Symphogear AXZ – Episode 10

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Hold onto your hats folks, we’re barreling back into SYMPHOGEAR! Season four’s last two episodes have more or less acted as a mirrored pair, and I’m fully expecting this one to complete the set. First off, Chris and Maria faced off against Cagliostro, obliterating my favorite alchemist in a blast of collaborative fury. Next, Tsubasa and Shirabe teamed up, dueling Prelati in a high-speed highway chase. At this point, we’ve only got two more wielders and one more member of the original alchemists – so if our trajectory is anything to go by, we’re in for a fight between Hibiki, Kirika, and Saint-Germain herself.

It’s clear at this point that AXZ is attempting to resolve a character writing issue that emerged last season: the lack of any genuine relationship between several members of the main team. Maria and Tsubasa quickly became a pair, and Chris happily embraced a big sister role relative to Shirabe and Kirika, but characters like Shirabe and Tsubasa had never shared a conversation, much less a point of genuine emotional connection. Through the “Fool’s Stone” and its subsequent training, AXZ has found a narrative excuse to rectify this character writing issue – now, all the main characters truly must get to know each other, because their strength in battle depends on it.

Ultimately, I feel like this whole process stands as an affirmation of Symphogear’s fundamental appeal: world-destroying threats will come and go, but the charming bonds between these leads are the core of this show. I’m happy this season has contrived a reason to expand those bonds, and eager to see Symphogear’s most genki characters explore their own friendship. Let’s get to it!

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Fall 2020 – Week 3 in Review

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Hello everyone, and welcome back to Wrong Every Time. You’ll be pleased to hear I continued checking out some genuine new anime this week, tackling Adachi and Shimamura, Love Live! Nijigasaki, and whatever else I’ll have managed to sneak in before this article’s post date (editor’s note: it was nothing, he watched nothing else). At the same time, I was happy to chew through some more noteworthy live action films, and once again enjoy that weird sensation of watching something that you know must have been formative for the stuff that was formative for you. Our life experiences and personalities are intrinsically tethered to the media that has spoken to us over the years, so it’s always an odd sensation to meet the aunts and uncles of our childhood idols – but also thrilling, as we begin to understand the long lines of influence stretching across media, drawing us closer to meaningfully contributing to that chain. So yeah, the great astral tether of media inheritance, all today in the Week in Review!

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Adachi and Shimamura – Episode 1

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Hello everyone, and welcome back to Wrong Every Time. Today I’ll be continuing with my unexpectedly timely episode notes, as we explore the premiere of yet another airing show: Adachi and Shimamura.

At first glance, Adachi and Shimamura looks like precisely my sort of thing: a delicate, intimate character drama, elevated through precise character acting and a keen understanding of conversational nuance. You could with some accuracy call this the “Kyoto Animation Formula,” but KyoAni hardly have a monopoly on productions like this, and from Wandering Son to Bloom Into You to After the Rain to Just Because to Stars Align to… well, as you can see, I’m a fan of the genre.

Beyond its general genre space, Adachi and Shimamura’s key staff also seem reasonable enough. Director Satoshi Kuwabara doesn’t have any big hits to his name, but his history reveals enough storyboarding and art director credits to make it clear he understands the importance of staging and cinematography, rather than being a fully management-side leader. More promisingly, series composer and scriptwriter Keichiro Ochi has precisely the type of experience I’m looking forward: a massive number of scripts contributed to Oregairu, which is one of the best-written shows of the last ten years. Without further ado, let’s explore the first episode of Adachi and Shimamura!

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Pokemon Sun and Moon – Episode 25

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Hello everyone, and welcome back to Wrong Every Time. I hope you’ve been having a nice day so far; personally, I stayed up far too late last night with some friends, and so I’m now hopelessly behind schedule on today’s work. That’s alright though, because I was already planning on treating myself to some Sun and Moon, and frankly can’t feel stressed while watching Pokemon regardless of my other temporal circumstances. Devastating Nyabby episodes aside, Sun and Moon is an emotional oasis, and so I hope you join me as we all chill out and enjoy some relentlessly pleasant cartoons. Without further ado, let’s slip back to the beaches of Alola!

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Wandering Witch – Episode 1

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Hello everyone, and welcome the heck back to Wrong Every Time. Today I am going to be attempting the impossible, by watching the first episode of a show while it is still actively airing, and thereby creating an article that might be of interest to anyone outside of hoary anime archivists. I know offering timely, relevant criticism of ongoing media is a little outside my wheelhouse, but I’m gonna try it this week, and we’ll see how it goes from there.

Anyway, today’s topic of note is Wandering Witch, one of Fall 2020’s most promising prospects. Running down the key staff, we’ve first got director Toshiyuki Kubooka, who has few overall directorial credits to his name, but plenty of impressive attributions nonetheless: animation director on Gunbuster, storyboards on Giant Robo, and a fair few other notable highlights. Kubooka’s work on Gainax and Mitsuo Iso productions might well have introduced him to the show’s art director, Hiroshi Gouroku; meanwhile, series composer Kazukuyi Fudeyasu has an encouraging sprawl of credits to his name, including JoJo, Monster, and Land of the Lustrous. I don’t really know anything about this property itself beyond its reasonably pleasant previews, so let’s not waste any more time, and see what Wandering Witch is all about!

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Fall 2020 – Week 2 in Review

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Hello everyone, and welcome the heck back to Wrong Every Time. We’re a couple weeks into the fall anime season now, and as it turns out, I actually have some anime to talk about. Though I spent much of the last two weeks luxuriating in the fact that I was no longer professionally obligated to watch all of the season’s new productions, it turns out I kinda do like anime, and so I’ve been slowly working through the properties that seem worth considering on my own time. I’ve also been playing a shit ton more Hades, but since my thoughts on Hades are still pretty much just “oh my god this game is so good Chiron bow is busted why am I writing I should be plotting my next run,” I’ll be sticking with the anime this time, and offering some brief assessments of the season’s alleged stars!

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Dorohedoro – Episode 3

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Folks, it is absolutely time for more Dorohedoro. Not only am I just generally down for more of this production’s charming shenanigans and gorgeous architecture, but we also happened to leave off on an absolutely intolerable cliffhanger, with Shin and Noi at last on their way to hunt down Caiman and Nikaido. The two major factions within this show’s cast have both proven themselves to be violent yet oddly adorable families, and considering this manga has gone on for eighteen years, I don’t expect them to murder each other quite yet. Then again, this is Dorohedoro, where life is cheap and death hilarious, so there’s really no telling who’s a truly plot-essential character.

Most importantly, Ebisu still needs her dang face back. So let’s not waste any more time, and set off once more on a journey through the magnificent decay of Hole!

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Pokemon Sun and Moon – Episode 24

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Hello everyone, and welcome back to Wrong Every Time. I’ve tried to deny it as long as possible, but autumn is truly in full swing over here, and the temperature has plummeted accordingly. New England has a pretty quirky seasonal schedule, in that we generally get around two months of summer, two weeks each of spring and fall, and around nine months of winter each year. In light of that, I’m doing my best to enjoy the rapidly falling leaves, as they’re essentially our one decent seasonal attraction, which makes for some unintentionally damning travel literature for anyone who actually lives here. “Come see the falling leaves, they make this frigid, unfriendly slab of coastline look nice for twelve days every year!”

All of this is to say that it’s cold and I’m mad and we’re watching some goddamn Sun and Moon. The show’s previous episode was a delightfully absurd Dugtrio-centered rock opera that made great use of Team Rocket, and I’m eager to see what our young trainers get up to next, be it continuing their island pilgrimage or just finding a weird rock in the forest or something. Let’s get to it!

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Kaguya-sama: Love is War – Episode 3

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Strap yourselves in folks, we’re checking out another episode of the last few years’ most beloved romantic comedy, Kaguya-sama: Love is War. Kaguya’s first two episodes were an unrelenting visual feast, demonstrating that director Shinichi Omata is just as comfortable elevating farcical conflict as he is illuminating somber dramas like Rakugo. Building off of Kaguya’s own fundamental design, Omata has constructed a dynamic world of red, white, and black contrast, with every scene offering creative new visual punchlines.

Of course, I knew going into Kaguya-sama that the direction would be fantastic, because Omata is one of our living legends. The bigger issue for me is the show’s somewhat repetitive comedic structure, an issue exacerbated by its as-of-yet unwillingness to really dig deeper into its characters’ lives. But even that seemed like less of an issue in the second episode than the first, and I’ve been told the show will continue to expand on its initial premise as it goes, evolving from its basic “spy vs spy reimagined as a love comedy” dynamic to a more character-focused story. With Omata at the helm, I’ll certainly have plenty to talk about either way, so let’s get right into another episode of Kaguya-sama!

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Fall 2020 – Week 1 in Review

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Hello everyone, and welcome back to Wrong Every Time. It’s the end of an era this week, as for the first time in seven goddamn years, I haven’t actually watched all of this season’s new anime premieres. In fact, I’ve only watched one – Jujutsu Kaisen. It was pretty good! I might watch another episode.

Contributing to Anime News Network’s preview guide was certainly a rewarding experience, and it’s been interesting to see trends in the medium evolve over the last half-decade or so. But ultimately, saying “this wasn’t particularly good” has always been the least interesting part of criticism to me, and so I’m happy to be at a point where I can invest more in the shows I’m passionate about, and less in the shows that are an affront to any sense of taste or decency. So without further ado, let’s dive into a regular old Week in Review, and take a few swings at some interesting art!

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