Anime Review: Status Update as of April 2012
So.
The two or three people out there who have been following this stuff may have noticed that for the past few weeks I have not been posting many reviews of late. Furthermore, I keep falling further and further "behind" schedule, so that I am still on the throes of reviewing shows from the middle of last year.
Well, sorry 'bout that. I've just been busy plugging away at some of my other non-work hobbies. Yes, Virginia, I sometimes do *other* things instead of just watching crappy anime and posting about it relentlessly.
For example -- I've been compiling my family tree, working away at my genealogical connections. This is something I've been doing on and off for the past thirty years, and recently cracked a handful of "dead ends" that have been bugging me for a couple of decades, opening up some new branches. Now I've identified 32 out of 32 of my 3xgr-grandparents, and 58 out of 64 4xgr-grandparents. I won't go into very much detail because it can be pretty dry stuff for 99% of the people out there.
I'm currently crunching through a list about 14 generations back, and still going. There are at least eleven people who came over on the Mayflower, plus assorted Jamestown settlers going back to 1608, and even a Roanoke connection. One was purser on the HMS Invincible, one designed and built the largest ship of the age (1860's), another was the "Donald Trump" of the time, the richest person in New York in the 1600's. Various founders of places like Montreal, New Orleans, Detroit, New York City, Boston, and the state of Maryland. There's someone who was accused and confessed during the Salem Witch Trials and sentenced to death. Lots of people killed in early Indian raids, and one who used it as an opportunity to skip out on his young wife and children and return to the Netherlands (the stealth move didn't work, she did the nearly unthinkable act of divorcing him the next year). There's a Papist minister who tried to secretly hold a sermon, martyred by the repressive government of the day. There's the "Bride of Bride Brook", assorted American revolutionaries as well as loyalist sympathizers, Bacon's Rebellion, you name it. Not that any of this is exceptionally unusual -- once you trace your own family tree back far enough, there's all sorts of interesting small stories and individuals.
And while that eats up an insane amount of time in front of the computer, I also do stuff outside the home, like a mind-numbing and soul-draining full time job. Oh, and I go out hiking in the middle of nowhere as well (that usually eats up at least a full day a week).
The whole point being that I've been spending less time on reviews than usual.
Now, here's the important point to all of this: I'M TOTALLY OKAY WITH THAT. I am perfectly fine with not adhering to any sort of hard schedule, I'm perfectly fine with slowly reviewing shows that lots of hardcore otaku reviewers out there completed many months ago.
I know that I've said this before, but it bears repeating. There are literally dozens of people out there who are "up to date" blogging on the most recent shows within days of when they aired in Japan. I am not one of those people, and have never been one of those people. If you come here looking for the most current, up-to-date reviews of the hottest new shows, you are going to be disappointed.
I guess it has much to do with the types of anime fans out there. Seems like the younger fans (college-aged and earlier) are more interested in the newest season's offerings. But most of the people that I know who are still watching anime have been around for a decade or two, and whether something comes out in 2012, 2006 or 2003...well, that really doesn't matter too much.
However, I still break up shows into "seasons", but that is more as a matter of convenience for having to put stuff into easy-to-manage categories that can be objectively defined.
And where does that leave stuff right now?
Stuff from 2010: - Still a small number of stragglers, mostly movies or stuff that did not get subtitled into English until well into 2011 (or even 2012). I've been plugging away a little at a time, and once I'm done I plan to go back, re-evaluate my "Top 20 of 2010" list, adding a few to the list, removing a couple others, moving a few up or down some slots.
Winter 2011 Shows: - I'm essentially done with the season, except for a handful of shows (mostly OVAs and movies) that were subtitled well after the season completed.
Spring 2011 Shows: - Still watching 8 shows, up through the eighth episodes as of now.
Summer 2011 Shows: - Still watching 6 shows, up through the fifth episodes as of now.
Fall 2011 Shows: - Just finished watching the first episodes of everything, 16 shows move to the 2nd round.
I'm working at all of the 2011 shows an episode at a time, and I'll keep working away at them for the next few months until I've finished. Then -- and only then -- will I feel comfortable in putting together my "Best of" and "Worst of" lists for the year 2011. At this point, I'd say expect that mid-summer.
Where does that leave 2012? I'll begin reviewing the shows from the Winter of 2012 (last three months) in the relatively near future. But instead of reviewing them all one episode at a time, I plan on doing them in three-episode (or larger) chunks. Plus I'm streamlining some of the review process, the whole idea to spend less time in the administrative minutiae of composing the reviews, and more time actually watching the shows.
In any case, I'm going to keep up with the reviews I've been doing. Just remember there's no schedule, I can do a whole bunch at once or take a week off, and I've come to terms that I'm always going to end up reviewing stuff months behind when the majority of the anime bloggers reviewed the same thing.