majestic

Well, that was that. Time for the second movie soon, and... Clear Card, I guess. If only it didn't look so... terribad. The ending was... okay. Fine. I... hm. No, really, it was fine. Mr. Wei is the best Alfred since Alfred, obviously. Damn.

Ey... Would it surprise you if I said that I don't like the Super Moonies' vocalist? She's pretty bad. Really, like bad. Capital B Bad. However, not liking Eurodance trash... I just got over you not liking Madoka, you know. Just kidding. It's one of these things that I grew up with and like even though it's 99% objectively bad - as objectively bad as music can get. It's my musical guilty pleasure. Have some Aqua! Okay, enough of that before I get a warning to not turn this into the music thread. I think the Sweet card episode is the worst in the entire run. If you would allow me the "spoiler" your presumptions are pretty much spot on. Sailor Mizuki will still be around as Sakura's teacher for a bit of course, but she'll limit the mysterious act to a bit of dialogue here and there. And by a bit of dialogue I mean a cryptic one liner and a bit of prodding every now and then. I was hoping for more Makoto action than I got, so you'll probably be good. The episodes also improve again after 30. 30 tries something different and it doesn't quite work. Some points for effort are in order, I guess. You'll see soon enough. Unlike Sailor Moon SuperS, these episodes can be traced to a single writer: Tomoko Ogawa. Even though she wrote the otherwise fine episode #25 with the Mirror Sakura, she has written 28, 29 and 33, and they're all like really high up on the worst episode of the show list. Probably to nobody's surprise, the only other episode not written by Nanase Ohkawa besides the upcoming #33 is #38, which, you guessed it, is also not entirely up to par. That doesn't mean that the other writers on the show all made episodes that were of lesser quality. Jirō Kaneko write some of my favorites (including the Wood card one), and Ms. Ohkawa has a few ones that aren't as good too, but that's not entirely surprising when she wrote like 50 of the 70 episodes. Ms. Ogawa has the worst good to not so good ratio though, sitting at one really good episode out of four. Although that's relative, the episodes are by no means bad, they're just not... as good as everything else is. In any other series, the baking episode would probably not be near the bottom (or at the bottom) of episodes. Now for the kicker. I'm going to say that Meiling worked for me in the way the writers probably intended her to. Completely, even. She begins her arc as an obnoxious, loud and supremely annoying counterpart to Tomoyo who simply self-inserts herself into the group even though nobody wants her there (not even Shaoran), then the show makes her the Butt Monkey so hard that you're beginning to find her sympathetic and then... she turns into a major Woobie while befriending Sakura and Tomoyo. Cryptic Sailor Mizuki-level vague spoiler: Something else, I just looked into the first few minutes of Clear Card. Tomoyo and Sakura sound the same, the writing is the same, the first joke is the same (guess who is almost late for school?), but... holy hell that looks so bad. Bad. Bad. Bad. Bad. Bad. Bad. Bad. Bad. Why? Whyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy?

That's probably some licencing stuff. I think that song had the same melody as the Japanese version in SuperS. You know what just happened? I went to YouTube to look the videos up to confirm if they have the same melody, found the Japanese one, scrolled down a bit and found these: There are the anti-vaxxer nutjobs that think vaccines are used for poplation control by Bill Gates. The more I read comments under Sailor Moon videos on YouTube, the more I wonder if that wouldn't be a good idea. Mr. Gates, please save us from Pedosus/Chibi-Usa shippers and people who think that Crystal's animation is beautiful, and make sure people who think that season 1 and 2 looked better than 3 spend eternity in that special place in hell reserved just for them. I'm pretty sure there's some space in between the poeople from the KKK, all the popes, Bruno and Stjepan. Don't you hate on my German Sailor Moon stuff! Well, actually... the Super Moonies are really, really, really bad. Okay, that's good. How do you like Sailor Mizuki so far? I mean... all I heard was Makoto talking, but I guess you don't really have that problem. edit: Right, so the big question, did you too think that episodes 28 through 30 were a little less interesting/great than the... oh boy, like 20 before them? Or was that just me?

No kidding, I just tried "I Wanna Be A Star!" and stopped after a minute or two. I don't even want to try anything else. At least our Sailor Moon songs were decent Eurodance trash (I mean "decent" in the way that I love the genre), aside from having lyrics that make no sense, like having a song about Sailor Saturn's conspiracy to... do something bad. No seriously, bad conspiracy. Huh, what? Right guys, maybe not write lyrics when you don't know what the show is a bout, huh? Moonlight Densetsu and its versions: I tend to agree, kind of. I wish the two were combinable, because I prefer the Dali version vocals over the Moon Lips vocals, but the audio engineering for the Moon Lips version is just better. It's not better performed, as much as I can tell, but it doesn't sound like it was recorded in a garage on a Sunday afternoon after Toei found out that they don't have an opening theme yet. It's really strange, because the other music in the show is top notch. Maybe that was intentional. My emotional attachment to that song is less than it could be, what with our German dub always having the same opening theme song for all seasons. The Sailor Star Song on the other hand, well... for some reason that just worked for me. I started out being weirded out by the change, and then loving it. I also appreciated Sailor Stars a lot more this time around than last time, but that's the changed perspective of adulthood, I guess, and it no longer bothered me that it had way too little Ami time, and what little was there wasn't as good as in other seasons. Heh. CCS, mild spoiler stuff: I also feel like apologizing to the people who made the Netflix subtitles. Yes, it did seem like they didn't realize that snowbunny wasn't supposed to be translated literally but is a nickname, but it probably was a stylistic choice, because Toya keeps calling Yukito "Yuki" after all, and it's never translated literally as snow, but if the quotes for the episodes on Wikiquote come from otherwise official subs (i.e. the ones on the BR), or one of the English dubs, then the Netflix ones are much better at expressing the emotional feeling that the situation carries. I don't know how accurate they are, but they certainly feel better than what the quotes read.

Hard to appreciate at times just how incredibly well done this is. I've been a bit hard on the second arc because some of the setup is a little forced and not as neatly integrated into the world as the first one was, but that first arc and the way it was set up was pure magic and probably hard to replicate. It's always Kero crying, not me. I'm totally not using the poor guy as a stand-in here. Nope! He really has a tough time dealing with the emotional stuff on the show when it happens. Non-descript spoiler (it still is a spoiler of a sort - so yeah, take care): Sakura also gets some character development. It's not that there never was development for her, but the writers made her deliberately more static than the supporting cast around her (at least, I think, maybe I'm reading too much into these never truly changing running gags, little kaiju ), as an anchor for the audience and a way to show how much far other characters have come.

Right, so that's enough for today. I'm going to sleep now. With four episodes left, the writers better had come up with a happy ending. Seriously. Guess I'll know tomorrow. @Bartimaeus why the confused look? Expected a real spoiler? I'll leave this here for posterity. You're probably done with the first arc by now anyway. edit: Or not, I've cut the Episode 60 spoiler. It's still in the preview, so unless Firefox crashes over night or the software eats it, I can still post it later... edit 2: Episode 66 had probably the best dialogue in the entire run at the end there.

Cardcaptor Sakura, episode 65. More sad incoming in #66 by the looks of it. Poor Kero is getting really worked over now.

IT BROKE NEW GROUND. Surprised nobody mentioned that yet.

Cardcaptor Sakura, episode 60. Anyway, the arc found its footing and has stronger episodes now. There's a certain amount of sequelitis going on and a bit of flanderization with Kero and Tomoyo, i.e. the show's beginning to overplay their love for sweets and Sakura, respectively, to the point where it sometimes becomes ridiculous. It's not entirely bad because they're still doing other things as well, but sometimes it's a tad too much. This episode... oi. Kero isn't just misty-eyed right now, why is he sobbing?

Good thing I complained a little about the first couple of episodes of the new arc. Episode 54 was an absolute highlight. The only thing is that Sakura looked a little strange. Not bad, just the animation was a little different than usual. Or maybe that was my imagination. I... hey well, look at Kero getting all misty eyed here. Man Kero, really. Heh.

A literary one, I'd say. His directing is less of an issue than his writing, in my opinion. Just look at From Dusk Til Dawn as proof. That film is so Tarantino that most people assume he directed, while that was Robert Rodriguez, someone who consistently made films that I enjoyed more* than any Tarantino offering. Except maybe Sin City, that can go rot in hell along with Pulp Fiction. I don't mind nonlinear narratives, but if you want to make three short films into one feature film offering, then... well, no, just don't do that. *By that I mean not wanting to pull my hair out while watching, at least. Machete was also pretty hilarious and entertaining, and that's pretty much all I require of films like that. Regarding Boyhood, keep in mind... Hahaha.

I'm pretty sure Meilin is Shaoran's karmic punishment for being mean to Sakura in the prior episodes.

You're also watching in Japanese and liking it. Welcome to Otaku City. It's also not ridiculous at all, but I'm guessing that was a rhetorical question. Don't worry, I'll stop posting spoilers, or keep things really vague from now on. Although, probably not even that. I wouldn't want to cause a heart attack. Have you continued past episode 19 by the way? Doesn't sound like it. I'm not sure why I quoted the post in such a disjointed mess. I guess I joined the Hysteron Proteron Club.

It was a joke. Sorry. But you'll get there soon enough. But yeah, good to know. No need to write mini-recaps then until you've caught up or finished. With the rate you're going that'll be pretty soon. edit: To explain fully, the first line above and inside the spoiler tag was a joke of a sort. I figured I'd tease something totally dramatic for comedic effect. That apparently worked a little too well, but you really need not be afraid of anything. There's a line directly below the first sub spoiler that reads "In case you were afraid to click, this was just a joke" but I guess you already bugged out before getting that far.

Cardcaptor Sakura, Sakura card arc, episode 4. I never expected this in this anime. Never. @Bartimaeus CLAMP made a whole lot of things from a wide variety of genres, and there are a good deal of anime adaptations, but I don't know how many of them were also written by CLAMP like Cardcaptor Sakura. I'm planning to check out Tsubasa: Reservoir Chronicle at least, because it was made by Bee Train and has a Yuki Kajiura soundtrack. Critics panned it for it's slow pacing and teenager focused romantic plot parts, which... honestly, both things don't sound that negative to me, even if it is apparently about an alternate reality Shaoran and Sakura. Ms. Kajiura at the very least most likely made a killer soundtrack.

Random observations about Sakura card arc, Episode 3 (well, 49 overall). English subtitles on Netflix refer to Shaoran as "Li" just like the girls call him ("Li-kun"). Begs the question why they do that, actually. He's been around for a while now, they could move to a first name basis there, really. But they're much better than the German ones.

Could be, but her mother is nothing but kind, and not scary. Maybe she had an experience with a bad spirit at some point. Or maybe not, either way, it's fine and fun. I guess they're not going to be the same subtitles, because subtitles have the same weird licensing issues as films and TV shows - and they're often from separate companies. It's entirely possible to have a BR of a film with a certain set of subtitles that simply aren't available on any given streaming service because the streaming service did not or could not license the subs. It's baffling. Honestly if there's a film on a streaming service I have access to that doesn't have the subtitles I want, I strap on my peg leg and hook, grow a mean beard (okay with all the barber shops more closed than open in the past months, that one has become more permanent ), drink grog and listen to the best parts of the Deadfire soundtrack, the sea shanties, without feeling one bit bad about it. However, I will know for sure once Shaoran is addressed by first name. He didn't appear in the second episode after I switched. The biggest problem with the German subtitles is that they feel machine generated - translated from out of context of the show. With the subs for the first arc, while they could have used an editing pass (so many instances of Sakrua, that spell checking did not work at all, if there ever was one), they at least read like whoever wrote them watched the episodes, and didn't just translate an excel sheet full of Japanese with no context. I hope the English ones are better. They were for the end of the episode, but there wasn't that much dialogue any more.

Kādokyaputā Sakura: The Gathering, a new CCG by CLAMP and NHK. Cardcaptor Sakura certainly isn't what I expected it to be at all when I began watching. It was part of a Sailor Moon review on YouTube that I watched for one of the longer posts about Sailor Stars that I made that suggested Revolutionary Girl Utena and Puella Magi Madoka Magica as a differen take/deconstruction* of the Magical Girl genre and Cardcaptor Sakura as a straight variant. I expected something more like Sailor Moon, what I got was different but equally great - and (in?)arguably much better constructed. *I also saw a very angry video by a literary theorist who spent almost half an hour telling everyone that clicked on the clickbaity title of the video - like me - that what is colloquially known as a deconstruction is called a subversion, because deconstructionist reading in literary theory happens purely within the work itself, not in relation to prior works. I was just once again reminded of how much of a waste of time certain philosophical debates really are. You should really cleanse that spark of weeabooism in your ear there. Go watch the first episode of JoJo's Bizarre adventure, that should reset your ears. No, just kidding. It's true though and I said that before, but Sakura's performance really grew on me when combined with her animation. Ami, Mima and Shinjuka are a class of their own, of course, but there's just something special about the combination that makes Sakura stand out so much for me. Speaking of Sakura and the Rainbow of Memories, the car ride is a perfect example of what I mean: I have this much homework! I loved that scene, really... and the entire episode. I don't think there is an episode without Tomoyo. At least she was in every episode so far, I think. I'm actually not sure because I've watched way too many episodes in such a short time that it's all rather one fuzzy mishmash of episodes. That was the first episode that I made a longer post for... I really like the Sakura is afraid of spooky things running gag. It makes no sense since she knows more about magic than anyone else except Shaoran and Kero, but it's great. Minor spoiler: Yes, there really are a huge number of little things that make this great. It was a pretty big moment for her, being able to feel the aura of a card. That was the first time, I think. Before that there was only Shaoran that could do that, and Kero. It's one of her growing moments as magic user, but yes, it seemed a bit overly dramatic. I wonder who the girl in the sailor fuku was at the end there. That seems familiar, somehow... If you don't then the writers did something wrong. She's supposed to be intolerable and annoying - at least at first. Character spoilers: And now... Cardcaptor Sakura: Sakura card arc, episodes one and two. The first two epsiodes, the opening of the new arc did a few things that were fun, and a few that left me wondering. Overall the two episodes weren't nearly as strong as the prior ones, but in all fairness, neither was the opening of the Clow card arc. Spoilers ahead. The one thing that is super, super, super, incredibly and super super SUPER annoying is that the subtitles for the second arc were written by someone else. The first set was credited by Netflix to a Veronika Ritter and were often riddled with typoes and some grammatical errors, but at least they were decently written. This arc has subs credited to one Sophiana Collins (I think that was the name, not 100% certain), and guessing by the name, the reason why they're so bad is because they're either machine translated from English to German or Ms. Collins translated from one foreign language to another. Luckily I was able to solve that by switching the subs to English, where they are at least... making sense and use the appropriate pronouns. It's not nice to refer to Toya as "it" there, subtitles. Even if he is annoying every now and then. One of the things in the German subtitles that made me switch was having to spend a bit of time to figure out what Kero meant by saying snow hare.

That's perfectly fine. With the new arc coming up I doubt there's much to write up in the next couple of episodes anyway. Perhaps a new character or two, and some other cards, I mean... I have no idea how they're going to continue this. There aren't that many episodes in the first season that are truly worth talking about in detail. That doesn't mean they're not great, far from it - it's just that they're well crafted, perfectly simple stories and interactions that are great to watch. It's baffling how well this all works in its apparent simplicity while still having the same level of care and quality in scriptwriting and direction that you'd expect from something much more serious and expensive. That's pretty much the difference between making things up as you go and having a, while not completely finished by the time the anime was made, at least a well plotted out and fairly well crafted manga to base things on. Sailor Moon's absolutely strong points are the result of them having to put the storyline on a backburner combined with the ridiculous scope of the story itself, it's always the doom of the Earth or at the end even the galaxy or universe. Cardcaptor Sakura is, comparatively, well grounded and low key, and it works massively in its favor, and it takes care to set everything up properly. That might make things apparently obvious for adult audiences, but who cares? In the end, this is an anime where you're watching Sakura "fight" a tree that grows out of her basement, with her absurdely rich friend helping to clean the house afterwards, and it's just glorious to see unfold. It's a tree. It might threaten her house, and that's bad, but that's pretty much it. Take any plot of the day from Sailor Moon, and the enemies succeeding would have spelled the end of existence. At least in the first two seasons, the others wisely toned down the stakes of a single enemy win (thus allowing Eudial to be less than a constant failure). It didn't help SuperS any, but that's something else entirely. The first arc had a really strong run overall. I'm actually kind of... loathe to begin the second arc. I hope they can keep the quality up. Only a handful of episodes after a streak of absolutely brilliant ones that I can remember not... finding great. Just decent or good. Will be curious to see what you think (that's episodes 28 to 30, FWIW).

Cardcaptor Sakura: Clow Card arc finale. There's three episodes - 44, 45 and 46. The show comes full circle. Arc ending spoilers ahead, obviously. Venture forth at your own discretion. That's probably a good choice.

Would you recommend Rising of Shield Hero, overall? Not like I'll be getting around to watching it soon. Utena, Kill la Kill and Cardcaptor Sakura are going to occupy me for a while yet, then there's JoJo's and Steven Universe Future to finish.

Cardcaptor Sakura, episode 43. ...