Any week that features the finale of a Yuasa show and Joseph Joestar fighting his own arm has to be a keeper, right? You can’t really go wrong with either of those things. Plus Chaika and Sidonia both pulled off top-tier episodes, so overall I’d say this week was a roaring success. Let’s run it down.
Tag Archives: One Week Friends
Spring 2014 – Week 11 in Review
Not the most impressive week in anime, but Ping Pong was so damn good that it doesn’t really matter. JoJo also pulled off a stellar episode this week, and Chaika at least promised a great upcoming episode, so I can’t really complain. I guess I’m mainly just annoyed that One Week Friends has fallen apart.
Now that I’ve told you about my week in anime, I guess I should tell you about my week in anime.
Spring 2014 – Week 10 in Review
This week, I actually fell behind on Ping Pong, of all things. Not because I don’t have any interest in watching it – on the contrary, it was actually because of precisely what I warned myself I wouldn’t do this season. I’ve somehow found myself doing Ping Pong writeups, meaning Ping Pong tends to get pushed back until I feel like I have time to do a Ping Pong writeup, meaning Ping Pong gets neglected. And it’s so good too goddamnit this system is terrible.
Not that that’s any real excuse, considering I posted another three SAO writeups this weekend. Can’t really justify that one, huh.
Alright, enough of my moral failings. Let’s get to the shows I did watch!
Spring 2014 – Week 9 in Review
With Mushishi still on break and One Week Friends kinda stumbling around, this week was a little below-average. Ping Pong is still fantastic though, and I feel like Sidonia is actually getting better every week. This season’s still a pretty good place to be!
Spring 2014 – Week 8 in Review
It’s so nice to only be watching good shows. I think One Week Friends kinda stumbled this week, but other than that, I don’t really have any complaints about anything. I should drop shows more often!
Spring 2014 – Week 7 in Review
Some strong episodes and some weak ones this week, but fortunately the shows that could really be damaged by a weak link (Ping Pong, One Week Friends) came out swinging. Running them down…
Spring 2014 – First Half in Review
Welp, we’ve reached the season’s halfway point, which means it’s once again time to roughly shepherd everything I’m watching into a reductive hierarchy that through its very nature misses the point of art altogether. Everybody loves lists!
Incidentally, the fact that it is so reductive is why I do this nonsense in the middle of the season, and not the end. Lists are fun, but I don’t want lists anywhere near my actual takeaway from shows, so I use this mainly just to sort out my general feelings on the season’s overall tenor. This season has turned out to be very good, and I have already dropped every single show I’m not solidly enjoying – if anything on this list looks entertaining to you, I can confirm that even the lowest shows have been solid enough at what they’re doing. And the top shows… yeah, this is a season to be proud of. Let’s run it down!
Spring 2014 – Week 5 in Review
Man, my schedule is so optimized at this point. Four great shows, one okay but very enjoyable show, and Captain Earth as my only speculative pick. I also finished Mushishi last weekend, so I’ll soon be catching up on that as well. Grahh all these good shows anime YEAH.
Spring 2014 – Week 4 in Review
The season has settled at this point, and where it has settled is a very satisfying place. JoJo, Ping Pong, and One Week Friends are fantastic, Sidonia is much stronger than I expected, Captain Earth is kind of wibbly-wobbly, and Chaika is comfy as all get-out. Once I add Mushishi to the list, this will pretty much secure this season as the best one since I started watching airing shows. Good times!
One Week Friends – Episode 3
Management: I know, right? Another accidental writeup here, this time in my usual style. I only realized I’d become trapped in a writeup about halfway through the episode, so it’s a little sparse, but hopefully still enjoyable!
So yeah, One Week Friends is pretty great. It’s got a wonderful atmosphere, its characters are absolutely charming, its direction does great work in driving home the emotional states of the characters, and it actually digs at some really poignant stuff. As I said in my week in review, One Week Friends kind of covers the same territory as Evangelion – a fear of human connection underlines all the actions of this series. But One Week Friends is a much more upbeat show than Evangelion, so it doesn’t just wallow in that fear – by design, it exists in the fraught space between isolation and comfortable connection, meaning it is pretty much always about the importance, difficulty, and power of trust. Due to Fujimiya’s memory, its characters are continuously reaching out, continuously being forced to extend a hand they’re not sure will be reciprocated. And through both the narrative and the cinematography, One Week Friends demonstrates again and again how extending that trust can open up your world.