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Jun 23, 2022
If I had to describe Gaikotsu Kishi in one word, that word would no doubt be "infuriating."
Gaikotsu Kishi-sama, Tadaima Isekai e Odekakechuu is the most generic power trip isekai imaginable, but this time with a twist: the main character is a skeleton! Incredible. It truly is an ingenious choice, as without being a skeleton Arc would be the least interesting character of all time. Besides for Arc's overly formal speech patterns, I struggle to come up with even a single aspect of his personality. He has no discernible motivations for anything he does, and neither does he seem to care about much of anything. After
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being isekai'd he just decides "oh okay I'm gonna live here now :)" and that's it. The entire reason the second half of the show happens is because he goes "oooh elf! fantasy! woohoo!" and decides to tag along with Ariane and see what happens. It's like the author literally could not care less. Speaking of Ariane, she is the only other actual character in this show. Her defining features? There's two of them, and they're both on her chest. Classic anime moment.
These two dogshit characters act out an equally dogshit plot. Arc is supposed to be pretty much the most OP being in the universe, and that is demonstrably true given that every time he fights he wins in like one attack. But now our not very intelligent author has hit a roadblock: "how do I create any sort of tension or conflict when my main character is super duper OP?" To solve this predicament, the author has decided to have Arc literally just sit there and do nothing. Arc sees a group of ruffians kidnapping elves? He just sits there and watches when he could kill them all in one hit, just so that Ariane can have her epic entrance. Some weak as shit minor antagonist has popped up in episode 11? Arc has to just stand there and watch him talk for literally the entire episode, when instead he could kill the guy in 0.25 seconds. This, of course, is because we wouldn't have a 24 minute episode if Arc just killed the dude. In that same episode, some beast creature is about to clobber a passed out Ariane. What does Arc do? Does he use his instant teleportation skill to block the attack? Does he just kill the monster before it can attack? Nah. He just stands there, so that some other side characters can show up to save the day. There is no justifiable reason for anything to happen the way it does, other than that the author is lazy as hell and has no idea what he is doing. Everything anyone does is done for the sake of plot convenience. The characters are quite literally used as plot devices, rather than being actual characters with coherent thoughts and motivations.
In conclusion, I hate this show and it pissed me off. Thanks for reading.
Reviewer’s Rating: 5
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Nov 30, 2019
Why is this low budget powerpoint presentation with an incoherent plot sitting at an 8.72? Seriously, besides sound, what redeemable aspect is there here?
I'm not even really sure why I watched this; I knew it would be completely terrible. After the shameless plagiarism, non-existent characterization, and bizarre pseudoscience of the parent show, literally no one with any shred of self-respect or decency wanted a sequel. Yet here it is, and it's somehow exponentially worse than its already terrible prequel.
Let's start off with characters, shall we? The focus character of this movie is nobody's favorite character, Mai Sakurajima But She Doesn't Have a Rabbit Hair Clip.
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Seriously though, they just recycled Mai's character design for Makinohara's grown-up version. Nice!
In terms of characterization, there's not much to say. None of the characters even remotely resemble real humans. They're completely contrived to do whatever is needed to progress the plot. Nothing they do is based on human emotion, and rarely is it ever based on rationality. Although this was a problem in the original show, it's even worse in the movie; none of the characters have any defining character traits whatsoever. Mai really likes Sakuta, Sakuta really likes making sex jokes that no one above the age of 11 finds funny, and that's about it. Instead of giving the characters any sort of personality, hack faux-author Hajime Kamoshida instead decides to have them break down into tears every 4 minutes, because crying is sad, and sad is good. Clearly, he's learning from other successful faux-authors like Makoto Shinkai.
The plot is fucking terrible. Like, who came up with this? Did someone just go, "Hey, you know how Steins;Gate is super successful? What if we just completely ripped off the end of Steins;Gate, except instead of Sci-Fi we just explain it away with a bullshit surface-level interpretation of quantum mechanics?" Time travel isn't something I'd usually complain about since shows usually don't try to explain it with actual science. As with all the scientific explanations of the parent show, Futaba gives you some sort of vague bullshit, and you have to accept it because the author said so.
Moving away from the science aspect, the movie's plot completely falls apart due to abhorrent execution. There's no transitioning between scenes; there's no flow. Things just kinda happen. It's already impossible to be emotionally invested in this pathetically written tearjerker due to how horribly characterized the characters are, but this makes it even worse. The plot follows a fairly simple time-travel formula: nothing happens for the entire first half of the movie, some really bad thing happens out of nowhere, and now the MC has to undo the bad thing. There's nothing interesting about it. The hugely shocking scene about halfway into the movie is just dropped onto you out of nowhere, and literally only serves as a plot device for the MC to realize that his previous attitude was wrong (I'm keeping this in vague terms to avoid spoilers). Despite all of its flaws, with decent execution, the plot could be alright at best. Unfortunately, considering that this movie literally has the flow of a powerpoint presentation, the execution is far, far below decent.
The complete lack of competent pacing makes the already confusing plot even more difficult to follow. Think about what Steins;Gate would've been like if all the worldline stuff wasn't properly explained. You'd have no idea what's going on, right? That's exactly how it feels to watch this entire movie. "Oh, this is happening because of puberty syndrome" is pretty much the only explanation you're ever given. These aren't just the ramblings of someone who hates the franchise; two of my friends, who both enjoyed the movie a good amount, both admitted they had no clue what was happening. There are also like 4 threads asking for explanations about the plot/ending in the movie's forum section.
The art is pretty much the same as the parent show, meaning that it still isn't good. The throw-up-in-your-mouth CGI crowds are also still here, which is really nice. The OST is unmemorable; the voice acting is pretty good.
Overall, barring episode 7 of Babylon, this movie was the least enjoyable experience of my entire life. The entire 90 minutes of this abhorrently paced, incoherent, and ugly insult to cinematography evoked in me not even a single emotion. Even KimiSui was sadder than this disgrace to Japanese cartoons.
Reviewer’s Rating: 1
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Oct 13, 2019
It's been about a month and a half since I finished this show, and yet, I'm still pissed at how bad it was. As such, it's time for my first non-seasonal review in like half a year.
What are the key components of a good murder mystery? First, and quite obviously, is the mystery itself. The mystery has to be clever, in such a way that the solution is unexpected, yet logical. The viewer also has to have adequate engagement with the story and be able to figure out the mystery for himself. Secondly, and also quite obviously, there is the investigation. The detective looks for
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clues, talks to witnesses, and pieces together the final picture, all while providing the same information to the viewer. And lastly, there has to be suspense. The viewer has to be invested in the story. If there is no suspense, the viewer simply doesn't give a shit and the solution to the mystery falls completely flat. Common sense, right?
Well, The Perfect Insider (right up there with KADO: The Right Answer for most cringy/edgy anime title) has none of those elements.
The mystery itself is pathetic, and literally anybody should be able to figure it out in the first five episodes of the show. As I want to spoil as little as possible, I can't really explain why, but I'll try anyway. The key to the mystery is given to you nearly instantly. When the corpse first rolls out (literally, it rolls out), there is an immediately noticeable age difference between the corpse and the supposed victim. The corpse looks about 14 years old, but the supposed victim is around 30. Hm, I wonder what could possibly explain that! I've got no clue! (By the way, the show explains this away as "she doesn't age". Uh, what?) Secondly, the door to the room the corpse rolls out from hasn't been opened in like 15 years or something, so the supposed victim, the *woman* inside, is the only possible victim! But who could've killed her! Hmmmmmmm. Take a moment and try to piece the two strings of information together. Besides suicide, how could a woman be murdered in a room that has undoubtedly not been entered by anyone in 15 years, and why would the corpse look like a 15-year-old instead of a 30-year-old? Gee, I just have no clue.
Moving on to the second aspect: The Perfect Insider must be the first murder mystery ever where the characters legitimately do not investigate (besides for like one episode of them walking around the victim's room and looking at her PC). Although this is reasonable, considering how absurdly simple the mystery is, it doesn't make for good entertainment. The entirety of the show is dialogue, and most of the dialogue is infodumps. For like eight episodes, the two main characters just talk to each other until one of them goes "haha! I've figured it out!", and that's it.
And, if it's not yet obvious, there's no suspense. My experience of watching The Perfect Insider went something like this:
Episodes 1-3: "why the fuck are they talking for 3/11 episodes of a murder mystery before the murder ever happens?"
End of episode 3: "ah looks like the murder finally happened. why is the corpse limbless, wearing a wedding dress, and rolling out on a sci-fi robot trolley? did sakae esuno write this?"
Episodes 4-11: "zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz"
Like, the show somehow managed to get more boring AFTER the murder occurred. That's really impressive tbh. I guess the only thing more boring than the buildup to a murder mystery is a murder mystery that you've already solved.
Another important aspect that needs to be noted is the sheer amount of edge. (Just as a reference, since "edgy" constantly gets thrown around as a meaningless criticism, my definition is "excessively dark to the point of being comical or difficult to take seriously"). Now, I'm usually a fan of edgy shows. I enjoyed Mirai Nikki, Akame ga Kill, and even Arifureta a fair amount. But holy shit this is just too much. Here are just a few of the hyper-edgy aspects of the show:
1. The state of the corpse as previously mentioned
2. The supposed victim stabbed her parents to death for virtually no reason when she was 15. The show and the main character, by the way, treat this as a normal thing, because "it's natural for a child to want to kill their parents" or some retarded shit like that.
3. One of the characters has an extremely fucked up, incestuous relationship
4. Not a single character cares about the murders, or that they are trapped with a murderer in a facility that you can't enter or exit. They just treat it as an everyday occurrence and move on with their lives.
5. The whole conclusion to the show (about the last four episodes or so) is asininely edgy, to the point that it's unbelievable. As I'm trying to keep this review spoiler-free, I'd refer you to the second-to-last paragraph of Flawfinder's review (4th top one), if you want to spoil yourself.
As for characters, the 2/10 rating of "dreadful" is quite accurate. Besides the three main characters, no other characters exist in the show. The most favorited side character has 7 favorites, and he has about four minutes of screentime before never again appearing in the show.
Main character 1: Psycho Bitch. She mainly appears in flashbacks, and she's really smart. She's also insane, as she killed her parents. That's literally it.
Main character 2: Emo Genius. This guy, just like main character 3, isn't a character. He is a plot device. He is the detective in the case, and that's it. He also often says depressed, pseudo-philosophical things that pretend to be deep. My favorite one of these is as follows:
"Whenever I get up in the morning, I always think to myself, 'Am I really the same person I was yesterday?' For example, just as a computer loads its OS into memory and boots up each time it restarts, is it possible I'm just booting up the person called 'Saikawa Souhei' each morning and trying to play that role?"
What the fuck does that mean? Nothing. It means nothing. It's pretentious, faux-intellectual garbage masquerading as philosophy.
Main character 3: Horny Sounding Board. My favorite one of the three, as she is neither obnoxious nor insane. She exists so that Emo Genius has someone to tell his bullshit and expository dialogue to. She also wants to fuck him.
Sound: Why is every show with a KANA-BOON opening always shit? Seriously, why is one of the best Japanese bands relegated to dogshit like this, Sarazanmai, and Boruto? The OST is pretty good tbh. I'd have given the sound an 8 if not for a ten-minute-long conversation that was entirely in Engrish. Literal ear rape.
Art: The best part of this is that the original character designs are done by Asano Inio, the king of faux-intellectualism. That's just incredibly ironic. Other than that, the art is ok. This being a 2015 A-1 Pictures show pretty much says everything.
In conclusion, this is by far the worst mystery I've encountered not only in anime but in any type of literature whatsoever. It would perhaps be passable as a novel, but it fails as a work of an audiovisual medium. The whole show consists of infodumps, the mystery is easily solvable, and not even the characters give a shit about the case.
Reviewer’s Rating: 3
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Aug 30, 2019
I just don't get what the appeal of this show could be.
First, let's get this out of the way: I fucking hate the 'Historical' tag. Every time I see the Historical tag, I get fooled into thinking the show is realistic. After all, you'd assume that something that is 'historical' would be true to history. Even working with the lax definition of "set in the past", you'd still expect a sense of realism. Yet every time without fail, I am continuously disappointed. Instead of being set in the past, every 'Historical' show is set in an alternate universe's past—one in which any bullshit is excusable
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(after all, it's anime!). This is fine in shows like Baccano and Kuroshitsuji, where the historical aspect isn't that relevant. The lack of realism in Vinland Saga, however, is a massive stab in the back. The action scenes are boring as fuck due to a lack of cool superpowers, so you'd assume the show would want to present itself as something realistic. But no, the very next second, some chad singlehandedly beats dozens of armed men with his bare hands, a kid somehow kills an adult soldier with a knife, these dudes literally sprint at really high speeds while carrying a SHIP on their backs, and some dude throws an ax, decapitating four people in a row. The fights are boring due to realism, yet they are ruined due to... a lack of realism? It's almost like the show is having an identity crisis and doesn't know what it's supposed to be. That's not my biggest problem with the 'Historical' tag, however. My biggest problem is that I was fooled into thinking I would get to watch an interesting show, only to be presented a generic battle shounen (despite what the Seinen tag may suggest) with a slight twist to its setting.
The plot is ingenious. This dude's dad gets killed by this other guy, so now the dude is traveling with the other guy to get revenge. Except the dude spends more time helping the other guy out than he does getting revenge. Cool.
Since there is no plot, you'd think the characters have to be good, right? After all, there has to be a reason this pile of trash gets near-unanimous praise. Well, fuck you haha! We've got the worst main character I've seen since Takumi Nishijou, some dude who can only be described with the word "cool", and then the MC's dad who is just a naive degenerate. Thank god that dude died due to his mindnumbing stupidity! Dude unironically thought a pirate would keep the promise of a duel, and then when his son got taken hostage because, well, you're up against pirates, he just let himself die. What a genius! Is there any trope more obnoxious than self-righteous, moral high ground characters like these? "If you kill your enemies, you're as bad as them!" Fuck off. You live in the Viking age, not the 21st century.
Seriously though, Thorfinn must be the most obnoxious anime character ever made. He was already annoying as fuck as a little kid, but his grown-up version is 10x worse. "My dad died, so since I'm traumatized by that, I have to be SUPER edgy! I have to go "grrrrrrrrr" and look angry whenever I am on screen, because I am angry that my dad died, and I want revenge. Grrrrrrrr!" Other than that, the dude has no personality whatsoever. The dude doesn't even speak unless it's to say something extremely edgy that sounds like it came straight out of a conversation in The Perfect Insider. Where are all those people who hate how edgy Akame ga Kill and Mirai Nikki are when you need them?
And then we've got Askeladd, who is some weird fusion between F/Z Gilgamesh and the protagonist of Arifureta. He is what would be created if you told a 12-year-old to make a cool character. I can see why this is one of the best shows in the past decade. Definitely.
The sound has also shocked me—and not in a good way. Yutaka Yamada, the guy who made Tokyo Ghoul's soundtrack (which is one of my all-time favorite anime soundtracks) is finally back in another relevant show, and.... the result is quite forgettable. Like, the OST is just... average. On the other hand, the OP is impressive. Not only is it an overall great song, but it also matches the show well. That part where the dude screams his lungs out with no warning pretty much exactly describes Thorfinn. The ED must be the only Aimer song that I have ever disliked.
Now, let's get to the art section. There are three points to make here:
1. Episode 1 looks stunning
2. Everything after that doesn't
3. The CGI is a 1/10
Seriously, how are we in 2019, two years after the release of Houseki no Kuni (which still features the best use of CGI in anime), and big-name studios with massive budgets like Wit are pumping out such horrendous CGI? You'd think they'd learn how much bad CGI can ruin a show after Overlord III got released, but no, they never do. What's even worse is the blending between the 2D and the CGI. It's legitimately disturbing.
On the other hand, the animation and art are pretty good. Unfortunately, unlike a good battle shounen, Kimetsu no Yaiba (which is also made by a good studio, ufotable), Vinland Saga has been unable to maintain its level of visual quality. Pretty much every episode the animation dips in quality. It has, in its eight episodes so far, went from 10/10 animation to 7/10 animation. The 2D art, however, stays really good throughout.
And so, I'll end this review by quoting the current top review for this show. "Are you interested in Vikings and Norse mythology? [Do y]ou want stunning animated action scenes? Good [world-building]? Great character development?" Well, if you do, look somewhere else. This pretty much isn't about Vikings due to its lack of realism. This is as much about Vikings as DanMachi is about mythology. The "stunning animated action scenes" don't exist past episode one. The world-building is alright at best. The character development is laughable. I simply don't understand why people like Zombieland Saga (haha get it they both have 'Saga' in their names haha comedy gold!). Nothing about it is outstanding—not even the production values.
Reviewer’s Rating: 5
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Aug 17, 2019
2015 was certainly an interesting year. The SCOTUS legalized gay marriage, Subway's Jared got exposed for being a pedophile, and DanMachi was about dungeons. Now, in 2019, DanMachi is not about dungeons. DanMachi is now about fanservice and whatever happened in the first four episodes.
The first arc of this season is unbelievably bad. The main antagonist of the arc decides that he wants Bell for himself and challenges our protagonists to a War Game. Ignoring the comically stupid motivations of the main antagonist, this almost sounds cool, doesn't it? Except there are three episodes of setup and one episode of War Game. Fantastic!
In reality, however,
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the terrible pacing is a blessing in disguise, as episode four is far worse than the first three episodes. In the War Game, Hestia's familia has 5 combatants, while Apollo has like 100+. But hey, who cares! Everyone in Hestia's familia can take on dozens of Apollo's fighters singlehandedly. This might make sense for Ryu, who is a much higher level adventurer than everyone else. What doesn't make sense is Welf and Mikoto being able to beat dozens of adventurers of the same level as them with literally one attack. "Oh, but Mikoto has an OP spell! Oh, but Welf has an OP magic sword!" One of the worst things a show can do is contradict its own world-building. Why were we told so much about adventurer levels only for them to get defenestrated in this episode?
That's not even the worst part of what is certainly one of the worst anime episodes ever created. The worst part comes in when Bell fights Apollo's commander. That guy beat Bell to a pulp with his bare hands a couple of episodes ago, but now, Bell can beat him easily. Why? He trained pretty much offscreen for a couple of episodes! That makes him comically OP! So comically OP, in fact, that he literally beat the guy with a kick and a punch. This juvenile writing should be insulting to any fan of the first season.
After those four atrocious episodes, we get two fanservice eps in a row. Unlike the creators of KonoSuba, however, the people responsible expect you to take this season seriously. Episode 5 is slice of life with a bath scene. Episode 6 is Bell hanging out with a bunch of prostitutes. Fun! I don't have a problem with fanservice in itself; but when there is no substance whatsoever behind the fanservice, that's annoying. I remember when Bell was fighting a minotaur in season one. Can we bring that back? That was pretty cool.
From protagonists becoming comically OP despite doing nothing to deserve it, to the absurd ratio of "plot" to plot, this season feels like some 12-year-old's power trip. If you want to see female anime characters get objectified, go watch HDxD or something. There are plenty of way better fanservice shows. If you want good fight scenes, you won't find them here, because the animators seem to give up on animating every other fight scene. As such, there is literally nothing redeeming here, unless you like bad fight scenes and mediocre fanservice. J.C.Staff already ruined DAL and Index, and here's the latest victim of their never-ending spree of destroying beloved franchises.
Reviewer’s Rating: 4
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Jun 26, 2019
After being killed for no reason whatsoever, an average salary-man is reincarnated into a fantasy world. Upon his reincarnation, he meets one of the most powerful beings in the universe. Entering a familial relationship with this being, the protagonist becomes extremely overpowered. Following this, every character who knows about the MC's awesomeness does little but talk about how awesome he is. All the while, we have an insanely bland cast of side characters and really generic art, with barely any overarching plot.
Some dude from an insanely influential family enrolls in a magic high school. Turns out, this dude is the most overpowered creature in the
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universe. Not only is he so overpowered that he can create whole new types of magic and magic gear (did i mention that he is completely invincible), but he is also absurdly good at hand-to-hand combat. Every side character, unable to even hope of competing with the MC's awesomeness, just kinda sits there in awe of his overpoweredness. The whole show is pretty much about how cool and OP the MC is.
I'm talking about TenSura and Mahouka, right? Well, you're wrong. I'm actually talking about the anme industry's newest indistinguishable stream of visual diarrhea, pumped out for the sole purpose of turning a profit by pandering to insecure men who seek escapism in the form of anime with insanely overpowered blank slate self-inserts MCs.
Special shoutout to my favorite joke of the show: some irrelevant side character tells the MC to hold back on his magic powers. The MC completely annihilates the room they are in, and then says "haha sorry I was holding back". Wow. Now this is truly the pinnacle of comedy, refined and perfected after centuries of studying such pioneering comedians as Aristophanes and Dante. How could the anime industry possibly hope to compete against such creative genius? Shows like Yojouhan and Kaguya-sama simply can't rival the intellectual titan known as Tsuyoshi Yoshioka.
Oh, and, I couldn't possibly end this review without crediting the greatest peak of creativity brought to us by the anime industry this Spring: that one episode where they told us about the main antagonist's backstory. Now, this was truly tragic. Indeed, as I sat in front of my monitor on that Wednesday, eager to watch the latest episode of Isekai wa Smartphone to Tomo ni, I was not expecting to be hit with such tear-inducing drama. As I sat there and learned that the main bad guy used to be good, but then some bad things happened to him, causing him to turn bad, I wept.
Reviewer’s Rating: 4
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Jun 21, 2019
Before going into this show, I expected to watch a generic CGDCT—certainly not something that I would review. Yet, as I made my way through Hitoribocchi no Marumaru Seikatsu's 12 episodes, I found myself more and more inclined to write the text you are now reading. While the CGDCT genre is normally as inoffensive as can be, Hitoribocchi was often a thoroughly unpleasant experience. How, and more importantly, why, did this happen?
The show follows Hitori Bocchi (English: "alone") as she struggles with social anxiety after entering her first year of middle school. As her misadventures continue, she becomes friends with characters such as Sunao Nako
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(English: "honest child"), Honshou Aru (English: "has a hidden character"), and Sotoka Rakita (English: "came from the outside"). The names are all you need to know for the characters. Bocchi has social anxiety, Aru gets unlucky/makes stupid mistakes despite seeming capable, and Sotoka is a foreigner obsessed with ninja culture. That's literally it. Nako is the only character that isn't defined solely by a trope.
As with most CGDCT shows, the comedy is centered around the characters. When 3/4 of the main characters are defined by a single trope, the comedy becomes repetitive. If you ever want to get alcohol poisoning, just play a drinking game where you take a shot every time Nako calls Aru "unfortunate". Other jokes present in the show are either about Bocchi's comically crippling social anxiety or about Sotoka's obsession with ninjas. The jokes got so predictable that I could often guess exactly what a character would say/how she would react. Indeed, with every week of watching the show, I continually enjoyed it less and less.
The main problem with Hitoribocchi, however, is that the entire premise of the show is to make light of social anxiety. Take, for example, the very first episode. Nervous about starting her new school life, Bocchi puts up a sign on the classroom door, which reads "Class 1 has been abolished, so we kindly ask that you all transfer schools". I'm not sure what I, as the viewer, am supposed to do. This is obviously presented as a "funny" moment, but what would I be laughing at? That the character has social anxiety? I'm not sure who greenlit a show with this premise, but it certainly does not work.
There's really not much else to say about Hitoribocchi. At its best, it's a generic CDGDCT, and at its worst, it makes fun of serious issues in a way that I found unsettling. It's not the worst show in the world, but due to the repetitive comedy and mediocre production values, there's really no reason to watch it over anything of the same genre.
Reviewer’s Rating: 6
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Apr 11, 2019
In my preliminary review, I had said that this season of Mob Psycho, while overrated, was still good. After finishing the 4 episodes that I had left to watch, I no longer feel this way. MP100II took everything that made the first season great and replaced it with shounen tropes and fight scenes. In this review, I will talk about the plot of each arc and explain why every arc besides the Reigen arc is not good. This review will not touch on characters, art, or sound, as those are just as good if not better than season one's.
Episode 1: Great stuff. This episode felt
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more like an OVA of the first season than the beginning of a second season. It had the same light-hearted mood and comedy as the first season. 9/10.
Filler episodes before Mogami Arc: Pointless. The only purpose these episodes served was to set up the dark atmosphere of the second season. Light-heartedness and comedy are gone, and in their place, we get boring fight scenes against random antagonists that serve no purpose in the plot. These are truly Naruto Shippuden-level filler episodes. 4/10.
Mogami Arc: The second-worst arc in Mob Psycho, and a prime example of my problem with this season. Instead of a unique Slice of Life, we get the single most generic shounen trope possible: "MC beats antagonist with friendship". This whole arc can be summarized extremely easily: edgy nihilist antagonist tells Mob that he has no friends. Mob is sad and nearly loses. Mob wins because he remembers he has friends. Did they mix up the MP100II script with the Boku no Hero Academia Season 8 script? This arc is nothing if not cliched. 3/10.
Reigen Arc: This is how a serious arc in Mob Psycho should be handled. Reigen completely changes as a character after it; character relationships are deeply explored. I nearly even cried at the end of the arc. Oh, did I mention, there aren't any 10-minute long battle scenes thrown in. That might have something to do with how good this arc is. I'd probably have given this season a 4/10 were this arc not a 10/10.
Boku no Hero Academia Arc: Vile blasphemy against the franchise. What am I even supposed to say here? I'm pretty sure that about 80% of this arc was battle scenes. The main antagonist is motivated by nothing but "me super strong me evil >:(". Instead of being, you know, an actual arc, this is just a collection of fight scenes against undeveloped antagonists who have no motivations whatsoever. Oh yeah, did I mention that the antagonists from season 1 are now supporting characters, and one of the antagonists from this arc becomes a supporting character by the end of the arc. That's really cool. I thought I was watching MP100, but apparently, I'm watching Crunchyroll's Movie of the Year 2018, Boku no Hero Academia the Movie: Futari no Hero. This arc is a solid 1/10.
It's honestly quite amazing to me how one season can be so polarizing. How can the best arc in the franchise be sandwiched in between the two worst arcs? In conclusion, MP100II is an empty shell of its predecessor. Rather than being unique, funny, and engaging, it opts to be a generic, trope-filled collection of fight scenes with undeveloped antagonists.
Reviewer’s Rating: 6
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Mar 25, 2019
Welcome to TenSura, one of the latest additions to the niche and undersaturated genre known as "isekai" *laugh track plays*. Since there are about 17 isekais produced every anime season, studios have realized that in order to produce a truly successful isekai, they need to grab the viewer's attention in the first couple episodes. What happens after that? Eh, who cares. The show's already popular.
Story (4/10): I believe one of the greatest flaws of TenSura is the concept itself. The idea of a light-hearted Overlord may sound good on paper, but it fails in execution. Overlord works as a show because Ainz is cool. The
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problem with TenSura is that Rimuru really... isn't cool. He's OP in a Kirito-like, boring way, in that he lacks any personality other than being an average, nice person. After the pretty good first few episodes (up through the establishment of the goblin village) Rimuru just doesn't do anything interesting. I'm struggling to recall what actually happened in the arcs because there's not really anything connecting them. Rimuru just goes to some random place and gets more allies for his village by talking to them. Personally, I don't find that this makes for a very entertaining show. There's no overarching plot, no "cool factor," and no tension since Rimuru can easily defeat any enemy with his OP isekai protagonist skills. Oh yeah, apparently there was a comedy aspect here? I didn't find it funny, and apparently MAL didn't either since this show doesn't have a comedy tag.
Characters (5/10): Who? The only character listed as a "main" in TenSura is Rimuru, who, as discussed above, I do not like. The other characters include a harem of personality-less dolls, some side characters like Souei who attempt to compensate for Rimuru's lack of coolness, and random characters that appear once and are never brought up again. Shizu, the only character that may be argued to be "well-written" is nothing but a well-disguised MacGuffin. All she does is progress the plot.
I'd like to talk about the random side characters in further detail. The problem here is that this season is pretty much an introduction into the universe. You get all of these characters that are simply introduced and left alone, like demon lord with clown servants, demon lord with blonde hair, knight girl who is hinted to be Shizu's disciple, those adventurers from the guild near the end of the show, and probably others that I've forgotten about. They're probably going to be important in the next season, but what about this season?
Art (8/10): Pretty solid. The character designs are relatively memorable. The color scheme and the overall art help build the comforting, light-hearted atmosphere that the show strives for. The fights are nicely animated.
Sound (8/10): Idk why I'm giving this a high rating. There's this one OST that plays during every battle that's stuck in my head, so apparently that somehow makes the sound good. The OP and ED themes also nicely mirror the quality of the show. Just like the show was good at the start and became a drag, the first OP and ED were good, and the second ones really weren't.
Enjoyment & Overall (6/10): TenSura was extremely bland, but I can't really give it a lower rating since it was decent enough for me to have the desire to watch every new episode. I'm really hoping that this was simply a setup season and that season two will be better, since this season seems to lay the groundwork and nothing else, but only time will tell.
Reviewer’s Rating: 6
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Mar 14, 2019
Shield Hero is the epitome of everything a good isekai is: uninspired, brainless, and self-fulfilling entertainment with good waifu bait.
Characters (10/10): Naofumi is the king of Chads. He hates everyone and everything and is always angry because that's just how he rolls. Having a mental breakdown and completely flipping your personality is the normal reaction to being framed for rape. Of course, Naofumi will always save any person in need he comes across, but not before extorting them out of their money, since he's the Chad King, and he's always right. His Chad abilities also allow him to make any female that isn't an antagonist
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fall in love with him, which brings us to the next segment: the non-chad characters. Raphtalia is pretty cute. Filo is also really cute. Oh yeah, the other 3 heroes are not Chads and they are bad. All of their actions are bad, while all of Naofumi's actions are good. Did they go do what they were supposed to do and kill the wave's boss? Yeah they're morally disgusting. They should've been protecting the random villagers along with the Chad King. The addition of Team Rocket is also really great. Jesse (princess) and James (spear man) just appear to cause trouble whenever possible, because they're bad, and Naofumi is good.
Story (9/10): After a really disappointing first episode that had things that don't belong in an isekai (actual good writing, characters you can sympathize with, a somewhat original plotline), the show's plot greatly improved. Everyone except the Chad King does bad things, but Chad King does good things. These despicable antagonists do things like "try to free a Stockholm-afflicted slave", which is just absolutely ridiculous lol. After C.K. resolves these issues, he just kinda drives around an enchants potions for 5 episodes straight while Raphtalia acts cute. Oh, and he also has the perfect shield for every single situation, since the Chad King must not be stopped by anything. That's exactly what I want from my isekai, not all of that "interesting start to the series" stuff.
Art & Sound (8.5/10): Kinema Citrus, just like usual, has above average art. Nothing special, but definitely good. The OST is average and the OP and ED are average. The voice acting, however, loses some points from me, as C.K. and Raphtalia's voices remind me of the disaster known as "Seishun Buta Yarou".
Enjoyment (9/10): As I said before, this would've been a masterpiece of the isekai genre if not for the appalling first episode.
Reviewer’s Rating: 1
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