Today I’ve got a streaming review from last season, as I look back at the off-kilter but extremely charming Hinamatsuri. Hinamatsuri certainly wasn’t a perfect show, but its oddball stew of comedy and family drama made for a very satisfying watch all the same. Every season should have a solid comfort watch!
Well folks, the premieres have mostly crash-landed at this point, and it’s finally time to start sifting through the wreckage. My work on the ANN preview guide means I’ve personally watched basically every non-sequel premiere, and thus have a moral responsibility to share my knowledge, lest anyone else suffer this terrible burden. Every new season comes with somewhere around thirty relevant new productions, and it is absolutely not worth anyone’s (unpaid) time to watch all those shows, so today I’ll be breaking down this season’s premieres into vague tiers for your perusal. As always, I should clarify that this isn’t meant to be a hard, “objective” list or anything – I personally think I’m pretty okay at critiquing narrative/aesthetic craft and whatnot, but we all bring unique and valid perspectives to art, and so my list can’t really amount to much more than “I thought this was pretty cool.” Ultimately, if you’re a fan of some show’s given genre, most anime are at least watchable – but hey, you’re here and reading this, so you might as well check out my thoughts.
You can check out the full list of shows/reviews over at ANN, or just keep reading as we run through the season’s offerings. I should also mention that not everything actually has had its premiere yet, and thus last-minute challengers could still shake up the season (looking at you, Revue Starlight). And finally, this season I’ll be delegating the job of tier designation to Chitanda Eru, who I’m certain will do a phenomenal job. Let’s start with the season’s all stars and run through some premieres!
Today I conclude my journey through the first four arcs of JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure, and presumably get everyone prepped for the coming fifth season. I know I’m very lucky to be living in the era of an actual, committed JoJo adaptation, and at this point, it almost doesn’t feel like a proper anime season if I don’t have a JoJo to rely on. It’s been a long wait for arc five, and I’m beyond thrilled to get to it. I hope you enjoy the piece!
The Thrilling Tales of JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure, Part Two
Alright, looks like I’ve got at least half an hour or so before the next flood of shows arrives, so let’s take stock with another first impressions post! I am currently utterly overwhelmed by the volume of new releases, but fortunately, it already seems like this season is shaping up to be an unexpected solid one. Pretty much all the shows I was hoping would be good pulled off strong first episodes, but even unexpected contenders like Chio’s School Road and Asobi Asobase have turned out to have plenty to recommend them. As usual, you can click through here to check out the full ANN list, or look below for all of my new scores and links to individual reviews. Let’s get right to it!
The team battles continue in Chihayafuru! There’s no time for messing around anymore – with the Fujisaki team fully introduced and the reader already reaching for the first card, it’s looking like this episode will be the first act of the team finals from start to finish. We’ve also got a wide variety of subconflicts set up for this tumultuous climax, so let’s quickly break down where we’re at on that front!
First off, Chihaya actually doesn’t seem like she’ll be the focus of this match, at least in an emotional sense. She just went through a focus match against Megumu, and beyond that, Chihaya’s attachment to this match is fully an extension of her desire to succeed with her team. There will certainly be plenty of Chihaya material, but my read so far is that her segments will focus on a combination of figuring out her mysterious opponent and general “we’re doing it together” team emphasis.
Taichi seems like a more reasonable focus character, and it seems like he himself is framing beating this Arata-resembling opponent as him mentally overcoming his Arata-related insecurities. With Arata actually in the building, it seems very likely that Taichi’s big turn and Arata’s long-awaited appearance will end up overlapping.
Tsukuba is our third potential focus character, and his regret over not noticing Kana’s injury last time leaves me suspecting this may be the point where his selfishness as a competitor is directly addressed. Tsukuba has always played for himself at the expense of the team, but here in the team finals, his attitude and the overall spirit of the event may come to blows at last.
Beyond those three, I somewhat doubt Tsutomu will be prioritized, and get the feeling Nishida will just be a sturdy role player like usual. Of course, if you extend our scope beyond Chihaya’s team, we’ve got ongoing character arcs focused on Arata, Shinobu, Retro-kun, Hanano, half the members of the Fujisaki team, and plenty of other people I’m sure I’m forgetting. The dominoes are stacked up and ready to fall here in the long-awaited team finals. Let’s get right to it!
The summer season has finally arrived! Normally the advent of a new season is a little bittersweet, since it means saying goodbye to a bunch of other beloved shows, but no-o-o-ooot this time. Not only did this year’s spring season kinda suck generally, but its two best shows, My Hero Academia and Legend of the Galactic Heroes, are continuing on regardless. That means I’ve got basically no regrets coming into this new season, and am fully prepared to be dazzled by whatever comes. So far, “whatever comes” has mostly been HANEBADO and a bunch of easy skips, but hey, that’s how it goes when you’re checking out absolutely everything. As usual, you can check out ANN’s full list of reviews right here, or hit the jump for my individual rankings and links to those specific reviews. Let’s get to it!
At long last, we’re returning to the high-flying Simoun! It’s been a little while on my end since we checked in on Chor Tempus, and I’m very eager to return to this strange, uneven, and endlessly compelling series. The show’s last episode was a roiling sea of emotional turns, upsetting the relationship between Neviril and Aaeru while also offering more dark hints at the true nature of Dominura. “Aaeru and Neviril can’t get along” has been one of Simoun’s most enduring conflicts, but the nature of the relationship is definitely different now – it’s no longer Neviril retreating into her shell that seems like the problem, it’s Aaeru trampling over Neviril’s feelings with her own fanatical desire to fly.
The end result of this miscommunication was Neviril’s unhappy realization that she’s actually afraid of Aaeru, which doesn’t surprise me at all. Most of these priestesses fly because they’ve always assumed this is what they’re supposed to do, because they genuinely believe in the sanctity of their mission, or because they’re not ready to visit the spring. Aaeru has stated she’s not ready to visit the spring, but her love of fighting goes beyond that, and seems to be something Neviril finds fundamentally disturbing. I imagine their disagreements will be approaching a head in this episode, if only for narrative spacing reasons; we’re over halfway through this series, and if anything regarding this society’s fundamental nature is going to actually be resolved, we kinda need to get the band back together soon. Either way, Simoun always finds a new way to surprise, so let’s see what episode fourteen brings!
It’s time to continue our journey through Chihayafuru! Having just defeated Megumu and her unexpectedly talented teammates, Chihaya’s team is basically against the ropes at the moment. Chihaya herself lost, Nishida also failed, Tsutomu only won because of a fifty-fifty guess, and Kana is so wiped out she’s asked Tsukuba to take her spot in the finals. In terms of in-universe stamina, the team is likely exhausted, and facing down opponents who themselves beat our school’s closest rivals in an effortless, 4-1 victory.
In more metanarrative terms, this feels like a fight that could theoretically go anywhere, but will most likely end up being a dedicated celebration of team karuta. My reasoning for that is pretty simple – this is the very last match that our crew will compete in as a team for a full year, and the joy of playing karuta as a group has always been one of Chihayafuru’s most enduring threads, so this is basically the last, best chance to center a conflict on that particular theme for a long time to come. Additionally, the board pieces have been deliberately set up to allow a dramatic team match to further several character arcs. Tsukuba, whose fatal flaw has been his selfishness and unwillingness to trust in the team, needs to learn to care about his teammates’ fortunes, and contribute to an effort that’s greater than himself. Arata, who’s spent full seasons pining for his friends, is now primed for a dramatic appearance that revives their spirits and rekindles their friendship at their lowest point. And even Shinobu has now been characterized as a person defined by loneliness and contemptuous of team karuta – I frankly think her turn might have to wait for the third year, but it’s still very relevant here.
Maybe none of these variables will be used in the ways I expect, but regardless, I’m very excited for the finals. Our heroes have come a long way and earned many victories, and they’re currently all fitted with resonant personal arcs primed to add a human component to all this tactical drama. Chihayafuru is an extremely confident narrative, and we’re arriving at what almost has to be a dramatic peak. Let’s get to the fireworks!
Let’s continue our rambling journey through Simoun! Looking back on our recent history, it feels like the show’s last couple episodes have neatly demonstrated Simoun’s extremely variable dramatic range. At times, like in Floe’s focus episode, Simoun rises to become a simultaneously immediately thrilling and thematically rich war thriller, exploring the complexity of individual motivations within an oppressive social order, and smartly contrasting Class S yuri melodrama against a searingly appropriate dystopian background. At other times, like in Kaimu’s episode, the show can get lost in awkward digressions, center its emphasis on drama we’ve been given no reason to invest in, and essentially forego anything resembling a coherent dramatic structure. Simoun’s first act was deeply constrained by this messiness, and it’s only been in the last few episodes that things have pulled together into a propulsive story.
Series composer Sho Aikawa and script writer Mari Okada are both infamous for exactly that kind of narrative incoherence (well, at least they are to me, and I’m the one who gets to make all the damning declarations here), but each of them have also written true masterpieces, and are absolutely writers worthy of respect. I’m guessing Simoun will continue to bear both the messiness and the brilliance of its creators, and am excited to see it all unfold. Let’s jump right into one more episode of Simoun!
Week twelve, you guys. The season is basically over, and we’ve already arrived at the end of June. How could this possibly happen? I feel like I was still settling on what to watch this season just a couple weeks ago, and now we’re saying goodbye to Hinamatsuri as Joe preps for his very last match. The uncharitable reality might just be that this season was never able to establish much of an identity for me; neither My Hero Academia nor Legend of the Galactic Heroes are shows I’d considered tethered to this particular moment, while Megalo Box will likely end up a low entry on my end-of-year list and Hinamatsuri will shuffle off into fun but kinda trifling seasonal memory. But while the season as a whole might not be much to speak of, this particular week in anime was strong all around, demonstrating there are damn good reasons I’ve kept up with this particular catalog. Any week that adopts one of my favorite scenes from My Hero Academia can’t be that bad, and this week’s episode did everything it could to do that sequence justice. Let’s start right off with that then, and run this week down!