Category: film
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Anime Review: The Hollywood Theater OVA Film Festival (2023)
This past weekend, the Hollywood theater did a film festival of OVAs, featuring Neo-Tokyo, Baoh: The Visitor, Dragon’s Heaven, and Project A-Ko. As I haven’t seen the first three, I’ll give my thoughts on those (and I’ll be doing a podcast episode on A-Ko later for the Anime Explorations Podcast).
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Anime Explorations Episode 8: JoJo Part 1 – Phantom Blood + Battle Tendency
This month we’re beginning the Summer of Jojo with JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure Season 1: Phantom Blood/Battle Tendency.
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Anime Explorations Episode 7: Bocchi The Rock
This month we’re doing a quick rundown of some of the shows airing in the Spring 2023 season, before we discuss Bocchi! The Rock – a music comedy series about dealing with social anxiety.
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Film Vlog Review: Dungeons & Dragons – Honor Among Thieves
I went and saw Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves in a theater, and I’m going to talk about it!
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Spy Classroom: Anime Review
I’m not entirely sure if Spy Classroom knows what it wants to be. On the one hand, it’s an anime series about a bunch of (cute) teen girl spies going on missions in an alternate-history Europe – in this case, one inspired by Europe in between the World Wars, and before the rise of Fascism.
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Ippon! Again: Anime Review
I’m a fan of Naoki Urasawa, and one of his manga that got him on peoples’ radar (and the anime adaptation that came with it) was Yawara! A Fashionable Judo Girl. That series was a more conventional sports anime – closer to something like Hajime No Ippo/Fighting Spirit. This year, we got what I believe
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Anime Review: In/Spectre Season 2
The second season of In/Spectre is less dominated by a single mystery for the entire story, and is instead broken up into a series of smaller mysteries – generally not one-and-done cases, as they usually take a few episodes to resolve. However, it does mean that if the Steel Lady Nanase mystery seemed to drag
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Anime Review: Trigun Stampede
Continuing with the theme of revivals of classic anime franchises, the Winter 2023 season saw the return of Trigun, with Trigun: Stampede, from Studio Orange (best known for Land of the Lustrous), doing what is effectively a half-reboot/half-prequel to the original series, with Trigun Stampede.
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Anime Review: Urusei Yatsura (2022-3)
These past few years have been a time of resurgence for various classic anime & manga franchises – not only with the long-running new adaptation of JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure, but also with an adaptation of Ushio & Tora, and a sequel to Inuyasha, it only seemed appropriate that someone returned to the manga that put
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Anime Explorations Episode 6: My Dress-Up Darling
This month we’re discussing My Dress-Up Darling – a romantic comedy anime (with some fanservice) all about cosplay, followed up by a discussion about this year’s Crunchyroll Anime Awards and the r/Anime Awards.
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Thoughts on the 2023 Anime Awards Ceremony
Crunchyroll has held their 2023 Anime Awards Ceremony – the first one that was in person since the pandemic and the first ever in Japan, and I have some thoughts on the presentation.
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Anime Review: Girlfriend, Girlfriend
In honor of White Day, it’s time for some silliness with a bunch of horny idiots.
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Anime Explorations Episode 5: Today’s Menu for the Emiya Family
This month, Tora, David, and I kick off the inaugural installment of Fate-uary with a discussion of our background with the franchise, and a look at Today’s Menu for the Emiya Family.
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Anime Explorations Episode 4: Thunderbolt Fantasy Season 1 + The Blade of Life & Death
This month, David, Tora and I are taking a look at the first season & film of Thunderbolt Fantasy for Lunar New Year.
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Anime Review: Lupin Zero
On the one hand, Lupin Zero is a show that doesn’t “need” to exist. We’ve had several TV specials and the series A Woman Called Fujiko Mine has covered some of this in the past. Lupin Zero tries to put their own spin on it by making Jigen & Lupin either late-Middle Schoolers or early
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Anime Review: Mobile Suit Gundam: Witch from Mercury (S1)
Mobile Suit Gundam: Witch from Mercury is an excellent example of how to handle shifting the tone of a series incredibly well. The show opens with a prologue episode set several years before the main body of the series, establishing what the Gundams are, and what the Gundam (or GUND-ARM) technology that powers them is
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8 Favorite Anime of 2022
A little bit late, I have a rundown of 8 of my favorite shows from 2022, with two per season.
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Anime Review: Chainsaw Man
Chainsaw Man is a manga series that I’d have to admit that I held off on reading because I’d read some of the early art and thought it was edgelord crap. However, I kept hearing that no, it’s actually that good. So, when the anime adaptation aired, I decided that this was what I needed
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Anime Review: Spy X Family Cour 2
Season 1 of Spy X Family aired as a split cour show – that is, we got 12 episodes, then a break, then the other 12 episodes of this “Season” – so it’s time to get into how the back half of the show turned out.
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Anime Review: Uzaki Chan Wants To Hang Out Season 2
The first season of Uzaki-Chan wants to hang out was a fun, if kind of standard, sitcom RomCom anime which played into the whole concept of “male character being lightly bullied by a younger female character” which also showed up in “Teasing Master Takagi-San” and in “Don’t Toy With Me, Miss Nagatoro!” – only this
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Anime Review: Akiba Maid War
Akiba Maid War was a series I came into this season out of curiosity, and which immediately demonstrated it was something that was absolutely my jam. There will be some spoilers in this review
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Anime Review: Do It Yourself
When I put Do It Yourself on my watchlist for this month, I was expecting a more generally explanatory anime series – something along the lines of Diary of our Days at the Breakwater something comedic, and explanatory about the subject matter in question (handicrafts in this case) – and chill but not necessarily a
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Anime Review: Shinobi no Ittoki
Shinobi No Ittoki is probably the most mediocre of the anime series that I’ve watched this season. It’s not bad, it’s kind of “mid”
