Welcome to another general discussion thread! Feel free to use this thread to talk about things you have watched recently, questions you have, or recommendations you want to give!
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Current season:
Initially, the only current series I watched was espisode 26 of MF Ghost, which was fine. I don’t expect it to do more than entertain me, and occasionally cynically amuse me with its adherence to the formula, and that’s what it does.
But then midweek, I was browsing back through the thread from last week and noticed that wietach had pointed to Ikoku Nikki as a surprisingly early contender for AOTS, so I gave it a shot. And I agree wholeheartedly. That was easily one of the best first episodes I’ve seen in a long, long time, and it laid the groundwork for much more to come. I loved everything about it - the story, the characters, the art style, the voice acting, the music, the dialogue, the non-linear but seamless timeline, the perfectly placed bits of surrealism… And last week’s episode - the second - was more of the same. It’s just very, very good, and in every respect.
And the first episode of You and I Are Polar Opposites aired, so I got to see that one too. I was sort of both pleased and underwhelmed - I followed the manga from start to finish and this is a faithful adaptation (even the chibified characters are the same), so it doesn’t really add anything for me. But that’s likely a good thing, since the manga was very good, and don’t mess with what works. I’d definitely recommend it to anyone who hasn’t read the manga (or who has read it and wants to re-experience it animated) and is interested in a school slice-of-life rom-com (with multiple romances). And I’ll keep watching it for certain - my favorite character (Nishi) hasn’t even appeared yet.
Past seasons:
First up last week was the rest of Hanasaku Iroha, which I started the previous week.
It’s mostly a slice of life, with a bit of romance mixed in, and I was very impressed. The cast is excellent - large and diverse and well fleshed-out. And most of them get at least some development along the way. It’s set at a hot spring inn though, and much of the focus of the series is on the inn itself, which is very old and very traditional and very well-loved, but at this point, not very successful, so the ongoing background is the conflict between the desire to maintain the inn’s beloved traditions at the expense of commercial success or to attempt to update it to hopefully appeal to a broader range of customers, but at the expense of its traditional appeal. Along the way, different characters take different, and sometimes shifting, positions on that. But that’s just the background - the thing that knits everything and everyone together. There’s much more to it too, as the characters interact and grow. And the art and voice work were also very good. I would strongly recommend it to anyone who appreciates SOL.
Then, wanting a change of pace, I watched another episode of Mnemosyne no Musume-tachi - episode 5 of 6 total. It’s a gritty cyberpunk with 45 minute standalone episodes and an overarching plot that’s been slowly playing out (very slowly - the in-universe timespan from episode 1 to episode 5 has been 55 years). Since the episodes are self-contained and long, and tend to be both complex and brutal, I’ve just been watching them one or two at a time for a few weeks now.
Next up I bounced off of Soul Eater. I really wanted to like it, mostly because of the art style, but it’s just so shounen. I made it through the first three prologue episodes hoping it would improve when it got to the story episodes, but I only made it about halfway through the first of them, cringing all the way, and had to give up.
Then I knocked around for a bit, watching a few favorite episodes of favorite series - Apocalypse Hotel 6, Zombieland Saga Revenge 4, Asobi Asobase 4 (I’m laughing just thinking about shogi) - then rewatched Milky Subway for the I-don’t-know-how-manyth time, then finally settled on Jijou wo Shiranai Tenkousei ga Guigui Kuru aka The Clueless Transfer Student is Assertive aka My Clueless First Friend. It was good all in all, though the central gimmick wore a bit thin. And the art style left a bit to be desired. But it was cute and wholesome and amusing, and that’s good enough.
And at the moment, I’m rewatching Trigun Stampede, getting myself oriented for Stargaze. It’s kind of risky, since broadly what I remember is that I enjoyed it in spite of its flaws, so this time around, it’s up in the air whether I’ll be more aware of the things I enjoy or the flaws. We’ll see, but so far so good.
The fact that people still find and enjoy Hanasaku Iroha warms my heart. It was the first anime that made me enamoured with SOL as a genre. Need to rewatch it at some point.
Oh yeah, Hanasaku Iroha feels uniquely homey and escapist at the same time.
Oh damn, it’s been a while since I’ve seen that one. Also haven’t come across many people that watched it.
Used to be on my favourites for a long time, but at some point in my life I didn’t really vibe with this anime much anymore. Maybe I should give it a rewatch. I should have the DVD somewhere…
Yeah - I can see both of those responses to it. It’s an interesting world and relatively engaging characters, but it’s also self-consciously edgy and relentlessly brutal. So it’s one of those series that make a strong initial impact, but then sort of overstay their welcome.
Yeah, I guess that was the thing I liked in my late teens, but that’s no longer the case. Rewatching it several years back made it feel more like torture porn than anything else at times.
For what it’s worth, I’ve also seen it, although it was quite some time ago. My feelings about it at the time were mixed—it was interesting in many ways, but there were also aspects of it that I could have done without, and unfortunately it’s mostly the bits I could have done without (like that one torture scene) that have stuck with me.