What a boomer.
Wash It All Away Ep. 7
Wakana is clueless about the internet, so she lets a bunch of kids essentially become her social media manager. ‘Cause y’know, kids are known for their good judgment. In fact, how old is Nairo? Should she even be allowed on the internet? I recently saw a video about how even a site like Pinterest is full of child predators.
Even though Wakana and her cleaning service haven’t exactly gone viral, she’s already gotten work from a supposedly famous influencer. I just think it’s weird that the influencer immediately sends Wakana an item to clean. Usually, you would message the business, discuss details, figure out payment details, yadda yadda yadda, then send the item. But not this time! Here’s my soiled hat! Clean it!
There was a Cute Girl in the Hero’s Party, so I Tried Confessing to Her Ep. 7
Strange to be getting a Valentine’s Day episode in an isekai. Well, you know the drill: every guy gets special treats from his special someone, including Yoki. He just had to wait until the last second for dramatic effect. He also needed to stop these trio of spoilsports. Doesn’t the girl on the left look a bit like Gallagher, that guy who’s known for smashing watermelons? I mean, she even wields a hammer in battle. It could be a reference to the comedian, but why? That would be so obscure.
Tune In to the Midnight Heart Ep. 7
Everyone’s enjoying Inohana’s impromptu concert, but a girl by the name of Aiko is glowering in the corner. Why? Because Inohana only does popular song covers. Aiko hates the fact that Inohana won’t sing her own original songs. Pfft, can you imagine destroying a friendship over songs? “You’re wasting your talent, so we’re not friends anymore!” That’s positively alien behavior.
So how does Yamabuki help Inohana fix her issue? Just plain ol’ exposure therapy. Can’t sing your original songs? Well, you’re gonna have to, because we’re doing a concert with nothing but your original songs! But he’s not a total idiot, so for now, the concert is only for the girls in the broadcasting club. Y’know, baby steps.
I have to commend this episode for being so music-focused, because it allowed me to skip through scenes where all the characters do is sing. Sure, I could pay attention to the lyrics and decipher their meaning. I’m sure Inohana’s songs were jam-packed with subtext! But I also value my time.
The Case Book of Arne Ep. 7
I guess the case is closed on that mermaid and her not-so-dead lover. This week, we get a story about a phantom thief trying to steal an expensive jewel known as the Blue Heart. Stealing hearts? Calling cards? Is this a Persona 5 reference?! Look at this stone slab featuring Leannan Sidhe! That’s a demon you can summon in the popular hit video game series Persona!
Anyways, the twist here is that there’s nothing to steal. The Blue Heart has already gone missing along with three men connected to the museum. Those three men eventually turn back up as headless statues, so we have a murder mystery on our hands. Intriguing? Not really.
Not when Lynn does her classic wotagei dance.
Jack-of-All-Trades, Party of None Ep. 7
This episode is exactly what you expect it to be. Orhun is showered with praise, his old party gets humiliated. Well, I actually expected more humiliation. I thought the Adventurer’s Guild would rake them over the coals for almost getting a bunch of kids killed. Do they even get punished? Or is it just gonna be a slap on the wrist?
Speaking of the little devils, the kids all try to recruit Orhun to their guild, but he keeps running away because he’s been betwayed before! What if his new party betways him again~! Hmph! But seriously, I couldn’t roll my eyes hard enough. If the moral of the story is that teamwork makes us better, then why have Orhun beat the black dragon all by his lonesome? If Orhun is so awesome as the jack-of-all-trades, then why does he need a team? Why have him hog all the glory? The story doesn’t know what it wants.
Easygoing Territory Defense by the Optimistic Lord Ep. 6
Camera angles in anime are kinda weird sometimes.
Very weird.
Anyway, the gang defeat a forest dragon. The reward for this victory is a formal alliance between Van and the Viscount Panamera. That’s it. That’s the story. I know it’s called “Easygoing Territory Defense,” so fine, we’re going to have episodes where Van simply protects his home from attackers. I just expected more than, y’know, random fauna. Why did a bunch of armored lizards attack them outta nowhere? Who even provoked the forest dragon? Were these animals simply trying to protect their territory? My point is, fending off beasties with no brains is just not that interesting. I expected maybe some war games, maybe a bit of political maneuvering in order to secure fragile alliances, etc. All I get instead is an isekai hero shooting at a bunch of lizards, and somehow impressing his future child bride in the process.
The Invisible Man and His Soon-to-Be Wife Ep. 6
A good chunk of this episode is devoted to Jiraishi trying to find clothes that would go well with her fur pattern. She actually says at one point that she can’t trust the advice of a beast person with plain fur. That’s raci–…
Karma also has a pretty hefty subplot in this week’s episode (again), but I find him super annoying so I’m just going to skip over it. It’s not the curses, buddy. Your personality is just grating.
The Holy Grail of Eris Ep. 6
I’m going to stop doing dedicated posts for this show. While I’m still somewhat intrigued by the mystery, I think the pacing has been a mess. More importantly, the character writing is very lacking. In this week’s episode, Constance swears that she’ll never rest until Scarlett gets her revenge. We also see her look dejected when Randolph simply refers to Lily by her given name. I want the story to explore her motivations and desires on a deeper level. I want to understand why she is willing to risk life and limb for a ghost who helped her out once. Why does she keep going beyond the initial investigation into Lily? Why does she trust everything Scarlett tells her? We didn’t even pause after her best friend’s kidnapping. I mean, isn’t she worried that the evil organization might go after other loved ones in her life? And why she is so instantly drawn to Randolph even though they’ve barely spent any time together? But we’re constantly being pulled to and fro by plot, so it never feels like we have a moment to breathe and properly study Connie and deconstruct her personality. The Holy Grail of Eris feels like one of those pulpy page-turners where you wanna find out what happens next, but when you put the book down, you realize that none of the characters had any depth to them.
Roll Over and Die Ep. 6
Lots of lovey-dovey stuff between Flum and Milkit in this week’s episode. Like I’ve said before, I think Milkit needs to be in a healthier place mentally. I’d say this about any relationship that starts out the same way. I don’t know why these adventuring shows always have such an obsession with romancing former slaves. If you want to rescue them, if you want to help them recover their humanity and self-worth, if you want to help them find their place in society, cool, awesome. But it almost always leads to love, and that’s the part that I find questionable.
Right before the episode ends, a bunch of guards surround Flum. Dein obviously sent them. He’s probably going to accuse her of murdering his men even though they had attacked innocent villagers and were about to rape Milkit. I think the weird part for me is how there wasn’t any follow up to that incident. Hm, someone sent these men to attack my friend. Maybe I should do something about it. But then nothing happened, so Dein was basically free to cook up yet another scheme.
Dark Moon – The Blood Altar Ep. 6
Of all the possible gifts Sooha could’ve gotten, she decides to give the vampy boys an anti-vampire kit. Okay, that got a legitimate laugh out of me. What a fucking idiot. I mean, yes, she doesn’t know that the vampy boys are vampires. But still, what kind of present is that? Ooooh, my partner hates bed bugs. I better get her some diatomaceous earth on her birthday!
One of the wolfy boys hands Sooha a gift, which I find distasteful. Not the gift itself, but the act. It’s like when one kid has a birthday, but the parents has to give the other kid presents as well to make it “fair.” Well, Sooha is the only girl in this harem of dudes. She’s basically spoiled rotten already.
Anyways, it’s all fun and games until the girl goes back to the mansion after the party is long over. As a result, she finally finds out that the vampy boys are indeed vampy. They lied to her! She hates vampires! Chris is back! But wait, he’s also a vampire! But she hates vampires! The drama!
Also, the count of women besides Sooha in this week’s episode: big fat zero.
HELL MODE: The Hardcore Gamer Dominates in Another World with Garbage Balancing Ep. 6
A baron has come to town, and he’s brought his daughter along with him. Ah, I see. The isekai protagonist always needs a love interest, but Allen’s relationship with Krena has always been starkly platonic. Now I know why. The village tomboy is sadly not good enough for our isekai protagonist. It always has to be some upper class, noble girl. And naturally, she’s in need of an attitude adjustment.
Allen shows the baron how much progress they’ve made in the boar hunts. The baron is mightily impressed, so he finally decides to lift some of the villagers out of serfdom. Not everyone, mind you. You still gotta slave for ten whole years before you can become a commoner. But hey, we did it! Allen’s family is no longer at the bottom of the totem pole! No revolution here! Just good ol’ social climbing, because we love being ruled over by men who sit on their asses all day and judge us!
Rodin gets one more wish, so he begs the baron to give Allen a job. So instead of being able to run free and go hog wild, Allen is now a manservant. Oh good, he now gets to tame the shrew, so to speak. And just like that, Allen leaves his family behind.
Reincarnated as a Dragon Hatchling Ep. 6
When we last left off, the dragon gets that human transformation spell he’s been wanting so badly. Unfortunately, it doesn’t make him very human. Nope, not even close. As a result, he scares the new pair of adventurers. They immediately attack the dragon on sight. Welp, there goes that plan.
On the one hand, I understand why he wants to be human again so badly. He literally used to be one. He used to live with people. To suddenly become a dragon and live in the wilderness must suck. Even though he’s found a friend in the black lizard, I’m sure he still craves a normal conversation with actual people. On the other hand, it would be incredibly boring if the protagonist manages to become a human again one day. I mean, the anime’s already boring enough as it is. Making him human again would just remove the one interesting gimmick about this show.
In the second half of the episode, the dragon fights a monkey leader. This is a duel to the death, which just means the dragon will take over the pack of monkeys. See? Who needs boring ass humans when you can create your own animal community?
Scum of the Brave Ep. 6
Well, we’ve seen Yashiro train the girls one-on-one, so now it’s time to train all three of them at once. Of course, it’s for money. The guy is doing this just to get an autograph from his oshi. And for the most part, the training doesn’t reveal anything we don’t already know about the girls. For instance, Jogamine doesn’t want to hurt people. On the other hand, Sara only wants to fight if victory is assured. Basically, those two have huge flaws. On the other hand, Indo gets off easy. She’s actually a decent fighter. Her only problem is that she’s stupid, but we can work with that. I mean, you don’t really need arithmetic in a street fight.
We get a cliffhanger after some jerks disguised as guards attack Yashiro and the girls. One of them even grows an eldritch arm like Thorn.
In the Clear Moonlit Dusk Ep. 6
Every romance series has to have the obligatory summer festival episode, and this show is no different. But we can’t even get to the summer festival, because there’s just so much drama in the way. It’s not even good drama. It feels fake and artificial. For some reason, the story has added a third wheel in the form of a handsome part-timer at Takiguchi’s dad’s curry shop. Takuto isn’t actually new to the show (he was introduced a couple of episodes ago), but what is new is how he’s managing to make our heroine feel a certain sort of way. So naturally, Ichimura gets all jealous, which leads to Takiguchi acting all confused. Somehow, she simply cannot comprehend his obviously jealous behavior, because she’s horrendously clueless — as if she’s never encountered a love triangle in fiction before even though she lives in the land of the rising NTR. When Ichimura finally spells it out to her, Takiguchi slumps to the ground and grabs her head like Hank Scorpio from The Simpsons: “My goodness, he was jealous? Of me and the part-timer?! What an idea! Why didn’t I think of that?!” Seriously, I’m not even joking. This is literally her:
Afterwards, she’s still confused!
Girl, it ain’t quantum mechanics! It’s good ol’ fashioned jealousy! Everyone has felt jealousy before! Especially teenagers!
As you can imagine, I’m not a fan of love triangles. I’m also not a fan of shows teasing a potential love triangle. Most of all, I’m definitely not a fan of romance leads so clueless that it feels contrived. I don’t buy it. I just don’t.
Kunon the Sorcerer Can See Ep. 8
On the way to the mage academy, Kunon’s maid Iko is replaced with Rinko, her younger sister who is almost identical to her in every way. Even their humor is the same. So… what’s the point? Functionally, what has changed? I just don’t understand what any of this adds to the narrative?
The rest of the episode is mostly hijinks. Not-so-innocent hijinks, mind you. This weird dude wants Kunon to conjure up a woman to sleep with — a woman in the form of his crush. That’s creepy, man.
Hana-Kimi Ep. 8
Mizuki passes out from binding her chest too tightly, because she’s not accounting for her growing breasts. Well, she gets no pity from me, ’cause she wouldn’t be in this situation if she weren’t lying in the first place. Cut that out, and you won’t have to worry about your health!
But the troubles don’t end there for Mizuki. She’s still blissfully unaware that this Makita guy is targeting her. Sano tries to warn her — hell, even his rival Kagurazaka tries to warn her — but she just gets pissy instead. She starts whining about how Sano has no right to say anything about Makita, because he lets Tamami bug him all day. Sigh, I don’t like Mizuki. I don’t like her one bit. Even when she’s in danger, she’s just so annoying. Does she not have eyes? Can she not see that Sano isn’t giving Tamami the time of day? This is the guy she crossed an ocean for. The biggest ocean. This is the guy she’s doing this bullshit, fraudulent cross-dressing, borderline illegal shit for. But now she’s trying to turn the tables on him and treat him like he’s a two-timing cheat? What the fuck is this? Mizuki sucks, man. Worst romance heroine in a long, long time.
Look, I hope Makita doesn’t do anything bad to Mizuki. I wouldn’t wish that on anyone. But if I could decide the ending, I would have Sano tell Mizuki to get a life and fuck off back to America. Too bad he’s probably in love with her already or some shit.
Kaya-chan Isn’t Scary Ep. 6
I know the ojisan wants to protect Kaya, but good lord, could he not sneak around like that? Plus, how can he afford to stalk her all day? Doesn’t he have a job? Doesn’t he need to pay the bills? Doesn’t his wife find any of this questionable?
We meet a couple of new faces in this week’s episode. First, we have Nana, Kaya’s aunt. Y’see, after last week’s episode, Kaya’s grandmother Mutsu isn’t do so well. The old woman is pretty confident that Kaya’s mother will give birth to a hellspawn. Other than that, however, she’s been completely mind broken. Problem is, Nana thinks Kaya is the reason why Mutsu has lost her marbles. I dunno what I want to happen next. At first, I was thinking, Gee, I hope Nana doesn’t dig too deep. She might not survive the encounter with Kaya’s unborn sibling. But the fact that Mirai, Kaya’s mom, is estranged from the rest of her family hints at the idea that maybe they treated her horribly. Maybe they abused her. So as far as I know, whatever happens to Nana might just be karma, y’know? Plus, it was kinda weird of Nana to approach Kaya in a wig and pretend to be Mirai. That’s straight out of the kidnapper’s handbook.
Next, we have this hooded fella. Apparently, he’s the ojisan’s master in… all things occult? In exorcism? Well, he tells ojisan to stay away from Kaya’s home, but I have the feeling the latter won’t heed the warning.
Last but not least, there’s a wholesome story where Kaya finally learns how to empathize with her classmates.
Noble Reincarnation: Born Blessed, So I’ll Obtain Ultimate Power Ep. 7
Albert, the crown prince, and Noah continue to clash. Normally, you would call this a “power-struggle,” but believe me, there’s no struggle here. Every deduction Noah makes is genius, every move he takes is unbelievable. All hail the shota-king! And now he’s about to gain even more power! Woo!
Every once in a while, Youtube will recommend me these 6+ hour videos that are supposed to help me sleep at night. Dark Souls lore to fall asleep to! Silent Hill lore to fall asleep to! Well, this show belongs in a similar vid: top 10 most boring anime to fall asleep to!
The Villainess Is Adored by the Prince of the Neighbor(ing) Kingdom Ep. 6
It always tickles me when characters have names like Tiararose and Aquasteed, but this schmuck over here — the King of the Forest, apparently — is simply known as Keith. Bro, that’s your name? What happened? Did they copy and paste from the wrong name generator?
Anyway, Keith’s a predator. Even though Tiara only likes Aqua, he keeps doing shady shit like flirting with her, kidnapping her, forcing her into a slumber via magic… yeah, how is this any different from slipping roofies into her drink?
Meanwhile, Tiararose is still insecure, because she still thinks Aqua has no control over his feelings. As a result, she’s scared that Aqua will fall in love with a… lemme check my notes, a 14-year-old?! C’mon, man.
By the way, I’m all for couples in anime kissing, hold hands, etc, but please don’t nibble each other’s ears. Gross. I don’t need this in my Japanese cartoons.
Everything else about everything else:
I finished and platinum’d Dragon Quest VII Reimagined. I hit the credits around 45 hours. Unfortunately, it took me another 20 hours just to get all of the items required from some RNG-heavy mini-game. That sucked.
I took a detour to get myself caught up in Honkai Star Rail, since 4.0 just dropped. Things I like:
— I enjoyed the platforming mini-game. It feels decent. The only thing it’s missing is a sprint button.
— I like Planarcadia’s general aesthetic. I never vibed with the Greek-themed Amphoreus patches.
Things I didn’t like so much:
— Since March had been out for the vast majority of Amphoreus, I thought she would be our companion for at least the entirety of 4.0. But instead, Himeko steps in halfway through the story. Sure, Planarcadia is where she’s from, but she’s probably the dullest member of the Astral Express. She’s just so boring. 4.0’s cliffhanger might eventually lead to an interesting backstory for her character, but meh, I’m not going to get my hopes up.
— Yao Guang’s archetype is one of my least favorites. I don’t like diviners.
— The game kept preventing me from exploring until I finished the MSQ.
