Ah, teenagers.
Episode 4
Hyouka, Episode 4
For a show about a group of teenage friends living a curiosity filled life together, there sure is a lot of understated tension bubbling underneath the surface of their generally cheery lives (Oreki excepted, of course). They aren’t saying it, of course—but they don’t have to, because the camera is taking care of all of that for them. [1]
Blood Blockade Battlefront, Episode 4
Unlike episode three, which I found to be quite the tough nut to crack, episode four was a little easier to figure out in terms of its visual code. It’s no less intricate or well-constructed; just a little easier to access. At this point in these write-ups, I suppose I should note that I’ve basically thrown all doubts about “over-analyzing” into the wind. I’ll talk about this somewhere in this post, but the attention to detail in Blood Blockade Battlefront, even when it’s not using super fluid animation, is astounding and has entirely convinced me that I can interpret away with enthusiasm knowing that there are people behind this show (Rie Matsumoto, most prominently) who really care about what they’re doing and are offering up a work of art worthy of our attention and analysis.
Ore Monogatari!!, Episode 4
So, it’s time to venture into relatively unexplored territory, at least as far as romance anime go. What do you do in a romance anime after you already have a canon couple? It’s not like it’s never been done before, but even those that have (looking at you non-Ore Monogatari) don’t usually spend time on the implications of life after the courtship has ended and the relationship has begun. Happily, because Ore Monogatari!! is built with the relationship as its main feature, not just a related thread, we get episodes like this—and, other than (what is starting to becoming a troubling pattern of) diving into melodrama, it was quite lovely.
Toradora!, Episode 4
So, if the last episode was about Minori and Ryuuji’s crush on her, this episode is about Kitamura and Taiga’s crush on him. Really, though, we got a lot less information about Kitamura this episode than we did about Minori last. It’s not really that much of a surprise given how open Minori seems to be, but in comparision, Kitamura is something of an enigma. I think he’s the type of person I’d like, but always feel nervous around. This episode also had kind of a lot of nice visual details, so you’ll see more of those cropping up here than in past write-ups.
Fall 2014, Week 4: Highlights of the Week
Honestly, I just don’t feel like writing much of an intro right now. But I’m gonna do it anyways, because if I just spend this space talking about how I don’t want to write an intro, I’ll just end up with an intro anyways of me talking about just that. So, here’s handful of random stuff—that counts, right?
- Look at my beautiful screencaps from WIXOSS this week!
- Three weeks late, I’m finally as excited about Bahamaut as everyone else is.
- I can’t stop thinking about how much better Your Lie in April would be if Kaori was a violist instead of a violinist.
- Something something Chaiiiiiikaaaaaaa
- In case you missed it, the blog hit 100k view this week!
Zankyou no Terror, Episode 4
What did I say last week? “Give me more of the teens,” I said. “They make the show better,” I said. Well, you know what? Zankyou no Terror did exactly what I wanted it to, and turned in the best episode since the premiere because of it. The final minutes of this episode (omigosh that freaking soundtrack) were an amazing ride—yup, I just did that. This is the kind of stuff I wanted from this show from the start, and when I got it…well, you could say I was a bit misty-eyed.
That’s going to look amazing on the BD’s.
Summer 2014, Week 4: Highlights of the Week
My week in anime this week was yet another confirmation in my belief that the 3-episode rule is complete bunk and that 4 episodes is a much better standard if you want to box yourself in by arbitrary numbers. Argevollen, Glasslip, and Aldnoah.Zero all engaged me at a much deeper level in their fourth episodes this week, moving each of them solidly into “keeper” territory. By the way, 4 episodes is actually not an arbitrary choice. In traditional three-act structure terms, the fourth episode is the start of the second act. I’m not saying its unreasonable to drop a show because you didn’t like the three episodes of set-up, but waiting to see how the show is executed at the beginning of the real substance seems to be a smarter thing to do, at least if you aren’t just looking for reasons to drop shows.
Rinka and I share the same opinion about her show.
Free! Eternal Summer, Episode 4
Honestly, Free! Eternal Gou-chan is a staple of my anime week. I don’t know what I’d do without—twenty-five okay, more like twelve and a half minutes—of the best swim manager this side of the Pacific ocean every Wednesday. This has been a good season of anime for redheads.
You can’t teach this kind of glamour.
Mage in a Barrel 