foxinthestars (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
foxinthestars) wrote2013-07-03 08:42 pm
foxinthestars) wrote2013-07-03 08:42 pm
Entry tags:
Spring turns to Summer
Yeah, I’ve been quiet for awhile, and I didn’t post a fic in June; I plan on doing at least two in August for Parallels to make up for it... BTW, the prompts have gone out, and I’ll just tell you, if you’re doing one of these exchanges and you have one of your offers that you think “well, this one would be kind of a curveball, but surely it’ll be okay...”...? You WILL get that one. So far, though, I’ve always been glad for the prompts I’ve gotten in the end, and this one is shaping up to be no exception...
So, another anime season ends. Final thoughts on the things I watched to the end (except Red Data Girl, which is in a previous post)...
Chihayafuru is still Chihayafuru --- that is, awesome --- but I felt like Season 2 didn’t so much end as just stop --- oddly, because there were good notes to wrap up on like five minutes before the end, and instead they start on the next plot thread only to cut it short. Hopefully this is a sign that they’re confident about getting Season 3.
Karneval stayed Karneval --- that is, mediocre and occasionally nonsensical but fun. The concept is and remains pretty run-of-the-mill and it tosses everything in in such a rush that when a traitor is revealed in the penultimate episode, there’s no real shock --- not because I expected it to be that person, which I didn’t, but because I didn’t know that person well enough to care. Still, Nai achieves his goal of finding Karoku although things get weird (“Did I surprise you?” --- no, you just confused me), and Gareki has a breakthrough and is off to take a level in badass, so our two main characters come to some kind of new level on their issues, and throughout the season Nai’s innocence, Gareki’s streetwise, and Yogi’s whatever-you’d-call-that kept it fun to watch.
Hataraku Maou-sama! was probably the most fun show of the season and stayed smart and funny to the end. It did drag a bit in the second half (after Lucifer is absorbed into the cast and Suzuno shows up); Alciel gets precious little chance to shine, Maou’s character has become unfortunately bland and I wish the tension between his Ente Isla and Japan personae had been managed better, but the last couple of episodes ended strong with another signature dramatic-and-action-packed-yet-still-hilarious set-piece followed by a gentle coda of a finale, and the post-script after the final ED subtly and wonderfully staked how far we’ve come; that little smile from Emi was worth a ray of light from heaven. (I admit, I would hate so much to break Chiho’s heart, but I’m more of a Maou/Emi person). Would love to see this get a second season.
Devil Survivor 2, for some reason I put off watching the last two episodes until like, just now. Probably it was because I expected an emotional wringer, although, see my previous blathering about this one, that’s also what I love about it. Now that I have seen them, honestly I was expecting something stronger, like the catharsis of ep 10 on a larger scale, and instead the end turned out to be surprisingly muted and bittersweet. (Okay, so our big triumph means that all those awesome people you met, you'll probably never meet them in the prime reality and the two people who even remember what you went through together, one of them just kind of disappears and the other is unlikely to give you the time of day. Um, yay?). The final battle got too bogged down in verbal wrangling that actually blunted the impact of the ideas discussed --- for Hibiki this was about human feeling and compassion; it wasn’t about logic or philosophy and shouldn’t have been treated like it was. Plus there was a somewhat lame deus ex machina, and the shamelessly-delivered moral of the story was more unnecessarily-tacked-on logic and gave me amusing flashbacks to the final speech from It Conquered The World, but at least Hibiki got to win on his terms. Overall a decent ending, but not spectacular. (I admit I’m a teensy bit disappointed that a) Hibiki never got Genbu and Seiryuu and thus didn’t get to end with a FOUR GODS FUSION COME ON OURYUU, KIRIN, SOMETHING!!!, b) I was just reading too much into he and Alcor’s resemblance, and c) the early hints that Hibiki was on a New Game+ never seemed to amount to anything HIS NAME EVEN MEANS “ECHO,” SRSLY, but hey. ::shrug::) Nobody except me (and maybe Branch) seemed to take this one at all seriously, but even with my complaints about the resolution, I thought it was one of the best of the season.
As for Gargantia... There should have been a lot to like about how this was all resolved. Chamber decisively transcends machine-hood; Ledo makes his choice, embraces life on Earth, and finds his place in it (one that’s not only a favorite of mine but nicely appropriate in context). The trouble is that it was all so gracelessly executed. The moral of the story is driven in with a sledgehammer, character development feels sudden and forced, the evil cultists just have to prove how evil they are and it just has to involve a cute kid (and I watched that whole scene thinking a) the cultists are breaking their own logic to manhandle a god-man from the sky like that, and b) Ledo, I bet you could just call Chamber over here to help you straighten these people out, which might have been a more fun way to see it hit the fan at least...), and the writers pull multiple trump cards out of their asses. Did we mention that Chamber has a hyper mode with a “kill pilot” timer? We didn’t? So what about Gargantia having a superweapon? No, huh...? Much was made of Urobuchi Gen’s involvement (the only show of his I was previously familiar with was Madoka Magica which is still and forever OMG AWESOME, but I call this one like I see it); however, the scripts were being passed around among five different writers, and it looks like there wasn’t enough communication or planning among them --- seriously, it reads like one of those high school games where you pass it around writing one paragraph each and anyone who actually cares about the story ends up pissed off. Not only did I not get the Dances-With-Wolves-as-a-Sci-Fi-Healing-Anime that I wanted, I didn’t even get a well-made consolation prize. In the end, I still say this show sets the gold standard for wasted potential.
With Spring over, Summer is already starting up, and at this point there isn’t much in the new season that excites me --- although I tend not to get excited until I’ve seen first episodes, so this might change. So far Free! does look the most promising (and yes, the first ep is up, I just haven’t watched it yet); I was never caught up in the Swimming Boys frenzy and I admit the muscles don’t hit my personal happy-button (I prefer a smoother look), but the PV seems awfully interested in complex emotions playing across people’s faces, which I take as a good sign. There’s also Silver Spoon, which, not having read the manga or anything, I’m a bit ambivalent about trying since the thumbnail description scares me more than it appeals to me, city-slicker-shaming being a pet peeve and all, but it is well-recommended and it is Arakawa-sensei (although Hero Tales was a hot mess and trusting that I will like everything a mangaka makes has tended to be a mistake in general). A few others sound like they could be interesting, but at this point it’s “wait and see.”
So, another anime season ends. Final thoughts on the things I watched to the end (except Red Data Girl, which is in a previous post)...
Chihayafuru is still Chihayafuru --- that is, awesome --- but I felt like Season 2 didn’t so much end as just stop --- oddly, because there were good notes to wrap up on like five minutes before the end, and instead they start on the next plot thread only to cut it short. Hopefully this is a sign that they’re confident about getting Season 3.
Karneval stayed Karneval --- that is, mediocre and occasionally nonsensical but fun. The concept is and remains pretty run-of-the-mill and it tosses everything in in such a rush that when a traitor is revealed in the penultimate episode, there’s no real shock --- not because I expected it to be that person, which I didn’t, but because I didn’t know that person well enough to care. Still, Nai achieves his goal of finding Karoku although things get weird (“Did I surprise you?” --- no, you just confused me), and Gareki has a breakthrough and is off to take a level in badass, so our two main characters come to some kind of new level on their issues, and throughout the season Nai’s innocence, Gareki’s streetwise, and Yogi’s whatever-you’d-call-that kept it fun to watch.
Hataraku Maou-sama! was probably the most fun show of the season and stayed smart and funny to the end. It did drag a bit in the second half (after Lucifer is absorbed into the cast and Suzuno shows up); Alciel gets precious little chance to shine, Maou’s character has become unfortunately bland and I wish the tension between his Ente Isla and Japan personae had been managed better, but the last couple of episodes ended strong with another signature dramatic-and-action-packed-yet-still-hilarious set-piece followed by a gentle coda of a finale, and the post-script after the final ED subtly and wonderfully staked how far we’ve come; that little smile from Emi was worth a ray of light from heaven. (I admit, I would hate so much to break Chiho’s heart, but I’m more of a Maou/Emi person). Would love to see this get a second season.
Devil Survivor 2, for some reason I put off watching the last two episodes until like, just now. Probably it was because I expected an emotional wringer, although, see my previous blathering about this one, that’s also what I love about it. Now that I have seen them, honestly I was expecting something stronger, like the catharsis of ep 10 on a larger scale, and instead the end turned out to be surprisingly muted and bittersweet. (Okay, so our big triumph means that all those awesome people you met, you'll probably never meet them in the prime reality and the two people who even remember what you went through together, one of them just kind of disappears and the other is unlikely to give you the time of day. Um, yay?). The final battle got too bogged down in verbal wrangling that actually blunted the impact of the ideas discussed --- for Hibiki this was about human feeling and compassion; it wasn’t about logic or philosophy and shouldn’t have been treated like it was. Plus there was a somewhat lame deus ex machina, and the shamelessly-delivered moral of the story was more unnecessarily-tacked-on logic and gave me amusing flashbacks to the final speech from It Conquered The World, but at least Hibiki got to win on his terms. Overall a decent ending, but not spectacular. (I admit I’m a teensy bit disappointed that a) Hibiki never got Genbu and Seiryuu and thus didn’t get to end with a FOUR GODS FUSION COME ON OURYUU, KIRIN, SOMETHING!!!, b) I was just reading too much into he and Alcor’s resemblance, and c) the early hints that Hibiki was on a New Game+ never seemed to amount to anything HIS NAME EVEN MEANS “ECHO,” SRSLY, but hey. ::shrug::) Nobody except me (and maybe Branch) seemed to take this one at all seriously, but even with my complaints about the resolution, I thought it was one of the best of the season.
As for Gargantia... There should have been a lot to like about how this was all resolved. Chamber decisively transcends machine-hood; Ledo makes his choice, embraces life on Earth, and finds his place in it (one that’s not only a favorite of mine but nicely appropriate in context). The trouble is that it was all so gracelessly executed. The moral of the story is driven in with a sledgehammer, character development feels sudden and forced, the evil cultists just have to prove how evil they are and it just has to involve a cute kid (and I watched that whole scene thinking a) the cultists are breaking their own logic to manhandle a god-man from the sky like that, and b) Ledo, I bet you could just call Chamber over here to help you straighten these people out, which might have been a more fun way to see it hit the fan at least...), and the writers pull multiple trump cards out of their asses. Did we mention that Chamber has a hyper mode with a “kill pilot” timer? We didn’t? So what about Gargantia having a superweapon? No, huh...? Much was made of Urobuchi Gen’s involvement (the only show of his I was previously familiar with was Madoka Magica which is still and forever OMG AWESOME, but I call this one like I see it); however, the scripts were being passed around among five different writers, and it looks like there wasn’t enough communication or planning among them --- seriously, it reads like one of those high school games where you pass it around writing one paragraph each and anyone who actually cares about the story ends up pissed off. Not only did I not get the Dances-With-Wolves-as-a-Sci-Fi-Healing-Anime that I wanted, I didn’t even get a well-made consolation prize. In the end, I still say this show sets the gold standard for wasted potential.
With Spring over, Summer is already starting up, and at this point there isn’t much in the new season that excites me --- although I tend not to get excited until I’ve seen first episodes, so this might change. So far Free! does look the most promising (and yes, the first ep is up, I just haven’t watched it yet); I was never caught up in the Swimming Boys frenzy and I admit the muscles don’t hit my personal happy-button (I prefer a smoother look), but the PV seems awfully interested in complex emotions playing across people’s faces, which I take as a good sign. There’s also Silver Spoon, which, not having read the manga or anything, I’m a bit ambivalent about trying since the thumbnail description scares me more than it appeals to me, city-slicker-shaming being a pet peeve and all, but it is well-recommended and it is Arakawa-sensei (although Hero Tales was a hot mess and trusting that I will like everything a mangaka makes has tended to be a mistake in general). A few others sound like they could be interesting, but at this point it’s “wait and see.”