Blog Archive

Monday, April 6, 2020

Spring 2020 Anime First Impressions: Part 1

Tamayomi:  Cute girls and baseball, what's not to like?  Unfortunately, there was some other anime with the exact same concept a bit ago and it was insufferably dull.  Even what looks like a winning formula can go wrong.  For a first episode, this was fine.  But what if it gets boring too halfway through?  I actually expect that.  I guess it makes sense for the girls to have such thick thighs given they're athletes, but it was a little weird.  Oh well, I'll get used to it.  Pass.

Tower of God:  This isn't even anime.  It's full cg 3d.  I guess to add on to my objections, I don't like such forceful plot developments as -- 'you're suddenly thrown into this alternate reality where all of society's rules are null and void,' I want well structured, well thought out worlds where people act like human beings.  Fail.

Hachi-nan tte, Sore wa nai deshou?:  Isekai are always a good bet.  A pretty humorous rebirth into a poor hinterland of only 800 people is a good twist, despite Wendelin having powerful wind magic that lets him cheat through life like so many other isekai protagonists.  A fine first episode, now we just have to wait and see whether it gets boring over time.  Pass.

Kakushigoto:  An entire series about a single gag -- that a father wants to hide his embarrassing job away from his daughter but it could be revealed any second if this mishap or that mishap occurs -- isn't sufficient to keep things interesting or funny.  You would at least need five characters with their own gags like Galaxy Angel whose gags constantly interact with each other in new and interesting ways.  Even if the art and voice acting is good there's nowhere for this plot to grow.  Fail.

Shin Sakura Taisen:  This isn't anime, it's 3d cg.  What's with all these 3d cg shows?  Have they any pride?  Japan is great because of its anime, not because of its computer graphics.  Disney has the best 3d cg shows and always will.  Why are they stupidly trying to do something they aren't any good at?  Fail.

Listeners:  I'm not interested in a mecha that shoots out music to defeat ink blob giant mice.  Come up with a more sane plot next time.  Fail.

Nami yo Kittekure:  I'm not interested in drunk sluts telling lies for a living.  Fail.

Arte:  I sympathize.  I really do.  Women should be allowed to work for a living.  Otherwise marriage is slavery, not a true union.  Telling women that they must marry to eat makes a farce out of marriage.  Why not skip the farce and straight out enslave the women with whips?  At least then you'd be dealing with them honestly.  I wouldn't even let it get to 'work for a living' though.  In my ideal system, people are guaranteed a living whether they work or not, so they aren't required to serve anyone, husband, employer, the State, anyone at all.  It's called the universal basic income and 55% of Americans aged 18-39 agree with me.  It's slavery, however you dress it up, it's always slavery if you have to do what someone else says in order to survive.  Everything else is window dressing.  People should work for luxuries beyond basic necessities, for fun, and as a public service.  They should never have to work to live because then employers or the government can force them into terrible working conditions, exploitative low pay, sexual harassment, immoral jobs, etc.  They should have the leverage to bargain for a decent relationship, a real contract between equals, and that doesn't occur right now, much less 16th century Florence.

But what I don't like about this series is the lecturing attitude about how all the problems in the world are due to prejudiced people.  It sounds less like 16th century Florence and more like woke 21st century bloviating.  Forgive me if I feel like there's an ulterior motive behind the particular plot device they chose to go with for this tale.  Everyone knows women were treated unfairly in the past.  Why write a story about that?  Who are you trying to persuade?  For that matter, most men were treated unfairly in the past too.  Serfs, slaves, peasants, atheists, anyone who wasn't nobility were all treated unfairly.  Comparatively women had it easy.  So why single out this particular oppression?  It's fishy.

A few episodes from now I'll be able to tell if this is a genuine story just concerned with the lives of the characters, or if it's woke liberal propaganda masquerading as a story.  For now I can only wait and see.  Pass.

Hamefura:  An excellent, hilarious, well drawn and animated beginning.  I like how proactive this girl is -- no whining about her fate as a woman here.  The only problem I have with this series is I already tried reading it in manga form and got bored halfway through.  Perhaps the value added of being an anime will change my mind?  Pass.

Yesterday wo Utatte:  This series reminds me more than anything else of True Tears.  True Tears was a good anime, so maybe this one will be too?  I really hate smokers though.  It's hard to like a series whose protagonist is stupidly smoking his health and money and life away.  Spike and Sanji have an excuse -- they're so often on the front line of battle that they'll die young regardless, and it's a good source of stress relief in an extremely stressful, life threatening world.  What's this guy's excuse?  He's in about as low stress a situation as humanly possible.  So what the hell is he doing?  Pass.

Shachou, Battle no Jikan desu!:  Such a lifeless, boring story full of lifeless dull characters.  You can tell zero effort was put into this at all.  Fail.

Princess Connect Re:dive:  Great art and animation, but it's not enough.  The plot is catatonic and the characters are average IQ 50.  Fail.

Shironeko Project:  Could a story be any more stereotypical and empty?  The evil king of darkness is disrupting the world's balance, lets all train in swords and sorcery to become strong enough to save the world.  Come on.  A five year could have come up with this plot.  Honestly it feels like the series is intended for five year olds.  Fail.

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