Today I’ve got my review of Hyouka’s second half, which unsurprisingly turned out to be just as strong on this viewing as any of the others. Hyouka is just a ridiculously good show in every single capacity, maintaining a level of richness and beauty throughout that is simply staggering. It is remarkable that this show exists at all.
You can check out my full review over at ANN.
Flip Flappers’ third episode introduced us to the barren world of Cocona’s psychology, an inhospitable place defined by the dichotomy of fierce self-denial and total hedonism. Cocona escaped that place, with the help of Papika, and seemed by the end of that episode to at least be able to acknowledge Papika’s friendship. In its fourth episode, we turned from Cocona’s world to Papika’s, where our two leads learned to trust each other far more completely than ever before. By the end of that episode, it seemed like Cocona was ready to accept Papika’s love, and perhaps even reciprocate.
Here in episode five, Pure Illusion offers a vision of what society has to say about all of that.
This week’s March comes in like a lion wasn’t an aesthetic marvel on par with last week, but it was just as emotionally harrowing in its own way. Actually getting to see Akari’s perspective was a welcome shift from the show’s usual focus, and the show’s articulation of her assumed parental insecurities as as thoughtful as any of its other beats. I hope we keep getting to see her and Rei support each other from here out!
You can check out my full review over at ANN, or my notes below.
Let’s keep on chugging with Chihayafuru! Last episode represented the conclusion to another of Chihayafuru’s mini-arcs, as both Chihaya and Taichi found themselves defeated in the team’s first major tournament. That arc also introduced Shinobu, who is awesome, but I’m guessing we won’t be seeing her for a little while. Chihayafuru is fast-paced, but it still generally obeys the tenets of its genre, and concluding a tournament means it’s likely we’ll be cooling down with either training, character development, or some kind of lighthearted segue material. I’m guessing we’ll be shifting gears to focus on Arata’s return to karuta, but without a clear next goal already established, the show could go in a variety of directions from here. Wherever things end up, I’m having a great time with Chihayafuru, and am excited to continue. Let’s get right to it!
Just Because! pulled off a nicely focused episode this week, essentially using Haruto as the central pillar to contrast Mio and Hazuki’s experiences of young love. While Mio is coming to realize a long-held crush might not be the strongest basis for a relationship, Hazuki is starting to believe that not really knowing Haruto isn’t necessarily enough of a reason not to date him. Both of their experiences felt valid and well-articulated here, continuing Just Because!’s sturdy trend of incredibly well-observed adolescent romance.
You can check out my full review over at ANN, or my notes below.
Dear lord is the anime good you guys. The anime is so, so good. Even the shows I’ve been kinda so-so on, like Kino’s Journey and March comes in like a lion, turned in all-star performances this week. Last season’s emptiness seems to be getting paid back in full this season, as Fall 2017 is pretty much offering everything I want in anime. A thoughtful, subtly executed character drama? Just Because! A rambling, evocative thematic treatise? Kino’s Journey. An over-the-top but still character-focused action spectacle? Juni Taisen. And all those pillars are strongly bolstered by plenty of other shows, including TWO, that’s right, TWO actually funny comedies. We very rarely get seasons this good, and I’m doing my best to appreciate every minute of it. LET’S RUN THIS WEEK’S EPISODES DOWN!
Today on ANN, I reviewed the second season of the always satisfying My Hero Academia! As I often mentioned while the season was actually running, it was a great relief to see My Hero Academia’s sequel pick up the pace of adaptation, and give the original’s arcs precisely the amount of screen time they needed. The adaptation even improved over the original at times, making it an altogether excellent take on a very good manga. BRING ON SEASON THREE!
You can check out my full review over at ANN.
Let’s get back to Simoun! Simoun’s first episode was an astonishingly rich premiere, packed with compelling worldbuilding and intriguing thematic subtext. The twin pillars of the holy land’s strange, martially-focused theocracy and its gender-related cultural assumptions gave me a whole bunch to dig into, and on top of that, the episode was also just fast-paced and beautiful. We were given enough natural hints to draw up an alluring portrait of life in this world without exposition ever overrunning narrative, and I’m already somewhat invested in several of our apparent lead characters. Fantastic premieres are a lot more common than fantastic shows, but a great premiere is certainly a good way to start. Let’s see what episode two brings!
March really knocked it out of the park this week, offering one of the strongest episodes of the show altogether. I don’t know what mystical alchemy conspired at SHAFT that allowed them to pull together so many talented animators to work on such a great storyboard, but the results certainly spoke for themselves. I’ve reached a point of zen where I accept that no basically no show can actually look like this every single week, but goddamn is it spectacular when it happens. Great work, team.
You can check out my full review over at ANN, or my episode notes below.
Today on Crunchyroll, I dug into how well Juni Taisen has balanced the assumptions of its premise and the general demands of dramatic characterization. The show isn’t wasting time killing off its contenders, but those contenders are being used well – their deaths are all meaningful in their own way, and the fact that I actually felt very sad for Chicken and Boar is a testament to the show’s overall writing. You can check out my full piece over at Crunchyroll!
Character Economy in Juni Taisen (Part One)
