Category Archives: Episode Writeup

The Legend of Vox Machina S2 – Episode 10

Posted on by

Hello folks, and welcome the heck back to Wrong Every Time. Today I’m delighted to be returning to The Legend of Vox Machina, as Grog and his companions square off for a battle that will surely kill them. Seriously, there’s like no way Grog can fight his uncle Kevdak – Kevdak’s wielding a legendary pair of knuckles, Grog already lost this fight back in the day, and he’s currently as taut and muscular as a strip of beef jerky. As such, I’m intrigued to see in what particular fashion Mercer “cheats” for this encounter, giving Grog some productive route forward while nonetheless making it seem like Grog himself earned this victory.

Skillfully laid deus ex machina is well and good in a traditional narrative, but relying on outside interference generally strips players of agency in a tabletop setting. I’m guessing Grog’s victory might serve as a payoff for his last-episode revelation (perhaps Pike will counter his “strength is looking after the little folk” with a “sometimes strength is looking after the big folk”), but I’m eager to find out how.

As for my own campaign, the bustle of moving furniture out of our old apartment and searching for a new one has made it difficult to schedule any new sessions, so I’ve instead been hard at work plotting out the last act of the campaign. This is of course an inherently fraught proposition, as player agency and a fully scripted narrative are naturally at odds, but we’ve fortunately journeyed far enough into the campaign that it’s essentially all payoff from here, meaning I can at least script the broad beats of the upcoming adventures. To be honest, it’s actually quite similar to a common strategy for writing novels: establish the big structural beats so you can be thinking long-term, but allow the characters to surprise you as you’re filling in the individual scenes and sections. This whole process has been so invigorating that I’ll likely start working on some original fiction again once this campaign wraps up, but for now, my mind is abuzz with final boss concepts worthy of the time my players have invested in this rambling tale. Now enough of that, let’s see what Vox Machina are up to!

Continue reading →

Bocchi the Rock! – Episode 11

Posted on by

Hello folks, and welcome back to Wrong Every Time. Today I’d like to check back in on the status of Bocchi and the gang, who are currently gearing up for a performance at Bocchi’s school festival. From a starting point of lugging her guitar to school in the vague hope of being recognized as a Cool Rocker Chick, Bocchi has now earned the credentials to truly support that optimistic self-image. She’s in a real band! She’s played at a real club! She’s made friends with a real alcoholic bassist!

Kikuri’s support has indeed been crucial to get Bocchi this far, alongside the persistent encouragement of Seika and her bandmates. Through their steady guidance and Bocchi’s own faltering efforts, Bocchi the Rock! has articulated the evolving challenges of gaining social confidence with sympathy and precision, consistently acknowledging the fragility of new gains, inevitability of wayward digressions, and cruciality of a loving support network. With Bocchi’s initial goal now within reach, let’s see how our anxious hero is faring!

Continue reading →

Kaiba – Episode 8

Posted on by

After half a season of rambling episodic tales with diverse thematic takeaways, Kaiba’s eighth episode finds itself falling victim to that enduring foe of metaphorical fiction: narrative continuity. With our protagonist’s fate uncertain following Vanilla’s heroic sacrifice, our story turns to the planet highlighted in the show’s opening, the planet of rule and rebellion. Here, the tyrannical Warp rules from on high in a body that’s strangely familiar, while Lord Dada foments rebellion below, aided by his chief accomplices Popo and Neyro. The course of this episode resolves as so many dominoes tumbling into place, the falsehoods of both Warp and Dada breaching the surface as the friends Kaiba has long grasped towards make their final stand.

Continue reading →

Yuki Yuna is a Hero – Episode 3

Posted on by

Hello folks, and welcome back to Wrong Every Time. Today I’d like to check back in on Yuki Yuna and her continuing heroic escapades, with the team having just secured a victory against three simultaneous invaders. Yuki Yuna’s second episode answered some questions and raised others, affirming and expanding on its internal mythology while leaving the mechanisms and larger motivations of this conflict conspicuously vague. This ambiguity stands in contrast to the show’s highly specific sense of place: as one of my readers helpfully explained, Yuki Yuna is specifically grounded in the city of Kan’onji, on Shikoku Island.

Aside from overt reveals, last episode’s emphasis on Fu and Togo reconnecting, as well as the gamified resolutions of its final battles, made it clear that explicating personal bonds and illustrating strategically grounded conflicts are also among the show’s top priorities. I’m a little wary of the show’s emphasis on “national defense” (no Togo, high schoolers are not deserters if fighting monsters seems outside their comfort zone), but we’ll have to see if that’s an ongoing thread or just a few odd turns of phrase. We’ve got Vertices to bash, so let’s get to it!

Continue reading →

Skip and Loafer – Episode 2

Posted on by

Hello folks, and welcome back to Wrong Every Time. Today I think I’m gonna treat myself to another episode of Skip and Loafer, a show whose premiere proved delightful in basically every respect. Our protagonists Mitsumi and Sousuke are already demonstrating themselves to be both inherently charming and satisfyingly multifaceted characters, endearing apart and adorable as a unit, each with clear lessons to learn from the other’s example. Rather than simple, formless infatuation, it feels like we’re moving towards that “each provides what the other lacks” sort of relationship that tends to define the best anime romances, from Toradora to Spice and Wolf to Oregairu.

And alongside the show’s strong writing and characterization, director Kotomi Deai’s production is providing a perfect aesthetic compliment to the show’s narrative fundamentals, offering art design and animation flourishes as nonchalantly accomplished as the show’s character drama. The color work is light and inviting, the character acting is playful and expressive, and even the sound design is working hard to accentuate the key emotional moments. Skip and Loafer is proving itself as charming and skillfully realized as I could hope for, and I’m eager to get back to it. So let’s do that!

Continue reading →

BanG Dream! It’s MyGO!!!!! – Episode 2

Posted on by

Hello folks, and welcome back to Wrong Every Time. Today I’m eager to dive back into the thorny drama of BanG Dream! It’s MyGO!!!!!, after a premiere that seemed to promise far more tears and resentment than starry-eyed musical performances. MyGO opened on a band breakup and continued more or less in that vein, as the scattered members of CRYCHIC all went about their separate ways, some eager to pick up the pieces, others hesitant to invite such pain again.

Into this tangled web of relationships stomped Anon Chihaya, who has no idea what’s going on, but goddamnit if she’s not gonna make it about herself. Anon is a delightfully self-absorbed heroine who exhibits none of the optimistic or inspiring qualities you’d expect from a music drama lead; she’s pursuing a band purely to fit in at her apparently band-obsessed high school, and has so far responded to the emotional troubles of her compatriots with a mixture of gossip-hungry curiosity and loud indifference. Basically none of the characters introduced so far seem to exhibit healthy relationships with their peers, which seems like a terrific recipe for some Rumors-style musical alchemy. Let’s see what they get up to next!

Continue reading →

Bocchi the Rock! – Episode 10

Posted on by

Hello folks, and welcome back to Wrong Every Time. Today I thought we’d check in on the misadventures of Bocchi and the gang, as our crew settles back into their school routine after a semi-triumphant summer break. Bookended by the shining victories of Kessoku Band’s latest performance and their trip to the beach, Bocchi’s vacation was otherwise characterized by a retreat to Bocchi’s familiar bedroom hermitage, emphasizing how personal growth is never quite as easy or consistent as we might hope.

That said, Kita has promised she’ll be paying more attention to Bocchi at school, so I imagine we’re in for a fresh run of socialization immersion therapy as classes reconvene. Can Bocchi square her desperate need to be seen with her paralyzing terror of being known? Let’s find out!

Continue reading →

Tsurune S2 – Episode 5

Posted on by

Hello folks, and welcome back to Wrong Every Time. Today I’d like to check back in on the boys of Tsurune, and see if Minato’s team can drag themselves out of their current funk. Having failed to compete as a true unit in their recent tournament, Masaki ordered all of them to figure out what they’re lacking, and that’s precisely what they’ve been doing. After most of an episode of morosely practicing off the range, Minato seems to have realized he’s lost sight of his team – and what’s more, that he doesn’t actually know what his own preferred style might be.

With the bold examples of Nikaidou’s team proving the variable nature of “correct form,” Minato isn’t alone in this uncertainty. Ryouhei is beginning to doubt the value and nature of “beautiful archery,” while Kaito is realizing for the first time how his own play inherently builds off the performance and mentality of his teammates. Their strategic concerns serve as natural echoes for the process of identity reassessment all adolescents experience; social pressure instigates a process of self-analysis that causes us to doubt our unconsidered modes of behavior, and perhaps consciously assign ourselves new patterns and perspectives. Given this, it’s little surprise that the already self-critical Seiya and highly emotionally intelligent Nanao are weathering this challenge with grace; after all, self-assessment is second nature to both of them. But our other boys will likely need a little help, so let’s see how they’re fairing in a fresh episode of Tsurune!

Continue reading →

BanG Dream! It’s MyGO!!!!! – Episode 1

Posted on by

Hello folks, and welcome back to Wrong Every Time. Today we’re embarking on a new adventure, as we explore the first episode of the currently concluding BanG Dream! It’s MyGO!!!!! I’ll confess, I have virtually no experience with the overall BanG Dream! franchise; I found the first season’s first episode perfectly watchable back when it premiered, but have since then skipped out on the continuing struggles of its various bandmates. However, I’m told that MyGO is more or less self-contained, and beyond that, everything I’ve been learning about this show via twitter osmosis seems to indicate MyGO is a unique and apparently kinda devastating experience.

I’ve seen musicians choking out performances through tears, memes wagering the relative toxicity of all the show’s principle relationships, and all manner of other inexplicable reactions to MyGO’s clearly tempestuous drama. Alongside their wealth of experience composing for various idol shows, series composer Yuniko Ayana also tackled the brilliant and devastating given, so I’ve no doubt they can articulate convincing human tragedy. What form that tragedy will take remains a tantalizing mystery, so let’s not waste another moment – onward to MyGO!

Continue reading →

Land of the Lustrous – Episode 11

Posted on by

Land of the Lustrous’ eleventh episode begins moments after the last, with Dia shattered on the floor and Bort squaring off with this imposing, now apparently divided Lunarian. Having faced this creature on the shoreline, Bort’s finely tuned instincts came to an obvious conclusion: we cannot defeat this creature, and thus we must flee to await Sensei’s guidance. Ensconced in the certainty of their role and purpose, it was an easy call to make, and thus Bort fled without a second glance. Though Bort takes pride in their strength, they are not arrogant or foolhardy; the very fact of their strength means they must take all the more care in applying themselves, ensuring their abilities serve as not just protection, but also a model and guide for their fellow gems.

Continue reading →