of having such a strong one is that now the expectations are sky-high.

Yet–and I of course could be wrong here–I just have a feeling about this one. While watching this episode I couldn’t help but tap on my desk excitedly, at the climactic scene above I whistled aloud, and my mind didn’t wander for even a second. Whether it will do all it strives to do is an open question, but we are unquestionably in for an absolutely wild twelve weeks. In the realm of anime, I can ask for nothing more.

If you like my work, consider following me here on WordPress or on Twitter, supporting me on Ko-Fi, or checking out my other anime-related work on Anilist or for The Geek Girl Authority.

All views expressed on Magic Planet Anime are solely my own opinions and conclusions and should not be taken to reflect the opinions of any other persons, groups, or organizations. All text is owned by Magic Planet Anime. Do not duplicate without permission. All images are owned by their original copyright holders.

Posted on in anime, Seasonal Impression Roundups

Spring Anime Season First Impressions – Round 4

Mewkledreamy

One of the most purely un-available shows of the season, Mewkledreamy lacks an official pickup and has currently been subtitled by only a single person who’s made it clear that they’re probably not going to sub beyond the first episode. That said, even if it were more widely available, it’s a little hard to imagine recommending Mewkledreamy to many people.

The core premise of the 48-episode(!!) series is that the Queen of The Sky commits some humans to being “dream partners” by way of a magic stuffed animal. These partners can enter other peoples’ dreams and purge them of evil influence. If you’re looking for a more grokkable explanation, this is basically Precure with the caveat that all of the monsters and such exist mostly in the dream world. With only the stuffed animals (and their evil counterparts) being physically present in the real one.

What Mewkledreamy has going for it is some great expression comedy and a colorful art style. Working against those strengths though is the show’s general flow. It’s a hard thing to peg more concretely but the series’ first episode just feels oddly-constructed, not helped by the J.C. Staff‘s somewhat floaty animation. This does occasionally work in the show’s favor. When we see the first dreamworld in this first episode the sheer surreality of its setting (some kind of office/dance club embodying our main character’s mother’s dueling desires to be a responsible businesswoman and uh, get lit, apparently) is an asset, but elsewhere it just makes the show feel kind of off.

The earlier Precure comparison wasn’t solely on the basis of them both being kids’ shows, as that’s clearly what Mewkledreamy is trying to model itself after, down to the placement of the henshin sequences, design of the mascots, and an all-CGI dance routine ED. The key difference is that Pretty Cure generally has its core thematics sorted from the word “go”. Even the first episode of a given Precure season will clue you in as to what the writing team is going for. Mewkledreamy by contrast feels aimless so far, with even the requisite “buy the toy, kids!” portion of the transformation sequence feeling abrupt and peripheral.

It’s certainly possible that Mewkledreamy will find its footing a little later on, being four cours long, it has a lot more time to do so than most things I’ve been covering in the first impression roundups, but at this stage it really seems like that unless you literally are a Japanese middle schooler, there’s not a ton of reason to watch Mewkledreamy except perhaps idle curiosity.

First Impression Score: 6/10

Diary of Our Days at the Breakwater

“Virtues of rural livin'” stories really are the same everywhere, huh?

Snark aside, Diary of Our Days at The Breakwater (formerly and unofficially known as Afterschool Embankment Journal in the anglosphere) is a pretty simple little thing. Protagonist Hina is a city girl recently moved to the country, where she is roped by lanky redneck Yuuki into joining the Breakwater Club, a line- and rack-fishing club at the local high school.

To lay it all on the table, as someone who lived in a rural town for most of my life, I find stories that focus on romanticizing these locations a bit inherently offputting (it’s why I could never get into Non Non Biyori), so I will never claim to be entering into this particular sphere of subject matter unbiased.

My own life experience aside, though, the series is well-animated and well-composed. Fans of cult studio Doga Kobo (who it feels weird to call that, but it’s true) will find another entry in their oeuvre to enjoy here. To be sure, there’s a lot to like if you’re into slice of life comedies. Yuuki in particular is a great character, and the series even this early on radiates a genuine love for its setting and characters. A lot of the comedy though does lean heavily on Hina getting freaked out by “country folk stuff”, especially in relation to fishing as you might expect given the show’s premise. If you find that offputting, you’re probably better off getting your seasonal dose of this genre elsewhere.

There’s honestly not much else to say about this one. You’ll figure out pretty quick if it’s your thing or not.

First Impression Score: Fishing/10

Princess Connect! Re:Dive

Princess Connect! Re:Dive is a show brave enough to ask the simple question; what if the chosen one sent to save your generic fantasy world was a complete idiot? No no, dumber than that. No, dumber still. There you go.

Princess Connect! is based on a mobage but I don’t know offhand if the series inherits much of that game’s tone. Disguising itself as an impossibly-generic straight fantasy anime for about 60 seconds, Princess Connect! reveals its hand pretty early. The series has pretty much exactly one trick. It will set up a situation that seems like it should be a plot beat in a fantasy series, or have some sense of gravitas, and then let the air out of it by having everyone be, to a man, unbelievably stupid.

Much of the first episode takes place in a typical RPG-style “starter town”. The banner image is from our hero, Yuuki, trying to eat a coin. This is the show’s sole trick, but damn if I didn’t have to stifle laughter every single time it happened. Comedic fantasy anime are nothing new (even relatively recently most people are at least aware of Konosuba), but this is a good one. The show’s sheer stupidity manages to leverage its relatively mediocre visual presentation as something of an asset–I think it would actually be less funny if it looked better. Even later in the episode when a surprisingly well-done fight scene breaks out, it’s undercut by several deliberate matches to less-well-animated cuts for comedic effect.

It is admittedly hard to imagine that this will still be funny twelve weeks from now, but who knows? Perhaps it has some other tricks up its sleeve or maybe it’ll simply keep setting up situations to pull the rug out from under. Either way, if you’re a fan of the truly dumb, this is one to check out.

First Impression Score: 7/10

Shironeko Project Zero Chronicle

Astoundingly artless JRPG adaptation by chronically low-ambition studio Project no. 9. Writing that makes Sword Art Online look profound locks blades with uninspired art direction, mediocre animation, and a lame, hollow, plot that is stuffed with cliches that were hoary 30 years ago. The first episode’s meager positives: two or three (not an exaggeration) competent cuts done by animators who will hopefully find a better studio to work at some day soon, some okay character designs, the writing being so bad that it’s sometimes unintentionally comedic, are vastly outweighed by the general sloggishness of the entire affair. If you want to watch a fantasy shonen this season watch Tower of God, if you want to watch a not-very-ambitious fantasy shonen this season watch Princess Connect or Shachibato. We have only so many years on this planet of ours, and there are not enough to waste time on something this boringly meritless.

First Impression Score: 2/10

Shadowverse

People have been riffing on Yu-Gi-Oh! since it was new, and Shadowverse is no exception. This particular entry in the “card game battle shonen” subgenre is an adaptation of the digital card game of the same name (which, just to point it out, yours truly is in fact a casual player of). Honestly, if you’ve seen any of these shows you’ve got a decent idea of what to expect here. Kid with a funky haircut defeats bullies and villains in card games with the power of friendship and/or a magical artefact of great power. Fans hoping for a straight adaptation of the game’s story mode might be disappointed, but it’s hard to imagine such an adaptation doing much justice to that bundle of oddness anyway.

The animation is solid and fun enough to make up for most of the cliche in the writing, and it’s great to see some beloved cards in animated format for the first time. Although it’s not a great sign that our token girl cast member gets shafted already in the first episode in order to play up the MC’s talents by comparison. Still, this is another one where you’ll know pretty quick if you’re in the target audience, it’s worth checking out if you like this kind of thing or are a fan of the game.

First Impression Score: 7/10

If you like my work, consider following me on Twitter, supporting me on Ko-Fi, or checking out my other anime-related work on Anilist or for The Geek Girl Authority.

Posted on in anime, Seasonal Impression Roundups

Spring Anime Season First Impressions – Round 3

Shachibato! President, It’s Time for Battle!

I’m not one to accuse shows of going through the motions, but it feels fair to say that Shachibato! is aiming pretty much exclusively for one crowd–people who like the mobile game it’s an adaptation of–and nobody else. The ultratypical fantasy series is spiced up with the minor twist that the main character is the president of an adventurer’s guild rather than a hero archetype, and thus has to contend with all manner of humdrum business stuff as well as the usual monsters and mages.

To be honest, what this series mostly has going for it are some neat character designs, high production values, and a certain ease-of-watching. If that sounds like faint praise that’s because it kind of is. I can’t imagine anyone following twelve weeks of this, despite a perfectly inoffensive and pleasant first episode that looks nice and hits its plot beats just fine. The main thing I ended up walking away from Shachibato!‘s first episode thinking was that one of the characters–Akari–looks a lot like Hatsune Miku. It did also make me want to check out the mobile game, so it succeeds as an ad, at the very least. Will the series greatly improve and stage a come-from-behind takeover as one of the best anime of the season? Well, anything’s possible, but it doesn’t seem terribly likely, let’s put it that way.

First Impression Score: Aquamarine Twintails / 10

Wave, Listen To Me!

In an already ridiculously strong season, Wave, Listen To Me! might have the most singular premiere of anything currently airing. Our main character; Minare, an office worker with a drinking problem and the worst-best case of The Rants you’ve heard this side of a pompous rockstar concert intermission. A chance meeting at a bar with a scuzzy radio producer prompts an angry mid-workshift drive to the radio station the next day as Minare finds her bar ramblings being used as cheap airwave drama fodder. Then, our heroine is unceremoniously dropped into the role of amateur-hour radio DJ.

Lead actress Riho Sugiyama talks like a waterfall runs. Insanely, this is only her second main-cast role ever following a run in Franken Family back in 2018. She absolutely makes the show, and her performance as Minare is probably the best single character performance of the season so far.

The series itself is spellbinding, almost entirely because of that performance. Minare is clearly a trainwreck of a person and I’m certain the show will delve deeper into the how’s and why’s later on, but even at this early juncture she’s just fascinating. It’s easy to speak of “realistic” or “grounded” character writing, but Minare is intriguing specifically because she’s so bombastic and rambly. All this is tied together with a distinct look and, fittingly for something about radio, incredible sound design. I don’t think it’s absurd to say that this the most interesting thing airing right now. Watch this.

First Impressions Score: 10/10

Gleipnir

Sigh.

Gleipnir is another manga adaptation, this one coming to us courtesy of studio PINE JAM. I can’t in good faith say I went into Gleipnir’s premiere unbiased. To the casual observer it might seem like a good (maybe even great) first episode of a solid action anime. Unfortunately, I’m familiar with the manga, which I’m on record as thinking is pretty awful. The good news here is that the production values are uncommonly high for a seinen adaptation and the animation and soundtracking work are good throughout the episode (if occasionally bizarre, listen to whatever the hell plays as BGM when Claire is getting changed, for instance). So if you are a fan of the manga, this is going to be a high point of the season for you, certainly.

The real issue with Gleipnir is its scuzzy writing, which shows through even at this early stage. Mostly in the first episode this deals with the treatment of the female lead–the 15-year-old Claire Aoki–as some kind of sexpot femme fatale, but it gets worse in widely varied ways later on. Even if you’re unbothered by that kind of thing on a moral level, it’s incredibly hokey. Male protagonist Suichi Kagaya doesn’t fare much better, being the same kind of self-loathing pseudo-nice guy that stars in the vast majority of the sort of manga that the original series is a part of, squandering his singularly weird superpower of transforming into a Five Nights At Freddy’s reject. It’s a tired archetype.

I can’t in good conscience score the episode too low because of said production strengths, but this isn’t one I can recommend to most people. At best, if you’re the same sort of animasochist I occasionally am, it’s shaping up to be a decent hatewatch to riff on with friends.

First Impression Score: 5/10

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Posted on in anime, Seasonal Impression Roundups

Spring Anime Season First Impressions – Round 2

LISTENERS

Self-empowerment parable through the medium of superpowered CGI rock n’ roll-robots. You’ve heard this story before even if you didn’t realize it–the folks behind Listeners are surely familiar with the seminal FLCL–but wearing its influences on its sleeve is no knock. Call Listeners a “high variance” seasonal, this one could end up being the best of the season or it could putter out into the same disappointment pit that Darling in the FranXX fell into. Perhaps most likely is that it could stay the course and turn out to be Just Solid. It’s hard to say right now.

The show’s got a fair bit going for it; a strong aesthetic that welds a 2000s-era look (I’ve seen Eureka Seven brought up as a point of comparison and I do see it) to clear inspirations from classic rock album art, and a good command of what differentiates the retro from the merely dated. On the less positive side, the animation is inconsistent and there are some very unwelcome sex jokes in the first half of the first episode. Listeners is a “who knows” right now, but consider keeping your eye on it if you’re the gambling type. Speaking personally, I’m also a sucker for anything whose first episode ends with its protagonists having to flee from their hometown (well, one of theirs’ hometown, it’s complicated) on a train. We’ll see where it goes.

First Impression Score: 6/10

Gal & Dinosaur

One of the season’s true oddballs, Gal is ostensibly an adaptation of the manga of the same name, a comedic slice-of-life series about a gyaru and her unexpected new roommate, a blue dinosaur. While it does directly adapt the source material the approach is….eclectic, to say the least. This all makes more sense if you consider the director here–Jun Aoki, of Pop Team Epic fame.

This isn’t to oversimplify, as the two shows are far from identical. Even the animated front half has a slow, loping pace that flows like not much else airing right now, and very differently from the hyperfrantic PTE. The second half of the series, which is in live action and reprises some of the same material, is more in line with what Aoki converts from Pop Team Epic will be expecting. The altered context and different medium changes the way some of the gags land and it’s interesting to compare and contrast the two. Of course, even if you’re not one for that kind of thing, it’s hard to deny the simple comedy appeal of airhorns.

I suspect whether you prefer the more traditionally adaptive first half or the weirder, more experimental second will come down to how big a fan you were of the manga. Personally, I was never huge on the Pop Team Epic adaptation (as far as bizarre slapstick anime I prefer Teekyuu and the brain-melting Ai Mai Mi!), so I know my preference, but both halves excel at what they’re trying to do. It’s hardly “essential TV”, but this is the kind of thing that if you’re part of the intended audience, you’ll figure it out pretty quickly. Definitely one to at least give a cursory watch to see if it’s Your Thing or not.

First Impression Score: 7/10

Sing “Yesterday” For Me

Straight-n-true adaptation of a classic drama manga makes its way to television. The original manga dates way back to 1997, and some of the plot beats here make that pretty obvious even if the setting didn’t (and it does). Yet, despite going into this being pretty sure I wouldn’t like it, I found myself surprisingly compelled by the cast of castaways that are Sing “Yesterday” For Me‘s characters. To a one, they’re burnt-out young adults ranging from a high school dropout to a high school teacher to our main character, a disaffected convenience store worker and self-described “loser”.

This is stuff that’s fairly well-tread ground for the genre and it wasn’t exactly revolutionary in ’97 either. Yet, somehow, I feel more of a beating heart under this show than I do many similar titles, perhaps it’s just the age range of the cast, perhaps it’s that even in the first episode said cast picks at and openly questions the value of stories like this in the first place. Maybe I’m just kind of amazed that there was a confession in the first episode of something based on a romance manga. Who knows? Yesterday is one to keep your eyes on. Those familiar with the original will have more concrete opinions, but even for someone like me who isn’t, the possible ceiling for this series seems very, very high.

First Impression Score: 8/10

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Posted on in anime, Misc. Anime, Seasonal Impression Roundups

Spring Anime Season First Impressions – Round 1

The first few weeks of an anime season are always the most exciting to me. You get to see how the short little clips and promo art pieces of preview materials translate into actual, full-length episodes. So to share that joy, I’ve decided I’m going to pen short little thoughtpieces (or maybe not-so-short in some cases, who knows) on each show I’m checking out this season. I’ll be doing these at basically arbitrary points, whenever I have enough shows under my belt to make a post of decent length.

BRAND NEW ANIMAL

This is the one, if you’re curious. Technically, I’ve been following BNA for two weeks now. The first six episodes were unceremoniously dump-trucked onto Netflix some time back and Little Witch Academia standbys Asenshi.moe have been subbing them at a roughly weekly pace, so I’ve only seen two of those episodes thusfar, but what I’ve seen puts it at the top as far as promising shows for this season.

I’ve loved TRIGGER basically since the original LWA movie dropped so this will probably surprise nobody, but among their big ticket directors I’ve always felt that Yoh Yoshinari was among the most underrated. His style’s in full force here, but the story being told has much higher stakes than the relatively school life genre-indebted LWA. Michiru (our protagonist) has already questionably-legally immigrated to a city full of beastmen, had her wallet stolen on her first day there, and been inadvertently involved in busting up organized crime. God knows what else is in store for the poor tanuki.

The show’s gearing up to tackle some pretty big ideas, and it’s entirely possible that it’ll fumble the ball there, but the visual chops can’t be denied, and given some surprisingly subtle character design decisions (making our Big Badass Cop archetype a social worker instead, for instance) it might have a more nuanced approach than some might assume. This is some great stuff, folks. Keep your eye on Asenshi’s uploads.

First impression rating: 9/10

TAMAYOMI: The Baseball Girls

On a totally different note, we have this. Tamayomi is, at least so far, a nearly perfectly archetypal slice of school life-meets-sports anime. It’s almost comically orthodox for this particular genre intersection, but that shouldn’t be taken to mean that it’s bad, necessarily. In what I assume is a strength inherited from the manga it’s adapted from, the show has a warm inner glow that goes beyond mere cuteness (although there’s that, too). Add a little dollop of some pretty on-the-nose lesbian subtext–a pair of twins are fawning over protagonist Yomi’s pitcher hand before the ten minute mark–and you’ve got a perfectly good little anime.

I will say, the visual work is shaky at the best of times, and in some cuts the characters are downright badly-drawn, with inking errors like mismatched eyeshadow thickness and such, which does undercut some portion of its charm. My hope is that this is the result of either the current global unpleasantness, the fact that the first episode had to be done a month ahead of schedule for a preview screening, or both. Otherwise, while it’s certainly the least essential of the four shows here, it’s perfectly good and worth watching if you like this kind of thing.

First Impression Rating: 6/10

Kakushigoto

From the mind of Zetsubou-sensei creator Kouji Kumeta comes an oddball comedy about a dad who draws a dirty comedy manga and his quest to keep his beloved young daughter from ever learning that fact. This one took me slightly by surprise, as I wasn’t originally aware of Kumeta’s involvement and was expecting more of a heartstring-tugging father/daughter bonding type of story. What it actually is is great too, though, and as someone who mostly passed over Zetsubou-sensei in its popular heyday I was a bit surprised to find myself grokking the sense of humor here as quickly as I did. They don’t quite operate on the exact same wavelength, but this is one fans of stuff like Nichijou and Daily Lives of High School Boys should keep an eye on. Even if it’s not quite that frantic. This is definitely the best comedy of the season so far, with a gag late in the episode about how Starbucks orders sound like magic spells being my favorite.

If I do have a complaint it’s about the odd coding of Mario, the extremely campy owner of a fashion boutique the main character works near, but he’s not onscreen enough for it to be a major strike against the series yet.

First Impression Rating: 8/10

Tower of God

Roughly once a season, some huge shonen series drops that seemingly everyone and his grandmother watches. I’m only rarely interested in these shows (by and large, despite being a known fan of gaudy fight scenes and overdesigned characters, it isn’t my genre) and have a bad habit of thinking “oh this is the one” about once a year and then dropping it four episodes in. It’s too early to say if Tower of God will be the thing that breaks that trend, but it just might be. This one’s got an interesting IP history, too, being an adaptation of a South Korean web-manhua that’s been running since the beginning of the last decade. The original comic was among the first such properties to ever get an official English translation, and Crunchyroll of all folks are partly bankrolling the anime.

As for the show itself? Dirt-simple story (“girl leaves boy, boy goes on epic adventure to find girl”) meets lavish fantasy worldbuilding. There’s not a lot out there that’s like this, in spite of its simple building blocks, and it tickled a part of my brain that I don’t think has been buzzed since I watched MÄR on Toonami as a kid. Despite the stock protagonist archetype that male lead 25th Bam (yes, that is his name) falls into, the first episode was quite engaging, involving our hero having to figure out how to crack open a black orb in a giant water tank while being hounded by a sea monster. Also introduced here is Ha Yuri Jahad (seen up there in the header picture) who I took an immediate liking to. There’s just something charming about seeing the “rebellious princess” archetype played perfectly straight in 2020 and with a character with such a great design, too. I was also interested by the mysterious, rabbit-like Headon, who seems to be the titular Tower’s caretaker.

I don’t need to tell anyone to watch ToG–you’ll know pretty much right away if it’s your bag or not–but I was surprised by how much I enjoyed it. If every episode is this interesting this might be the first shonen series in some time that I actually finish.

First Impression Rating: 7/10

So that’s it for Round 1 of the Spring Anime Season impressions. Everything I’ve seen so far this season is at least solid, and I think all four of these shows have the potential to get even better. This is the most excited I’ve been going into a fresh season in some time, and we haven’t even gotten to some of the real heavy hitters yet (in particular, a certain beloved romcom from last year returns next Friday), so I’m thrilled. What about you? How’s your season looking so far?