Fall 2016 – Week 7 in Review

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It was very clear this week that many of this season’s shows took careful notes based on my first half in review post, and adjusted their content accordingly. Normally it takes at least a few weeks for shows to shift gears based on my exact preferences, so I was happy to see the response time so accelerated here. Shows like Girlish Number and Sound! Euphonium clearly took my complaints to heart, and as we all know, being able to accept constructive criticism is an admirable quality. I’m glad we can all agree anime turns out better when it listens to me specifically.

Alright, impossibility of my writing affecting anime production in any way whatsoever aside, this week really did see many shows directly tackling some of my existing complaints. Girlish Number dug in to its cast, Euphonium emphasized the variables that had worked in the first season, Yuri on Ice offered its most well-earned and best-composed personal material yet, and Flip Flappers was just fantastic in all regards. The fall season continues to impress in new ways, so let’s start with those flip flaps and RUN ‘EM DOWN!

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Planetes – Episode 17

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Planetes’ seventeenth episode begins with a shot of an open hand, as pills are shaken into it from an unmarked container. As the next shot reveals, these are Gigalt’s pills, a symbol of his fraying health here used as the very first thing introducing us to this episode. Victory and legacy and career trajectory, all pointless in the face of our constantly encroaching mortality. Gigalt is a decorated employee and a credit to his company, but at this point he’s becoming just another old man.

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March comes in like a lion – Episode 7

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This week’s March comes in like a lion felt like the first time the show was wholly in control of its more upbeat material. The show has firmly established its main cast at this point, so sequences like Nikaidou’s self-help shogi commentary play off our existing understanding and fondness for the characters. With its evocative depression-focused material matched by equally engaging slice of life segments, March now seems to be hitting just the balance it’s been striving for. Hopefully it stays this strong!

You can check out my full review over at ANN, or my notes below.

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Why It Works: Girlish Number’s Insult Crossfire

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On this week’s Why It Works, I finally found an angle for digging in to Girlish Number, one that basically highlights the show’s favorite things – insults and character writing. Girlish Number isn’t a fantastic show, but it certainly has strengths worth talking about! Hopefully next season offers some reasonable critical fodder – I’m already wondering exactly how I’m gonna fill my column without JoJo to always lean back on. Oh wait, Rakugo is coming back, nevermind. There’s always something to cover!

ANYWAY. This article’s about Girlish Number. I hope you enjoy it. Here’s the piece!

Why It Works: Girlish Number’s Insult Crossfire

Girlish Number

Nichijou – Episode 16

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Alright alright it’s time for Nichijou! I have no idea how long it’s been since the last post from your perspective, but over on this side, I’ve taken a few weeks off from the Nichijou train to restore my nichijuices, since it felt like I was getting just a little too inured to nichijokes for the last couple. I really love this show, and I’d prefer to be in a frame of mind to appreciate it, since we are probably never going to get an anime comedy this good again. Plenty of time has passed by now, so I think I’m ready to return to this maddening world of talking cats and screaming Yuukos. Let’s not waste one more god dang minute. LET’S NICHIJOU.

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Planetes – Episode 16

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Planetes’ sixteenth episode opens with heavy, panicked breathing, thick gasps presented to us before we even understand what’s happening. That’s intentional, as we soon learn – Hachi has spun free in space, and so in order to simulate his immediate confusion, we are left in the dark as well. Extreme closeups convey the claustrophobia of the situation, mixed in with shots framed to highlight the vast emptiness of space. And the sound design remains important throughout, that breathing soon finding itself accompanied by creaking, hissing noises from Hachi’s suit. As his breathing accelerates and pulse becomes audible, those mechanical noises impress on us a constant and oft-overlooked truth – that for all his confidence and security, Hachimaki is only separated from disaster by the thinnest layer of human engineering.

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Sound! Euphonium 2 – Episode 7

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Sound! Euphonium really returned to the strengths of the first season this week, with a conflict that echoed that season’s key variables in both its relevant characters and its thematic substance. Haruka and Asuka make for a fascinating pair, and this episode made the most of each of them, making for a strong comeback after some shaky narrative territory. I’ve been told the third book is stronger than the second in general, so here’s to more great character drama to come!

You can check out my full review over at ANN, or my notes below.

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Girlish Number – Episode 6

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Girlish Number got dark in the best way possible this week, by taking a break from Chitose’s narcissism to revel in the sadness of all the other characters. Koto, Kazuha, and Momoka all got solid material this time, with Koto in particular offering some personal reflections that echoed the general poison of the anime industry. That’s pretty much what I was hoping for from this show – not pointed economic satire, but reflections on how the problems in the industry have a specific human cost. Hopefully this is a good sign for the episodes to come!

You can check out my full review over at ANN, or my barely-existent notes below.

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Fall 2016 – First Half in Review

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The season’s halfway point has arrived! Normally this is the part where I’d comment on how quickly time seems to be passing, and probably make some offhand gesture towards our inescapable mortality, but given we just concluded one of the most horrific and dispiriting political contests in my country’s history, it really doesn’t seem like time’s been passing all that fast lately. But if you wanted fatigued political commentary, you’d check my twitter feed – in spite of all else, the world keeps turning, and that means talking about cartoons!

This season has been offering us a terrific bounty so far, presenting close to half the shows that will likely star in my year-end list. The better shows get, the more small-minded and useless it seems to rank them in any kind of reductive list, but what’s the point of a tradition if it’s not celebrated far past the point of reason? So let’s once more do that thing I always do, starting at the top and running down my favorites of the season so far!

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Aikatsu – Episodes 1-3

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Hey everybody! Today I’ll be powering through the first few episodes of what’s become something of an odd favorite in my twitter circles, Aikatsu. Aikatsu is a long-running show based on an arcade card game, and is definitely far more Serious Idoldom than relative “crossover hits” like Idolmaster or Love Live. I’m not really expecting high-quality production or anything, but lots of people seem to find this show very charming, so hopefully I have a good time! I’ve also been stretching myself pretty thin for those megasized Nichijou notes writeups, so this one will be scaled back – I’ll point out interesting stuff when I find it, but I’m also gonna try to just enjoy the ride. Anyway, that’s enough preamble. Let’s get right into Aikatsu!

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