Aniwords

Aniwords – The Lost Village is the Best Comedy of the Season

iblessall 17 Comments

I didn’t write that title just for the clickbait; I wrote it because I actually believe it’s true.

It takes a lot for a show like The Lost Village (Mayoiga) to succeed as well as it does, and analysis of things that are well-crafted in non-traditional ways is nearly always rewarding. Having a chance to spill out everything I’ve been thinking about why The Lost Village is as consistently funny as it is was almost as fun as watching the show itself, and I’m rather pleased with how my arguments for and analysis of it turned out. It’s not often I try to analyze things purely on a craft level, but Mizushima and Okada made it easy for me. Hope you guys enjoy (and maybe decide to check out the show if you haven’t)!

Here’s the link~

Mayoiga

Aniwords – Brando, Now We Got Bad Blood: Family Heritage in Early JoJo’s Bizzare Adventure

iblessall 1 Comment

Ordinarily I wouldn’t recommend just watching the first two episodes of a show as a last ditch effort to try and come up with a post, but that’s what I did for Aniwords this week and I think it turned out okay! I’ve never watched any JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure before (its particular brand of craziness just never struck me as something I’d care a ton for), but I was surprised and pleased that I enjoyed the first two episodes as much as I did. A large part of that was the dynamic between Dio and JoJo and the unexpectedly rich texture of their rivalry. What exactly that texture is… well, you’ll have to read the post to find out!

Here’s the link~

JoJo's Bizarre Adventure

Aniwords – We Ain’t Swallowing No Buckets of Barium Here! Kiznaiver and the Sign of a Scar

iblessall 11 Comments

You guys wouldn’t know this since I haven’t done a weekly round-up post in a while, but Kizaniver‘s probably my third or fourth favorite show this season—besides being the first Studio Trigger show I’ve actively liked. As such, I took my chance with this week’s Aniwords to explore one of the things that’s most fascinated me about the series so far: the use of scar imagery as a symbol for human connection.

Here’s the link~

Kiznaiver

Aniwords – Sleepy Spotlight: On Tanaka-kun and Flying Witch

iblessall 4 Comments

I’ve been waiting since Non Non Biyori for a show to inherit its specific kind of slice-of-life bent, but I didn’t expect we’d get two of them in the same season (on the same day, no less!). As you already know, they are Tanaka-kun is Always Listless and Flying Witch, and I took some time on this week’s Aniwords to chat about how Tanaka-kun and Flying Witch are inheritors of the Non Non Biyori spirit and why the three of them work so well.

Here’s the link!

Flying Witch

Aniwords – Uncharacterization in The Lost Village

iblessall Leave a comment

The Lost Village wasn’t my favorite premiere so far, but it was probably the most interesting first episode to anything that’s aired from the Spring 2016 season so far. My love affair (not literal) with Mari Okada is well-known, and while my feelings on Tsutomu Mizushima (Shirobako) are more ambivalent than you might expect, putting them together on a show was something I was looking forward to. Apparently, rightly. And so, this post on writing and horror and using characters for a very specific purpose was born.

Here’s the link~

Mayoiga

Aniwords – Durarara!! and Unhidden Monsters

iblessall 4 Comments

Durarara!! x2 has…not been the best the franchise has ever been, that’s for sure. With a seemingly unending stream of new characters flooding into Ikebukuro over the last two and a half seasons and a plot that’s become tangled beyond anyone’s ability to follow, you couldn’t be blamed for thinking the show had gone entirely bonkers—and not in the good way. And so, believe me when I was it was somewhat to my surprise that I discovered that I had been noticing those elusive things called “themes” cropping up in the show.

What follows is the account of my discoveries. Here’s the link~

Durarara!! x2