Report Kiwii_121's Profile

Hey there, once again sorry for the late reply, Christmas and New Years were busy and I'd been somewhat more inactive on online stuff lately. I *finally* sent you the friend request on Discord though, so if you see some 🤓 with a cute cat profile pic, with the initials CS, that's me 👋
You're probably right, it'd be more efficient to move these conversations over to there.

Oh and I finally got around to watching Sonny Boy - seems I had underestimated the anime after all, it was very different to what I had initially thought it would turn out to be. Still thinking about it, trying to put my thoughts about it into words later...

I've finished Boogiepop and really liked it. It's really hard to describe in words what happens, but it's not artsy fartsy symbolism, the arc's stories are gripping and move forward. I'd rate both seasons at 7.5/10. So this may end up with an 8 for S1 and 7 for S2 to express it. My 256 character tag notes are:

S1: Universe in which the line between the supernatural, teen angst and psychology blur. Using unreliable and non-linear narration, events and characters are spun into a dark, holistic dreamscape. There's plenty of substance, not mere artsy fartsy symbolism.

S2 is less episodic and otherworldly, telling 4 arcs driven by personified psychological issues. The supernatural dark teen angst world from S1 is present in the backdrop. A more straightforward narrative style doesn't sacrifice the atmosphere and mystery.

From what I read, Boogiepop makes extensive use of POV narration and the unreliable narrator technique. I.e. the same event is presented trough different eyes and with different narrator context / knowlege. I'm used to that and of course that makes the whole narrative corpus holistic - i.e. it can only be understood as a whole after the fact. Rashomon and Twin Peaks are often credited to pioneer this style, and I've survived both. So fear not for me :)

Thanks for the first hand info, you very obviously spent some research. I've checked multiple "watch order" threads and the fandom wiki. My conclusion was to go with 2019/1-3 -> 2000/1-11 -> 2019/4-18 -> 2000/12, and skip the movie as it's not anime. The latter obviously isn't a good idea. The order is "almost LN release order", ie. I would not go for full chrono order because like you most articles say that it's not that easy. I'll have a 2nd look based on your input, thanks for that!

Sooooo, I originally wanted to reply back to you once I had finished the Eighth and Final Episode of Umineko (which has really surprised me so far), but since I guessed that I would probably take me a while longer to actually finish it I'll just have to message you about my final thoughts and all once I'm done later, cause I didn't really wanna leave you hanging here. :I

First of all: I hope you had a pleasant Christmas time, as well as a good start into the New Year! I spent most of my holidays here with my family and it was a really relaxing time, we didn't really do anything special apart from our traditional dinners for Christmas and New Year's Eve. Since buying fireworks has apparently been forbidden since last year (I honestly didn't really notice that lol), New Year's celebrations were rather silent, since the only fireworks being fired were other people's leftovers from last year or imports from our surrounding countries. Well anyway... :)

Thanks for another bit of Japanese name trivia in the beginning of your last message there. I only recently noticed that the price tag for "Love" during one of Hachikuji's and Araragi's discussions in Nisemonogatari wasn't seemingly random either, but instead could be read backwards as "8=hachi 9=ku 2=ji", although it seems that there was no real meaning (as in foreshadowing or something like that) for the later parts of the series behind that. The rest of the cast's names (like in Ougi's case) have pretty cool names, like you described with that example.
I started reading the Sayonara Zetsubou Sensei manga a few weeks ago (currently about 1/6 into it), and it's actually been more fun than I had imagined. Seeing the many similarities and differences between the manga and the anime is definetly part of what entertains me. And now, although the thing about Zetsubou-Sensei's name is explained a bit in the beginning, without further actual knowledge on the Kanji themself, I can still only grasp the joke on it on a "read knowledge" (=/= "understood") level. In any case, the other members of the Itoshiki family each have their own wordplays with their names. I'm still excited how this manga will keep going for the rest of the 5/6, since it amazes me how media of this sort can stay in publishing for such a duration (similarly to Seitokai Yakuindomo).


Quick update on Umineko: Episode 6 and 7 might've been my favorites so far (not saying that some of the question episodes were bad or anything), but they felt pretty unexpected to me and just had me really hooked on the story. Episode 8's intro was great, being able to see a "happy" Rokkenjima for once (even if it's not real), was just really uplifting, and I liked seeing the positive twists on each character. Erika returning was a cool twist and I'm looking forward to seeing how her Battle with Battler will go.
I think I actually saw the video you sent there somewhere before - and yeah, it must've been WazEvergarden's profile haha. The voice acting really changed my view on the characters a bit, I mean, I knew that Erika is "a bit twisted", but actually hearing those lines does make have an impact.
Might continue with the Higurashi anime soon too - without spoiling (if possible), why was the ending terrible? I'd heard that from other people as well, but was wondering what that meant exactly.

I recently checked whether there were any local places here for people to borrow/buy stuff like manga/LN from, but sadly we only got a rather small bookstore (with what appeared to mostly be German releases - I'd definetly prefer reading in English), with a not so big assortment of titles, as well as a small library which I haven't checked out yet. In general, I'd definetly like to support the manga industry by being able to buy physical copies (as every chapter of the Umineko scans, and many other scans I've read have mentioned as well), but the localisation thing just isn't really good, sadly. Of course, pirating is a whole nother issue, and you might've heard about the CODA thing as well: news, I just wish the whole matter would work better worldwide.

I also took a mental note to watch the KareKano anime (maybe also read the manga afterwards), sometime! :)

Watching Code Geass after Guilty Crown made me realise that Code Geass pretty much was "everything Guilty Crown ever hoped to be", but in the end, both felt to me like they tried to be a bit "too much of everything" at once. The random moments in CG were fun indeed, such as the cat episode. I'm also not planning on watching any of the spinoffs/movies/extras and whatever else the franchise has to offer, for now. But at least I can understand Code Geass references (such as those in Zetsubou Sensei) better, next time.

The thing you mention about 3-gatsu no Lion consistently portraying failure is one thing I also really liked about the series as a whole, and part of what made it feel so "realistic", along with how every character was not just a "character" (in the show to serve some purpose), but an actual "person", somebody who has their own goals, dreams, characteristics, etc... That part in the 2nd season leading to the burnt field was an amazing arc, and it was definetly worth seeing all the characters from more than just one perspective!
Concerning Souji Touya - it's the same for me. Those episodes in the 2nd season that showed how "broken" he was, contrary to the general view of him as "some chess prodigy".
It definetly does relate to Hibike Euphonium's third movie - I was really not expecting them to "completely fail" that competition! Now I'm left waiting with all the others for another season sometime in the future...
A few of the facial expressions from the Zetsubou Sensei manga did indeed seem similar to some in 3-gatsu no Lion. Another mental note taken for me to watch HachiClo.


What's your opinion on the Pompo Movie? Personally, I enjoyed it quite a lot. It just felt refreshing, maybe just because it was so different from the stuff I've been watching lately; the visual style, the voice acting, the soundtrack just made for a fun 90 minutes. I have no idea why Nathalie just busted out some dance moves in this scene though:


Oh yeah, I also got around to watching the second season + specials of Hidamari Sketch - I don't quite know what it was, but somehow it just felt "more impressive". I couldn't bring myself to skip the openings even once, they were fantastic. All in all, it was just one pleasant bundle of wholesomeness, and since I was watching it before bed, it was actually kind of difficult to not fall asleep at times, the show was just *that* relaxing.
And the specials just start of with this: video ❤

I watched the Kino no Tabi special/movie as well, the prequel that bridges the gap between Kino's escape from her country and becoming a proficient gun wielder. I can see why you said it was important. All in all, it felt like another episode of the main series, and I enjoyed it as an extra as such.



I think I've covered pretty much all I had on my mind for now.... I hope you've been doing well and all, and until next time! :]

actual goated taste

Oof - once again I was a bit busy over the weekend, I'd wanted to reply by last Friday but whatever 🥴



It's cool that we were thinking of the same Monogatari AMV! Man, the Kizu movies were just some seriously phenomenal experiences...
Funnily enough, I think Namae no Nai Kaibutsu was one of the first songs I heard of Egoist myself as well (also not aware that it was Psycho Pass's ending song, I heard the series is good though, also from a couple of friends so I really should watch it sometime).
As for "My Dearest", I'm not really sure why I like it so much. The anime opening version just really struck me with the first ~10 seconds in the beginning and I love the buildup, which can be heard even better in this version for example:


Your digression on Tribe Nine was fun to read. I have still not played the games, but I'll try to get to them some day (a few of my friends also *really really* recommend them, so I'm sure they're great). Speaking of games though, while not anime-related, the one I'm looking forward to most at the moment is the PC release of Monster Hunter Rise in January. MH World was a fantastic game and I've had a lot of fun playing it with 3 friends for over a year, also more than a year ago. Incidentally it was my first MH game, which is understandable I guess, since World was the entry that seemed to really open up the series to newcomers and I have to say it did a great job at that. Having played the PC port, I came to appreciate the effort put into making the controls work for mouse & keyboard (since I still don't have a controller for PC, for whatever reason...), especially when I tried out Nioh with a pair of friends some months ago. The controls there were terrible and I just couldn't get into it sadly. Anyway, back to your topic, lemme know if the other games you were talking about are any good! :)



Huh what you said about Berserk makes sense. The thing about characters being "irrelevant" like that is something that often bothers me. It works either way, for protagnists and antagonists. Why even bother to get attached/hate a certain character if they're just gonna be gone in a few chapters anyway. And cramming in as much violence as possible, in an open manner, also doesn't sound all that necessary in my opinion. I like those sort of things more when they're rather just "implied", enough info to get what's going on, but you don't actually have to see it. But that's just a personal standpoint. I'll keep in mind to watch the anime before the manga though, thanks for that recommendation, it sounds like a good idea.
EDIT: Oh I've also somehow stumbled upon "Beast in Black" on YouTube, I think through their cover of Micheal Jackson's "They Don't Care About Us" at first, and I remember asking a friend (who's more into that whole Metal genre than I am), if he knew about the band, but surprisingly, the other friend of mine who was there at the time pointed out that they were the ones who made Berserk-themed music a while ago, and so this kind of fits here: Some Beast in Black lore.

I haven't been reading all that much manga lately myself - but I caught up on Witch Hat Atelier, it's become one of my current favorites for sure. I don't really know how to actually put it into words, but it's just been a really fun and interesting manga for me. The art is fantastic, it blends tense passages with comical interludes pretty well, the characters are fun and all have their own stuff going on, the worldbuilding is awesome and I like the background thematic with witches & "normal people" as a conflict setting. It's amazing how this series is like 9 volumes in when the story still feels like it hasn't even really started yet!
I'm also planning to finally get back onto Umineko now, continuing with Episode 5, so I'll have to see how that goes.

That's almost it though. I finished Hibike Euphonium 2, the Kakushigoto song was awesome in it (Kimiwa Tennenshoku), I've still got the sequel movie to watch. Finished Code Geass' first season last week as well, it took me longer than expected, and I've got the second part still ahead of me as part of a small group watch with a couple of friends. First season was alright but had many really really weird aspects in it, which I won't go into detail in right now, let's just say it meshed up a few more topics than what I think might have been enough. For whatever reason I binged the first two seasons of Yuru Yuri (here we are back at the "Doga Kobo makes good bad anime" topic), which I thought I would hate, but it's been great to watch before going to bed just because it was fun, lighthearted and exactly some of the parody comedy that I enjoy.

Anyway, I hope Detective Conan's been fun so far - I used to watch it dubbed on TV as a kid and it's for sure something that just keeps going and going, just like Pokemon, and if you like some of the episodes, you're practically guaranteed gonna enjoy it for quite a while. See you around next time, got another assignment to work on/finish today. :P 👋

Ah damn it, I had wanted to reply sometime earlier this week but somehow I just didn't get around to it... Anyway....
When I woke up today I was surprised to see that we've had our first snowfall of the year, and although it was nothing much it did put me more into the Christmas/December mood which is now just around the corner! We've also got some guests coming this weekend (my uncles), which will probably be quite lively. Black Friday (week) was something that happened too this week, which always confuses me, seeing as (I think) it originated from America around the time of Thanksgiving, where - as a token of appreciation - people celebrate by buying stuff? I guess it is more of an ad campaign nowadays, so whatever - does Brazil also do that kinda stuff?

Moving on to the more important other stuff...