Anime? During the Semester?
Yeah, I don't usually watch anime during the semester. Largely because I don't generally have the time. Plus, I like to binge watch, rather than just sneaking in an episode here or there. So I'd rather wait until the breaks, so I can marathon a series in a couple of days. And I have been really busy this semester, anyway. Lots of homework, a truly insane amount of reading, plus two extremely awkwardly scheduled courses...I'm spending the vast majority of my time just trying to stay on top of everything.
But, uh. My willpower failed me last weekend, and I ended up watching episodes of two different series. Two currently airing series, at that. (Which is something else that I don't do often. It's the binge watching thing again.) What series are they, you ask? Well, the first is Darling in the FranXX, and the second is Cardcaptor Sakura: Clear Card.
And I have some thoughts.
This is entirely Crunchyroll's fault. See, I liked their Facebook page a while back, so I see when they post. And they've been posting pictures from Darling in the FranXX. Mostly of Zero Two, who is cool looking. So, knowing nothing about the series, I started to get interested just from seeing the pictures. So, I wiki'd it, and found out that it's a mecha series, which I dig. So, I went to Crunchyroll. "I'll just watch the first episode or two," I told myself, "To see if I'm interested." Just the first episode...ha. I watched all nine available episodes at once....staying up until nearly 9:00AM in the process. Yeah, I suck at adulting. Anyway. Needless to say, I enjoyed it enough that I'm going to continue watching it. And I have some opinions and questions.
First off, the animation and art style are pretty. Which I knew going in, seeing as it was screencaps that initially attracted me, but still. The one thing that surprised me was the design of the FranXX. Typically, giant robots are male. But these are definitely female. And they have eyes and facial expressions and all. Kinda weird, simply because I've never seen another series that did that. But not necessarily bad, I suppose.
The blatant sexual overtones to the whole cockpit situation bother me, but I'll hold my judgment until I see the rest of the series. If the rest isn't overly sexist, I guess I can ignore it. But if it goes too much into blatant fanservice territory, then I'm done. Another thing that makes it weird is how naive the characters are. They call themselves 'children', even though several of them are clearly post-pubescent. And they clearly have no knowledge of the concept of romantic love or sexuality. Which...is kind of bizarre. I mean, this is a weird, futuristic society, and clearly things aren't structured even the slightest bit normally. But still. The idea that you can have a society where people can grow to puberty or beyond and not know what a kiss is, or why people do it? Weeeeeird.
So, a lot of what I want out of this series is to see where they take some of these weird ideas. Seeing how the pilots learn and grow, and how their relationships mature...that'll be interesting. Unsurprisingly, I ship Hiro/Zero Two, and also Goro/Ichigo. As for my favorite characters, it's pretty much the same. Zero Two's probably my favorite, then I also like Hiro, Ichigo, and Goro a lot. I like the others okay, though none of them have been developed quite as much yet. I really want to know more about Zero Two, honestly. Not only is she a neat character, but I just get kind of a mysterious feel about her. She seems more mature than the others, in the sense that she knows more about the world, anyway. She's the one who tells Hiro what a kiss is. I want to know more about her life. Also, I want to know more about this society, and the world at large. She kind of hints at knowing about it, but nothing much has been given away yet.
Honestly, I'm just really looking forward to seeing what kind of plot we get out of this. (Assuming we get one, that is.) I feel like they've set things up so we're already having questions, so hopefully they'll delve deeper and get into things as the series progresses. But, we'll see, I guess.
And then, there's the new CCS series. I knew I'd be watching this one as soon as I heard that they were making it. I loved the original CCS, so the idea of a sequel made me squee. But, I'd initially planned on waiting until it was finished, and then watching it all at once. Well...again, I partly blame Crunchyroll. They've been posting pictures of this, too. So I knew it was airing. And I was tempted to go watch it, but I convinced myself I should wait. And then after I caved and watched Darling in the FranXX, I had no more restraint left in me. So, I watched this one, too.
I read somewhere that they brought back the original cast and studio to do this new series, and it shows. It feels just like the original, but even shinier. The art and animation were good before, but now they're even prettier. And the opening theme is by Maaya Sakamoto, who did my favorite of the original series openings, so you know I'm happy about the music. Plus, there's Sakura/Shaoran cuteness everywhere, which you know I love. And I'm oddly amused by the presence of modern technology. Like smart phones and camera drones! =D I guess this just shows I watch too much old anime and not enough current; I don't know that I've ever seen a series where the characters had smart phones! Cell phones, yes, but not smart phones with video chat and all. And I know I've never seen one with a camera drone. But then, Tomoyo isn't in any other series, either. And who else would have one? XD
Now, I'm just really curious about the actual plot. There have been some hints, and some things that make you question, but (understandably) nothing has been explained yet. Like, I want to know WTF is going on with Shaoran. He clearly knows something about all this; he's in cahoots with Eriol, FFS. That doesn't really sit right with me, honestly. I'm not sure I can see Shaoran keeping things from Sakura like that. Not without a damn good reason. And maybe he has one; we don't know yet. But I want to knooooow~! And as a slightly-Shaoran-related aside, I'm kind of thrilled that they've included Meilin in this. I wasn't a fan of hers at first, but by the end of the series she'd really grown on me. So it was nice to hear from her again.
And the new transfer student, Akiho. I feel like the narrative is poised to have her as some sort of alternate!Sakura. Like, they keep pointing out how similar they are; even their names! And they've put the focus on her stuffed bunny a little too often for me not to find it suspicious. Kero's incognito form is a stuffed animal, after all. And that butler/caretaker/whatever of hers...he kind of smacks of Yue. Something about him just feels...fishy, somehow. And the bit about how Akiho came to Japan just for a book...the Clow Cards were originally sealed in a book. The parallels are too obvious, so I wonder where they're going with it. Heck, maybe it is all a coincidence. But I doubt it. I just want to know what the bigger picture is, here. Sakura isn't a 'magical girl' in the traditional genre sense of the word; she's a mage, and Clow's chosen successor to his magic. So, what is Akiho? There were the obvious parallels between Eriol/Ruby/Spinel and Sakura/Yue/Kero, because of who Eriol is. But there's no obvious reason for such parallels with Akiho. Even if she's a mage, she shouldn't have equivalent Guardians. Hmm. So many questions. When is the next episode, again? XD
Overall, I'm enjoying them both, so far. I plan to keep watching, so I may or may not post about them again. We'll see. =D
But, uh. My willpower failed me last weekend, and I ended up watching episodes of two different series. Two currently airing series, at that. (Which is something else that I don't do often. It's the binge watching thing again.) What series are they, you ask? Well, the first is Darling in the FranXX, and the second is Cardcaptor Sakura: Clear Card.
And I have some thoughts.
This is entirely Crunchyroll's fault. See, I liked their Facebook page a while back, so I see when they post. And they've been posting pictures from Darling in the FranXX. Mostly of Zero Two, who is cool looking. So, knowing nothing about the series, I started to get interested just from seeing the pictures. So, I wiki'd it, and found out that it's a mecha series, which I dig. So, I went to Crunchyroll. "I'll just watch the first episode or two," I told myself, "To see if I'm interested." Just the first episode...ha. I watched all nine available episodes at once....staying up until nearly 9:00AM in the process. Yeah, I suck at adulting. Anyway. Needless to say, I enjoyed it enough that I'm going to continue watching it. And I have some opinions and questions.
First off, the animation and art style are pretty. Which I knew going in, seeing as it was screencaps that initially attracted me, but still. The one thing that surprised me was the design of the FranXX. Typically, giant robots are male. But these are definitely female. And they have eyes and facial expressions and all. Kinda weird, simply because I've never seen another series that did that. But not necessarily bad, I suppose.
The blatant sexual overtones to the whole cockpit situation bother me, but I'll hold my judgment until I see the rest of the series. If the rest isn't overly sexist, I guess I can ignore it. But if it goes too much into blatant fanservice territory, then I'm done. Another thing that makes it weird is how naive the characters are. They call themselves 'children', even though several of them are clearly post-pubescent. And they clearly have no knowledge of the concept of romantic love or sexuality. Which...is kind of bizarre. I mean, this is a weird, futuristic society, and clearly things aren't structured even the slightest bit normally. But still. The idea that you can have a society where people can grow to puberty or beyond and not know what a kiss is, or why people do it? Weeeeeird.
So, a lot of what I want out of this series is to see where they take some of these weird ideas. Seeing how the pilots learn and grow, and how their relationships mature...that'll be interesting. Unsurprisingly, I ship Hiro/Zero Two, and also Goro/Ichigo. As for my favorite characters, it's pretty much the same. Zero Two's probably my favorite, then I also like Hiro, Ichigo, and Goro a lot. I like the others okay, though none of them have been developed quite as much yet. I really want to know more about Zero Two, honestly. Not only is she a neat character, but I just get kind of a mysterious feel about her. She seems more mature than the others, in the sense that she knows more about the world, anyway. She's the one who tells Hiro what a kiss is. I want to know more about her life. Also, I want to know more about this society, and the world at large. She kind of hints at knowing about it, but nothing much has been given away yet.
Honestly, I'm just really looking forward to seeing what kind of plot we get out of this. (Assuming we get one, that is.) I feel like they've set things up so we're already having questions, so hopefully they'll delve deeper and get into things as the series progresses. But, we'll see, I guess.
And then, there's the new CCS series. I knew I'd be watching this one as soon as I heard that they were making it. I loved the original CCS, so the idea of a sequel made me squee. But, I'd initially planned on waiting until it was finished, and then watching it all at once. Well...again, I partly blame Crunchyroll. They've been posting pictures of this, too. So I knew it was airing. And I was tempted to go watch it, but I convinced myself I should wait. And then after I caved and watched Darling in the FranXX, I had no more restraint left in me. So, I watched this one, too.
I read somewhere that they brought back the original cast and studio to do this new series, and it shows. It feels just like the original, but even shinier. The art and animation were good before, but now they're even prettier. And the opening theme is by Maaya Sakamoto, who did my favorite of the original series openings, so you know I'm happy about the music. Plus, there's Sakura/Shaoran cuteness everywhere, which you know I love. And I'm oddly amused by the presence of modern technology. Like smart phones and camera drones! =D I guess this just shows I watch too much old anime and not enough current; I don't know that I've ever seen a series where the characters had smart phones! Cell phones, yes, but not smart phones with video chat and all. And I know I've never seen one with a camera drone. But then, Tomoyo isn't in any other series, either. And who else would have one? XD
Now, I'm just really curious about the actual plot. There have been some hints, and some things that make you question, but (understandably) nothing has been explained yet. Like, I want to know WTF is going on with Shaoran. He clearly knows something about all this; he's in cahoots with Eriol, FFS. That doesn't really sit right with me, honestly. I'm not sure I can see Shaoran keeping things from Sakura like that. Not without a damn good reason. And maybe he has one; we don't know yet. But I want to knooooow~! And as a slightly-Shaoran-related aside, I'm kind of thrilled that they've included Meilin in this. I wasn't a fan of hers at first, but by the end of the series she'd really grown on me. So it was nice to hear from her again.
And the new transfer student, Akiho. I feel like the narrative is poised to have her as some sort of alternate!Sakura. Like, they keep pointing out how similar they are; even their names! And they've put the focus on her stuffed bunny a little too often for me not to find it suspicious. Kero's incognito form is a stuffed animal, after all. And that butler/caretaker/whatever of hers...he kind of smacks of Yue. Something about him just feels...fishy, somehow. And the bit about how Akiho came to Japan just for a book...the Clow Cards were originally sealed in a book. The parallels are too obvious, so I wonder where they're going with it. Heck, maybe it is all a coincidence. But I doubt it. I just want to know what the bigger picture is, here. Sakura isn't a 'magical girl' in the traditional genre sense of the word; she's a mage, and Clow's chosen successor to his magic. So, what is Akiho? There were the obvious parallels between Eriol/Ruby/Spinel and Sakura/Yue/Kero, because of who Eriol is. But there's no obvious reason for such parallels with Akiho. Even if she's a mage, she shouldn't have equivalent Guardians. Hmm. So many questions. When is the next episode, again? XD
Overall, I'm enjoying them both, so far. I plan to keep watching, so I may or may not post about them again. We'll see. =D