The Disappearance of Nagato Yuki-chan – Episode 4

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Haruhi continued her invasion of Nagato’s show this week, almost accidentally stealing Kyon as Nagato derped about working on Valentine’s Day chocolate. I didn’t feel like this heightened drama was a great fit for this show, and said as much in the review, but it certainly is an interesting experience to see the assumptions of one show acting as the “villain” in another one. Still, I think cute scenes with Kyon and Nagato are basically this show at its best. We’ll see how this wacky misunderstanding plays out next time.

My full ANN review is available here. Notes below!

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Sound! Euphonium – Episode 3

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We’re doing it. I think we’re doing it. Sound! Euphonium just keeps holding steady, demonstrating remarkable control in its direction and storytelling. KyoAni are pulling off a top-tier version of exactly the kind of show they do best, and it is damn satisfying to see it in action. At this point, it seems strange to me that the evidence is pointing to this being a one-cour show – the pace of character work and plotting here just seems much more appropriate for a twenty-something episode show. But there haven’t been any missteps yet, so I’ll trust they know where they’re going, and keep enjoying it as long as it stays this good.

Here’s my full ANN post. Notes below!

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Spring 2015 – Week 3 in Review

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So I know this is supposed to be the bad season that follows winter’s shocking bounty, but it turns out this season is actually really good. It’s not exactly a deep bench, and Plastic Memories is so far turning out to be a disappointment, but Blood Blockade Battlefront, Oregairu, and Sound! Euphonium are all top tier shows, Ore Monogatari!! isn’t far behind, and even the rear of the pack is relatively entertaining. I normally only expect one or two truly great shows in a season, so even if nothing else rises in my standings (and honestly, there’s not much that could, outside of maybe a surprise turn by Punch Line), this is still solidly above par. Who would have thought that a season with a sequel to one of my all-time favorites, a show directed by one of my favorite directors, and a new low-key drama by KyoAni might actually be pretty okay?

Yeah, I guess I should probably have seen this possibility. Well, for once, I’m very happy to be proven wrong. Let’s run ’em down!

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Oregairu S2 – Episodes 1-3

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My first Oregairu S2 post is up! Don’t have much to say here that I didn’t already say in the piece – I love Oregairu, the new season is so far even better than the old one, and I wish we got more shows that were nearly this sharp in their character writing. I really hope it stays this good!

My full ANN writeups is available here. Notes below!

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The Disappearance of Nagato Yuki-chan – Episodes 1-3

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And my second episode writeup of the season is up! This one’s a little less intense, because, well, Nagato Yuki-chan is a pretty derp show. Silly faces and eating turkey and hoping Haruhi doesn’t completely overwhelm everything. Kyon and Haruhi are already falling back into their old relationship pattern, so I guess it’s time for Nagato to fight back, but I can’t see current Nagato doing much but mope and accept things if Haruhi ends up Stealing Her Man. I’d honestly really prefer more cute near-relationship scenes than an overt drama triangle, but I guess we’ll see.

My full writeup is available here. Notes (such as they are for a show like Nagato Yuki-chan) below!

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Yatterman Night – Review

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Another full streaming review is up! This one’s sadly much less positive, as Yatterman kinda collapses on itself, but it definitely seemed like it was going places for a while there. I had to kind of pan this one’s animation in spite of it actually possessing a fair amount of really stylish webgen animation throughout, both because it wasn’t really that consistent and because the last episode was a trainwreck, but we at least got some good single sequences and episodes out of the show. They can’t all realize their potential, I guess.

Here’s the full review over at ANN!

Yatterman Night

Sound! Euphonium – Episodes 1-2

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Jeez, am I going to be able to do a full season of posts like this? I’m guessing tackling single episodes at a time will prompt me to switch to a more conventional breakdown style, but it was nice to do almost a tiny essay in the format of my KimiUso piece or whatnot for these episodes. I think I’m slowly getting better at achieving a balance of flow and analysis in the ANN pieces.

Oh, right, Euphonium. Euphonium is very good! Really liked these first two episodes, and since I didn’t cover it in the actual piece, I should say that I like the way is handling its establishment of a real ensemble so far. I don’t expect this to be Shirobako or anything, but it does seem like the show wants a bunch of characters to be recognizable people, and I also like that it’s taking pains to bring us in on basically the ground floor of this music group. Even though this really seems like Kumiko’s story, we need to be invested in the group if we’re going to believe in her eventual investment.

Here’s my full ANN writeup. Notes below!

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Spring 2015 – Week 2 in Review

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Well, I’m exhausted. Preview week’s done, my new media and identity essay is out, and I just want to lie down somewhere for a very long time. But anime marches inexorably on, and so it’s time once again for the week in review. This’ll just cover episodes that weren’t already covered in my retrospective – I’ll be continuing Punch Line conditionally and MY Love STORY!! definitely, but their first episodes only arrived within the last week. Other than that, my lineup seems pretty set for the time being. Let’s run ’em down!

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Death Parade – Review

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YEAHHH DEATH PARADE. I really wanted to write about this show, but I only had so much time before preview week, so I settled on a review that also includes the major thematic breakdown stuff I wanted to hit. Plus I get to talk about craft, in both aesthetics and the way the show juggles genre structure. And also about the crazy contradiction at the heart of the show’s goals – demonstrating the impossibility of judgment through vignettes that imply people are more than vignettes. It’s a neat trick! Death Parade is an excellent show, and I have sky-high hopes for its director. It’s not a Kyousogiga-level debut, but it’s not that far off, either.

Here’s my full review!

Death Parade

No Politics: Media and Identity

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We’ve been hearing a lot of it lately, at least from the more gurgly and questionable-smelling corners of the internet – a demand for “objective reviews.” Reviews that leave politics at the door, and simply give audiences an untainted appraisal of some media property. If you read my stuff at all regularly, I’m sure you can take a guess as to my thoughts on the validity of this request – given how often I stress the variability of personal experience, art experience, and critical evaluation, it should come as no surprise that I find this demand pretty misguided. But it keeps coming up, and it actually reflects on a number of more interesting elements of both how we parse media and how media is constructed, and so I figured I’d take my own shot at the topic. So let’s get down and dirty with objectivity in criticism!

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