AMAIM is a show where the first half of the series had some questionable issues, but ended on a really strong note that left me coming back for the second season. The second cour of the series, while it does have some strong concepts, has some significant problems with the finale that makes it not quite work.
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Spy X Family Season 1: Anime Review
Sometimes you get an anime series that is so tremendously charming that there’s basically nothing bad you can say about it except that you want more of that series. Spy X Family (which I verbally call “Spy Family”) fits that criteria.
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Science Fell In Love Season 2: Anime Review
When I watched the first season of Science Fell In Love So They Tried To Prove It, I started out by binge watching the show, and I found the show was basically one joke repeated with some variations. Consequently, when I switched to watching just one episode or so a week, I got a lot more enjoyment out of it. When season 2 was announced, I decided to watch this week to week, figuring that that would be the optimal way to get the most enjoyment out of it. It was – but this also lead to me running into a tonal shift brick wall on the last episode of the series, and without any significant foreshadowing. So, this review is going to have to get into some spoilers for the last episode.
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Spider-Man: No Way Home: Movie Review
While Spider-Man: No Way Home was intended to be released after Doctor Strange: Multiverse of Madness, it did ultimately come out before that movie, so I felt it was probably a preferable idea to watch this movie before the next Doctor Strange solo film. So, now that I’ve done that (and just after Sony has announced that an extended cut of the movie will be getting a theatrical release in December), it’s time to give my thoughts some. There will be spoilers for the film’s conclusion.
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Ya Boy Kongming!: Anime Review
I have generally avoided doing a lot of Isekai anime. I’ve watched and reviewed the first season or so of Sword Art Online, and all of Log Horizon and My Next Life As A Villainess to date. However, otherwise, this means that the closest I’ve come to Reverse Isekai has been Miss Kobayashi’s Dragon Maid, which is using that particular genre definition loosely. So, Ya Boy Kongming! initially slipped under my radar… until I heard the OP – and then I had to see it. I made the right decision.
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Let’s Play Tactics Ogre PSP: Ep. 175 – Save the Princess I
It’s time to finally throw down with Lanselot Tartaros.
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Anime Video Review: Boogiepop Phantom (2000)
This time I’m taking a look at the anime that came out before 2019’s Boogiepop and Others, but is set after the novels that anime adapts.
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Legend of the Galactic Heroes: Die Neue These – Season 1: Anime Review
A while back I reviewed the previous 100+ episode Legend of the Galactic Heroes anime (after reviewing the novels in turn). After a short break, I’ve figured now is as good a time as any to check out the Season 1 of the new series – appropriately subtitled “Die Neue These” or “A New Thesis” and see how this new adaptation of the show fared in comparison to the original series.
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Ultraman Season 2: Anime Review
Several years after the first season of the Ultraman anime came out, we’ve finally gotten our second season of the show – this time only half the length of the first season, with a second season the same length coming out next year (giving a whole new meaning to the concept of the “Split Cour”). The question becomes “how well does a shorter, tighter narrative handle the series.
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Let’s Play Tactics Ogre PSP: Ep. 152 – Estranged Relatives I
The party is reunited with Cistina & Olivya’s sister Sherri.
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Anime Video Review: Boogiepop & Others (2019)
2019, 3 years ago, was the first time that the Boogiepop novels had gotten an anime adaptation. It’s time for me to give my thoughts before I get into the earlier Boogiepop anime series.
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Shikimori’s Not Just A Cutie: Quick Thoughts
Moving on to the next of the anime series of the Spring Season that I’ve been watching – as of this writing I’m about 4 episodes into Shikimori’s Not Just a Cutie – one of the new rom-com anime of the Spring 2022 Season that caught my interest. I’m about 4 episodes in so far, which is far enough to give me a pretty good feel of the show’s dynamics.
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Demon Palace Babylon: Book Review
This time I’m following up on the direct sequel to Demon City Shinjuku, and the second half of the relevant omnibus.
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Spring 2022 Anime: Season 2-s
Outside of the shows that carried over from the Winter Season (like Requiem of the Rose King), there were a couple earlier series that I reviewed that are getting second seasons, that I feel like giving some quick thoughts on – partly to cover for time on the blog (because, again, work wrapping up) and partly because honestly, I haven’t done much with the “As They Air” thing for ongoing series before and this might be worth doing for the long term. So, here are the two Season 2-s of anime I watched from earlier seasons that I’m checking out in the spring.
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Spy X Family: Quick Thoughts
Unfortunately, with my current work wrapping up, this has played hell with keeping things caught up on my daily blog posts – so I’m having to grab some ideas more or less off of the cuff. In this case – with my regular anime viewing, I’ve gotten about 3 episodes into one of this new season’s most popular shows – Spy X Family, and I figure it’s worth breaking from my usual tendencies to give my thoughts on the first 3 episodes of the show.
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Wotakoi: Love is Hard For Otaku – Anime Review
Wotakoi is a remarkably chill slice-of-life rom-com anime. It’s just a fairly drama light series, which focuses on two otaku couples who share a workplace, and have mutual friends, just spending time together. It makes for a nice, refreshing bowl of vanilla bean ice cream in anime form.
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My Dress-Up Darling: Anime Review
I’m a sucker for an anime that has an element of instruction and education to its premise, and as someone who also appreciates cosplay, but who does not cosplay himself, I’m interested in the craft behind it. So going into the Winter 2022 season, I’d already suspected that My Dress-Up Darling would be my jam on that front. What I wasn’t expecting was to get a tremendously sweet love story along the way.
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Boogiepop Phantom: Anime Review
Boogiepop Phantom was an anime that came out in 2000 that very much served as a counterpoint to Serial Experiments Lain in the eyes of American anime fans. Both works are dark psychological suspense works containing conspiracies and supernatural elements. Both works are heavy on suspense, and depict their high school-aged protagonists dealing with a heavy weight of intense personal dread, psychological pressure, and often with that trauma based on the burdens of society and how they play on their peers.
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Lupin The Third Part 6: Anime Review
Lupin The Third: Part 6 is, unfortunately, a mess. Unlike previous Lupin series, this one neither has a serialized focus (like with Woman Called Fujiko Mine) or a primary episodic focus (like Parts 1 through 3). Instead, the series tries to be a hybrid, sort of like Part 4, but instead of the stand-alone episodes fitting in the overall continuity, they go off on their own directions in ways that are very hit-or-miss. This is all aggravated by splitting the show into two different serialized plots – one per cour.
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Bakemonogatari: Anime Review
Bakemonogatari is my first introduction to Nisioisin and to Shaft as an anime studio. I had tried to watch the show in fansubs when it first came out, as it hadn’t been licensed, and I remember being struck by the visuals of the series and the level of visual style – I could tell that the show was doing something – but I couldn’t tell yet, and I ultimately decided that I’d get around to it once the show had finished. And then I forgot about it entirely until this past year, when I decided it was time to finally get around to watching the damn thing – and I’m glad I finally have.
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The Anime Appendix N: Sidebar 1
For the first Anime Appendix N Sidebar episode, I take a look at what use a “Recommended Works” section provides to an RPG, to GMs, and to Players, and how you can use one to help prepare players for your own game.
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UQ Holder: Complete Manga Review
Ken Akamatsu’s most recent (and likely last for a while) shonen battle manga, UQ Holder, has come to a conclusion. So, having previously discussed it the last time I got caught up, now is a good time to give my thoughts on the series.
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Blade Runner: Black Lotus – Anime Review
Blade Runner, as a franchise, has had a lasting impact on anime, particularly in the Cyberpunk genre. In the lead-up to Blade Runner 2049, an OVA – Black Out – was released to expand the setting. As a further part of those efforts after 2049’s release, Adult Swim & Crunchyroll collaborated with Shinji Aramaki & Kenji Kamiyama to put out a CGF animated series set between the Black Out OVA and 2049 – Blade Runner: Black Lotus. Crunchyroll & Adult Swim’s last collaboration – Fena: Pirate Princess, was somewhat mixed, and unfortunately, this series, Blade Runner: Black Lotus, is much the same.
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My Neighbor Totoro: Anime Review
My Neighbor Totoro is, undoubtedly, one of Studio Ghibli’s (in general) and Hayao Miyazaki’s (in particular) most beloved films. IF there was a film that established, clearly, Miyazaki as the “Japanese Walt Disney” to international audiences outside of anime fandom, this was it, whether Miyazaki wanted the title or not.
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