reviews

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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Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. – Episode 3.02: “Purpose in the Machine”

Things get messy.

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The memory of Season One’s snail’s pace must still haunt the writer’s room, because we waste no time this week moving all of our story lines forward and wrapping up some at a blazingly fast pace. While I’ve enjoyed SHIELD a lot more since it became plot-focused, I do have to wonder if we didn’t lose some opportunities this week, particularly when it comes to developing characters. But hey—at least May’s back!

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Panning the Stream: Attack on Titan Junior High, Mr. Osomatsu, Peeping Life TV, Starmyu

They sure are throwing a lot of, uh… different stuff at us this season, I’ll give ’em that at least.

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Got an odd batch for you here. Only one of them is technically a new series, but the others aren’t really sequels in the proper sense, either—more like spinoffs or reboots. We’re also heavy on the comedy this time, with mixed results, but there were some moments that tickled my funny bone. Hit the jump for laughter and crickets alike.

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Panning the Stream: Iron-Blooded Orphans, Concrete Revolutio, One Punch Man

After an early stumble, Fall may be climbing up again.

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The anime gods heard our complaints yesterday and saw fit to grace us with three series that are a vast improvement over the majority of the others I’ve watched thus far, packed with great animation, distinctive characters, and competent (or at least passionate) writing. In truth, these were the three I pegged as potential goodies going into the season, so it’s mostly just a relief that they weren’t total clunkers. Hit the jump for all the exciting details.

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Panning the Stream: Comet Lucifer, Young Black Jack, & Four Bad LN Adaptations

Off to the races once more!

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As a reminder, I watch every licensed premiere and do at least a brief writeup about them. I’ll do full meet ‘n’ greets for shows that caught my interest enough to warrant it. Everything else gets a blurb explaining what I liked, didn’t like, and why the show might not or didn’t make the cut.

The fall deluge of new shows has begun, and despite that exciting tag line, it’s been more like a five-car pileup than a “race” at this point. I like to include at least one full meet ‘n’ greet in each of these, and it took a whole lotta panning before I found one. Hit the jump for a flicker of potential, a half-naked doctor, and a pile of light novel nope.

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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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Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. – Episode 3.01: “Laws of Nature”

Ch-ch-ch-ch-changes! Turn and face the strange!

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Last season ended with Inhumans and Monoliths and a whole lotta promises that SHIELD was going to continue going Full Comic Book, and we waste no time making due on those promises, as this episode is absolutely chock-full of superpowers, aliens, sweet science-y magic, and barely contained breakdowns.

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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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