Tag: Episode

Animini: Zombie Land Saga – Episode 1 – Good Morning SAGA

Greetings my sweet Island Guests, today’s cocktail is something new yet unexpected. One may find the taste a bit odd.. but it is pretty much in line with “me” as a brand! So I planned to start watching The Promised Neverland here! Unfortunately Crunchyroll turns out to block this for my reason due to licensing issues. So I found myself without a show to watch!  I kind of wanted something weird or something Idol like.. so when I discovered this weird Idol show ( I did not know about it before)  I was sure! Zombie Girls trying to be Pop Idols! Yes! Yes! YES! 

The Summary

Sakura is a pretty girl who is about to start her second year in high school!  She happily is watching an Idol-show planning to be an idol herself one day! Dreaming off the future she hops into her shoes and happily starts running towards school!  Truck-Kun shows up however and we see the girl get ragdolled through the air. Heavy Metal music starts playing as we see her neck twist in an awkward position and the credits are presented in blood! Clearly this girl will not shrug it off. Yet the next thing we see is her waking up in a creaky old mansion. She has no memories of how she got here!  While exploring this strange place she is attacked by a woman who looks to be a zombie! She flees into another room which is filled with other girl zombies!  Scared for her life she flees the mansion. She first spots a sign showing she is in the fairly rural Saga Prefecture  and then she  sees a cop!  When she tries to tell him of her distress, he is scared of her and even fires his gun at her!  When she sees her own reflection in one of those traffic mirrors she is revealed to be a zombie as well.  Confused, she collapses.. When the cop is about to finish her off he is whacked in the head with a shovel and Sakura passes out. Neat! I did not know zombies could pass out!

When she wakes up the guy, a man dressed in a vest and sunglasses tells her of the plot. He is a necromancer it seems that resurrected her and a lot of other girls who had an idol like function throughout the course of history. Calling her his number 1. Apparently she was the first one to awaken to a conscious, although she has no memories of her old life.. the other girls.. are still just regular zombies. When she asks what this “stimulated”  thing is.. the man who introduces himself as Kotaro Tatsumi tells her it doesn’t matter and everything is like all that other zombie media.  His plan for resurrecting these girls is that he wishes to return glory to the Saga District.. who once produced some great idols!  This Idol Project he started is given a title that is quite similar to the title of the show! Would you look at that! Not quite but close enough!  As Sakura is being nibbled on by one of the braindead girls Sakura asks how he plans to make them idols.. and he says he entered them in an open stage event Today!  

Now in full mortal make-up Sakura discovers she has been signed up for a heavy metal open stage! This won’t go well, her new friends will surely eat the crowd. Tatsumi tells her she is responsible however .. and the performance begins. A nervous Sakura almost immediately gets booed off the stage and she narrowly avoids one of her fellow zombies to eat the audience. However when their new manager begins to play some metal music a few of the girls find themselves headbanging ..flailing their broken bodies around, as if their necks were broken.. impressing the metalheads.  The blond zombie whose name I don’t know yet.. even though it was shown once..  finds a megaphone and begins screaming in it.. randomly.. it amps up the metalheads even more. Sakura sees this and just wails in the microphone as well and flails her broken body around to do some impressive headbanging.

The crowd goes wild and while staring into the stage light it seems as if Sakura remembers something.. an idol group of some kind!  She is having a fun time and decides to stage dive…. which leads to the other girls following her example and munching on the audience. As Sakura remembers her first failed performance she also thinks back on those idols she met. Then a scream is heard from the house! She runs inside and finds out nearly all the zombie girls have suddenly awakened. She has an awkward talk to make.. she starts addressing them by shouting GOOD MORNING.

The Positives

Okay long Summary! But hey that is quite usual with first episodes!  I had a great time with this show and it is a great show to watch in times like these. It’s super breezy and lighthearted but I also found the episode to be quite creative!  The show is super self aware which gives it a nice and lovely tone. It doesn’t create false expectations, it will just give you a big stupid grin for being something so silly yet charming.  I also like the visuals, it is bright despite also being washed out and zombie-like at the same time. It shows the contradiction between the world of zombies and Idols well. I also really like the voice actress so far!  She just feels so right for the part and the stress and confusion in her voice can be heard when she experiences these emotions. There is a lot of colour in that voice and that is important for an Idol show I’d say!  The design of the girls is all pretty amazing as well. I don’t know them much yet but I really love the bitey zombie!  The Blonde and the Blue haired girl really appeal to me as well.  I really like how the Blue one was depicted with a big heart on the outside.  There is a lot you can do with this.

I also love how much contrast there is in this show. We see a super cute girl running out in the street.. then I see one of the most brutal truck-kun kills yet!   Quite visceral!  Mostly because we just see her head crack against the window and then ragdolled in slow motion as slowly parts of her body seize to function, letting go of her homework, her head falling back with eyes that grow more empty! Eek! The metal music playing with that.. while not a type of music I appreciate too much unless sung by Johathan Young, really helped this scene.  The idea of cute girls singing metal on stage reminds me of the charm of BabyMetal. I like them as well… kinda!  There is a constant balance between dark and somewhat edgy with ultra cute and I really dig that.  I also like that the show knows you can’t really write this stuff well so they spoof it themselves, making a joke about not providing satisfying answers. I know I will not get those now.. and at least I can chuckle with it.

The Negatives

While I will not be terribly harsh on it, I do think the first episode misses a good song to bob to!  Love Live had the amazing Start Dash,  and while I might not expect Death Musume (Name Pending)   to do the song.. perhaps a sweet idol song from future rivals or something would have been a good way to insert a bit more idol feelings. Have Sakura sing an idol song at the beginning of the show.. a song she was working on.. forgot and through the course of the show might be able to remember.  In short I wanted a bit more of that “Pitch Perfect” Vibe. While I still got a very funny and colourful comedy, I don’t think it is that unfair to ask for at least a bit of music in an Idol show right?!   A bit more background in Sakura’s idol dream could have done wonders! It’s good as it is but it is just something that could have been done better, in my humble opinion! Who knows maybe she will remember more later.

While I do love the idea of having a super vague story that is filled with plot holes that the characters just ignore, I do want to know more about how these zombies work,  will they infect people they bite? Probably not.. given that they are dead people from across time I am 95% sure they were made by necromancy!  I don’t think those zombies infect. It might be something we will see next episode!  I also would not mind if the show leaned a bit more into that darkness. When we see the zombies attack the audience, show a bit of blood, confirm a fatality or something! I do like the mix between light and dark, but I feel the show could use a little more commitment to the dark aspects.. that being said I do think they will fade away a bit more as the girls become more aware so it is quite excusable! Though if that darkness DOES indeed fade away I think that would kind of be all the more reason to do it!  So yeah.. again not so much a negative as it would be a point of improvement.

The Score

This episode is a clear Berry Good to me!  It is a very personal Berry Good though because this show is weird and self aware . It isn’t very clean written, some things don’t make sense and there isn’t much depth. In fact if you would be able to talk to this episode and ask “Where is your Depth?” It would probably answer “Depth? Isn’t that that guy who got fired from those wizardy movies?… Oh hey look… a butterfly” So this is one of those shows that is very much not for everyone, yet I felt it is very much for me!  It is also perfect for when you are feeling a tad blue, it is just cute but kind of twisted fun! I was in the mood for that so yay! It pretty much delivered what I expected from it!  I really never heard of this before so I was happy to have discovered it!  

I do not think this anime will enter in my top 5 anime anytime soon, though  they are almost all exclusively weird shows so who knows!  It might just get there.. I already rate it higher than Code Geass  and Attack on Titan, so this is probably really a show for me!  I hope it doesn’t go deep into lewding the Zombie girls, that would completely ruin this for me but I have no idea on what to expect!  For now I kind of think it is anime junkfood. Sometimes you can appreciate that more than a gourmet meal, and while I am in lockdown, I am just a few cute songs shy of falling in love! 

Animini: Cowboy Bebop – Episode 6 – Sympathy for the Devil

Greetings my Dear Island Guests, today’s first content cocktail contains a lot of preservatives as we look at those who do not age!  These are served in a somewhat darker cocktail. Packed with both sweet and bitter flavours. This cocktail is best when you drink it at our poolside on a moonlit night! The episode in question is strong in atmosphere but doesn’t have the kick some of the others had so far! So let’s take a sip and enjoy our content cocktail.

The Summary

A nightmare , of what seems visions of the past,  place Spike on an operating table! It isn’t a very hygenic operating room because I am pretty sure I saw fish float with the organs.. or they put a tube with live fish between it.. which is just plain weird.. message received either way… these are probably not good guy doctors.  When Spike wakes up he is in a blues bar. A kid is playing Harmonica on stage, it almost seems as if he is cosplaying Lupin the Third.  The bar is seedy and smokey and just the perfect amount of grime! Yet then a horrible crime happens! Faye , who is back at the Bebop, is rifling through the fridge to find it empty, showing the group is still out of money.. The only thing in the fridge is dog food for Ein, who happily barks to receive this blessing!  Then Faye eats herself! She tells Ein to work for his food and looks at a bounty..pondering if she can make the guys get that money for her!  Faye loses lots of points from me.

Back in the bar Jet has joined Spike! It seems they are indeed after that Bounty… a man nicknamed Giraffe , he doesn’t have a long neck so it is quite random.   Another Bounty Hunter named Fatty River (yes I remember these types of names) , who IS fat is one the case as well. Leaving Spike to deal with Giraffe.  Giraffe is following the kid and some wheelchair bloke. Spike decides to pursue them in his fighter. Yet when he gets to the hotel they were heading , Giraffe ends up falling through a window with a huge gunshot wound. While Spike catches him.. he can’t prevent him from falling, the man dies anyway but not before handing Spike a ring and telling him to not be fooled by his looks and to protect him.

Having failed yet another Bounty Spike and Jet decide to do some more investigation into this. Apparently  the wheel chaired man is called Zebra.. they were partners in leading a group of raiders. While on a terf dispute.. things went awry and Zebra was said to have betrayed Giraffe. Thus him wanting revenge.  This happened ten years ago.. but when Zebra showed up again he was wheelchair bound and with this harmonica kid. When looking for info about the kid, Jet finds him in a 30 year old magazine. Spike follows them after a new concert and discovers the boy named Wen is actually well over 50 years old. Something in his body got changed when something called “The Astral Gate” accident happened. An event that seems to have devastated earth. The Astral gate blew up the moon and high powered meteors showered the earth charing Wen’s mother and father.. but their corpses shielded him from dying.

Now he is completely immortal.. even gunshots do not kill him, so Spike is out of his league. In a chase Wen dumps Zebra on him..showing the man to be in a completely catatonic state.  He is hooked up to a machine that can read his memories and we see Giraffe was trying to save his friend from Wen..instead of getting revenge. The ring is deduced to be a meteorite piece and with it..Wen can be killed..or so they theorise. A Bullet is made and Spike chases Wen into the desert by blowing up his taxi! The boy is completely unharmed. Spike uses the special bullet after being shot at a few times and shoots the boy in the head. The boy  rapidly ages (way more than 50 years)  and dies. Spike tosses his Harmonica and yells BANG.

The Positives

I have very mixed feelings about this episode,  which makes sense, coming after the incredible 5th episode. Self contained this episode was pretty great. There was a neat little mystery to unpack in the form of what’s going on. The Whole Zebra , Giraffe, Wen situation is pretty interesting.  Though somewhat obvious as well. It might be me.. but when I see a kid with raven black hair, cold eyes playing a Harmonica in a smoked up blues Café.. at the skill level he does…  you know he is evil. Blues should only be played if you have a pained heart and have experienced something..and he did. Yet that does show the power of this shows music. Regardless of the obviousness it was a pretty sweet little adventure to see unfold. I was fooled into believing Giraffe was just working with Wen so finding out he is basically a vegetable to be used as a doll to make the boy have a parent so he can get into places sounds quite cruel and exactly the type of stuff I want to see in Cowboy Bebop. Atmosphere 10/10.

I also liked the idea of the Astral Gate accident. Telling us what happened to earth by making it relevant to the plot is one of the better ways you can do exposition. The incident seems pretty gruesome and it opens up possibilities for some interesting effects. I really digged how gruesome it was depicted with Wen popping up on a devastated earth by having his fathers charred corpse on top of him. It shows both love and sorrow and makes the situation quite real. A parent would probably shield their kid, even though I would use kids as a shield, such trauma would cause the boy to go pretty bonkers.  I get where his Blues capabilities come from. It also gives so much flavour to earth!  Which I assume is mostly desolated.  I am not sure I have seen it yet.. I don’t think so.. but then we saw a lot of desert so maybe one of those. Unsure! Regardless, a very cool world event and credits for the amazing world building yet again. It makes sense that people would fan out after such an event resulting in this more nomadic and .. settlement based,  living style we see in Bebop. Pinkie is impressed.

The Negatives

That is also why this episode annoyed me quite a bit.  This show is great at it’s writing but Wen I found a pretty terrible character. Sure he is a pained “antagonist” of the episode.   But he acts as if he is hundreds of years old. In the end when he says “I can finally die” .. he is only like 60-ish.  Maybe late 50’s or early 60’s.  He lost his parents sure.. but so did many people seemingly.   He doesn’t seem to be off THAT bad that he has this deep desire to die at age 60 to me.  The heck is going on! It really confused me a lot.  Maybe being an 8 or 10 year old or whatever he is forever makes things annoying but I am just not buying he is this tired of life already. Even if he was , it made no sense to kill Giraffe who had the ring, let him kill you with it then?! I might have missed something here but Wen did not make sense to me at all.  The way he mummified at the end.. that’s not what a 60 year old looks like!! It seemed like they forgot just how old he was and just made him like 300 or something. I really did not believe the character.. I believed his music.. but something felt really off for me.

For some reason I also could not escape the idea that this episode was solely created to tell the story of the Astral Gate Incident. As much as I love this way of exposition I really got a feeling this episode happened for expositions sake. As if one episode later will be set on the moon or a destroyed earth and you need to tell us why it is in the state it is. I can’t fully explain it but this episode felt a bit cheap to me.  Giraffe and Zebra really felt throwaway.  The other bounties so far at least had connections to bigger gangs, or organisations this one feels so “random”.  Besides Giraffe , Zebra and Wen there is nothing behind it.. or at least we don’t get to see it at all. While Giraffe trying to get Zebra back is charming to see we never had any memories of how the two were buddies so his good guy act did not have THAT much impact either.  I love myself a good Bromance.. but when we have to assume Bromance solely on the line “give him back” it lacks that spark! I wasn’t even in a sour mood or something when I watched this episode.. I felt it was good on some levels but it just felt as SUCH an empty episode to me. I felt nothing for the trio this episode was about.

The Score

That is why I score this episode , just an Okiwi. I liked the elements in there and for the series a lot of cool things were established. I loved the music, I loved the lore but as an episode this did absolutely nothing for me. I wasn’t bored , I wasn’t THAT annoyed I just experienced nothing.  I saw some cool sets.. I do liked the headshot.. and the Bang in the end was enough to kind of make me smile but in comparison to all the other episodes this wasn’t it! It is weird though because I don’t think of this show any less. Normally I wonder stuff like.. could I be falling out of love with this show.. is this a turning point for me.. No.. this episode literally did that much of nothing for me. 

Had they just have Wen be dead by the headshot.. had he shown an intention to die or  something to make this tale feel more consistent this would probably be up there with my favourite episodes so far. I could just not get over that thing that I feel like he was overly aged.  Maybe because I watch so many vampire shows. 50 years feels so little. Heck even in anime we have seen so much older girls and boys who don’t complain about being 60. I just did not resonate with Wen.. . I did not understand him at all and it completely tanked this episode for me! Luckily.. I am pretty sure.. he is dead!

Animini: Natsume Book of Friends – Episode 6 – The Sparrow at the Bottom of the Lake

Sobby and Sniffly Salutations my Island Guests! Natsume let me feel stuff again! I kind of cried for a character I saw in a single episode again! Well not really cried but I was misty eyed nonetheless. This might be the first thing I am not giving a perfect score despite making me cry! It came very close.. but it just missed out! In this blog I will discuss the 6th episode of Natsume Book of Friends.

The Summary

Natsume and his friends, I think,  are taking a bike tour when they come across a “drowned” village.  A village that got flooded and abandoned by building a dam. Of course Natsume sees a present but his friends, I think,  do not.  The addition to the “i think” comes from  the fact that I don’t really know anything about them. They are always around him and interact with Natsume regularly but he doesn’t really seem to hang out with them.. except for this time. I assume they are friends but they also could be a study group or something!  Regardless, Natsume sees something.. it fades.. then with a whoosh of wind he is knocked out. He wakes up at home, the doctor tells he has a heat stroke but we soon find out he is possessed. He finds this out by returning the names of a few Yokai who dwell in the drowned city. In return for helping him they give him a magic mirror that allows him to discover the possession. Nyanko pushes off the spirit and as it leaps for Natsume.. Donned in a Swallow mask, Natsume punches it. The mask breaks and it is revealed a girl wearing an eye veil is underneath..with pure intentions.

She wants to see someone again, for one final time before her spiritual energy grows too weak and she fades away. This is her dream and Natsume takes a liking to her and decides to help Madara/Nyanko’s Chagrin. His “friends” help him get an address for this man and while Natsume and the girl yokai go look for the man they begin to bond a bit. Natsume learns this girl named Tsubame (meaning Swallow)  was once a Baby Swallow who fell out of the nest.  A kind human put her back in the nest…but since it now was tainted with human scent the parents abandon the nest and Tsubame cries for food..while seeing her brothers and sister starve.  Blaming herself the resentment caused her to transform into what she calls a demon. This demon hid from the world.. but a kind man kept feeding her every day.. this is the man she wants to meet again. She does.. and while waving at him happily and talking to him he ignores her.. unable to see her. Tsubame says she is super glad she got to do this but it is not enough for Natsume.. he wants her to actually talk to the man. To help her he attends a festival  of Yokai .. led by the guy who gave him the magic mirror earlier.   The Yokai can win a Yukata that allows them to appear as humans for a day. Even though the spirit plans to eat Natsume he is determined to compete and win for Tsubame’s sake.  With the help of Madara he does so. He gives Tsubame the yukata and says his goodbye.. never seeing her again. A few days later he asks the man if he ever saw Tsubame and the man shows him a picture of them attending a festival together. Natsume sobs a bit.. glad his new friend got what she wished for and looked happy..but also clearly sad he will never see her again.

The Positives

I loved Tsubame myself.. and the last line.. to think that she is gone already made me super sad.  She is voice acted great and drawn great and written great. You just start to care for her. When Natsume tells she is slowly losing strength I genuinely was genuinely worried for her.  The way she waves to that person that is so important to her.. telling him all sorts of things with a smile on her face while clearly she must know he can not hear her really pulled my heartstrings!  It is also good to see Natsume form an actual bond for once. This is not an act of convenience,  or because it is right or because he wants to figure out more about his grandma.. no Natsume has taken a shine to this “person” and enjoyed her company and spirit and wishes to see things end well for. Much like with the tiny guardian. I found myself quite infatuated with this swallow girl and her story.. despite being quite generic and birdlike made me look at it from the fletchling perspective. Poor little birds slowly starving. The idea of seeing your brothers and sisters get abandoned because you messed up.. and got greeted with an act of kindness.. it really worked for me and became something bigger.

I also like the idea of Natsume acting with the spirit world a lot. He punches the spirit, he races against them,  he gets a magical item from their world and uses it to further his agenda.. (though selfless). It makes the world of Yokai a lot bigger  than just the names in the book. Where I compared  it with an inverse Pokemon after the first episode I now realise that analysis is incorrect because these Yokai are much more people with their own little world for us to understand. Their own bonds, their own emotions and now even their own items and culture! Do take note though that I like the idea.. not the way it is executed, more on that in a little bit. The series is working towards expanding its possibilities and does so early on so it can not fall into a hole and I really like that. The hug Natsume got also feels like the first reward he really got.. it might seem tiny.. but it is something and I really needed to see that.

The Negatives

Had this episode only featured Tsubame I would have easily given this my highest rating yet! I really love that character A LOT more than I should do for a one episode character. The other Yokai in this episode though.. are a problem. They aren’t bad persé.. but it is like  putting Merryl Streep in a movie with Tyler Perry or with Will Arnett.  You know the latter two will be completely blown away by the former. The tournament host and magic mirror guy feels a bit forced.. he transforms into the same type of demon Madara is and they scuffle for a bit but it isn’t that interesting. It feels a bit soap-opera-like .. exposition needed to tell the real tale. I like the Kimono as a magic item, the race kind of feels forced however.  There is a Kimono stuck in a tree and all Yokai must race there without using their Yokai powers.  Natsume goes undercover but has too short legs  to win.. it all feels a bit nothingy.. while I do get we see Madara start to care for Natsume here.. I feel this could have been done in a much more interesting way.

The race also offers another problem, the plot feels a tad messy. This is in part due to the fact that Natsume has to attend a Festival one day, so Tsubame can attend another. Kind of like forcing Cinderella to win a dance-off to win tickets for the ball. I didn’t really like that structure. Also how did Natsume know where the other guy is while he was out racing Yokai, I doubt he could track the guy during all that. It just felt really weird and awkward to me. The other spirit is just so weakly written. I give you a peek in this magic mirror. .. which turns out just the thing to start the plot. He is an engine and not a very well written one and it takes some serious shine out of an otherwise amazing episode.

The Score

I loved half of this episode and I truly mean loved!  Man if I ever become a mother I am gonna starve all my kids hopefully the last survivor will be as great as Tsubame. It is great to see a more alive and emotional Natsume, even though seeing him cry made me get some tissues.  I love how this show can invoke those feelings and this is the third time it did.  It did it in a much more raw way then episode 2 and 4 as well …  jeez even numbered episodes rule in this series so far.   Had this episode been pure between Natsume and the little Swallow I would have had my new favourite episode of the show. The good in this episode isn’t just good!  It really is amazing.

Unfortunately the rest of this episode kind of feels half baked. The rest of what we see is not that much more than exposition or plot convenience.  I am super happy they chose to keep these events separate from Tsubame but in a way that also makes it worse.. you know.. as if they are aware of the fact that this part of content isn’t as good.  The pacing in the Tsubame bits is great and I LOVE the idea of Natsume never seeing her again.. and being insecure ..but so curious he talks to a stranger, which seems very against character.. it shows how much he cares.  Yet the pacing with the other spirit is quite poor. The race had no Oomph what so ever and even Nyanko/Madara’s decision to help Natsume was overshadowed by its “let’s get this over with.. we have a better story to tell” pacing. It’s like having a delicious meatball and some vegetables but not really a way to call it a dish so you pour on some water and some noodles and call it ramen.  The meatball is still exceptional but now that is part of a dish it will only be described as good.

Animini: Samurai Flamenco – Final Episode – Naked Samurai Flamenco!

Steam Salutations .. and this time the steam is from a little bit of an unexpected ending! For a moment there my face went red as we concluded Samurai Flamenco. Last episode I was super hopeful.. the week before that I felt utter despair. I felt episode 18 was the perfect ending to a show.. and in a way it was.. but the ending in episode 22 is a lot more satisfying. Though also a bit less perfect. Goodbye Samurai Flamenco.. let’s review you one last time!

The Summary

The episode begins with an origin story for Goto, which is not a good sign considering he just had a gun pointed at him and the trigger being pulled.  We see how he got his Girlfriends phone and slowly lost his mind trying to offer himself solace.  One message in particular highlighted the last message she truely sent him. In retrospect it is kind of weird that so many years have passed and no one notices how old of a flip phone he was using..and the fact that a telephone survived for that lone.. but oh well. The shot misses and we see Hajii reveal his real plan. He wants to transform Samurai Flamenco into a Dark Hero, by seeing his best friend kill his rival. Causing him trauma he can not forget.  So that means Goto has to kill Hajii to make this happen.. Hajii angers him by deleting all of Goto’s girlfriends messages including the final message she sent him.  This causes the poor man to properly lose his marbles and he swears to kill the young boy and then Masayoshi steps in.

Hajii tries to force him into his Samurai Flamenco costume but Masayoshi refuses.. he instead gets naked! Saying the two have to find love together and he will fight Hajii as Masayoshi not as Samurai Flamenco!  During their scuffle Goto gets the keys to his handcuffs and the gun and he wants to kill Hajii but Masayoshi stands in his way.. trying to talk him out of this. He does this by….proposing to Goto, still very naked. Goto calls Masayoshi stupid.. but doesn’t turn down the proposal, and the two call each other Baka and Aho for about 4 minutes or so.  Masayoshi realises he truly loves Goto and can not allow him to be corrupted and the end their standoff. Goto lowers the run. Masayoshi goes to Goto but what happens then is blocked by Mari who pops into the screen and beats Hajii up! Goto and Masyoshi talk and we see the criminal boy get kicked in the balls by Mari. A timeskip later and we see everyone being happy again. A sentai museum is opening and the flamengers are all there, Mari and Moe and Mizuki are having concerts again and Masayoshi visits Hajii in jail.. saying he wants to see him change. When he exits Goto is waiting for him and the two walk to the museum together.. Goto has a new phone and when someone litters, Masayoshi transforms into Samurai Flamenco once more.. chasing the litterer leaving a smiling Goto behind

The Positives

So apparently there is a manga that is set after this where Goto and Masayoshi live together, there is also a card game that shows their wedding. I am not sure if it is canon but my does that make this twist ending delightful. Those two would make a great couple.. and it does give Goto some peace of mind. That smile he has at the end.. that is great! And YAY Hajii was real! Thank Arceus for that.. I would have cried if he wasn’t.. Goto and Masayoshi becoming an item at the end was not what I had expected for an ending.. but last week I already expected an ending I would not expect.. and BOY did that deliver.  This really might be one of my favourite endings of a show.  Which admittedly also might seem so amazing because I was kind  expecting a trainwreck. But the ending is just so sweet and adorable.. and it is kind of neat that the final battle had to be fought as Masayoshi not as Samurai Flamenco it really was a nice turn that was properly set up.

The epilogue also delivered on the satisfaction. The opening to the museum works great as a visual callback , the walk of Goto and Masayoshi is super cute and a little bit loaded.. you want them to spill the beans and see if we can find out what happened to the proposal but it wisely never does. Even if Bromance.. with the B potentially between brackets  is not for you, you can take the ending anyway you like. They could just be palls! The extended universe makes them more.. but it is totally up to you if that counts yay or nay! Smart! We see everyone happy, and that whole World President stuff is also conveniently dropped which makes it a lot more airy and digestible.. it keeps Masayoshi as an innocent young man who hasn’t changed all that much yet realised something very important in his life. While he hasn’t changed he has become a much more complete man and that is enough.. that is what makes this show great in the end.  I still think episode 18 would have been a good enough place to end as Samurai Flamenco.. yet episode 22 is a much better place to end as Masayoshi.. and I like that there is a difference.

The Negatives

For me, Masayoshi did not have to go naked. The scene would have worked just as well in his boxers or even his underwear.  Metaphorically naked would have worked as well. It would not have weirded Hajii out as much maybe.. but I am not sure if him being weirded out mattered that much. Was it just so Goto got to see him naked? Am I missing something here?! To be fair I do not get weirded out or shocked from a naked person because I don’t really believe in that Taboo. A naked person doesn’t go much for me let alone a drawn one.. and we don’t even get to see anything.. it’s more like the Austin Powers implied Naked that is cleverly covered up in each shot. Somewhere I get it.. as it is pure Masayoshi.. no hiding behind anything.. but again underwear would have been enough.

That stupid random adoption scene from ther last episode has no impact here, we do see the Flamengers, but mostly it’s just Lady Axe calling Pink a sow other than that they are just impressed with the Museum.. also Black’s Grandpa is fine which is nice but I can not help that because of that random episode this felt like the least conclusive and satisying endings.. the rest got all closed up nicely but there was a bit of unfinished buisness left.  Like I said last week the parents of Haji indeed helped him fake his death as it turns out which makes sense enough.. but Kono only NOW finds out they are kind of worried about what he has been doing with this?! The boy has been dead for a year you know.  It seems kind of weird that his parents would not have any idea. Where does he store his explosives, can they never hear any phone calls he makes, how does he learn to infiltrate an apartment.  You can do a lot in a year but making the parents completely oblivious makes them horrible people in my eyes. Just allow him to do this or something because they are just as crazy obsessed with him as he is with Masayoshi or something. Now it is kinda hokey?!

The Score

I can rest at ease now and leave this series with a huge smile on my face. The twist ending was lovably weird but also quite in line with the show! A bromance moving into a romance….. which is how I take that ending is a great way to break up the stale trope of the hero being alone. Not only do we get closure, Goto get’s closure.. and while his behaviour in episode 20 still kind of disgusts me he has suffered enough. The fact that he doesn’t completely let go.. shows he is crazy enough to be with Masayoshi as well and the fact that almost all other people except for Goto have been using smartphones did kind make the scene better.. but still it kind of feels like someone is playing on their Iphone 10 next to someone with an iPhone 4…Mari, as shallow as she is would be bound to notice!

It’s a great final episode that has a few logic leaps that make the pay off not AS strong as it could have been.. but it’s one of those ending.. where you do not care about that. Is it perfect no!  Have I seen shows with stronger endings.. I most certainly did… yet I have said this before.. I do distinguish BEST and favourite. If someone asks me for the best anime I have ever seen, I would struggle to find an answer and probably end up with Spirited Away or one of the Ghibli movies.. if they ask for my favourite I say Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann.  From what I have heard Cowboy Bebop has one of the best endings in anime.. though tragic, (I have yet to see it myself)  but my favourite ending… it might very well be this one! So this end gets one heck of a subjective Star Fruit! Thank you for existing Samurai Flamenco! And Moe.. my sweet summer flower, I am glad you are okay!

Animini: Natsume Book of Friends – Episode 5 – Heart Colored Ticket

The Heck is a Heart Coloured Ticket…?!  I thought I would know after this episode but no! I still don’t know! There is a ticket.. and there is love.. but I do not agree with this title. I would have called it Bootleg Totoro and the Fish..  but then again that might be disrespectful! I don’t mean it like that though.. but it really is about a Totoro thing that is not Totoro … and a fish! I kind of loved it!

The Summary

The episode begins with Natsume roaming in a box of his grandmothers stuff, each time he runs a name he gets part of her memories and he is curious about her life.. or so he claims.. from a Library book she forgot to return drops a train ticket.. leading to a now out of use station. Natsume decides to investigate the ticket the next day. That day Natsume’s classmates fight on how to eat something which I think is chicken.. I have no idea but they call it Kitsune.. I don’t think they are eating fox but well.. they don’t see eye to eye on how to eat this meal thing and decide to separate and never be friends again. Sasada then comes poking her nose into Natsume’s business! What is that ticket? What are you going to do with it? Can I come?!  I wanna see one?!  Stuff like that. Natsume doesn’t want to get the girl that wants to spend time with him around.. so he is super glad the priest’s son distracts her long enough so he can sneak away from her on the bus. (Kind of a dickish bus driver). I kind of want Natsume to like this girl! I like having her positive energy around!

Sasada gets left behind though and Natsume travels to an abandoned station where he finds Santo.. a big furry hippo like Yokai that walks on two legs and dances around and reminds me a lot of Totoro.  Just.. more vocal and less eloquent.  Santo is a friendly Yokai who waits on this station because he got in an argument with a friend once who told them to leave and never return. Reiko met Santo and he gave him her name.. which we find out caused the conflict between the two. Santo gets his name returned and Natsume finds out through her memories that she promised Santo to take him to go see his friend Mikuri the next day. She never delivered on the promises though so Natsume takes Santo to do so. However since years have passed now.. Mikuri became bitter and possessed by Earth Spirits, enlarging his negativity. As a result the forest tries to stop their approach. Mikuri corrupted a huge catfish and Madara fights him  while Natsume and Santo yell at Mikuri to stop! Then the fish possessed by rage tries to steal the book.. but Santo protects it!  A combination of both seemed to work and the still quite angry Mikuri is reunited with his friend.  While Natsume tries to settle their fight he realizes they already settled their fight and are just arguing because they are friends. The next day in school his two classmates are all buddy buddy again and Sasada asks him what happened.  The priest’s son whose name I completely am blacking out on.. gets thanked for the help the day before leaving Sasda clueless still.

The Positives

I really liked Santo and Mikuri , once again the design and flavouring of these Yokai is done very nicely and satisfyingly. The whole  super dumb anime character might be a trope I do not always enjoy, Santo brings so much innocence to it.. but also a form of challenge. He knows what he wants to say .. but he is just too dim witted to express himself leaving Natsume without some valuable much needed information. So he must find a way to work around that. Thus the humor of this episode is actually in service of the story and I am very fond of that type of design. Do not build in jokes because you need a funny moment, make moments you need to tell funny. It offers a lot more charm. Santo being one of the most innocent things you have ever seen is also a nice contrast with the Yokai we have seen normally here. No harm from others befalls upon him.. there is no evil spirit or priest causing him pain. Santo’s worst enemy is Santo himself.. and the promises he made. He never went to look for Mikuri because he promised Reiko  to wait for her and because Mikuri said he could not come anymore. That’s just the type of guy he is and he is in his own way.

I also really like the whole premise of Natsume wanting to dig deeper into his relatives’ past and using a box of memories along with the book that apparently is also filled with memories  is an interesting way to do this. It gives a few puzzle elements and I have been wondering how Reiko was a person. I for now think she was a pretty bad person but Natsume seems to refuse to believe this. She completely forgot about poor Santo though!  I am curious to see where this will go and in fairness the show so far has not done much in terms of establishing an overarching narrative. This could be the first step towards that and if so I am quite on board with this.

The Negatives

I did not like how Natsume ignored Sasada in the last episode, and I do not like here either.  It’s a nice girl that is interested in you and believes in you.. she wants that connection my guy and you have shown to want that sort of connection as well.  I always have trouble with characters that go through self imposed misery and feel depressed for being alone.. but then when  a person wants to be their friend they ignore them.. While Natsume isn’t nearly hypocritical enough for me to actually dislike it.. I see enough of this self imposed negativity to enjoy it less then when Sasada would have played a bigger part. I think her positive behaviour is a welcome addition to Natsume’s more down behaviour.  At the same time though Natsume doing this alone lets the Yokai shine a lot as he doesn’t have a strong personality.. so the spirits always take the spotlight! That has value as well.

The second gripe I had with this episode is in its resolution. The Catfish versus Cat fight  felt a bit sloppy. Tentacles were bitten and pulled..  Elongated cat demon gets snared but transforms.. then bites the fish again.. but then it looks like the fish also bites him.. but maybe its not because suddenly the fish goes poof! ?I had no real idea what was going on there. Natsume was quite badly animated while  wrapped by a tentacle as well. It all just felt a bit muddy and thrown in for some action. I honestly preferred the fight with the earth spirit and the mysterious fog on the tracks. One bad fight scene however does not ruin an episode. Especially when it’s so short.  I would have liked to see more Santo protecting the book though. That might have been the trigger what caused Mikuri to be healed but it at least wasn’t fully clear to me.

The Score

While not a perfect score episode I really had a lot of fun with this episode.  Santo is an adorable character and even Mikuri in his original form is quite adorable. The evil forest chase was very entertaining and.. just Santo being Santo , eating poisoned berries and all it just made me smile. It had little impact all in all but I was still very entertained. It just had a few scenes for me personally that did not resolve in a way I would have preferred. It’s a silver or bronze type situation instead of gold. Still a winner though.

My biggest peeve here is how Sasada was offsided here, and I am afraid I will see a fair bit more of that in the future. I just do not like the lonely character wallowing in their loneliness by shutting off good people.  It really irks me and I have little sympathy for them. As long as this show doesn’t try to invoke sympathy for him being so alone.. I will not have much of a problem , other than just being a bit bitter here and there.. but if they do and try to invoke sympathy while he shuts people out.. that will be a sure fire for me to grow and dislike him as a character. Nothing wrong yet just reporting some symptoms for now. Great episode with just a few concerns. Like.. how was that ticket heart-coloured?

Animini: Hikaru no Go – Episode 25 – Fear and Impatience

Steaming Springs and Sprockets! This anime is just so good! This episode is quite amazing. My dear Island guests I am super happy I started Hikaru no Go.. it is such a humble show.. with such real problems.. it should be boring me to tears because I still don’t understand Go that well.. but I am truly fascinated.  I loved how this episode brought us a conflict that wasn’t really set up…yet makes so much sense in the context of where the journey is going currently! It’s amazing!

The Summary

Hikaru is stuck against a wall again. He has mostly been getting losses recently and isn’t progressing anymore. His chart does show a few wins  but things aren’t going that smoothly. Waya notices this and invites him to join a game session with his masters and some pro’s. Hikaru thinks this is boring but Sai forces him to do so. While waiting for their first session to begin.. Hikaru encounters Ogata in the main lobby when he gets cold feet to join the pro’s.  This leads Hikaru to be invited to the pro-workshop of Meiji Touya where Akira also will be. Hikaru refuses this.. he does not want to train with Akira.. but FOR Akira. Sai cries as Hikaru refuses.. but then Waya steps in , takes them to  meet his teacher and Hikaru feels quite overwhelmed and uncomfortable.  We also get talk of some tournament.. where young pro’s fight Insei! Hikaru wishes to participate and face Akira…but he then finds out he has to become number 16 of class one to even participate.. the pressure is on.

We cut to Hikaru losing a lot of matches and dropping all the way to the bottom of class two again. Dejected we see him get a Soda while listening to another Insei.. much older than him giving up hope to become a pro!  Seeing this inspires Hikaru to try harder… but victories aren’t coming to him. Sai knows why! It is because Hikaru is facing off against an opponent as strong as Sai.. he  punishes every mistake.. and because of that Hikaru has taken a much too defensive playstyle.. He doesn’t risk anything and because of that he can be countered and beaten rather easily! He needs courage in his moves again. Sai trains this in Hikaru and we see the boy perform better and better in the workshop! One day his old teacher, who is part of the workshop , challenges Hikaru to a match! Hikaru now fights with more courage as he goes in for the attack.

The Positives

It has been a while but Sai really comes in clutch for this episode. We finally see him again in the capacity of Hikaru’s teacher, which before was mostly implied to happen offscreen instead.  I am happy we finally see us get some mileage out of Sai as well. It even got some nice set up with the topic of teachers being discussed, thus once again the show slides into its subject matter in a very organic way. The lesson we learn today feels like it’s fits.. because we build up to it. Even though Hikaru’s wall is a completely new obstacle and mostly used as a narrative crutch to probably let him become a lot stronger a lot faster.. the show makes it feel earned. Hikaru training with Sai to master a new step of mastery of the game feels satisfying on all levels. We also see Akira is not bothered by his loss… also showing he has grown!  He handled losses poorly in the past… REALLY poorly yet here we see a much more complex Akira, one that is much more following his own path. He doesn’t care about Oza, he cares about staying ahead of those currently behind him. Losses don’t matter because Akira’s goal lies behind him. Hikaru experiences the reverse. losses matter because his goal lies in front of him.

The last episode I complained about not using any metaphorical visuals.. which can make scenes a bit bland and sterile.. and lo and behold this episode uses visual metaphors. We see Hikaru and Sai battle with Katana’s on that neon version of the Go Board that signifies important matches. THANK YOU that is all I wanted from last week’s episode. This episode is visually so much more interesting than the previous one.  We get less subtle references.. but there is also much less at stake here.. but we get a lot more colour, interesting set pieces, visual metaphors and just all kinds of goodness to keep us with the action. The cast this episode also has a bit more oomph and flavor..  they are more definable to me as.. moustachio man that writes stuff.  The presentation is up by a lot.

The Negatives

Not really any negatives for me this week, just pointers that could have made this episode even better. The first element they could have done is .. not have Sai cry when Hikaru refused to play with Meijn and Akira.Sai lives in Hikaru’s head .. he should know how Hikaru feels , plus there was never really any sense of loss, he would still see pro’s play games.  It is just not THE pro. With Sai realising that Hikaru’s current level has stagnated I feel like he should be smart enough to realise this and him crying once again played for comedy.  I know the man is excited about the sports.. but he is also fascinated by all levels of it.. this felt a bit..ungrateful or something. Nothing too bad, it doesn’t feel like the same Sai we see for the rest of the episode. 

I do still think that the show has too many characters to juggle around. Ogata pushing the rivalry between Hikaru and Akira seems a bit strange but somewhat fascinating.. but now we get Waya’s teacher and his group and we have Mejin’s  workshop click as well, along with the girl Insei now showing up more regularly.. and that boy that really looks like Weevil Underwood from Insei class. It really helps the world of Go feeling large but it also really invokes.. “Wait who is that again”.. and the moment you start thinking you move out of the episode a bit.  Maybe a flashback here or there for the viewer could have come in handy.  This will probably be less of an issue if you binge this show a bit.. but since there usually is a week before I watch these ( I tend to watch them on Saturdays unless I have no time)   if someone doesn’t show up for a couple of weeks all is kind of vague.  A name sign appearing or a flashback could really benefit this cast.. even add some details like rank and stuff. Great info would make the show a bit easier to follow.

The Score

Episode 25 of Hikaru no Go once again gets my highest grade.  Despite Sai crying is a weak scene, I can not say anything but positive about the rest of the episode. It offers a new obstacle.. a new element in the Go puzzle! Emotion! Hikaru must not just play with his head but also with his heart. Otherwise he will get ruled by fear.. and while I do not understand it in terms of Go .. I do know lots of gamers both analogue as digital who are held back by fear who I can wash because I dare to take risks. They play games a lot better than me but because they play the meta.. they become predictable and that can be punished. So I am happy to see the show also addresses this aspect of the game. It makes sense Hikaru becomes super careful from facing superiority all the time. 

There is also yet another subtle reference in this. Akira has his father as a teacher, he  trains the same way Hikaru trains.. but Sai acknowledges that Akira does not share the same flaw as Hikaru. This establishes that Akira still is pretty far ahead..  Because the Insei Akira they faced in the first episode… or at least in the rematch.. was already past this point.  In a way Hikaru is at least one year of Akira’s pace development away from Akira himself. This episode does show that he grows faster though..They will come to clash.. a sense of inevitability is established in this episode.. but when it happens will all depend on if Hikaru can make his current deadline .. adding tension for the future!

Animini: That Time I got Reincarnated as a Slime – Episode 20 – Yuuki Kagurazaka

Steamless Salutations, my dear island guests! That is right.. we are out of coals and for the moment are without steam.. This is all a very convoluted way to say that this show itself, for me personally, is quickly running out of steam as well. As this show has since the defeat of the Orc-lord for me personally quickly devolved from a series I really love and have fun with.. to just a series I dislike that I don’t like it enough! While the potential is still there.. and the set up is still great.. I feel the writing talent is really lacking.

The Summary

After turning the Megalodons that accompanied Charbdis into sushi and other amazing foods the town of Rimuru has a great party to celebrate their victory over Charybdis. Or I guess over the Megalodons because Mlim just one shot the monster that is supposed to rival a demon lord.. of course the government officials don’t partake in drinking and show off their boobs in a hot-tub again instead. Rimuru asks Milim why she became a demon lord and tells she can’t remember.. while three episodes before she proclaimed it was to perpetually fight strong people. Maybe it is her being more genuine here.. maybe it is inconsistent writing.. but the scene doesn’t go anywhere. Milim suddenly remembers she has to work.. changes into clothes as the group claps for her and she zooms off. Everyone wishes for her to return soon, though Rimuru is kind of okay she is gone for now or so it seems. That night Rimuru has a nightmare of sorts.. a vision that shows Shizu wants him to train the children she was training. Feeling compelled to do so Rimuru leaves the town of Rimuru behind for a bit and goes to the realms capital to find the school that Shizu worked on. 

Now I am pretty sure that this doesn’t make much sense timewise. Rimuru apparently has been in the other world for two years now and I think Shizu trained these kids way before Rimuru came here. But I might have misinterpreted a line or two.. it felt weird to me that these kids were still 10 year old.  From what I gathered kids are summoned to this world around the age of 10.. to become powerful warriors but because their body can not hold the power it explodes at one point.. no longer than five years after they arrived. So how are these kids all 10 year olds..still if Shizu thought them 2 years ago?! I am not sure.  Regardless Rimuru first visits the headmaster of the school.. who is the kid that taught Shizu the line about Slime.. he is an other-worlder as well.. The two get acquainted, Rimuru makes him some Manga from Memory and the two weeb out for a moment. He then offers Rimuru the job to teach these children to do right by Shizu. The moment Rimuru walks in the classroom he is almost killed by an ultimate attack wondering why these dying kids have so much energy.

The Positives

Milim not being a permanent addition to the group and her going to do her own thing was a welcome change, even though she got adopted into the village it is nice to see that there is at least some form of consistency in the fact that Mlim still is a demon lord and has her tasks to do.  In a way it is also nice to see Rimuru leave the village.. even though the building of the city is what at this point had me most invested in this show, the change of scenery to a more urban setting works nice and the machinations of the huge city are compelling, fun and creative. The show is pretty good at world creation.. not world building.. but world creation,  as in coming up with new interesting elements to create a fantastical world filled with diverse places.. they don’t connect all that well.. but as far as imagination goes this show really does well. I also like the idea that the concept of Isekai is rather common in this world and there are two ways to do this. It in a way spoofs how many Isekai shows there are and shows how likely it is that you end up in such a world. I personally would have loved to see this concept be taken a bit further as all Other-worlders now come from earth and I would have liked to see them draw people from other worlds as well.. especially since earthlings explode at a certain age.. but I still admire the creativity poured in it all.  I also like seeing Rimuru excited about something simple as Glass.. though this is later a bit negated. It makes him feel a bit normal again.

I also very much liked the level of geekism on display. Rimuru and Yuuki , the headmaster person thingy  really geek out and they discuss real life geeky things. No Snoka Koala and Peepsie .. Yuuki flat out asks Rimuru how many Final Fantasy Games there are now.. to which he replies.. 19.. which makes me wonder.. does he live in the future or does he kind X2 and 13, 2 and 3.. if so he has to count Crisis core as well to reach 19 but why would you call crisis core?!  Or does he count Final Fantasy IV the After years?!  Who knows! At one point there even is a Salt Bae Meme I think. The show does know who it’s audience is and pleases them, the people that matter in this world think like us and act like us and that adds a lot of relatability to this episode and gives it some much needed charm.

The Negatives

The writing though… isn’t good! It isn’t good at all. The Milim thing seems like one of the easiest contradictions but like I said.. I don’t get how these kids fit in the timeline of Shizu. With the stories Eren told before it doesn’t seem likely these kids are 10 still? Or is it that they are brought here when they are five and explode around the age of 10?! It could be.. because that is certainly implied at the end.. but Shizu is a summon as well, and she did not die.  The logic is that if you are transported to the new world you are given a new body that gathers power.. and eventually it becomes to much and says “pop”  sort of speak.. but then why would someone as powerful as a Demon Lord summon Shizu and stuff an Efreet down her body.. would that not make matters worse? If the Demon Lord knows putting a demon in them helps.. why would the countries not know this?! It’s not like they care for the humans they summon, they are intended as weapons so how would that cross a line?! I don’t see it make any sense.

This bad writing also applies to Rimuru in this episode. Does he have a photographic memory now that he can produce all these Manga’s he has ever read? If he has had that perfect memory due to great Sage.. why does he not ask Great Sage why he does not ask school books he read, or maybe to put a documentary he saw on making things to paper.  He could ask Great Sage how people in manga would take down a monster like the one he is facing to get a strategy.. it just feels like something he could have used. If he is this impressed by glass.. why doesn’t he make it inside himself.. all he needs is sand. Rimuru gets past a checkpoint showing his ID while masked, which also doesn’t make too much sense. He has a reference from Veldt sure.. but wasn’t it established those types of mask were worn by Majin? Would you really let someone walk through like that? Must have been one hell of a reference. Finally I find it kind of weird that teaching kids, will be the arc you will end season 1 on.  Should season one not just be about making the village.. as much as I hated the Charybdis arc… I think it would have been much better if the final four episodes were spend on fleshing that out more. Also what happened to that whole just a helpful slime rumor plotline?! It seems completely overwritten by the fake ID thing.

The Score

While I do see an improvement from the last few episodes I think this show is written super poorly, this arc should have happened before Charbdis at the very least,  Probably even before the Orc-Lord arc.. Now so much things so not make sense to me. Even if we say normally these kids die at around of the age of 10, the Shizu arc happend early in RImuru’s time here.. so I will assume.. maybe an half year in or so.  That means 1,5 years have passed which is at least a third of the time these kids have spend in this world.. How can they still remember Shizu so fondly, even at best she has been dead for a good year. These are small kids..their first reaction would not be.. this person kind of looks like Shizu. Had they been raised properly I could kind of understand but they are shown to be kind of childish otherwise..so it all just fits together really poorly.

In the end we got is like an artwork of a hobby painter trying to mimic a Picasso. It’s not a masterpiece.. but it is something interesting to look at.. it just does not make a beaverdam lick of sense if you look closer.  I will admit I have fun with slime.. sortoff.. during my watch but as soon as the episode passed I feel like.. wait.. but this.. and this.. and this.  So perhaps I am watching this show wrongly.. perhaps it is a show to bing a couple of episodes and when you are tired you just go to bed. However I have fallen out of love with this show hard… I feel like the Mangaka really tries to mimic how Oda builds his worlds in One Piece, with stuff happening everywhere in the world .. showing there is more to the world than just our heroes. For what it is worth he shows in this episode he can create interesting locations and interesting elements.. however.. when you pivot them all around the main character.. it doesn’t feel like a living world anymore. Oda’s villlains will act DESPITE  of Luffy’s existence and that is why that amazng world building works..once more this episode introduces a new interesting element.. but by letting it revolve around Rimuru it doesn’t stand on it’s own.. and it feels like a way to pad out your Manga,, and that is why this episode is sub-par for me.

Animini: Digimon Adventure Episode 14: The Kings of Insects Clash

Steamy Salutations my readers… and yes I do mean steamy in strictly the vaporised water way! It has finally happened. After 14 episodes we finally see Kuwagamon. The classical first episode monster from the series now only rears its ugly head in episode 14 in yet another very good digimon episode. Yet little things for me held it back JUUUST a little.

The Summary

It’s an even numbered episode number so we change back to Taichi’s group and will most certainly see Tentomon evolve! The episodes do not even try to hide it.. and that is fine.. we are here to see how it happens. Which becomes obvious fairly quickly. The group has to navigate through a maze of canyons. Encountering all sorts of weird materials. Surrounding by the high and tall cliffs the group can not use their digivices to communicate because of blocked reception. While this has been built up I do kinda wonder.. how the group can communicate across different worlds.. but not through rocks.. but who knows they might be made of a special material.  While Mimi has a lot of fun with some mirror rocks.. because of course she likes mirrors, Koshiro’s laptop breaks down. No longer able to analyse anything he feels rather useless to the group, which becomes even worse when the group is ambushed by a pack of Kuwagamon.  The group suddenly struggles to fight a bunch of champion level digimon, which seems kind of odd.. when Koshiro realises.. these attack patterns are not random.. These monsters work as a team.  They are quickly overwhelmed and have to flee.. only to realise.. this was part of the Kuwagamon’s group hunting strategy.. they fall into the claws of the ultimate digimon Okuwamon, the evolution of Kuwagamon.

The group gets overwhelmed even more and separated in their fight with Okuwamon. Taichi and Mimi do not let their digimon go into their ultimate form… for some reason, I think because of the lack of space or a clear strategy..maybe from sheer confusion.. but either way Koshiro gets seperated.. now further away from the group with no idea where they were and no way to analyse a proper strategy. When Kabuterimon is about to be killed by Okuwamon .. after a lot of self doubt the digimon ensures his partner that Koshiro still has the tool that makes him the greatest.. His brain. Realising he used his laptop top much, Koshiro uses his tactical mind to get Kabuterimon out of a hairy situation.. freed from the negative thinking and with a sharp mind again, he is able to super-evolve Kabuterimon into Atlurkabuterimon (which is the Japanese name for Megakabuterimon). Using his knowledge of standard bug behaviour, the attack patterns so far and the layout of the battlefield Koshiro comes up with a strategy that allows Taichi the time to Super-evolve Agumon as well.. and while the leader takes down the Kuwagamon.. Atlurkabuterimon faces off against Okuwamon and comes out on top!  Koshiro saves the day and Mimi tells him she is proud to have him as a servant as the episode ends.

The Positives

Yet again this show really is good at establishing a good cause and effect chain.. Although admittedly not as well as the last episode, there is a perfect reason for Koshiro to face his trouble. Communications are out.. Koshiro’s tool is taken out of commision, he now finds himself in a tough spot. The idea of letting an enemy use a coordinated attack when the one normally coming up with the strategies is out of commision is a great way for Koshiro to tap into his own strengths! It really feels like a Koshiro episode  in it’s very core. From the enemies chosen, the hazards to overcome and a battlefield where he has the advantage.  His relationship with Tentomon has always been one of my favourites in the original show and that is not too different this time around. I enjoy their bond where Tentomon seems to really idolise Koshiro in his own way and that is brought up again here!  Using the battlefield to your advantage in battles is always a big plus for me as a D&D player who always looks for those kinds of things.

The second big thing this episode does very well is once more establishing all the chosen ones as someone unique. From the very first few moments where Mimi encounters a reflective rock all the three children see different things. Taichi sees a funhouse mirror and reminds him of fun times. Mimmi sees a mirror admires it for that.. something that reflects her and Palmon.. and while she also has fun with it.. it is much more from a vanity stance. Koshiro however sees the rock as something to analyse, an interesting anomaly. So even in little things these heroes feel so distinct from each other. Where the original story oftenly had the characters that were not Taichi and Yamato take a backseat. This constantly happens throughout the episode and other episodes as well. Such as Mimi instead of saying well done Koshiro.. saying “Great Job, That’s my Servant” because she still keeps up the Princess Mimi act. It just adds so much flavour. Of course bringing back the classic Kuwagamon is a strength as well. There is a lot of respect for the original as well, it just modernises it.. and speeds it up quite a bit!

The Negatives

The episode is not flawless though, more so than in other episodes this one takes a fair few conveniences. Like Greymon and Togemon not digivolving. I do get why Gremon doesn’t evolve.. they are fighting in cliffs of stone, his missiles could surely endanger them.. but Lillymon can fly and fight with kicks if she needs to.. so it would seem she would do well here.  Koshiro being separated from his friends as he did also did not seem to make a lot of sense. The show is smart enough to leave out what exactly happened but one moment he is with his friends, the next he is two minutes of flying away from them.. it’s odd to say the least and in an episode that is about logic, recognising patterns  and finding a way it all stands out. It never feels obnoxious but it feels as if information we needed was left out.. like important parts of the episode where cut.  Which ties in with my second gripe.

The knowledge Koshiro has while fighting his big battle seems a step or two , two big.  He knows how to distract the Kuwagamon, he knows where there are more of these shiny rocks besides the one they encountered. It feels like we miss a scene where Kuwagamon attacked a mirror instead of a chosen one.. and if it happened in the episode it was a blink and you miss it moment. That would be a great time to let him have a flashback.  Show us how he got to know this.. now it feels a tad Deus Ex machina.  Which isn’t helped by the fact that NOW Taichi can suddenly digivolve Greymon into Metalgreymon .. The episode feels, jittery.. as if I am watching a lagging stream. I have the idea I miss a few words or in another way do not get the full experience. The grey cliffs are also a bit boring compared to all the amazing things we have seen before.. and while they do make a good obstacle to overcome with logic it sometimes makes it hard to follow who is where exactly. 

The Score

On Crunchyroll this episode scores a 4.9 out of 5 based on 316 reviews. Which is already quite telling that this is not going to be a bad episode. However I do feel this episode is a bit less imaginative than the others. It delivers on fan-service, it delivers on it’s goal and it does even tell it’s story in a sublime way.. it just doesn’t have as much fun with it  as something like the last episode or the Weregarurumon episode did.  Taichi’s group is having the weaker episodes. Which is kind of weird because I do like that group more than the other. Maybe I am holding them to different standards? Just this episode to me lacks JUST that bit of soul to be as great as the other parties adventures.

Koshiro DOES have by far the best adventure of his group though. I did not like the Metalgreymon episode and the Lillymon episode just left me feeling rotten, despite being quite good. This episode does everything the amazing episodes do just a bit less. The music has less impact, the story is a bit less creative and the set up is a bit too straight forward. In that manner this episode is like a german car, or anything german really. It’s super solid, it works and it works well.. it works REALLY well. It might work the best of all the super evolution episodes i have seen so far even.. yet in the end I just wasn’t as excited.

Animini: Cowboy Bebop – Episode 4 – Gateway Shuffle

Jolly good to see you all again steampunk people! Paradise’s week of anime concludes with an unexpectedly strange episode of Cowboy Bebop! I never expected monkeys to show up! While this episode to me may not be close to how amazing the third episode was , I had an amazing time and thus yet again the strength of the week was in the tailend of things. Join me as we see Faye join the Bebop crew in this fourth episode of an all time classic.

The Summary

Faye’s ship has run out of fuel and she is drifting in Orbit of a planet called Ganymede.. or well google shows it’s actually one of the moon’s of Jupiter. People mostly ignore her calls and pass her by.  When some debrief floats by however she spacewalks towards it hoping to loot some propellent but what she finds is much different. She finds a dying man who hands her a container with something unknown. Hoping it might be worth a lot, Faye goes back to begging for help! Breaking the man’s wishes to not look at the item. It is unknown however what exactly she has acquired.  A fun set up and I do love how Faye really fills the role of Femme Fatale including their classic shortcommings.  It really felt like I was reading or watching one of those classic noir scenes, where the tough woman finds herself in high water. Speaking of Water.. Spike and Jet are having breakfast… On Ganymede!  What are the chances! There they discover a potential bounty who orders some kind of sea creature.. in the rudest way possible. A few Eco-Terrorist lead by what looks like Josuke Higashikata (Jojo’s Part 4)  actual  mother..  a woman named Twinkle Maria Murdockc then murder him for it.

Jet realises the woman has a 25 million bounty and Spike takes her to his ship.  On their way into orbit to strike a deal they also happen to stumble across Faye Valentine and pick her up again! Two bounties?! That must be good to be true! And so it turns out to be.. while Spike tries to break open the container Faye has brought along, Jet discovers the bounty on Twinkle Maria has been lifted. Because she holds the planet hostage. She possesses a virus called monkey business.. a bio weapon that makes humans devolve back into a monkey like state… Super Mario Bros movie memories made this quite delightful.  Thus bounty hunters have to let the woman walk free… and since the government of Ganymede doesn’t follow her exact terms she launches a missile with Monkey Business towards them. The bounty now reinstated causes Spike and Faye to work together to stop the missile and capture miss Twinkle.  Going through a Hypergate thing when the missile goes off. The Ganymede people close the gate which would leave Spike and Faye trapped forever.  Dodging and trying to destroy the Monkey Missiles.. heroes barely manage to escape but not Miss Twinkle.. as she swears revenge.. the content of the container Faye was handed falls out of her pocket. Spike broke it earlier and saw her reaction and figured out what it must be.. thus leaving her to slowly turn into a monkey trapped in Hyperspace.

The Positives

I love how Bebop is a show that isn’t afraid to have fun with itself. Eco-Terrorists that try to turn humanity into monkeys? I really love the idea!  Faye Floating in her ship with just bags of chocolate, salt sugar.. and chicken with rice floating around seems so mundane yet funny at the same time.  Like it’s a joke on astronaut food, all in the most basic of brown bags. It makes this world feel so “lived in”. It’s sci-fi but it deals with the same trouble we have.. an overzealous PETA or .. whatever those guys from Whale Wars were called, car trouble and trying to flirt your way to being saved. It is quaint, just pushed into a hyper caricature of itself  by adding cyberpunk sci-fi elements to it. Added with a lot of Film-Noir tropes. I can not fully describe it but every scenario just feels so “right”.. like “this is the correct way to tell this tale for “this series’. The twists, the dysfunctionality it is like watching one of those youtube videos of seeing a machine cut playdough in super neat chunks.  I am just so intensely satisfied. Another big thing that is really catchy is that the main characters nearly always seem to have fun.. sure there are goals  they pursue for other reasons as well.. but they are also having fun and that emotion really carries over.   We have fun “WITH” them rather than having fun because we see them do stuff.

I really liked the animations in this episode as well, the way Spike charges up his little electrical beam, the way the missile splits into several pieces.. because Maria made a weapon that can defend against typical weaponry. There is a level of mechanicalness to it!  Beams charge up, gun turrets need to move into aim,  a missle detaches a lid before it splits up into tinier parts.  Yet that energy seems to come from somewhere, the move of the turret isn’t exactly fluid as it might not move from a neutral position but revolve back from a less fortunate position. There is  something really satisfying about seeing Spike and Faye lean onto their dashboard to make their vehicle go faster.. while of course it doesn’t make any difference. It all feels real and thought out and because of it you can really get into the action not just because it is epic but because it has impact as well. Motion not only serves the scene but is subject to the world and it really makes it seem more lively and believable.

The Negatives

The episode does not escape a few flaws, my main gripe is the whole.. “oh look at the chances we end up in the same place as Faye” thing. Lots of anime do this.. but  off alll the moons on Jupiter you just happen to go to the same one she is orbiting. And on  your way out of orbit you stumble across here? While earlier it is established she has been there for a while?! It’s a bit lazy and I know this show can do better. The whole convenience thing could have been solved with a single line like “It has been months since you escaped”  or  “We heard rumors you might be around here”  but instead they wonder how she could have spent all the money from last episode already. While this also signifies a passage of time it is not defined as a long time.. rather as a short time.. making the convenience feel more real. It is super common in anime or western media to see but in something as large as our solar system I would love to see at least some sort of explanation. 

I also think the eco-terrorists are a bit over designed. While they eat with Mamma Maria they have their faces revealed and it is the faces of people that fit the stereotypical eco terrorist. I am totally on board with that, however when they take out their guns and prepare to kill they have these weird seel helmets or whatever the creature is. That felt slightly too much for me . Twinkle Maria’s design is nice but doesn’t seem to eco-terroristy to me, to be fair she is ruling it more like a mob-boss and that she does look like but I would have loved to see a bit more of an eco-terrorist in her rather than just a money hungry mob-boss using eco-terrorists on her behalf. The way she steps up in the beginning to defend animals was fun.. but she lets go of that behaviour  later in the episode which I think is a bit of a shame. 

The Score

Cowboy Bebop is once again among the best episodes I have seen this week.  The plot may border on being  too silly, but for me it is something filled with nostalgia and a cheeky little charm, where the creator isn’t too afraid to have fun. The way Faye is reintroduced to the group requires you to suspend your disbelief quite hard.. but it is worth it to see how well see interacts with the group and how in her place she feels. The twist ending of the space fight feels like a bit of an afterthought.. with a fake out that doesn’t do anything but that comes as fast as it went and when push comes to shove we got a whole lot more positive things than negatives causing a high but not perfect score.

While in the large scale of the show I probably will not think about this episode a lot.. the inner workings of the show are very much shown are at it’s best here. Like an amazing tech demo telling me that the journey that will follow is absolutely amazing and I just had such a great time at watching things move,, seeing spaceships go  woosh and big beams go mmzzaappp! It’s like one of those Lego Technic bulldozers or cars. I do not care that much about the package as a whole.. it’s fine but kind of forgettable.. but if I stare at the loose parts and admire how everything works.. I can stare at it for hours and just be mesmerised and entertained..admiring how well everything is put together.

Animini: Natsume Book of Friends – Episode 4 – Shigure and the Girl

Absolutely Joyous to be re-acquainted, my dear Island guests. Once more the strength of my anime week lies in the back. The fourth episode of Natsume was an absolute delight. Cute creatures, a ghostly setting.. Megane girls, even Madara, Nyanko turns into a girl! Oh what a delight! We even get a pretty heartwarming moment and I get to see a Kappa! I love Kappa!

The Summary

The episode begins on a hot summer day.. Natsume sees a Kappa dehydrating on the road.. so he pours his water bottle on it to refresh it!  Little does he know that he is being watched!  We then move to that trial of bravery that was discussed in the second episode and I get my favourite location in anime! Haunted houses! I got a great one in Flip Flappers.. and this one.. is not as good but Haunted House! Yay! It does not take long for spooky stuff to start happening. People get locked in, there is a person when the group is being divided and it doesn’t take long for students to go missing. All these events seem to connect to a guy who is looking at Natsume from behind an Umbrella. He almost gets taken by this presence when Sasada shows up and the presence vanishes. What follows next is an interesting series of mysteries. Who was that?!  Why did it scare from Sasada, where did the others go? What is it?! All these questions are neatly unwrapped.. but we also get something very important happening. Sasada asks Natsume…Can you see them?!  

This shocks him and Madara/Nyanko knocks her out thinking she might be the Yokai in this house.. realising she is not. Nyanko goes out to investigate taking the shape of a girl.. who claims to have knocked out Sasada with a dodgeball for some weird excuse reason!  He does hint to Natsume.. for the guy to not be detected by someone as himself this spirt has to be very powerful. Sasada now left alone with Natsume again, once more asks him if he can see them.  Natsume avoids the question, clearly wanting to bond.. but not sure if she should tell her the truth. Sasada tells a story on how she once saw a Yokai in this place.. she lost her lucky charm that meant the world to her.. and this spirit helped her out. It was a spirit that saw itself as corrupted.. ever since she has been coming to this place so she could thank him for what he did for her.. but the spirit never appeared for her again.  Stuff happens.. that mostly involves Madara dragging Natsume to places and people reacting. Eventually Sasada begins to pry again into Natsume’s power which causes him to rush and confront this spirit. It does not want it name back as it just hates humanity.. but Madara does a glowing thing and Natsume sends Shigure away. Before the spirit fades away however it tells why it never showed before Sasada again.. he liked her and if she could say what she wanted to say she would not come again. She finally storms up on the roof and thanks the fading spirit.. just to be slightly patted on the head. The next day Natsume waters a Kappa again.

The Positives

I really liked this episode! While it did not hit me as hard as the little guy fading away, the arc between Sasada and Shigure was very satisfying. I am always a sucker for a person who sees themselves as something rotten while another sees something bright and good in them. I love stories that change in the eye of the beholder. I do not believe in good or evil persé, at least not in an absolute form. A guy can have claimed 18 students with his ghostly powers, but if you are not aware and only see the sweet thing he did for you he will be a good guy.  It is also a story that shows us that while something might seem small to someone, it can seem huge to someone else. The trinket Sasada loses seems like a generic lucky rabbits foot of sorts.. but it means more to her.. and to Shigure it is cursed.. he can’t touch a pure item.  So Sasada the effort to tell Shigure thanks for what he did seems small, she never stops or gets tired.. but in it Shigure found a form of fate. Even a simple question as “Natsume can you see them?” is subject to this. To Sasada it is a questions whose answer will give her hope.. but in Natsume’s eyes it is something that might bring her misery, put her in danger or maybe complicate things even further.  I really enjoy themes like that. They are very close to some big values of me and I love to see that other people sometimes see things my way as well. I really like Sasada as a character for that very same reason.

This is also an episode about things being different. Shigure is unlike every other Yokai.. his goals are different. He hates humans.. but Sasada is different. In the last episode we saw Natsume being desperate to find someone to talk to with his whole seeing spirits thing.. but when Sasada asks, things are different. It’s all down quite beautifully and the backdrop of an old school building that is about to be demolished gives it a sense of tragedy by putting it in the frame of a finite time.  Sasada has her goals.. some that really matter to her.. but she realises her time to do so is very finite. Her resources to do this are also limited. That is also why she sees hope in Natsume.. he may help her. Yet when he claims he can not see spirits.. she does not seem dejected. She still wishes to convey her gratitude regardless. I was very touched how they make this big event out of something so small. What in  the eyes of your regular beholder seems like nothing more than a courtesy is a deep plight for her and I hope people watching this are remembered about the value of little things.

The Negatives

So .. enough with the floaty, analytical stuff.. I can’t get too deep here or I will ruin my reputation, time to find some negatives .. and they are way way waaaay much more shallow than anything positive about this episode. First off all, the way the students go missing lacks a bit of impact.. it’s just like they poofed away like one of Naruto’s shadow clones.  There is no real fear from Sasada or Natsume, while not really knowing this spirit’s abilities. For all they know their friends could have been dragged into nothingness. While I do get Sasada not showing reaction.. because of her positive outlook on Shigure, I do think Natsume takes things a bit too lightly. He does talk about saving his classmates.. but at the time he did I am not sure he knew if they could be saved? I might have missed a line while taking a sip from my drink though. He also gets trapped by a door that I am pretty sure you can throw a chair through and get out.. a few funky things like that happen but it’s nothing too bad.

The second thing I question is why Madara is visible to others, I know he has more power  but if other students can hear the cat talk, would the monk from last episode not have seen a cat talk as well?  He literally shouted at Natsume at that moment for being stupid. Perhaps he did not hear it from shock but that also seems unlikely. I kind of miss an explanation here.  The way he interacts with the cat also seems like things people would react to .. but it doesn’t happen. So Madara is used a bit inconsistent here. While entertaining it feels like things don’t completely add up. Can they see him in his true form as well? If so then the priest of last episode should have definitely seen him. He just feels a bit off in this episode. I am sure it will be explained , or I will stop caring about it being inconsistent. I do hope this shapeshifting trick will be used once more.. It would be great if he tried to trick Natsume with it at one point.

The Score

This episode gets a Berry Good score from me. It misses out on the highest score because of the lack of creepy in a spooky setting. Almost as if the visual story they are trying to tell differs from the narrative one.  Shigure looks very creepy, the setting looks very ominous and it creates an expectation, an expectation that doesn’t deliver. While this really  works well with what the episode is trying to tell I can not help but to feel that I miss that little ghost hand reaching out through the wall..  That creepy shadow that doesn’t act like it’s supposed to or at least a little something of that nature. I don’t expect a lot of that.. because there was a lot of story to tell but I would have at least liked a scene. This kind feels like entering a ghosthouse to play the Pinata game in the middle of it. Sure there is candy and boy is it sweet.. yet somehow you also can not escape the thought.. it would have been really cool if we actually could have been on this ride!

That is just a side thought though,  what this episode does it does wonderfully well. I REALLY like Sasada’s build up , her design to not be super amazingly pretty and more mundane, the way she appreciates the little things and the value of a thank you. I love the themes in this episode and once again the Yokai design is sublime!  I also liked the Kappa a lot..because they look so clunky and awkward and have this duck-like estetic!  There are adorable little Kurbioh like guys as well. It’s amazing! I do know of a few Yokai but these designs seem quite unlike other interpretations I saw.. They have a really distinct style that I just adore and I loved little tweaks such as Yokai’s voice being warped because he talks through a bucket. It was super cute and adorable and I had a great time.