Wooper: Happy November, everyone! With schools across the country having recently concluded their first quarters, it seemed appropriate for us to issue our own report card, as it were, for the fall anime season. You won’t find any letter grades in this post, however – just Lenlo and I giving our thoughts on a bunch of currently airing shows. We’ve got surprise hits, mediocre manga adaptations, sequels of varying strength, and a potential AOTY candidate lined up for you here, so read on to see which is which!
Sword Art Online Alternative: Gun Gale Online II – 2-5
Lenlo: Little girls with guns go pew pew. Seriously though, much like Shangri-La Frontier, Gun Gale Online actually communicates a lot of the fun of playing these sorts of MMOs. Hanging out with your friends, doing stupid stuff with stupid builds, competing, random insane PKers and people making stupid calls. It’s everything that Sword Art Online wishes it could be. And the fact that there’s no world-saving, life-ending threat, means there’s always some tension because our leads are actually allowed to lose. Again, much like Shangri-La, defeat doesn’t mean the end in Gun Gale Online. What I’m trying to say is, Gun Gale Online is a fun, chill action series about a bunch of people running around shooting each other and having fun, knowing that no one is in any actual danger and the only thing at stake is pride inside of a video game. The battle-royale scenario, the closing ring, the CoD style maps, it’s all just… fun. And for me, that makes it worth continuing.
NegaPosi Angler – 2-4
Wooper: Angler has been the most pleasant surprise of the fall season for me – you might say I’ve fallen for it, hook, line and sinker. The music is especially good; contrary to its obnoxious OP, NegaPosi’s score is firmly downtempo, featuring guitars of all varieties that pair perfectly with whatever is happening on screen. Episode 3’s chase scene between Hiro and a trio of loan sharks, for example, features whimsical nylon string noodling that nicely matches the characters’ running speed. Then, as Hiro leaves them in the dust and comes to a standstill, the guitars get quieter and slower before stopping altogether. Even when a character is doing something as simple as reeling in their lure, the music matches their technique, creating a nice mood during the lengthy fishing scenes. Everything else is pretty good, too – episode 4 recently skipped the OP to make room for a montage of floofy-haired Hana’s daily life that charmed the pants off me (thanks in part to the series’ mastery of cartoon facial expressions), and Angler has demonstrated real restraint in developing the bromance between Hiro and his new roommate Takaaki. I’ve got criticisms here and there, but mostly I’m just enjoying the show and its cast for what and who they are.
TRILLION GAME – 2-6
Lenlo: Trillion Game is the best ugly show I’ve seen in a long time. Seriously, it looks terrible, the designs are still chubby and it barely moves whatsoever. It’s even worse than Blue Lock in a lot of ways, because at least it has appealing character designs and some stylistic moments. But where Trillion Game succeeds is in its characters and narrative. Haru and Gaku’s quest to success is a joy to watch, Haru’s haphazard plans and Gaku’s skills working within them, how confident they are in each other, I love it. I especially enjoy how Haru isn’t just this good looking asshole using Gaku for his own ends, the guy legitimately cares for his partner and is loyal to him above all others. That sort of genuineness is something I enjoy a lot, reminding me of shows like I Parry Everything. Hopefully Trillion Game can keep this up, because I’m still not sure how it’s going to stretch this concept across 26 episodes. Still, I’m enjoying it so far.
Hyakushou Kizoku – 15-18
Wooper: Hiromu Arakawa’s little-known third anime adaptation is back for another season of short episodes, and the show is heavier on the educational aspect than ever. I’d prefer a 75-25 comedy-edutainment split rather than the current 50-50 arrangement, but I shouldn’t look a gift cow in the mouth, especially when the one-person sub group Seigyoku is putting this much effort into the series’ typesetting. Besides, it’s not as though Kizoku’s comedic slant has disappeared – episode 15 even contains an anecdote about a young Arakawa getting showered with shit after her dad accidentally turned on their farm’s manure spreader while she was in its firing path. Contained elsewhere in these four episodes are stories about a famous bear that terrorized Hokkaido farms for the last half decade, and the dangers of standing too close to a tractor with a sweatshirt cinched around your waist. And hey, in case you ever wanted to know what conditions Japanese beef must fulfill before receiving one of the country’s prestigious labels (such as wagyu or Kobe), this is your show!
DAN DA DAN – 2-6
Lenlo: Ah Dan Da Dan, how torn I am on you. On one hand, easily the best animated, best looking thing of the season. I absolutely adore the artstyle, and the use of color to differentiate between science-fiction and occult is beautiful. The voice acting is also fantastic, I love how much emotion they are able to pour into some of these interactions, with the most recent episode being a perfect example of that as both leads spend almost half the episode talking to themselves in their own heads but still selling every moment. My only issue is the humor, and maybe some of the production decisions and character designs. I’m really not a fan of how every joke is sex related somehow, there’s only so many “Ball” and “Shaft” jokes I can stand before I start wondering who this was made for. Tack on the Grandma’s mediocre design, seriously she looks more like a 24 year old than a grandmother, as well as the questionable choice of music during the big chase scene 2 episodes ago, and I become really unsure of my long term enjoyment of the series. Hopefully it manages to figure all of that out soon, because it’s a joy to look at, and I’d really rather this not become another Elusive Samurai for me.
Blue Box – 2-5
Wooper: When making my contributions to our most recent season preview, I singled out Blue Box as perhaps the show I was most looking forward to. After all, I enjoy both the sports and romance genres, and those two things make up the totality of this series’ plot. Unfortunately, Blue Box seems permanently stuck in its protagonist’s head, resulting in many scenes (both athletic and romantic) that feel as though they were written in compliance with a “no viewer left behind” mandate. Episode 2 started off on a slow note, with Taiki fretting about his new living situation with Chinatsu, but it did clear up a potential misunderstanding about his interest in third wheel Hina that might have otherwise festered, so I can give it a passing grade. Since then, however, his constant nervousness, restatement of the obvious, and second guessing of his thoughts and actions have had me shooting questioning looks at my monitor multiple times per episode. The way that episode 5’s aquarium visit was orchestrated was so clumsy that I went in not caring how it might unfold, and all the previous episode’s mental hand-wringing about changing clothes in front of each other had me in “too old for this shit” mode within minutes. I don’t mind that Blue Box has pronounced shounen DNA, but since it can’t trust its audience to pick up on its characters’ feelings on their own, I’m not sure I’m willing to keep watching.
Demon Lord 2099 – 2-4
Lenlo: There were a couple episodes here where I felt… not betrayed, but confused by Demon Lord 2099. Who could have possibly expected the sub-plot where an ancient Demon Lord becomes a V-Tuber alongside Towa-sama to rebuild his followers and faith-based powers? Not me, that’s for certain. It worked out though, operating as a humorous way to teach him about the modern world/technology and powering him up in a way that doesn’t feel cheap. It also helps that Demon Lord 2099 hasn’t forgotten about the larger plot, with the most recent episode showing us the bad guys’ big plan, giving our lead a purpose/something to fight against and kicking things into gear with the disappearance of Machina. All in all, Demon Lord 2099 is starting to get into gear and make use of this fun, future-magical setting. It seemed fun and interesting early on, and it’s managed to retain that as the plot starts up. Hopefully it can keep it up!
Ranma ½ (2024) – 2-4
Wooper: Rather than viewing the new Ranma adaptation purely for enjoyment’s sake, I’m watching it mainly to chip away at my ignorance regarding the franchise. Though I prefer the look of cel anime to today’s digital productions, I bounced off the original series after just a handful of episodes, and I’m finding this newer, faster-moving version a lot more tolerable. As a point of comparison, the remake introduced rival character Ryoga and orchestrated his fight with Ranma in the same episode (4), while the OG used twice the time both to reach that point in the story and to depict the same events (7-8).
Speaking of fights, they’re one arena where the new series shines, at least from an animation perspective – though its habit of using purple shadows and picking clashing colors for the backgrounds during some combat shots puts me off from time to time. I think the staff are just casting a wide net in an attempt to differentiate this adaptation from the first, since screentone-heavy shots and sticker borders crop up occasionally, as well. It’s really just the improved pacing that they ought to focus on, in my opinion, though even that has its drawbacks; for example, after a pivotal martial arts scene between Ranma and Akane in episode 3 where he compliments her looks, they’re not even given a minute apart before he appears perched on her bedroom windowsill. My primary hope for the series going forward is that the writers will be more judicious with the fast-forward button, as it’ll need to hit a narrow sweet spot to maintain my interest.
Orb: On the Movements of the Earth – 2-6
Lenlo: Orb, this 15th century character drama about Heliocentrism, continues to be the best show of the season for me. Possibly of the year! The way it presents the night sky is this beautiful, unreachable, infinite presence, how it means something different to every character while still tying them all back to this same singular idea of our place in the universe, is incredible. I absolutely love what it’s doing with the church as well, showing both the good and the bad. Yes there are elements that seek to suppress knowledge, to hold onto power, but we also see how every single astronomer so far has also been motivated by the beauty inherent in God’s work, insisting that He could never create something so flawed as the Geocentric model. Orb isn’t about Atheism vs Religion, it isn’t about Science vs Superstition, but the curiosity inherent in mankind, the desire to learn and understand our world, and those who seek to hold onto their own power. Yeah it’s not much of a looker, most night scenes are so dark you can’t see anything. But even then that just makes the night sky pop even more. And yeah, I was a bit confused/concerned about how it killed off our lead character 3 episodes in only to replace him with some new ones. But as the show has continued on, Orb has done a great job of showing how this isn’t about any single person but about how knowledge and learning propagates and finds a way, how we as a species can’t be held back by our worst tendencies and can become better in spite of them and those trying to suppress it. A legitimately beautiful show.
Yakuza Fiancé 2-4
Wooper: Raise wa Tanin ga Ii hasn’t exactly panned out like I’d hoped. The show is keeping its cards close to its chest regarding Somei-san’s reason for shipping his granddaughter off to Tokyo – too close, in my opinion, since that vagueness forces the show to continually fall back on her erratic relationship with her would-be fiancé. Episode 3 did reveal a bit of Somei-san and Miyama-san’s shared past, and Yoshino being sent to the big city surely has to do with those yakuza boss’s relationship in the present, but the way the show tiptoes toward clarifying that topic and then reverts to being a Male Yandere Simulator is nothing if not frustrating. In these three episodes, Kirishima knifed a guy in the eye, beat the shit out of multiple bodyguards, strongarmed a brothel owner into paying protection money, and permitted Yoshino to have sex with other men on the condition that he got to kill them afterwards. Her green-eyed friend from Osaka is less insane, but only by contrast, since he nonchalantly offers to murder Kirishima if he ever got to be too much for Yoshino. Dude, he’s already “too much,” and so is your entire show! Dropped.
Shangri-La Frontier Season 2 – 2-4
Lenlo: While this season of Shangri-La started with the same issues as the end of the previous season, a lack of focus and what feels like a bunch of filler content, it’s also been steadily improving as it works its way through this transitionary content. The pacing feels better, with a healthy mix of regular MMO grinding and slow plot progression, and the production feels much better, everyone looking much more expressive and moving much more dynamically. Assuming this keeps up and it doesn’t fall apart, I’m actually looking forward to the next big arc that should be starting soon. It’s just as fun as the Wezaemon stuff, with some great opportunities for the animators to go a bit crazy. Only time will tell of course, but for the moment I think Shangri-La is looking up.
Blue Lock Season 2 – 2-6
Lenlo: Somehow, some way, Blue Lock Season 2 is even worse than I expected it to be. I knew the narrative would be lackluster, this arc is a bunch of training and a weird sort of transition point as the series tries to figure out what to do with itself after the initial competition, but the production has been absolutely abysmal as well. It’s hard to even call this season animated, as 90% of the time it’s just still images literally sliding across the screen. I cannot understate how disappointed and annoyed I am at how poorly produced it is. I have a foolish hope that they are just saving all of their effort for the big U-20 game, but the more I watch the less likely that seems as it just keeps getting worse and worse. If something doesn’t change, I may have to give up on this anime adaptation.
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