Category: First Impressions

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First Impressions Reviews

Winter 2017 First Impressions – Minami Kamakura High School Girls Cycling Club

Hiromi Maiharu moved from Nagasaki to Kamakura. She begins her new life in Kamakura and her first day in high school by bicycling to her school, but she has not ridden a bicycle since she was young. On the way to the ceremony for the first day, she meets Tomoe Akitsuki, and Tomoe helps her train to be better at bicycling. – ANN

Streaming at: Crunchyroll

Number of Episodes: 12

Source: Manga

Episode 1 Summary: Hiromi is starting her first day at a new high school, and against her mother’s protests decides to ride her bike to school. She hasn’t ridden a bike since she was small, but is pretty sure that she’ll pick it back up in no time. After a terrifying downhill descent, Hiromi realizes she doesn’t really remember as much as she thought she did, but luckily she crashes into a new classmate, Tomoe. Tomoe does her best to keep Hiromi upright on her bicycle, but it seems like a lost cause. The two decide to hoof it instead, so at least they’ll arrive in time for the opening ceremony. On their way to the school building they meet one of the teachers, and Hiromi discovers that her food isn’t safe from the sea birds flying near the shore. After getting situated in class and listening to an inspiring speech from her homeroom teacher, Hiromi heads home and sees a group of cyclists whiz by on fancy road bikes, and she’s instantly hooked on the concept. But she’ll have to learn to keep her balance first!

Impressions: Oh good grief. I queued this up because I thought it would be cute and harmless. After struggling through Saga of Tanya the Evil, I just wanted something nice and pleasant to enjoy. I was unfortunately not prepared to experience such an intense and immediate dislike of the main character. It has often been a trope of sports anime to introduce the sport or other activity in question through the eyes of a character who doesn’t know much about it, or has only done it casually in the past. Hiromi serves that role here, but her ignorance of cycling is almost beyond comprehension. I don’t blame people for not knowing how to ride a bicycle. I grew up doing it, but not everyone had that luxury. But generally even people who aren’t familiar with bikes know something about how the vehicle functions, even in just the most basic sense. Hiromi mounts her bike and it starts to roll downhill… and it takes her a few beats to realize that she’s supposed to propel it by using the pedals. She nearly crashes into Tomoe before she figures out how the brakes work (and then gets tossed over the handlebars after clasping them too hard too quickly). Hiromi comes across not as someone new to a sport, but as someone who is clueless to basic aspects of life, and that doesn’t make for an engrossing experience.

Beyond that, though, there’s not really anything substantive to think or talk about. The episode sets up the premise competently, but I don’t really feel like I needed twenty minutes of goofy biking antics to learn that Hiromi is kind of directionless and that cycling might be her ticket towards some greater character-building purpose. There is a very tame element of humor throughout the episode that provides a little something to grasp onto (I did chuckle a little bit when a bird stole Hiromi’s sandwich… and she revealed another backup sandwich soon afterward) and the rest of it is harmless enough, but “harmless” doesn’t generally get me pumped to watch much more. I love iyashi-kei or “healing” shows, but often those have endearing characters and some sort of emotional hook; this series is less a contented sigh and more a non-committal shrug.

I’m also getting the sneaking suspicion that perhaps the local Kamakura tourism board had some hand in this anime adaptation, because boy does it read like a thinly-veiled advertisement at times. Did you know that Mount Fuji, which can be seen from the seashore in Kamakura, is about seventy kilometers away? Oh, and the area is in close proximity to Enoshima? This is what I learned today while watching this episode. This is nice information to know, but it feels a bit like Tomoe is providing this exposition/info-dump in a very unnatural manner and it feels extremely obvious. I certainly wouldn’t fault them for wanting an anime tie-in, because anime tourism has become big business in recent years, but my opinion is that the focus should be on telling a good story; the benefits will follow.

There is an upside to the strong focus on Kamakura as a setting, though – the background artwork is consistently vibrant, detailed, and gorgeous. The artwork appears to be referenced from life as the Hiromi’s neighborhood really looks very lived-in and lush with plants. There’s also good use of CG to provide more three dimensional first person point-of-view shots from Hiromi’s perspective as she travels through town. If the rest of the show were slightly more tolerable in other aspects, I think this could definitely be worthwhile watching for the scenery porn.

The last two minutes of the episode are a live action segment featuring two voice actors learning about the sport of bicycling; in episode one, they learn about the merits of bicycle frames constructed of different materials, and deciding how they plan to use their bikes before purchasing the one which will work best. It’s useful information, but I don’t find seiyuu culture all that interesting, personally, so the additional appeal from that aspect was a little lost on me.

There’s a difference between being low-impact and being frustratingly boring, and unfortunately my first impressions of this series is that it crosses the line into the latter. I wish I liked any of the characters a little better, or thought that the bicycle plot had more potential, but it’s difficult to see that from where I’m standing. I’ve seen slice-of-life and sports done so much better, so I can’t really recommend this one.

Pros: The background artwork is beautiful and the CG is well integrated.

Cons: The main character’s incompetence is grating. Some of the episode feels like a thinly-veiled ad for the region in which the anime is set.

Grade: C

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First Impressions Reviews

Winter 2017 First Impressions – Saga of Tanya the Evil

Tanya Degurechov used to be one of Japan’s elite office workers, but because of a wrathful god, was reborn as a little girl. She has blonde hair, blue eyes, and nearly transparent white skin, and she flies through the air and mercilessly strikes down her opponents. She speaks with a young girl’s lisp and commands the army. Tanya prioritizes optimization and career advancement above all, and she will become the most dangerous entity among the Imperial Army’s sorcerers. – ANN

Streaming at: Crunchyroll

Number of Episodes: TBA

Source: Light Novel/Manga

Episode 1 Summary: In a pseudo-European world under siege, young mage Tanya Degurechov is the weapon that the Empire needs to fight off the various entities that would trample on her fatherland’s borders. Tanya appears to be a young girl of ten years old, but her ruthlessness and ability to dole out orders (and reprimands) to other officers speaks to someone much older, cunning, and world-weary. She has little patience for weakness and especially looks down on possible desertion, so when two mages under her command begin to show a pattern of disobedience, she sends them to rot far from the front lines. After using her intense, powerful magic to utterly obliterate a platoon of enemy magic-users, we learn that the insubordinate officers were killed by enemy fire. It’s almost as if Tanya knew that they were at risk, and purposely sent them to their deaths.

Impressions: Even though there are a good number of anime this season that I’m at least a bit interested in, I decided to go off script a bit and watch something that I knew had aspects I probably was not going to like. Military fiction (and especially thinly-veiled attempts to rewrite World War I/II era military history) always make me a little bit uncomfortable, especially since Japan seems to maintain a kind of weird romanticism focused around Germany or the German-esque. There are many examples of modern attempts to recreate the aesthetics of that era (for example, some lolita fashion lines that incorporate recognizable Nazi motifs, or cosplayers who don replica Third Reich uniforms for fun) while sugar-coating or tiptoeing around the bulk of the bad things that happened and crimes that were committed during the time period. It skeeves me out and I very much question the motivation behind it.

Likewise, one trope of anime in particular that leaves me cold is the one in which very cutesy characters are contrasted with the unthinkably horrible acts they are made to commit. It didn’t work for me in Gunslinger Girls, nor with the Higurashi series, and similarly I think it’s mostly used to cheap effect here. While Tanya isn’t necessarily what I’d call cute, in that her main facial expression seems to be “utter disdain” and her angular features make her look like something other than an actual kid, she still has the stature of a child and she’s referred to as such more than once by other characters (though only in fearful whispers behind her back, of course). And look, she spends most of the episode barking orders, threatening others with bodily harm, literally tearing people apart and burning them to ash, and not demonstrating any actual emotions about it. Whoa, edgy! I find that portion of the premise to be very lacking, to be honest.

The bulk of the episode is seen from the point of view of a subordinate mage named Visha (Viktoriya) Serebryakov, who is the type of character one sees and thinks “how did this person happen to stumble into the military, make it through basic training, and not get kicked out immediately afterward?” She’s the typical kind of audience helper-character who seems to not be very good at her job for the purposes of prompting exposition, and she’s altogether pretty innocent-seeming and naive. She doesn’t display a wacky, comedic kind of incompetence, she’s primarily just mildly clumsy, timid, and in awe of Tanya’s murderous actions, because shouldn’t we all be dumbstruck by gratuitous mass-murder perpetuated by a ten-year-old? (Actually, yeah, we probably should). She and Tanya are also the only women thus far in the show who are named and not background nurses or other sorts of crowd-fillers. That’s not necessarily bad in the sense that they’re the most focal characters thus far and an anime featuring two women in important roles (where they aren’t featured in constant up-skirt shots) is generally a victory (though considering the supernatural element suggested by the general plot summary and Tanya’s reference to herself as a “salaryman,” it’s not clear whether she considers herself a woman or not, but this is making things more complicated than it needs to be to make a point). The problem is more that their character designs are both wildly out-of-place compared to the military men that surround them. The guys get to be young and brash, old and grizzled, sharp-chinned, weary-looking, wrinkled, hairy… in one word, varied. The women look like, for lack of a more descriptive term, anime characters. Dewy eyes, soft features, and long eyelashes. It’s not a complaint that’s specific to this anime in particular, but it’s part of a continually frustrating trend. They all seem to exist in the same harsh, unforgiving environment, so why don’t they look like it?

There is something to be said for the portrayal of the environments and the general art direction in the episode, though. The background artwork is, in its bleakness, striking and gorgeous. What I really loved lingering on when I was taking screen shots were the gray-blue of the clouds above the battlefield, rimmed by hints of yellow in perpetual evening light. I began to recall bits of Shirobako, which I had the chance to re-watch recently. Though the shows that the Musashino team bring to life in the anime are not really what I’d call “high art,” a lot of work goes into making them look their best, with art directors and background artists contributing to an overall visual appearance that ends up being greater than the sum of its parts. This episode of Saga of Tanya the Evil comes across as slightly better than typical to me; while the story isn’t appealing and feels almost cynical at times, it’s easy to see the care that went into the art design, cinematography (by which I mean, the joining of animation, effects, and lighting), and getting the CG to look at least tolerable (which, in my opinion, is still about as good as you can expect). It helps to slightly obscure the otaku sheen and highlights the large amount of work that likely went into visually developing the adaptation. It makes it difficult for me to dislike it too much.

I’m mildly curious about the direction this show will take, if only to learn more about Tanya and her past life as a hard-ass Japanese business person (which I’m not treating as a spoiler since it appears to be in every publicly-available synopsis of the plot), but at the same time I also find her pretty intolerable as a human being and I’m kind of repulsed by all the violence and destruction served up in this episode. War is terrible and I hear enough about it in real life; I’m rarely in the mood to see it fictionalized and glorified in a cartoon, especially so by a character who seems to be some sort of sociopath. I understand that alternate history scenarios may be interesting to some, but I lack that interest myself, especially when particularly controversial time periods are involved. I have a difficult time condemning this first episode fully taking into account its merits, but I do find the subject matter pretty distasteful and doubt I’ll watch any more of it.

Pros: The background visuals are bleak but beautiful. The show features two non-sexualized women(?) in main roles.

Cons: There’s a boat load of violence to slog through, which may not appeal to some. The character designs are inconsistent along gender lines. The titular character is defined by a cheap trope (young child does horrifying things).

Grade: C-

 

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Anime Reviews First Impressions Reviews

Summer 2016 First Impressions – Sweetness and Lightning

Sweetness and Lightning CoverMath teacher Kōhei Inuzuka is a widower with a young daughter named Tsumugi. Inuzuka isn’t adept in the kitchen but with the help of his student Kotori Iida and his daughter, he embarks on a culinary adventure. – ANN

Streaming at: Crunchyroll

Number of Episodes: TBA

Source: Manga

Summary of Episode 1: Kyouhei Inuzuka is a high school teacher, but he’s also a single father to his young daughter, Tsumugi. It’s been six months since his wife died, and he’s just trying to take each day one day at a time and make sure he can take care of Tsumugi. Unfortunately, he’s often out late and more often than not resorts to grabbing convenience store bento for dinner. While out in the park flower-viewing, they happen upon a young lady weeping over her rice balls. She’s not sad, just moved to tears over the delicious food that her busy mother prepared. It just so happens that her mother owns a restaurant, and she passes along a business card. A couple of days later, Tsumugi is really feeling sad over the lack of home-cooked meals at their house, so Kyouhei does something impulsive – he races to the restaurant, daughter in tow, in order to provide something warm and nourishing. One problem – the owner is out and the restaurant is technically closed for the day, but Kotori, the owner’s daughter and coincidentally one of Kyouhei’s students, offers to cook up something simple. That night, they enjoy hot rice together, and Kotori asks that they join forces and learn to cook with one-another.

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Kyouhei pieces together Tsumugi’s lunch using store-bought pre-prepped side dishes.

Impressions: I have a major soft spot for stories that involve parenting and genuinely cute kids. Not because I have any of my own, but likely because it’s such a unique occurrence in anime. I remain a big fan of Bunny Drop (hey, it was a really excellent 11-episode anime and an equally good 4 volume manga!), enjoyed Kotetsu’s relationship with his daughter in Tiger & Bunny, and in general am impressed when the parental relationship is depicted as being substantial rather than as some afterthought in an anime full of teenagers (I don’t really have time to get into the related issue of dead moms in anime, but that’s certainly something to note). In any case, anime series that consider the parents’ point of view and depict that trials of trying to bring up a young person in an environment which makes that difficult are some of the anime I find appealing.

So far this show has a lot going for it in that regard. Kyouhei is depicted as a genuinely good person who has his daughter’s best interests at heart. It’s the specifics of their situation, as well as perhaps some residual depression following the death of his wife, that creates a lot of challenges for him to try to overcome. For the most part, Kyouhei seems fairly on top of everyday life; he makes plans to do the laundry with Tsumugi that weekend, they get out of the house to spend time together, he gets her dressed and out the door in the morning and generally arrives in time to pick her up from daycare. In short, he’s loving and competent, and while obviously any single parent situation is difficult to manage, there’s a decent amount of realism in his ability to juggle all these things and it’s clear that Tsumugi is grateful.

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A cell phone shot of Tsumugi during her first (and only) experience with dad’s cooking.

What left an impression on me after the first episode, though, is its (and by extension, the show’s) focus on food and meals as they relate to family life. In flashback, we learn that Kyouhei’s late wife Tae was quite the experimental chef, and her meals were beloved in the household. Because of the food lifestyle I (mostly) adhere to, I’m used to hearing the refrain that “food is fuel” and that we should strive to remove the emotional aspect from it (as in, try to stop emotional eating and listen to your body’s hunger signals instead). That’s fine on a logical level, but for me in particular food and meals have always served the purpose of showing love to those I care about and bringing together friends and family around a shared table. Tsumugi is a generally happy, bubbly youngster, but her sadness at eating convenience store bento boxes while her dad catches up on his classroom work is obvious. To her, meals are something that she wants to share with family, and a home-cooked meal trumps anything from the microwave (though her dad’s early attempts at home cooking so far have left a little to be desired, judging by her reported reaction).

I think this episode does a good job of explaining (without explicitly doing so) why Kyouhei hasn’t taken up cooking, and in fact has outright avoided the task. Aside from the fact that he doesn’t have much cooking experience and his first attempt was a major bomb (seriously, that photo of Tsumugi making a disgusted face is hilarious), it becomes clear that the subject of cooking is too strong a reminder of what’s missing now that his wife is gone. Trying to do something that was so closely associated with someone who’s now gone has got to be incredibly painful; each dish, whether successful or a failure, is just another way of pointing out the empty space left behind. It wouldn’t be unusual for Kyouhei to avoid cooking out of respect for his wife’s memory and a desire to keep from feeling as though he were trying to replace her. All of this is interpreted from what’s written between the lines; unlike a lot of anime, this one so far is a little bit more “show” and a little less “tell,” which in itself is nice.

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Kotori crying while eating in the park.

Lest everyone think this is a show all about doom and gloom and death, let me mention that I found the first episode to be incredibly cute and also pretty funny. Tsumugi is at that particular age where emotions are still shared right out in the open, and social norms don’t necessarily play a large factor in everyday interactions. She says what’s on her mind and expresses her feelings without worrying what others might think, and that’s one of the things I find cutest about little kids (well, until their emotions go into overdrive and devolve into tantrums; then I’m quick to leave the area). I enjoyed how she declares her love for her dad, and also how she had no qualms about approaching Kotori (at that time a total stranger) in the park to comfort her and ask why she was crying. There’s just something really heartwarming about the earnestness of children that gives me that warmhearted feeling.

I’m guessing that any “concerns” about the direction of this show that one might have would be due to the fact that one of the three main characters is a high school student of Kyouhei’s. Maybe it’s my cynicism talking, or maybe it’s just anime’s propensity for being willing to go in distasteful directions, but I’m wary of the fact that Kotori is likely going to be spending a lot of time with Kyouhei and possibly filling part of the role that Kyouhei’s wife used to and of the fact that the Wikipedia entry references Kotori’s possible crush on her teacher. The anime seems fairly cute and innocent so far, and Kotori’s attitude seems innocent enough, but I’ve been burned in the past and just don’t want such a cute series to go down that dark road.

I’ve been feeling kind of crappy the last few days (bad allergies are keeping me medicated-up and I’m having a hard time staying awake and focusing on anything), so it was nice to take a moment to sit down with something that’s very cute and heartwarming while trying to unwind. For now, rather than worry about what direction it will take, I’m going to accept the show at face value and just appreciate the fact that anime is a medium with so much variety in story and character and that there are still series that are made to appeal to people my age. I was impressed with the first episode’s ability to demonstrate its cuteness without being overly saccharine, as well as how well I gained a window into the protagonist’s feelings. I’m calling it – “feel-good anime of the season.”

Pros: Kyouhei’s life and choices are explained well through the narrative. The episode is genuinely cute and heartwarming.

Cons: Kotori’s “crush” on Kyouhei, though mostly unexplored thus far, has me feeling wary.

Grade: B+

SweetnessLightning04 SweetnessLightning05

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Anime Reviews First Impressions Reviews

Summer 2016 First Impressions – The Morose Mononokean

ImononokeanCovern a certain tea shop there lives a man called the Mononokean. This morose looking man gained his name for his ability to work with yōkai, guiding the ones that wander in our world into the next. – ANN

Streaming at: Crunchyroll

Number of Episodes: TBA

Source: Manga

Summary of Episode 1: Ashiya Hanae is the son of an overly-enthusiastic flower-shop owner. He’s really looking forward to starting high school. The evening before his first day in class, he encounters what he believes to be a stuffed animal laying on the ground. It is, however, a very-much-alive ball of fluff that only Ashiya can see and which takes an instant liking to him. And then starts to suck out his life force, bit-by-bit. Soon his school days are spent recuperating in the nurse’s office, and it’s only by extreme chance and desperation that Ashiya notices an advertisement for someone looking for part-time help and who seems like he might possibly know how to exorcise this very fluffy demon. Ashiya meets Abeno, a curmudgeonly young man dressed in vintage style clothing, in a very shady tea room that appears to exist outside of normal time and space. Abeno can help him, absolutely… but only for a very steep price. And of course, circumstances play out which indebt Ashiya to Abeno. There’s no chance of escaping, either, since Abeno shows up in Ashiya’s class the next day.

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Ashiya gains a new… friend?

First Impressions: As an anime fan and also someone with an interest in Japan in general, Japanese myth and folklore has always intrigued me. Anime and manga are rich with tales that draw upon these sources, from the library of late, great yokai-master Shigeru Mizuki himself to more contemporary titles like Natsume’s Book of Friends and Mononoke. Even sci-fi series like the recently-released-on-disc Dennou Coil incorporate elements of this kind of mythology to establish a particular kind of Japan-centric supernatural undercurrent to excellent effect. So you could say that I’m on the look out for this sort of thing when I’m browsing around in anticipation of a new anime season. The trailers for this show had me pretty excited – Cute creatures, attractive male characters, bright colors… not necessarily masterpiece material, but definitely a lot of things that scratch my itch if you know what I mean. And, of course, there was the promise of Japanese mythological references and the inclusion of familiar yokai. On paper it definitely seems like a winner. My feelings about the first episode are very mixed, however. There are a lot of elements that I enjoyed about the first episode, including the general tone and the look of the less-human mononoke (primarily suggested by imagery in the opening and closing animation and the preview), but there’s something about the way it all falls into place that ends up feeling sort of flat.

In most cases I prefer not to jump right to criticizing animation quality, because I genuinely don’t believe that even in a storytelling medium that’s just a style of animation, the quality of animation is the be-all-end-all defining aspect. This puts me in opposition to a lot of anime fans, and I’ve made peace with that; many of you out there feel (for good reason) that something animated should look good and appear to have some base level of quality, and I respect that. I’ve just seen too many series that fall outside the accepted aesthetic (I love you, Masaaki Yuasa!) and which have affected me strongly enough that I don’t consider weirdness, off-model animation, or a high level of still frames or talking heads to remove a series from the discussion by default (if I were a “Chopped” judge I’d probably be pretty forgiving anytime a contestant forgot a basket ingredient, too). I do, however, think that the first episode of an anime should be an example of the staff putting their best foot forward in order to captivate and impress the audience, and this first episode just doesn’t demonstrate a lot of finesse that’s often evident even when you can tell a show doesn’t have a lot of budget to work with.

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Ashiya begs Abeno-san for help.

The yokai in this series (at least from what I can tell) are brought to life utilizing CG imagery. You all know by now that this isn’t my favorite thing by any stretch of the imagination, but I think “Fluffy” as he’s affectionately named by the protagonist, doesn’t demonstrate a lot of the weird qualities that make CG clash with traditional 2D animation. I think the issue I have is that the hand-drawn animation feels very flat and lifeless in comparison and just in general. The lines are a little too thick, the character coloration feels thickly-applied and lacking in detail, and there are character facial inconsistencies that make this feel like an episode 6 or 7 (past a mid-cour climax but not quite into the final rising action) rather than a striking opening entry. The background art is very lacking in texture and richness. Abeno’s tea room feels flat and lifeless, not like a place that exists outside the real world. It’s definitely not a deal breaker, but also not the strong sort of fantasy aesthetic I was hoping for based on the promotional images. As this episode takes place primarily on the mortal plane, there’s obviously still time for the underworld to make its debut. But I wish it had made its appearance sooner, to give things more of a “Dorothy entering OZ” effect.

There are things about the episode that hit me more positively, though. While I think a lot of the humor is too much along the lines of the “incredulous characters yelling in exasperation” variety, it’s actually some of the cornier, cliche moments that triggered me more positively. The montage of Ashiya’s daily belabored walk to school (and his eventual collapse closer and closer to the door) was pretty funny in the sense that it escalated well. I also liked the fact that Abeno is revealed to be Ashiya’s classmate. That “twist” was 100% predictable as soon as Ashiya started his introduction to the class at the end, but I definitely chuckled. And considering the fact that Ashiya’s indebtedness situation is drawn directly from xxxHolic, it still manages to be kind of funny (even if a bit mean-spirited). I do also think a lot of the characters that show up in the opening and will likely feature in future episodes are pretty cute. It’s obviously not the main criteria for a good show, but it’s definitely a contributor.

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Ultimately, all Fluffy wants is someone to play with.

I think ultimately what spoiled me here was that I just really have a strong hankering for another season of Natsume’s Book of Friends (I can’t wait until the Autumn season!) and was hoping for something to keep me going until then. This series seems like it will be fun enough, but so far it’s really lacking in the lovable charm and humanity that makes Natsume so appealing. I’m thankful for the opportunity to get a glimpse of the world of Japanese yokai again, and I’ll probably check in with this series from time to time just for that reason. But I’m still wary of adding it to my already lengthy watch list based just on episode 1.

Pros: The element of humor comes across well enough to provide some entertaining moments. The yokai featured in this episode is also quite cute.

Cons: The first episode has an overall feeling of being made on the cheap, with kind of dull aesthetics and some uninspired background artwork.

Grade: C+

 

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Anime Reviews First Impressions Reviews

Summer 2016 First Impressions – Orange

OrangeCoverNaho Takamiya is a timid 16-year-old girl. One day, she receives a letter from her future self detailing actions she must take to prevent Kakeru Naruse, the new transfer student, from sinking into depression and taking his own life. – ANN

Streaming at: Crunchyroll

Number of Episodes: 13

Source: Manga

Summary of Episode 1: Naho is a sweet, quiet girl who aims to be the type of person who doesn’t cause trouble for those around her. That usually means allowing others to have what they want while keeping her desires and discomforts private. This begins to change one day when Naho receives a mysterious letter in the mail; the writer claims to be Naho herself, only 10 years in the future. In the letter are written instructions for how to approach the events of the coming days, especially as they relate to a new transfer student. Naho doesn’t know whether to believe the letter or not until the events of her school day line up exactly with what is written. The Naho of 10 years from now seems to harbor several regrets about things that happened during high school. As the next several weeks unfold, Naho begins to strengthen her resolve. Is it only coincidence that her feelings for Kakeru, the new transfer student, begin to blossom into romantic feelings?

First Impressions: I’m admittedly not going into this anime with zero knowledge or expectations. A few months ago I overheard a friend of mine talking about the Orange manga, and since it’s available in full on Crunchyroll (if you’re a subscriber), I decided to give it a look. The fact that I read the entire series in one go over the period of a couple hours should do enough to express how compelling I thought the story was. Needless to say, when I found out that an anime adaptation was in the works, I was pretty jazzed. I’ve been excitedly anticipating this premiere since then.

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Kakeru, the new transfer student, is conveniently assigned to sit next to Naho.

So what is it that makes this series more interesting than the glut of melodramatic shoujo manga adaptations that are floating around out in anime land? Speaking from the perspective of a manga reader (though hopefully without spoiling anything), I think there are quite a few interesting things at play in this story. For one thing, this isn’t really just a shoujo-style romance played straight. It’s got some unique cross-demographic origins that were a little bit surprising to me when I learned of them – the story was serialized in both a shojo (girls’) magazine, then later in a seinen (adult men’s) one. There’s also a very subtle sci-fi mechanic as far as Naho’s “letter from the future” is concerned, and the story is able to maintain its own internal logic well enough to keep that bit from being too goofy (time travel is rarely done well in fiction and I’m personally fine with that, but this series does well by not getting overly explanatory with the concept). What I think is most important, though, and very evident already from this episode of the anime, is that, even though the story ends up becoming an ensemble piece, a very large part of the story is Naho’s growth as a human being. That to me is way more engrossing than a bunch of dry sci-fi concepts with some characters pasted over the top.

The way Naho behaves in this episode, especially her inner monologue while she and her friends are deciding which kind of bread they want (Naho likes curry bread the best, but she defers to others when asked which kind she’d like to have), and also the way she tends to deny herself the experience of doing things she’d really like to do (because it might make her friends uncomfortable or draw too much attention to herself), cuts like a knife. Those types of feelings and emotions are so familiar to me that it immediately imbues this series with a type of realism that would otherwise be difficult to establish in so short a time. It’s fairly common practice to give shoujo manga heroines some sort of quirky trait in order to try and humanize them a bit – while I think the concept of a “Mary Sue” is terribly sexist since male characters often aren’t examined through the same critical lens, it’s also admittedly not very interesting to watch a character who is already powerful and completely capable with no flaws whatsoever (I’ve never been one for hero worship). So a heroine who is attractive and smart but also has some personality flaw or dirty little secret is pretty common. It also serves as an easy source of comic relief – think Yukino Miyazawa and her secretly-slobbish nature, or Haruhi Fujioka‘s plot-convenient gender fluidity. But Naho’s character flaw, her self-denial, is expressed with a lot of care and doesn’t manifest itself in an over-the-top way. It’s not a source of comedy, but instead serves to underscore the exact situation that the Naho-of-the-future hopes to avoid – the regretful experiences of her high-school life. It feels very genuine to me.

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Kakeru trades his curry bread for Naho’s melon bread.

Knowing that this is a story that relies a lot on its emotional content, I was really hoping that the first episode would start off on the right foot in that respect. For the most part I would say that it hits the right beats from the first few chapters of the manga, although there are a couple of aesthetic choices that I personally wouldn’t have made. The episode leans heavily on its use of visual montage to tell certain parts of the story, and while it gets done what it needs to do (showing a lot of action that takes place over a long period of time in a very short period of screen time, obviously), it adds an element of “wackiness” that seems a bit out of place. Knowing what I do about the general plot arc, this could be a ploy on the director’s part to throw off the audience, but it’s difficult for me to tell at this point. Likewise, the soundtrack tends to be a a bit goofy and overbearing in some scenes, which I think provides the wrong impression. While there are lighthearted moments, the most prominent mood I think should be conveyed is bitter-sweetness; uptempo, noisy music in the background takes away from my ability to feel that. On the other hand, there are a couple points in the episode where there are some really interesting visual filters in use (there’s a scene near the beginning where young Naho and adult Naho symbolically cross paths, and the image is given a hazy, over-saturated and otherworldly quality), and there’s some good use of framing that’s utilized to keep the focus on what’s important (namely, Naho herself). The visual composition of the series is clearly very competent and manages to use some flashy tricks in a more subtle and refined way. I like it.

It’s pretty rare for me to have read a manga before its anime adaptation is available (normally it’s the other way around since I’m primarily an anime fan with manga as a side interest), so to have so many concrete expectations for this adaptation is somewhat foreign. I can get a little disparaging towards manga fans when they get upset over anime adaptations that stray from their source material. It’s experiences like this which provide me with some much-needed perspective. People become critical of adaptations, not generally out of a need to complain  or poo-poo on others’ parades, but out of love for the source material itself. When a story grabs hold of your heart and remains rooted within you long after you’re finished experiencing it, an adaptation which falls far short of its source material can almost feel like a personal insult. But an adaptation is also someone else’s interpretation of a story, and it can really pay off to balance one’s own desires for how that story should play out with the requirements of a different medium and the strengths, weaknesses, and varying tastes and interpretations of the person doing the adapting. It’s definitely something that I’ll have to keep in mind as this story plays out. Luckily, the first episode gives the strong impression that this story is in good hands.

Pros: The story is one that should resonate with multiple demographics pretty easily, as its themes and multi-generational cast have mass appeal. The visuals are high-quality and there is good use of scene framing and modern animation effects.

Cons: Some of the music gets a little overbearing at times. There is a heavy use of montage in this episode which comes across as cheesy.

Grade: B+

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Categories
Anime Reviews First Impressions Reviews

Summer 2016 First Impressions – Berserk

BerserkCoverGuts, a man who calls himself “The Black Swordsman” looks upon his days serving as a member of a group of mercenaries, the Band of the Hawk, nicknamed “the Grim Reaper of the Battlefield.” Led by an ambitious, ruthless, and intelligent man named Griffith, together they battle their way into the royal court, and are forced into a fate that may change their entire lives. – ANN

Streaming At Crunchyroll

Episodes: TBA

Source: Manga

Summary of Episode 1: Following Griffith’s initiation of the Eclipse and transformation into the demonic God Hand Femto, Guts finds himself on the run from the evil forces that have been unleashed on the world. He’s a branded man – the insignia burned into his neck draws wicked spirits and the restless dead to him in unending waves, and it is with his gigantic sword, really just a crude, gigantic slab of metal, that he fights them off one-by-one. After a bar brawl, a young elf named Puck begins to follow Guts. He becomes a first-hand witness to the horrors that now define Guts’ life as a kindly monk and the young girl accompanying him become victims of the risen dead.

First Impressions: I want to start off by mentioning that the Berserk series in general needs a big giant content warning for violence, gore, war crimes, and rape. This series is the very definition of grim-and-gritty and bad things happen to both good and evil characters.

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The scars from Guts’ past are evident.

It might come as some surprise to those of you who only know me via the internet that I actually really, really enjoy Berserk. I count the original anime series among my favorites, and though I haven’t in any sense of the word caught up on the manga, I really like what I’ve read (part of that is Kentaro Miura’s incredible artwork, obviously). The story is certainly incredibly violent (not something I normally like) and the three main characters of the initial story arc are essentially defined by how non-consensual sexual situations have affected them (and these things are shown rather than suggested in most cases), but the story as a whole just holds a certain appeal to me. Perhaps its unflinching darkness hit me at the right time in my anime fandom to leave a mark. In any case, anyone who’s seen the original anime series knows that it leaves off on what’s basically a cliffhanger. The Eclipse happens, we see Guts obtain his sword, and that’s about it. The show is actually sort of circular – if you watch the first episode directly after the final one, you’ll see what I mean. But there’s so much more story to tell, and fans of the show, myself included, have been waiting a long, long time for more of it to be animated.  When the trilogy of new films that reanimated the “Golden Age” story arc (the one covered by the TV series) were released recently, I think many of us began to suspect that something might be in the works. Soon enough the speculation became reality, and here we are.

I’ll say, I definitely have some mixed feelings about this, and I think those of you who’ve watched the episode already will probably have some idea where I’m going. I really, really am not a fan of the way CG is used to animate the majority of this show. On the one hand, it allows more consistency and detail in the characters and backgrounds, and that in and of itself isn’t bad. One hallmark of Miura’s art is that it’s hopelessly detailed (there’s some speculation that one of the reasons that it takes so long for a new chapter of the manga to get finished is due to the detail in the artwork and the fact that he might not be utilizing the services of any assistants to keep things on pace). The original anime series just didn’t even try to animate to the artwork, and used a lot of still-frames and pans to tell the tale of Guts and company. It got the atmosphere down very well and really captured the grittiness of the story, but there just wasn’t a lot of actual animation to speak of. This episode is fully-animated, and we get a lot of cool camera angles and body parts flying, but the characters look like puppets because of the way their limbs move – it’s both too smooth and overly-clunky at the same time. Anime-style animation is all about dynamic character posing and bursts of energy in between static shots; Even though Guts is doing some cool stuff with his swords, the overall movement is too smooth and restrained. Puck’s chibi form is also so disastrously out-of-place when animated this way… yikes.

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The Black Swordsman lives up to his name.

There are a few moments that are clearly hand-drawn, mostly close-ups of faces and some scenes from the opening theme (especially those that hearken back to the previous series), and those scenes are like reaching an oasis in a desert. It’s in those instances where the fine details really seem to come alive. I realize that hand-animating a series like this would require a lot of person-power and that using CG models allows the animators to maintain a consistent quality level without going overboard on labor, but considering how famous this series is, how much merchandise there is for it (it keeps being produced!), and the fact that it’s pretty much earned a place in the pantheon of anime classics, you’d think that perhaps some more resources and care would have been allotted to make this into a prestige piece. It’s like Sailor Moon Crystal all over again (except with more demons, decapitations and flying human entrails).

That being said, there will always be a certain amount of BS I’m willing to deal with in order to see a great story make its way to one of my favorite forms of media. Despite feeling a tad disappointed in some of the visual choices made, watching the first episode of this new chapter of the story feels a little bit like returning to the person I was in the early 2000’s when I first saw the original Berserk series. That is to say, very in awe of the sheer number of anime available in the world, most of which were still out there for me to discover. There really are not a lot of anime around today that really go all in with violence, gore, horror, or the darkness of human nature they way TV series and OVAs did in the 1990’s. I think part of that is just that tastes have changed and we as anime fans have become more accustomed to embracing life’s cuteness and not giving a damn about what non-weebs think of us for it. It also seems like, since the early 2000’s, the world’s real-life horrors have become so much more pronounced, and our escapism is more aimed at contrasting that with happiness and simplicity. Of course, this is also the age of Game of Thrones, where some of the worst aspects of human nature are put on display from week to week to the delight of millions of viewers (and yes, I’m one of those viewers, too). I suspect there is something in many of us that gets lit up when we feel powerless to help ourselves or to make real change in the world. Sometimes it’s just satisfying to see someone in a bad situation bust out and make heads roll, literally. It’s stories like Berserk that put a voice to that urge for me.

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Guts endures a flashback while asleep.

Content-wise, I don’t feel like there’s much for me to worry about. I don’t really question the strength of Berserk‘s underlying story, though I’m interested to see how well the anime adapts it and what sort of pace it will take (I’m unclear on how many episodes there are supposed to be and how much of the manga storyline they’re planning to tackle in this segment, so I’m not willing to start making any big predictions). One thing that might be frustrating for some people, though, is that this series pretty much picks up where the previous one left off. If you haven’t seen it, you’ll either have to watch the trilogy of recent films (pretty easy to do, but they’re not streaming anywhere that I know of so you’ll have to get a hold of the DVDs or Blu-Rays somehow) or dig up an old dusty copy of the original anime series (it’s waaay out of print at this point, though I hope maybe the remaster will get re-released someday or that Crunchyroll might add it to their back library now that the new show is coming out). It’s certainly worth your time to do so if you can handled the content. As a side note, I was interested in how they were going to account for Puck since he was cut out of the original series, but this episode did a pretty good job of plopping him right on in!

I really like Berserk and I’m still looking forward to watching this show despite the visual missteps. I think the first episode “feels” mostly correct to me, even if I still find it weird that a story that is so much of a certain time and place has dramatically succumbed to the realities of the modern anime industry. I’m looking forward to continuing the story this season.

Pros: I’ve been waiting a LONG time for more of this story to get animated! It’s quite different in tone than a lot of what’s popular in anime right now, which makes it feel fresh (even though it’s a story that’s been in the process of unfolding for a good 25 years at this point, in manga form).

Cons: Ugh, that CG. Someday we’ll get to a point where it looks almost as good as hand-drawn animation. We have not reached that point, yet. The content will also be too intense for some viewers, as it delves into some pretty violent and explicit territory.

Grade: B

Categories
First Impressions Reviews

Winter 2016 First Impressions – Ajin

Ajin_Demi-Human_Manga_Cover
Ajin manga Copyright Kodansha/Gamon Sakurai

“For high schooler Kei -and for at least forty-six others- immortality comes as the nastiest surprise ever.

Sadly for Kei, but refreshingly for the reader, such a feat doesn’t make him a superhero. In the eyes of both the general public and governments, he’s a rare specimen who needs to be hunted down and handed over to scientists to be experimented on for life-a demi-human who must die a thousand deaths for the benefit of humanity.” – Vertical Inc.

Streaming at Netflix (Summer 2016)

Episodes: 12

Source: Manga

Summary of Episode 1: Kei is like many high school kids; he has a steady group of friends, cares about his family, and spends a lot of time worrying about passing his entrance exams. Unfortunately, his current life has come as the result of some sacrifices, namely his close childhood friendship with a boy named Kai. Kei’s mother disapproved of the friendship since Kai was carefree and significantly less studious; in her eyes, the road to maturity is paved in part by the cultivation of one’s relationships, and only those who exhibit positive traits are worthy of association. Kei and Kai still see each-other around town, but their interactions are strictly limited to wordless acknowledgement.

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Kei realizes with horror that he is one of the reviled Ajin. Copyright Polygon Pictures.

In school, Kei and his classmates are learning about Ajin, a new species of intelligent life that appeared during a war in Africa seventeen years ago. Ajin are unique in that they can be mortally injured but cannot die. This makes them of great interest to several world governments, and once they’re discovered (generally when they are injured by chance and are able to quickly recover), they’re captured and experiments are performed on them in captivity. Kei seems disturbed by the concept, and as he crosses the street deep and thought, he’s hit by a truck. And then, his mangled body rises up from the bloody pavement and Kei realizes – he’s been revealed as one of the most hated beings on the planet. It isn’t long before the police begin searching the town’s outskirts for him, and Kei calls the only person he can think of who might possibly not try to turn him in to the police – Kai. Kai has already begun setting things in motion, and rushes to save his friend, no questions asked. The two ride away in the dark of night, fugitives for the crime of being other than human.

First Impressions: First of all, it bears mentioning that this series is another of Netflix’s late-casts, similar to Knights of Sidonia and The Seven Deadly Sins, so it will be appearing in an official capacity at a later date (they’ve said “Summer 2016” but not given a more accurate time frame). Normally it would be my practice to watch an official version of an anime series since I really believe that anime streaming has virtually removed most of the need to watch fansubs (and now most of the sub groups are either ripping official subs and adding stuff like -san and -chan, or their translations don’t demonstrate a clear understanding of English spelling or grammar – I think all the good translators have probably gone legit). In this case, though, I was personally interested in the show from reading the manga, didn’t see a lot of other impressions of it (since it’s not easily available), and wanted to see ahead of time if it was worth checking out in full at a later time (I have a Netflix account but for some reason it’s like pulling teeth getting me to actually use the service that I pay for every month.) I think this is why I never checked out Knights of Sidonia (though I did buy the DVD and will watch it… eventually). I didn’t want a repeat self performance.

As for the first episode of Ajin, I was pleasantly surprised. I’m familiar with the general story from what I’ve read of the manga (I’m not far in but have at least read what’s covered in this first episode), and this is a good adaptation. One of the fears I had going in stems from the fact that this is both 1. the story of a teenage boy who (unwillingly) gets some special (and very violent) powers and 2. the general concept puts the series in the “edgy” category. I’ve had supremely bad luck with this sort of thing in the past – Deadman Wonderland is a good example of something that was really popular and people on the internet swore up and down was really intelligent and edgy, but turned out to be so, so violent and mean-spirited without much of a coherent message. I was worried that this would end up being another “sad teen fights violently with a bunch of people” anime.

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Kei finds himself cornered by the police. Copyright Polygon Pictures.

I think what quelled that fear for me, in both the manga and this episode of the anime, is that the friendship between Kei and Kai seems to play such an important role in establishing the plot. Their relationship seems to represent a microcosm of what is happening out in the world – Kai is misunderstood and assumptions are made about his character because of how he looks and the way in which he disregards school, just as the entire world has made assumptions about Ajin and how “othering” them has given society at large an excuse to mistreat them and remove their rights as human beings. In a way it’s a sort of clunky allegory for race relations and the way we have treated almost anyone who is “different” – disabled folks, people on the autism spectrum, trans individuals… the list is extensive. In any case, one thing I really appreciated was that Kai was ready, no questions asked, to help his friend despite the fact that their relationship hadn’t been close for several years. It’s a level of kindness and emotional maturity that surprised me, especially since teen boys in anime tend to be given short shrift when it comes to being given any sort of sensitivity or basic humanity.

I’m betting many of you are wondering about the animation in this series, and it’s definitely worth mentioning. We seem to be entering an age when 3DCG animated anime is becoming an actual thing. I have a lot of mixed feelings about that. Anyone who’s watched the anime series Shirobako (and for those who haven’t, you really should because it’s downright excellent) will probably have a greater appreciation for the role that CG plays in anime and the work that goes into making convincing 3D elements, and I really try to keep that in mind. Unfortunately, I don’t think that CG is yet up to the task of convincingly recreating the look of typical 2D anime, and in many chases the movement of the characters just seems… off. I’ve spent a lot of time trying to figure out why this is and why it’s so difficult to accept that 3DCG anime is probably an inevitability, and I think what it comes down to is consistency. One of the hallmarks of Japanese anime is just how inconsistent it is. When you see characters’ faces from different angles, the mouth positions and how they appear don’t actually make sense a lot of the time, but it’s a type of stylization that we’ve come to expect and accept as consumers of the medium. There are also often vastly different animation styles and frame-rates even within one episode of anime. Important scenes are given more attention and often certain animators are given free reign to go off-model and demonstrate their particular command of movement, and I find that these special scenes really give me a thrill and are one of the reasons why I enjoy watching anime. The use of computer animation removes that unexpected attribute.

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Kei makes his escape. Copyright Polygon Pictures.

That said, I think what Polygon has done in this series actually looks pretty good. It took me until a few minutes into the episode to stop being distracted by the 3D models and the cell-shading and such, but much like watching Gankutsuou (which you should also go watch as soon as you have the opportunity if you would like to see why people used to like Gonzo), once your eyes have adjusted the look kind of becomes a non-issue. It’s not my favorite, but it’s admittedly a lot better than watching a show that’s consistently off-model for reasons that have nothing to do with artistic style (side note: people complaining about Ping Pong being off-model need to go educate themselves). I think people who are not married to anime’s particular aesthetic will be even less distracted and will likely not be bothered at all (this is a series I would show my parents, for example – my mom isn’t an anime fan, but she does like horror and thriller-type series so I bet it would be up her alley).

I really liked this first episode. I don’t know if I’ll keep up with it right now since now I feel kind of bad about downloading an unofficial video of something which is going to be released officially, even if the official release isn’t technically a simulcast. It’s funny how your conscience can adjust like that, isn’t it?

Pros: The show takes a concept that could easily be mishandled and injects it with enough humanity to keep it from becoming one-note. The friendship between the two male characters forms a believable core.

Cons: The 3D animation will definitely be an issue for some. It’s a Netflix late-cast, so the official release won’t be available for several months.

Grade: B+

Categories
First Impressions Reviews

Winter 2016 First Impressions – Dagashi Kashi

Dagashi Kashi manga cover
Dagashi Kashi manga copyright Shogakukan/Kotoyama

“Kokonotsu Shikada is the son of a dagashi snack shop owner. Although he wants to become a manga artist, his father, Yo, wants him to take over the family business. One day, a girl named Hotaru Shidare shows up at the shop and challenges Kokonotsu.” – Funimation

Streaming at Funimation.com

Episodes: 12

Source: Manga

Summary of Episode 1: It’s difficult when your own aspirations conflict with your family’s expectations. Kokonotsu “Coconuts” Shikada just wants to draw manga, and his art skills are actually pretty good, but his father wants him to take over the family business – becoming the next in line to run the family sweets shop. It’s not just tradition informing this opinion; when an outgoing and snack-obsessed girl named Hotaru shows up at the shop one day, Kokonotsu learns the truth – Hotaru’s candy company wants Yo, Kokonotsu’s father, to join with them because of reasons. Kokonotsu will have to commit to running the shop before Yo is free to follow his own dreams. Kokonotsu isn’t keen to give up his own goals, but Hotaru is very insistent. She plans to insinuate herself into Kokonotsu’s life and use anything in her power to convince him to change his mind, including becoming friends with his sort-of girlfriend and spreading candy throughout town.

First Impressions: I wanted to check this show out because I have a certain interest in Japanese cuisine, and obscure Japanese snacks fall under that umbrella. While I can’t really eat most of these goodies anymore since sugar makes my brain feel like it’s about to burst out of my skull, I can still stand having them paraded around in front of me. As I feared going in, however, the snacks are probably the most interesting things about the episode and the characters who eat them are somewhat hard to tolerate.

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Hotaru Shows up at the dagashi store.

I’ve seen several reviewers describe Hotaru as a “manic pixie dream girl,” and to some extent I think that’s accurate. Kokonotsu is faced with a life decision that’s likely to take the length of the series to resolve, and Hotaru shows up as he stands at a crossroads and promises to make big changes in his life. She’s a very weird human being, defined so far by her sweets expertise and weirdly regal bearing. She also looks almost exactly like a manga character that Kokonotsu was drawing as the episode opened, which helps contribute to an eye-rolling introductory scene. She’s a male fantasy, an unrealistic woman who is more plot device and catalyst than equal partner. It’s not the worst of sins that a piece of fiction can commit, but it makes things a lot less interesting.

Something else the turned me off was the constant over-acting and forced comedy that peppered the episode. There’s a lot of yelling, goofy behavior, and immaturity on the part of several of the characters, especially Hotaru and Yo. As far as I can tell, the majority of the characters are young adults, and at the very least Yo is, but the humor is incredibly juvenile and Yo especially is a complete goofball. One of my least favorite tropes is parents who act less like adults than their own children, and while I’ve probably seen this trope expressed more by some anime mothers or female authority figures it’s just as irritating when dads do it. The jealousy exhibited by Saya, Kokonotsu’s childhood friend and likely romantic interest, is extreme. To be perfectly blunt, Kokonotsu really hasn’t proven himself to be a man worth giving a crap about, so Saya’s reaction upon hearing that there was merely a weird city girl in his family’s shop just makes her look bad. It’s difficult to get invested in a story when all the of the characters range from irritating and unrealistic to completely intolerable.

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Yo is a grade-A doofus.

The show’s saving grace is the minimal amount of attention that it pays to the “dagashi” (traditional snacks) that are referenced by the show’s title. like I’ve mentioned, I really like learning about food even if it’s technically food that I can’t eat anymore (sugar and simple carbohydrates make my brain feel like it’s about to leap out of my skull). Possibly my favorite scene in the episode occurs when Hotaru challenges Kokonotsu to create a delicious culinary combination of different Umai-bou flavors. I had coincidentally watched a Youtube video earlier in the week in which the person making the video took different flavored Umai-bou and combined them with various actual foods to create new taste sensations. It fascinates me that such a culture exists around what are essentially large, diversely-flavored Cheetos, and these are the things I really like to learn about. It amuses me that there are more desirable ways of eating the “fries” that the characters snacked on, or that you can buy what are essentially mini-donuts in cute little packages (they look way yummier than the dusty powdered-sugar “Donettes” that are ubiquitous at American gas stations). And now I’m really craving something sweet and doughy to spoil my dinner.

I didn’t have especially high expectations for this show, but I thought it might be an amusement worth checking out. I could conceivably see myself watching another episode or two just to gain some more trivial knowledge about Japanese treats, but the characters themselves make doing so feel like more of a chore than an amusement.

Pros: It’s fun to learn about Japanese cultural tidbits, and Japanese treats and snacks are one of those obscure areas that don’t get a whole lot of coverage in the West.

Cons: The characters are irritating in various ways and the women especially get the short end of the character development stick. The comedy is heavy-handed.

Grade: C-

Categories
First Impressions Reviews

New Anime Winter 2016 – Short Form Series Impressions

IconGood afternoon! Since it’s so incredibly cold in the Twin Cities this weekend, I thought it would be a great time to sit down with a cup of hot tea and snuggle underneath a fuzzy blanket to write some first impressions of this Winter’s crop of anime. Look for several series-specific First Impression posts to appear over the next few days. I’ve gathered all of the short-form series I was interested in into this post here, sans She and Her Cat since it’s still MIA as of this writing (I’ll update this post if/when it becomes available).

I’ve been debating how to go about these impressions and how thorough they should be. For these short form series I think I’ll keep things brief, but still offer some pros and cons that will hopefully be informative enough for readers to decide whether the shows sound interesting or not. Let me know what you think!

 

OjisanOjisan and Marshmallow

  • Simulcast on Crunchyroll
  • Number of Episodes: TBA
  • Episode length – 3.5 minutes
  • Episodes viewed – 1 and 2

Hige-san is a middle-aged worker at a “Web-Related Company.” Despite his stocky, gruff appearance, he’s actually got some cute habits, the most obvious of which is that he loves marshmallows. His younger female co-worker Wakabayashi-san knows this and uses it to her advantage – she has a huge crush on Hige-san and knows that marshmallows are the way to his heart. The issue is that she’s a bit too forthcoming in her marshmallow-related advances, making both Hige-san and anyone around the two of them uncomfortable. In episode 1, she attempts to steal a kiss from Hige-san by putting the last marshmallow in between her lips, and in episode 2 she implies adult activities while Hige-san calls to let their boss that they’re stuck in the rain. Will their mis-matched personalities ever meet to light the spark of romance?

On paper, this series sounded really cute. I’m always happy when anime series star adult characters, and candy and romance are things that usually lead to sweet ends. Unfortunately the first couple of episodes made me feel really uncomfortable. There’s a sort of unsettling train of thought that, if someone of lesser power in a traditional power relationship is doing the sexual-harrassing, then it’s supposed to be funny rather than disturbing. In this case, Hige-san is older and also a man, giving him some definite social advantages in the traditional-looking office setting he and Wakabayashi-san share. And it’s Wakabayashi-san who’s being really sexually forward with him. The problem is that it’s all completely inappropriate behavior for the environment they’re in and also their current relationship (as coworkers) and it’s decidedly not funny to me. What’s worse is that the other employees don’t really seem to care that she’s acting this way. I didn’t necessarily expect this to turn into a discussion of sexism in the Japanese workplace system, but seriously? This show gave me kind of a knot in my stomach just because it’s very casual with its employment of sexual harassment humor.

Pros: The series stars adult characters, which is a rarity in anime.

Cons: The humor seems to hinge on a lot of uncomfortable sexual situations and outright office sexual harrassment.

 

GalkoPlease Tell Me! Galko-chan

  • Simulcast on Crunchyroll
  • Number of Episodes: TBA
  • Episode Length: 7.5 minutes
  • Episodes Viewed: 1 and 2

Galko, Otako, and Ojou are three friends with very different personalities. Galko is a “gal,” a popular, stylish girl who gets a bad rap for coming to class late. Otako is an otaku through-and-through. Ojou is a wealthy girl who can be lacking in life experience. The girls spend their days discussing some of the questions that many people would probably like to ask but might not be comfortable with, including periods (tampons versus pads), bathroom habits, pubic hair, breast size, and other stupid myths about the female body that the boys in class seem to pull out of thin air.

Just to get this out of the way, the subject matter in this show is pretty crass and focused on bodily functions and oddities of the human body. This is not subject matter that bothers me, really, but I think it might be off-putting to others (though if hearing about girls’ periods in even the most abstract sense squicks you out, you need to grow up). What I really liked about this show is that the characters themselves tend to defy expectations. Gals can be reviled because of the stereotype that they’re shallow, lazy, and sleep with a lot of guys. Galko (who was my favorite character of the three) is stylish and can be concerned with her looks, but she’s also smart, caring, interested in literature, and has her own hobbies. She also gets kind of embarrassed when it comes to romantic things, which is kind of a fun character trait. I don’t think it’s negative for a woman to want to have a broad range of sexual experiences, but the fact that Galko defies that expectation is kind of cute, too.

I don’t know if it’s a good thing or not, but I kind of like the portrayal of the guys in this show. What actually makes me kind of happy is that their ignorance of women and their complete unwillingness to interact on a normal-person level with the girls is met with an attitude of eye-rolling disdain, which I think is warranted. Anime would likely be a lot better in general if some more of the male leads got some of this kind of feedback (at least it would be in my fantasy world).

Pros: The discussions are really straightforward and I laughed quite a bit out of identification with the things that the girls were talking about. The guys are also called out for being willfully dumb towards girls.

Cons: This is not a clean, cute series about cute girls having a cute slice-of-life time. If you don’t like bathroom humor, best move on.

 

Sekko1Sekkō Boys

  • Simulcast on Crunchyroll
  • Number of Episodes: TBA
  • Episode Length: 7.5 minutes
  • Episodes Viewed: 1 and 2

Art student Ishimoto Miki got so sick of drawing still lives of busts and statues throughout her high school and college career, that she vowed never to draw another statue again. Instead, she decided to enter show business and become a manager for stars and idols. Her first big break comes as a manager at Holbein Entertainment Inc. where’s she’s put in charge of a hot new boy idol group. This could be her dream job, if not for the fact that the group calls themselves the Sekkō Boys and they’re actually the busts of famous saints, gods, and famous people from history – Mars, Hermes, St. Giorgio, and Medici. The boys are heavy, hard to transport, and they get mistaken for props wherever they go. It’s only after acknowledgement by another famous female idol that they begin to feel better about themselves.

One positive consequence of the uptick in okay-to-mediocre male idol anime lately has been the appearance of male idol parody anime. Probably one of the most recently famous occurred in the now-censored first episode of Osomatsu-san last season, but this show continues somewhat in that vein by taking all the tropes of male idol and reverse-harem shows and applying them to completely ridiculous characters. Look at how “chiseled” their features are! They’ll never age-out of being idols! It’s a little like personifying countries in Hetalia, only in this case you don’t have to consider the truly icky implications of making moé-moé jokes about WWII (people do feel bad about that stuff, right?). Anyway, as someone who’s pretty fed up with the real-life screwed-up Japanese idol culture and how it gets romanticized in anime and other media, this is a great deal of fun.

Pros: The choice of characters really proves that Japan has jumped the shark on idol anime – in the good way. The characters are also voiced by famous male Seiyuu, so if you’re into that fandom it’s a nice bonus.

Cons: I question how many new and humorous situations the boys can get themselves into; it seems like gags about their weight and composition will run out of steam pretty quickly.

 

YamishibaiYamishibai Season 3

  • Simulcast on Crunchyroll
  • Number of Episodes: TBA but probably 13
  • Episode Length: 5 minutes
  • Episodes Viewed: 1

On his way home, a young man notices a public bath house that he’s not seen before. Since it’s hot and he’s sweaty, he decides to stop in and freshen up. The bath is run by an old woman who looks ancient, and there’s not another customer in sight. As he’s washing his hair, he hears a voice from the women’s bath on the other side of the barrier. “Could I borrow a bar of soap?” she asks, and he tosses her his soap. “Could I borrow a bucket?” she asks later on, and he warily gives her the one he was using. “Could I borrow a razor?” but he doesn’t have one. She becomes frantic and speaks as if possessed before finally revealing herself and stealing the young man away.

Yamishibai has always been kind of a mixed bag. A lot of the short stories are really goofy and tend to steer away from cultivating any true sense of horror. But when the show is on its game, it tends to be pretty good. This episode was enjoyable and I think it’s because it fit really well in to the formula of “three;” it upped the dread with each repetition of “could I borrow…?” by making each request less and less logical. The sense of being alone in what would normally be a bustling public place is also one of my personal fears – I have had nightmares where I was with friends, and then turned around to find the environment gone dark and no one around me (I blame the opening scenes of Silent Hill 3 for that). It’s still not as terrifying as that episode with the hair inside the copy machine from season 1, but that one will be difficult to top.

Pros: The episode stayed away from corniness and did a good job of cultivating a sense of impending dread.

Cons: The show overall has been a mixed bag and I expect not every episode will be as good as this one.