Hey folks, and welcome the heck back to Wrong Every Time. Today I come to you equipped with ghouls, goblins, and tales of rapturous fantasy, as is only fitting for this most Halloweeny of weeks. Yes, I know Halloween was on Monday, but that’s still closer to this Week in Review than the previous one, so that’s what I’m conceptually going with here. Regardless, this has been a relatively fruitful week of film screenings, including classics of both horror and romance, as well our continuing adventures through the Naruto film canon. Back on the home front, I’ve also been gearing up for the climax to act one of my house’s D&D campaign, where I’m thinking their last opponent might turn out to be an In The Hills, The Cities-style colossus of melded human flesh. Too much? Maybe too much. Still tinkering with that one, I’ll get back to you. In the meantime, let’s break down some films!
Zoku Owarimonogatari – Episode 6
Alright Araragi, it’s time to figure this shit out. As I’ve suspected and Hanekawa seemed to confirm, this world we’ve been exploring is less of an alternate reality than an internal one; a product of Araragi’s mind, as he desperately seeks an answer to that fundamental question of “who am I, now that my childhood and pre-scripted path are behind me?” In search of that truth, he has held discussions with disparate versions of many of his companions, but avoided the one person who might truly know him well enough to answer: Oshino Ougi, his own Other Self.
As with all of this world’s Oddities, Ougi has served as a container for all the feelings Araragi refuses to acknowledge, a shadow that is as authentically him as his surface personality. His self-hatred and obsession with his own destruction, his lingering regrets regarding the possibilities of his vampiric nature, even his inability to visualize himself as an authentic and consistent person are all realized through Ougi’s mercurial presence. Araragi has come to accept Ougi’s authenticity as a part of him, but has nonetheless avoided their input in this crucial moment. As Sodachi said, what we see in the mirror is only a partial reproduction – Araragi is incomplete without Ougi, so it’s no wonder he’s only been able to produce incomplete answers. With his two sides united at last, let’s see how this strange mirror tale ends!
Anne of Green Gables – Episode 12
Hello friends, and welcome back to Wrong Every Time. Today I figured we might sneak our way back to Green Gables, and check in on the continuing saga of Marilla’s amethyst brooch. Marilla claims Anne lost it and Anne claims she did not; with two such stubborn characters as these, that’s basically all it takes to erect an insurmountable impasse between them. Truthfully, it seems most likely that Anne forgot to remove the brooch before heading off to the Idlewild, and thus it’s nestled safely somewhere along their woodland passageways. But while this conflict’s resolution will likely be simple enough, the course of its drama is serving as an enlightening referendum regarding Marilla and Anne’s feelings towards each other.
On the production front there is much cause for rejoicing, as this episode features the return of Yoshiyuki Tomino on storyboards, as well as Takahata himself on scripts. Tomino’s storyboards for Anne’s first day at Sunday school greatly elevated one of this show’s first emotional climaxes, offering a mixture of evocative symmetrical layouts and scenes where character blocking skillfully amplified emotional intent. That episode’s final reconciliation between Anne and Marika might be my favorite moment of the show so far, and so I expect great things from his execution of Anne and Marika’s latest dust-up. Let’s see how our friends are faring as we return to Green Gables!
Spy x Family – Episode 7
Hello everyone, and welcome back to Wrong Every Time. Today I’d like to check back in on the Forger family’s continuing theatrics, as we return to Spy x Family. Last episode saw Anya doing her best to prove herself in her first day at school, only to be assigned the black mark of a Tonitrus Bolt for her efforts. In your average school, Anya’s righteous smackdown of the despised Damian would gain her a slap on the wrist and a lofty position in the social pecking order; here, it brings her one step closer to dissolving this family altogether.
That episode also demonstrated that there’s no need to fear this show will lose its spark when the Loid family is separated. In fact, Anya’s attempts to manipulate her schoolmates was one of the show’s funniest sequences so far; whereas her family interactions have largely settled into routine punctuated by occasional shock at Loid’s secret thoughts, offering a whole class worth of new characters provided all sorts of opportunities to riff on both her psychic powers and generally goofy personality. With her parents now aware of the fault lines in her social group, I imagine she’ll return to school equipped with a fresh set of well-intentioned but self-defeating tactics, and make some implausible new mess of things. Let’s find out how!
Fall 2022 – Week 4 in Review
Hey folks, and welcome on back to Wrong Every Time. Today I’ve got a somewhat lopsided collection of thoughts for you all, with plenty of the requisite horror findings, but also an impressively terrible fantasy film, as well as the final must-watch production of this exceedingly generous fall season. That’s right, I did indeed check out Bocchi the Rock, and must admit you were all correct in saying I really ought to do so. Turns out when you team up a dynamite production team with some genuinely witty source material, great things are likely to happen. We’ll get to Bocchi soon enough, but let’s first start off with some gleefully sleazy horror sequels, before we wind our way back to animation. It’s time to burn down the latest Week in Review!
The Legend of Vox Machina – Episode 10
Hello everyone, and welcome back to Wrong Every Time. Today I come to you one dungeon mastering session older and hopefully wiser, having tackled my campaign’s second session, and the first including our entire four member party. The dynamic was significantly more chaotic with four players, mainly because that fourth player is the embodiment of chaos itself, but I think I did pretty okay. Bounties were pursued, festivals were attended, and the whole gang found themselves embroiled in some kind of folk horror forest ritual situation. With me being me, I’m sure it’s no surprise that my first setpiece is drawing heavily from The Wicker Man and its spooky compatriots.
Our second session also provided plenty of trial-by-fire lessons for me, ranging from the diverse nature of player investment to the setting of expectations regarding player agency. Successful DMing requires paying close attention to player desires, and often coming to understand what they want better than they themselves do. In our last campaign, our DM attempted to ameliorate Captain Chaos with more mechanical tools, which only slowed down gameplay – in our campaign, I’ve instead been giving him greater range of creative self-expression, which has resulted in player satisfaction with no added complexity. On the other hand, my initial use of a heist quest to debut the game has set some perhaps untenable expectations regarding players’ ability to pre-scope any combat encounter, which may result in some inescapable friction down the line.
It’s all an impossibly complex network of mechanical, creative, and personal concerns, all of which only makes me more impressed by Mercer and crew’s ability to navigate this conceptual labyrinth. Last episode saw Percy assuming his destined mantle of Savior of Whitestone, only to immediately about-face back into his Dark Avenger persona. Such deliberately anti-party-unity behavior makes for great drama, but difficult campaign writing, making me further suspect that Mercer and Percy’s player essentially co-wrote this whole arc. The dungeon master’s guide suggests DMs create separate results for success, partial success, and failure in any event, but with all respect to the dungeon master’s guide, that’s fucking stupid and not at all the way stories work. Complex narratives require some degree of player predictability, so I’ll be keeping a close eye on how Mercer fixes the scales as we continue our journey. Let’s get back to Vox Machina!
Star Driver – Episode 9
Hello folks, and welcome back to Wrong Every Time. Today I’m eager to get back into Star Driver, and finally see what this new act has in store for us. It’s currently pretty difficult to make any solid predictions as to this story’s trajectory, as the last episode resolved basically all of our immediate conflicts, while also finding time to seed in a couple new ones. It’s a brand new day on Southern Cross Isle, and I can’t imagine what Enokido has in store for us next.
For the moment, we can at least take stock of where last episode put us. Takuto and Sugata have resolved their disagreements through the Fists of Friendship, leaving our core trio repaired, and Sugata as the only person who’s activated the King’s Pillar and recovered. Meanwhile, the mysterious Order’s leader has lost his caged bird, having dismissed her in the wake of her challenging his desire to leave the island. This presumed shrine maiden has now left the island entirely, but in her wake, a new girl appears to have just arrived.
All of these changes seem to imply a shakeup is incoming, as the Order rethinks their tactics while their enemies solidify their bonds. This is a fairly common transition in Enokido compositions; after the first third or so of the story establishes a dynamic through repeated episodic routines, the second act opens with a rearranging of the narrative variables, challenging the audience on their understanding of this world and its attendant themes. Like his former collaborator Ikuhara, Enokido seems to enjoy using familiar narrative templates (in this case, a “mecha of the week” battle anime) to unusual ends, using the familiar to spotlight the new, while simultaneously challenging the moral assumptions of the original structure. With Star Driver’s first act behind us, let’s see what brave new paradigm emerges from the wreckage!
Scum’s Wish – Episode 7
Hello everyone, and welcome back to Wrong Every Time. Today I thought we’d stop back in with Scum’s Wish, wherein Hana continues her death march of causing problems on purpose for basically everyone. “Inspired” by Akane’s gleeful selfishness, Hana has decided that she too will claim anything and everything she wants to, which so far has included Mugi (unfortunately), Ecchan (unwillingly and mostly by accident), and Some Random Dude Akane Fucked (a source of instant regret and immediate take-backs). And what does she have to show for this new venture? You guessed it, a whole bunch of sadness and self-loathing. Who could have guessed!?
From the outside, it is excruciatingly clear that Hana’s current project was misguided from the start. Akane is some kind of sociopathic joy-vulture, finding happiness only in the denial of happiness to others, whereas Hana is simply a mixed-up teenager who doesn’t like herself very much, and thus feels desperate for validation from external sources. Acting like Akane was never going to offer Hana the satisfaction it provides her monstrous instructor, but Hana simply lacks the experience to know that. From her perspective, the only relevant data points are “Akane succeeded in gaining what I desired” and “I believe I am a monster, so I might as well act like one.” She’s conflating the natural insecurity of growing beyond your childhood with whatever unholy motivation fuels Akane, and making some seriously misguided conclusions as a result.
What has become abundantly clear so far is that Hana is unlikely to simply reason her way out of this emotional malaise. She needs a friend who’s not just willing to comfort her, but to actually challenge her; but with all of this show’s other characters wrapped up in their own drama, it’s hard to see any of them playing that role. And in that case, perhaps the right enemy will do in a pinch – so let’s get Moca out here, and maybe have her smack some sense into our poor foolish protagonist. It’s time for Scum’s Wish!
Fall 2022 – Week 3 in Review
Hello folks, and welcome back to Wrong Every Time. I’m delighted to announce that this week I actually did the goddamn thing, and checked out around half a dozen of the season’s new airing anime. Gundams, shonen hits, anime-originals; you name it, I watched it (so long as your names coincide with the handful of buzz-heavy productions I actually screened). The fall season is proving to be a historically odd moment in anime production; we’re receiving a wide array of prestige productions, but the industry is in complete crisis mode in terms of staff and scheduling, meaning even some massively hyped productions are already showing cracks. We’ll likely be seeing a variety of production collapses in the weeks to come, but for now, this appears to be one of the most stacked anime seasons in years. Let’s break it down!
Bodacious Space Pirates – Episode 22
Hey folks, and welcome back to Wrong Every Time. Today I thought we’d check back in on the intrepid spacefarers of Bodacious Space Pirates, who most recently served as security for the 19th Nebula Circuit. Marika performed admirably in her role of head of security, in spite of technically also being the main reason they needed security (since any would-be bandits were far more interested in her pirate license than disrupting a high school dingy race). But the true champion of the Nebula Cup was clearly Ai-chan, who managed to outmaneuver the enemy while piloting a ship designed for coastal sightseeing, and clearly proved herself as the Bentenmaru’s best potential dogfighter.
The Nebula Cup also served as the first arc to fully integrate Space Pirates’ professional and yacht club dimensions, at last fulfilling the promise of “hardened pirate crew must collaborate with a bunch of exuberant teenagers.” I’d love to see more of that as we enter our presumed final act, but will undoubtedly be charmed by whatever off-kilter adventure this gang gets up to. Marika has more than proven herself an excellent captain, she’s got a wide array of delightful eccentrics beside her, and the cosmos loom above, promising riches and wonders beyond imagination. Let’s embark!