Frieren: Beyond Journey’s End – Episode 8

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Hello folks, and welcome back to Wrong Every Time. Today I figured we’d stop in with Frieren and the gang, and see how their journey towards the land of departed souls is progressing. When last we left off, the team had run into a snag in the northern territories, with Frieren ending up imprisoned due to her unwillingness to make nice with demons. Unfortunately for everyone, it has since been made clear that Frieren was actually right to distrust, as apparently the illusion of civility is simply a garb demons adopt in order to lower the guards of their enemies.

In the abstract, this style of “humanity’s enemies are inherently evil” worldbuilding has fallen out of fashion in recent decades, for understandable reasons. Intelligent races that are “born evil” simply don’t tend to facilitate interesting stories, and instead naturally evoke a sort of “we are right to conquer the savage natives” colonial queasiness. Robbing cultural clashes of their moral complexity is a dicey proposition, so I’m hoping this particular choice dovetails in some meaningful way with Frieren’s thoughts on aging and legacy, the realms in which it truly shines. Let’s see how our sleepy elf is getting on!

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Scum’s Wish – Episode 10

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Hello folks, and welcome back to Wrong Every Time. Today we return to the clusterfuck of emotional torment that is Scum’s Wish, as Hana returns from an alleged “heartbreak trip” designed to help her get over her feelings for her teacher, now that she finally mustered up the courage for her doomed confession. Of course, this is Hana we’re talking about, so that grieving process was here combined with a fresh set of entreaties towards her long-suffering friend Ecchan, who she refused to either let in completely or break cleanly away from. As such, both of them remain stuck in a painful limbo, with Hana promising to “wait until Ecchan is ready” to draw closer, ensuring neither of them can properly move on.

That’s how it tends to go in this lovelorn production. And frankly, speaking of “love” in the context of Scum’s Wish seems inappropriate; for if any of these characters are in love with anything, it is more likely their own egos than their various would-be paramours. Hana loves the feeling of being wanted and cared for, the feeling of possessing another, and the sweet anguish of lacking either; her feelings towards her peers are superficial, but her feelings about those feelings are rich and nourishing, enough to sustain an entire inner universe of imagined intimacy.

To this utterly misguided heroine, seemingly starved for love but in truth starved for perspective, our last episode offered an unexpected guide: her onetime rival Moka, who urged her to take a minute and smell the flowers (or savor the Danish, as the case may be). Hana’s feelings of romantic longing are all-consuming specifically because she has let them consume her, because there is nothing in her life but this desire to be wanted. Hana needs to learn who she actually is on her own, what Hana herself enjoys and cares about, beyond how such interests might affect her relationship with her various would-be soulmates. Let’s find out if Hana can Get A Life as we return to Scum’s Wish!

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Winter 2025 – Week 5 in Review

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Hello folks, and welcome back to Wrong Every Time. This week saw me finally breaking ground on the current anime season, as I screened the first two episodes of MyGO followup Ave Mujica in quick succession. While the show is certainly more broad and melodramatic than its predecessor, it’s also extraordinarily entertaining, showing that MyGO’s writer/director team are just as confident with this sort of operatic theater as they are with MyGO’s quieter pleasures. We’ve also been munching through the Ramayan, and have at this point reached the big action-adventure core of the series, when Ram’s wife Sita is stolen and he must square off with the demons who’ve claimed her. It’s a pleasure as always to see such a formative, archetype-defining text in motion, and it’s serving as a fine compliment to our Armored Trooper Votoms excursions. But let’s forget all that business, for today I bring you a selection of fresh films, plucked directly from my towering film review buffer. Let’s break ‘em down!

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BanG Dream! Ave Mujica – Episode 1

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Well folks, it’s finally happened. Just a year and change after the conclusion of the fantastic BanG Dream! It’s MyGO!!!!!, we have arrived at the long-awaited/dreaded debut of Ave Mujica, the gothica-drenched followup to the adventures of Tomori and friends. While Tomori took the breakup of her beloved band CRYCHIC as an opportunity for personal growth, and ultimately drew together four fellow “lost girls” into the symbol of persistence that is MyGO, Sakiko has apparently spent the interim dedicating herself to becoming as mentally unwell as possible, and has now resurfaced in a lace mask and corpse paint on a stage that looks suspiciously like a sacrificial altar. You guys here for a good time? Ready to party? Too bad, wrong fucking band. We’re here to have a bad time.

So yes, I am pretty darn excited. With both director Kodai Kakimoto and series composer Yuniko Ayana returning from MyGO, I have every expectation that Ave Mujica will maintain its predecessor’s playful elegance of cinematography and richness of character drama, offering a new tangle of expectations, allegiances, and one-sided grudges to furnish its melodramatic performances. And given the maximalist aesthetic of Ave Mujica itself, I’m confident that constancy of execution will extend as well to MyGO’s just-barely-tongue-in-cheek tone, allowing us in the audience to fully sympathize with its characters while still finding humor in their self-important histrionics. Is the night of Sakiko’s liberation at hand? Let’s find the fuck out.

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Yuri is My Job! – Episode 6

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Hello folks, and welcome back to Wrong Every Time. Today I’m eager to return to Cafe Liebe, where it seems Hime and Mitsuki might well be on the verge of an emotional breakthrough. Though Mitsuki is still frankly terrible at expressing herself outside of the formalized confines of Cafe Liebe’s performance, Hime’s declaration that she would “never betray Yano” clearly got through to her, affirming the doubts she was already possessing regarding how their first friendship ended. And in spite of not understanding Mitsuki’s admittedly vague statements, Hime can see the change in her as well, and is beginning to embrace her own genuine emotions.

Of course, genuine emotions are difficult to express at Cafe Liebe, where every idle passion is formalized into a rigid dance, and every statement of longing must meet the approval of a judgmental audience. In its systems of hierarchy and rejection of anything betraying convention, Liebe has turned the once-freeing context of yuri drama into its own form of social confinement, with the online comments of attendees now serving the role that Hime’s classmates performed in grade school.

Transgressive art breaks boundaries and allows unlimited personal expression, but transgressive art turned into an industry (or worse, a fandom) becomes an institution with strict expectations and inarguable internal rules. Mitsuki briefly found solace in the reliability of these rules, but she’s now discovering the feelings she bears towards Hime do not necessarily fit within the interpretation of love demanded by Cafe Liebe. Can Hime save both her relationship with Mitsuki and their performance as Schwestern? Let’s find out!

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Trigun Stampede – Episode 4

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Hello folks, and welcome back to Wrong Every Time. Today I’m eager to return to the sand-blasted wastes of Trigun Stampede, as our reluctant hero and his companions suffer the fallout of Knives’ calamitous appearance. The two brothers are opposing reflections; Vash sees himself as no more than a rootless drifter, but cannot help cherish and protect the lives of those he meets, while Knives sees himself as a new god, and the humans of this planet as no more than supplicants and sacrifices. Even while falling from heaven, we can always make a choice; while Vash has become a reluctant savior, Knives has clearly decided it’s better to rule in hell than serve in heaven.

I’m intrigued to see both how this metaphor is carried forward, and also simply how the main cast interact in the wake of these revelations regarding Vash’s nature. Additionally, having munched through the entire original Trigun adaptation in the time between Stampede viewings, I’m all the more curious to explore this rendition’s twists on the original formula. The two shows are so different that they basically fall into distinct subgenres; the original Trigun was far more episodic, and actually revealed even less of Vash and Knives’ history in its entire run than this version has in the first three episodes. That means whatever’s coming down the line will still be new to me, and given how generous this production’s been so far, I can’t wait to greet it. Let’s get back planetside!

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Winter 2025 – Week 4 in Review

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Hello folks, and welcome back to Wrong Every Time. With the winter season now solidly underway, we’re finally reaching the point where we can separate meaningful contenders from first-episode pan flashes, a process that so far seems to be indicating this is an entirely sequel-centric season. We’ve got 100 Girlfriends, Ave Mujica, and The Apothecary Diaries, the third of which I have at this point heard enough about from enough reliable sources that I’m actually getting curious. Of course, I’ve also still got plenty of Armored Trooper Votoms to get through, and have recently started the ‘87 TV adaptation of the Hindu epic Ramayana, which my housemate first watched as a kid. So yeah, eclectic mixture of media at the moment, and I’m having a delightful time with all of it – including these fine film features below, which I have hand-selected for your latest Week in Review. Let’s get to it!

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Hugtto! Precure – Episode 47

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Hello folks, and welcome back to Wrong Every Time. It’s been a long and richly rewarding journey, but I am afraid the final battle of Hugtto! Precure is upon us. Our heroes have found lifelong friends, challenged scores of villains, and reckoned with that alluring horizon that is adult life, considering, pursuing, and reassessing the futures that might await them. Though seeking a happy place in the adult world is an intimidating process, they have been comforted along the way by the many confident examples around them, as well as those who’ve demonstrated how personal reinvention is a lifelong process, and that no unhappy ending needs to last forever.

Having struggled and fought to find peace with their own futures, our Pretty Cures must now fight for the futures of all, squaring off against a villain who believes a certainty of peaceful stasis is preferable to the chaos of an uncertain future. Criasu Corp’s ranks have been reduced to two misled hamsters and one nefarious overseer, but a great beast now stalks the shoreline, George’s cynical will made manifest. Let’s charge once more into brave battle, as Hana and her companions fight for a brighter tomorrow!

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Blue Reflection Ray – Episode 5

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Hello folks, and welcome back to Wrong Every Time. Today we’re diving back into Blue Reflection Ray, which most recently offered us the stinger of our delinquent Momo straight-up joining the rest of the cast’s high school class. Apparently no longer content to drive her motorcycle around looking cool all day, Momo has rejoined productive society, which will presumably give her far more chances to bond with Ruka, Hiori, and Miyako. Our team in general are starting to grow far closer; though Momo and Hiori are extremely different people, their contrasts are proving a fine basis for communication, a process facilitated through Miyako’s charmingly annoying provocations.

Aside from that, our recent drama has hewed to a reliable magical girl template, offering episodic dilemmas centered on the team’s schoolmates much in the manner of Sailor Moon or Ojamajo Doremi. Such conveniently resolved challenges are a natural complement to this “getting to know you” phase of the narrative, and if I were to guess, I’d hazard that we’re in for another side drama intended to push forward Momo and Miyako’s relationship. That’s perfectly fine by me; both of them are endearingly messy characters, with Miyako in particular proving the show’s standout so far. Let’s see how our team is evolving as we return to Blue Reflection Ray!

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Spy x Family – Episode 36

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Hello folks, and welcome back to Wrong Every Time. Today I’m eager to check back in on the Forger family, and see what new threats are lurking in the shadows. Although to be honest, it feels like the Forgers could still use a break from all the scheming and skullduggery; given their recent vacation involved murdering a small army of assassins while also defusing half a dozen bombs, they’ve clearly earned a vacation from their vacation, perhaps centered on a school festival or other similarly low-stakes excursion.

Regardless, I’m sure Tatsuya Endo and our reliable dual production studios have us in good hands. Spy x Family is basically the definition of comfort food, a show combining an inherently robust comedic premise with enough earnest, charming sentimentality to ensure every episode feels like a cozy afternoon nap. It is a perennial joy to return to, and I’m quite grateful I get to explore it with you all. Let’s see what’s next on the Forger itinerary!

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