Posted on December 30, 2022January 2, 2023 in anime, Anime Orbit Weekly, Misc. Anime

Ranking Every 2022 Anime I Actually Finished from Worst to Best – Part 2

“Ranking Every Anime” is a yearly, multi-part column where I rank every single anime I finished from a given year, from the very worst to the absolute best. Expect spoilers for all anime covered.

You’ve met the bad, and you’ll meet the good starting tomorrow. Meet the ugly. The weird, the flawed, and the under-sung.

Let me give you a peek under the hood, friends. To break this list—the whole thing, I mean—up into manageable chunks, I conceptualized it, as, essentially, four broad categories. The first part of the list was those few shows from this year that I genuinely disliked. This chunk? A motley assortment of the flawed but interesting, the under-loved and underrated, and a handful of things I still more liked than didn’t but was too frustrated with to put higher on the list. (I try not to think too much about this kind of thing when writing these lists, but if there are any truly Controversial picks here, I’m betting two in particular from this chunk of the list will be them.)

Without further ado, let’s get to this particular collection of weirdos.

#30. Miss KUROITSU from the Monster Development Department

It’s janky, it’s obscure, and it occasionally cracks problematic jokes. Nonetheless, Miss KUROITSU From The Monster Development Department is the first entry on the entire list that I can truly say that I like without too much in the way of further qualifiers.

Now, being a doofy comedy anime based on the premise of following a scientist who works for the evil organization in your average toku show, Kuroitsu is also undeniably really niche, at least as far as Anglophone audiences are concerned. But what can I say? I started watching it on a whim and found a lot to love between the deep-cut toku references, the absurd character comedy, and from time to time, some actual no-shit feel-good moments, such as an episode where the titular mad scientist helps one of her creations, a zombie girl, become an idol in spite of the fact that she can’t initially sing (or even speak) at all. Between that and the cameo of a character who is pretty obviously Minky Momo, I can’t help but have a certain only slightly-begrudging affection for this show.

Now, the gags about Wolf Bete, a male wolf monster accidentally put in a cute anime girl body, maybe those I could do without. But, hey, no show is perfect. Next!

#29. My Dress-Up Darling

Ah, young love. It can be sweet to the point of cloying, it can be horny to the point of awkward. In that sense, maybe no anime so far this decade has yet captured the feeling so well as My Dress-Up Darling.

You can distinguish MDUD from the bottom of the barrel romcom by virtue of both of its leads having tangible personalities. Honestly, Gojo and Marin make a pretty sweet (and believable!) couple the vast majority of the time, and it’s easy to intuitively understand how their overlap in interests—making clothes for dolls on his end, cosplay on hers—would push them closer together. On top of that, MDUD has a real love of otaku culture; Dress-Up Darling is almost certainly the anime this year with the most fictional anime, manga, games, etc. within it, and we learn enough about Pretty Cure ersatz Flower Princess Blaze that I was able to wring an entire april fools’ article out of the subject.

So why isn’t it higher on the list? Well, let’s circle back around to that “horny to the point of awkward” point. The series is fairly salacious; I’ve gone back and forth over how much of a flaw I think this really is. One must after all remember that this show is aimed at teenage boys, and teenage boys deserve good anime, too! Still, I think the series’ sometimes overbearing fanservice crosses the line of good taste a bit too often and it unfortunately hurts the show more than it helps. Maybe the inevitable second season will tone that down a little bit? Eh, let’s not ask for miracles. Ultimately, MDUD is an otherwise good show that just needs to learn to keep it in its pants better. Or maybe I’m just a prude, who knows.

#28. TOKYO MEW MEW NEW

The cat came back! 2022 was a great year for anime all around, but I was personally saddened by the lack of much that fits the broad “battle girl” mold. There were a few magical girl anime, but not terribly many that fit the wider idea of the supergenre, with even most of this year’s mahou shoujo being decidedly less fighty than normal. In the broader battle girl field there was of course Lycoris Recoil, but if you weren’t super keen on that show, or just wanted something that involved fewer guns, what exactly did you have to fall back on if you wanted to see a troupe of girls in themed outfits kick some ass?

Well, Pretty Cure. But! If you wanted a second choice, Tokyo Mew Mew New wasn’t a bad one.

Mew Mew New is a pretty naked nostalgia play; it aired in an otaku time slot, so it wasn’t really trying to compete with Pretty Cure or any other kids’ anime. Instead, it aims to be a distilled and concentrated version of the original Tokyo Mew Mew anime. A somewhat breezier adaptation of the manga that the former is based on, perhaps. I can’t say how well it succeeds in that specific regard—being unfamiliar myself with both the original Tokyo Mew Mew anime and the manga source material—but I can say that it’s an enjoyable and, more than anything, just downright fun twelve episodes of classic magical girl silliness. It was beat in even that category this year, as we’ll get to, but that doesn’t make Mew Mew’s attempt not worthwhile.

Speaking of which; of all the anime on this list that have gotten second season announcements, this is probably the one that surprised me most of all. But hey, I’m going to tune in, will you?

#27. Spy x Family

Once upon a Cold War, there lived a man named Twilight who, to fulfill a mission, found himself with a “fake” family consisting of an adopted daughter and a hastily fake-married wife. I think time and the show’s popularity have obscured just how weird Spy x Family’s premise is, but it’s worth bringing up because that strangeness is what makes the show worth following. When SpyFam dials things down into normal “shonen comedy” territory, you get bores like the episode of part two that is entirely about how bad Yor (the wife, if you somehow don’t know) is at cooking. When it remembers that it takes place in what is effectively East Germany during the Cold War, the show suddenly springs to life.

I’ll be honest, I debated long and hard where, precisely, to stick Spy x Family on this list. Because in its best moments it can be ridiculously funny—and it’s not just a parade of strong Anya Reaction Faces that’s making me say that—and even surprisingly heartfelt, but enough of it drags that I don’t really feel comfortable putting it particularly high up, either. I’ve written more about SpyFam than most anime on this list, and yet, I am still thoroughly undecided as to what I actually think of it “on the whole.” Ultimately, though, what I think doesn’t really matter here, SpyFam is easily the most commercially successful new face on this list, with its first season (broken up into two non-consecutive cours. Confusing, I know) raking in a truly rare amount of viewership not just among otaku but among the general public, probably owing to its fairly accessible nature. (There’s not a ton of “anime bullshit” in Spy x Family if that’s something you care about.) With a second proper season and a theatrical film on the way, Spy x Family will probably return for next year’s list. Maybe by then I’ll have a better idea of what the show means to me.

#26. Shinobi no Ittoki

Here’s a hypothetical for you; can you call something “okay” and mean it as a compliment?

No, I’m serious. Shinobi no Ittoki feels like a self-conscious throwback to an older kind of action anime, where The Sakuga™ was not necessarily guaranteed and was more of an intermittent thing when it did show up, where the character designs were mostly interchangeable, and the entire thing was entertaining but not really about much of anything beyond maybe some nebulous spins on big ideas like determinism vs. free will and cycles of violence. The series’ unflashy charm has all but guaranteed that it hasn’t and won’t ever develop a large fanbase (although, I should be careful about saying that ever since The Detective is Already Dead had its second season announced. Maybe you never really know.), but I’d argue it doesn’t really need one. Stuff like this is almost meant to fly under the radar, there was no way that this was going to pick up some huge following in the season that featured both Chainsaw Man and the return of Bleach, but that it has any fans at all is no mean feat, given the circumstances.

As for why it feels like a show out of time, I have a pet theory; a running theme in 2022’s anime was the knowingly retro. Miss KUROITSU is arguably an example as well, and we’ll run into a few more throughout this list. Of these, Shinobi no Ittoki might just be the one that realizes those mid-00s ambitions the most fully. Surprising, for an anime most people probably wrote off from its key visual alone.

Why does it nail that aughts-core authenticity? Well, in of itself, it’s hard to pinpoint anything “special” about Shinobi no Ittoki, but that very semi-anonymity is exactly what makes the show tick, a curious case of something being obviously nondescript but nailing the fundamentals so well that it manages to breathe a bit of new life into some pretty old tropes. The doofy high school protagonist who’s ripped from his ordinary life and inherits a secret legacy, ridiculous gee-wiz techno ninja gadgets, the scheming and sinister Tsuda-voiced villain, the death of the village chief, the final suicide mission, the all-in finale with excellent animation, it’s all here.

For bonus points: The blonde twintail traitor Kirei serves as an outside pick for one of Aoi Yuuki’s stronger—and weirder, dig that scratchy, nervous timbre—roles, if you’re into that sort of thing.

#25. The Demon Girl Next Door Season 2

Returning from way back in 2019, the anime more commonly known as Machikado Mazoku is the other other other magical girl anime on this year’s list. Although you could be forgiven for not really thinking of it that way, given that The Demon Girl Next Door focuses more on charming character-driven antics and general goofiness than it does fighting the forces of evil. (That’s really all in the rearview for co-protagonist Momo anyway. She’s retired.)

To be honest, in terms of “objective” merits and flaws, this is one of the rougher shows on the list. Machikado Mazoku’s second season has a real problem with overdrive pacing; some of the gags aren’t given quite enough room to breathe and it does hurt the show a bit by suffocating some of the more subtle character work. On the other hand, though, when it remembers to slow down there’s a real sense of approachable personality here, one that holds through equally well when the show delves a bit more into its proper plot with elements like journeys into lead Shamiko’s troubled mindscape as when it’s in more lighthearted pure-antics territory, as when she gets a job at a restaurant owned by a baku.

Machikado Mazoku will probably never top popularity polls, but managing to stick the landing on a second season several years later proves that it’s maintained its dedicated fanbase for a reason.

#24. Lycoris Recoil

Oh, LycoReco, what are we ever going to do with you? With the hype cycle some months in the rearview this feels like less of a #HotTake than it did at the time, but to me, what Lycoris Recoil is, before it is anything else, is an illustration of the difference between having good characters and telling a good story.

Here’s what it does get right. An extremely strong cast; not just Chisato and Takina, whose uneasy partnership blossoms into what anyone with eyes will be damn ready to call romance by the end of the show, but also Chisato’s father Mika, Mika’s villainous ex Yoshi, the playful hacker Kurumi, etc. They all feel like real people, and it’s a joy to watch them work through the winding tunnels of espionage that comprise the show’s plot. LycoReco does intuitively understand that a connection between two people, if it’s strong enough, can get anyone through even very dark times. This is a theme that showed up in several anime this year, including a few we’ve yet to get to, and it’s a strong core for something like this to have.

But, the same can’t be said of everything about LycoReco, which is why it’s not higher on this list. Too many of the actual plot points simply don’t survive any scrutiny, and I remain offput by the assumptions the show’s world is built on. Fiction that stars what are essentially cops develops more and more problems the closer it gets to reality. Lycoris Recoil’s galaxy brain spin of “it’s bad that cops shoot people but it would be fine if they used rubber bullets like the protagonist” is so utterly ridiculous that it’s not worth seriously engaging with, despite being a spin on a real thing some people think. The series’ commitment to exploring the idea is so minimal and half-assed that it scans as simply brainless rather than an active defense of the concept. But it is still pretty bad, and the show suffers for it.

Because of all this; how much of LycoReco’s downsides someone is going to be willing to forgive because of how charming the characters as written actually are, not to mention the show’s rock solid action anime fundamentals, is going to vary wildly. Especially because how good the show is at a given moment tends to be tied pretty directly to how much it’s focusing on its characters vs. how much it’s focusing on its boneheaded central narrative. I feel like an indecisive centrist putting LycoReco in this spot, of all places on the list, but as summer changes to autumn and autumn to winter, and LycoReco moves further and further into the past, I find myself totally torn between appreciating LycoReco for what it is and being disappointed in what it isn’t. There are worse ways to end your series than a sunny sky and crystal blue waters, so I can’t dislike the show and indeed, I don’t. The “retired in Hawai’i” ending doesn’t even entirely feel unearned. Even so, it still feels like something is fundamentally missing. So, when you get down to it, do I actually like-o ‘Reco? Well, at the end of the day, yes, but with a fucking lot of caveats. Hence its appearance here rather than a fair bit farther up. There’s only so many ways I can say that I love the characters but am not crazy about how they’re handled. It is what it is.

(And if you’re a super-fan and it makes you feel any better, this is another case where maybe you shouldn’t care what I specifically think. The show did just top a popularity poll over in Japan.)

#23. Fuuto PI

Every year, I watch a few shows that are solidly quite good, but have a few central flaws, or even just don’t hit quite enough high notes to make it into my personal best-of’s. 2022 was a damn good year for anime, so even the stuff that is merely decent, is, in a vacuum pretty good. Fuuto P.I. is one of those, combining a novel premise (transforming hero shenanigans + a somewhat silly pastiche of ‘gritty detective’-type stuff) with an impressive pedigree (it’s a sequel to 2009’s Kamen Rider W, which, full disclosure, I haven’t seen), and an unusual production team from Studio KAI, who are not really known for punchy action anime like this.

Upgrading to an older audience (remember; W is over a decade old. All those 8 and 9 year olds who watched it when it was new are adults by now) means that Fuuto P.I. acquires a bit of a sleazy streak, and while this feels like a flaw I should be nailing the series for, I found it hard to be seriously upset by the show’s more openly leery tendencies. Mostly because of the fact that it has a shameless amount of camp that really makes the jump from live-action tokusatsu to an adult-aimed action anime feel totally natural.

Because of where it lands in terms of character building, our heroes—Shotaro and Phillip—have already had their long journey wherein they learned to trust each other long ago. Here, they’re just two cogs in a well-oiled machine, with newcomer Tokime, the female lead and the focus of much of the fanservice, providing a twist on what is presumably the old formula. The result? A solid six hours of lightly trashy fun, combining action anime flash, the particular campy sensibility that only toku can deliver, and a few interesting, meatier points to chew on by its conclusion. And hey, the ending strongly suggests more on the way in the future. (Which makes sense, given that it’s an adaptation of an ongoing manga.) I’d watch it.

#22. The Executioner and Her Way of Life

The year is 2022, and isekai has reached a point of true saturation. Every single season, we are inundated with new tales of featureless potato-boys being whisked away to generic JRPG-style fantasy worlds and given heaps upon heaps of special powers which they use to fulfill idle fantasies of banging as many dubiously-drawn Hot Anime Women ™ as they can find while lazily hacking up goblins. The Executioner & Her Way of Life sees all of this, and it is not impressed. But to avoid going too far down the path of “this anime isn’t like other girls,” it should be noted that the main reason that Executioner is, shockingly good, is what it does with the basic conceit of an isekai in the first place. It doesn’t stand out because it rejects the premise, it stands out because it does something interesting with it.

To wit; our protagonist is not the otherworlder—isekaijin, as said in the show, which I don’t think is a term unique to Executioner but is one I am very fond of—Akari, who serves as more of a secondary lead. Instead, it’s Menou, an assassin employed by the local church whose whole job is finding these crazy-powerful elseworld drop-ins and killing them before they can cause too many problems. There’s just one issue; Akari is way more powerful than even she realizes, and Menou quickly develops a hard-to-place liking for the girl. I won’t spoil too much, but suffice it to say that what’s going on here is a lot more interesting than the stereotypical “guy gets a huge harem and looks at stat screens” plots that litter this format. (In fact, there isn’t a single stat screen at all, so far as I can recall, which is kind of amazing in its own right at this point.)

What this boils down to is that Executioner’s main strength lies in its ability to pull its parent genre apart into its constituent building blocks and then reassemble them into an intriguing new shape. Not just in its core narrative but also interesting worldbuilding details that show us just how the isekaijin have shaped Menou’s world. (Note, for instance, that literally everyone seems to speak only one language; Japanese. And yes, that detail is intentional. It’s pointed out explicitly at one point.)

It was not the only surprisingly good isekai anime this year (aside from another which will appear farther up on this list, there’s Reincarnated as a Sword, which apparently got quite good only a few episodes after I wrote it off. You can take my mentioning it here as an apology), but it was the only true anti-isekai this year. A story stitched together from the ripped-up shreds of a genre that many people, myself included, are very tired of by now. The show isn’t perfect, of course. Its flaws are few but fairly obvious; it ends in a noncommittal “go read the books, stupid” kind of shrug, it’s maybe occasionally a bit too edgy for its own good. That kind of thing. Still, all in all, in a year that had fewer “lesbians kicking ass” anime than I might have liked, you really do have to hand it to Executioner for holding it down.

#21. Delicious Party♡Precure

Ah, here it is. The exception, the thing I carved out a specific little niche of its own for. Delicious Party Precure—DePaPre, for short—isn’t actually finished airing, which on its own, makes scoring it a different, and much more difficult, prospect than ranking anything else here.

Yet, the fact remains that I really just utterly fucking love Pretty Cure. Delicious Party feels like it’s already being written off as a “weaker” season of the series before it even ends, and while that might be true in some grand rank-your-faves sense, it’s awfully rude to the show itself, which has maintained an effortless charm from its premiere up to present while dodging production issues and the deeply unfortunate Toei database breach earlier this year.

Certainly, that resilience shows itself off better in some corners than others. Amane, alias Cure Finale, is almost inarguably the character who’s most developed. Seeing her face turn is one thing, but the real meat is in how she copes with feeling like she isn’t quite a good enough person to be a Pretty Cure. Even that aside; there are all sorts of fun little details that only an anime afforded a full four cours—rare in this day and age—could indulge in. The gentle light that is the grandmother of Yui, the lead Cure, the quiet-girl introspection that Kokone is prone to, the zany antics of Ran (who, as Cure Yum-Yum, might hold the record for the silliest Pretty Cure alias), and even the ever-present B-plot about Mary, the girls’ mentor figure, and his disappeared former partner. This thing’s even got a time travel episode. Really, can you complain when even a “weak” Pretty Cure season is this good? I certainly can’t.

#20. The Ranking of Kings

You may be a touch surprised to see this here! Ranking of Kings (Ousama Ranking at home in Japan) started airing late last year, but only finished up back in the ‘22 winter season. The entire way, it forged a strong visual identity that looks like absolutely nothing else that aired this year and spun that visual charm into a fully realized fairytale world of princes, knights, and monsters.

Our heroes? Bojji the little mute prince and his roguish blob of a best friend, Kage. Together they set out on a truly classic adventurous tale, the kind that makes you wish that this sort of thing got such lavish treatment more often. Really, it’’s one of Wit Studio’s best-ever anime from a purely visual standpoint, with enough characterful sakuga to bring a smile to even the most cynical animation enthusiast’s face.

Ranking of Kings’ ending sees Bojji spurn his original goal, only to set out on a brand-new adventure, so it seems likely that we’ll return to this fairytale someday in the not-too-distant future. (A spinoff is definitively in the works. I wouldn’t be shocked to see a second season greenlit.) Like many anime on this list, I’d happily watch that second season, and I doubt I’m alone.

#19. TEPPEN!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Laughing ’til You Cry

Comedy anime get no respect. Whether classics like Nichijou or Azumanga Daioh or modern offerings like TEPPEN!!!!! here, pure comedy anime just never seem to quite pick up the followings that their more dramatic compatriots do over here in the Anglosphere. Maybe it has something to do with the fact that comedy is fairly cultural. Maybe people just don’t respect the power of a hearty chuckle enough. Whatever the reason; TEPPEN!!!! Deserves more credit than what little it got. If absolutely nothing else, it’s the only anime on this list whose air schedule was directly impacted by the assassination of former Japanese prime minister Shinzo Abe. That’s weird and notable enough to stand out all on its own; it helps that the show’s pretty good, too, featuring bizarre, absurdist shaggy dog tales concocted around everything from haunted inns to Bitcoin schemes.

At the end of the day that is why Teppen is higher on this list than a number of things I have “more to say about.” It was just fucking fun! Deriving a wide variety of zany slapstick from its central conceit of a group of teams competing to be the best comedy group in Japan (the titular Teppen competition) is in some ways the obvious route, but it worked for Teppen, and I can really only dock points for a couple off-color jokes I didn’t really like. Two sets of bonus points for you: along the way it found the time to squeeze in probably the year’s single best time travel-related episode (its fifth) and engineered an insanely catchy rapped OP theme. Put some respect on its name.

#18. Magia Record: Puella Magi Madoka Magica Side Story Final Season -Dawn of a Shallow Dream-

I have to confess; I develop a not-entirely-logical attachment to anything I cover for long enough. I have written about Magia Record in various places a number of times since it originally premiered back in 2020. It is, as of this entry, the only anime that’s showed up here, on my 2020 year-end list, and on my truncated top 5 last year. There is an admirable strength to that persistence, even as I have to admit that what MagiReco tried to do as it closed out its final season, Dawn of a Shallow Dream, is a pretty niche thing. I’m actually not sure between this and RWBY: Ice Queendom, which was the more-watched SHAFT battle girl show of the year. This was certainly the better of the two, but anecdotally, I saw almost no discussion about it at all. Have people really written the Madoka Magica extended universe off that hard?

If so, that’s sad, but all too apropos. This particular corner of the dark magical girl subgenre pulls off an interesting trick of thriving best when ignored, and Magia Record itself ends with the white-gloved hand of Madokami herself shutting the book tightly on this particular story, as its protagonists lament that no one will ever know what they did here. Will it even remotely shock you, coming from a woman who’s eagerly defended both Day Break Illusion and Blue Reflection Ray, that I thought this was pretty good? It’s not just the metatextual angle, but that does help.

Now that’s not to say it’s a perfect finale, not by any means. For one thing, it’s really more of a movie, with any notion of it being a “season” being put to a serious test by the fact that it dropped all at once. (Not that this is inherently a problem, but it does suggest some behind-the-scenes issues.) For another, it is visually all over the place. It never gets as unsightly as the ugliest parts of Ice Queendom, but there is some pretty wonky character art in spots, here. But, by contrast, there’s also a lot that’s really lovely to look at, and in general the ‘season’ has a mesmerizingly surreal look to it that, in its best moments, does ably recall the heights of The Rebellion Story, still the strongest single articulation of Madoka’s core themes and aesthetic concerns. I am also still a little sad that they felt the need to kill b-character Kuroe, who took an unexpected leap from being totally off my personal radar to one of my favorites in the second season last year.

Still, despite its shortcomings, I find it hard to argue that this isn’t a solid end to an intriguingly strange alternate take on the Madoka story. I’m glad we got to take this particular ride.

And that’s all for today’s chunk of the list. See y’all tomorrow.

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Posted on March 27, 2022 in anime, Weekly Writing Roundups

The Frontline Report [3/27/22]

The Frontline Report is a weekly column where I summarize my journey through anime, manga, and the related spheres of popular culture over the past week. Expect spoilers for covered material.

Hi folks, simple writeups this week, nothing too fancy. But I hope you’ll enjoy them as one of our recurring anime comes to a close and another heads there at a mile a minute. But first–

Seasonal Anime

Miss KUROITSU From the Monster Development Department

Miss Kuroitsu probably isn’t quite consistent enough to be called a seasonal underdog, but damn if it doesn’t sometimes come close. This past week’s episode is the beautiful little fable of a mute monster girl filled with weapons (named Mumy and played by singer YURiKA) who wants nothing more than to become an idol. The general idea is hackneyed, and the episode looks like ass. Did I tear up multiple times throughout anyway just because the show got me so attached to this girl? Yes I did. Did I have to actively stop myself from crying even more at the end of the episode where a combination of vampire bioengineering and sheer fucking moxie means she’s miraculously grown a voicebox and developed a beautiful singing voice? Yes I absolutely did.

What else can be said? Sometimes even a benchwarmer bats a home run.

Princess Connect! Re:Dive Season 2

I wish people still sincerely called things “epic.” I can’t think of a word that better fits the blazing spectacle that Princess Connect has transmogrified to as it enters the final stretch of its second season.

To get something out of the way; in previous articles where I’ve discussed Priconne, I’ve made a point of entertaining alternate points of view. The show is widely liked, but not universally liked, and while I do still respect everyone’s rights to hold their own opinion, I think the time for trying to specifically acknowledge criticisms that others might have has passed. If you object to rapturous praise for stuff like this, you’re on the wrong site. Sorry.

“Stuff like this,” if you need to be brought up to speed, is an absolutely shameless blind-fire of the Proper Noun Machine Gun, mixed with what is certainly some of the flashiest animation of the year so far. (Priconne is good at that.) We get some new characters here (and a few old ones make return appearances), and a good chunk of the episode consists of a guild–a guild who seem to have some knowledge of how the world of Princess Connect really works–fighting against Christina, another of the Seven Crowns and Omniscient Kaiser’s sort-of lackey, below Kaiser’s palace.

This is, in a word, awesome. New arrivals Ruka (Rina Sato) and Anna (Asami Takano) attack Christina with Anna’s Final Catastrophe attack. Ah, but of course, Christina is one of the Seven Crowns, so her passive ability Absolute Defense renders her immune to normal damage.

But that too can be overcome by simply overloading the ability’s computational capacity–a kind of VRMMO underflow error–but then it turns out that Christina secretly also has access to Absolute Offense, which fires glowing beams that invert the world’s colors. They eventually subdue her…only for the secret true form of Omniscient Kaiser to emerge from the very thing they were fighting over! All of this is deeply ridiculous, but it’s a total blast. Anna in particular is really fun, being perhaps the most chuuni chuunibyou I’ve seen in any anime in years.

Alongside this is Pecorine’s fight to save Karyl. Impeded here by the return of Jun–the blindfold-wearing knight we were introduced to several episodes ago–but now she is, of course, brainwashed by Kaiser and in full battle armor. The two prove a solid match for each other, although it says a lot that this is actually the more restrained of Priconne’s two battle scenes in this episode.

Eventually, Pecorine is able to break Kaiser’s hold on Jun, and the two turn the tables against the evil wolf-woman and kill her. Except they don’t actually, because of the aforementioned hidden true form of Omniscient Kaiser lurking beneath Kaiser’s palace. The form that they’ve been fighting this entire time? Merely a particularly strong-willed shadow. It has a very hammy death, and it’s not gone for ten seconds before the real Kaiser starts tossing Pecorine and Jun around like ragdolls with a wag of her finger. (As a side note, Kaiser’s actor Shouta Aoi deserves some praise here. He has a reputation for voicing dangerous women, and he is indeed very good at that, but he can also holler like a motherfucker when the scene calls for it, and he uses that skill several times in this episode.)

As you can surmise from the appearance of credits over this final scene, this, and the cut immediately after where Yuki finally arrives, is the end of the episode. But we should back up a bit, because one more thing of import does happen in between all the flashy sword-clanking.

Kokkoro, in about the middle of the episode, is spirited away by the Ameth, that mysterious girl with the broken clockwork floating around her who, like Labyrista, seems to have been instrumental in controlling the world. Regardless of the specifics of her, though, what she gives to Kokkoro is important; a small device for “keeping Yuuki’s emotions in check.” Ostensibly to keep him from overloading his powers and hurting himself. It’s an odd turn of events, and seems to imply that maybe Ameth isn’t entirely on the level, either.

The season finale approaches, so perhaps we’ll get some answers there. Or at least, more intriguing questions.

Ranking of Kings

“Shine on toward a yet-unseen tomorrow.”

Ousama Ranking‘s finale begins thusly; Daida reaffirms his (puzzling, though given the vaguely medieval-ish setting perhaps slightly less so) decision to marry Miranjo, swearing that the both of them will turn over a new leaf and concentrate on doing good in the world. At the same time, he relinquishes the throne, and all of Bojji’s retainers hail him as the new king; the scene is a happy one, with all present praising Bojji’s bravery and strength of character. There’s much celebration, and King Bojji’s new subjects quite literally toss him into the air with joy, and later take him to his new throne room so he can receive formal homage from the townsfolk. It’s very classic fairy tale. There are a lot of happy tears. So, we’re all good, right? Happy endings all around.

Well, no, not quite.

Not present among Bojji’s gaggle of retainers is Kage. The shadow clansman rationalizes that the young king no longer needs him–and that his own reliance on the boy is bad–and leaves silently, seeking honest work in the same nearby town he used to make his way as a thief in. He ends up miserable there, of course, as the townsfolk haven’t really changed. No one wants to hire him for honest work, and when he sets up a small wooden hut outside of town someone destroys it.

Meanwhile, Bojji, too, is lost without his best friend. He seems like a fine king based on what little we see, but his heart clearly isn’t in it. Fittingly, it’s Queen Hiling (now Queen-Mother Hiling, one supposes) who picks up on this. In a cozy bit of motherly wisdom, she tells him that being a king is his responsibility, but if there is something that truly matters to him more, he should go seek that instead.

Bojji, thus, ends his brief reign by re-relinquishing (delinquishing?) his crown to Prince Daida. Making for, I’m sure, a fun footnote in their kingdom’s history some hundreds of years down the line.

Bojji sets out to find Kage the very day, and they meet up again not long later. He reveals to Kage his secret ambition; to someday found his own kingdom, after having a great many adventures before then, of course.

As for what happened to King Desha at the end of last week’s episode? We don’t know, and perhaps we never will. Some mysteries remain even under the morning Sun.

Ousama Ranking is occasionally criticized–and I’ve made these criticisms myself–for its odd pacing and the plot’s tendency to drift all over the place. Even in this final episode there’s an aside that really doesn’t add anything at all, although it does look pretty cool. (Kingbo makes a surprise return appearance, splits the rock that Ouken is imprisoned in in half, and then decapitates him and chucks his head into a lake many miles away in the span of about 3 minutes.) But, while that is certainly a flaw, it’s not one that negates the show’s many strengths. In the end, Ousama Ranking boils back down to what made it great in the first place; Bojji, Kage, a bag of treasure, and the great, wide world stretching before them. The promise of more adventure on the horizon billows into the sky like smoke. If not now, it seems to say, then someday, somewhere.

Elsewhere on MPA

Vote on the Next Let’s Watch for the Spring 2022 Anime Season

Please vote on this if you care about what I’m going to be covering during the (rapidly approaching) next anime season. You’ve got a little under a week left to make your voice heard!

Let’s Watch SABIKUI BISCO Episode 11 – “I’m Bisco!”

Sabikui Bisco continues to be Sabikui Bisco-y as it comes to a close. I kinda feel like I’ve run out of much to say about this show other than what’s already in the

Let’s Watch MY DRESS-UP DARLING Episode 12 – “My Dress-Up Darling” (SEASON FINALE)

Meanwhile, My Dress-Up Darling ends the only way it really could have, sweet nothings and fireworks. It doesn’t hold a candle to the very best fireworks-centric romcom finale in recent memory–that being a different show’s season one finale–but still, it’s a definite high point to go out on for a show that’s been something of a rocky ride. I hope the second season (and let’s be real, one is definitely getting made) is more like this than say, like episode six.

Like what you’re reading? Consider following Magic Planet Anime to get notified when new articles go live. If you’d like to talk to other Magic Planet Anime readers, consider joining my Discord server! Also consider following me on Twitter and supporting me on Ko-Fi or Patreon. If you want to read more of my work, consider heading over to the Directory to browse by category.

Posted on January 16, 2022January 16, 2022 in anime, Weekly Writing Roundups

The Frontline Report [1/16/22]

The Frontline Report is a weekly column where I summarize my journey through anime, manga, and the related spheres of popular culture over the past week. Expect spoilers for covered material.

Hello guys, gals, and nonbinary pals! I hope you’re all doing well out there. Premiere Season is basically over here at MPA, so I hope you’re enjoying my settling into a more relaxed seasonal groove.

I wanted to make a personal plea here before moving on to the (relatively short) FR writeup proper for this past week. Between the last Frontline Report and now, I have started HRT treatment, which, if you’re not familiar, is a crucial step of the transitioning process for most trans women. Why mention this on my anime blog? Two reasons; for one, I am hoping this treatment will lead to me being happier and healthier (I feel better about myself in general already, but that could be the placebo effect this early on.) For two, the more practical side of this is that I now have a medical bill–the cost of the HRT treatment–to pay every few months. It’s not a ton of money, averaging out to about $60 after the local clinic’s discount for low-income people, but it’s an added financial pressure.

On top of this, I’m hoping to get some other long-standing medical problems treated this calendar year (among them; I need new glasses and need a bad case of hearing loss in my right ear treated.) All of this to say that if you read my blog and can afford even occasional small donations, please please please consider donating to my Ko-Fi or becoming a Patreon patron. (I don’t currently offer any Patron bonuses because I frankly just don’t have enough of a subscription base. If I start to get more subscriptions over there, I will give it some thought.) I also offer review commissions; you can see my policies for review purchases, complete with a pricing chart, here.

I don’t really like to beat the “give me money” drum too hard. The primary reason I write anime criticism is because I enjoy it and find it personally important. But the monetary side of things really is what allows me to continue doing this, so thank you for bearing with me in this regard.

In any case, onto this week’s anime! The actual writing roundup is pretty short here, but I hope you’ll find these entries worthwhile.

Seasonal Anime

Ranking of Kings

As Ousama Ranking enters its second half, war clouds begin to blot out the sky. Recent episodes have made it clear that Miranjo’s machinations intend to drive the entire Kingdom of Bosse into ruin, not merely displace Bojji. We’ve explored everything from the depths of Daida’s own mind in the Twilight Zone-esque episode 11 to a small rogues’ gallery of evildoers in the more recent two episodes, which have kicked off the series’ second cour.

In the most recent episode, with said rogues’ gallery besieging the castle Bojji once called home, Queen Hilde’s retainer Dorshe ends up getting a lot of love. He puts up a hell of a fight, though the episode’s sinister ending makes it ambiguous as to whether or not he’s actually successfully protected his charge.

Equally emphasized here is the sinister and downright bizarre Ouken, the so-called “Sword King,” an effective force of sadistic nature who we know vanishingly little about. Save that Bojji musn’t be allowed to confront him directly, for some reason or another.

Ousama Ranking remains, really, almost too good for its own good. I can think of little better to tell you to do than to watch the series if you aren’t already, and to catch up if you’re a bit behind. It remains a wonderful thing to watch.

Tokyo 24th Ward

If you squint, you can see what Tokyo 24th Ward is trying to do with its second episode. The intent is two-fold; to show how our main group of protagonists came together as the “hero” unit they once were (and how they got the nickname “RGB” in the first place), and more abstractly, to demonstrate how past trauma can intrude on the present. Both ends are served by the episode frequently cutting to flashbacks, often in ways that don’t make it instantly obvious that they even are flashbacks. To Tokyo 24th‘s credit, this does give the episode a slightly hallucinatory quality. In all other respects though, this mostly renders the episode confusing, and serves to disguise the fact that very little is actually happening.

What the episode does have in spades is talking. There is a lot of exposition here; about our characters’ pasts and relationships to each other, about the history of the 24th Ward itself, about why certain characters act the way they do, about the upcoming “Gourmet Festival” in the Ward that may or may not become a major plot point, etc. etc. etc.

This is a classic example of the “show, don’t tell” maxim not being followed, and while there are no hard and fast rules in the arts, this is certainly an example of “tell” being done pretty badly. Add to this the fact that the episode’s production is overall lackluster (what happened to the pop-in technique the show used so liberally last week? It’s totally gone here!) and you have a recipe for an episode that is in all respects disappointing. Even the subtitles seem asleep at the wheel, which is hardly the series’ own fault, but it definitely doesn’t help. Winding, ramble-y phrasings abound, and there are a few straight-up errors too. (Although all this does produce a few funny lines.)

Mari, speaking of that image, also gets a little bit of character development here. Which is nice, even if it is buried in a pretty bad episode overall.

My hope is that this is a rough patch for Tokyo 24th and not the start of a full-on freefall, but I suppose time alone will tell.

Elsewhere on MPA

I have been busy recently! Here are some highlights from the past little while.

Way too many First Impressions articles to reasonably list all of them here. – I didn’t cover quite as much as I did last season, but I still wrote about 7 different broadcast anime and also an ONA, which I think is a pretty good spread. (Plus My Dress-Up Darling, which I didn’t technically write a “First Impressions” article on because I knew I was going to pick it up for weekly coverage, but is included in the list because, you know, reasons.) Some of these I quite liked, some I was mixed on, one I outright hated! Give the list a look if you’re wondering what to pick up this season.

(Review) The Magic of Artiswitch – I watched this fascinating little web series basically on a whim and reviewed it for much the same reason. It ended up becoming the 300th anime in any format I’ve logged on my Anilist profile, which I must say, I couldn’t be happier about. I don’t like calling things “hidden gems,” but I think the term applies here. Give this one a look.

Let’s Watch CUE! Episode 2 – “Their Respective Colors” – First of all; yes, I did change how I format the titles for the Let’s Watch posts. Secondly; is it weird that CUE! might be my favorite thing airing right now? It’s not some grandiose production monster, but it has heart in a way I really like. Oddly, it reminds me of The Idolmaster. Maybe I only think that because of the huge cast? Regardless, it’s an entertaining show, and I already love rooting for Haruna, the protagonist, in her quest to become a great voice actress. I really want more people to pick this up. Consider making room for it in your schedule!

Let’s Watch MY DRESS-UP DARLING Episode 2 – “Wanna Hurry Up, and Do It?” – Woof, that episode title. Pop culture critics like myself have in recent years picked up a habit of calling anything that remotely deals with anything adjacent to sex or sexuality “horny,” using it as a loosely-defined but vaguely positive adjective. I’m hesitant to apply the label to things, so when I say Dress-Up Darling is pretty horny, please know I’m not exaggerating for clicks. That said; I thought this week’s episode was pretty fun even if I can absolutely imagine all the cheesecake (remember that term?) putting someone off. I do agree with the general consensus in hoping the show moves in a direction a bit more narratively-focused soon. I’m not expecting this to turn into Evangelion or anything, but trading in some of the, ahem, “plot” for more actual plot would be nice.

(In spite of all this; Dress-Up Darling is not the horniest anime airing this season. That would be the hormonal anxiety nightmare that is World’s End Harem. I watched the first episode of that and, frankly, had no idea what to make of it. You’ll have to turn elsewhere if you want someone to cover that series I’m afraid.)

And that’ll about do it for this week’s content on the site. I’ll be seeing you all again pretty soon, have a good week, anime fans 🙂

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Posted on December 6, 2021December 6, 2021 in anime, Weekly Writing Roundups

The Frontline Report [12/6/21]

The Frontline Report is a weekly column where I summarize my journey through anime, manga, and the related spheres of popular culture over the past week. Expect spoilers for covered material.

Good day, anime fans. I don’t have terribly much to say this week in the lead-in. Here’s some thoughts about an anime I’m a bit mixed on, one I really like, and one that I….just feel like I have to tell people about.

Mieruko-chan

I have always been a bit of two minds about the Mieruko-chan anime. I thought, and still think, that its positives outweigh its negatives, but it is admittedly difficult to evaluate a show that contains a somber, heartstring-tugging story about a teacher’s failed pregnancy in the same episode where the lead at one point pisses herself in fear. That’d be episode 8, and that’s Mieruko-chan in general. Something tragic and something funny (or “funny”, in this case) within the span of minutes of each other and seeming like they don’t quite go together.

One could argue this reflects the chaotic uncertainty of life in general. Normally, that is in fact exactly what I would say, and I have said similar things about other shows with this kind of tonal yo-yoing. But there are a lot of anime out there that pull this off than Mieruko-chan does, and it just doesn’t fit together properly much of the time. Increasingly, I just wonder if this is the sort of series that should’ve stayed in the manga format.

On the other hand, occasionally it does hit it out of the park. Episode 9, the most recent as of when I’m writing this, is about 50% about Miko and friends visiting a haunted house. Realizing that she can here react to whatever she sees however she likes, Miko revels in the chance to scream her lungs out. Much to the confusion of Julia, her also-able-to-see-ghosts sometimes-rival whose inability to perceive the larger spirits that torment Miko has given her a very inaccurate idea of what our lead is actually like. (Julia is probably my favorite character in general, it must be said.)

So, I don’t know, maybe the show is fine as it is. My hope is that the transition into the arc about Zen Toono, a substitute teacher at Miko’s school, will signal the start of a more interesting run as the series enters its final few episodes.

^Perfectly^{nice, I’m sure.}

Ranking of Kings

Last week dropped a bombshell; through some dark magic, King Bosse was back, in the body of his son Daida. Meanwhile, as Bojji trained in the underworld, he appeared to now be able to split boulders with his fists. We get a fair amount of explanation relating to these developments here, but as in basically any good ongoing piece of serial fiction, they raise as many questions as they answer.

We open on a flashback with a young(ish), not-yet-King Bosse negotiating with, wouldn’t you know it, the great red devil who showed up when he passed away a number of episodes ago.

His wish? To be the strongest. The demon’s reply? He can’t conjure power out of nowhere, but if Bosse had a family, he could steal it from a blood relative. Bosse, thus, finds the strongest giant woman in the world and proposes to her. (In doing so, he performs a perfectly understandable action for sinister reasons. Quite a jerk, King Bosse.)

This, as we learn (though it’s not hard to figure out), is Bojji’s biological mother. What exactly happened to her after the tiny prince was born is not revealed here, though it’s hard not to assume the worst. Bosse carves out his own realm in what seems to be just a few short years.

^{That is Bosse in the distance, walking away from a whole battlefield of dead orcs. In some anime, this would be a way to show how cool he is. Ousama Ranking is not such an anime.}

This sequence, and much of Ousama Ranking in general, seem to contemplate the cruelty of power. If one has to do such terrible things to become so strong, what can one possibly do with their strength that’s actually worth it? And does it not inevitably lead to the pursuit of power for its own sake? After Bojji is born, Bosse swears that he will ensure a future for the prince where he wants for nothing. It’s safe to say, given the present, that he didn’t succeed. But there is a marked disconnect between Bosse as we see him in the past and Bosse as we see him returned in Daida’s body. The influence of his vizier Miranjo¹–a flesh-and-blood person in these flashbacks but trapped in Daida’s mirror in the present–may have something to do with it, but it’s hard to call definitively.

We also catch up with Domas and Hokuro. Their relationship here changes quite rapidly. It develops from Hokuro trying to kill Domas for his treachery and failing, to Domas rescuing a to-be-executed Hokuro from Queen Hilling’s wrath out of apparent guilt, to Domas being ordered by Bosse–who makes himself known to the swordsman–to destroy a cave to the underworld that exists beneath the castle. Ousama Ranking‘s pacing has been brisk but quite good so far, and this marks the rare occasion where it’s a bit too fast. This seems like the sort of plot that could’ve carried its own episode. Although, I will note, there’s no reason to suspect that Domas and Hokuro’s partnership won’t continue to change. Their interactions in this episode end with Domas promising to train Hokuro. Training he claims Hokuro will sorely need for the task ahead of them.

Finally, there is Daida. Yes, it would appear that the blonde prince is still alive. Although what state, exactly, he’s in, is quite ambiguous. The final moments of the episode conclude with him waking up in a totally black void. He stumbles around, wondering if he’s been imprisoned somewhere, but the total lack of any features seems to imply his prison his more metaphysical in nature. Spare a thought for the ambitious prince, he’ll need it.

As for Bojji? Well, the little big man’s training is complete in this episode as well, though this is one of the show’s episodes where Bojji assumes a minor role in his own show. (Not a bad thing, but notable.) Perhaps his newfound power can help him rescue his brother? Maybe because Bojji came by his strength honestly he won’t fall into whatever pit of ambition Bosse ended up in? It’s hard to say. All we know for certain is this; The Ranking of Kings continues, and somewhere nearby, a devil grins.

Waccha PriMagi!

A new face on this column, and one that’s quite the watching experience.

I’ve been following Waccha PriMagi since it aired. But it’s something I watch with friends on the weekends, so I haven’t really ever thought of it as something I intended to write about in this column. And my knowledge of the larger Pretty Rhythm / King of Prism (I’m not even sure which name is “more correct”) meta-franchise which it’s a part of is quite limited. But I really feel like I need to just tell somebody how utterly bonkers this show is. To record it for posterity so that a hundred years hence, someone can know that yes, this was a real thing and yes it really was like this. God help us all. Or maybe international superstar Jennifer help us all. In the show’s world they seem rather interchangeable.

^{She’s like if Beyonce` was blonde and had the most generic name ever.}

The actual premise isn’t much to stretch the brain here. Matsuri, our protagonist, likes idols and wants to be one. One day, the magical cat girl Nyamu appears and helps her become one. There’s a competition to see who’s the best idol, pretty standard stuff for the genre aside from the magic element, and even that is not really where the weirdness comes from.

No, the weirdness comes from two things. For one, the gaudy character designs. The girls, especially in-costume, look like they’ve been shot with a glitter cannon by Lisa Frank, and there are enough pride flag colors snuck into character designs that it feels like an intentional easter egg on the part of a character designer rather than simple coincidence. Even the comparatively “dark” designs like Lemon’s gothic lolita ensemble are just so much. This is a strength, not a weakness, but it’s a level of audacity in character design that is rather rare, and it takes some getting used to.

Secondly, there is the writing.

Good god is there the writing.

I wouldn’t dare to say that Waccha PriMagi is badly written. It’s a kids’ show, and it’s not for a 27 year old college dropout who writes a blog for a living. It is however, definitely hyperactively written. Compared to it, co-seasonal Tropical Rouge Precure (which is also for young kids, mind you!) looks downright sedate. The simple quantity of things that happens in a given episode is through the roof, and episodes tumble into one another as though the entire series were a single long film. There is little of the episodic nature often associated with kids’ anime. This shit has continuity, and it has the audacity to expect you to remember it all. (Or maybe it doesn’t, given that the most recent episode, the tenth, is a recap episode less than a dozen episodes in.)

Is any of that a problem? Honestly, not really. The series’ sheer chaos works in its favor. Most anime take a fairly straight line from point A to point B. Waccha is content to doodle all over the map on its way there, which is why it took ten episodes for us to get a concise explanation of what the tournament that will presumably drive much of the rest of the plot actually is. This would be annoying for a shorter anime, but as Waccha is an annual it seems safe to assume it will run for a full four cours (landing somewhere between 42 and 50 episodes by its finale), so it has plenty of time to figure out petty things like “plot” and “making sense” later.

What it does excel at, chaotic as it is, is character interaction. The characters in this are great. The sole exception I’d maybe make being our actual lead, Matsuri, who I find a bit of a cipher outside of her idol fangirling. (Even then, she’s pleasant and charming, just not to the level of the other characters.) Nyamu is a total brat, something like a land-bound cousin of TroPre’s Laura La Mer. There’s a cool senpai in the form of Hina, whose day-glo raver look could maybe dull some of the surprise from learning that the song from her first concert kinda slaps.

^{Seriously, why does this sound like something that would dominate the radio in 2007?}

Then there’s Miruki, a baldly two-faced little conniver who would be absolutely detestable if she wasn’t so damn funny. It’s here worth noting that these characters all have their own animal companion friends. And hers is a decidedly stoned-looking bear. And finally there’s Lemon Kokoa, my personal favorite character. I should also take a minute to mention the incredibly good official subtitles this thing has, with full credit to translators Natalie Jones and Nathan Lopez. They’re a bit loose, which some purists may dislike, but they add a lot of color to the show by incorporating modern stan terms, including “stan” itself, “bias,” etc. I mostly bring this up because Lemon is an idol otaku, and also just generally a reclusive, anxious wreck of a gamer girl shut-in. When she and her friends (read: her MMO guild) show up, the translators also take the opportunity to tangle in some modern internet slang. Which leads to the decidedly surreal experience of seeing, say, a phrase like “big mood” in an anime.

^{Lemon is just below the frame, having passed out from the immense stress of being perceived.}

She also has easily the best outfit in the series, the aforementioned gothic lolita dress patterned after the stained glass in a cathedral. A friend described her debut song as sounding “like Touhou music,” and I couldn’t agree more. It also rules.

^{Yes, the logo behind her says “Radiant Abyss.” It says that because Lemon is cooler than all of us.}

I don’t expect I’ll cover Waccha PriMagi often on this column, and it may well never appear here again. As I said, it’s more of a fun weekend watch with friends for me. But! I should stress that if you can find some folks to watch it with, it is immensely fun. (I imagine watching it solo unless you’re a sugar rush’d-out ten-year-old might be a bit much. But you’re welcome to experiment and see if I’m wrong.) Waccha absolutely drips with style and personality. Sometimes when you’ve got so much of that, common sense takes a back seat. Personally, I think it suits the show just fine.

_{^{1: I am admittedly not fully sure if this is intended to be her actual name or is some sort of title. In Japanese the character is apparently only referred to as “Mahou no Kagami”, which I believe simply means “Magic Mirror”, so I’m not entirely certain what’s going on there.}}

Posted on November 29, 2021November 29, 2021 in anime, Weekly Writing Roundups

The Frontline Report [11/29/21]

The Frontline Report is a weekly column where I summarize my journey through anime, manga, and the related spheres of popular culture over the past week. Expect spoilers for covered material.

Hello again, anime fans. I don’t have terribly much to say in my lead-in here. It’s been a bit of a week and I’m a bit struck by the winter blues. I hope you won’t begrudge me that this week’s column is only about two shows. For what it’s worth, I think they’re some of the best that have aired this year. One of 2021’s great stories comes to an end and another begins to hit its stride….

The Heike Story

A common nugget of wisdom holds to show, not tell, when weaving a story. But it’s a false dichotomy in some ways. In the Heike Monogatari, now concluded after eleven weeks, the showing and the telling are one in the same. Never has this been more true than in the series’ final act, where Biwa, fully embracing her role as a chronicler of fate, tells us of the Heike’s demise as we see it happen; two perspectives unified like the visions from her own mystical eyes.

The series’ finale is a thing of beauty. The Heike Clan make their final stand in a battle at sea. They lose, as we knew they would from day one. Many, including the young Emperor, cast themselves into the sea. It is not what you’d call a happy ending.

A common criticism I saw of Heike Monogatari during its airing is why, exactly, Biwa did not “do more” to help the Heike who are, after all, her adopted family. As a critique it makes some sense on the surface. She can see the future, and if anime has trained us to expect anything it’s that those with heterochromia and mysterious powers will intervene to stop bad things from happening. But I cannot help but think this is a simplistic view of both Biwa’s personhood and her situation. She is a witness to history; as we all are, in spite of whatever unique talents we may or may not have. Many of us could “do more” to change things with our own talents, yet we do not. If it is a character flaw on her part, it is one most of us share.

And then there’s the series’ moral, such as it is. A fundamental truth of the world; all things are impermanent. Everything dies, empires rise only to fall. What remains are the stories we pass down and the feelings we hold with us. That, truly, is all.

This is a theme that has run through some seventy years of anime history, but if one wanted to find contemporary examples, they would not need to look all that hard. Surely critics who have studied more classical literature than I have will point out that this is a “very Japanese” and “very Buddhist” theme. Perhaps these things are true, the series is based on a historical epic after all and such things are very much informed by their era and place. I also think, though, it may also be a warning against self-importance akin to what we often grant ourselves here in the Anglosphere. We treat ourselves as living at history’s end, but it continues to happen every day in spite of us.

Heike Monogatari‘s true triumph is to delve into the minds of those gone by; to make the past feel real by showing us the human beings behind history’s academic brushstrokes. In doing so, it reminds us that we are all mortal, and we are all witnesses. Like Biwa, many of us will live to see the fall of all kinds of empires. The only question is whether we will deign to sing about it.

I do my best to sing. Do you?

Ranking of Kings

I don’t usually pick shows up mid-season, but Ranking of Kings (known as the somewhat snappier Ousama Ranking in its home country) just didn’t give me much of a choice. “Positive buzz” is one thing, but Ranking on a pure visual level does not look like most anime. This is a reflection of the source material, which seems to draw both on a western-influenced fairy tale book influence and on older strains of anime, not many of which have particularly many artistic descendants in the modern day. So provably, even speaking aesthetically, Ranking stands apart from the usual seasonal grind. This would be interesting on its own, but without a strong story to back it up, it wouldn’t be worth much. Thankfully, Ranking stands as a buzzer-beater candidate for one of the year’s most unique anime from just about every angle. Its visual style could fool one into thinking it’s a happy, straightforward story, but the truth of the matter is that it’s more of a deliberate contrast against the complex character writing and political machinations that our lead, the Deaf Prince Bojji, finds himself caught in.

It’s an utterly fascinating little show, and eight episodes in I can confidently say I have no idea where it’s going to go from here. But what I can do is tell you where it’s been. Doing so alone should be enough for any skeptics to hop aboard the Bojji Train before it’s too late.

Our setup is pretty simple. Bojji is the eldest son of Bosse, the king of a nameless kingdom of which he was the founder. In the show’s opening act, Bosse dies, leaving the question of succession a difficult one. Bojji is Deaf, physically small, and has the misfortune of living in a distinctly fantasy-medieval setting. (Ranking effortlessly pulls off letting us into Bojji’s inner world without any spoken dialogue, but many of the adults around him tend to treat him with vague disdain, or at best, an infantilizing overprotectiveness.) He’s also not much of a swordsman, despite the guideship of his trainer Domas. Though interestingly, he’s great at dodging, a skill that has yet to quite pay dividends narratively but is sure to later.

In contrast to Bojji, there is his younger half-brother, Prince Daida. Daida is much more in the image of a traditional heir to the throne than Bojji. It is thus unsurprising that when Bosse passes away, the kingdom’s council of advisors votes to install Daida as the king instead of his older brother. One might initially think that the story’s central conflict will come down to Bojji’s quest to reclaim his rightful throne, and it may still circle back around to that eventually, but something that simple would not do justice to the sheer amount of stuff this series has covered so far.

For instance; adding fuel to the movement to replace Bojji as the heir apparent is that when Bosse passes away, a massive red devil appears and gestures at the prince. What does this mean? We still don’t know a good half-cour later.

Which is good, because that’s how you build some genuine mystery. Details like this are packed into every minute of Ranking’s runtime and things are only explained directly if absolutely necessary. As a watching experience, it’s engrossing, and doesn’t have much recent competition. I haven’t even brought up Bojji’s plus-one, his shadowy friend Kage who the prince won over with his kindness, and whose obligate backstory episode is one of the show’s highlights.

Some of this attention to detail might come down to Ranking‘s runtime; it’d feel rushed were it only one cour, but it’s thankfully two. (This sadly puts it out of the running for my top five list I’ll be publishing at the end of December. I’m sure the folks at Wit Studio are just heartbroken.)

I have to admit that I considered doing a writeup of this week’s episode as well, but in deference to those who have perhaps not started watching the show yet but might find it interesting based on what I’ve said, I will not do so. Next week, though, you have my promise! Stay strong in the meantime, Prince Bojji!

^{He’s a mighty little man.}

The Magic Planet

Tag: Ousama Ranking

Ranking Every 2022 Anime I Actually Finished from Worst to Best – Part 2

The Frontline Report [3/27/22]

The Frontline Report [1/16/22]

The Frontline Report [12/6/21]

The Frontline Report [11/29/21]