Anime + Manga Titles

Noragami Aragoto – Episode 3: “False Bond”

The characters’ worlds may be unraveling, but Noragami‘s narrative is as tightly woven as ever.

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Three episodes in and Noragami shows no signs of slowing down its full-steam-ahead plotting, yet there’s never a moment where things felt rushed or confusing. This is partly thanks to the wise inclusion of short lulls between the conflicts, moments that allow the cast (and audience) to digest and react to the conflict that just took place, but it’s also a testament to the show’s confident, character-driven storytelling style. Events don’t just happen because the plot needs them to—individuals make them happen, interacting with and affecting one another in ways true to their established strengths and flaws alike.

Simply put, this show’s firing on all cylinders right now, and it makes me groan every time the end credits roll and I have to wait another week to see how Bishamon and Yato’s rapidly accelerating crises are going to turn out.

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Sailor Moon Newbie Reviews: Episodes 148-149

Forget Freytag pyramids—this dramatic structure is all about Amazon arcs.

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Redemption arcs, that is, and wouldn’t you know it, Sailor Moon pulled off another magnificent one. If I had to name the single, primary element of anime that got me to fall in love with it, it’d be its interest in telling stories like these: about sympathetic antagonists and all-too-human villains, and the underlying belief that even those of us who seem the most hateful or hopeless can and often do learn, grow, and improve.

It was just so different from the all-good and all-bad morality of the Disney films and most of the cartoons I watched growing up, and that interest in nuance for both heroes and villains struck a chord of truth in Preteen Me that’s resonated ever since. There’s value in creating ideal characters for audiences to seek to emulate, to be sure. But for my money, the stories about flawed, selfish people nevertheless learning how to move towards empathy and altruism are the really uplifting ones.

That was a long way of saying these episodes were great and I loved them. The even longer way of saying that is below the jump.

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Panning the Stream: Sequels and Carryovers Edition (Fall 2015)

♪ Welcome back, welcome back, welcome back~ ♪

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While the fall premieres haven’t been quite as dismal as I’d originally feared, this is one season where most of my excitement was reserved for sequels, and so far they’ve done a solid job of not disappointing. Two 2014 favorites are back and just as fun as ever, campy vampire fiction makes its triumphant return, and we head to a familiar setting after nearly a decade away.

This season’s a little odd in that we have some sequels in the traditional sense (i.e., stories that pick up right where the previous season left off) as well as some “sequels”: stories taking place in the same universe but with different characters, locations, and time lines, making them fairly accessible to newcomers. I’ve divided them up accordingly below, so hit the jump for familiar faces, or locations, or both.

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Noragami Aragoto – Episode 2: “One of Her Memories”

We’re just diving right in this season, ain’t we?

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It’s another strong (albeit painful) outing for Noragami this week, as various relationships are strengthened, frayed, or shattered altogether, characters confront the tenuous bonds of memory, and a particularly nasty antagonist sets his plans into motion.

Oh, and speaking of that antagonist—well, I pretty much called it last week, but as soon as he started mustache-twirling I realized I story-predicted myself into a predicament. So to clarify something important: Yes, I did start reading the Noragami manga, but I stopped at the end of the Yukine arc, meaning that everything happening in Aragoto is new to me, too. So you don’t need to worry about me giving away any plot points. (And if you have read this part of the manga, no spoilers in the comments section either, please!)

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Sailor Moon Newbie Reviews: Episodes 146-147

{Insert witty subheading here}

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What do you get when you cross fall anime season premiere week with fall allergy week? A very fuzzy-headed blogger, turns out. I had a ton to say about Episode 147, but I blazed through 146 to make up for it, and I have exactly nothing of value to add in the opening remarks except “It was a good week and neither episode made me throw my tablet out the window, yay!”

And if you wanna read the SuperSubstance I managed to scratch out before the sinus meds wore off, hit that jump and dive right in!

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Panning the Stream: Dance with Devils, Beautiful Bones, Atashin’chi

There really is no accounting for taste, I s’pose.

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The stream’s slowed a bit in recent days, but we’re still clipping along at a pace that lets me give you another trio of series, and two have even earned themselves full meet ‘n’ greets! One surprised me by how much I enjoyed it, while the other I was surprised I didn’t enjoy more. Hit the jump to read on and shake your head at my questionable judgment.

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Noragami Aragoto – Episode 1: “Bearing a Posthumous Name”

The Noragang is back after nearly two years away, but it’s like they never left.

Screenshot_2015-10-02-13-18-49The first season of Noragami snuck up on, sucking me into the world and characters a little more each week, and despite a somewhat rocky anime-original final arc it ended up being one of my favorite shows of 2014. I started snagging the manga once Kodansha brought it stateside, so needless to say I was pretty stoked when BONES announced a second season in the works. (Oh, and if you haven’t seen the first season yet, it’s available on Funimation, Hulu, and Netflix in various sub/dub formats, so you have plenty of binge-watching options.)

I’m covering this one over at Anime Evo, so same drill as we did the past two seasons with My Love Story. The posts will also eventually wind up here in their entirety, just so I have them for my own records.

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Sailor Moon Newbie Reviews: Episodes 144-145

Remember that thing I said about Ami episodes a few weeks back? WELP.

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Oh hey, lookie there, I mostly enjoyed SuperS this week! Funny how those weeks so often coincide with Ami episodes, innit? And, I mean, anytime Sailor Moon does an episode about artists, it usually ends in a good time. Although it’s always super(S) unpleasant when the show decides to make cracks about Usagi’s weight. For a series that’s usually so good about empowering young women, it has a rough track record when it comes to body image commentary, that’s for darn sure.

Still, most of the events were pleasant enough, although we’re still deep in Filler Territory, meaning there ain’t much to talk about other than what’s in the recaps themselves. So hit the jump and let’s get to it!

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Glancing Upstream: Summer 2015 Retrospective and Review

Having some good old-fashioned fun in the sun.

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Summer might not have had the most groundbreaking or ambitious of series, but what it lacked in artistry it made up for in pure enjoyment. This season was just plain entertaining, chock full a variety of genres from high fantasy to crime drama to horror to comedy. Well-executed (or awesomely bad) pop fiction was the name of the game, and I was genuinely excited for the next episode of even the lowest-rated series on this list.

That isn’t to say there weren’t some excellent ideas and characters to be found among the batch, mind you. While “entertainment” was the primary focus, many of the top series featured strong character writing, showrunners who knew how to develop unique atmospheres through art and music, and an understated but insightful exploration of social issues such as power imbalances and bigotry.

School-Live and Gangsta dealt with trauma in nuanced ways, and Snow White and My Love Story depicted some of the healthiest relationships in shoujo memory, promoting communication and quietly but consistently challenging traditional gender roles and genre stereotypes. Part of the reason I had so much fun this season was because I wasn’t having to constantly roll my eyes at some trite or harmful characterization, but could just get swept along in a bunch of great (or hilaribad) stories. And that makes this a pretty strong season in my book.

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GANGSTA. – Episode 12: “Odds and Ends” (Finale & Review)

Well, that’s one way to boost manga sales.

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After a bumpy third act hamstrung by ongoing production issues, Gangsta comes roaring back with a stellar final episode that reminds me of all the reasons I fell in love with it in the first place. Taking time to expand upon the supporting cast while never losing its central focus on our main trio, “Odds and Ends” is one-part character study and one-part tense, action-packed shootout, drenched in melancholy and badassery in equal turns and looking damn sexy to boot. It’d be one hell of a great way to end the series… if this were anything even remotely resembling an ending, that is.

As has become customary, I’ll spend the first part of this post providing a mostly spoiler-free series review and the second discussing the episode itself. Hit the jump and I’ll let any newbies know when to close the window.

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