First Impressions: Fall 2014 Anime (Part 3)

October 16, 2014iblessall 17 Comments

This is the third and final iteration of my Fall 2014 Anime first impressions. I do apologize about them being so spread out, but there were just so many shows…(Part 1, Part 2).

Well, well, we’ve finally come to the end of all the premieres. It feels like it’s been a quite a while since the season kicked off, what with Amagi Brilliant Park and the Ghibli series getting orphaned and YuYuYu having a really late premiere. However, it’s all over now and the time of separating the wheat (keepers) from the chaff (drops) has come! All of the impression below are based on the first episodes only.

Literally the worst thing possible.

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selector spread WIXOSS, Episode 1

October 6, 2014November 1, 2014iblessall 4 Comments

Y’all know I was looking forward to selector spread WIXOSS after the first cour ended solidly in the at the end of the spring season. Episode 1 gets us started back up in what seems to be chronologically only a few weeks or so after the events of last season’s finale, and I was happy to see that we got good end-of-season WIXOSS instead of episodes 2-5 WIXOSS.

The stage is set. Open!

Yuzuki, I have missed you.

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Dual Review: Problem Children and Dream Eater Merry

October 4, 2014October 7, 2014iblessall Leave a comment

I’m back to school these days, and last week I had a paper due that I really didn’t want to write. This is also know as the prime conditions in which I marathon a lot of anime, so of course I wound up cranking through a couple shows, finishing both Dream Eater Merry and the exhaustively titled Problem Children Are Coming from Another World, Aren’t They? I’m not reviewing them together solely because I finished them in the same week (although that’s part of it), but more because I had somewhat similar responses to them.

Both shows finished with a 5/10 rating (Rankings).

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Free! Eternal Summer Review

September 24, 2014iblessall 3 Comments

“If you did find a dream, what would you do?

If you had told me at the beginning of the summer season that I’d be sitting here thirteen weeks later about to write a review of Free! Eternal Summer, one I knew it would be impossible to write without talking about its themes…well, I probably wouldn’t have believed you. I came into this season of Free! expecting nothing less and nothing more than a slickly produced, super-shiny fanservice show featuring a bunch of muscular high school boys swimming half-naked in pools. And you know what? I was fine with that. Free! Iwatobi Swim Club, the first season of the franchise, was more than enough fun for me to want to watch the second season. But Free! Eternal Summer felt, at times, like a completely different show. So, for a noticeable improvement, for being fun, and for looking decadently pretty, I’m giving Free! Eternal Summer a 6/10 (Ranking).

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Gekkan Shoujo Nozaki-kun Review

September 21, 2014iblessall 15 Comments

What an absolute breath of fresh air Gekkan Shoujo Nozaki-kun [Dogakobo, 2014] was for this season of anime. From beginning to end, from Sakura’s confession to the finale’s fireworks, from the groovy first notes of the OP to the final line of dialogue, Nozaki-kun has been nothing but warm, relaxing, and hilarious. Whether it was engaging in parody, using character-driven comedy, cracking jokes about writers, or just being pleasant to watch, Nozaki-kun stands as one of the top anime comedies I’ve seen. I’m happy to give it an 8/10 (Ranking) and I can confidently say that it was my favorite show of the season.

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Aldnoah.Zero (Season 1) Review

September 20, 2014September 21, 2014iblessall 14 Comments

I suppose I have to be honest going into this review: I don’t like Aldnoah.Zero [A-1 Pictures + TROYCA, 2014] very much and, aside from a few episodes in the middle of the show, I never did. So, although the finale had me spitting venom and wanting to blackball the show, that’s merely an enhanced version of my overall opinion of the show. So, for annoyance, misery, good graphics and soundtrack, Inko’s cool name, and everything else, I’m giving Aldnoah.Zero a 4/10 (Ranking).

Nope. Not really.

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Zankyou no Terror, Episode 8

September 4, 2014November 1, 2014iblessall 2 Comments

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.

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Gosick Review

August 22, 2014March 25, 2015iblessall 3 Comments

Sometimes when I watch BONES anime, I get the sense that this studio and I were just destined for each other—it’s as if they’re making anime specifically for me. I love the way BONES does anime, and Gosick [BONES, 2011] is just another in a long line of shows from this studio that I have watched and genuinely enjoyed. Gosick isn’t a spectacular show, but it’s a warm, kind show with a particular awareness for a small selection of themes and an easy charm. I’m glad to give Gosick a 7/10, and place it near very good company in the Rankings.

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Nichijou (My Ordinary Life) Review

August 4, 2014iblessall 2 Comments

If our society’s sense of humor and willingness to be entertained has come to a point where shows like Nichijou [Kyoto Animation, 2011] can no longer be appreciated, I would say we need to reassess how seriously we take ourselves. Like J.C. Staff’s Kill Me Baby, Nichijou, based on the manga by Keiichi Arawi (teach me how you got you name in both OPs, senpai!) brings an off-kilter, random brand of wacky humor to the table. It’s occasionally hilarious, often quite dumb, and but mostly just entertaining. And then, there’s the animation, which alone forces my hand in pushing Nichijou to a ranking of 6/10 (Ranking).