I had been meaning to watch DBZ for YEARS. I remember watching one episode of it on Adult Swim when I was a kid. At the time, I had definitely heard of the show before but I hadn’t seen a single episode. I don't remember exactly what episode I watched (I think it was during the Planet Namek saga where Vegeta and Frieza or maybe it was Piccolo floating in the air and talking to one another about something idek) but I do remember changing the channel after 5 minutes because 13 year old me thought it was boring as shit. I was like: "Where's
...
the fighting at?"
I was always curious in watching this show somewhere around that age but I just never got around to doing it. I think watching that small part of whatever episode I happened to stumble across dashed my interest in watching it. I think I just wasn’t really the patient type back then as I ended up watching SpongeBob instead because that was more of my speed. But even though I never got to watch this show as a kid, I somehow knew so much about DB lore.
Like I knew some of the character's names, knew what a Spirit Bomb and Kamehameha Wave was and knew what going Super Saiyan meant. I think that just shows how iconic DB as a franchise actually is. Even my parents know what Dragon Ball is and they don’t even watch anime. I was also very familiar with the "It's over 9000!" line but that's only because I saw a YouTube video of Rocket Jump doing a music video parody on it. Yeah, anyone remember that? So anyway, now that I have finally watched it and completed it, I can safely say that this is the greatest anime ever made…if you’re like 12 years old.
Don’t get me wrong, I liked it and I can definitely see why it’s considered an anime classic, but I didn’t love it. It’s kind of how I feel about Dragon Ball as a series overall. I like it, but it’s not a huge favorite of mine as far as shounen goes. I think ever since I’ve gotten into anime, I feel like I’ve seen better shounen than this. Sorry, there’s just a lot of hits in this genre. Also I think if I had given this show a chance on the day I had randomly stumbled across that one episode, I might’ve enjoyed it way more and maybe had been a fan of it. But watching it as an adult, it didn’t really hit that hard for me tbh.
I think the reasons for this, starting with the first one, has to be easily my biggest problem with this series, and that’s the pacing. Yeah, that whole meme about this show being only like 9 episodes straight of powering up and screaming is very accurate. Because there’s a difference between making a purposeful slow burn and just being slow for the sake of it. Now on one hand, I think this very slow pacing actually works if you watch it in the context of when this show came out. But on the other hand, if you don’t watch it with that framework and just judge as if you were watching it today, this approach is very dated and it’s apparent why most shounen nowadays aren’t made like this anymore.
Because manga artists don’t seem interested in writing long stories anymore and it becomes more obvious when you see manga artists blatantly shut down plot points or aspects about it that could milk their series for longer. Unfortunately, Dragon Ball was made during a time where mangakas didn’t really care about that, which is the reason why this show can be difficult to come back to by today’s standards. Now I have heard that DB Kai fixes the pacing issues and adheres more to the manga’s story so I might check that out someday to see if that’s true, but as of now, the pacing in this show fucking sucks, I’m sorry.
Another problem I have is that this show has that one trope that I absolutely hate in shounen. It’s the trope where during a fight between two characters, they’ll stop it for no reason other than to talk to one another about their powers or to give small character development. And every time I see this it pisses me off because I feel like there should be a more efficient and nuanced way to give this kind of information. I know that anime isn’t the most subtle medium ever and that’s just part of the appeal, but why does it have to be like that? Some of my favorite anime at least have some subtlety to it. I’m very much a show don’t tell guy and this series isn’t really like that.
Anyway those are my dumb nitpicks, so let’s talk about why I actually like this show. First of all, I cannot deny the massive impact of Dragon Ball. Like this series created anime fans period, and if you think about it, it’s no wonder why this series is so influential. One weird thing that I love about Dragon Ball as a series overall is just how cute it is. Idk some of the characters in this show and their designs like Pan and Majin Buu and Goten are just so adorable to me. I also thought this show was surprisingly funny, which is something I didn’t expect. I mean it’s not lol funny but I chuckled a few times. And this all makes sense because the author the DB manga, Akira Toriyama (RIP) did start as a gag humor mangaka.
And this series' characters and their designs are pretty much iconic at this point. You’d have to travel miles to find someone who doesn’t know who Goku is and it doesn’t matter if they watch anime or not. And I pretty much like every character in this show (except for Yamcha) but if I had to choose one character that I like the most, I think it would be Piccolo. I just love how he goes from this evil villain who wants to destroy Goku to becoming a huge softie once he gets closer to Gohan. And moments like this that remind me why I like this show as much as I do.
Because for me, I could give less of a fuck about powerscalling or Saiyans or whoever is the strongest in this series because that doesn’t really interest me. I’m more interested in character interactions and relationships and figuring out if the story flows in a logical and engaging way. Speaking of story, I’ve heard people complain that Dragon Ball has no story to it, and idk if these people have even watched the show. Because there is actually a story, believe it or not. Yeah it’s pretty simple and not very complex and super overarching compared to other shounen, but in the context of this show, I think it works just fine. Because with this show in particular I really tried to watch it with the mindset of someone who is living in the early to mid 90’s (or the 2000’s if you watched it on Toonami) and just casually watching it weekly. I think that’s the most ideal way to watch it because binge watching it through a modern lens isn’t the most fun compared to other shounen.
Personally, I try to enjoy watching movies or shows with the mindset of when they were originally released whenever I can, but if I try to compare this to other shounen that I’ve seen out there, it’s pretty standard fare for me. So again, putting myself in the mindset of a little kid watching this show while it was first airing or doing reruns definitely saves it for me. But I can’t deny that without that framework, the show is kind of ok, but it does get points for its cultural significance.
Apr 14, 2024
Dragon Ball Z
(Anime)
add
Recommended
I had been meaning to watch DBZ for YEARS. I remember watching one episode of it on Adult Swim when I was a kid. At the time, I had definitely heard of the show before but I hadn’t seen a single episode. I don't remember exactly what episode I watched (I think it was during the Planet Namek saga where Vegeta and Frieza or maybe it was Piccolo floating in the air and talking to one another about something idek) but I do remember changing the channel after 5 minutes because 13 year old me thought it was boring as shit. I was like: "Where's
...
Reviewer’s Rating: 7
What did you think of this review?
Nice
 0
Love it
 0
Funny
 0
Confusing
 0
Informative
 0
Well-written
 0
Creative
 0Show all 
Apr 2, 2024 Recommended Preliminary
(1099/? eps)
If you ask me, One Piece is one (no pun intended) of the most fun anime I have ever seen. Those are the best words I can use to describe it: it’s just…so fun. But unfortunately, I don’t think I would recommend it to first-time anime viewers. Mostly because it’s obviously a pretty daunting show clocking in with over 1000 episodes, in fact the longest story arc as of now (that being Wano Kuni) is approximately 208 episodes! Like, damn. But despite its intimidating reputation, I think once you have a little more experience with anime and if you are a more patient viewer who’s
...
willing to give it a try, I think you’ll find something very approachable and rewarding. But on the other hand, I also think that this is the one shounen that’s just not gonna be for everyone. Because I remember back when I first took the plunge with this series, I thought to myself: “Man, this show is slow and boring!”
Yeah, I just wasn’t feeling it at first, it wasn’t my jam. I wouldn’t say it was bad or anything, I just thought it was ok at best. But I was kind of turned off by a lot of things in this show, from the artstyle and humor which is all very cartoony and childish to the kind of annoying characters, I’m looking at you Luffy. And I wasn’t really watching it as much as other shows, movies, etc at the time and I was thinking of dropping it multiple times. But I was still willing to give the show a chance because it’s so popular and beloved and I wanted to know why that is. And I think it was at the point where once I started the Alabasta arc (episode 62), I began to realize: “Wait a minute, this show is actually kinda good.” And the more I watched it from that point, the more this show began to grow on me and win me over. To the point where after Robin had her iconic moment during the Water 7 arc, I was like: “Goddamit, I love this show now.” And I have been riding with it without turning back ever since. It was like my third eye was opening just a little bit more with each arc and I was gradually beginning to see Oda's vision for how insane but also creative this series can be. And the aspects that I didn’t fuck with at first started to grow on me in a big way, like the art style and humor. Which yes, the humor is your typical over-the-top anime humor which isn’t really my thing, but I began to realize that this type of humor fits like a glove with this art style that’s so colorful and distinct and also weirdly nostalgic, because it kind of reminds me of cartoons that I used to watch as a kid. Another thing that began to grow on me were the characters, specifically the titular Straw Hat captain himself: Monkey D. Luffy. Who at first I thought was the most annoying character in the whole show, and while I do think he kind of stays the same headstrong and food-obsessed boy that we have seen at the beginning of the show, he does actually become more of a badass throughout the narrative. There is this one moment that really stood out to me during Fishman Island where Jimbei tells him that he needs to be more responsible as a captain instead of just dicking around all the time and getting his crew in danger since at that point in the show, that's what he's been doing as a captain. But then Luffy reveals that he is aware of that responsibility but he'd just rather take his chances and see what happens since for him it's more fun that way. Uh, alright, I'll accept that answer I guess. I wouldn’t exactly say it’s character development as much as it is character progression. And this goes for every Straw Hat crew member. Now I have heard the complaint that this show has no tension because all the Straw Hats survive every predicament they are in. And yeah, you’re right, but there’s still plenty of tension in this show. It just chooses to use the environment for tension instead of what will happen to our main protagonists. Like in Alabasta or Wano where the Straw Hats have to save a country from a cold-blooded ruler, or anything that happens in Marineford. If you don’t think this show has tension or stakes, well then I don’t know what to tell you. As far as my favorite characters in this series, the one character that I easily liked from first impressions alone is Chopper. Who is just so goddamn cute and adorable that I’m tempted to buy a stuffed animal of him off of Amazon. He kind of reminds me of Shippo from InuYasha but if he was less annoying, more interesting and contributed more to the Straw Hats success, since he is the doctor of the crew. So yeah, he might be my spirit animal and I also strangely really like Robin. Not because she’s hot…ok maybe because she’s kind of hot but y’know she’s a cool character, she’s got enjoyable qualities if you know what I mean lol. But seriously, I feel like she has one of the more interesting backstories out of the Straw Hats, and I also love how she acts kind of motherly towards Chopper, like it always warms my heart when those two are together. Oh, and she’s an archeologist, which reminds me of Indiana Jones, which is a major plus for me because I get really nostalgic and giddy when something reminds me of Indiana Jones. One thing I respect about One Piece is how despite this show looking very cartoonish and colorful, it’s never afraid to get depressing and even kinda violent. Another thing I respect is the animation, or at least how it evolves. I even once thought: “You know maybe the animation will stagnate because there’s so many episodes.” But that is absolutely not the case here. In fact, the animation actually improves with each passing arc. To the point where once I got to Wano Kuni, I started thinking: “Where did this animation come from?” Yeah I’ll just say that Wano is easily without question the best animated story arc that we’ve gotten so far and I’ll just leave it there. I did mention that Wano is the longest arc in this show and I’ve said this before but I'll say it again, I’m not the biggest fan of long arcs. I’ve said why in some other reviews but when it comes to this show, long story arcs are its specialty and kind of something you have to accept. This series is very much trying to be a slow burn compared to other shounen and I respect that. From the continuity to the subtle foreshadowing to of course the world building that’s always on point. Oda really has the nerve to make each arc better than the last one. How he even comes up with some of this shit is beyond me because like I said before, this show is just insane. Even during the beginning of some arcs, I would be thinking: “Yeah, this isn’t really that interesting to me, maybe this arc will be one of the weaker ones.” The story will get flipped on its head out of nowhere to make me engaged again. A prime example of what I’m talking about is at the beginning of Summit War, if you know you know. Now as I am typing this review, I consider myself a very casual One Piece enjoyer. Like I only watch the mainline series, I don’t watch any of the movies, or read the manga. And for some reason, manga readers seem to hate the anime and I wasn’t really sure why so I decided to look into it and it mostly just has to do with the business model of the anime. People just complain that the pacing is worse compared to the manga. I don’t know, I feel like this personally doesn’t concern me because I’ve never read the manga. I’m sure the manga is great but I don’t really read much manga. That’s why a lot of manga is adapted to anime because most people just don’t like to read, me included. I mean you always hear the “manga is better” excuse whenever a new anime comes out. To the point where I just have to ask: Why even watch anime at all when people are just gonna say that the manga is better? Anyway, I would talk more about this show, but then I would be getting into spoilers. But even though this show has grown on me a lot since I first started watching it, I still do have a few critiques. For one, this show does have its filler episodes but compared to other shounen that’s over a 100 episodes, there’s surprisingly very little of them despite this show being super long so it’s not the biggest deal breaker in the world. Also some of the fan service can be a little distracting at times even if my intrusive thoughts say otherwise. Another thing is that as much as I like Zoro and Sanji as characters, their pissing contest has started to become a little played out, especially since I have seen more than 1000 episodes of this show and those two still have beef with one another. I assume they are going to squash their differences in the end but who knows. Oh another thing that’s become played out is Sanji being a simp for women. Now I get that’s like his main joke and flaw as a character but when I think of down bad anime characters, Sanji is usually in the top five, and that’s not a good thing. Although I will say at some points I can definitely sympathize with why he violently nosebleeds over the sight of some of these women because…y’know…who wouldn’t do backflips for some of the women in this show? Yeah, this show can get kind of horny at a lot of points. I feel like Oda purposely drew some of their knockers almost bigger than their head just to fuck with us straight men. Am I being weird? I’ll move on. And the last nitpick that I have is that the story arcs are kind of the same to me. Not that they feel the same, but they are more so structured the same. They usually follow this pattern: The Straw Hats arrive on an island, shenanigans ensue on the island, and the arc usually ends with Luffy fighting the main bad guy. There are obviously exceptions to this, but that’s kind of how most of the story arcs play out and I kinda wish there could be a little more variety although this series does do a good job at masking the similarities of other arcs to help you not notice. So even if this series does have some flaws and it isn’t exactly my favorite shounen ever, I cannot deny that it still absolutely rocks and I think the positives definitely outweigh the negatives for me. I’ll probably continue to watch it for years to come and I’m glad that I have stuck with this show for as long as I have because if I dropped it, I feel like I might have regretted it. I have no idea when this show is gonna end but god dammit I’ll say that it can go on for as long as it wants, just if it continues to keep a consistent level of quality and I hope to be there when it does end. I know the Big Three (One Piece, Naruto and Bleach) isn’t really a thing anymore, but I definitely see why most people call this the best one out of the three because it kind of is. It’s the most creative, the most colorful, and the most planned out. Again, I don’t think it’s a masterpiece for me but I can still see why people call it “peak fiction."
Reviewer’s Rating: 9
What did you think of this review?
Nice
0
Love it
0
Funny
0
Confusing
0
Informative
0
Well-written
0
Creative
0Show all 
Mar 19, 2024
Lupin III: Part II
(Anime)
add
Recommended
I don’t even know where to begin with this review. This is easily one of the goofiest anime I have ever seen. And I love this show but not in the way that you expect. I'm tempted to say that it’s so bad it’s good. In a way, this show does kind of teeter on that line of being very enjoyably bad but it does have some unironically good aspects believe it or not. So as campy and dated as this show is, I’m gonna talk about the stuff I like first. The main thing I like about this show is that it’s just so
...
fucking funny. They do sneak in some actual funny jokes once in a while but for the most part this show is just a masterpiece in being an unintentional comedy. Just watch this show with a group of friends or watch it while under the influence and you’ll probably have the best time of your life. Every time I did watch this show I felt like my IQ was lowering and I was turning into a caveman with how dumb the whole thing was.
I feel like words really can’t do this show justice but I’m gonna still try my best to write this review and explain how fun this show is. I mean this show was already campy in Part 1 but they really amped the campiness up to 11 for Part 2. Like the people who made this knew exactly what kind of show they were making and it leads to some of the most hilariously insane plotlines that you’ll ever see Lupin and the gang be a part of. This series overall is very episodic with each episode being a different story and almost all of them have no connective tissue between one another. Firstly, I have to emphasize that making each episode different from the next is a lot harder than you’d think. You have to get really creative and you don’t want episodes to feel similar to one another, even though this show does have a bad habit of sometimes doing that. Secondly, that’s kind of what I love about Lupin the Third, it’s a very easy series to get into and enjoy. You can start wherever you want, you don’t even have to watch every episode like I did. You could start at the last episode if you really wanted to. As a matter of fact, you don’t even have to watch any episode of this show, you could watch one of the movies and you won’t be lost at all, that’s how episodic this series is. Now this isn’t the case for series’ like Parts 4-6 and the Fujiko Mine spinoff but that’s kind of how this show mostly goes down. Now that approach might not be for everyone. Some people have criticized this series for being very repetitive and barely doing anything new. And I kind of agree. I think by the 95th episode I was starting to feel pretty tired. I think after you’ve watched at least 20 episodes you’ve seen the entire show. There are a few episodes with two parts to them but for the most part it just kind of feels the same from beginning to end. I really think there should’ve been way less episodes. But weirdly enough, I really wish there were more Miyazaki-directed episodes. There’s only like two of them that I can think of, those being episode 145 and episode 155 and those episodes are easily without a doubt the best ones in the series. If you were to compare the Miyazaki-directed episodes to the normal episodes, it is like a day and night difference. I’m under the firm belief that Hayao Miyazaki and Lupin the Third really go together like peanut butter and jelly and I think Part 2 should’ve emphasized that way more. Yeah, Miyazaki was probably a pretty busy guy back in the day to make more episodes of this series but it still would’ve been cool to see, for me at least. But on the other hand, I do think Lupin the Third is a very comforting anime to watch. I still think my favorite comfort anime overall is Kino’s Journey (2003), but this is very much a close second. It’s an anime where you don't have to pay that much attention to. Which is fine because when you do pay attention it's still fun and when you don't, you can just chill, relax, and enjoy yourself or whatever. I like to watch one of the movies or the episodes of the show in the background while I'm doing work or chores around the house. I don’t need all art to challenge me. Some things I just wanna watch just to be entertained by and the Lupin the Third series overall is a perfect example of that. If I was to compare this series to food, I’d probably compare it to eating pepperoni pizza. You know exactly what you’re gonna get for the most part, but it still tastes good nonetheless. It also helps that I like all the 5 main characters and I could watch a whole show of them just hanging out and doing nothing important. They’re just so likable and have such distinct personalities from one another. Lupin for example is probably one of my favorite anime characters ever. I’m dead serious. He’s basically anime James Bond and since I’ve been a big James Bond fan ever since I was a kid, it was like I was destined to love this character. Even though he’s not the most complex character ever, in fact he isn’t really much of a real character in this particular series, I think it works just fine here. In other series’ and some movies they do try to give him more dimensions and explain that he’s someone who embodies freedom and escapism, something that I’ll admit, I personally strive for a lot in life. Then there’s his partner Jigen who’s just kind of a badass whenever he shows up. He definitely feels like the straight man of the group and always has great banter with Lupin. Goemon also joins up with them frequently and he’s a samurai who always speaks words of wisdom and cuts shit in one slice with his katana named Zantetsuken, which really should belong to me but whatever. He takes himself very seriously which gives him some good comedic moments. And Fujiko, uh, I actually don’t wanna talk about Fujiko. I get kind of distracted when I think about her. She just has some really enjoyable qualities if you know what I mean. I’m not being a simp, I’m just being very-observative. If you don’t like her, I recommend you watch her spinoff show which does make her more of a “real” character instead of just Catwoman without the costume. And finally Zenigata, a police inspector who would probably give up sex in order to capture Lupin. He’s so obsessed with catching him that he gets so upset when he thinks Lupin dies, and basically shows that he secretly enjoys trying to catch Lupin. That’s basically his whole character in a nutshell. And this works mostly because Zenigata in this particular show is fucking hilarious. Maybe it’s just me but every scene he’s in makes me laugh. He could be doing something completely normal, and it would still be hilarious. It’s like his character is an alien pretending to be a human. Another thing that helps make this series feel cozy for me is the music. It’s so fucking jazzy and vibey and I love it. The Lupin the Third theme is another iconic theme from a popular IP that I have stuck in my head and recognize whenever it starts playing. It’s very Cowboy Bebop-esque although it doesn’t explore more genres like that show does but the music is still great nonetheless, it’s easily one of my favorite aspects of this whole series. I really can’t reiterate it enough. There are so many scenes that perfectly exemplify why I love this show and why I also think it’s kind of a huge joke. I could compile a bunch of random 5 second clips throughout the show, edit it into a 30 minute YouTube video and you would have instant comedy gold. Also the names of these episodes are just-amazing. Like “Gettin’ Jigen With It,” or “Zenigata Getcha Outta My Life.” Like, c’mon! Whoever named these episode titles is truly the Socrates of our time. Now let me clarify things real quick because I feel like some readers might be a bit confused after reading this review. I want to emphasize that when I mention the campiness of this show it's not meant as a criticism at all. I’ve said multiple times in this review that I like how campy this show is. I genuinely believe that the campiness was deliberately incorporated by the creators. What I'm trying to convey is that the campiness is kind of a product of its time and this level of absurdity stands out by today's standards. But overall, I embrace the campiness as it makes the show 100% more enjoyable. Even at its worst, this show still remains fun to watch, like you can't help but have a good time watching them. While I still prefer more current Lupin the Third content I can still enjoy this older series for what it is. Anyway this show is dumb as hell, I love it. ORIGINALLY REVIEWED ON 02/17/2024
Reviewer’s Rating: 7
What did you think of this review?
Nice
0
Love it
0
Funny
0
Confusing
0
Informative
0
Well-written
0
Creative
0Show all 
Mar 19, 2024
Tenkuu Danzai Skelter+Heaven
(Anime)
add
Recommended
Dear Skelter+Heaven,
Before I watched you, I was a miserable wreck. My wife left me and took the kids after I was fired from my job as a telemarketer. I began suffering from chronic depression and suicidal thoughts started to bubble up in my mind. I had begun to lose all hope and meaning in life. But on the day I am typing this letter of gratitude, everything changed. I was viciously drinking at the bar at 3 am when suddenly the TV mysteriously changed to an unknown channel. It was playing you, all 15 minutes of you. And from the moment you started, I ... was immediately out of my drunken state. It was like I instantly became sober while watching you. My third eye had opened and my penis was enlarged. Everything I saw was so inspiring to the point where tears started to rain down my cheeks. From the incredible characters like Down Bad Girl, and Soldier Boy, and Other Girl, to the engaging story and beautiful animation with some realistic backgrounds looking like they came straight off of Google Earth, to the OST and OP that sounded like something out of a Dreamcast-era Sonic game. I began to reflect on my past and present life and after you ended, I sat there, a new man. I was no longer the sad, guilt driven loser but now a handsome, motivated and disciplined individual. You know the story of Chris Gardner and how he went from a homeless salesman to forming his own multimillion-dollar brokerage firm in 1987? Yeah you know how it took him like 7 years to finally make it out of poverty? Well I did it in a single day. I immediately got my life together by becoming a multi-billionaire after winning the lottery multiple times at a local gas station. I got my wife and kids back and now me and my family are happily living in a private estate worth millions. I was able to buy your company: "Idea Factory" for a whopping 2 dollars and turned it into a new multi-billion dollar company simply called: "Apple 2," where we develop cutting-edge technology and create the new best-selling smartphones appropriately titled: "mePhones." I am obviously the CEO of the company, obviously. Sorry if I might sound egotistical right now, but I MADE IT AND I'M SO HAPPY!! I am currently swimming in my pool of money like I'm Scrooge McDuck and playing with my kids who (don't worry my wife approved of this) I have legally changed my 12 y/o daughter and son names to "Rin" and "Otsuya," named after the two main characters of your beautiful masterpiece that I totally didn't look up on the internet :) I have now seen you fifty times in a row, and will continue to watch you for many years to come. I even have a room in my house dedicated to you. Unfortunately there is nothing in the room since I can't seem to find any merch of you no matter where I look for some reason, but don't worry I'll probably create my own merch by tomorrow. Thank you for helping me fix my inner and outer flaws and shaping me into the man I am today. You are the biggest inspiration of my whole life and the greatest thing I have ever seen. Thank you! Love, Me P.S: Where's the sequel though? ORIGINALLY REVIEWED ON 12/19/2023
Reviewer’s Rating: 10
What did you think of this review?
Nice
0
Love it
0
Funny
0
Confusing
0
Informative
0
Well-written
0
Creative
0Show all 
Mar 19, 2024
Shingeki no Kyojin
(Anime)
add
Recommended Spoiler
Well, on the day that I am typing this, Attack on Titan has finally ended. It feels kind of weird. This show has been such a staple of anime for 10 long years that it's hard to see a time without it. Social media has been in either an uproar or praising the series finale that aired this midnight. As for me, I watched both the second to last episode and the series finale right when they both came out. For the finale, not only was it the first anime where I got to experience a series finale right at release, I made sure not
...
to use social media until I actually watched the episode. I tried not to watch any trailers, clips, or see any pictures beforehand. I made sure I was seeing this final hurrah completely blind.
And after watching it and letting it sink into my memory for the whole day, I feel like I finally have something to say about the ENTIRE show in general. Because I've never really had anything to say about this show before, and the reason why is because it's just kind of too good, and everything I want to say about it has already been said by someone else, so I'd just be reiterating. Because I don’t think I’m gonna offend anyone when I say this is probably one of the most significant anime shows ever made. I’d say it’s one of the best TV shows ever made but that’s just me. And I could really talk about this iconic moment and that great moment and what they all mean but I feel like that would just take too long. Instead I'm gonna try to bring my own perspective into the mix, because I had never been a long time fan of this show. If you’re one of those people that watched this show when it first started airing, I kind of envy you, because I only became a fan pretty recently. Attack on Titan first aired in 2013 and became a runaway hit, and I was not aware of this at all. But I was like 10 years old at the time, I don't know I'm not gonna do the math, and I didn't really give a shit about anime to begin with. Over the years I would begin to hear about it, but I had no interest in watching it because I was like an anime atheist as a kid, specifically during my teenage years. I had this surface level viewpoint that anime was for weirdo nerd losers that I was trying to keep away from. And I thought all anime was just too dramatic for me to take seriously. It wasn't until late 2022 when I finally decided to give this show a fair shake. I remember being in my freshman year of college at the time and I now had a newfound appreciation for anime as an artform. At this point I had definitely known of its existence and heard how good it was, so I went in with really high expectations, and even from the beginning I was not at all disappointed. In fact, the first season kind of blew me away. When I first saw Eren swinging around like Spider-Man in that epic long take, I was thinking: "Yeah, no wonder this show is so popular, because this goes hard.” But even after that, the show just kept getting better and better until I tried to figure out when it would ever miss me. Whenever I would come back to AoT, I couldn't help but finish the season that I started on in one sitting. That's how invested I was in the story and characters. And if you know me well, I really like when movies or shows or any kind of media are just straight up miserable, and this show definitely scratches that itch. But what I love is that it balances a depressing tone with lighthearted, charming moments. And there’s also some pretty sick action. And yeah, the story is very engaging and thought provoking throughout and I got hooked pretty quickly because of that. And the characters that the show chooses to focus on are all very believable and interesting, they all have their own traits and motivations. And when someone dies in this show, they fucking die, like you never see them in person ever again so there’s always tension and you're always on your toes at every moment. I would feel bad when something horrible happened to a character and then felt rejuvenated when they were able to get through their pain with sheer bravery and determination. Definitely one of my favorite characters in the whole show is Levi. He’s just kind of a badass and that's all I really need to say about him. And I guess the character I personally relate to the most is Jean. And the world that this show has created is just really fucking cool to me. I don’t even know how to describe it. It’s like medieval, but it’s almost steampunk in a way. And the show does such a great job at not only giving you cool shounen-esque action but mixing it with political intrigue and moral ambiguity to make it more than just an entertaining action and adventure show, but a philosophical work of art. I’m sorry I’m so corny right now lol. I also love how they treat the titans like it’s a zombie apocalypse, or like The Walking Dead but with huge giants and people using grappling hooks. This show also happens to have some of the most satisfying animation I have ever seen, it's only made better by the epic music. And speaking of music, it ranges from tear jerkingly beautiful to some real hype shit, specifically with the song "The Rumbling" by SiM which is a straight up banger. As a person who thinks most OP's are the same unless they really stand out like with Cowboy Bebop or Samurai Champloo, when I first heard this song in the OP for Part 2 of The Final Season, I was like: "Oh shit. This song kind of slaps." And even though this genre of music isn’t really my cup of tea, it was just too hype to the point where I couldn't help but watch that OP from beginning to end. In fact, this whole show is just hype. There were some episodes where I started treating this show like the goddamn Super Bowl, most notably the two Final Chapters of The Final Season. OK, I have to bring up a personal nitpick real quick, but this show might have some of the worst title schemes I have ever seen for an anime. Like they had Attack on Titan: The Final Season Part 1 which then had a lot parts to it, and then they had Attack on Titan: The Final Season Part 2 and Part 3 and then Attack on Titan: The Final Chapters Ultra Edition Extra Soggy Turbo Mode. The way they named these seasons, specifically with the final one gives me a goddamn headache with how overly convoluted it was. They had shit like Season 4 The Final Season Part 1 and then 2 parts to that part so I'd be Part 1, Part 1 and Part 2 of Part 1, and then recently with Season 4 Part 3 and the first episode is Part 1 of Part 3 of Season Four's Final Season, which means Part 2 of Part 3 is the actual ending. It's so fucking stupid to me is what I'm trying to say. There was no reason to name it this way, it just made things really messy and muddy for no reason. Like they could've just called it Season Four like any normal person would and leave it at that. You would never have to put Final Season there and associate it with a final because it wasn't. It was leading up to the finale which just dropped today. What they should've done was just call the episode that dropped in March earlier this year "Final Part 1" and then the series finale could be "Final Part 2." It would've been much easier for my reptile brain to comprehend. That was just a really silly decision and a big L from the naming department, but everything else was a massive W for me. Speaking of "Final," I should probably talk about the finale now that I've gotten all that out of my chest because I feel like I have more to say about this topic than any other aspect of this show. As a person who hasn’t read the manga, I wasn't exactly sure what the big hoopla was with it being “divisive.” I actually checked the anime and manga endings and compared the two today, and they're practically the same except the anime had a couple of tweaks and additions and a few other minor adjustments but nothing major. The story beats are basically the same for the most part. At first my theory was that people just wanted a 100% happy conclusion where the world is just perfect by the end. But then I looked into it, and I realized people were mad because they wanted a 100% genocide outside the walls including the deaths of the main characters besides Eren. So basically people wanted an Evangelion type ending. And while that does sound neat, I think the ending we got was probably the only one I would accept for this kind of show. If Eren had told Armin like; “Oh there’s gonna be no more war, famine and violence for the rest of time,” then this show would be dogshit. A show like this shouldn't end with sunshine and rainbows. If it did it would be a complete tonal disconnect from everything we had seen in the show so far. I really like how this show ends with the world just being in a constant cycle of peace to war and back to peace again. Because honestly, why the fuck would everyone in the whole world just be immediately kumbaya with one another after The Rumbling almost killed everyone? And our hero's victory to defeat Eren was kind of pointless because there's just gonna be more war and suffering for many years to come, you know, just like real life. The world of this show you could interpret as a parallel to our real world. I just find it really frustrating when some people take things at face value without really analyzing what they're seeing. Because at face value it is frustrating, but then again, THAT'S THE FUCKING POINT, LIFE ITSELF IS FRUSTERATING-you know what you get the idea. This whole series is supposed to be showing the true nature of humanity, that even though we are all flawed and can never attain true peace, we can still hope for it cause you never know what happens in the future. To quote Mikasa: “The world is so cruel, but it’s also very beautiful.” And why do people think that Eren needs to still be alive by the end of the show? At this point Eren is the main villain so he kind of deserves death at this point, especially when he later reveals that he destroyed 80% of humanity. And going back to Eren, his death at the hands of Mikasa is one of the most moving death scenes I have ever seen in an anime. Anyone who says Eren died like a little bitch is a fucking idiot that probably just wanted him to stay alive and somehow miraculously get his fairy tale ending with all the remaining characters, or just be the last person standing on Earth, which again does sound cool but I loved it just the way it was. And it’s a small thing, but I like how this show begins and ends with Eren and Mikasa at that tree together. There’s just a lot of really good satisfying moments in this last episode and of this final season in general while still being bittersweet overall. Sorry if I’ve sounded a little ignorant during this explanation, but this ending didn’t really bother me all that much-for the most part, there are some moments that are a little bit shaky if you really think about it but if you’re willing to overlook it you’ll be just as satisfied as I am right now. If you didn't like it being depressing and not positive, well then I don't know what to tell you anymore, and if you didn’t like the ending not being a 100% genocide from Eren, then go read or write some fan fiction or whatever, because this is the real conclusion whether you like it or not. If I actually had to force myself to find some things to criticize about this show, I'd say that there are some expositional scenes that could be cut down slightly shorter for my liking. And I also think Eren as a character does leave a little bit to be desired, mostly during the beginning of the show. He's a very cut and dry character, and it works in the context of the series at that point, but he never really becomes too complex until the final season. I'm not complaining about how he didn't grow as a character, because that's exactly the point that this show is trying to get across, that Eren never really developed and only stayed a spiteful child who's mad at the world no matter how old he got. I'm just saying that I kind of wish there was a little bit more going for him at first instead of just basic shounen motivations. But all the complaints that I do have are pretty minor and they don't ruin the show as a whole for me. It also has me thinking about which epic, grand scale series I love more, either this or Code Geass because they do have their similarities. If you haven't seen Code Geass I won't try to give any specifics or spoil anything significant about anything even though that's kind of hard to do with a show like CG but I feel like it's the only way to get my point across so I'll do my best. Basically, CG ends somewhat similar to how Attack on Titan ends, except in CG it's more optimistic. But in AoT, it's more realistic. I kind of accept it in CG because it's a more colorful and cartoon show, while AoT is going for a more real and human approach. I think both shows execute their ideas and endings very well, but as of now I'm starting to lean a little bit more towards Attack on Titan being my new favorite epic, grand scale anime. I haven't seen Code Geass in a very long time and I haven't rewatched it since then, but maybe I'll come back to it sometime and compare that and AoT together to see which one is the best one to me. As for Attack on Titan, while I do feel sad and a little empty that’s it’s all over, I am very thankful that I got to experience its end once it released. And you know, this show really does mark the end of an era for anime, because it might be a very long time until another anime like this becomes more than just a popular anime but a cultural phenomenon that is known across the world, even for people who don’t watch anime. It sure as hell holds a special place for me and I look forward to revisiting it someday. So I'd probably give the whole series of Attack on Titan a 9.5/10. It was good, enough said. ORIGINALLY REVIEWED ON 11/05/2023
Reviewer’s Rating: 9
What did you think of this review?
Nice
0
Love it
0
Funny
0
Confusing
0
Informative
0
Well-written
0
Creative
0Show all 
Mar 19, 2024
Naruto: Shippuuden
(Anime)
add
Mixed Feelings Spoiler
I am very exhausted. I’ve heard a lot of people say that Shippuden is an improvement from the original and I somewhat agree with that statement. I personally think it was kind of more of the same from the original but I did like Shippuden a little bit more. And overall my feelings on this show are pretty complex. Because on one hand there are some really good ideas in this show but then they follow it up with some really dumb shit. With a show that has 500 episodes plus 220 more if you count the OG series you can’t expect all those episodes
...
to be bangers. I wouldn’t say this show is overrated because a lot of anime fans love to over rate their favorite show or movie, even I can be guilty of this. Instead I’d say Naruto is over hyped a little too much. I think this is the case with most shounen anime that I have seen even though I do enjoy watching shounen. I’ve always seen shounen anime the same way as superhero movies, specifically the MCU. They’re entertaining and easy to enjoy but I don’t see them as like 12 Angry Men (1957) or anything like that.
And my mentality rings true with Naruto. While I’m still not a huge fan or anything like that, I think I had fun for the most part. And since I like to compare this show to Harry Potter, I think they both share similar pros and cons. And one more thing before I start to get deep into this review, for people who didn’t read my review for classic Naruto, I never grew up watching this show, and I don’t have any nostalgia for it like most people do, so that’s probably why I don’t have the strongest feelings for this series in general. So to start, I’m gonna be a butt head again and tell you what’s wrong with Shippuden to get out of the way. But don’t freak out because I’m gonna talk about the things I liked right after, so buckle up and be patient. First of all, in the spirit of its predecessor this show has god awful filler episodes. To the point where I didn’t even watch all of them, by the 200 episode mark I just started skipping them entirely. But even without the filler episodes the narrative could still get kind of messy and some of the main storylines were just not that interesting to me. It also goes to show that this series is just way too long and bloated. To further emphasize my point of how long this show is, when Naruto defeated Pain and got respect from everyone in the Hidden Leaf Village, I honestly thought this was leading to the climax of the series where Naruto and Sasuke would finally have their long awaited fight with one another. I mean yeah Sasuke and his group were going after Killer Bee but I kind of forgot that even happened until many episodes later. I just thought that was some weird side quest and not an actual important story beat. What I’m trying to say is that I thought the show was heading into its climax and then it would wrap up and end. But then I realized that there were approximately 335 episodes left! And knowing that I was like: “What could possibly happen next for this show to have that many episodes?” Well what follows is the ninja war arc that takes up a 3rd of the show, and it just went on and on and on. Don’t get me wrong there were some great moments during it, like the part where Madara started tearing assholes and going ham on all the shinobi soldiers for the first time. Or the part where Sasuke got bittersweet closure with Itachi in those caves. But even though those moments were very satisfying to see unfold, in the back of my mind I couldn’t help but keep thinking: “Shouldn’t this story be long over by now?” I get that they’re trying to raise the stakes and make the story more epic, but I felt like it kind of lost what the core of the show was all about: character building and grounded ninja battles with some jutsu involved. Because I felt like the fights became less about ninjutsu and more about mecha battles and magic. There also became a lot of overcomplicated lore and characters not named Naruto and Saskue were not given enough focus as much as they used to have which was pretty disappointing to me. But there were still some moments that I maybe couldn’t have lived without, so you can kind of see my dilemma here. I also really didn’t like the plot point of there being more beasts than the nine-tails. I also didn’t like this plot point in the classic series either, because explaining that Naruto is not the only one with beasts inside of him kinda makes him seem less important. If they had just said all the other beasts died and he was only one with a tailed beast inside of him, I think that would’ve really solidified him as the Chosen One. But it doesn’t matter anymore because there’s more tailed beasts out there. Another thing is that the humor was still not for me and I didn’t find it funny. And I know that’s a subjective thing to say, but it’s probably because I’m too much of a grumpy old man for me to laugh at this over exaggerated kind of humor. Like when American cartoons use exaggerated humor like this, it’s charming and it feels more genuine because it’s made for a more kid-friendly audience. However, when anime tries to emulate that, it’s just lame to me. Because most shounen are targeted toward young adults right? I guess the whole gag humor schtick just doesn’t really work for me. Also just like the OG series the animation is very hit or miss. Sometimes it looks really impressive, and sometimes it just looks lazy. This probably comes with the territory of having too many episodes. And this show still had a bad habit of spoon feeding you information and over explaining things. I feel like the creators still didn’t understand that ambiguity can be a good thing. I’m not saying you need to ALWAYS be ambiguous because that will just lead to unnecessary plot holes. I’m just saying that I personally do not need to have everything explained to me in a way that treats me like an idiot. But even though I do have my complaints, this show is nowhere near as bad as haters say it is. Yes, this show does have some poorly developed character arcs and a badly paced story and misplaced, inappropriate humor at times, but it also has aspects that I think are handled really well. For one, I think the emotional moments are handled way better than in the OG series. Unlike in the original show where some of the emotional moments were sometimes unintentionally hilarious to me, in this one I didn’t get that vibe at all for the most part. They’re handled with a little more care this time around. The one thing that I really respect about Naruto is how they’re willing to kill off important characters and do it in a way that’s satisfying for that character instead of for dumbass shock value, which is a problem that Harry Potter can really have a problem with at times. While I was never really fond of Naruto in the previous show, I do like that he very gradually grows from an annoying brat to a mature man throughout the show’s progression. He’s way less antsy than he was before which is a good thing for me at least. It’s a slow process but I did begin to notice a few positive changes from him as I trudged through the episodes. I also like how all the villains in Naruto aren’t really bad people, they’re all just misguided or have bad luck. And I guess I kinda liked some of the new characters they introduced like Sai. The Naruto and Pain fight was pretty badass, definitely one of the best fights in the whole series. The Sasuke and Itachi fight was kinda awesome as well. And what is it with Naruto and Sasuke getting the best fights in this show? Why can’t every fight in this show be as cool and smoothly animated as that final battle? Probably because there’s too many episodes but fights like that were so good to me to the point where I actually considered giving this show a higher rating. And this is where I’m left divided because I don’t think this is a bad show, it’s just a very confused mess of a show that has some really good stuff in it. I just wish they had streamlined a lot of it. And lastly the ending definitely dragged a lot for me but I think it still paid off anyway. So while Shippuuden does have the highest highs in the entire series, it also has the lowest lows. Can’t say it blew me away but by the end I was not at all disappointed. At this point I do not want to watch or read anything Naruto related for a very long time. (And no I’m not watching Boruto because I’ve heard nothing but bad things about it and most Naruto fans seem to hate it so I’m not gonna waste my time with that). Maybe in like 30 years I’ll go back and rewatch it to see if it holds up, but as of now, I want to separate myself from this series. Sorry but I need my rest ok? Because like I said in the beginning of this review, I am very exhausted. So I guess I’d give this show like the lightest, featherist, softest 7/10. I don’t know these shows are pretty hard to rate for me. Anyway I’m done, moving on. ORIGINALLY REVIEWED ON 10/11/2023
Reviewer’s Rating: 7
What did you think of this review?
Nice
0
Love it
0
Funny
0
Confusing
0
Informative
0
Well-written
0
Creative
0Show all 
Mar 19, 2024
Sword Art Online
(Anime)
add
Not Recommended
Yeah it’s official, I don’t really like this show. I understand that it’s kind of polarizing and unfortunately I’m on the side of not liking it. And if you like it that's fine. It's ok to like stuff, but it's also ok to criticize things that you like. My intention is not to tell someone that they're wrong for liking something. My goal with this review is to get my opinion out on a show that I was really not a fan of and to educate people that might be feeling the same way as me, and maybe stop them from wasting their time by
...
watching it. Now with that out of the way, let me try to explain why this show fucking sucks.
I barely even liked this show ironically. This wasn’t a guilty pleasure for me cause when I watched it I felt no pleasure, only guilt. In fact I think Sword Art Online is now one of my least favorite anime that’s mainstream and I do not say that lightly. And it absolutely boggles my mind how popular this show is. I guess if I had to hypothesize, the reason SAO is popular is because there’s hot waifus in it, so if you like hot waifus then you’re lucky enough to be in the central hub for them. It also doesn’t help that my expectations for it were pretty low. I looked at the poster and it just looked like some generic, fantasy romance anime in an online setting. It looked like something that just wouldn’t be for me. But with that being said, I tried my best to be a little bit optimistic. I was hoping it would be entertainingly bad like High School DxD was or I’d actually become an SAO fan and see what I was missing, but I really doubted the ladder. But alas I didn’t become a fan, and it wasn’t that unintentionally funny. It was about as emotionally compelling as reading Apple’s Terms and Conditions page. The real battle for me wasn’t hoping that the main characters would survive the fights, it was me fighting the urge to fall asleep. But maybe I’m just being too harsh. To be fair, I did watch the first ten episodes late at night and I was yawning quite a bit and feeling tired during them. So during the afternoon where I continued watching the show I thought: “Now that I’m rejuvenated, maybe I’ll start to warm up to this show and be entertained for once. Maybe I’ll finally be excited with what’s on screen.” But then I continued watching it, and I still felt tired. The thing is this show isn't very good if you over hype it. The art style is just generic as hell and never stands out. There were a few exceptions but overall I was not blown away by the presentation. It was giving me extreme Deja Vu because I felt like I had seen this show before even though this was my first viewing. In fact every aspect of this show I felt like I had seen a million times before and had seen done better. But probably the biggest issue I had besides this show being generic and boring is that I never got invested or interested in anything that was happening. Because in a show like this, hooking me in and making a first good impression is very important. For example I may not be a Bleach fan but at least Bleach kind of hooked me in from the start. And I felt like that show had its own identity and had characters I liked. And I tried hard to latch on to something with SAO but everything was just so bland. It was like the show was afraid to be creative. I also didn’t give a shit about a single character. And the story was so boring, cliché and full of plot holes so I also didn’t care about that either. It personally took me fourteen episodes for me to start getting somewhat interested in what was happening. Fourteen! And it’s not like this show is a slow burn either, this show moves by so quickly and they time jump so many times that it never really feels like they’ve been in the game for so long until the 14th episode. You’ve probably realized that the only episode I mildly enjoyed was episode 14. But even after that the show just gets worse and it still doesn’t make an attempt to be original or riveting. I guess the most eyebrow raising moment was in episode 15 but that grabbed my attention for all the wrong reasons. What happened in episode 15 you may ask? Well it has to do with a little word called INCEST. Now yeah maybe this is acceptable in some countries but as a grown ass American man it really made the hairs on my neck stand up. I just wanted to puke when I realized what was happening. Why the fuck did they add this? I did not need to see that! I didn’t even get into the characters yet, but I honestly don’t have much to say about them because like the show itself, I didn’t find any of them interesting. Take the main character Kazuto or Kirito for example. He’s this badass swordsman, but he’s also an introvert and he doesn’t want any friends. But that’s ok because every girl he meets is so bad for him that he won’t feel lonely anymore. And I know a lot of people like this character. And that’s fine, in fact I actually think he could’ve been a compelling character. They had some potential for him in the beginning but instead they turned him into a harem anime protagonist. I guess he learns to live life to the fullest, which is fine but this message is never really focused on in many of the episodes. He also misses his family yet we never even see his sister or his mom until episode 15, so we have no visual context for anything he does. I also found it hilarious that he’s nicknamed: “The Black Swordsman.” Well let me tell you he ain’t the real Black Swordsman to me. Idk just seeing this skinny teenager calling himself “The Black Swordsman” was just so funny to me. He isn’t really that convincing of a badass, he’s just kind of powerful from the beginning of the show. And some of the powers he used just didn’t make any sense. This is evident in episode 4 where he somehow becomes immune to sword damage, somehow. Like all the sword attacks just pass through him like he’s a ghost. Where the fuck did he get that ability from? They never established before that he could do that, so how the fuck can he do that? It makes no sense! Now you could argue that this show is made for a more kid friendly audience, but there’s a lot of sexual tension in this show that isn’t really appropriate for kids. Like there’s an older guy who wants to fuck Asuna, a teenager. Like that’s not very family friendly. And watching it as an adult, I found it to be pretty dumb and stupid. So I guess the target audience is teenagers and weeaboos who are still virgins. Which is fine, but like I said before, I don’t think I’m the target demographic for this kind of show and it’s just admittedly personal preference. For me this show is everything I don’t find fun in anime. And maybe this show is supposed to be something you turn your brain off to, but I kind of didn’t want it to be that. I actually think there’s some potential with this show but I’ll get into that later. For now let me talk about the second main character, Asuna. Who didn’t have nearly as much potential as Kazuto. She actually had somewhat of a character arc at the beginning. She becomes a sub leader of the Knights of the Blood and she's more confident in herself thanks to Kirito giving her the motivation needed to step out of her comfort zone of being a lone wolf. But after she falls for Kazuto in episode ten, her character arc abruptly ends and is never developed ever again. She starts focusing on Kazuto and becomes a damsel in distress, which means that she doesn’t really grow as a character. Her traits are that she only has eyes for Kazuto, and she knows how to cook well which is kinda sexist but whatever. As for the other side characters, well I legit have nothing to say about them, because they were pretty forgettable. As far as the dialogue is concerned, all I will say about it is once I first heard one of the characters saying the word “noob,” I immediately cringed so hard that I thought I traveled back in time. Yeah that’s the quality of writing we’re dealing with here. And I’m not saying that I could do better because I’m not a screenwriter, I don’t wanna write stories, I’m just saying the writing really needed some work. Now I don’t wanna sound like too much of an asshole for this review because if I really think about the concept of this show, I guess I could see some potential for it. You have this virtual MMORPG in a fantasy setting, I think you could do a lot with that. I would’ve liked it if this show took more of its time developing the story and characters in a more compelling and natural way. Because as it stands, the pacing in this show is kind of overwhelming. They really needed to slow the tempo of this show down a lot. Like when certain characters died near the beginning of the show, I just didn’t care, because I barely even knew them even though the show tries to make a big deal out of their deaths. And later on I kind of forgot they even existed or mattered as characters since the show was moving at such a fast pace that I didn’t have time to think about their deaths. I think it would’ve been a lot better and more emotional to see these characters suffer more, which would make their eventual victory much sweeter. Because there’s like barely any tension or stakes in this show so I think that’s something that could’ve been improved. I also would’ve liked to see the romance build up longer and then finally pay off in the last few episodes, because seeing Kazuto and Asuna confirming their feelings for one another early on in the show isn’t as satisfying as seeing them getting confirmation way later on. I would’ve liked it if we saw more of Sword Art Online and how it operates as a world. I also think it would’ve been nice to see the real world’s perspective of the game and how it’s affected people’s lives. Maybe we’d see more of Kazuto’s mom and his “sister” and see their perspective on things. It might sound like I’m spitballing ideas here, but it would’ve been cool to see some of my ideas come to fruition, but no, that’s not what happened here. So what did I actually like about this show? Uh, I guess the music was alright, and as generic as the art style was, it at least looked competently made. I’ve mentioned it before in this review but I thought episode 14 was ok. It was the only time where I didn’t know where the show was going to go next. But really the best compliment I can give this show is that it’s semi watchable compared to other things. Like I’d rather watch this than watch School Days ever again. Which isn’t a very high bar to jump over but I’ll take it. Now I can complain and nitpick for more paragraphs but I think you guys get the idea. I just don’t like this show. It’s not one of the worst anime I’ve ever seen but it’s still not good. ORIGINALLY REVIEWED ON 09/25/2023
Reviewer’s Rating: 3
What did you think of this review?
Nice
0
Love it
0
Funny
0
Confusing
0
Informative
0
Well-written
0
Creative
0Show all 
Mar 19, 2024
Vinland Saga Season 2
(Anime)
add
Recommended Spoiler
I know the year hasn't ended yet but imma just call it right now, this is ANIME OF THE YEAR. I know that's a bold claim but I really mean it. And it's really sad that it's not getting the attention it deserves and it's probably because of the new direction that this show is going in. I've heard some people say that it was boring and then they would drop it after the first few episodes and honestly I can see why. Because this new season is a huge contrast to the last one. While the last season was bombastic with awesome action scenes
...
and it had the sense that it needed to prove something, this season is like the exact opposite. This is more of a smaller scale story with more drama and way less action and that aspect isn't going to be for everyone, especially for mainstream anime.
And going into it I didn't know that it was gonna go in that direction because I haven't read the manga. But honestly, I was very pleasantly surprised. This season took a huge risk and I think it paid off beautifully. I was pretty invested with this slow burn of a season and I really appreciated it taking its time building and developing characters and making them interesting. I also think this season gets way more deep and philosophical than the last one. Not that the last season wasn't deep or philosophical, it was. But in this season, I think they really go the extra mile with it. And I'm probably being biased saying all this because I'm a big Vinland Saga fan and it's one of my personal favorite anime that's out right now, but I just really loved this season and I wanna gush about how good it was because I just finished watching it. And I've been watching the English Dub which might sound like a sin for some people, but I thought it made more sense to watch the English Dub for this particular show. Because why the fuck would vikings be speaking Japanese? But anyway, let me talk about the first season real quick. So I watched the first season or the prologue this year for the first time, and I was totally on board. I know people gushed over Askeladd and rightfully so. He's definitely the most fully realized character in that season. But I actually felt the most for Thorfinn who has become one of my favorite anime characters ever. I just felt so bad for him during that season and he was really the only character that I was kinda rooting for. And he also just happened to be extremely badass. Like whenever he used those dual wielding knives against people while masking his face with a hood, it was too fucking cool for me to comprehend. He almost looked like a character straight out of Assassin's Creed. And even though he's pretty one dimensional during that season, I actually think it was fine for me because he's a kid and he's really stubborn, just like most teenagers going through puberty. Like the whole time he's obsessed with killing Askeladd because he killed Thors, his father. It's all he thinks about and he wants to kill him in a duel properly but he loses every fight against him and Askeladd keeps him alive because he's been important in battle. Thorfinn begins to slowly work alongside Askeladd as he kind of becomes a new father figure to him. And I also feel like Thorfinn misinterprets what Thors wants from him as a human being. One of my favorite scenes in season one that really stuck out to me happens in the episode "After Yule." Where Thorfinn is overhearing this preacher telling young Canute and Yule about God as they pray toward a grave that belongs to one of the prisoners that was killed by Askeladd. But the preacher is doubting God for not saving the prisoners. And then Canute is like: "We should never doubt the love of our heavenly father because that's sinful!" Then he walks away as Thorfinn looks at one of his knives and he says: "Father," almost as if he saw Thors as his own God. Or at least that's how I interpreted it. It's such a great subtle moment and if you've read my other reviews, you know I love subtly. There's more moments that I love in this season but I'm talking about season two here so I'm just going to skip to what happens at the end of season one. Because season one ends on one of the depressing notes I've ever seen for an anime. It leaves you just as defeated as Thorfinn himself and that’s just so awesome to me. So Canute is the one that kills Askeladd and Thorfinn has so many conflicting emotions about it just like the viewer. Then Thorfinn gives Canute a scar on his cheek and then he's taken away by Canute's men. And after this season Thorfinn's like: “Oh I didn't get to avenge my dad? Ok, I'm gonna be a fucking slave now." And that's basically where season two begins. A few years have passed as we see Thorfinn deciding on his own to be a slave on a farm and he's basically given up on life and now he has to learn in this season that life is worth living for. This season I kind of see as a big character study on Thorfinn. He also meets his new slave partner Einar who I think is a great character to pair with Thorfinn. And he's also kind of the main character at the beginning, Thorfinn doesn't even appear in the show until the end of the first episode. And I think the creators are smart for doing this cause we get to see a new character fleshed out and it subverts your expectations by showing us somebody we're not familiar with yet. And speaking of new characters, I loved all of them. I don't think there was a bad character or one that I wasn't interested in. I loved Olmar's arc where he wants to be a warrior but he's really scared to. And he's always told by his peers to be brave and courageous and this season is a big lesson for him to learn that it's ok to be scared and afraid because not every guy needs to be macho or unfazed by death. I also loved the character of Snake. Not Solid Snake from Metal Gear Solid but Snake from Vinland Saga. I loved Ketil, Thorgil and Arnheid. I would give more detail on who these characters are but I don't want this review to be too long. And there's a lot of deep and like I said before, philosophical layers and themes to this season but if I was to try and boil it down into one statement, I think it would be violence rids the sins of humanity, and we as an audience are supposed to reject that idea. As far as individual episodes are concerned, episode nine blew me away. This episode is fucking amazing. Not only is it epic and cinematic as hell, it's also just really emotional to the point where I almost couldn't handle it. And I love when the tone of something is straight up miserable and Vinland Saga always scratches that itch. And it is extremely satisfying during the episode "Two Paths" where we see Thorfinn convincing Canute who is now the new king of England to not attack Ketil's farm. And Thorfinn invites Einar to create a new peaceful country and then they depart from Ketil's farm saying goodbye to all the characters that they have been with. I honestly just wanted to cry tears of joy during this episode but I couldn't for some reason. In fact there were plenty of moments during this show where I thought I was gonna get teary eyed but it just didn't happen. That's nothing against the show. I think it's just because I never get too emotional when watching anything, but I really felt like doing it for this season, because the execution is just so powerful. And you know what, if this season had no action scenes I think I would still love it anyway. This show just feels the most real, it feels the most human. My favorite moments aren't even the action scenes, which are still great and exciting even if there's not much of it in this season. My favorite scenes are the ones where characters are talking or arguing with one another. That's how strong the emotion is. And after I watched the last episode, it of course left me very satisfied but it also left me excited for what's to come. And yeah, other than that, I don't really have much else to say about it. Actually that's not true at all. There is way more I wanna say about it but again I don't want this review to be too long. Overall, I'm just really impressed with this show. I honestly couldn't find a bad thing about it or something that personally took me out of the experience and there’s a lot of moments in this season that I’m gonna be thinking about for a long time. I am very much open and looking forward to seeing what happens next in this emotional roller coaster of a show. ORIGINALLY REVIEWED ON 07/04/2023
Reviewer’s Rating: 10
What did you think of this review?
Nice
0
Love it
0
Funny
0
Confusing
0
Informative
0
Well-written
0
Creative
0Show all 
Mar 19, 2024
Highschool of the Dead
(Anime)
add
Not Recommended Spoiler
What the fuck did I even watch? This was one of many questions that I asked myself after finishing Highschool of the Dead. And going into it, I knew it was going to be bad, but I least expected it to be fun. And it definitely had its fun bad moments, but it's basically your standard cliché zombie survival story, with an anime harem twist. But at this point zombies aren't even scary anymore. But I guess The Walking Dead was still popular when this came out so I guess this fit right in with the pop culture landscape at the time. I also guess
...
this show is trying to represent the male fantasy that some horny teenagers think about if they get into a zombie apocalypse with a group of hentai babes. This show is supposed to make boys feel like a badass or a man. And if that's this show's goal, then I guess it succeeds, but that's really the only thing that it succeeds at. There's not really much that I unironically like about this show. I do like the animation and the English Dub voice acting unfortunately, and at least this show is not boring. As bad as this show was to me, I at least enjoyed it out of pure irony. Because realistically, this whole show is pretty bad.
For starters, I feel like the writing is trying too hard to be edgy. I don't know who the author of the manga is, but I wouldn't be surprised if it was like a guy in his 60's thinking of unrealistic dialogue a teenager would say in a zombie apocalypse. There's also a little narration from the main character Takashi 6ix9ine at certain points where he says shit like: "We had to change. The world as we knew it came to an end. We got used to killing zombies." Like, no shit. And he pretty much says this like five times just in different ways. It's like if Black Lagoon was written for adolescent teenagers. And speaking of Black Lagoon, this show also does a lot of cursing and makes pop culture references. Which I don't really mind but in this show it felt kinda awkward. For example, one of the girls references George Romero even though she pronounces his last name wrong. It's not row-MER-oh, it's row-MAIR-oh. Get it right! And I guess some of the jokes where they mentioned popular fashion brands were kinda funny. But really the funniest moments to me was when this show wasn't trying to be funny. There was this one scene near the end of the first episode where Takashi just killed Hisashi after he turned into a zombie. And Rei is really sad about it while also being pissed at Takashi because she thinks Takashi was jealous of Hisashi for dating her, and how she thinks he enjoyed killing him out of revenge. So Takashi decides to leave her saying that he doesn't need to be around her anymore, and then she immediately changes her attitude to be like: "No, stay with me I don't wanna be alone!" So yeah, if you're expecting the female characters to act like real people, then you're watching the wrong show. Because all the female characters are mostly just sex objects and to be attached to Takashi and that's about it. There was also another scene near the end of episode six where Rei was telling Takashi how much better Hisashi was to her and how he wasn't boring like Takashi is. Then Takashi proceeds to yell at Rei that Hisashi is dead and how she has to move on. And then Rei tries to get awkwardly intimate with Takashi. Because if there's one thing that really puts a girl in the mood, it's being yelled at about how their old boyfriend is dead and telling that girl that you killed him. Really the biggest problem with this show is that the tone is all over the place. Like this is a show where some naked girls have a sexual bathroom fight. And in the same episode, a police commander shoots himself in the head and a photograph of his family comes flying out of his pocket. I mean High School DxD was also dumb and stupid to me but at least it had a consistent tone to it. This was like the exact opposite and it was really distracting. And this has nothing to do with the tone, but what's the point of calling this show Highschool of the Dead when the main characters are only at the high school for two episodes? I think calling this show High Schoolers of the Dead or Teenagers of the Dead would've been more appropriate. Another thing is that there are a lot of plot conveniences in this show. Like the blonde chick, Shizuka apparently has an expensive apartment owned by one of her friends who happens to work in the military. And it happens to have all the food, clothes and weapons they need. And the main character happens to know how to ride a motorcycle pretty well. Imagine how much better this show would've been if it wasn't so convenient for the characters and things didn't go according to plan. It would kinda make us feel bad and we'd want our characters to get to safety even more despite our characters being pretty underdeveloped. Except for Saeko who actually gets a backstory. And for some reason she's the only female character who gets a mildly interesting backstory. Or maybe if this show was a commentary about how zombies are still human on the inside and how we should question if they are worth killing or not. I guess this show kind of makes an attempt on that concept with some human riot at one point. And everyone is like: "Don't kill them! They're still humans!" But it's pretty surface level and it's never brought up ever again. Because that's not very interesting, HERE"S SOME BOOBIES!!! In fact sometimes the characters don't really see the zombie apocalypse as that dire. They kind of treat it as a joke at some points. Why should I give a shit if the main characters aren’t more worried or afraid of their situation or struggling with their predicament? I wouldn’t mind asking this but like I said before, this show is tonally inconsistent as there are points where the show is taking itself too seriously. That’s why there’s never any tension in this show. They make it very apparent from the beginning that the main characters are gonna get away Scott free and things are gonna go their way. Suspend your disbelief all you want but I dare you to get invested in anything that happens in this show. This all culminates in the last half which like many times before is taking itself too seriously. Like the plot of this show was pretty simple before and I think the show was more entertaining when it was just dumb fun. But for the last three episodes it tries to be kinda somber in tone and it seems so out of place. Like does this show want to be dumb or does it actually want to say something significant for some reason? Although I think the climax went back to being dumb fun which is what I wanted. But on the flip side, in the 16 minute OVA, they made a joke about Breaking Bad that made me cringe so hard that I was willing to turn the show off right there. That one small moment was when the show finally broke me. But it was the last episode so I kept trudging through it just so I could get this whole show over with. And speaking of OVA, not worth watching, and the ending was really unsatisfying and just shitty. But the part that really made me burst out laughing was when Alice said: "To be continued!" Yet there hasn't been a season two since this show's release. And the manga was discontinued in 2013. Which is pretty heartbreaking if you're a fan of this show for some reason, but I personally don't give a shit because I was never even emotionally attached to this show to begin with. Sorry. But yeah, uh, this is a show that exists and I'll most likely never watch it again. But still I guess I had my fun with it, and it felt pretty short. It was only 12 episodes so it doesn't really waste too much of your time. And other than that, I don't really have much else to say. It's obviously not the worst thing ever. I mean just like High School DxD you can enjoy it ironically and laugh at it like I did but that's about it. ORIGINALLY REVIEWED ON 06/27/2023
Reviewer’s Rating: 4
What did you think of this review?
Nice
0
Love it
0
Funny
0
Confusing
0
Informative
0
Well-written
0
Creative
0Show all 
Mar 19, 2024
Boku no Hero Academia 6th Season
(Anime)
add
Recommended
First of all let me get this off my chest real quick: Can we all collectively agree that My Hero Academia has easily the absolute worst fanbase for an anime ever? Like, if you’re an MHA fan, I really hope that you are mentally stable, because the kind of shit that your fanbase does is really concerning and whack. For example, you guys have no idea how many posts I see on Instagram and Twitter where people have shipping drawings of Deku and Bakugo. Like, what the fuck man? Out of all the characters in this show, why the fuck would you wanna ship those
...
two? If it was like...idk, Deku and Ochako shipping drawings then I guess that would be fine since they have a relationship I think? But no, it's like they blindly pick these characters out of a hat and then are like: "Yeah, let's just ship those characters even if it doesn't make any sense."
And that's just the tip of the iceberg. There is a plethora of weird and toxic shit that the MHA fanbase loves to do like it's a goddamn pastime of theirs but I honestly don't wanna go too deep into that rabbit hole for this review because I don't want this review to turn into a rant about the insane asylum that is the MHA fanbase. But I feel like it's important to bring up because a lot of people say that the fanbase ruined this show and I have to agree, the fanbase for this series absolutely sucks and I never wanna be apart of it thank you very much. Now as for the show itself, if we could just pretend for a moment that the fanbase isn't a problem, what do I think about it? Well, I guess I like it. I mean, I'm not a huge fan or anything like that and it's not really one of my favorites, but I think it's a fun show that I mostly enjoy when it's on. I personally like to call it "Anime X-Men" because this show reminds me SO much of X-Men and just Marvel superheroes in general and since I just naturally like superheroes I'm pretty much destined to at least like this series. And I was actually looking forward to watching this new season since it has the highest MAL rating out of all the other seasons and I was hoping it wouldn't be as uneventful and underwhelming like season 5 was. And I'm happy to say that I enjoyed it way more than I thought I would. I think this series realized that the last season was kind of a dud because with this season, they go in guns blazing. This season kinda felt like the last season to me, even though it isn't. Which I have no idea when this show is going to end, it seems like they are setting up the finale, but apparently the manga is still being published soooo...who fucking knows? But despite that I think they set up the "finale" quite well. The season really starts with a bang as we get this huge superhero battle. And things certainly get more interesting once certain plot twists are revealed. And honestly there was one twist that I didn't really see coming even though I probably should have noticed it. And I also liked how this season took itself a little more seriously than any of the other seasons. This whole season is a huge turning point in the show so it makes sense that they would handle the situation a little more maturely than other seasons. Another thing I noticed is that there's barely any Mineta in this season. Let's be honest, that guy is easily the worst character in this whole goddamn series. And I think the show has realized that because they have seem to utilize him less and less throughout the show's progression to the point where he's not even that much of a main factor anymore. Which is both hilarious to me and a huge improvement because I cannot stand when that character is on screen. I CAN'T STAND HIM GODDAMMIT!!! I also like the direction that Deku goes through near the end of this season, he becomes kind of a badass and it was pretty fun to watch. But to complain a bit, I still don't like how some characters aren't getting much development, or sometimes getting no development. Like when a certain teacher died, I didn't feel much because I didn't really know that character on a personal level. In fact there's still some characters that feel like background characters to me. Hopefully in the next season they give them all satisfying development and conclusions but we'll just have to wait and see. And another thing is that even though the middle act kind of excited me, it didn't really pay off as much as I liked. I think this season really peaked during the first half but it kinda lost its steam during the halfway point. But it's still far from a bad story. And for once, I'm actually looking forward to seeing what happens next. And I think this show is at its best when it gets to the point or gets to the stuff that people want to see, like amazing animation, cool action, good development between characters and a nice emotional core. I think that's why shows like Demon Slayer and Jujutsu Kaisen have become so successful because they don't waste your time on dumb shit. This show is at its worst when it's doing exactly what those two shows are NOT doing. Like adding more slice of life drama when there already is enough of that in this show, then attempting to balance that with the superhero action. Not that I'm against more normal moments in a shounen anime, but this show does it kinda poorly for the most part. But this season seemed to forego a lot of that and I'm so glad it did. ORIGINALLY REVIEWED ON 06/26/2023
Reviewer’s Rating: 8
What did you think of this review?
Nice
0
Love it
0
Funny
0
Confusing
0
Informative
0
Well-written
0
Creative
0Show all |