Anime
I am writing this post in between studying because surprisingly, I do need a break from stretching the limits of my short-time memory from time to time, and also because I've been meaning to do another anime write up for a while now.
I'm taking a break from One Piece and Fairy Tail until they've finished their current arcs so I can watch them in one go, but as always, I follow a few shows as they air.
The second season of Chihayafuru, aka my favourite shoujo/sports anime about an obscure Japanese card game, finished a few weeks ago. I already miss it. What am I going to do with all these FEELINGS and EMOTIONS now? I hope we get a third season and that the wait won't be as long as between seasons 1 and 2.
I still ship ChihayaxTaichi like you would not believe, and in that regard the season left me very torn. The love triangle - if it really is one - felt very non-traditional in the first season, but I feel like it moved more towards the 'classic' version in this one. From a story perspective, that's a bit disappointing, but from a shipping perspective it makes me super sad because I never get the pairing I want out of traditional love triangles. N-E-V-E-R. I really loved the ChihayaxTaichi moments we got in these episodes, but the last episode left me in a puddle of despair.
As for the new characters that were introduced, I'm still not quite sure how I feel about them. Maybe it's just that they haven't gotten enough development yet, but their presence in the show feels kind of disruptive. Though I suppose that could just be me wanting the show to devote more screen time to the 'core' characters.
The new HunterxHunter continues to be very entertaining, despite the absence of my darlings Kurapika and Leorio. At least I will get to see them when the movie is finally out and subbed? Anyway.
We have moved on from the still relatively light-hearted Greed Island Arc to the HOLY SHIT WHAT THE FUCK IS THIS AAAAAAH Chimera Ant Arc. The combined (body) horror of this and Attack on Titan can be a bit much sometimes, tbh. I've spoiled myself for an important plot point in this arc, but I'm curious to see how exactly that will play out. I'd say I hope this part of the story is over soon, but then the anime would catch up to the manga pretty soon, as far I know. And the manga is on a pretty long break right now, so. (And just as Leorio came back, too. D:)
Free! is amazing. A-maaaa-zing I say. Aside from being gorgeously animated and genuinely funny, if completely over the top and ridiculous, it is also really interesting. It is of course incredibly fan servicy what with everyone running around half-naked all the time, but it's just so novel, actually being the target of said fan service. It really showed me just how much I am not used to the female gaze.
I'm hoping for some more character development of our colour-coded-for-your-convenience main cast as well as some real plot, but for now I'll keep watching. Hell, I'd keep watching for Ama-chan-sensei (<3<3<3) and Gou/Kou alone.
I didn't mean to start watching Attack on Titan/Shingeki no Kyojin. I really, really didn't. But then I kept seeing people reblogging and posting all those videos with this really awesome, catchy song, so obviously I had to find out where it's from. And then I saw the opening the song belonged to and said to myself: that does not look like a show I would enjoy. The next step was, of course, to spend an eternity on the show's tvtropes page and oops, somehow I started watching it, however did that happen. <.<
So really, the sheer catchiness of the opening song, Guren no Yumiya (and whose bright idea was it to change the opening song after 13 episodes anyway? HunterxHunter has had the same opening song for 4 arcs now and it's driving me crazy, but Attack on Titan just throws the awesomeness away?) made me watch the show. Also the fact that it was praised as devoid of sexism might have been a factor.
It does include a lot of factors that would otherwise keep me far, far away from a series, but the mangaka and the people adapting it really make it work. I'm very curious about the underlying mystery as well as the politics of this world. One thing that I'm still kind of meh about is the main character - this has gotten better in the latest episodes, so I'm hopeful that I'll come to like him more, but from the start his one and only characteristic was murderous raaaaaage (and self-righteousness), even before the event that could've justified it better. Meanwhile, all the other characters are way more faceted and interesting - Mikasa , in her amazingness and kick-ass ways, Armin, with his strategic capabilities, Levi, who we've barely seen so far but who is so fun to watch.
The first time Eren showed some other sides of himself before the latest episodes was when he interacted with all the other people in his training squad (also very interesting characters that I need more of, all of them). With the position he has now been placed in as of episode 14, I hope to see more of that.
I'm taking a break from One Piece and Fairy Tail until they've finished their current arcs so I can watch them in one go, but as always, I follow a few shows as they air.
The second season of Chihayafuru, aka my favourite shoujo/sports anime about an obscure Japanese card game, finished a few weeks ago. I already miss it. What am I going to do with all these FEELINGS and EMOTIONS now? I hope we get a third season and that the wait won't be as long as between seasons 1 and 2.
I still ship ChihayaxTaichi like you would not believe, and in that regard the season left me very torn. The love triangle - if it really is one - felt very non-traditional in the first season, but I feel like it moved more towards the 'classic' version in this one. From a story perspective, that's a bit disappointing, but from a shipping perspective it makes me super sad because I never get the pairing I want out of traditional love triangles. N-E-V-E-R. I really loved the ChihayaxTaichi moments we got in these episodes, but the last episode left me in a puddle of despair.
As for the new characters that were introduced, I'm still not quite sure how I feel about them. Maybe it's just that they haven't gotten enough development yet, but their presence in the show feels kind of disruptive. Though I suppose that could just be me wanting the show to devote more screen time to the 'core' characters.
The new HunterxHunter continues to be very entertaining, despite the absence of my darlings Kurapika and Leorio. At least I will get to see them when the movie is finally out and subbed? Anyway.
We have moved on from the still relatively light-hearted Greed Island Arc to the HOLY SHIT WHAT THE FUCK IS THIS AAAAAAH Chimera Ant Arc. The combined (body) horror of this and Attack on Titan can be a bit much sometimes, tbh. I've spoiled myself for an important plot point in this arc, but I'm curious to see how exactly that will play out. I'd say I hope this part of the story is over soon, but then the anime would catch up to the manga pretty soon, as far I know. And the manga is on a pretty long break right now, so. (And just as Leorio came back, too. D:)
Free! is amazing. A-maaaa-zing I say. Aside from being gorgeously animated and genuinely funny, if completely over the top and ridiculous, it is also really interesting. It is of course incredibly fan servicy what with everyone running around half-naked all the time, but it's just so novel, actually being the target of said fan service. It really showed me just how much I am not used to the female gaze.
I'm hoping for some more character development of our colour-coded-for-your-convenience main cast as well as some real plot, but for now I'll keep watching. Hell, I'd keep watching for Ama-chan-sensei (<3<3<3) and Gou/Kou alone.
I didn't mean to start watching Attack on Titan/Shingeki no Kyojin. I really, really didn't. But then I kept seeing people reblogging and posting all those videos with this really awesome, catchy song, so obviously I had to find out where it's from. And then I saw the opening the song belonged to and said to myself: that does not look like a show I would enjoy. The next step was, of course, to spend an eternity on the show's tvtropes page and oops, somehow I started watching it, however did that happen. <.<
So really, the sheer catchiness of the opening song, Guren no Yumiya (and whose bright idea was it to change the opening song after 13 episodes anyway? HunterxHunter has had the same opening song for 4 arcs now and it's driving me crazy, but Attack on Titan just throws the awesomeness away?) made me watch the show. Also the fact that it was praised as devoid of sexism might have been a factor.
It does include a lot of factors that would otherwise keep me far, far away from a series, but the mangaka and the people adapting it really make it work. I'm very curious about the underlying mystery as well as the politics of this world. One thing that I'm still kind of meh about is the main character - this has gotten better in the latest episodes, so I'm hopeful that I'll come to like him more, but from the start his one and only characteristic was murderous raaaaaage (and self-righteousness), even before the event that could've justified it better. Meanwhile, all the other characters are way more faceted and interesting - Mikasa , in her amazingness and kick-ass ways, Armin, with his strategic capabilities, Levi, who we've barely seen so far but who is so fun to watch.
The first time Eren showed some other sides of himself before the latest episodes was when he interacted with all the other people in his training squad (also very interesting characters that I need more of, all of them). With the position he has now been placed in as of episode 14, I hope to see more of that.