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Little Witch Academia OVA 1 (2013)

Kemurikusa

Eizouken ni wa Te wo Dasu na

86

Sousou no Frieren

Akudama Drive

YuruYuri S1

Mahou Shoujo Madoka Magica

ODDTAXI

Nichijou

...or something like that.

The only thing that caught my attention right off was Kowloon Generic Romance. I was interested in the setting, but the manga never managed to really convey it, and hopefully an anime will.

Well... and Shiunji-ke no Kodomotachi, but that's because it's from the same mangaka as Rent a Girlfriend and I read the first dozen or so chapters on a whim and it was even more insipid and tedious and awful than I expected. I have no intention of watching it - I just noticed it on the list and was surprised.

Lazarus looks kind of interesting, but it's unlikely I'll watch it while it's releasing. If it's anything like the other Mappa action series I've seen, it'll be decent in the long run, but it'll go through a period at about the 2/3 mark when the story will be going in about ten different directions at once and there will still be enough background secrets left to be revealed that none of it will make much sense, and I'd rather binge my way through that.

So last week started with the rest of the Little Witch Academia series. I rank the first LWA OVA as the best single "episode" of anime I've ever seen (and I rewatched it a few more times last week - so over the last two weeks I've watched it about a dozen times - and that opinion still holds), so any follow-up couldn't help but be sort of anticlimactic, and with that in mind, it was fine. It stumbled a bit here and there, and I found Akko's inexplicable lack of character growth particularly disappointing, but I liked it well enough all in all. And the final episode was excellent (and I suspect part of the problem with the series was that that episode was planned out in advance, so the rest of the series, and especially the last few episodes leading up to it, had to be shaped to accommodate it).

Then I cast about for something just light and silly and preferably short and ended up with Uchuu Patrol Luluco. And only noticed later that it was also Trigger. It's one of those that doesn't even bother trying to make sense and just revels in lunacy and nonsense, and it was fine.

Then because Trigger had become somthing of a theme, I poked around a bit and went on to Kiznaiver, which was... okay. It had a fair amount of potential, but the pacing was awkward. It basically spends the first ten episodes or so just heaping on layer after layer of essentially context-less mystery, then stuffs the last two episodes with a flood of reveals and exposition to finally make some sort of sense of all of it.

And over the urge to watch Trigger productions, I wandered into Kuzu no Honkai, which is a tawdry love polygon and a rollercoaster of hope and despair and longing and betrayal, and has been pretty good in a smutty soap opera-ish sort of way.

That was more or less what I expected/hoped for.

And it worked out as I expected/hoped - the whole issue in the first place was that she hit a wall trying to direct a love story, so even beyond saving the world of Perishing, that was the central problem that had to be solved.

And the last scene was nice - predictable in retrospect, but handled well.

All in all, I liked it. The series started off really strong, but then hit a bit of a slog at about the 2/3 mark. The end was nice though and while it might've been a bit trite, it was the ending that Natsuko wanted, and that everyone deserved.

Meh.

The drama feels even more unsatisfyingly tacked on than it already did, but it's pretty easy to see what the broad shape of the last episode is going to be, and it should be an acceptable if not particularly surprising or compelling ending.

It's a shame this wasn't better paced. It had a lot of potential in the beginning, and it even could've ended pretty much exactly the way it appears it's going to and still could've been much better just by unfolding at a more natural, even pace. But it also could've been worse...

And Kaede scores a critical hit on Kouhei.

I love that Emilia is the strongest member of the strongest group of adventurers in the land, and just being around Grey and the kids completely overwhelms her.

I guess that means that ultimately Nina is strongest...

Same here. I've actually re-read the series a few times now, just because I want a dose of its charm and there's nothing new.

They're just both so awkward and so cute and so absolutely perfect for each other, and it's an endless series of one of them unconsciously doing something adorable and the other one (and us) going "Hnnng!"

Pshew.

To its credit, this is all starting to come together. It's just that what it's coming together into is very dark.

There was an interesting bit in there. While Natsuko was going through that sort of hallucinatory flashback, with what appeared to be actual memories mixed up with people with their hair over their faces haranguing her, there was one scene where she was on a sidewalk as people walked by, talking about how awful her movie was and what a bomb it was and how overrated she is and so on.

I don't think those were her memories. They were the director's.

Aah... great use of tropes there.

The splash/sneeze/bath series was already well-played if terribly cliched, since we needed a scene in which Honami and Yui got to understand each other, and Honami being vulnerable is always adorable. And a little fanservice never hurts.

But then to introduce a secret boss who's Honami's ara ara onee-san, and who's so terrifying that she reduces the otherwise preternaturally beautiful, strong and domineering Yui to a quivering wreck? That was a great touch.

The story has come together oddly, and unfortunately unsatisfyingly, in this.

Early on, I wasn't even sure if it was going to have a plot to speak of. It was pretty much a slice of Alina's life and her trials and tribulations as a guild receptionist who, if all else failed, could one-shot a boss monster just to make the world easier for her to deal with.

Then it started pulling in little bits of a broader plot, with the secret dungeons and dark gods and man in black. Okay - great.

But somehow none of that has really been incorporated into the story. Instead, it's felt like it's still a slice of Alina's life (expanded to include tsundere romance), and it just has some little bits and pieces of a broader story awkwardly stuffed into place here and there. Like nobody is actually focused on that part of it - that they're just going along with slice of life and gag humor and tsundere romance, then they come to the part of the script that says "insert dark god here" or "trigger encounter with man in black here," so they just do a scene that meets those requirements and bolt it into place. Then they hastily exposit, or just handwave, whatever gaps exist between the current bit of awkwardly inserted story and the previous bit.

I suspect the broader problem is just trying to stuff too much story into too few episodes, having to cut things to get it all to fit, and doing a relatively poor job of deciding what to cut.

It has accomplished one thing though - it's reminded me of why I generally don't watch currently-airing anime.

I'd never been quite clear on what Kaede made of the idea of childhood friendship blossoming into romance.

Now we know.

Kouhei sure has his work cut out for him...

Maybe I'm slow on the uptake but I just realized with this chapter that if this series continues long enough, there could be and should be another entire arc coming in which everything comes apart.

Just as Emi wasn't really Remilia, Pina isn't really the Star Maiden.

(Or whatever her name is. Is Pina her original in-universe name? We knew that she was inhabited by an isekaied human, but have we learned her real name, like Emi to Remilia? I don’t recall that distinction being made explicitly, but I don’t remember the details…)

And this distinction between demons and devils sets up a situation in which the demons, who have been accepted into human society because all indications are that they're not malevolent, could turn malevolent.

And Remilia's thirst for revenge could well lead her further toward evil than Emi would've gone.

All of which sets up the possibility that the demons will begin to transform into devils and pose the threat they were originally thought to be and Remilia will end up, just as in the original version of events, leading an evil force. And it will be up to the Star Maiden, who quite possibly has been present all this time in the back of Pina's mind, just as Remilia was in the back of Emi's mind, to be the hero who sets things right.

And just as the trauma of being cast out was enough to overwhelm Emi and allow the original Remilia to take over, the experience of being publicly exposed and humiliated could be enough to overwhelm Pina and allow the original Star Maiden to take over (and just in time).

Huh...

The thing, to me, that's best about Isshiki is that she is, for Hachiman, a perfect combination of playful and serious. By one measure, she's always completely honest with Hachiman, but her honesty is buried under a layer of playful banter and teasing, which actually makes it easier for Hachiman to deal with.

She's much like Komachi in that respect, and it's not a coincidence that Isshiki's and Komachi's eventual meeting is epic - they instantly recognize each other as kindred spirits.

I assume that what we're seeing lately is literal filler. They have a background plot going with this mysterious villain who's spreading rumors of secret quests and apparently trying to get people to confront dark gods, and my guess is that they already have the culmination of all of that planned out, and ended up with two or three episodes they had to fill with something first.

The latest episode does have a bit of character growth, at least as measured on a relative scale (with someone as tsundere as Alina, a little goes a long way). But it's still mostly biding time.

So Season 2 of Oregairu wasn't quite the slog I was afraid it was going to be, though not because the characters really improved at all. They were still pretty much all assholes of one sort or another - it's just that the other characters didn't get as much screen time, thanks to the VERY welcome addition of Isshiki to the cast. Just having to sit through less of Haruno would've been enough all by itself to greatly improve the season overall, but as a bonus, Isshiki actually turned out to be a great character (easily my favorite in the entire series), and a perfect foil/accomplice for Hachiman.

Then I went on to Season 3, which was... okay. It was initially difficult, in part because it was like Hachiman and Yukino and Yui cranked their already frustrating inability to communicate up to 11, but mostly because it put a lot of emphasis on Yukino and Haruno's mother, who's one of the most foul, loathsome, manipulative bitches it's ever been my displeasure to encounter in any medium, and just seeing her on-screen ruined things for me. But once it got that c*** out of the way and Hachiman and Yukino finally started to open up, it was (finally) pleasant. Oddly enough though, the ending sort of suffered IMO by coming together too quickly and easily, particularly after all the time spent tediously building up to it. It was okay all in all, but mostly I was glad it was over.

I wanted an antidote after that, so I deliberately looked for something roughly similar but far more pleasant, and ended up finally watching Zero no Tsukaima, which has been on my TBW pretty much as long as I've known Louise existed, which is pretty much ever since I first went online. I expected it to be amusing and enjoyable, but it surprised me by actually being sort of awesome in addition to that. I really enjoyed it, and even more than I'd hoped I would.

Then I bounced around a bit and finally, for I don't know what reason, ended up with Queen's Blade, which is one of the most thoroughly bizarre and ridiculous things I've seen. It manages to combine cringily brazen fanservice, battle royale, complex political intrigue, genuinely interesting characters, tragedy and gag humor into... something. It's so exaggerated that it almost seems like it was meant to be a satire, but it stops just short of actually being one. It is definitely... something though.

And as far as current series go, Guild Receptionist is moving a bit too slowly lately, Zenshu is still flailing a bit, but I'm hoping it's going to do that MAPPA thing where they somehow manage to tie everything together in the end anyway, and I'm still really enjoying Honey Lemon Soda, trite and tropish though it may be.

Same here - I read the first few chapters and just couldn't get into it.

It's not just that the MC is too creepy for me to tolerate - he's so over-the-top creepy that he breaks my suspension of disbelief.

It's hilarious that even the guildmaster is intimidated by Alina.

And nice to see Jade actually make a bit of progress. He still has a long way to go, but her heart did actually thaw just a bit, and that's a first.

Great episode - everybody got some character growth.

Lululee overcoming her self-doubt was the obvious original focus of this arc, but it was still nice to see.

Jade showed both determination and creativity, both of which he's going to need if he's going to keep up with Alina.

Lowe being unexpectedly badass was particularly great to see.

Ah but the highlight - I've been especially waiting for the moment when Alina would finally let her guard down, and it was every bit as awesome as I'd hoped it would be. And she even opened up a bit about Shroud. Of course, neither one lasted long before her tsun kicked back in, but still...

Mm... I guess that'll do.

The series hinted at deeper, darker secrets, and romantic possibilities, none of which figured in the end. But that's sort of okay, since it didn't get the time to lay all the necessary groundwork for that, and just making it simple and light is likely a better choice than speedrunning the rest of the details just to get the ending in place.

I've definitely seen worse.

Is Kouhei making his move?