Animisery – A Blog About Living Miserably with Anime (Among Other Things)

I’m back! Again! I just moved! It wasn’t a grand move as I really just moved across town but packing as a professed weeb/otaku/whateveryoucallus is such a Herculean effort as that meant all the figures, blu-rays, books, and assorted chotskies also had to be packed and that was exhausting. Plus all my non-anime and anime accessories were packed as well but that’s hardly exciting to read if you’re reading a blog dedicated to anime, right? Regardless between straining my back to straight up ludicrous levels (it’s all in the back when you lift heavy things, look it up) I did manage to watch some anime as I took a lie down from the physical toll and I want to type about them!

VANDREAD: THE SECOND STAGE

I watched this so close to the start of the month and so much has happened that I can hardly discern where the first season stopped and the second one began. I can definitively remember that the second season was where Vandread actually decided that “yes my kind of harem sci fi ecchi mecha show CAN have stakes, can’t it!?” and proceeded to give kids space cancer and have other characters react to said space cancer with shaving their heads which is a boon for sure. A new girl was added to the cast who normally wouldn’t call for excitement for a harem anime as we all know the last girl hardly wins but she did have a fun chemistry with Dita! The chemistry of course being that they routinely fought for the stake of the high prize known as the JRPG as hell main character Hibiki. It gave me CW teen drama vibes when they were in conflict which is a shame because it felt like it was only a focal point for two whole episodes and then dropped to routinely be a backing issue for the Dita x Hibiki shippers which obviously had every right to have sublime confidence in their ship. It felt almost as if Vandread gave up the ghost of being a quote unquote harem as well since the other competing girls who weren’t Dita and NEW GIRL just became wallpaper for the show. Jura, the girl I liked most, was just content to want Hibiki for a breeding partner and Meia did a stoic every time she was on screen. The lore of Vandread came to a head as well and it honestly failed to thrill yet I did find this season almost tripled the interest I had in the show with what plot was there. It’s not high praise but it did keep my phone on the coffee table which is a feat because you know I gotta watch my Family Guy clips and Subway Surfers gameplay footage whenever I watch something. This is sarcasm in case it didn’t translate well in reading. I don’t need to do that. Speaking of things I don’t need to do any more, I don’t need to type about Vandread any more. The second season is fine but it’s still not anything that I’ll want to come back to. It does have some novel ideas and concepts (a 2000s anime kind of having some discourse on lesbian relationships and a respectful if poorly handled trans character) but I’d only watch it if you like mecha. It’s a fine 6 out of 10 which gives Vandread an average of 5.5 if you cared at all.

FULL METAL PANIC? FUMOFFU

Every time I watch a KyoAni (Kyoto Animation) show, I instantly want to watch all of their backlog that I haven’t got around to. They’re always outstanding in the terms of production value and quality and I guess they’ve just always been like that as their very first anime, Full Metal Panic? Fumoffu, is an actual classic of comedy anime. It’s unfortunate that having to experience the first season of Full Metal Panic is a prerequisite to grasp at the full spectrum of the gags but it’s Fumoffu is a well deserved reward for what could be a struggle for some. Sousuke Sagara and his straight laced super serious handling everything with military form and precision personality meshes so well with the ever normal Chidori even if the straight man personality antics can be exhausting. There’s also a little romance at play as well in this season as the mecha combat and military intrigue take a backseat and the show completely swerves into strictly slice of life/comedy/romance territory. There’s some episodes involving military style combat shenanigans but they are usually nothing more than that: shenanigans. It’s all to serve the joke or what episodic story is featured in the episode and nothing more. I don’t believe the actual mechs made a standard appearance in this season as any conflict is simply guns and fisticuffs territory which is great for me! I didn’t really even like the mechs. I think what made Fumoffu succeed so well, at least to me, was that it was also committed to the fluffy levity of pursuing a joke but never doing something as ridiculous as rendering the whole canon moot by destroying the world or something absolutely absurd like that. Fumoffu is treated as a story there within Full Metal Panic and gives us a peek into the extracurricular lives of our heroes and doesn’t invalidate their accomplishments so far. Yeah, it’s almost dead set on ignoring the story of the previous season but is that a bad thing if it’s in the pursuit of fun? I don’t think so. My favorite aspect of the first season was, surprisingly, the comedy as Sousuke’s incompetence to blend into civilian life was outlandish and never ventured into the “beating a dead horse” land that some anime will happily camp out in. Fumoffu being more of what I wanted was like a sugar rush that left no cavities and the gorgeous animation that KyoAni equipped it with was just the extra scoop of ice cream on the cake that was this dessert of an anime. I loved it but it does have some older anime tropes that can sour the experience for some but you’ll have to take this as a product of its time for a fuller experience, I guess. I had a blast with this show and think it was well worth the sometime struggle of the first season just to get a great 8.5 out of 10 comedy anime like this one. You might be able to go into Fumoffu raw (phrasing) but it’ll likely satisfy better knowing these characters beforehand.

JOJO’S BIZARRE ADVENTURE: GOLDEN WIND

I routinely like to make myself look the fool which is why I’ll say one thing like “I’ll never finish JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure: Golden Wind” and then immediately do the opposite of that and say “I just finished JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure: Golden Wind”. I do this because with this economy I can’t afford a proper adversary so I’ll have to make due with being my own worst enemy every time. Golden Wind is JoJo at it’s most blissfully strange and that’s a huge part of the appeal. The problem, however, is sometimes you just don’t know what (excuse my language) the actual fuck is happening. I wanted to pursue the demon of finally wrapping up Golden Wind just as a dare with myself and so I could finally profess myself over what made me loathe JoJo and I feel rewarded with the final sequence of Golden Wind as loquacious as it can be. JoJo will go to the kind of lengths to explain itself that make me think it’s committing some kind of crime and I’m not against it but some scenarios are just outright stupid. “Of course it works like this!” proclaims Hirohiko Araka all dressed in Gucci and satin. “Everyone knows this is precisely how evolution works,” said Araki with greater gusto as he decided that gravity was heavier than time and strode out, with great fanfare, to do 50 billion collabs with every Italian artist in the world. Araki is going to Araki and Golden Wind proceeded to do just that with reckless abandon with time skip powers that require a masters in several different fields and a finale that implies being a drug dealer will send you to effectively hell courtesy of the Gucci gang. The STANDO POWAH!!! in this entry were the most abnormal (SOME WOULD SAY BIZARRE EVEN) which is phenomenal as I don’t rightly give a single care about JoJo’s story. Just give me some uncanny guys fighting with ghosts that turn candy into heat sinking missiles and I’m in my seat with a large popcorn. As such, Golden Wind was more goodness and I’m glad to have watched it even if it took almost 7 years to do so. It’s another 8 out of 10 which is the JoJo standard as far as my scoring goes.

JOJO’S BIZARRE ADVENTURE: STONE OCEAN (Part One)

It would be wholly unfair to judge Stone Ocean piece by piece as this is all to serve a larger story but I also need to get my numbers up (I don’t want to be a rookie and all) so here we are. I’ll actually try to use some brevity here as a result. This was the part that I’ve been anticipating the most in part due to having the most unique premise of JoJo’s so far as well as actually implementing a little bit of diversity in the cast. The problem lies in execution though: Araki doesn’t know how to character write all that well so all the nuance the cast could’ve had is wasted so far as they proclaim where their personality is and then immediately backpedal with inconsistencies. If it’s not the character Weather Report being told to the audience that he’s a true eccentric only to become another typical JoJo’s combatant almost suddenly and immediately then it’s Ermes having a personality to suddenly just reduced to the role of obligatory JoJoBroBro who accomplishes nothing more than telling the audience and protagonist what they already know. Another strong contender for why this show is proving to disappoint me is that JoJo’s, a well established show for being exquisitely made with high production value, has abruptly started to feel cheap. The animation feels looser and the usage of CG has become noticeable to a depressing degree. I’ll take the road more traveled and blame Netflix because the correlation just can’t be denied but it’s so demeaning for JoJo to get to this point. It’s almost like a monkey’s paw creation where some desperate fan wished for Stone Ocean to be brought to reality but got it in the form of an actual Netflix original. I can’t see Netflix wanting to throw a vast amount of money on something a tiny bit more niche but it’s still jarring to witness Stone Ocean’s drop in quality after immediately completing Golden Wind. So far, my enthusiasm for Stone Ocean has been met with rising disinterest so it may be a long time before I get back on the ride. Thus far, I’ve only felt like Stone Ocean to be a 6.5 out of 10 as of this first part. Maybe it’s a symptom of burn out for the franchise but I’m not making the next parts a high priority.

KOWLOON GENERIC ROMANCE

“Watch Kowloon Generic Romance!” I told everyone in my vicinity who asked for anime recommendations in the month of May and June. “It’s an actual adult romance with intriguing sci-fi and mystery elements,” I would say as I lauded Kowloon with more and more critical praise. In this way, I made a key mistake. NEVER, if you have good sense about you, RECOMMEND A SEASONAL ANIME BEFORE IT’S FINISHED. It’s never too late to absolutely (excuse the language again) shit your bed so hard that you stain the mattress. Kowloon Generic Romance didn’t shit its bed in any severe capacity but it might have just went ahead and wet it a little. The premise on paper is stellar: Reiko works alongside Hajime an outspokenly friendly man with a past part of which includes having a photo of Reiko that she doesn’t remember taking in his desk. Reiko and Hajime grow closer as she tries to unearth the mystery of this photo as well as the hidden depths within the city of Kowloon. It sounds AWESOME, does it not? It’s a romance anime where the love interest is hiding more than he lets on with a main character inflicted with a strange bout of amnesia making her wonder where she starts and someone else begins. Actually typing it out kind of makes it sound generic (I SAID THE THING HAHAHAHAHA) but it’s a legitimate romance anime with adult characters who kiss so we take what we can get. The thing about Kowloon is that the manga seemingly thrives on instilling romance in the pages where anime Kowloon is a sci-fi mystery with a piece of romance there within. The relationship between Reiko and Hajime felt as if so much went on behind the scenes with vignettes the audience weren’t allowed to see. Hajime was suddenly much more outwardly affectionate to Reiko and Reiko felt as if she was in perpetual free fall to adoring Hajime. The secrets within Kowloon felt like what the anime had greater interest in and, you know what, that is a valid way to adapt this manga. I’ve only read so much of it but the anime Kowloon is crafted in a way to be more about the fast paced thrills of what Kowloon is rather than a romance. I felt as if Kowloon always wanted to end on a cliff hanger with each episode often in a fashion that made me wonder if I ever got a chance to catch a breath and process what I had just seen. That’s not a bad thing to me; I’d much rather have a quicker paced anime rather than a slower one. The thing is that Kowloon was taking too great of leaps at the end which rendered the ending feeling just pasted into the plot as to give a definitive finale rather than an actual conclusion. I will applaud the anime for having an anime original ending for an ongoing manga which is a huge rarity nowadays. The confidence it takes to say “this is an adaptation, not a straight replication” is admirable but it’s a lot more accomplished of a task when you know what you’re doing. It’s not even a bad ending per se. It just feels more like a bail out finale to a tiresome Dungeons and Dragons campaign as opposed to a naturally reached “fin”. I had my fun with Kowloon at the start for sure but by the end I was happy to send it off never to think any more of it. It has been said the anime adaptations of manga serve to sell the source material and, if so, Kowloon is a good example of it. I want to read more of the original and see what the true intent of everything was rather than what was presented to me and deemed “enough”. As it stands, Kowloon Generic Romance was a solid 7 out of 10 that will surely have manga fans in a riot because not having a 1 to 1 recreation is a bastardization of their beloved picture book. I’ll never make the mistake of premature recommendations again.

MY HERO ACADEMIA: VIGILANTES

I did not anticipate my shining star of spring to be a shonen anime that was a spin off of an already popular series that I only care so much about but life is all about surprises and sometimes taxes. My Hero Academia Vigilantes is what happens when you decide to make My Hero not about the nepo babies with the power of god and anime on their side and give us characters who are just regular before anything else. Koichi gave up on his hero aspirations and is just settling into college with a part time job, Pop⭐Step is just a teenage girl who aspires to be an idol, and Knuckle Duster is your average mysterious brute who assaults people for doing drugs who always successfully Spider-Mans away from his battery charges. There may be something off with this analogy, I think. Vigilantes never reaches to the “save the world” stars of the core series and that makes such an easier show to stomach as our protagonist (Batman wannabe mentor aside) just legitimately wants to give everyone what help he can with his limited powers. He isn’t like your Deku who only helped when someone he knew was in danger and didn’t start actually giving a proper care until he got grandfathered into having a quirk. Koichi is aware his power is lackluster yet he’s still out there in nothing more than a hoodie and mask doing what he can because it’s what CAN do. It endears me to him even as the story of Vigilantes does descend into “WE HAVE TO STOP THE GIANT FROM DESTROYING THE CITY” escapades that are a hallmark of the average superhero story line. Koichi spends time with his fellow vigilantes between rescues and their routine disregard of Koichi’s place lets them breathe as friends as they step on each other’s toes. As much as a Vigilantes is about action, it’s also that much more about balancing your hero and regular life when you haven’t been given a license to property damage. Like a good cape comic, Vigilantes is focused on the full picture of each hero and not just their persona. The action there within Vigilantes is thrilling particularly when we get the obligatory main series cameos that befall this kind of property and Vigilantes does feature some stand out sequences specifically in the final few episodes. It’s not particularly reinventing the wheel or even giving the wheel a sick racing stripe but it’s doing everything well with the skill that you want out of a crowd pleasing anime like this. It’s not meant to challenge your notion of superhero media; it’s just equipped to give you characters to root for and fights to be drawn in by. There is a plot threat with Knuckle Duster that I won’t spoil but he, as well as this story, were easily my favorite features of this season. As it stands, I think Vigilantes is an easy pick up even for those unfamiliar with My Hero. Hell, I’d easily take this over the original any day of the week. Maybe that’s because Vigilantes hasn’t had a chance to sour me on itself like My Hero did with its fourth season but I think the heart of Vigilantes is far more in line with what I crave from my disposable entertainment. It’s fun, it’s heartfelt, and it has an idol singer in it. These are all the ingredients to make good anime as written in the ancient texts. I don’t make the rules on this but I will enforce them with brutal and unjust force. Vigilantes is a brisk 8 out of 10 show that made me smile from start to finish and far few things can beat that.

It’s another month down! Moving is always rough even if it’s across town but, barring one show, I had a great crop of anime to relieve me from that stress. This upcoming summer season of anime looks ab-so-lute-ly stacked so I’m sure I’ll have more anime to keep me company in the wake of the unpacking struggle which is a nice consolation.

Let me know how your June went and what you watched! I’d love to hear from you! As always, feel free to go check out my podcast The Anime Brothers Podcast (episode 201 and onward) if you want to hear me yell into a mic about anime. I’d love to have you as a listener. Until then, have a safe summer and stay hydrated by drinking lots of water!