At last, another season has come to an end. This one wasn’t a particularly auspicious season, but hey, it happens – sometimes the best shows are in genres I don’t really care for, sometimes I sleep on the wrong shows (sorry, Princess Principal), and sometimes there just aren’t that many things worth watching. Even if the airing catalog wasn’t very deep this time, I had a great time with My Hero Academia, Tsuredure Children, and Made in Abyss, and also found lots of time to watch a whole bunch of older anime. The backlog is basically an infinite yawning gulf of quality entertainment, and no matter how much I tear at it, my expanding genre palette just seems to make it broader and darker all the time. With a very promising season coming up, let’s take a few moments to say goodbye to summer’s final stalwarts. Starting with those lovable kids of Class 1-A, let’s run this week down!
Tag Archives: Classroom of the Elite
Classroom of the Elite – Episode 12
Classroom of the Elite actually ended pretty well this week, tying a satisfying bow on its most generally effective arc. The series of betrayals and counter-betrayals made for a very propulsive watch, and we even got some decent character moments with a few members of the secondary cast. In the end, Classroom certainly wasn’t a very good show, but it only really fell into terrible territory for its middle act there. Thank you Classroom for not being worse than you were.
You can check out my full review over at ANN, or my notes below.
Summer 2017 – Week 12 in Review
With Tsuredure Children having already ended, there really wasn’t all that much anime to sift through this week. We’re entering the seasonal Dead Zone now, where our only comforts are the shows that started awkwardly late, a procession of extended goodbyes that can sometimes stumble all the way into the following season. I’m certainly ready for this unfortunate season to end, but now that we’re at the brink, it’s tough to think that I’ll no longer be getting new weekly installments of My Hero Academia. The show’s second season has been a revelation after the somewhat questionable first act, consistently elevating inherently great material and just generally demonstrating how fun a good shounen adventure can be. With JoJo Part Five nowhere in sight and Hunter x Hunter far in the rear view, my weeks will be cloudier for lacking a great punch-stuff story. Symphogear, please rescue us soon.
Anyway, enough lamenting. Let’s start with the dregs and run this week down!
Classroom of the Elite – Episode 11
Classroom of the Elite’s final arc had its second major misstep this week, as it attempted to pull off a structural trick that really stretched the limits of its aesthetic capabilities. Visual storytelling isn’t just garnish – your show’s ability to convey information outside of dialogue inherently dictates your dramatic range, and “slowly building pressure cooker” is well outside Classroom’s tool set. Still, I guess I have to give the show props for trying something different.
You can check out my full review over at ANN, or my notes below.
Summer 2017 – Week 11 in Review
It’s time again for the week in review! This week in anime was… acceptable, I guess? When you’re only really hanging any hopes on three shows, the caliber of your week is pretty easy to diagnose. And this particular week, all the things I’m caring about pulled off episodes that were reasonable, but not exceptional. On the plus side, Rick and Morty’s third season continued to impress, offering a replacement for interdimensional cable that easily eclipsed that tradition’s lukewarm reprise. And hey, we’re basically at the end of the season anyway. If this fart of a season wants to go quietly into the night, I won’t complain. Either way, let’s start with the anime frontrunners and run this week down!
Classroom of the Elite – Episode 10
Classroom of the Elite’s tenth episode continued this arc’s very solid run, easily establishing this as the most consistent arc of the show so far. It’s a little unfortunate that the show’s ending right around the same time it becomes consistently watchable, but I suppose that’s just another of the odd quirks of watching not-so-great anime. Regardless, I’m happy things are going well, and hope Classroom can hold it together through the end.
You can check out my full review over at ANN, or my notes below.
Summer 2017 – Week 10 in Review
Let’s strap in for the week in review! We’re nearing the end of the season now, but it doesn’t really feel like it, at least from my perspective. With My Hero Academia simply ending a fairly minor arc and Tsuredure Children sticking largely to self-contained skits, Made in Abyss is the only show providing me with all that much closure – and even there, this week’s episode felt more like the introduction to a new stage in Riko’s adventure than anything truly final. But climactic or not, this week’s Abyss was a stunner in all regards, the dramatic payoff to all these weeks of knowing fandom titters. So let’s start right there, and then ramble our way through this week’s choicest offerings!
Classroom of the Elite – Episode 9
This week’s Classroom of the Elite represented a big step in the right direction for the show, returning to its bombastic comfort zone with a Lord of the Flies setup perfectly suited to its strengths. Even the show’s visual execution was much more engaging here, and the small outbursts of comedy were well-implemented as well. Classroom is certainly not going to turn into a good show, but this week put it on the right track to being an entertaining one.
You can check out my full review over at ANN, or my notes below.
Summer 2017 – Week 9 in Review
The conclusion of Game of Thrones’ mini-season sadly means these week in review posts will be shrinking again. Fortunately, the shows I still have to talk about were pretty much all excellent this week, offering a varied sample of distinctive pleasures. My Hero Academia started off on an exciting new mini-arc, Made in Abyss constructed a “filler episode” that was more satisfying than plenty of its normal episodes, and Tsuredure Children kept up its endearing shenanigans. Really the only outlier was Classroom of the Elite, and we don’t talk about Classroom of the Elite. Let’s start down in the abyss and work our way up through this week in anime!
Classroom of the Elite – Episode 8
Classroom of the Elite managed to sink to a variety of new lows this week, which is perhaps impressive in its own way, given the show is already hot garbage in all respects. I’ve basically lost all ability to extract any joy from watching this show be melodramatic, and am in minute-counting mode at this point. Some anime sure is bad.
You can check out my full review over at ANN.
