Category: Anime Reviews

Categories
Anime Reviews First Impressions Reviews

Summer 2021 First Impressions – Peach Boy Riverside

Streaming: Crunchyroll

Episodes: 12

Source: Manga

Episode Summary: Sally is a former princess whose longing for adventure saw her leave her quiet castle in the countryside in search of stimulation in the outside world. One day during the course of her travels, she discovers Frau, a member of the Harefolk community, whose rabbit-shaped visage betrays their status as a demi human. Sally’s experiences with demi humans is essentially nonexistent, so she’s somewhat surprised and disheartened to find that most people harbor a deep prejudice against them. Even though they have some ability to speak and Frau in particular is very loyal to Sally, they’re still shooed away at every turn by villagers who fear the worst.

And they do have some reason to be fearful, at least in a general sense; the world has been under attack by giant monsters and ogres, and it’s simply an unfortunate reality that this fear of being brutally murdered has perverted into hatred for other races. Even when Frau uses their power to defeat an ogre, there’s very little convincing the villagers who witness it. After defeating the ogre, Sally and Frau are taken into custody by the local knight captain, Hawthorn, but despite his own suspicions he warms up to them quickly. As Sally and Frau seek repayment for their troubles in the form of dinner, the city is brutally attacked by a high ogre and her companion. After witnessing this destruction and watching Frau attempt to fight the ogre alone, Sally enters a sort of trance and comes into some buried physical abilities that are a sight to behold. She may be travelling in search of a boy born out of a peach, but her own special powers are nothing to sneeze at.

Continue reading “Summer 2021 First Impressions – Peach Boy Riverside”
Categories
Anime Reviews First Impressions Reviews

Summer 2021 First Impressions – Drug Store In Another World: The Slow Life of a Cheat Pharmacist

Streaming: Crunchyroll

Episodes: 12

Source: Light Novel

Episode Summary: Reiji Kirio was formerly a salaryman, but now he lives a quiet life as a pharmacist in a fantasy world alongside a friendly ghost and a werewolf. His claim to fame is his ability to create potions and medicines that actually taste good in addition to being effective. Once a local shop starts selling his energy potion, his fame spreads far and wide and things aren’t quite so quiet any longer.

This fame sometimes leads to Reiji getting involved in situations for which he might not be entirely qualified, as assumptions about his expertise mean that, to many folks, he’s the man with all the (medicinal) answers. He accepts a request from a young man whose girlfriend has been reacting in an extreme way every time he interacts with other women. Though relationship counseling is outside his purview, Reiji identifies that her paranoia is likely due to a lack of sleep, so brews a special tea that allows those who imbibe it to feel calm and sleep better. There’s never a truly dull day at this pharmacy, though it’s leaps and bounds more chill than the rat race ever was.

Continue reading “Summer 2021 First Impressions – Drug Store In Another World: The Slow Life of a Cheat Pharmacist”
Categories
Anime Reviews First Impressions Reviews

Summer 2021 First Impressions – Tsukimichi: Moonlit Fantasy

Streaming: Crunchyroll

Episodes: 12

Source: Light Novel

Episode Summary: Makoto Misumi leads a decent life. He’s good at archery and his parents are pretty interesting people. But it’s his parentage that ends up causing him problems when the gods come to collect on a debt. It seems that Makoto’s parents came to Earth from another world, and in exchange they offered up the thing that meant the most to them. In this case that means their child, and if Makoto doesn’t go along with the transaction then his sisters might be forced into it in his place. At the behest of the god Tsukuyomi-no-Mikoto, Makoto is transported away to visit the goddess of this mysterious other world. Unfortunately the goddess is extremely unimpressed by Makoto, and banishes him to the far corners of the other world with only the ability to read, write, and speak the various languages of other races.

Fortunately Tsukuyomi-no-Mikoto also secretly helped to protect Makoto with his power, so he isn’t completely helpless. Makoto learns this when he defends an orc girl named Ema from a giant wolf and completely obliterates it. He also seems to have a knack for magic, which comes in handy when he confronts the dragon that’s been causing grief for Ema’s people. The supposedly invincible dragon, Shin, finds herself outmatched. She offers to make a mutually-beneficial contract arrangement with Makoto, mainly because his memories of his previous life are so fascinating to her. Though he may have been banished to the far edge of the world, Makoto’s group of companions is slowly but surely growing larger.

Continue reading “Summer 2021 First Impressions – Tsukimichi: Moonlit Fantasy”
Categories
Anime Reviews First Impressions Reviews

Summer 2021 First Impressions – Seirei Gensouki: Spirit Chronicles

Streaming: Crunchyroll

Episodes: 12

Source: Light Novel

Episode Summary: Rio is an orphaned boy living in the slums, biding his time until he can find the means to avenge his murdered mother. One day after experiencing a fever, he begins to remember his former life as Haruto Amakawa, a 20-year-old college student in Japan who was killed in a tragic bus accident. Rio’s past and present lives begin to intermingle when, after an odd encounter with a group of women from the palace, Rio returns to find the group of bandits he was living with murdered. It’s at that point that his innate magical ability awakens, and he’s able to channel his former martial arts training to help rescue the kidnapping victim the bandits had recently brought home.

Rio’s ragged appearance and his proximity to the crime make him the prime subject once the victim, Princess Flora, is retrieved by her companions. After undergoing a round of physical torture, it’s only Flora herself who can manage to clear Rio’s name. This grants him an audience with the king for his heroism – but what might an orphan boy from the slums have to say to the country’s monarch?

Continue reading “Summer 2021 First Impressions – Seirei Gensouki: Spirit Chronicles”
Categories
Anime Reviews First Impressions Reviews

Summer 2021 First Impressions – Life Lessons with Uramichi Oniisan

Streaming: Funimation

Episodes: 13

Source: Manga

Episode Summary: Uramichi Omota is the host of a children’s program. But as an early 30-something whose talents as a gymnast somehow brought him to this (as he sees it) dead-end, he’s beginning to let his frustrations show through on the air in the presence of the children who don’t yet know any better about life’s many challenges.

Uramichi isn’t the only cast member struggling to manage these dark thoughts, either; a couple of his former underclassmen who dress in animal costumes on the show are wrestling with both their own positions and their complicated perception of the classmate they formerly looked up to, and two of the other human character actors have landed in those jobs after failed music careers. Being a millennial is suffering – or at least it seems that way for Uramichi-oniisan and his crew.

Continue reading “Summer 2021 First Impressions – Life Lessons with Uramichi Oniisan”
Categories
Anime Reviews Personal Reviews

The Fleeting Beauty of Youth and the Persistent Beauty of Youthfulness – Pretty Boy Detective Club

When I started high school, some friends of mine told me that our school building had a tunnel system that could be accessed from some of the classrooms. When the campus was first constructed in the mid-1950’s, it included a nuclear fallout shelter; that’s what these tunnels were originally for. Calling them “tunnels” was generous, too, because they weren’t meant to accommodate the height of a person standing (I suppose the assumption was, if they were getting used, the folks inside would be huddled heads-to-knees while the bombs went off outside).

When I heard about the existence of these tunnels and saw the few grainy photographs my friends had taken during their time investigating them, I immediately wanted my own opportunity to explore. We all picked a day to stay after school and hoped that there wouldn’t be too many teachers around to thwart our efforts. Unfortunately we seemed to get caught during every attempt we made to poke around shelves and move potted plants in order to uncover access panels, and were continually shooed away. After a while we just gave up on the effort and moved on to other shenanigans.

I’ve never really forgotten about those tunnels and my desire to poke my head inside them, but like so many things that happened (or didn’t) around 9th grade I kind of made peace with the fact that I’d probably never see firsthand what was hidden down there beneath the floor. It was kind of like when I tried out for the fall play and was the only one of my friends who didn’t make the cut, or when my undiagnosed learning disabilities and complete lack of study skills finally caught up with me in math class, despite my aspirations of becoming a “game programmer” – I was forced to wrestle with the reality of what was and wasn’t possible for me to accomplish by my own skills and gained some sobering perspective on my limitations.

Continue reading “The Fleeting Beauty of Youth and the Persistent Beauty of Youthfulness – Pretty Boy Detective Club”
Categories
Anime Reviews First Impressions Reviews

Summer 2021 First Impressions – The Detective is Already Dead

Streaming: Funimation

Episodes: 12 (The first episode is double-length)

Source: Light Novel

Episode Summary: Note: The first episode is double-length. I will endeavor to keep the summary concise.

Trouble seems to follow Kimihiko wherever he goes, so when he’s nabbed off the street and forced to carry a mysterious attaché case onto a flight, it feels like par for the course. But this is no ordinary plane ride – mid-flight he meets Siesta, a self-proclaimed detective, and involuntarily becomes her sidekick as she’s summoned to the cabin to help solve an… issue. There she faces off with an individual intent on hijacking and crashing the plane. Siesta correctly identifies that this man, code-named “Bat,” was put up to this by a certain organization, but that doesn’t stop him from brutally attacking them both with an augmented appendage. As it happens, the attaché case contains a special gun used to defeat this adversary. The fact that Kimihiko was forced to carry it onto the plane was all a machination on Siesta’s part.

After they land Kimihiko assumes his odd adventure is over. However, Siesta has other plans. Inviting herself into his home, Siesta eventually learns that Kimihiko’s school has been experiencing an odd rash of student disappearances that seem to be related to the Hanako-san urban legend. She poses as a student to attend the cultural festival, and manages to identify the real root of the problem. After all this, Kimihiko is still reticent to become her official sidekick, but an offer of protection pushes him over the edge. Yet their adventures are not all sunshine and roses, because… the detective is already dead.

Continue reading “Summer 2021 First Impressions – The Detective is Already Dead”
Categories
Anime Reviews First Impressions Reviews

Summer 2021 First Impressions – Getter Robo Arc

Streaming: HIDIVE

Episodes: 13

Source: Manga

Episode Summary: 19 years ago, a disaster destroyed cities and infrastructure all over the world. Now people struggle to afford food and essentials as the planet is continually attacked by invaders. Hayato Jin, pilot from the original Getter team, has spent the past several years attempting to develop a new robot (and a pilot) who can manage a win against these deadly enemies, but has thus far been unsuccessful. His most recent creation, Getter Robo Arc, requires three pilots to bring out its full power, and thus far he’s only been able to find one whose body can endure the strain piloting it causes.

It’s seemingly by chance (though it’s possibly by premonition) that Takuma Nagare and his companion Baku Yamagishi encounter one of the failed Getter prototypes once its pilot has been defeated. Piloting Getters runs in Takuma’s blood; his father Ryouma was the leader of the original Getter team. Takuma is also incredibly sturdy, which turns out to be a boon once he faces off against a member of the alien forces. But he can’t defeat it alone. It takes Shou Kamui, a half-dinosaur hybrid whose body can withstand the punishment of piloting Getter Robo Arc, to come to Takuma’s aid when the situation becomes grim. Could these two pilots working together possibly be the answer that Jin has been seeking?

Continue reading “Summer 2021 First Impressions – Getter Robo Arc”
Categories
Anime Reviews First Impressions Reviews

Summer 2021 First Impressions – The Duke of Death and His Maid

Streaming: Funimation

Episodes: 12

Source: Manga

Episode Summary: The duke of a certain villa is cursed such that anything he touches dies in his hands. Yet his flirtatious maid, Alice, sometimes gets much too close for the Duke’s comfort, and often acts in a way meant to specifically get a rise out of him. It’s not that he dislikes her attention, but he’s terrified that with one stray touch, the duke might accidentally drain the life away from the one person who seems to want to be around him.

When his childhood fried Phillip asks for a meeting, the Duke is momentarily excited. Phillip was a handful when they were both young, but he also never judged the Duke. Unfortunately over the years things seem to have changed, and Phillip arrives with an entourage of guards and seems terrified to be there. It turns out that he was asked by the Duke’s estranged mother to see if the curse had somehow been lifted; if not, then she plans to pass the family title down to her younger son. The Duke wishes more than anything that he could be normal. Not so much to retain his title, but to be able to live among other people and to put a ring on Alice’s finger by his own hand.

Continue reading “Summer 2021 First Impressions – The Duke of Death and His Maid”
Categories
Anime Reviews First Impressions Reviews

Summer 2021 First Impressions – Re-Main

Streaming: Funimation

Episodes: 12

Source: Original

Episode Summary: Half a year ago, Minato was on top of the world. He and his middle school water polo team were national champions. But a freak car accident left Minato in a coma, and now that he’s finally awakened he’s missing those memories of middle school and the sport he once loved. All he wants is a feeling of normalcy, and when he pledges to re-join water polo it’s because he wants his family to worry about him less. But his atrophied muscles and the fact that he still has to study for high school entrance exams mean that his promise to take up his formerly favorite sport again is one he likely won’t be able to keep.

After 8 months of studying and rehab, Minato is accepted into a perfectly average high school that’s close to his house. Moments into his first day, however, is when he starts getting bombarded by requests to join sports clubs, including the water polo club. Jo, the head of the club, recognizes Minato from his middle school days, and Eitarou (Minato’s biggest fan) corroborates this against Minato’s will. As Minato runs from his two pursuers, he discovers one more forgotten relationship that may have once held a place of high importance for him.

Continue reading “Summer 2021 First Impressions – Re-Main”