Is it Okay to Like Your Lie in April?

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If you’re dialed in to the anime fandom, particularly the simulcast-watching, blogging segment of the fandom that I inhabit, you’ve probably heard at least some hints of the controversy that’s been surrounding noitaminA’s new show, Your Lie in April, a 2-cour anime produced by A-1 Pictures and based on the Kodansha Manga Award winning manga by Naoshi Arakawa.

Near as I can tell as someone standing apart from those who are decrying the show, the bulk of the outcry surrounding KimiUso is derived from the show’s treatment of protagonist Kousei’s traumatic-abusive childhood at the hands of his now-deceased mother.

Now, I’ve always tried to form my own opinions of a show divorced from the complaints and praises of other, but KimiUso has been something of a special case for me. This is, partially, because I’m hearing these complaints from other bloggers whom I personally like and respect, but also because the criticism seems not to be directed towards KimiUso‘s technical aspects so much as it targets ethical concerns, excepting cases where the two merge together.

Your Lie in April

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Anime Artwork Adventures #9

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Hmmm…what to talk about today? Well, I do have one announcement coming up soon, but I don’t think I’m quite at liberty to release it yet, so y’all will have to wait on that until next week at least.

I finally finished up Revolutionary Girl Utena, which was a brilliant series. I stuck it at #15 on my top shows list, but it will probably sneak slowly upwards the longer it remains in my consciousness. And, since I’m writing a paper on it due at the beginning of December, it will remain so for at least another 3 weeks or so. For those of you who haven’t seen Utena yet, get out there and watch it. It’s a superbly crafted show. Even if you don’t have the same love for theatrical, dramatic, and Shakespearean elements as I do, it’s still an amazing anime.

Now for some pictures!

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Your Lie in April, Episode 6

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Well, it took me a while to really warm up to Your Lie in April (abbreviating it as KimiUso), but I’m finally there with episode 6—which mostly kept up the visual pace set by the past couple episodes and finally added in some much needed nuance to its thematic wanderings. I’ve said in my past highlights of the week that the thing I feared most was that KimiUso would oversimplify everything, from the story itself to the sorts of thematic entanglements it was setting up.

If KimiUso continues to develop along these lines, I might even find something to talk about each week!

Your Lie in April

Desho~!?

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Fall 2014, Week 6: Highlights of the Week

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Another long week, except somehow this week I was caught up early in the weekend and got behind again at the beginning of the week. But, overall, it was a really good week! Two shows (Shirobako and Akatsuki no Yona) impressed me enough to merit their own episodic posts, Your Lie in April pulled me back in and everything else pretty much held steady. Twintails and YuYuYu are the shows that I’m still not sure about.

Garo the Animation

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Akatsuki no Yona, Episode 6

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I like writing about good episodes, and this episode of Akatsuki no Yona was a very good episode indeed. From the beginning of the show, I’ve felt Yona had the potential to take a recognizable story form and mold it into something more compelling than a reverse harem set in a fantasy world, and this episode stood on the shoulders of the episode before to start to make that suspicion a reality. That’s not to say that Yona has shed all its flaws, or that the anime has turned into a deeply impactful piece, but being on that path is about all we can ask from the show at this point.

We ended last episode with Hak poisoned and Yona’s eyes burning with more spirit than she’s had all season—this episode both got them out of that particular bind and allowed Yona to regress a little, a natural and (I think) important decay for her character.

Akatsuki no Yona

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Anime Artwork Adventures #8

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Hey, guys! It’s been a long week—I applied for two different jobs today—and I’m sitting in the back of a trivia night feeling exhausted, with a surprise birthday part to go to in a couple hours, so this is going to be a bit shorter than normal, for which I apologize.

There’s a lot of cool stuff going on in the fandom right now, not the least of which is this great season of anime. So, yeah, sorry, that’s all I’ve got right now. Let’s get to the pictures! Lots of originals this week!

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Shirobako, Episode 5

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Subtitle: On the Importance of Workplace Communication

Shirobako‘s a pretty sneaky show—it gives us an episode titled “Those Who Blame Others Should Just Quit!” and then proceeds to give us an entire episode of one guy who probably really does deserve to be blamed (although not entirely). It’s pretty eye-opening to watch Tarou’s exhibition of his absolutely abysmal communication skills (and lack of common sense), and as fun as it is to just blast him over sucking at his job, I think there’s a pretty impressive opportunity for self-reflection here. Even if you don’t have a job right now, Shirobako‘s highlighting a pretty important message here: communication is key.

And, along with all that, Shirobako managed to squeeze in a whole bunch of jokes, commentary on the 2D-3D debate, parallel that debate with Aoi’s struggles with her future, and lead us into the “one person’s problem is everyone’s problem” episode.

Shirobako

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Fall 2014, Week 5: Highlights of the Week

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So, even though I dropped Sora no Method, I do want to plug the ED—both the song by fhána and animation (apparently the entire ED was animated by just one guy). It’s hanging out somewhere on YouTube. This felt long a long week to me, but there were a lot of show with really good episodes, which made it enjoyable. I’m now down to 11 simulcasting shows with Your Lie in April going on hold and Sora no Method out of my schedule, so I might end up picking up a few more (like Gundam Build Fighters Try) or just doing more backlog watching. Either way, it’s a good season so far!

Hitsugi no Chaika: Avenging Battle

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Dead Monday Q&A—Fifth Edition: Themes, MAPPA Shows, a VN

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So, I know this is of concern to people—the name Dead Monday no longer technically applies to Monday like it did last season, because I have Bahamut AND Inou Battle to watch on Mondays. (Sundays are actually my no shows day, now that I’ve dropped Sora no Method.) But, fortunately, I have a great new reason to keep the Q&A on Dead Monday, and that is in honor of Bahamut‘s wonderful lolizombie, Rita, voiced by the wonderful Miyuki Sawashiro. She may techinically be undead, but I mean, c’mon, she can control zombie dragons!

Ahem. Anyways, about those questions. As always, thanks to everyone who asked—and if you missed out, you can still ask (anonymously, if you so choose) on my ask.fm!

Rage of Bahamut: Genesis

Always package your lolizombies with care.

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Poll: Revolutionary Girl Utena Posts

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Update: Thanks to everyone who voted! You can still vote if you wish, but it looks like the plan will be to just route the posts through the Utena Project page. You might see one or two pop up on the front page if I think the episode is really significant, but if it happens, it’ll be only rarely.

Hey, guys! This has been something that’s been bugging me the past couple days, so I thought I’d bring it up to you, my readers. As you hopefully know by now, I’m currently watching Revolutionary Girl Utena and planning to write episodic posts for each of the 39 episodes.

So far, the plan has been has been to just date the posts a while back so that they don’t all cascade across the front page of the blog, but~! I’m putting a lot of effort into these posts and I do want people to read them, if they’re interested. The posts are primarily for my own processing, but still! So, let me know via this poll—or let me know in the comments—what you’d like me to do!

 

EDIT: Oh, and don’t worry about hurting my feelings and voting that you don’t want to read them at all! Like I’ve said, these are mostly for me, so I want to know what you guys think about reading them.