Anime and Manga - It's time for you to finish what you've started and watch JoJo's Bizarre Adventure: Stardust Crusaders

[uuuhhii]

On 4/11/2023 at 2:25 PM, Sarex said:

Re:Zero was the only JP novel I actually read, but at the time the translations were very slow. Somewhere along the line I just stopped. I don't remember when or why.

the novel isn't very good

give up before finish 3 volume

[Azdeus]

Watched some Gate - Thus the JSDF Fought There. I find it quite enjoyable so far, makes me think about

Spoiler

playing old civilization games and getting attacked by medieval civs while you've got tanks and whatnot

Tried watching some of madoka, but it's really not floating my boat, even though the premise is good

[InsaneCommander]

20 hours ago, Azdeus said:

Tried watching some of madoka, but it's really not floating my boat, even though the premise is good

How many episodes did you watch? There is quite the change after some events.

[Azdeus]

2 hours ago, InsaneCommander said:

How many episodes did you watch? There is quite the change after some events.

Partway through 7 if I remember it right

[uuuhhii]

4 hours ago, Azdeus said:

Partway through 7 if I remember it right

shinbo style usually take more than a few try

madoka are overrated

[InsaneCommander]

Gundam: the Witch from Mercury is back and it has improved a lot. Much less happy high school scenes and 200% more deaths, war crimes and ptsd. They also confirmed a dark fan theory that was literally written in front of everyone's faces.

On 4/16/2023 at 9:15 PM, Azdeus said:

Partway through 7 if I remember it right

Then you have definitely watched enough to decide if this is for you.

[Sarex]

Classic Denji

Spoiler

 

[InsaneCommander]

Re:Zero - Starting Life in Another World 26-31 (Season 2)

And here we go again. Subaru can’t rest, can he? Things just keep getting worse.

[Sarex]

New chapter of Berserk. It feels like I may even see an ending of it one day.

[Agiel]

In case anyone missed it, OtaKing, who created the excellent TIE Fighter animation released a few years back is working on an Alien tribute:

The clear throwbacks to 80's anime a la <<Bubblegum Crisis>> and <<Urusei Yatsura>> have my utmost approval, as does the soundtrack with shades of Chu Ishikawa.

Edited April 30, 2023 by Agiel

[PK htiw klaw eriF]

On 4/27/2023 at 3:48 PM, Sarex said:

New chapter of Berserk. It feels like I may even see an ending of it one day.

Man **** Griffith. A 10000 page muda would be too good for him.

[InsaneCommander]

Re:Zero - Starting Life in Another World 32-37

Ok, everyone is a psychopath.

And Subaru easily has the most dangerous harem I’ve ever seen. Ok, it is not really a harem, but there is even “Hannibal Lecter, the anime girl version”.

 

Spoiler

Was he really going to sign a contract after asking only about the advantages? Yes.

Some of these witches seem too kind. I imagine Minerva, Carmila and Sekhmet are probably much more dangerous than they initially seem. Carmila definitely seems too tame to be the witch of lust, but considering she looks a little like a child, I hope I never find out more.

Also, why not take advantage of the situation and ask more questions? Due to their rivalry, there would very likely be answers to any questions and corrections to those answers. Regardless of how precise the information he could get, he would at least know more about them and their relationship.

 

[majestic]

Going down an Einsteinian Insanity Rabbit Hole (tm), perhaps the fourth time is the charm, ey?

After Princess Tutu, Magic User's Club and Tamayura, I watched the first two episodes of Aria The Animation. Why? Who knows. Maybe because this is based on a critically acclaimed manga for a younger audience, so Mr. Sato cannot ruin it too much with "hilarious" slapstick and sexualized young girls in mini-skirts. Maybe because this is a part of its wikipedia page:

Quote

The English translation of the Aria manga was described by a reviewer at The Comics Journal as "quite conceivably the best comics series ever created for elementary-school girls," calling it "a masterpiece of storytelling and illustration, gorgeous to look at and a feast for the young imagination in its ability to present an inviting, fully realized world." Aqua and Aria together have been praised for their joyful calm, vividly depicted futuristic world, moments of magic,and sense of whimsy. Amano's artwork is praised for her crisp lines and details, especially in the backgrounds and landscapes. Amano has also been criticized for confusingly giving every character a name that begins with A, for letting some slice-of-life stories "drift too far out," and for making Akari's character too sweet and effusive.

Nothing happened in the two episodes, and I think that'll remain true for the rest of the first season. The series plays on a terraformed Mars renamed to Aqua, in a city modelled after Venice, creatively named New Venice. It follows a group of gondoliers. No, really, that's pretty much it. The opening episode has trainee ("Pair" in Aqua-speak) Akari ferry a girl from Earth ("Manhome") around even though she is not allowed to as pair, and they become friends.

Akari provides the narration of the series, in forms of e-mails to the girl from the first episode. Since she's a recent immigrant from Manhome, things are as curious for her as they are for the viewer. In the second episode, her friend Aika from a rival company has a fight with her superior Akira and stays with Akari over night. Akira comes to visit the company the next day, meeting her childhood friend, Alicia, who is Akari's superior. Alicia, who is the resident gondolier progeny and genious paddler () is rather appropriately voiced by Sailor Neptune.

Confused by all the names yet? I sure am, because I just spend some time fixing the errors in this post. The third episode will introduce the final main character Alice (Arisu in the original). Akari is friendly and makes friends easily, and she's just stumbling from one low-key "adventure" to the other. The ending of the second episode made me laugh in that silly way only comedic elements of anime can.

Ara, ara...

I guess my brain's already fried from looking at too many silly clips from modern shows, but the art of the series is, so far, not making me want to claw my eyes out. The character models are what they are, but, well... , at least the backgrounds are nice in their simplicity.

[Bartimaeus]

One positive of Millennium Actress over Perfect Blue is that I've been able to watch the former three times now. I wonder if the latter would impress on me even further with a re-watch like Millennium Actress has...or would it be much weaker without being able to watch it while out of my mind tired like I was when I first saw Perfect Blue? Hmm.

1 hour ago, majestic said:

Aria The Animation

not one, not two, but three distinct blu-ray releases, and every single one is a terrible, and the key word here is terrible, upscale

here's an idea ya trash-can anime labels and distributors: if something was digitally produced or cannot be re-scanned at a higher level of detail, just put the entirety of the show in standard definition progressive video on one bluray instead of a bazillion blu-rays, save in manufacturing costs, and have the possibility for better-looking video because video players will have better upscaling than your "just blow it up to 1080p, sharpen it, and call it a day!" 'technique'

but they won't do that because then they can't sell multiple scam blu-rays, which is probably the point when you're trying to re-sell an old series like this...but if you've butchered your blurays so badly that the original DVDs are better, then I really don't care, your blurays shouldn't exist

idk if I'll watch this, the prospect of having to muck around with DVDs just to try out something I probably won't like is making me the big grumpy

Edited May 6, 2023 by Bartimaeus

[majestic]

13 hours ago, Bartimaeus said:

idk if I'll watch this, the prospect of having to muck around with DVDs just to try out something I probably won't like is making me the big grumpy

Not entirely certain what to make of it after just two episodes, and I really don't know how they managed to drag out the concept over three seasons and some OVAs and specials, but after the second episode, I'm tentatively hoping that it won't end in a dumpster fire. If indeed this is, at worst, a somewhat relaxing show about nothing with a scene that reminds me of watching better animes, then I'm willing to call that a win.

What I am not certain of is if the setup and the silliness in the second half of the second episode made me laugh on its own merit, or if it worked because it reminded me of, uhm... a certain other anime season directed by Junichi Sato that we all kind of enjoyed. If it really is only the latter than it will probably not stand up to scrutiny, even in the first season, let alone three of them. Well, at least it is a short series regardless.

[Lexx]

Watched The Owl House. Was pretty great. Real sad there are only 3 seasons. Every character was great, and I liked their developments over time. Best one was Hoocifer, who's just a total psychopath. Interestingly, at first I thought he'd be totally annoying, but over time I couldn't stop just liking him.

[Bartimaeus]

5 hours ago, Lexx said:

Watched The Owl House. Was pretty great. Real sad there are only 3 seasons. Every character was great, and I liked their developments over time. Best one was Hoocifer, who's just a total psychopath. Interestingly, at first I thought he'd be totally annoying, but over time I couldn't stop just liking him.

1. I thought the first couple of episodes were such hot garbage that I gave up...uh, well, after the first two episodes. But...

2. Actually, it's pretty much the same story on why I gave up on Gravity Falls as well, except that was more like...5-6 episodes and not just 2.

3. I have been told, repeatedly, that both shows get much better after their initial poor starts. Which is actually pretty believable to me, especially when I look at Steven Universe and how bad and clunky it starts out as well. Western animated children's shows that are secretly kind of aimed at adults* seem to have to battle with their networks to start out with before they become established and get more license to do what they actually want to do. Well, that kind of happened at the end of Steven Universe when it effectively got soft-cancelled (i.e. had to rush to the conclusion...and conversely had bizarre filler-ish episodes that felt like they belonged to a different show) as well, but same idea really.

*There is another problem with cartoons like this: networks like Cartoon Network and Disney don't usually really care too much about the shows or their content...so long as they sell their bloody merchandise quotas. The issue is that shows with primarily adult audiences don't sell nearly as much merchandise as shows with primarily child audiences, which is often why such shows get cancelled prematurely even when they seem to have good viewership and critic ratings. Sigh.

8 hours ago, majestic said:

Not entirely certain what to make of it after just two episodes, and I really don't know how they managed to drag out the concept over three seasons and some OVAs and specials, but after the second episode, I'm tentatively hoping that it won't end in a dumpster fire. If indeed this is, at worst, a somewhat relaxing show about nothing with a scene that reminds me of watching better animes, then I'm willing to call that a win.

What I am not certain of is if the setup and the silliness in the second half of the second episode made me laugh on its own merit, or if it worked because it reminded me of, uhm... a certain other anime season directed by Junichi Sato that we all kind of enjoyed. If it really is only the latter than it will probably not stand up to scrutiny, even in the first season, let alone three of them. Well, at least it is a short series regardless.

it sounds like the first two episodes were at least more enjoyable than any episode of Noir, so there is that

Edited May 7, 2023 by Bartimaeus

[majestic]

16 minutes ago, Bartimaeus said:

it sounds like the first two episodes were at least more enjoyable than any episode of Noir, so there is that

I wanted to argue that I enjoyed the first four episodes of Noir, so there's a better than zero chance that if we pick any random Noir episode it could be at least okay, but then I realized that the rest of the series probably soured me even on the episodes I initially enjoyed, and even then, I probably enjoyed the idea I had in my head about what Noir was going to be more than the actual content of the episodes.

[Bartimaeus]

43 minutes ago, majestic said:

I wanted to argue that I enjoyed the first four episodes of Noir, so there's a better than zero chance that if we pick any random Noir episode it could be at least okay, but then I realized that the rest of the series probably soured me even on the episodes I initially enjoyed, and even then, I probably enjoyed the idea I had in my head about what Noir was going to be more than the actual content of the episodes.

Yeah, when you watch the first few, you kind of assume that there's a promise of...the show trying to accomplish something. A slow start taking up the first few episodes is not necessarily a big deal, especially when it seems to be a quality show doing right all the things that 99% of other shows don't...but not so much when that "slow start" actually takes up literally all 26 episodes and the show ends without it having felt like it ever began. Really, you're going to use all ~12 hours of your run-time on that? Like...come on, I see better character writing in PBS Kids cartoons like Pinkalicious. PINKALICIOUS, DAMN IT! I watch that crap in the morning before my nieces go to school. Like, the main character has a goth friend that she threw a birthday party for, and the goth girl is like "thank you so much, Pinkalicious...but um, no, there are way too many people here and everything is loud and brightly colored and it's really just not my scene, so I'm out, but hey, you enjoy the party" and she just straight up ditches her own party before it really even starts. This is a show for babies made on a baby-sized shoestring budget, but somehow manages to do some more interesting character writing than a show intended for adults with ridiculous production values like Noir. And it's not like Noir couldn't have...you have a glacially slow show heavily centered around two (and then three) characters, and you don't do anything fun or interesting with them for roughly 25/26 episodes. What gives? Might as well just have had them sit around at the beach not talking and only occasionally glancing over to each other for all of that.

Edited May 7, 2023 by Bartimaeus

[Lexx]

12 hours ago, Bartimaeus said:

1. I thought the first couple of episodes were such hot garbage that I gave up...uh, well, after the first two episodes. But...

I mean, it's not worse than 90% of the anime that people post about in here and hate(?) watch.

In my experience, first few episodes usually are always bleh, since you first have to get into the whole thing. However, if it's still terrible at 5 or 6 episodes, I guess it's time to move on.

[majestic]

Aria The Animation, episode three.

Akari and Aika meet Alice, talk to her a little while, and then later Akari meets an old aquaintance who ropes her into giving a free tour, since she's not yet allowed to take on customers on her own. He is annoying and calls her a ridiculous nickname, much like Seiya did with Usagi. Alice hears that and sees him pull Akari's hair, so she tells him to stop bothering her. They then all go on a trip together that ends with them visiting a terraforming station.

If nothing else, this series is super relaxing. It's like watching Card Captor Sakura without the card capturing and magic part. Well, also without any Tomoyo style character, no costumes and, uhm, no class for Akari to go to so less characters and yep, one can see this particular comparison fall apart in real time as I type it, even if Akari really does have Sakura's sunny disposition and Usagi's ability to make friends by just saying hello. Watching nothig happen on screen was rarely as entertaining as this episode. Having the guy being a fake customer who is given a tour is also a great way to justify the exposition dump that happened.

Still not convinced that the concept will last the 52 episodes and a couple of specials, OVAs and films, but so far this is really nice, even if I can't exactly tell you why.

Edited May 10, 2023 by majestic

[InsaneCommander]

Re:Zero - Starting Life in Another World 38-42

That was quite a party! At least some characters are sane. And in some cases they are the last ones you’d expect to be so.

 

Spoiler

Disappointed with Sekhmet (the Witch of Laziness) because she didn’t comment about her Witch’s factor on Subaru. She was probably just being lazy, I guess.

He should have tried to make a contract with Minerva or Sekhmet, who seem to be relatively normal. Perhaps Minerva could have given him some healing powers.

 

If there is something I’d never expect to see it would be

 

Spoiler

Betelgeuse hitting on Emilia’s mother.

 

[Gorth]

After a bit of a break, I found a new series to watch. It's not completed yet, so just like Mieruko-chan it may come back and bit me when I wait for more episodes

Anyway, a series called Jigokuraku ("Hells Paradise"). Only seen first two episodes. Lots of gore and chopping of heads. Set in a pseudo feudal Japan, ruled by a Shogun and people lose their heads faster than Russians fall out of windows. The protagonist was raised a someones pet killer-for-hire, working for the local towns leader. Getting married to a woman he doesn't realize he loves, he ends up getting ostracized and sentenced to death. Dying is a bit tricky for him, because he realizes a few seconds before finally dying, that he still has something live for. An emissary from the Shogun is searching around for people sentenced to death, who will undertake a risky mission for him to a newly discovered land, rumoured to be in possession of an elixir of immortality, something the Shogun would like to get his hand on. A few dozen convicts are assembled in the Shoguns courtyard and he tells the gathered convicts, that they are too many (and for his own amusement, arranges an impromptu "battle royale", leaving 10 survivors, who will travel by boat to the island. 10 armed "executioners" accompanies them, to make sure they don't get funny ideas. Episode 2 ends with the protagonist having flashbacks to his wife and what in retrospect was something good in his life, that he didn't appreciate when they still were together.

 

 

 

 

[majestic]

Well, at least there's some consistency to it.  

[HoonDing]

*anime may be interesting, looks up synopsis*

Thirty-six students find themselves and their school building suddenly adrift in a void-like dimension. When supernatural powers awaken in some of them, a sense of detachment begins to divide the group. Despite the student council's attempts to impose order, they clash with the students possessing special abilities, who rebel against their strict control.

This conflict leads them to discover that this world has its own set of rules—and following them is necessary for survival. After one of the students decides to take a leap of faith, the school switches dimensions once again. While they deal with the unique challenges and circumstances that each world presents, the students must unravel the mysterious phenomenon and find a way back home.

every single time