Hey all, and welcome back to Wrong Every Time. I watched a grab bag of horror movies this week, along with continuing my journey through the Ghibli catalog. I’m frankly getting a little anxious about that Ghibli journey at this point; I now only have one Miyazaki left, two Takahatas, and then a light scattering of their non-royalty productions. That’s not enough movies! Like my dive into Mamoru Oshii, I’m realizing that what initially felt like an intimidating library of canon classics actually comprises just a handful of films, and when I’ve watched them, that’ll be it. Anime is extremely young among art forms; if you’re judging from Tezuka onwards, its birth is actually still within living memory. Fortunately, there are still plenty of other mountains to climb – I certainly need to watch the pre-Ghibli Toei Doga films, I’ve got a bunch of key ‘70s and ‘80s series to examine, etcetera. But it’s an odd feeling to realize a once-imposing slate of historical context is now largely behind me, and when I’m done, there will be no more Miyazaki or Takahata films to enjoy. I guess you can’t really have a journey without a journey’s end.
Anyway, enough of that melancholy nonsense. Let’s break down some films!