Tag: THE GOD OF HIGH SCHOOL

Posted on in anime, Misc. Anime, Reviews

Ranking Every 2020 Anime (That I Actually Finished), From Worst to Best – Part 1

It’s always a weird thing to have to write about why you didn’t like something. I’m a big believer in the idea that positive criticism is both more important and more difficult than negative. Yet, the format of the list means that we’re starting with several anime that I consider the very worst of the year (and indeed these first two entries are….not what I’d call favorites, we’ll put it that way). It admittedly makes me a bit nervous, because negativity is not my preferred mode of criticism.

Yet, at the same time. I think that even bad anime can expand one’s frame of reference and provide interesting insights into the medium in general. My hope is that this first part of the list does the same for you.

#20: The Day I Became A God

As I write this, it’s been about half an hour since I finished The Day I Became A God. This is the second-to-last anime I needed to finish for this list (the entire thing, all four parts), and I really, genuinely did not think I’d be adding something this far down this late in the game. I have to rewrite the opening sentence of my next entry, which in its current draft now-falsely claims that it is the only anime on this list to make me genuinely angry. That’s no longer true! Frankly, The Day I Became A God‘s final three episodes are so far and away the worst television period that I have watched this year that it’s made me see every subsequent entry on this list in a better light.

To talk about the latest from Jun Maeda and his colleagues at Key, we need to talk about how it starts. Because understanding how The Day I Became A God transforms from a pretty solid slice of life comedy with a supernatural edge into one of the most galling, maudlin, hacky attempts at a make-you-cri-everytiem love story that I have ever seen requires understanding how we got here. Or rather how we didn’t.

The Day I Became A God concerns Hina, alias Odin. It feels like a lifetime ago that the character was introduced to us as a blithe esper with the power to know anything. The first two thirds of the series chiefly concern her adventures with Youta, the inoffensively bland everydude protagonist. They do fun things like cheat at mahjong and help a ramen restaurant turn its fortunes around. It’s hardly groundbreaking, but it’s good fun, and if that were what we were discussing here this series would be assured a comfortable spot somewhere in this list’s mid-section with all the other solid genre anime.

Jun Maeda’s signature as a writer–so I’m told, anyway–is to build up the relationship between the characters and you, the audience, with this kind of every day life fun. Then, near the series’ end, some sort of Sword of Damocles will drop, the drama will hit, and tears will flow. Indeed, I knew this going in to The Day I Became A God, and am familiar with the device from the only other work of his I’ve seen–Angel Beats!, an anime I actually like quite a lot. The show even appears to foreshadow this; the anime’s other core premise is that Hina can sense that the world will end in thirty days.

So, fair play, right? Why am I mad?

If only this show dealt with something as interesting as apocalypse. Instead, for its final third, through a series of plot contortions so mind-bogglingly ridiculous that I will not recount them here, Hina is abducted by a shadowy government organization and has the source of her powers, a machine in her brain, removed. It’s revealed to us that, actually, Hina was severely physically and mentally disabled this entire time. (Because of a fictional Anime Illness, of course. God forbid you give your disabled characters any actual condition.) It was only the sci-fi magic of the machine that was allowing her to do what she did with Youta and friends, in addition to being the source of her omniscience. Are you crying yet?

The Day I Became A God‘s final three episodes are not just bad, they’re slimy. I actively felt repulsed by 11 and 12 especially. I absolutely loathe calling things “cringey”, but I physically winced at the screen during scenes in which (through another series of plot contortions) Youta, woefully-unqualified, tries to return her to his home where she lived for most of the series by posing as a physical therapist. These episodes go through great pains to portray Hina as pitiable because she is largely nonverbal and physically handicapped. In a particularly insidious twist, the show frames Youta’s generally ridiculous actions as being somehow, secretly, what Hina “wants”. It is a framing that cannot help but feel gross, ableist, and exploitative.

The finale, in which her actual doctor lets her return with Youta and the gang watches a student film they shot during the series’ first half (pointedly, when Hina was still verbal and able-bodied), feels like having this nonsense rubbed in your face. One has to go back a solid ten years, to 2010’s Occult Academy, to find a series that suffers a drop in writing quality this precipitous in its final 90 minutes. Even then, I think this example is genuinely worse.

I am left to wonder; who is this for? I make no secret of the fact that I am a massive sap, but the tearful reunions in the final episode of The Day I Became A God did absolutely nothing for me. My eyes remained dry, my fingers drummed in irritation on my desk, and I could only feel relief that the show was over.

Maeda has said he intended to create “the saddest anime ever” with this series. The only thing he succeeded at was making one that is profoundly frustrating, disappointing, objectionable, and, frankly, insulting to its audience. I considered cutting this series some slack with its placement here; after all, those first two thirds do still exist. But I actually think that they make the finale even worse. By the end of The Day I Became A God, all of my goodwill and any endearment I felt toward any of its characters had been sandblasted away by one of the most colossally inept TV anime endings in recent memory. All involved can–and should–do better.

#19: Sing “Yesterday” For Me

The operative word for Sing “Yesterday” For Me is “unfortunate”. This is another one with a promising start that slowly careens into an unsatisfying finish. It’s not quite a worst-case scenario for adapting old material into new anime, but it’s close.

But let’s start with the positives, because despite what that sentiment might imply, I can easily imagine why people who aren’t me might like the series. “Yesterday”‘s earthy, grounded visual style and accompanying soundtrack give it an aesthetic sense that is a genuine treat. Plus, it helps make the show’s slow narrative go down more easily than it might otherwise. It also has its moments of self-awareness, such as in an episode about a photographer whose obsession with one of the female leads, high school girl Haru, parallels protagonist Uozumi’s own.

So what’s wrong with it? Nothing and everything.

“Yesterday”‘s entire premise rubs me the wrong way. What is markedly worse is that through no one’s fault but my own, it took me the entire length of the series to realize this. (You can find material on this very blog where I praise the series, in fact.) Saying I have something of an irrational grudge against this anime wouldn’t be entirely wrong.

“Yesterday” is ostensibly the story of the aforementioned Rikuo Uozumi, a young adult working a dead-end job, and two potential love interests; Haru Nonaka and a former classmate who is now a teacher, Shinako Morinome. To its credit, both Haru and Shinako feel like fully-fledged characters. While their relationship (or lack thereof) with Uozumi does dominate their arcs, it dominates the entire plot, so that only makes sense. The real issue is pretty simple; Uozumi is a college graduate, and while Shinako is his age, Haru is a narratively-convenient eighteen. After much hemming and hawwing over the course of the series, Uozumi and Haru kiss in the final episode. Roll credits.

Fundamentally, even if you don’t find age gaps creepy, the way Uozumi treats Haru until the closing fifteen or so minutes of the final episode gives every indication that he’s going to end up with Shinako, despite what is framed as a somewhat childish fixation on Haru. But if this were merely a case of bait-and-switch or of one’s preferred Best Girl not winning, it’d be a minor gripe at most. The back half of the show’s final episode throws everything the narrative has been building toward wildly out of whack. The series’ real, actual problem then, is that like so many romance anime, it ends where it should begin.

The idea of a college grad who is finally starting to pursue his photography dreams after waking up from the torpor of the layabout life while having to juggle a relationship with someone years younger than him is wildly interesting. It’s also arguably super weird, but that’s an angle a story can work with. Why does Sing “Yesterday” For Me take so long to get to what is by far the most interesting development in its story, and then just end?

There are no answers, at least none for me. I have spoken to others who enjoyed the series and a common view I find is that the series is about building up to lifechanging moments, to sudden pivot points from which there is no return. More power to the folks who can find it in them to read the series this way, but I cannot. Thinking back, I find myself craving a more properly developed drama. I can only consider “Yesterday” a disappointment.

#18: The God of High School

I’m genuinely not trying to be meanspirited with these first few entries, because I fully acknowledge that making any anime requires an immense amount of talent from many people all working in concert. It’s a process I could never be involved with and I do genuinely respect anyone in the industry grind, no matter what the end result is.

So with all that said; what on earth do you say about something like The God of High School? The God of High School is not really what I’d call a bad anime, and despite its abundance of hyper-compressed shonen cliche I’d say it’s still fun enough on a moment to moment basis. But it really is the sort of series that one struggles to describe not because it’s particularly inscrutable but because anything you could say about it also applies to many other, better-known (and just better) anime. For instance; I could tell you that it’s a tournament arc-heavy series where the protagonist lacks much characterization beyond a desire to fight and is loosely based on Sun Wukong, but you might then assume I’m talking about Dragon Ball Z. Other aspects of the series similarly feel so heavily indebted to its predecessors that saying anything positive (or even neutral) about it that couldn’t easily be mistaken as praise for Dragon Ball or Bleach or Jojo’s Bizarre Adventure or almost any other shonen series is extraordinarily difficult.

The issue is just that The God of High School feels very much like what it is, which is an animated adaption of a webcomic written by a shonen junkie. Consequently, while it’s fun in the places where it truly lets itself cut loose (such as the more out-there fight scenes), it feels dreadfully anonymous much of the rest of the time, and even when it is firing on all cylinders the breakneck pace of the adaption means it’s generally for only a couple minutes at a time. There are worse things to be than a decent way to burn six hours, but as it further recedes into the rearview I’ve come to realize I cannot imagine I’ll ever watch even a second of it again. And more than any other show on this list, I can even less imagine what a diehard fan of The God of High School would look like. If this is more indicative of the quality of what’s to be produced under the Crunchyroll Originals banner than a certain other Webtoon adaption that shows up elsewhere on this list, that is really not a great sign for future CR Original material. I would like to think it’s an outlier.

#17: 22/7

Maybe it’s unfair to call 22/7 disappointing. Yet, looking back on it a few months removed from its airing that’s the adjective that first springs to mind. 22/7 seemed poised to offer something interrogative and worthy of thought; early episodes gave the impression of building up to some kind of grand reveal, positioning the series as something of a would-be Madoka for the idol girl group anime genre. Whether through deliberate misdirection or just too-high expectations on some part of its audience, it never got there. Instead, as weeks stretched into months, it simply gradually ran out of steam until limping across the finish line at the end of its season.

Even setting that aside though, 22/7‘s command of character writing is pretty limited. Every character arc is hamstrung by the show’s bizarre editing, which likes to cut backward and forward, interweaving flashbacks with scenes of the present day. It seems likely that this is supposed to draw a deliberate contrast; how our idols got from where they were to where they are. Instead, it generally makes episodes thematically and tonally incoherent. Even the best of them (such as Jun’s focus episode) are often hamstrung by dicey writing. At its worst, as in episodes revolving around more minor and frankly less-interesting characters like Reika, it hauls in hoary sexist ideas of what an idol should be that feel stuck in the ’80s. It’s impossible to prove that these somehow stem from the involvement of industry oldguardsman Yasushi Akimoto, but his presence in the background of the series’ production does not incline me to charitable interpretations of the 22/7‘s flaws.

The show does have its positives, of course. It’s generally nicely-animated and sometimes well-directed, especially in the case of the aforementioned Jun episode, and it has solid character interactions even if the arcs are not particularly strong. But I think if 22/7 the series survives in the collective cultural conscience at all, it won’t be through the lens of the show itself. 22/7 is also an actual idol group, and their music ranges from solid to, at its best, fantastic. The melodramatic cloud of black smoke they turned in for the show’s opening theme–a cheery number about how life is hard and no one understands each other called “Muzui” or “It’s Difficult”–remains one of my favorite pop songs of 2020, and I found myself returning to it many times over the course of this difficult year. Far more time than I ever spent appreciating the series it’s a theme to. 22/7 the group have a bright future. 22/7 the anime is best left in the past.

#16: Burn The Witch

Burn The Witch is a weird one, for one several reasons. It’s not a TV series, for one thing (the only such entry on this list), and it’s in the odd position of being the adaption of just the first few chapters of its source material. Something that would likely have never happened were the writer of said source material not Tite Kubo. The man most famous for the polarizing–but undeniably very successful–Bleach. Burn The Witch has a lot of things going for it. It’s animated by Studio Colorido, and being made as a three-episode special means that it’s never less than great to look at, and the fights in particular here are superb. The worldbuilding is goofy but in a fun sort of way; you know that things are off to a good start when we get a made-up statistic about dragon-related deaths in London right off the top. Our two protagonists, Noel and Ninny, are also quite fun to follow, each in their own way. Even the show’s magic system is a good time, more anime could stand to experiment with goofy horn-guns as their weapons of choice.

So all that said, why isn’t this higher up (or, well, lower down, one supposes) on the list? Well, not to repeat myself, but Burn The Witch has a man-shaped millstone hanging around its neck.

It’s really hard to overstate how much of a problem male lead Balgo Parks is, as a character. He’s sexist, he’s obnoxious and he’s everywhere. He completely kills the fun any time he’s on-screen, and he’s on-screen all the time. It’s a terrible, terrible problem for an otherwise solid OVA to have, because every second he’s there he’s cutting into the actually enjoyable parts of it, and ultimately, he ruins it. Time will tell if this applies to any further adaptions of Burn The Witch we get (and it’d be surprising if we didn’t get at least a season or two of a TV series), but I certainly hope it doesn’t.

#15: Gleipnir

Grisly, grody, sometimes flat-out exploitative seinen adaption that’s a mess from top to bottom. I feel like if I were a more “respectable” commentator on the medium I’d hate this show. But I’m not, so I don’t. I wouldn’t say I like it either, exactly, but it’s definitely the entry in this part of the list I have the most nice things to say about.

Gleipnir‘s been a part of my life for an unusually long time compared to the rest of the entries on this list. I first read the manga (which I markedly did not care for) back in 2017. When I heard of an anime adaption premiering this year I was curious to see if it’d be improved at all by the change in medium, and, admittedly, I was hoping that if it didn’t, it’d at least be a fun thing to riff on with friends.

To a point, that is exactly what I got. Gleipnir‘s idiosyncrasies too often fall on the bad side of good taste for me to really call it great. There are too many offputting shots of the show’s female lead in her underwear covered in fluid, weird problematic or just straight-up uncomfortable elements (a centipede demon from the show’s 2/3rds mark springs to mind as an example) for that to be the case. And its male lead is the kind of shonen-protagonist-but-edgier that just doesn’t leave you with a ton to work with most of the time.

But nonetheless, there’s just something about this series. Maybe it’s the surprisingly good action direction and atmosphere, which is certainly a credit to both director Kazuhiro Yoneda and his team at PINE JAM in general. The man has episode direction credits on the grandfather of 2010s trainwreck anime; Code Geass R2. While I can’t prove that the experience somehow uniquely equipped him to deal with Gleipnir‘s ridiculously up and down source material, but it wouldn’t surprise me. Over the course of its single cour Gleipnir manages to, in spots, eke out some surprisingly affecting character writing, has a downright haunting final few episodes, and, as mentioned, some great fight scenes. An example in the final episode might still be one of my favorites of the year as it unites both the show’s literal reality and its thematic core of relying on others to compensate for your weaknesses and confronting your demons in a way that it otherwise struggles to articulate. Gleipnir‘s central issue is its tendency to get in its own way, but that’s hardly a rare problem for the medium.

I don’t know if a second season would fix (or even mitigate) that problem, but Gleipnir is the only anime in this part of the list where if one were released I’d be interested in watching it. That must count for something, surely.

And thus we finish the “unpleasant but necessary” part of the list. Still, even among these unlucky few there is not a single one among them I actually regret watching, not even The Day I Became A God. I have said many times that part of what draws me to anime as a medium is its infinite capacity for surprise. That surprise is not always pleasant! But you take the bad with the good.

Speaking of the good, I will see you in Part 2 when it goes live. Happy Holidays!

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, Weekly Writing Roundups

Weekly Writing Roundup – 9/28/20

Welp! It’s the middle of the night after another light week, but here we are. I hope you’re all doing okay out there. I don’t have much else to lead off with, so let’s get into things.

The Geek Girl Authority

THE GOD OF HIGH SCHOOL Recap (S1E12): FOX/GOD – I have actually completely finished the show (screeners!) as of the time of this writing. It’s still not really what I’d call a great anime, but the last two episodes are fun in how whole-hog they go on being As Shonen As Possible.

DECA-DENCE Recap (S1E11-12): “Engine” / “Decadence” – While Deca-Dence is not my anime of the year or anything like that (it’s been a pretty strong year, anime-wise, if nothing else) I’m really glad I watched it. It didn’t do everything perfectly and there are some changes I’d have made in an ideal world, but overall this is a really good little show and I hope people remember it.

Magic Planet Anime

(REVIEW): The Cat’s Out of The Bag: MAO MAO: HEROES OF PURE HEART – Here’s something rather rare, a review of an American cartoon! This was a commission so I wouldn’t expect it to become the norm (it kind of goes against this blog’s name, although I guess you could argue I’m using “anime” in the original Japanese sense, but that’s silly.) That said: I liked the series, it has a couple major problems preventing me from loving it, but it’s solid and I hope the forthcoming second season expands on its slightly more serious elements a little more.

Twitter “Live Watches”

Sailor Moon – We met Rei this week! Not sure how I felt about the Ikuhara episode, interestingly enough, but I loved her introductory ep.

Also, yes, Revolutionary Girl Utena will hopefully be returning within a week or two. I’ve just been busy with various things recently and haven’t had the energy. (Plus that last arc was enough of a drainer that I kinda needed some recovery time).

Other Thoughts N Such

I’ve actually been watching quite a lot of anime in my “off time” this past week. Chiefly, a Puella Magi Madoka Magica groupwatch with some friends, which has now finished the series proper and will be watching The Rebellion Story sometime in the next few days. Hoo boy.

I’ve also started Day Break Illusion, generally derided as one of the first “Madoklones”. I don’t want to get too far into my thoughts on it here, but it strikes me rather differently than that. I’ll probably end up reviewing it, so if you want more detailed thoughts, just stay tuned.

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, Weekly Writing Roundups

Weekly Writing Roundup – 9/20/20

Hi folks! Bit of a lighter week this time around, I’ve been in a rough spot mentally and I’m sure I’m not the only one, given yet more recent goings-on in the world. But I won’t get too into that here, this isn’t really that kind of blog. Take care of each other out there!

On to the roundup!

The Geek Girl Authority

THE GOD OF HIGH SCHOOL Recap (S1E11) lay/key – I don’t like being this blunt, but man I have just not been impressed with this show recently. I’m not sure if it’s actually gotten any worse (in fact I don’t think it has) but its tendency to seriously abbreviate character arcs has started getting on my nerves. Pacing problems like this are pretty common in the modern TV anime landscape since almost everything only gets a single cour at a time, but GOH really feels like it could’ve used another cour to really stretch its legs. The fights are still cool at least, although I wish they lasted longer.

Didn’t do a Deca-Dence recap this past week for Reasons. I’m gonna roll the final two episodes into a single recap this coming Wednesday, assuming everything goes according to plan.

Magic Planet Anime

(REVIEW) Love in Wartime: The Politics & Emotion of EUREKA SEVEN – Without blowing my own horn too much, I think this is one of the best things I’ve ever written for the site and possibly just in general. I absolutely loved Eureka Seven by its end and I hope I can inspire at least one more person to watch it. (The minder of fellow anime blog Crow’s Anime World mentioned they want to watch it, so it’s possible I’ve succeeded!) I only finished Eureka Seven a week ago but it already feels like a part of me, it’s really something special.

Full disclosure, this week was also supposed to see the triumphant return of the Twenty Perfect Minutes column, regarding this series’ 48th episode (one of my favorites in anything ever, full stop) but once again mental health got in the way. Maybe next time!

Twitter “Live Watches”

Revolutionary Girl Utena – I’m going through Utena at a pretty slow pace and I think these episodes are a good indicator of why. I love the show, don’t get me wrong, but parts of it are some of the most actively draining television I’ve ever watched. I feel absolutely terrible for….everyone involved, and we’re not even at what is, to my understanding, The Worst Part yet. Ten episodes (and a movie!) to go.

Sailor Moon – SAILOR MERCURY AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA. Yeah I don’t have a ton to say on this week’s Sailor Moon I love Ami. She’s great.

We’re getting near enough to the end of Utena that I’m starting to contemplate what I should start the next livewatch on after we’re done with it. Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha maybe?

Other Thoughts N Such

I was recently commissioned to watch Mao Mao: Heroes of Pure Heart. It’s a bit unusual for this blog since it’s an American cartoon. I don’t entirely know how I feel about it, being only a couple episodes in. It’s very….frantic, which feels like the logical consequence of a series for a generation raised on Teen Titans Go. (Watching this series makes me feel kinda old lol). We’re still well off from the proper review, so there’s plenty of time for my opinions to change. I like Adorabat, she’s funny.

On an administrative note. I’ve FINALLY updated my Carrd page after not doing it for the longest time. The biggest point of interest to blog-readers is going to be my commission page. Consider sending me some money to watch your favorite series, film, or OVA!

That’s all for this week! See you around folks.

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, Weekly Writing Roundups

Weekly Writing Roundup – 9/13/20

HELLO

It’s been a bit since I wrote one of these! I didn’t have much to report on on Tuesday since, as I mentioned in last week’s roundup, I was taking some time off. Since then though I’ve done quite a few things, so I’ve got plenty to write about here. I hope you’re all doing well!

Twitter “Live Watches”

BOY OH BOY HAS IT BEEN AN INTERESTING TIME IN TWITTERLAND THIS PAST WEEK.

Revolutionary Girl Utena (1, 2) – As you can see, I actually did two Utena livewatches this week. The second because the first one was so good. In the first pair of episodes there’s a funny Nanami episode and what is probably my favorite episode of the series so far, a dramatic ace in the hole where the rules as we know them start to change and Utena as a series begins to tip its hand. The second pair of episodes are another solid dramatic ep…and then The Egg Episode, a truly ludicrous piece of television so utterly surreal that it is infamous to this day. I really don’t know what to say about it! It was definitely something, I kind of liked it a lot but also hated it at the same time.

Sailor Moon (#FightingEvilByGroupwatch) – Fairly standard pair of episodes for Sailor Moom this week. I really liked the one about the musician. I only found out some time after watching that, funnily enough, it’s an Ikuhara-directed episode, thus providing a tangible link to the chronologically later Revolutionary Girl Utena that I’m also livewatching. Isn’t that neat? 🙂

The Geek Girl Authority

Deca-Dence recaps of “Turbo Charger” and “Brake System“ – I still love Deca-Dence a lot but it is revealing itself to have a pretty common issue with single-cour anime, which is that the pacing is kinda out-of-wack. They have a LOT to tie up in the remaining two episodes and I’m not entirely sure if they’ll be able to do it. Here’s hoping?

The God of High School (S1E10) oath/meaning – I think I’ve been fairly frank about the fact that I think of The God of High School mostly as a vehicle for neat fights. This episode is solid in that regard. Oh! And Jin’s mysterious rival is a furry, isn’t that fun?

Onyx Equinox Character Trailer, Cast, & Release Date Announced – Onyx Equinox is an interesting one. It’s not an anime, which makes it an outlier both in my writing for GGA and on here. (I’d argue it doesn’t even much look like one, being a very clear descendant of that mid-2000s Man of Action house style blended with some Avatar: The Last Airbender.) But the trailers have seemed really cool and the story’s premise draws heavily on Aztec myth which is not something that a lot of modern media tries to get inspiration from in the authentic way this is. I’m quite excited to see where this goes once it comes out.

Shenmue Anime & More Announced at Crunchyroll Virtual Expo – Just a quick rundown of Crunchyroll’s Virtual Expo. The big takeaway here for most people is going to be the announcement of a Shenmue series. I’m not familiar with the games personally, but I may check the anime out. It looks neat.

Other Thoughts N Such

I’m not entirely sure about the Monthly Movies thing going forward. I’ve gotten plenty of donations recently but no suggestions, which makes me feel like people aren’t super interested in the idea. I will of course keep my promise to watch the HeartCatch film, but I’m not sure, beyond that, if I’ll be doing more of those. I’ll try to brainstorm more ideas for how Ko-Fi donators and Patreon patrons can get involved. Feel free to hit me up on Twitter if you have any suggestions! It’s possible I’m missing something obvious.

As for other more minor anime musings this week. Goodness; I’m nearing the end of Eureka Seven and absolutely loving every minute of it, but I don’t want to share too many thoughts because I need to save those for the review.

On a more sour note, I watched the first two episodes of Vividred Operation. Which is….sigh. I’m not the sort of person who likes to constantly howl about how I think fanservice is bad. I’m an on-record apologist for Witchblade, Akiba’s Trip, Senran Kagura, and quite a few others. However, it can definitely kneecap a show’s reputation if it’s especially egregious or done in a particularly scuzzy way, and there’s valid reasons for that.

Vividred Operation has a lot going for it: a fun, outrageous tone, a mad scientist who is a weasel, cool power armor designs a la Symphogear (which also suffers from this problem, though not nearly to this extent), and the characters can even fuse, Dragonball-style, a really fun and underused storytelling mechanic. But I feel like I can’t recommend this show to anyone, because it takes about five minutes out every episode to focus the camera’s gaze on a middle schooler’s bum, and that is (completely understandably, mind you) just too high of a hurdle to reasonably ask most people to jump to get into a series. They will be grossed out and go watch something else.

I will probably finish the series and I’ll probably enjoy most of it, but that’s a really un-fun black mark on what’s otherwise an honestly kinda awesome anime. I have thought a lot in the past few days about this sort of thing and how it does seem to be slowly changing. (Compare a battle girl series like this from the earlier 2010s to something like Revue Starlight from the decade’s back half.) But it’s still prevalent enough to be actively damaging to the genre and consequently it bothers me. I wish I could share these anime that I often really quite (and in the case of some, like Kill la Kill and the aforementioned Symphogear, outright love) like with people, and consequently I wish they weren’t how they are in this single, specific way.

Anyway, I do apologize for the rant. You know how these things are and I’m hardly the first person to have this lament.

My Discord server started an impromptu group watch of Puella Magi Madoka Magica last night. I’ve only grown to love the show more since I first watched it last year and I’m thrilled to get a chance to again. My good friend Alice is the one who spurned the groupwatch and may well be reading this, so I’ll not mention any spoilers. It’s quite the great thing, though. One of my favorite anime of the ’10s for sure.

Anyway! That’s about all for this week. Saturday/Sunday, if things go according to plan, will likely be my new days for these roundups. So keep your eyes tuned in and your ears peeled! 🙂

Hopefully I’ll have a fair bit to write about next week….but I’ve also fallen into VTuber hell along with most of my friends, so who knows. Stay tuned!

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, Weekly Writing Roundups

Weekly Writing Roundup – 9/1/20

Hello again ladies, gents, and nonbinary friends! It feels like it’s been forever since I did one of these, but the actual truth of the matter is that I’ve just been quite busy! I got a lot of writing done this past week. One administrative note! I ah, haven’t been great about keeping the suggestions I got for anime films recently. So the first #MonthlyMovie as I’m calling it will be up to a vote and from some films I picked out myself. I do apologize if you suggested something, your blogger is a fool. I have details on how you’re going to be able to suggest films to add to the pool going forward below in the Magic Planet Anime section.

But that aside, let’s not have further delays. The roundup!

Twitter “Live Watches”

Revolutionary Girl Utena – We finished up the Black Rose arc this past week! What the hell was all that about, eh? Well, I have some thoughts and some others have shared theirs with me, but it’s honestly kind of impossible to summarize the surreal weirdness the show’s started dipping into except to say that frankly, I’m here for it. My good friend Sredni Vashtar has described this as the “time is a flat circle” portion of Utena. She may well be right!

Sailor Moon (#FightingEvilByGroupwatch) – No new major developments on the Sailor Moon front. This week’s lineup included what is apparently widely considered one of the worst episodes of the series and true to form it was really not great. The other though was a lot of fun, and I have confidence we’ll get more of the latter going forward. Liking this series a lot so far!

The Geek Girl Authority

The God of High School recap (S1E09): curse/cornered – An episode where Yoo Mira finally gets to do stuff! She gets a charyeok! That part is really cool! Less cool is the weird vaguely offensive design of the guy she fights, who turns out to be a clone of another guy anyway. Also big into the sorta-inexplicable brief introduction of a gyaru kung-fu lady here. She’s great.

Deca-Dence (S1E08): Turbine – Deca-Dence is a heist movie this week! There’s some good stuff in this episode and I’m curious to see where the subplot with Minato goes, but it’s not one of my favorites of the series thus far. I hope we get an episode more about Natsume soon.

Magic Planet Anime

The Manga Shelf: Relentless Ribbing & Queer Longing in “School Zone” – My new column / sub-blog The Manga Shelf made its debut this week with not one but two articles! This one is about school life comedy School Zone and how it’s managed to portray some surprisingly nuanced maybe-one sided maybe-not relationship dynamics in a queer context without feeling exploitative or disrespectful. I like this series!

The Manga Shelf: A Goodbye To “The Night-Owl Witch” – This manga’s unofficial English run ended a few days ago. Made me a little sad! I’ve never thought The Night-Owl Witch was a masterpiece, but it’s a solid little series with occasional moments of greatness. I look forward to reading the mangaka’s current series when I have the time.

Monthly Movies – As I mentioned in the opening paragraph, I have a plan for this going forward (other than this month which, as mentioned, is going to be kinda weird). From now on, any Ko-Fi donator will be entitled to suggest an anime film in the “send a message” box for their donation (no live action, I’ll have to think about non-anime animation but do please refrain for now. I don’t really want to stray from this blog’s mission statement too much). You get as many suggestions as you do donations! So go nuts. Likewise, Patreon supporters get a free suggestion per month, although due to some difficulties with the system, at the moment I will have to ask that those wishing to make such a suggestion contact me directly on Twitter. (I hope to have a more convenient method sorted out by next month).

At the start of the following month, I pop up a Twitter poll and the winner of said poll is what I watch and review for that month. (The September poll will be going up not long after this article.) Suggestions do not carry over! So if you suggest, say, Quasar no Blackstar this month and it doesn’t win the poll, you’ll have to donate again next month (or use your Patreon suggestion) to nominate it again. Phew! That’s quite a lot of text, but hopefully you all get the gist. Happy suggesting!

Other Thoughts N Such

I would like to mark the return of Twenty Perfect Minutes sometime this month. I even have an episode in mind, but we’ll see how things go.

My main Other Shows ™ thought this week concerns Yu Gi Oh SEVENS, which is surprisingly compelling for being a very goofy kids’ show. It’s got a markedly different feel from any prior season of the series and the rules (both in the series and in real life) have been changed, now belonging to a new format called Rush. It makes it a lot easier to follow and lets the focus be more on character interactions and such. I really quite like this one! I say give it a shot. It’s also where this week’s header image is from! Romin is an amazing character who has some truly great faces.

That’s all for this week! The coming week might be a bit sparse since Crusader Kings III just launched and history nerd BS is my other huge interest besides anime. So if you see me MIA, I’m probably uniting Ireland or something. See y’all around!

Oh! I almost forgot! I bought a redirect URL. So you can now just type “magicplanetanime.com” to get here. No fuss no muss! Isn’t that lovely?

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, Weekly Writing Roundups

Weekly Anime Writing Roundup – 8/25/20

Hello folks! Not much to say in the lead-in here, we’ve got an old groupwatch ending, a new one starting, a couple stray articles here and there. Nothing too crazy this week but I’ve been able to keep up a good clip. Still not entirely sure about the film thing I mentioned last week, for now I’m just going to have Twitter vote on a choice and perhaps let donators and patrons suggest the films to me in the future? Something again to consider.

On with the roundup!

Twitter “Live Watches”

The Rolling Girls (#anitwitwatches) – This is over now! I’ve covered my thoughts extensively elsewhere but I still love this show a lot. I have a bit more to say further down, you’ll see why if you don’t already know.

Revolutionary Girl Utena livewatch – Progress on this has been slow just due to it being a bit hard to find the time. That said, the couple episodes I watched this past week have been some of my favorites. Check this out for a moment where the emotions run so high that both I and my screenshot software have a breakdown.

Sailor Moon (#FightingEvilByGroupwatch) – And here’s the newcomer! I literally just finished this up as I’m typing this so I’m still collecting my thoughts. I like the series so far, though it hasn’t immediately hit me in the same “oh god this is my shit” way that I was the first time I saw, say, Pretty Cure. That’s not really much of a knock though, these three episodes were all pretty fun and the show absolutely oozes 90s which would make it a fun watch all on its own. Side note: this groupwatch was started by my friend @himawari_town_ on twitter. Go give them a follow if you’re interested in this sort of thing! And check the hashtag! Lots of people have neat things to say about this show. Or heck, consider joining in yourself! Lots of options here.

The Geek Girl Authority

The God of High School Recap (S01E08): close/friend – Kind of a slower more transitional episode compared to last week. It’s solid as far as such things go, but gosh do I just want to see shark man get the tar beat out of him.

Deca-Dence Recap (S01E07): Driveshaft – I’ve finally found a surefire way to get people to watch this show and it’s this image.

They huuuuug! 😭

Burn The Witch Announced for Crunchyroll Fall Lineup – I don’t normally link this sorta thing but my hope is that Burn The Witch being easily legally available in the US miiiiiight possibly lead to us eventually getting a TV anime? Not that I’m unhappy with how the film looks, the trailer’s really promising and there’s not a single sign of whatsisname from the manga, which makes me hopeful that he’s been mostly written out.

Magic Planet Anime

The Idolmaster (2011): Full Review – Time is a flat circle and I know that because I was dead sure it had already been at least two weeks since I wrote the im@s review, but nope! It’s a very good show that I like a lot, and I’m glad some friends of mine got me to watch it. I don’t have a ton else to say beyond that other than what I said in the review itself, so get reading. By the way, there’s a not as nice looking mirror of this on Anilist if you prefer that, for some reason.

Under The Deep Pale Moon: Revisiting The Rolling Girls Five Years Later – It only occurred to me after I had already published it that this title is kinda misleading since while it has been five years since The Rolling Girls aired it’s only been just under one since I watched it, oh well. Either way; this show is a part of me now, I go through some effort to try to explain why I love it so much and to be honest I’m not sure I did it justice. This is going to be one that I’ll come back to a number of times over the course of my writing career I think. (See you all in 2025? One of my favorite pieces of anime commentary from someone who’s not me this year was a ten year anniversary article after all.)

Other Thoughts N Such

I have a plan to get a manga column called The Manga Shelf off the ground sometime soon where I just write a couple of paragraphs about whatever I happen to be reading, regardless of whether it’s finished, unfinished, bad or good. Look forward to that sometime this week?

I have been continuing with Eureka Seven, the series is going in some interesting new directions but I’m not sure I have a ton new to say on it. I’m 3/5ths of the way done, so look forward to the full review when I’ve finished!

I’ve also started watching Yu-Gi-Oh! SEVENS and gang, this show is bananas. I highly recommend it if you need a dose of goofy kid show energy in your week. If you want a small taste, please enjoy this thread I made about a recurring character who is a 37-year-old that looks like a gradeschooler and her deck themed around outdated fashion trends. Your guess is as good as mine.

Don’t have a ton else to say! Fall Guys has been consuming a fair amount of my time to be quite honest and that’s not anime so I’m not covering it here! (Or maybe I will, who knows.)

Kneel before your new God.

And goodness that’s about all! I had more to list here than I thought this week, but I suppose that’s a good sign.

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, Weekly Writing Roundups

Weekly Anime Writing Roundup – 8/11/20

So it is Tuesday–Tuesday night at that–and I am only just now getting to this. A late one just three weeks in to my new schedule! Alas. You’ll have to forgive me, it’s been a rough few days here at the lakeside temple for reasons I mostly won’t get into here. On with the anime! I’m also formatting these slightly differently now, using bullet points was making it impossible to justify most of my paragraphs, which was annoying me. Just a minor note!

Twitter

The Rolling Girls livewatch for #AniTwitWatches – We only watched one episode this week, #9, which is about the only thing in the whole show I’d call a “transitional episode” since it’s where the series switches over from being pretty strictly arc-by-arc and pivots into its finale. This, in fact, is my favorite part of part Rolling Girls (narrowly beating out the Kyoto arc). And to this day I’m amazed that they managed to fit four distinct arcs plus the three-episode finale all into a single-cour twelve episode show without having it feeling rushed. Anyway, I won’t spoil anything about episode 9 itself. It’s a doozy.

Revolutionary Girl Utena livewatch – I got to the start of the Black Rose Arc, as it’s called, in Utena, and LET ME TELL YA FOLKS, people are not kidding when they say this is where the show really starts to amp up the weirdness! I speculate somewhere in that particular thread that Utena might’ve been an influence on some of the folks at ’00s SHAFT just because a lot of the wild architecture and particular visual setups are really starting to remind me of that. Regardless, I’m having a ton of fun with the show and in fact will probably be livetweeting more of it right after I finish this writeup.

The Geek Girl Authority

THE GOD OF HIGH SCHOOL Recap (S01E06): fear/SIX – “It’s slowly improving” is not an exciting way to sell a show to someone, but I would argue that that’s basically what GOH is doing. I’m interested to see how the already pretty stylized fights change now that actual supernatural powers are involved.

THE GOD OF HIGH SCHOOL Cast Q&A – I got to interview some of GOH’s cast! Kinda! It was just a short text Q&A I sent their way through my contact at CR and their responses were in turn fairly short, but I still think it’s cool that I get to do this kinda thing. I’m really interested who this “mob boss” character Mr. Tachibana mentioned is and why the auditions for him were apparently so amusing. Did you know that Jin’s VA was primarily a stage actor before this? That’s neat.

DECA-DENCE Recap (S01E07): Differential Gear – I’m running out of ways to tell y’all that this is the best thing airing right now. Please watch Deca-Dence it’s so good.

Magic Planet Anime

Hoo boy.

Apathy Is Not The Answer: The Anime Fan Community Needs To Defend Its Most Vulnerable Members – ‘Lo and behold, the most popular article ever posted to Magic Planet Anime, by an order of magnitude. (Somehow I doubt many of these will be repeat readers but I’d love to be proven wrong). I wrote this in response to some developments over at Anilist–the details are in the article itself–and I was really not prepared for the blowup it caused. I have nothing much else to say about the issues discussed within, I don’t think it’s a perfect article, but I think I expressed a very simple plea for empathy as effective as I could. Some people, unfortunately, do not think that I should have done that.

In the two days since it’s gone up I’ve responded to a number of counterarguments and read many more. Some of which are….let’s be polite and say “a bit rude”. I’ve also read and responded to a fair bit of thanks. My hope is that the ultimate result of the article is that some people open their eyes to issues that they’d previously not considered and, secondarily, hopefully more people check out my work. I don’t consider myself an activist or political writer or anything of the sort, and it’s more than a little frustrating to be pigeonholed as some kind of ultra-left demagogue less than a month out from writing a decently positive review of goddamn Akiba’s Trip. What can you do, I suppose.

Other Thoughts N Such

I’ve got several things to talk about down here this week!

I finished Oregairu‘s first season. No real idea what to make of it! It’s interesting and I liked it more than I didn’t but I’m not in a real rush to watch season two or catch up to the (currently-airing) third. It’s one I’ll be turning over in my head for a while.

I have also resumed watching The Idolm@ster after quite a long break. This show is still very good for many of the same reasons I outlined in my article about it way way back when this blog was in its infancy, although sadly Miki is not as present in the show’s back half. I am still not entirely sure what to think of the rival idol agency and its comically evil president, but hey! Also in that article I briefly mentioned that I was enjoying 22/7. Haha, how things change.

And finally, I’ve also been working my way through Eureka Seven. E7 occupies a really odd place in the popcultural memory and I want to talk about that more when I actually review it (as I’ve been commissioned to do, thank you patron, you know who you are!) but I’ve been enjoying it so far. I particularly love the character of Anemone who is, well, a lot. E7 in general is quite the wild ride and I’m really liking its particular brand of weirdness, particularly now, as the first eight or so episodes of the show were a bit slow for me. Side note! Connoisseurs of Mecha Anime Discourse may know that a few years back the Darling in the FranXX showrunners were accused of essentially xeroxing Anemone’s entire design. Having now seen some Eureka Seven, I get the complaint!

and GOODNESS. That’s about all for this week! I’ve been busy, I suppose! To that end, well, I’ll just direct your attention to the footer below.

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

Weekly Anime Writing Roundup – 8/3/20

So it’s the middle of the night and I’ve committed to doing these on Mondays I guess. Whatever! Anime time.

Twitter

  • The Rolling Girls livewatch for #AniTwitWatches – An advantage of linking to the Twitter moments is that I can literally just copy and paste the links lmao. Anyhow: the arc of The Rolling Girls we watched this week, the Kyoto arc, is among my favorites. Mostly just tweeted this one out as normal but do take a peek at my last couple tweets which are about the song sung in the latter episode of the arc.
  • Revolutionary Girl Utena livewatch – I would like to say that things are heating up in Utena but I’ve been assured that things actually start *really* getting weird in the next arc, so I guess I’ll look forward to that. I maintain that Nanami’s purple epulet / yellow jacket combo is absolutely killer.

The Geek Girl Authority

  • DECA-DENCE Recap (S01E04): Transmission – BOY THERE’S A LOT GOIN’ ON IN THIS SHOW, HUH? I have the exact opposite issue with Deca-Dence that I have with God of High School. There’s so much going on in each episode it’s a bit hard to know what specifically to write about. That said: I love where this show’s head is at and I’m super excited to see how it develops from here.
  • THE GOD OF HIGH SCHOOL Recap (S01E05): ronde/hound – After several episodes that I don’t think would really move the needle for most people The God of High School‘s fifth is the first one in a while where I think it’s actually done something to improve. Granted; it’s still not being wildly innovative here, “talk with your fists” is fairly standard shonen stuff, but it’s done well here. Consider picking this up if you like that kinda thing and have been on the fence about this one?

Other Thoughts N Such

  • I started watching Oregairu (or as it’s formally known in English, ahem, My Teen Romantic Comedy SNAFU. Yikes) just out of idle curiosity and at the inspiration of seeing someone I’m mutuals with livetweeting it. It’s a neat little series, I’m only a few episodes in so I can’t make any sweeping judgments yet, but I like how it manages to juggle the rather difficult tasks of making Hachiman seem like someone representative of the lame cringelord in all of us without making it seem like it’s endorsing his mentality, which are two different things. Obviously not everyone is going to feel that way about it, but still, I’m pleasantly surprised with this’n so far.

And that’s all for this week. See you guys around!

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.