This season defied all kinds of initial expectations, for better and for worse.
nobunaga concerto
Series Review: Nobunaga Concerto
I write this with extremely mixed feelings.
Below the jump: Spoiler-free review. Lots of praise. And some rants.
Panning the Stream: Summer 2014 Midseason Review
If I had to pick a single word to describe this season, it would have to be “eclectic.”
While this past Spring was dominated by very good sports series, and this past Winter was dominated by, uh… kami, I guess? (it was a pretty weak season), this Summer seems to have taken a cookie out of every genre jar. Action flicks, thrillers, rom-coms, satires, school dramas, period pieces, mysteries, Gothic horrors… you want it, this season has got it. And while none of them have been quite as jaw-droppingly perfect as Spring’s Ping Pong or Mushishi, on the whole I’d say there are a lot of solid, B-range shows on the schedule. It’s made it very hard to trim titles off my watchlist, that’s for sure.
And now that we’re six (or five, in Nobunaga Concerto’s case) episodes into the season, I figured I’d pop back in with some quickie reviews to talk about what’s still working, what reeeally isn’t, and everything in between.
Rule of Three Review, Adaptation Digest: Nobunaga Concerto, Sailor Moon Crystal – Episodes 2-3
Never judge a book by its cover – or a series by its animation.
I’ve been playing catch-up all week (IRL and online) thanks to last week’s LeakyCon whirlwind, so this is coming out rather later than intended. Thankfully this pair works well together, as both are adaptations of well-regarded manga and both suffer from a serious case of the Not Very Good Animation Blues. Can story overcome animation? Hit the jump to find out.
Panning the Stream: Nobunaga Concerto, Seirei Tsukai no Blade Dance
The stream is running a bit on the dry side.
I was really hoping to get a third show to go with these (which is to say I was hoping Funimation would finally get around to streaming Barakamon seeing as how they LICENSED it I mean what are you WAITING for, an INVITATION, because HERE’S YOUR INVITATION STREAM BARAKAMON ALREADY RAWR), but it looks like we’ve run out of licenses for the moment.
So then, here’s the final pair of shows to trickle down the stream: one mixed bag followed by a big bag of awful. I’ve also included the shortlist of summer shows airing but not (legally) streaming, which I’m still waiting to review. Enjoy!
The Josei Next Door 