Category Archives: Episode Writeup

The Fire Hunter – Episode 4

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Hello folks, and welcome back to Wrong Every Time. Today I’m eager to return to the ominous, intriguing world of The Fire Hunter, a world where Prometheus’ gift has turned against us, and even proximity to an open flame will turn human beings into ashes. Stranded within isolated villages, the last embers of humanity eke out a desperate existence, each community an essential link in a chain bound by forest-traversing trains. And now even that existence seems threatened, as greater and more terrible Fire Fiends challenge the few vessels left to humanity, and curses spread through the cowering villagers.

And of course, all that’s only the trouble faced by one of our two protagonists; over on Koushi’s side, we’ve also learned that the current governmental order is on the brink of collapse, that violent separatists are preparing for a major attack, and that anyone who’s in the know is already stockpiling weapons for the coming chaos. The Fire Hunter has constructed a world as evocative as it is fragile, and I am profoundly curious as to how Touko will find her place within it (or even survive the next five minutes, for that matter). Let’s get to it!

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Yuri is My Job! – Episode 12

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Hello folks, and welcome back to Wrong Every Time. Today we return once more to Cafe Liebe, with Blume elections settled and Schwesterns firmly solidified. It’s been a bumpy road to this point, as the navigation of personas inherent in our themed cafe has forced basically all of our “students” to reckon with the performances they already adopt in their own lives. Through the ornate rituals of Cafe Liebe, they have found new ways to express their own feelings, whether through embracing its time-honored artifice or realizing how their true intentions stray from its formula.

Cafe Liebe encourages intimacy up to a specific predetermined threshold; there is no love within its walls, only a performance of longing calibrated to the expectations of the crowd. And while you could rightfully argue that media of liberation becoming its own convention is a betrayal of those seeking genuine free expression, it is equally clear that these precise restrictions allowed characters like Kanoko and Mitsuki to feel safe within its walls, cushioned within a world of limits and language they could fully understand. Just like the formative dramas it is based on, Cafe Liebe is a sanctuary of adolescence, a cushioned world where they can play-act the feelings that frighten them, and thereby gain the confidence to embrace their true selves. Let’s see how their journey continues as we return to Yuri is My Job!

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Monogatari Off/Monster Season – Episode 6.5

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Hello folks, and welcome back to Wrong Every Time. Today we’re returning back to Monogatari’s wandering supplementary stories, as Nadeko’s adventures in identity-forming give way to some kind of sprawling Shinobu saga. As a pair, the two arcs seem likely to illustrate the far poles of Monogatari’s fables. Though it involved a great number of magical doppelgangers, Nadeko’s story was ultimately all about her personal psychology, grappling with the fundamental question of how our evolving senses of self square with the ostensibly stable trajectory of a specific life goal. By embracing the legitimacy and lingering truth of her old personas, Nadeko committed herself to moving forward without rejecting the past, finding personal insight and even community in her past selves.

In contrast, Shinobu’s stories are often Monogatari’s most fanciful, leaning into alternate realities, supernatural threats, and generally external conflict in all its manifestations. It seems appropriate then that we are opening with what is billed as “A Cruel Fairy Tale,” the latest of Monogatari’s frequent story-in-story digressions, complete with its own studio, adaptation team, and presumably novel aesthetic. If there’s one thing Isin loves more than stories about people, it’s stories about stories. Let’s get to it!

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Blue Reflection Ray – Episode 11

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Hello folks, and welcome back to Wrong Every Time. Today is certain to be a moment of reckoning, as we return to Blue Reflection Ray with Mio’s promised reprieve just now coming to its end. Having vowed to rewrite the past and thus provide her doomed world with a future, Mio is prepared to do whatever it takes to protect her sister Hiori. Meanwhile, Shino waits hungrily in the shadows, plotting to turn that same sister into the despairing fuel for her ambitions, with Mio’s demise likely serving as the catalyst.

It’s all a satisfying muddle of desperate hopes and brewing betrayals, lent some welcome emotional weight through the clear merit of Mio’s challenge to the Blue Reflectors. “Embrace your trauma in order to overcome it” is not a universally applicable solution, particularly for someone like Nina, who has not only suffered more acutely than any of our heroic leads, but who also lacks the support network that cushioned characters like Miyako through their recovery. And beyond this, for all we’ve learned about the reflectors, they still appear to be appendages of a system we do not understand, designed for purposes that remain wholly unclear. Thus our heroes enter the day of reckoning with no plan, no coherent philosophy, and no understanding of their own purpose. Let’s get to it!

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Shoushimin Series – Episode 4

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Hello folks, and welcome back to Wrong Every Time. Today I’m eager to return to Shoushimin Series, as our two mysterious youngsters attempt to crack the mystery of Osanai’s stolen bike. Having tracked Sakagami to a driving school on the outskirts of town, Jogoro feels certain the case can be solved with only a few crucial leaps in logic. Of course, accomplishing such a feat would require returning to his old self, and abandoning the pursuit of normalcy that has defined his bond with Osanai.

That in turn brings us to my own subject of fascination: the sharp-edged true selves underlying our leads’ humble, mild-mannered facades. Jogoro’s explosion at Kengo offered our expected and extremely welcome articulation of his anxieties, as he reflected bitterly on how his curiosity and intelligence had only isolated him from his peers, who disliked being examined and “solved” like experimental subjects. And Osanai seems similarly uncomfortable with the ambiguous, ephemeral “human element,” seeing in the impositions of her peers an unresolvable equation, a debt that can only be cleared through retribution.

Both of them are too pure and intense for the thoughtless niceties of high school; both of them have clearly seen in the eyes of their peers a recognition of the remorseless scientific instruments they see in themselves, and have retreated from this negative mutual understanding towards the fuzzy, frictionless malaise of self-conscious normalcy. But the masks slip with their every step forward, and with even Kengo now demanding Jogoro embrace his asshole self, their maintenance of this charade seems at its end. While Hyouka championed sincerity and proud self-expression, Shoushimin Series asks “what if our sincere, earnest self is a creature the world would hate?” Let’s see how they fare!

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Chainsaw Man – Volume 7

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Hello folks, and welcome back to Wrong Every Time. Today I’m happy to announce we’re returning Tatsuki Fujimoto’s phenomenal Chainsaw Man, in the wake of Denji’s brief relationship with the mysterious, murderous, and ultimately quite sympathetic Reze. Like Denji himself, Reze was both servant and victim of forces beyond her control, dancing at the whims of the arbiters of violence and capital that truly run our society. Destined to battle yet determined to maintain their humanity, the two found a precious fragment of normalcy in their mundane teenage infatuation – but of course, this is Chainsaw Man, and thus Reze was crushed by the machine just like Himeno before her, one more victim of our capitalist overlords and their slavering hellhounds.

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Frieren: Beyond Journey’s End – Episode 13

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Hello folks, and welcome back to Wrong Every Time. Today I’m delighted to announce we’re returning to the rambling adventures of Frieren and her companions, as they continue north towards the land of the dead. I admit, I may have kinda-sorta written ahead of my commissioned episodes previously, meaning it’s been a couple months in real time since I last checked in with Frieren. But that actually seems perfectly aligned with the show’s own timetable – for just as I was bunkering in for winter during the last couple episodes, so too am I now anticipating the first days of spring, staring out at the melting snow just as Frieren and company tramp through the same.

Frieren’s mastery of atmosphere and sense of tangible place have always been its strongest features, but our last episode complimented them with some poignant Stark-centric reflections, using the legends of both Himmel and Stark’s brother Stoltz to interrogate the measure of great deeds and worth of a life. The actual reality of Himmel facing the sword in the stone was immaterial; he chose not to define himself as the hero who failed, and his successful commitment to his own values led history to remember him as such. Similarly, while Stoltz was renowned as a warrior so gallant he slew foes without tarnishing his white cloak, what Stark remembers are the moments he willingly knelt in the mud, ensuring his brother felt safe and loved in his presence. Conducting yourself so as to theoretically impress future generations is a fool’s game; history will reveal or conceal as it will, and what truly matters is how you are remembered by those you cared about, by the people who walked beside you and knew the truth of your heart.

With Stark newly assured that those he journeys with care about him just as his brother did, we continue onward into the vast unknown. To the north!

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Andor – Episode 1

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Hello folks, and welcome back to Wrong Every Time. Today we’re checking out a new property, one which falls well outside the site’s general wheelhouse, but which has received enough positive buzz that I’m eager to explore it for myself. Thus I find myself engaging with one of the inescapable franchises that have so effectively narrowed our collective imagination, as we explore the Star Wars miniseries known as Andor.

Alongside fellow blockbusters like Jaws, Star Wars was one of the death knells of the rich and varied New Hollywood era, signaling the advent of a dumber, simpler cinematic landscape consolidated around a handful of endlessly replicable genre scripts. I suppose it’s not exactly fair to blame the original film (a fine riff on Flash Gordon-style adventure serials) for the death of cinema, but it certainly didn’t help – particularly since Star Wars has continued its zombie existence for decades, and now stands alongside superheroes and “live-action” remakes as one of the main artery-cloggers of film and television.

Our perception of science fiction is narrower for the outsized footprint Star Wars has left on the genre; as is readily demonstrated by the impoverished imaginations of modern isekai, the more your inspirations all resemble each other, the less rich and distinctive your own fantasies will be. All that said, if you want to reach people, you need to speak in their language – and from everything I’ve heard, Andor uses the language of Star Wars to speak of oppression and rebellion in genuinely meaningful, well-crafted, perhaps even inspirational ways. Thus, with my antipathy for Star Wars as a cultural institution established, I nonetheless dive into Andor with great curiosity as to how good it truly is. Let’s get to it!

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The Summer Hikaru Died – Episode 2

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Hello folks, and welcome back to Wrong Every Time. Today we are returning to the secluded foothills of Japan, to a town where shared history is etched on every tree and stone, and where a veneer of peaceful coexistence hides a rot so deep the stench is unbearable. Yes, we are returning to The Summer Hikaru Died, Ryohei Takeshita’s skillful adaptation of Mokumokuren’s intriguing manga, wherein our protagonist Yoshiki is grappling not just with the death of his best friend, but also with the continued presence of a creature directing his friend’s corpse, offering a pantomime of Hikaru’s old personality that every so often reveals the ravenous, bestial presence beneath.

So yeah, that’s quite a heavy load for a teenager, and so far this production is skillfully juggling a variety of threads – Yoshiki’s complex feelings towards both his absent friend and that friend’s replacement, the languorous atmosphere of rural Japan in the summer, the sense of perpetual surveillance intrinsic to small towns, and the occult/animalistic nature of Hikaru’s new pilot, a creature that seems to emphasize how we are all ultimately beasts, meant to consume and be consumed in turn. That the production is managing to successfully evoke all of these themes and feelings is a credit to Takeshita’s economic direction; Hikaru’s animation resources are clearly limited, but so much is being evoked through sound design, staging, and lighting choices that the lack of fluidity feels natural, one more echo of this town’s sleepy, stagnant atmosphere. Good horror is a precious rarity in anime, and Hikaru is so far proving an exemplary new addition to the canon. Let us return to the mountains!

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Please Put Them On, Takamine-san – Episode 1

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Hello folks, and welcome back to Wrong Every Time. Today we’re embarking on a new adventure, as we check out the first episode of the spring season’s Please Put Them On, Takamine-san. I’m frankly not sure what we’re in for here; by all accounts the production appears to be your garden variety adolescent romcom, with the overtly horny twist of a heroine who can rewrite reality by changing her underwear.

Presumably this device will initially be used to enforce a kind of unwilling intimacy on our leads, the classic “only you know my secret” tension that inspires the initial bonds of stories ranging from Bakemonogatari to My Monster Secret. And of course, as a general device, this sort of Groundhog’s Day time reversal almost inevitably facilitates themes of learning to live in the moment, to see mistakes as happy accidents, and no longer fret about seeking the “perfect path” through life. But what’s the point in speculating when we can find out for ourselves? Let’s get to it!

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