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Finally finished watching Seven Deadly Sins today. Loved it all the way through. Not the greatest or most innovative show to be sure, but as a fun, lighthearted adventure/fantasy series with some serious moments and loads of eccentric characters it was everything it promised to be from the get-go. Practically every character had their own "quirk" (or two, or three...) that made them amusing to watch, and Meliodas in particular is hilarious with his completely laidback, carefree manner (surprisingly, he never really goes "berserk" throughout the whole show, though he does get into typical shonen righteous anger at times).

Overall it was a series full of good, solid fun that I don't regret watching. I think the English dub probably helped a lot, as just being able to listen to what's been said allows to be immersed more immediately into the wacky, spontaneous atmosphere. This seems like a show that watching it subbed would take something away, IMO.

Also Guila is actually in a relationship with Gowther now? WTF...?
Evil flower of Pure Illusion... we're going to pluck you out!
I started watching a currently airing anime called KonoSuba and it is hilarious so far. 3 episodes in and I believe 6 are out so far.

Hitsugi no Chaika actually picked up so it's gone from a potential drop to a definite finish (7/12 episodes into season 1).
So I tried watching the first two episodes of Durarara lately. Honestly it didn't hook me so far. I've heard some really good things about this show and the characters that have been introduced seem relatively interesting so far, but it might ultimately just be a little too "slice of life" for me. Izaya is great though (in a "love to hate" kinda' way). Then again, I was in a bit of an off mood while watching so maybe I didn't enjoy it as much as I would have otherwise. I may continue just to see where it goes, depending on what happens in my life.

One issue I definitely noticed in the official English dub was how it refuses to have any sort of subtitles for the messages on Celty's phone. Considering that's literally her only means of communication, it basically means the western audience has no idea what she's saying half the time (unless it's explicitly narrated) which, considering she's one of the major characters is a somewhat baffling decision.
Evil flower of Pure Illusion... we're going to pluck you out!
Started watching Star Driver in the last few days. Certainly as ~FABULOUS~ as people made it out to be (I mean, the hero is called the Galactic Pretty Boy for Christ's sake, and pilots a mecha with high heels and a peacock feather head ornament). The characters are fun, animation is good and the overall setting and plot seem interesting from what little's been revealed so far (only up to episode 4 as of writing this). Only complaint is how episodic it is, and how criminally short the Zero Time battles are considering how awesomely animated they are.

Also a bit odd that Takuto (the hero) goes from having never piloted a mecha before to just immediately mastering it and utterly demolishing his opponents, but I presume that'll be explained in due time (and there's hints Takuto isn't as much of a naïve newcomer as he lets on, and may have known about the Maidens and Glittering Crux prior to arriving at the island). Anyhow, it's an entertaining show that I intend to watch 'til the end. Just wish there was a dub.
Evil flower of Pure Illusion... we're going to pluck you out!
Gotta say, the way that Professor Green got defeated in episode 5 was sooooo~ooooo dumb. Even knowing ahead of time that she was going to lose due to
getting distracted by Takuto's posing
it still managed to be even stupider then I'd imagined it would be. I'd at least assumed Takuto used some actual cleverness and put deliberate effort into distracting her in that way, instead of her just
randomly deciding to ogle her opponent (who had already made short work of a few of her colleagues) right in the middle of a fight
.

Let's be honest, she basically defeated herself in that fight.

Just another reminder that this show isn't one to take itself terribly seriously, I suppose. And it was funny to see Takuto's surprised reaction at having beaten her so easily. Still a bit disappointing to see the first opponent who seemed to pose a serious threat to him get taken out in the most ridiculous way imaginable, but whatever. Next episode looks like it'll have some action outside Zero Time for once, which should be interesting.

Also, the show apparently sympathizes with the Hot For Student impulse considering how she apparently ended up with the Drama Club guy at the end (forgot his name). Or at least that's what seemed to be the implication.
Evil flower of Pure Illusion... we're going to pluck you out!
I can honestly see why people wouldn't like Star Driver. It's very episodic, Takuto's fights have hardly any tension in them and while the setting seems interesting, a lot is spent on meaningless Cybody of the week combat with characters that are scarcely ever seen again (like that boxer guy George who seems to literally spend the entire rest of the show training in his room after Takuto creams him in episode 1).

Despite that I do genuinely like the show, enough to keep watching it day-by-day anyways. The characters are entertaining enough that I can enjoy watching them play off each other, the battle scenes are stylish and (mostly) very well-animated and the setting has enough mysteries to be at least a little intriguing.

I have a particular fondness for Takuto, how he's so cheerful and wears his heart on his sleeve but has hidden depth to him. He acts like your typical shonen idiot hero but you get the feeling he's actually quite intelligent, calculating even, and just chooses to act like a goofball because it's more fun that way. Plus an extra helping of ~FABULOUSNESS~ gives enough spice to stand above ye olde' shonen hero, IMO.

As for some of the other characters; Sugata is a weirdo and I have no idea what's going on in that guy's head half the time, Wako's cute and her Fujoshi tendencies are pretty hilarious, Kanako is best girl without a doubt.
Evil flower of Pure Illusion... we're going to pluck you out!
So, I'm nearing the end of Star Driver now (episode 23). Shit's finally getting real, with Takuto finding out the identity of his father and the Crux pitting all their remaining Drivers against Takuto in a three-against-one free-for-all. Makes you wonder why they didn't do that to begin with, considering that was the closest they ever came to winning. It does make some sense considering the rule that whoever beat Takuto would become the new head, meaning everyone would want the exclusive credit. Though that puts the blame on Head for making such a stupid rule in the first place.

Though, maybe it makes sense he wouldn't want them to throw all their Drivers at him at once. Going one by one means they have a chance to figure out his powers and devise counters to them, while all at once could just end with them all being wrecked and having no more Drivers left. Especially before they
reached Third Phase
.

Also,
Sugata
has officially joined the Crux as leader under the "Emperor" subdivision. It was pretty blatantly foreshadowed something like that was going to happen, since said subdivision had been empty for almost the entire show and wouldn't have been brought up unless something was going to be done with it. Though I can't really understand
Sugata's
motives for this rather abrupt Face-Heel Turn. Or his motives for much of anything, really. Guy's pretty much a total enigma to me.

Best I can tell is he's all
yandere for Wako
now or something, and is keeping it concealed under that stoic façade.

Speaking of which, his Crux outfit is by the far most ridiculously over-the-top garish thing in the entire show. Even by Crux standards. Seriously. It has a plunging neckline, gold armor and freaking peacock feathers (plus that stupid looking mask). Guy looks like a Final Fantasy reject of some sort.
Evil flower of Pure Illusion... we're going to pluck you out!
Welp, I finished Star Driver this morning. Overall, I had quite a bit of fun marathoning this series. Though at times you got the feeling the writers didn't really know where they were going. A lot of plot hooks (the nature of Ayingott and Zamekh's conflict, the ruins, the "Entropeople") never received satisfactory answers, and the series just sorta' felt like it was... going without really going anywhere particular at times. Characters would show up, get some backstory and promptly leave the island forever, making you wonder how much of a purpose they served to the plot as a whole. Heck, pretty much all the majorly plot-relevant stuff was jammed into the last five or so episodes.

That last episode made it all worthwhile, though. Final fight between Takuto/Tauburn and
Zamekh/Head
was the most epic thing ever. You can tell the studio all-out with its animation budget for that last battle, which was flashy as hell even by the standards of the show with tons of crazy special effects and breathtaking visuals. Head's ultimate motivation was an interesting reveal,
sapping the Libido (a very odd choice when "life-force" would work just as well) of the entire planet in order to give Zamekh enough power to send him back in time to relive all the happy memories he'd cast aside in pursuit of power.


Guy is a true egoist, willing to sacrifice the future of the entire world for his own self-indulgent paradise. He really was driven crazy by ambition and fanatical desire to uncover the secrets of Zero Time. You'd think after having lost everything close to him due to his obsession with power he'd realize that even more power was not the answer here. But then again, those types never do. Wonder what'll happen after Takuto
gave him a good Kamina style sucker-punch, since he didn't die or anything
.

Series ended on a rather abrupt note, overall. A bit of an epilogue would have helped showing the characters going on with their lives afterwards (Takuto and Sugata making out up, Wako going to the big city to begin her singing career now that
all the seals are broken
), though I suppose there wasn't enough time left in the episode.

All in all, this was kind of a weird show that at times didn't seem to know where it was going, but made up for it with genuine heart and some stupendously flashy battle-scenes. Definitely worth a watch IMO, just as long as you have tolerance for slow-paced, slice-of-life stuff.

Kiraboshi~! RoydGolden- Out
Evil flower of Pure Illusion... we're going to pluck you out!
Just finished watching the original Fullmetal Alchemist. Gonna start watching Fullmetal Alchemist Brotherhood tonight. Aside from that, I've been watching Rurouni Kenshin and Fairy Tail.
User: Hinalyte / ID: 1553 ~ loading kotori.css
Finished KonoSuba a few days ago. Fantastic comedy right there, so it was very fun! It's good to hear that season 2 of it is announced.

What's anyone going to watch for this season?
Great episode of Dimension W (dubbed) just came out today. Compelling action (better then the show's usual fair, I'd say), drama, plus actually getting some idea of what the Hell's going on (we better, what with being only two episodes away from the climax). Plus Kyoma actually treats Mira nicely for the first(?) time, saving her from the Void and even patting her on the head affectionately, though he still calls her 'hunk of junk'. A bit too little too late I'd say, and its pretty odd that he only softens up around her even slightly two episodes before the end. Especially if they go for some kind of romance angle (which they might since its strongly implied that she might
be his dead girlfriend reincarnated somehow
).
Evil flower of Pure Illusion... we're going to pluck you out!
What I've been watching lately:

JoJo Part 4 - Already read the manga, and this is a fantastic adaptation so far. No surprise here.

Gyakuten Saiban / Ace Attorney - It's...ok. Pacing is very fast compared to the original game, which leads to some details being skipped. The animation quality is the butt of many jokes on Twitter, but I've never been picky about that (although the CG audience bothers me). If you haven't played the game, you probably won't like it, and if you have, you might like it.

Bakuon!! - Picked this up because I like slice of life and cute girls. Turned out to be a great ecchi comedy series. If you don't like ecchi and fanservice, steer clear of this, but if you do, it's a good one.

Sakamoto Desu Ga? - Fucking hilarious. This is one of those shows that creates a ridiculous situation and then just keeps ramping it up further and further. I don't know how they came up with some of this stuff, but god it's amazing. Highly recommended.

Boku no Hero Academia - Only viewed one episode so far at the time of posting, but it seemed pretty promising. I've been hearing good things about it, so I'm sure it'll turn out to be pretty good.

Also, this isn't an anime, but it's anime-influenced, so what the heck. I've been watching The Legend of Korra, which is the sequel series to Avatar: The Last Airbender. I've finished one of the four seasons and started season 2. I love the characters and story; definitely lives up the legacy of the original show.
Anybody here watched/is watching Yuri Kuma Arashi? I'm up to the sixth episode now.

It's as if a series took all my deepest fantasies and jammed them together into one package mixed with a heaping helping of esoteric symbolism and beautifully done backgrounds. Seriously. I can't even imagine Doujins for this show, since all the scenarios one might fantasize over are already right in the source material.

Also the three 'judgemen' are hilarious. Particularly the central one. That is sexy! Shabadadoo.
Evil flower of Pure Illusion... we're going to pluck you out!
Checked out the latest episode of Big Order today just out of curiosity (though it gets consistently bad reviews on ANN). For one thing, what the Hell is the point of having these skinship scenes when the audience can barely see worth a damn due to strands of sunlight and crap? I guess it's for the inevitable uncensored DVD releases, but still...

And it's pretty ridiculous how Eiji was all like
"You're forcing Rin to do stuff against her will!"
to the villain even though he'd been doing the exact same thing to her himself for the past five episodes. In fact, said
villain actually restored her to how she was before Eiji tampered with her mind
in the first place. But yet, because the
villain
does it it's somehow evil and despicable (even when he's only
undoing the brainwashing inflicted
by our protagonist) but when Eiji does it it's all heroic and noble. That hypocrisy was pretty blatant, and his heroically proclaiming "I have to dominate Rin!" came off as really skeevy.

Some of the character designs were genuinely pretty cool (Rin was cute in her lovey-dovey moments, and I liked Eiji's fashion sense) but that kind of stuff makes me not regret tuning out this show from spring anime lineup.
Evil flower of Pure Illusion... we're going to pluck you out!
Originally posted by RoydGolden
when the audience can barely see worth a damn due to strands of sunlight and crap?

It's called consore, wait for the uncensored blueray release if it bothers you.
If for one, always do for ecchi type animes. Because, being honest with myself here, the "skinship" is often one of the mayor reasons why I watch these shows, and I hate censoreship ruining the scene...

On a sidenote, this also applies to shows which are censored due to gore. Like, I'm currently watching Re:Zero and I think it might be censored due to shadows in the scenes that are suppose to be gory, but I wouldn't have taken serious notice of it had I not stumbled upon some images from the manga:

(Serious gore warning)


Anime statistic on MyAnimeList:
400 animes completed ✓
6000 episodes completed ✓
100 Days completed ✓
... what even am I doing with my life?
Wow, I really don't know how I feel about the Yuri Kuma Arashi finale. Kureha
choosing to become a bear to be with Ginko
was a good twist (albeit one I was spoiled by due to seen fanart for
bear!Kureha
on image boards) but what happened afterwards was... really not what I expected from this show, and not necessarily in a good way either.

Make no bones about it. Past all all the falling lilies, angelic figures, otherworldly courts and other such symbolism, the two heroines
died
at the end. They were put in front of a
firing squad
and then were
taken up by Kumaria in a haze of heavenly light
. Can it be any more blatant then that?

I'm not saying an ending like that is inherently bad (though I'm not a fan), but it seems to run contra to the revolutionary impulses of Yuri Kuma Arashi (or at least, that a lot of people read into it). I mean, the show spends 12 episodes saying how bad and oppressive this heteronormative system is, but then at the ending instead of their love becoming a catalyst to overturn the corrupt system, Kureha and Ginko ultimately
'escape' said system not through revolution, but through death
.
La Petite Morte
.

Is that any different from saying "Don't bother trying to change the world, since you'll
end up in a better one once you die anyways
". That kind of message masquerades as optimism, but it's really an expression of profound hopelessness. It stifles any efforts to improve the world as it is, in favor of putting your faith in an abstract 'heaven' or 'utopia' beyond the current world.

That's part of why a lot of Hans Christian Andersen's fairy tales really rub me the wrong way. I read on the Mary Sue that YKA may be inspired by Andersen's fairy tales to some degree (and one episode does reference the Little Mermaid by name), so maybe I shouldn't be too surprised. But still. From what I'd heard of Ikuhara's works, I thought he had more of subversive bone in him.

YKA pretends to be subversive, but it's ultimately complicit in the oppressive system it skewers, saying that gays, lesbians and other oppressed people should give up trying to change the world and just (literally or figuratively)
kill themselves
. Especially since
LGBT suicides
are a real thing, it's a rather creepy message to endorse, to say the least.

Maybe I'm not being fair. Ikuhara's works are loaded with symbolism so perhaps the
'death'
depicted at the end is not really
'death'
but simply a representation of how the heroines move beyond the corrupt system. Apparently
Utena
, Ikuhara's most well-known work, did something similar for the finale. I've never seen
Utena
, so I can't comment, but in this case I don't think it's pulled off very well, in my plebian opinion.

You know what would have really been a cool ending? When Oki (Invisible Storm's leader) encourages all the girls to "Don't think, just shoot!" if they ended up
shooting her
instead of
Kureha and Ginko
. That would show that they all realize people like
Oki
are the real evil in the world, not the bears. That'd be a truly revolutionary message. I actually thought that was going to happen at first (it seemed like the kind of bait-and-switch I'd expect from this show), only to be sorely disappointed by the true ending.

The show up til' the ending was great. Loads of yuri, interesting symbolism, deep and conflicted characters, very stylish artistic shots. For an action junky like me, it's a testament to how good this show was that it managed to hold my attention for all 12 episodes. I don't regret watching it at all, but the ending definitely leaves a rather bitter taste in my mouth.

Frankly, I don't think Ikuhara knew what the Hell he was doing by the end. He'd put so much into the show (even hyping it up on Twitter 'Mobile Suit Gundum for the yuri genre') but by the end, it was really just a flashy, very well-directed mess. For all the pretenses of challenging society and pointing out the genre's faults, he ends up going for the hoariest old cliché of all:
the tragically dead lesbian(s) whose love is too pure for this sinful earth
.
Evil flower of Pure Illusion... we're going to pluck you out!
So, I wasn't into Attack On Titan at all but I decided to check out Kabaneri since I'd heard a lot of good thing about it. I've gotten to the second episode and...

Holy shit. This show's freaking awesome. I love the steampunk aesthetic. I love the epically geeky yet badass protagonist. And I love Mumei, who kicks tons of steam-powered zombie ass and looks cute/nonchalant while doing it. That action scene with her in the second episode was just... my jaw nearly dropped.

It clearly takes a lot of cues from Attack On Titan, but with more of an Hollywood action movie vibe rather then AoT's horror movie. There's less faffing around telling how scary the Titans are and how hopeless humanity's situation is and more emphasis on the heroes kicking ass and saving the day. Already one of my favorite shows of this season, I'd say.
Evil flower of Pure Illusion... we're going to pluck you out!
Reading Upotte!! and shit is getting serious between Akaganekou and Seishou. I feel so bad for FNC after what went on with FAL. I also wonder what's going to happen now that the cat's out of the bag about Genkoku's
ancestory
, even though it was the shittiest buildup to that revelation because I knew he'd either be
Browning or Kalashnikov or someone related the way they hyped it up.
I keep mashing refresh waiting for chapter 70. ~_~ Genkoku is such cardboard though... I can't see why FNC is so infatuated with him and feel like it has more to do with
his identity
that she's sensing yet doesn't fully comprehend than anything else... and he seems to care for her as a result of that but not in the way she would like him to. x.x

Other than that, I recently read a Touhou doujinshi called "Acting on Instinct." and it was incredible... involved Rinnosuke, an aphrodisiac he made, Reimu hell bent on molesting everybody, and a camera. It's only 5 chapters but it was one of the funniest things I ever read (also NSFW.) Highly recommended.

Just look above you...
If it's something that can be stopped, then just try to stop it!
Just finished another heartpounding episode of Kabaneri. That traintop fight at the end. Wow. Like something out of Devil May Cry. I'd love a Platinum Games styled action game based off this show, by the way.

Good to see that the characters finally realized that there's more ways to give someone blood then by violent biting. Also, the show seems to implying that Kabane are more then just mindless beasts. They've shown surprisingly human-like intelligence like when one
hurled itself through the water tank to sabotage it
in the last episode or in this one when we have a Kabane that's learned to swordfight. There's clearly still some kind of humanity left in them, so it makes one wonder if a cure of some kind is possible somewhere down the line.

Mumei is still best heroine. "If you die, I'd be seriously inconvenienced". Also is anybody else thinking that she might somehow
be Ikoma's sister who was turned into a Kabane
? There's a number of reasons why that doesn't make much sense (not the least of which is how she'd survive
her heart getting blown up
) but also a number of suggestions that it might actually be the case. How much Mumei talks about her unseen 'brother', her growing affections for Ikoma and not to mention,
those shots of her in the OP transitioning into a long-haired figure who looks a lot like what we've seen of Ikoma's sister in flashbacks
.
Evil flower of Pure Illusion... we're going to pluck you out!