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This show tricks you. It pretends to have all the misanthropic nihilism of your typical horror-tinted, death-based thriller, but actually SURPRISE! it has a whole lot of hope and heart and ultimately had me crying so hard I had to pause because I couldn't read the subtitles. Let's talk about Death Parade.

The first thing you'll notice about this show is that it has some snazzy production value. The art is very pleasing, and even if you have no interest in watching the show whatsoever you should definitely listen to the opening theme. That's "Flyers" by BRADIO. You're welcome.

The atmosphere of ... a swanky bar with a subtle edge of danger and darkness holds it's own throughout the show. Even as we learn more about the inner workings of this limbo, there's always one more mystery to keep you guessing until the last moment. The characters don't have much time to shine, but the leads milk their screentime for all its worth and actually have tremendous chemistry together. The show starts out episodic, and these Dead Person Of The Day episodes are hit or miss, sometimes with their philosophical takeaway getting lost in the muddle of characters and outcomes, but the show's lack of clarity on the moral front is actually something I like about Death Parade. There's a complexity and gray area surrounding each of these characters, and I think that's very human. You will find yourself unsatisfied with certain events, but it adds an emotional dimension to the show which I think would be lacking if the episodes had a simple solution.

Everything builds up to an ending that is perfect emotionally, but leaves some empty holes in terms of plot. Not every mystery is solved, and this will no doubt bother some viewers, but for me I was far more invested in the show's humanity than its nuts and bolts. It's not a perfectly well-rounded show, but it works. All in all, I found it rather beautiful, and it's easily one of my favorites of 2015.

This is the sort of show that will make the optimists out there think something like "I have no idea what's going on, but I'll suspend my disbelief for a bit and see what happens." What happens is that you wind up with your disbelief suspended so high it's somewhere in the stratosphere and yet your patience goes unrewarded.

I'm being harsh. Let's talk about what drew me to this anime. The art is hands down fantastic, with beautiful sprawling surreal settings and pleasing character designs to boot. The first two episodes promise a hilarious and stylized spoof on superheros driven at ... its heart by the relationship between two sisters. But then the show takes a completely different tack and ultimately tries to stuff way too many plots into twelve episodes, purportedly held together by a road trip that lacks any road trip style nostalgia and stars characters that get zero development. To be fair, there simply is not enough time! There's no time for this show to do what it tried to do, and for that reason it winds up a confusing, convoluted mess with way too many moments of "they just happened to be in the right place at the right time because... reasons... cough".

To be fair, however, I did enjoy this anime once I stopped expecting too much from it. Its power is in its individual scenes, which use its fantastic animation and sound to amp up your emotions to a "Hell yeah!!" frenzy despite your complete disconnect from the characters. There's something to be said for that skill. This show is also very funny, with a referential humor that might go over the heads of people without much intimate knowledge of Japan (read: me), but it still feels fresh and lively and doesn't take itself seriously. The tone and animation are what makes the show.

Is that enough to be successful however? I would regrettably say no. Even if I had fun with the first half of the series, I found myself dragging my feet through the rest because I just had nothing to latch onto, no characters or risks to get me invested on more than a superficial level. In the end, I'm disappointed but not unhappy. The potential was there, it just didn't pull through.

I've been mulling over this show with my reviewer cap on for awhile, but my first gut impression is still my strongest: This was the most fun I've had with a show in a long time.

How does one rate One Punch Man? It has its flaws. As a parody, it falls flat at times. It reuses the same jokes, and not all of them are that funny. The fight scenes are awesome but arguably suffer from their predictable outcome. But even as I'm writing this, there's a very insistent voice at the back of my head saying "I don't ... care, I loved it."

I think the final judge of this show is just how gosh darn enjoyable it is to watch. The animation is phenomenal, particularly during action; the characters are fun and lovable; and most importantly the show seems to smoosh everything I enjoy about shounen and fighting anime into one package (dare I say, one punch?) without taking itself seriously for a moment. I'm reminded weirdly of a movie like Pacific Rim or Godzilla. You can argue the craft of these movies all you like, but at the end of the day, people are coming for the giant monsters ok, and if there's giant monsters, the movie has delivered. That's how I feel about One Punch Man. You're coming here for fun and entertainment, and you're going to get that. A lot of it. It's gonna be awesome.

At the end of the day, I think One Punch Man's greatest flaw is that there isn't enough of it. Not only do I want more (I want so much more), but the show suffers from a lack of conclusion or overarching plot. It probably made the right choice not trying to force in any arbitrary cohesiveness to bring its 12 episodes together, but I feel like it would have been much more suited for a longer running series. I hope we see more animation for it in the future, as it really is perfectly suited for anime.

I have to point out, though, that when a series' biggest flaw is that you want more, it's doing pretty darn good. I loved One Punch Man. There I said it. I loved it so much that any nitpicking I could do won't even make a dent in how much I loved it. Give it a shot. It's definitely a great ride.

Let me explain. ... No, it is too much. Let me sum up.

Kazuya Minekura's Saiyuki is a fabulous manga, but due to publisher switches and long hiatuses, it has never quite made it to the world of animation without some major confusion.

The manga is composed of four series: Saiyuki, Saiyuki Reload (which continues from the end of Saiyuki), Saiyuki Reload Blast (which continues from the end of Saiyuki Reload), and a Prequel series called Saiyuki Gaiden which stars the previous incarnations of the series' main characters.

Confused yet? We're only getting started.

If you are coming to the Saiyuki anime for the first time, ... the place you'll want to stay is Gensoumaden Saiyuki (or just Saiyuki), the original anime. It is based on Saiyuki (the manga) and includes roughly the first half of Saiyuki Gaiden.

The next anime series, chronologically, are Saiyuki Reload and then Saiyuki Reload Gunlock, which cover up to the middle of the Saiyuki Reload manga.

These OVAs you're currently on are just the ending of Saiyuki Gaiden. (Likewise, the Saiyuki Bural OVAs are simply a manga arc that was not included in any of the anime series but was a fan favorite so I guess it got OVAs.)

Basically, tldr, if this is your first taste of Saiyuki in any form, you're gonna be very, very confused. These OVAs are mostly for established fans of the manga.

That said, as an established fan of the manga, I've never been satisfied with the anime adaptations. For one thing, as you can see, they're overly confusing and brimming with filler. I also have noticed that Minekura's art seems difficult to adapt to anime--the animation is horrendous at worst, vaguely weird at best. Saiyuki Gaiden is some of the best animation Saiyuki has gotten, but it still looks kind of off, as if her anatomy isn't quite made for moving. Not my favorite.

That said, I do recommend the manga whole-heartedly.

In terms of a standalone anime, the show certainly leaves a lot to be desired, but in terms of adapting a visual novel and trying to cram in one million storylines into twelve episodes, it was surprisingly successful. Not entirely successful, mind, but certainly successful enough to make you raise your eyebrows a little.

I'm not gonna lie, I enjoyed this show. I am not familiar with the games, but I found myself following the plot and worldbuilding reasonably well. I thought a lot more could have been done with the (surprisingly very cool) sci-fi setting, but the anime seems to have avoided ... expansion in favor of following the games as closely as possible. This might not have been the greatest artistic choice considering the game is meant to be replayed with multiple storylines building on one another, therefore rendering it almost impossible to squish everything into a single linear plot, but hey, I'm not the producer.

The art is average, the story cohesive but by the skin of its teeth, the music forgettable. However, what sold me on this show was the characters. I liked them! I even liked their ridiculous outfits! They don't fit entirely neatly into preset character tropes, or at the very least they burst forth from those tropes in a gaudy and original fashion. I found the relationships between Aoba and the other gents compelling, and the show did a good job of showcasing all the available "options" although never quite getting particularly romantic with any of them. It's weird that the smuttiness of the games was toned down to this downright celibate level, but in terms of treating all shippers as equal under the eyes of Anime Adaptation, the show succeeded.

The pacing escalates to a frantic fever pitch as you can just about see the writers desperately trying to tie up one million loose ends in the last ten minutes, but I walked away more or less satisfied. I think it works as a more PG-13 entry onto these fun characters and this world... albeit why that seemed like a necessary addition to a smut game is one of the world's great mysteries.

I went into this anime expecting some mindless trash (I was in the mood for mindless trash, to be perfectly honest), but what I found instead was a surprisingly heartfelt gem. There are pervy moments to be sure, with Maria's incubus and succubus familiars providing some raunchy laughs, but this solidly takes backseat to a character-driven medieval drama with some complex questions about religion and love. Go figure.

I powered through this show in a day, and wound up rooting for all of the characters despite their starkly clashing objectives (with some heartbreaking consequences for me, let me tell you). Maria's straightforward and ... earnest goodness makes for a lovable main character, as well as an excellent foil for the moral ambiguity taking place all around her. Despite only having 12 episodes, the show uses its time wisely and produces a satisfying emotional buildup between its web of characters, throwing them all forward into personal growth and conclusion against a backdrop of wartime violence. It is not as politics or battle heavy as a show such as Arslan Senki, but the medieval setting feels genuine and the plot natural, if character-driven. I'm not kidding when I say it actually gets philosophical at points. No really!

The art is not particularly original but certainly well-done. Overall, it is simply a show that feels like it got all the love and attention it could have hoped for, and then some.

A warning for viewers however: There are themes of sexual assault throughout the series in varying intensity. I would not recommend the series if you're particularly sensitive to these topics.