With the end of the summer Anime season, it’s time to do a quick round up of what I watched, what I thought about them and to make some recommendations to you fine readers who may not have delved deep into the quagmire like I did.
First off, I want to make a couple of special mentions. I have many opinions about many shows but some are the type you kind of need to see for yourself, or are not easily available in Australia. Some are not even out yet and I have to had to read the manga to get an idea of the story in anticipation of Netflix eventually figuring out with Simulcasting is.
The first special mention is NTR: Netsuzou Trap, any who has been on the internet for longer than a few months has probably encountered the term NTR, it sums up this show fairly well. Short 9-minute episodes that I found myself both dreading and anticipating in equal measure. Very good but not for a young audience or close minded.
The other is Kakegurui, this show was licensed by the ever-confusing folks over at Netflix who, despite doing a simulcast release of the show in Japan, refuse to release the series until 2018. Luckily for me the manga was available on Amazon and I am super hyped to see this show in all its animated glory.
With that out of the way time for a quick round up. I must note that these are only a couple of the near dozen shows I watched this year, for the full list feel free to hit me up on twitter. I am always keen to talk more Anime with other fans.
The Good:
Two shows caught my interest this season and managed to entertain me with their excellent premise and storytelling. They are of course, Classroom of the Elite and A Centaur’s Life. I want to talk about New Game!! But since it’s a second season it is automatically disqualified.
Classroom of the Elite is a light novel adaptation and blends a good mix of politics and detective work in a high school setting. The whole idea is not a fresh one, but the characters are a lot more interesting than most of the previous shows of this type. At the end of the day, if you enjoyed Assassination Classroom, you will likely enjoy this.
On the other end of the spectrum we have A Centaur’s Life, an adaptation of the Manga, A Centaur’s Life is a slice of life comedy set in a world where “humans” are anthropomorphic. Meaning Centaurs, Mermaids, Satyrs, Devil wings, Angel Wings, cat ears. If it’s a distinctive animal feature, it’s in this show. While this show is far from my normal high action or intense psychological types, it’s nice to just be able to enjoy a show about cute characters living their lives.
Of course, the amount of detail that has gone into the world is amazing, special seats for Centaurs, water logged cities for the merfolk and even snake people from Antarctica. This show is great fun.
The OK:
This is the location most of the shows I watch fell into this season. So many shows had great promise but failed to deliver. The ones that left the best impression were probably GAMERS! And Fastest Finger First.
Putting GAMERS! In just the ‘OK’ category will probably get me in trouble with some people but bumbling idiots who stumble their way into relationships and then proceed to do everything they can to sabotage themselves can get a bit tired after a full 12 episodes. Luckily the show slowed its pace and focused instead on developing their relationships instead of trying to self-destruct them. If this gets a second season I will be sure to watch it but I don’t expect it to be incredible memorable for anything except its great opening.
Fastest Finger First is one that I was never overly committed to watching but it was something I just couldn’t help but make myself finish. Ever character is bland and not just their personalities, the art of this show is middle budget at best. Nothing compared to the visual feast that Classroom of the Elite or Restaurant to Another World treated us to. The concept is fun and I enjoyed the intricate breakdown of how quiz shows might work in some super expert level, but the idea that average high school kids have enough general knowledge to guess a question and extrapolate its answer from only a handful of words is a bit much. Cool story bro.
The Ugly.
Now this is the one I really wanted to talk about. This particular spot had two contenders but I decided to place the crown only upon one these tremendous piles.
In Another World With My Smartphone.
The Isekai, transported to another world, to end all Isekais.
Seriously, please stop making these shows. Sword Art Online was fun, Log Horzion was brilliant, Re:Zero was amazing, even No Game No Life was a lot a fun. But this was just bad.
At first, I thought they had blown their whole budget on the opening but after watching it a couple of time a realized this show probably had no budget and the script isn’t really worth the ink it was written on. While the original Light Novel that it is based off, probably has some good points. A generic harem show that isn’t even all that funny despite its attempts, belongs in the early 2000’s.
For that sake of you wonderful readers I subjected myself to 24 minutes of some of the worst Anime I have watched in nearly a decade, just so I could tear it apart. Which is sincerely want to at length. But I will leave that for better informed, and probably more vitriolic, people on YouTube. I don’t particularly want to spend the time writing a script or even a full article on the whole show.
Now with all of that out of the way I do want to give a short mention to Knights and Magic, the other contender for the Ugly spot. Again, an Isekai show. While not as horrendous as Smartphone, K&M has some serious faults. The most annoying of which to me is the lack of continuity. Supposedly large gaps of time, months to years, pass in the show but the main character remains a constant Shota. This stylistic choice made me distinctly uncomfortable, especially given the creepy older female friend. But again, that’s a topic for another day. As a mecha show it does… OK.
Next season:
I am trying to not spoil to many of the next seasons shows for myself and have spent very little time combing through them on MAL and ANN like I normally would, I am hoping that this season contains less rotten eggs and more hidden gems.