I’m really liking this, and this was arguably the best episode yet…

I originally expected this to be an iyashikei, but (starting with the oddly dissonant OP) it sort of shifted from what I expected, and started to feel more threatening and somber than that. And this episode started out the most threatening yet. But then there was such a complete and rewarding shift in tone from start to finish that it made it ultimately just that much more warm and uplifting. And to the degree that this has a central theme, that seems to be it.

This is essentially an iyashikei - it’s just that it’s not naturally or automatically that way. It’s made that way by Yachiyo’s kindness and courtesy that’s tempered by quiet determination and a sharp sense of right and wrong. She’s unstintingly kind and courteous, right up until the moment that someone steps beyond acceptable behavior, at which point she immediately shifts to brutally honest and unreserved condemnation, which lasts exactly long enough to clearly convey her opinion of things, at which point she just as quickly and easily shifts back to unstinting kindness and courtesy. And it works. It’s made clear, even to someone like Harmy, that she bears no ill will at all - that her kindness is entirely sincere. It’s just that she’s also entirely honest and fair-minded and fearless, and when somebody deserves a figurative smack upside the head, she will deliver it. And they all come to respect and even admire that.

As do I.

Started off this week with the rest of Mekacucity Actors, which ended up being mediocre all in all (early on, I didn’t think it’d even manage that). In the later episodes, it mostly set aside the tedious Monogatari-style pop philosophy monologues set against geometric abstract liminal space backdrops and got down to some actual character development and exposition… It wasn’t particularly compelling or even coherent character development and exposition, but at least it was something.

Then, sort of wandering around aimlessly, I happened across a currently-airing series of a genre I’ve never bothered to watch before and what-the-hell gave it a watch, and that’s how I ended up catching up on and following Maebashi Witches. On the surface, it’s just cute and cheery, with pleasantly high quality animation and music and endearing characters and surprising emotional depth, and that might be all it ends up being, which’ll be fine. It’s surprisingly enjoyable just as that. But there’s also some room there for something else. Nothing is quite what it appears to be - they aren’t really “witches” in any recognizable sense, the mascot character who recruited them is revealing himself to be a smooth-talking and dishonest hustler and the deal they’ve made with him keeps getting more complex and its completion further out of reach. I don’t expect anything close to Madoka out of it, but there does seem to be a similar hidden agenda and while Keroppe is no Kyubey, he definitely isnt telling them the entire truth.

In any event, at worst, it’s cute and endearing and pleasant, and I’m enjoying it.

Then I sort of bulldozed my way through Sora no Otoshimono Forte, which I’ve been idly threatening to watch for years now, but I expected it to be similar to the first season, which is to say little bits of brilliance scattered here and there among lots of tedious and cringey trash, which is pretty much exactly what it was. Tomoki spent about 90% of the series super deformed and doing that “Kek kek kek” laugh while the rest of the cast just played their assigned one-note roles, but it wasn’t all bad, and the handful of serious moments were actually pretty good. So about what I expected.

Then I capped the week off with a real gem - Planetarian, which was absolutely glorious. It’s heart-warming and beautiful and tragic and uplifting and somber and deeply, deeply moving, and it made me smile and tear up at the same time and I loved it. I ended up watching both the series - Chiisana Hoshi no Yume and the movie/sequel - Hoshi no Hito, which tells a condensed version of the series plus some additional content after the events of the series. They’re both worth it.

And I already grabbed a Yumemi screenshot that’s my new wallpaper.

It told me to not expect anything original - to just settle in for the same insipid, contrived edginess they’ve already beat to death in the Monogatari series

That was some fine iyashikei.

Ponko continues to be a great character and Yachiyo is definitely growing as an individual (and not just with the va-va-va-voom upgrade). And it was nice to see the rest of the Tanuki family applying themselves.

And we got more aliens, and now Yachiyo can talk to them.

Just nice and heartwarming all around.

The only ones I’ve seen are to the only series I’m watching this season - Apocalypse Hotel, which is of note for an oddly off-key OP.

The first time I heard it I just took it to be the OP as sung by an awkward and poorly skilled robot, endearingly trying to sing a song that’s more upbeat than she is, and I loved it. I still do and I still do.

So I started off the week finishing up Noein: Mou Hitori no Kimi e, which was excellent. It’s part political thriller and part coming of age story, played out against a backdrop of quantum mechanics and multiverse theory, and just very well done.

Then I watched both seasons of Getsuyoubi no Tawawa, which, in spite of its four minute episodes dominated by fanservice is actually pretty good.

Then, somehow, I ended up watching Eizouken ni wa Te wo Dasu na! for the third time, and enjoyed it all over again. (And just thinking about it, I now have Easy Breezy stuck in my head).

And at the moment, I’m watching Mekakucity Actors, which atarted off being all style and no substance, which is particularly disappointing in this case, since its style is just a retread of the Monogatari series. And I don’t just mean that it’s the same basic style - it’s the same sort of character designs against the same sort of backgrounds (and seems as if they could be literally the same backgrounds) doing the same stylized gestures and motions accompanied by the same sort of droning narration of the same sort of edgy pop philosophy. So basically the anime equivalent of reheated leftover cup ramen.

The first time I saw a character do this damned head tilt, I almost shut it off right then and there.

Thankfully, it does seem to be finally revealing some actual substance (seven episides in) though whether it ends up being enough to be satisfying or not remains to be seen.

Great episode - Ponko is awesome. The “don’t be the prey” scene was especially good.

The Nudel was a bit too similar to the Graboids from Tremors for it to be an accident.

And Yachiyo got the “pretty voice” reward, so maybe the OP will evolve?

Tawawa on Monday

I bounced off of this one a few weeks ago. I liked the first episode and (what I thought was);the overall concept, but when the next episode introduced a different female lead who was immediately mostly defined by large bouncy breasts, I was a bit disconcerted, and then when I skipped ahead and sampled some of the other episodes, all apparently featuring different women, all defined by large bouncy breasts, I lost interest.

I’ll have to give it another shot though. It’s not that I dislike large bouncy breasts, but that I tend to assume that when they make such an early and prominent appearance, there’s not going to be much else of note.

Mmm… I can sort of see that. There are some impressive special effects that accompany the future technology that were likely dazzling for the time. And the CGI for the backgrounds likely was state of the art (and certainly better than, for example, Initial D).

Still though - the character animation seems pretty poor regardless of age, and the contrast of rough, fuzzy character art with simple, rigid, entirely rectilinear CGI backdrops is distracting.

All that said though, I don’t want to focus on the art too much. It’s a thing I noticed, so I mentioned it, but more to the point, the story is very good and intriguing and (so far) well plotted and paced, and the characters are well developed, and I’ll forgive pretty much anything for a good story with good characters.

I’m really looking forward to this. I love the manga, and I can’t wait to actually hear a Wada rant. And some of the manga scenes are going to be epic if they’re done well in the anime. I’m especially thinking of the “what to do if you’re attacked by a wild animal” scene, since it relies on slowly building tension and excitement capped by perfect comedic timing.

Started off the week with Gabriel Dropout, which is a barrel of fun. The basic setup is that in order to qualify as full-fledged angels or demons (as the case might be), angels/demons in training have to spend some time on Earth, which is how we end up with two angels and two demons making up the foursome for a CGDCT screwball comedy slice of school life. I liked it all the way through - good characters (none of them are particularly good at what they’re supposed to be), laugh out loud humor, nice artstyle. It’s not quite to YuruYuri or Lucky Star quality, but was well worth it.

Then, craving a bit more screwball comedy, I went back to a long-time guilty pleasure and rewatched Photon aka Photon: The Idiot Adventures. It’s a sort of sci-fi adventure story set on a far distant future Earth with a straightforward comedy hook - every single major character is an idiot of one sort or another. And in fact, their entire sort of quasi-mystical technology is based on “aho energy” - idiot energy. It’s not great by any means, but it’s good idiotic fun.

Then I sort of steeled my resolve and dove into one that I dropped after a couple of episodes about a year ago, because I could see it was going to be a rough ride, and at the time I wasn’t ready to invest as much energy and attention as it was going to demand - Noein: Mou Hitori no Kimi e. I’m about 2/3 of the way through the 24 episode run, and it has been very dense and dramatic, and very good. It’s a sort of Evangelion knock-off insofar as it’s in part a complex and vague science fiction/superpower war allegory on coming of age, but without the religious claptrap - it’s instead all built around quantum physics and multiverse theory. The only real downside to it is that the animation is frankly terrible - an awful combination of cheap fuzzy hand drawn and cheap low poly CGI. But the characters and the story make it worth it.

One of the creepier manifestations of his profound mental illness.