Appropriately, considering the subject matter, this episode of Hyouka felt incomplete, filled with half-truths, or…as if we didn’t have all of the clues…which makes it both difficult and easy to talk about.
Episode 8
Watching as Myself: Anitwitter, Me, and Sound! Euphonium 8
Up until episode 8, Sound! Euphonium had been one of my favorite shows of the current anime season—beautifully produced, delicately written, nostalgic in the extreme, thoughtfully reflective on the nature of competitive high school music programs. But, when episode 8 hit the Anitwitter waves, there was…a shift in focus I wasn’t expecting. And the effects of that shift were, well…I didn’t realize what they were for a while, but I thought the overall arc of my experience with the episode was interesting enough that I ought to bring my immediate reactions over from Tumblr and make a more reflective piece out of this fascinating experience.
Ore Monogatari!!, Episode 8
In which I shed many tears over the genuine love shared between a couple of friends.
So, wow. Yeah. That episode was phenomenal. Easily the best 25 minutes Ore Monogatari!! has done all season. Definitely among the best episodes of the season. Subtle, adorable, melancholic, touching. Special. I’ve cried over Suna moments before, but this…this was something else entirely.
Toradora!, Episode 8
Fun fact: of all the notes I’ve taken on this show thus far (12.5 pages thus far), these were by far my most neatly written ones. That might seem kind of random and trivial, but it’s pretty surprising how particular episodes or particular shows can inspire me to write differently, whether that be in my prose or my handwriting. This episode is one such episode—nuanced and subtle when it needs to be, painfully obvious when the time comes for it to be so. At this point, I pretty much feel like Taiga’s real feelings are crystal clear to the audience, even if she hasn’t figured them out herself.
(I’m a really big fan of the camera work for these three cuts out of the OP, so I thought I’d feature them here before the OP changes in just a few episodes.) Continue reading
Your Lie in April, Episode 8
Emi may have been playing a piece titled “Winter Wind,” but there was an incredible warmth to her performance. Even the chill of loneliness, it seems, can’t overcast the heat of her passion.
Fall 2014, Week 8: Highlights of the Week
Tomorrow’s Thanksgiving Day, but there will still be a post coming out (bless you, WordPress post scheduling). As for this week, as I look back on it now, it was a pretty darn good one. The strong shows continue to do their thing, but a few of the mid-tier shows really showed up with some quality anime entertainment.
PSA: Akatsuki no Yona might be one of the best written shows of the entire season.
Akatsuki no Yona, Episode 8
Well, that was maybe a little more of Yun’s backstory than we needed—but it did a really fine job of setting up a few more contrasts and bringing back the theism-atheism theme that seems like it’s going to be a fundamental part of the show going forward. And man, Yona‘s just so dang good at working the dualisms that we humans live with every day. God or no God? Selflessness or selfishness?
Zankyou no Terror, Episode 8
Hey, look who’s back today! It’s Zankyou no Terror! In case you need a bit of a refresher of what happened last episode (I did), here’s my write-up from two weeks ago. By way of summary: Nine and Five played chess in the airport, Lisa got trapped with the bomb, Nine and Twelve get her out in time while Shibasaki helps them from the control tower, the airplane blows up and nobody gets hurt.
So, where does that leave us going into this episode? Well, Sphinx has inevitably been framed by the media as the culprits of the airplane bomb and Shibasaki, et al. are in trouble for acting without orders.
Summer 2014, Week 8: Highlights of the Week
Three quarters of the season are gone, which means I’ve been thinking about ratings and rankings for the season a bit lately—and I’m not sure what I’m going to do with this season. I’m not even sure if anything will score about a 7/10. Don’t get me wrong, I like Zankyou no Terror, but part of me fears what’s ahead for the show. It’s definitely not 9/10 level, which means 8/10 is going to be the high water mark for the season. I suppose that’s reasonable, but it still seems somewhat disappointing. That said, we’ve still got four weeks to go, which is plenty of time for some of the shows I’m watching to distinguish themselves.
One Week Friends, Episode 8
Ah, man. I cried a lot watching this episode. It started with Shogo throwing the towel in Hase’s face in one of the best reactions to a PDA I’ve ever seen, and then came the walk…but we’ll get there. Brains Base is doing fantastic work on One Week Friends, but this episode took things a step farther. The writing and direction continue to be excellent, and really the whole package of this show amounts to what Kotoura-san could have been. Parts of this episode started to remind me of Toradora! and comparing anything to my third favorite anime of all time is a huge compliment. So, about this episode….
“Oh, a beach episode? Seen one, seen them all.”
How wrong I was…
Mage in a Barrel 
