Anime and Manga - I respect the first human to have eaten a mushroom

[Sarex]

24 minutes ago, Gorth said:

Off Rimuru, Ranga and the class goes in search of superior spirits...

Spoiler

"Superior"

 

Edited May 30, 2022 by Sarex

[majestic]

I forgot to mention that I of course watched last week's Komi Can't Majestic-ate. As far as episodes go, this one was okay. The first part was almost completely silent, and lo, the series works much better without that horrible voice acting in it. I really should just turn off the sound when watching.

That said, with each passing week Komi's ongoing predicament(s) become(s) more and more ridiculous. One step forward, ten steps back. Just let her at least talk to Tadano. Sigh.

Edited May 30, 2022 by majestic

[InsaneCommander]

On 5/29/2022 at 12:06 AM, Gorth said:

Slime story continued, episode 20...

he gets on Yuuki's good side by using his knowledge of manga's to instantly print a library of manga's that Yuuki hadn't read before he got summoned to this world

This implies that he has a perfect memory of everything from his previous life, probably thanks to the mysterious voice in his head. Interesting that such voice first appeared when he was a human dying on Earth, before becoming a slime.

[Gorth]

1 hour ago, InsaneCommander said:

This implies that he has a perfect memory of everything from his previous life, probably thanks to the mysterious voice in his head. Interesting that such voice first appeared when he was a human dying on Earth, before becoming a slime.

I do sometimes wonder if “The Great Sage” isn’t somewhat more than just a smug encyclopaedia 

[Bartimaeus]

Neo Tokyo (1989). This, Memories (1995), and Robot Carnival (1987) are all collections of shorts (although Memories' are a bit longer than the others, especially with Magnetic Rose and Stink Bomb being around 40 minutes each - the additional length is a good thing, IMO) and with some overlap in who made them. Neo Tokyo was by far the worst production out of the lot just from a visual and sound standpoint, but all three of its shorts were more engrossing than any of the nine in Robot Carnival. Not as good as Memories, but still a worth a watch.

Edited June 1, 2022 by Bartimaeus

[Amentep]

Space Cobra aka Supēsu Kobura

Episode XXIII: "The Tomb at the Bottom of the Ocean" aka "Kaitei no Bohyō"  

Episode XXIV: "Care to Buy a Robot" aka "Robotto wa Ikaga?"

Spoiler

Episode XIII: Cobra and Dominique take a vacation on a planet unaware that the vacation spot they've chosen, Port Osiris, is home to a group of sea pirates.

Thankfully no one ever ponders why Dominique keeps spending time with a character who by this point has to be known to be a shady character even if he isn't known to be Cobra.

They're attacked by robot sharks, followed by lady pirates

Insert "Jaws" theme here...

Dominique gets kidnapped and Cobra gets shot and manages to escape.  He is met on shore by a lady who proved to be one of the gang - and an android.  So Android Lady Pirates are now a thing.  She manages to tranq dart Cobra a few more times.  Cobra meets the android pirate lady leader, Ironhead and manages to escape with Dominique. However his first attempt to kill her fails as while she is an android, she is capable of living as only a head and escapes to a new body, this one armed with a shield that the Psychogun can't penetrate.  After a game of cat and mouse, Cobra hides under the seabed and shoots up through the shark Ironhead is riding and splits her in two with the Psychogun, eliminating the pirate threat.

Ironhead has a splitting headache...

Sort of a minor episode; rehashes some things we've seen before.  

Episode XXIV -

Cobra is setting up an attempt to rob a bank where the Pirate's guild holds most of their money.  The city has a robot bazaar which Cobra and Lady look through while casing the place.  Cobra is struck by the weird impulse to buy a robot he sees, does so only to find its chained to a robot arm.  Cobra leaves the robot arm.  His new robot pal can't remember who he is, so they continue on their way. 

Cobra buys a friend.

Overnight, the arm regrows itself and the new being takes control of the robots in the Bazar.  Cobra are awakened by a scream to find robot bees killing the women who operated them to collect honey.  They manage to save one and head for the city but are attacked by multiple robots and their rescue fails when robot bulldozers, channeling the TV Movie "Killdozer" destroy their hovercar by pushing rocks on it from the cliffs above.

Rescue mission failed...we'll get 'em next time...

Cobra, Lady and the new robot manage to survive the crash and make it to the city where they find the regenerated robot is now a giant crushing the city.  The city's defenses fail to stop it because it keeps regenerating its body.  The robot remembers who it is - apparently the robot they're facing, Zaval O, is the ultimate weapon from one of two races locked in an intergalactic war.  Sent to destroy planets, the robot Cobra bought was the only defense, able to resist its control, it had terminated Zaval O by dropping him in another dimension, cutting off its arm but in the process losing its memory.  

We also find that Lady, as an Armaroid, is immune to Zaval O's control (its almost implied that she is either so close to human she has her own soul or was once human and has retained her soul - a little unclear there).  The robot uses its final weapon, it reverses time imploring Cobra not to disturb it.  Time is re-wound is a sequence ripped from the end of SUPERMAN: THE MOVIE and Cobra, back at the robot bazaar declines to buy the robot.

They were fun enough episodes, but other than some character information about Lady that's not terribly definitive they don't add much to the overall mythos.

Also read Vol 10 of Glepnir...

Spoiler

Suichi has a talk with what is now pretending to be Honoko in his memories.  Since Alien couldn't bring her soul back, Kaito recreated her from everyone's memories of her, which makes her exist in everyone's memories as much as the real world, hence why she is able to confront Suichi in his own memories.  He recreation has left her spiritually empy, and once Kaito had her back in the  real world, she decided that the real Honoko killed herself because the world made her sad, so she plans to disappear the world.  Suichi confronts her about erasing everyone, but she points out that even he can't think what's she's doing is wrong since he hasn't missed his parents yet, which makes him realize that his parents have been erased from the world.  The lady who was using her power to help him explore his lost memories helps extract himself before Honoko can kill them both.

In the real world, Suichi tells Claire what has happened and Claire decides that they cannot wait much longer.  She contacts their allies with the goal of attacking Kaito in two days when they're organized.  Suichi finds his birthcertificate and sees his parents entries are blank, but rubbing his finger across it rubs ink on his fingers, impying the names are there (and perhaps implying that people aren't as gone as not-Honoko thinks). She also finally bonds completely with Suichi by using his gun while she's in control to shoot himself - Suichi's desire to protect her causes them to bond and saves her from the wound.

Suichi decides to spend his day before the confrontation at school, reconnecting with his friends since he doesn't know that he'll see them again.  Claire does as well.  But things take a turn for the worse as Kaito has decided that he's not going to wait for two days.  Killing many of their classmates (and revealing others as having also gotten powers, like Claire's friend who turns into a magical girl), Kaito's group rampages until Suichi and Claire finally get together to form their new pairing to face Kaito (in the next volume).

Really enjoyed it.  Feels like we're getting to the end of "Part 1" of the story.

[Gorth]

9 hours ago, Amentep said:

Space Cobra aka Supēsu Kobura

Episode XXIII: "The Tomb at the Bottom of the Ocean" aka "Kaitei no Bohyō"  

Episode XXIV: "Care to Buy a Robot" aka "Robotto wa Ikaga?"

  Hide contents

Episode XIII: Cobra and Dominique take a vacation on a planet unaware that the vacation spot they've chosen, Port Osiris, is home to a group of sea pirates.

Also read Vol 10 of Glepnir...

Cobra looks like it has a certain appeal... i really need to check it out some day

As for Gleipnir, dang, they really left a lot out of the Anime, didn't they? From your post, about 3/4 of the story (and I still liked the anime a lot)

[Amentep]

I think the Glepnir anime only got to vol 3 or 4 in the story.  I guess part of the problem of adapting a still young and ongoing story.

[Gorth]

That time I got reincarnated as a slime (I think I might just stick with its shorter nickname Tensura Nikki) episode 22 & 23 (a "dual episode")

 

Rimuru and his class of doomed kids travel to the "Dwelling of Spirits". Turns out the dwelling is more of a labyrinth than any obvious dwelling. They get met by a pink (yes, pink!) golem, which wants to fight them.

After a hard fight, they dismantle the golem and gets introduced to Ramiris... aka Ramiris of the Labyrinth, one of the ten Demon Lords and former Queen of Spirits (from the background lore, I found out she was killed many times over and reincarnated in order to prevent Guy and Millim from blowing up the world when the two of them had a fight, which lasted seven days. Ramiris kept absorbing the enormous quantities of magic released, died and came back, over and over. Her current physical form is that of a diminutive looking fairy)

Luckily she can be bribed with cookies

She is however still feeling somewhat peevish because Rimuru destroyed her golem. It took a lot of effort and energy to build!

Ramiris shares a bit of background info too about herself (how she was once the Queen of Spirits, who fell from grace and became a Demon Lord) and a fellow Demon Lord, 'Leon' (who was once a hero also fell from grace).

Another subtle poke at Rimuru, pointing out humans can become Demon Lords, like Milim mentioned previously, asking him why he didn't want to be one. Leon was the Demon Lord that summoned Shizu to this world iirc.

She does feel sympathy for the plight of the children and agrees to help, doing the summoning. The children will have to do the convincing of the spirits to merge with them until their bodies mature themselves however.

Each of the kids ends up merging with a spirit of various aspects, fire, wind, space etc. Except Chloe... she ends up with a mysterious spirit from the future before anyone can stop it.

Rimuru ends up somewhat red faced when Chloe says she loves him... wishing she would say that in eight... no, make that ten years time, instead

Everybody is saved for now and Rimuru makes his way back to his captital, leaving the education of the kids to the school for now, knowing they are not going to explode from excess magical energy any moment. After a moment of reflection with the mask of Shizu in his hands, knowing the kids will be alright, the end credits start (in the middle of episode 23!) and a new story arch starts in the second half of the episode....

I'll take that together with episode 24 in a follow up post.

 

Edit: This was also the first time Rimuru revealed to the kids (because he needed to show Ramiris) that he is not a human, but a slime

 

[InsaneCommander]

The Rising of the Shield Hero 2.8 and 2.9:

Naofumi and his friends get back to civilization (in a hostile country) and sell magic potions to earn some money. They plan to use an artifact to transport themselves to another kingdom (which turns out to be a little hostile too), but end up in a trap and get separated from Raphtalia, who, despite having leveled up a few times, is still in infant form.

Fishing Rod hero girl (what was her name again? Oh, Kizuna, I just saw in the screenshot below) introduces them to a rabbit-human mage (a boat hero, what is next, a barrel hero?) who can help them find Raphtalia. He creates a kind of familiar with Raphtalia's hair and Naofumi's blood and this creature can tell them where Raphtalia is.

They go to yet another hostile country (what a nice world!) which turns out to be exactly where Filo was. Well, that problem was solved really fast. I guess they will find Raphtalia soon too, right in the next episode. Unlike what I thought, Filo didn't revert to an egg, but she is now a different type of bird and is being kept as a slave and somewhat of a circus attraction.

They wait until nighttime to rescue her and Naofumi uses some kind of Ghost Rider's Penance Stare from his shield to make the slaver feel what he inflicted on Filo. Honestly, she was so traumatised that the guy didn't get a fraction of what he deserved. Damn it, even the normally calm and insecure green-haired girl Rishia (the screenshot saved me again) got pissed off with what was going on. I wished Jotaru would have come out of nowhere and Ora Ora that man into oblivion.

[PK htiw klaw eriF]

1 hour ago, InsaneCommander said:

I wished Jotaru would have come out of nowhere and Ora Ora that man into oblivion.

Go bigger.

 

[Gorth]

Tensura Nikki episode 23.5 & 24... (all hail our new slime overlord)

 

The end of episode 23 is sort of foreshadowing something or rather someone, observing Rimuru from afar, careful not to be seen. She looks like some kind of knight. Judging by her facial expression, she's no fan of slimes... or maybe Rimuru in particular.

 

Episode 24 is a flashback episode, showing an encounter Shizu had in the past with a mysterious stranger...

It begins with a desperate woman performing a summoning, seeking vengeance (I presumed at whoever killed her companions aka the corpses strewn around her).

 

How does the saying go, careful what you wish for?... sacrificing her life and her soul, she enters a contract with the summoned demon...

 

A quick location change and we follow Shizu, who is headed towards the capital of Filtwood, a realm neighbouring The Great Jura Forest (I saw a map in one episode, the world looks like a single, giant continent with Jura in the middle and various mountain ranges, swamps, kingdoms etc. surrounding it. A call has gone out for heroes to fight a demon that has recently been revived. She joins a large gathering of local heroes, fighters, adventurers etc. who all answered the summons. Of course it was a trap and the local army blocks all exits from the great hall. Claiming (falsely) that one or more of them are demons in disguise after killing one of them and putting on a big light show, making it look like the deceased was possessed by a demon, the lords of the place tells them, nobody can leave until all demons are killed. What nobody knew was, there was a real demon among them. The one summoned at the beginning of the episode... Shizu confronts him, suspecting he plans to kill everyone, guards, adventurers, servants, the lot, and wont have none of it.

The demon doesn't really want to talk about himself...

And Shizu doesn't really want to let him leave...

After a bit of fighting, the demon loses his right arm. Deciding to call it a draw (yeah, sounds familiar), he turns into a black cloud and evaporates away.

A bit of exposition follows with further flashbacks, Shizu thinking about some details the Demon Lord 'Leon' told her about the nature of different types of demons, including "Primogenitors" , known by their signature colours rather than names (Noir, Blanc and Rouge)

Yeah, not suspicious at all... the king is sitting to the right, his advisor to the left... and mysterious guy who appeared as a simple lackey until now in the middle. Smells fishy...

 

The guy in the middle is an arch demon. He proceeds to knock the stuffing out of Shizu and starts choking her Darth Vader style while telling her, she's going to be a sacrifice in a ritual. Rescue arrives from an unexpected side when the one armed demon from before returns...

He pulps the brain of the advisor (splattering it out over his seat), by jamming a metal rod through his skull, then proceeds to remove the kings head and finally turns his attention to the arch demon... adding "A lower demon like you can't..." to the list of last words.

 

The arch demon now gets to occupy the position formerly held by Shizu... being choked to death (and that by one armed demon)

 

All's good that ends good or something... at least for now. Off to watch something else for a while

 

 

 

 

 

[InsaneCommander]

19 hours ago, KP wants Blue Velvet said:

Go bigger.

 

That would be fitting. This was one of the most satisfying moments ever. The end, with the garbage truck, still makes me laugh hard.

[uuuhhii]

not sure why these isekai anime are so popular

the light novel they base on are mostly garbage

guess good graphic does a lot more than words

[InsaneCommander]

Personally, I don't care if the main character comes from another world. I'm interested in these animes because of the fantasy setting and the story. And good graphics are not essential.

[PK htiw klaw eriF]

3 hours ago, InsaneCommander said:

That would be fitting. This was one of the most satisfying moments ever. The end, with the garbage truck, still makes me laugh hard.

I remember some people were nervous that the 7 page muda would be cut, but they not only did the whole thing but also had Giorno do a Wryyyyyyyyyyyyyyy in the middle. It's probably the perfect extended beat down. DIO would be proud.

Edited June 4, 2022 by KP wants Blue Velvet

[Gorth]

4 hours ago, uuuhhii said:

not sure why these isekai anime are so popular

the light novel they base on are mostly garbage

guess good graphic does a lot more than words

No idea if they are popular. Didn't know light novels existed. The graphics are nice. I've seen other anime with better graphics though. Maybe it's because it provides a convenient way of disposing of existing conventions and settings for a protagonist? I'm sure there are people out there who wished they could leave the dreariness of their everyday life behind and be a "somebody" in a different world with different rules. Maybe everybody else just has better taste than you

But seriously, I think the need for escapism is a factor in why most people seek to immerse themselves for a while in stories.

[majestic]

It's by far and large the easiest way to have a fish out of water character that can serve as justification for any and all exposition you want dumped on the viewer. There are ways to make that work within a universe without reincarnation or transporting someone to the alternate reality of course, but that's a good deal more difficult. More difficult, but also more satisfying, especially if the exposition is organic but still followable.

Watch 魔法少女リリカルなのは StrikerS (can't believe I managed to type that without any typos on my first try ) for a really decent way to do that. For the most part, at least, somewhere near the end the season falls apart a bit and it just has a regular exposition dump episode for no reason.

[uuuhhii]

3 hours ago, Gorth said:

No idea if they are popular. Didn't know light novels existed. The graphics are nice. I've seen other anime with better graphics though. Maybe it's because it provides a convenient way of disposing of existing conventions and settings for a protagonist? I'm sure there are people out there who wished they could leave the dreariness of their everyday life behind and be a "somebody" in a different world with different rules. Maybe everybody else just has better taste than you

But seriously, I think the need for escapism is a factor in why most people seek to immerse themselves for a while in stories.

many light novel reader wish they still have the trash taste they have in early days to tolerate the endless amount of garbage the industry are producing

light novel been stagnant for at least a decade now

used to be filled with highschool trash and now isekai trash

the formula become more obvious and pointless more one read

why are these people still go to highschool after the incident in volume 2

why are these book start with a random person kill by truck if it never mattered in the story later on

there is a point that writer cannot just hide their incompetence behind genre convention forever

[InsaneCommander]

18 hours ago, KP wants Blue Velvet said:

I remember some people were nervous that the 7 page muda would be cut, but they not only did the whole thing but also had Giorno do a Wryyyyyyyyyyyyyyy in the middle. It's probably the perfect extended beat down. DIO would be proud.

This comment on YT is particularly interesting:

Quote

The beatdown starts at 0:17 and ends at 0:47. This means the 7 page muda was 30 seconds long. This means 7 pages of a stand rush beatdown should be 30 seconds long when animated. This means that 30/7 or 4.2857142857 seconds is a singular page of stand rush beatdown. This means that since Cioccolata would also be getting the life energy implanted into him making time seem slower the longer it went on, the amount of time that happened from Cioccolata's perspective was 548.5714285696 seconds. The math behind this is 4.2857142857 x 2^(7) (thats 2 to the power of 7). 548.5714285696/4.2857142857 is 128. This means that from Cioccolata's perspective, he experienced 128 PAGES OF MUDA. He was a sociopath but Jesus that much pain being seemingly expanded in his mind mustve been horrible!

So that was almost 10 minutes of Muda Muda from Cioccolata's perspective.

[InsaneCommander]

Spy x Family 9

 

Holy s***. These people are almost killing each other and the secrets haven’t even been revealed yet.

 

At least, for once, Anya was just sleeping peacefully (mostly).

 

 

The episode starts where the previous one ended, that is, with Yuri demanding that Loid and Yor kiss to prove they are indeed married for real. Yor can’t bring herself to kiss Loid, even after getting intentionally drunk so that she could do it. Not noticing that, Yuri tries to stop her and ends up being slapped on the face and flying to the other side of the room. His face was already bleeding after she threw a fork at him when she got drunk and now he is bleeding even more. Still suspicious, Yuri leaves, threatening to have Loid executed in case he does anything bad to his sister.

 

In the morning, Anya reads Loid’s thoughts and gets excited with the idea that there is a secret police, even if she doesn’t really know what that is. She gets angry and frustrated that they didn’t introduce her to her uncle.

 

Yuri gets to work and tells a colleague that his sister’s husband is too nice so he must be a con man or a spy. And his colleague considers the possibility, asking if there is any proof. Well, isn’t it nice to live in a fascist state?

 

Loid finally starts suspecting Yor and plants a listening device on her. Then he and one of his contacts disguise themselves as the secret police to interrogate her. What a wonderful idea! If only they knew they are threatening a professional assassin… Anyway, Loid stops suspecting her and they all celebrate the (fake) marriage anniversary eating a cake with Anya.

 

Edit: in the video, Anya asks if it is the end of the world.

Edited June 4, 2022 by InsaneCommander

[Bartimaeus]

Vampire in the Garden, episode 1.

So the few images I saw of this show highlighted a few things that I liked: odd character design, a girl looking pathetic and disconsolate (as if she had failed or done something that she'd rather not have), two girls working together in what looked like a factory (one of them being the previously mentioned sad-looking girl, which would imply one or both of them are important characters), and...vampires. I didn't really realize it, but I think Miyu has had an effect on me in that I find the idea of vampirism kind of interesting now (assuming they're not the outrageously stupid kind). So even though this is a piece of crap Netflix anime released in 2022, I thought I would try an episode. Plus, it's only 5 episodes long to begin with, and I don't think there's any possibility of a sequel, since it's an ONA? I'm not sure how that works, really.

Well...it had some things that I liked, and a few things that I didn't. Well, really, it was kind of just one thing that was strongly negative, but it happened like three times: the main character deciding to have super emotional moments during important scenes that kind of just deflated them because they poorly handled and way overdone, which is unfortunately a bit of a staple of modern anime. Still, I'll watch a second episode, and that's not too bad - I'm kind of curious to see where it goes. I certainly have a much more positive impression than I did when I watched the first couple episodes of that Netflix Castlevania series.

Edited June 5, 2022 by Bartimaeus

[Bartimaeus]

The End of Vampire in the Garden. I had a fit of insomnia and watched the rest of it. You know what, @KP wants Blue Velvet was right, it was pretty decent. Did I love everything about it? No way, but it more or less made up for the things I didn't like with things I did, so I wasn't being hypercritical while watching it, and that's what's important.

Spoiler

Some hilariously bad CGI aside (seriously, what were they thinking every time they animated Fine's car, holy crap that thing just flew all over the screen seemingly at random), I kind of got the feeling it was "Romeo and Juliet, but with gay vampires" by the end of the second episode, and that's pretty close to what it ultimately was. Can't complain about that too much however, since I did enjoy it. I really wanted to cut that mom's face off, though.

 

[PK htiw klaw eriF]

16 hours ago, InsaneCommander said:

So that was almost 10 minutes of Muda Muda from Cioccolata's perspective.

That's a lot of muda. Good.

3 hours ago, Bartimaeus said:

You know what, @KP wants Blue Velvet was right, it was pretty decent.

I'm usually right. Unless I'm not.

CGI cars in anime are some of the worst things I've seen. Just pure uncanny valley that you can't really ignore.

[Bartimaeus]

Spoiler

I was pretty tempted to make a gif of a particular scene of that car moving because I was so dumbfounded that they would ever possibly think that they could animate it that way and not have it look utterly atrocious, but it's pretty difficult to make gifs on the Netflix player. I actually yelped out a "WHAT?" when I saw it. Goodness gracious, put just a tiny bit of effort into it, please.