Blog Archive

Friday, April 7, 2023

Spring 2023 Anime First Impressions: Part 1

Jigokuraku:  An interesting premise, sending superpowered people from Edo Japan to face a supernatural mythological land spoken of in Edo Japan, creating a nice power balance while also leaning into to a period feel.  The art and animation are amazing.  The characters are kinda blah but all the series needs to be is watchable not perfect.  Pass.

Tengoku Daimakyou:  The world has ended, but there are still survivors roaming around the ruins.  Other survivors have set up a futuristic walled off society.  Is it better to roam around ruins or live in a creepy fake world?  Only you the viewer can decide.  Pass.

Yamada-kun to Lv999 no Koi o Suru:  A shoujo series I can get behind.  A girl with realistic emotions and personality faces the cruel modern world and has to compromise to find what happiness is available.  That means accepting that guys like to play video games and working with them instead of judging them for it.  Pass.

Tensei Kizoku:  A cookie-cutter setting with a dumb protagonist given way too much power by the gods.  Isekai like these are what give the entire genre a bad name.  Fail.

Alice Gear Expansion:  What's good isn't original and what's original isn't good.  Fail.

Kizuna Allele:  I've got enough idol shows on my plate, why waste time branching out to inferior cg idols?  Fail.

Isekai Cheat Skill:  I don't like the protagonist, there's no excuse for being fat.  Good art can't save the dumb initial premise.  Fail.

Skip to Loafer:  This series is like a 'what if?' where the question is asked, 'what if Akebi-san wore a blazer instead of a sailor outfit, was unathletic, unpopular and unattractive?'  The answer, of course, would be Akebi-san would no longer be a good series.  Fail.

Kaminaki:  An isekai that's totally unbelievable, killing perfectly healthy, young, productive citizens of their own country for no reason.  This is followed by the hero suddenly summoning a God to aid him in his fight against said evil ruling structure, which has no superpowers of its own, so basically the story is now over as he can now curbstomp all problems into the ground.  Fail.

Yuri wa Oshigoto:  I've already watched Maria-sama ga Miteru, twice.  There's no need to watch a parody of it.  Fail.

Yuusha ga Shinda:  I've never seen a hero die that easily, that suddenly, and with that little foreshadowing.  The poor guy, he seemed like a nice hero too.  Nevertheless the show must go on so now we have a zombie impersonator of the hero surrounded by cute girls on a mission to save the world.  It's funny enough at least for a first episode.  Pass.

Edomae Elf:  A boring and pointless episode where a miko lectures an elf for being an otaku (even though the audience watching the series are all otakus, so basically a story that insults its audience.)  Fail.

Isekai Nee-san:  A boring and unrealistic series where no one behaves as they should given their situations.  Fail.

Megami Cafe Terrace:  A series that really would be better if it were less raunchy, but too late now, it's already discredited itself.  Fail.

Kawaiisugi Crisis:  I'm not a big fan of pets in the first place, but an entire series devoted to praising how cute pets are is way too much of a one-track mind.  Fail.

So far 4 passes and 11 failures, with a boatload of debuting series left to come, which will be covered in a part 2.  But new debuting series aren't really the source of a season's strength, it's sequels of already established series that matter, and spring has plenty of those, including Kimetsu no Yaiba, so all of this is a sideshow.

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