Winter Anime 2022: The Covid Runback

[Mattias]

Watched a bunch of stuff tonight.

Monster Development was funny. I like the Sentai Villains as a normal corporation take. And having to bullshit your big bosses because your direct boss screwed you over? Chef's Kiss.

Akebi's Sailor Uniform: I have no idea what kind of show this will be, but damn is it pretty. Did Clamp make these characters? It's something about the necks and chin's that's giving me hugs shoujo vibes. No noodle arms though, so I can't be sure. I died when that entrance ceremony happened.

Dress Up Darling: It's Kanji Tatsumi without the anger issues meets hot nerd. Also a really pretty show. Also a surprisingly horny show. Best thing so far this season.

Weakest Crest: It's Demon King Acadamy 2.0, only MC isn't as bombastic as Anos Voldigoad. Really felt like the whole episode was a giant speedrun of an entire LN volume. Best part was the unintentionally hilarious "Devilis was actually a demon?!".

[Toranth]

Weakest Crest really did speed through a lot of material, most of which was background worldbuilding - not essential, but would give a lot more understanding to the situation. For example, did you realize that in his previous life, he was the most powerful magician in a very high-magictech society, complete with magic cars, magic airships, magic TVs and telephones, etc? Gives a bit more meaning to the next scene of him riding in a horse-drawn wagon, doesn't it? As far as ORE-TSUEEE fantasy stories, it's pretty standard, with the one exception that most people in the world have brains. But don't expect much more than that.

Leadale was pretty accurate to the web novel - and what you saw is what you're going to get for the rest of the series. There's no real drama, no shonen hot-blooded battles, just some light slice-of-life isekai fantasy stuff. Looks like they'll hit the entire web novel, as this episode covered 5 or 6 chapters, and there's only 60 or 70 total.
Of course, I'm a little confused as to how this became a show in the first place. It was serialized and ended almost 10 years ago. It was somewhat popular back then, but... why now?

Terminal Harem was as bad as I remember. Actually, it's even worse when animated. God, I regret the time I spent watching this - 20 minutes of life that I could have spent banging my head on the desk instead. Would have been more fun.

Monster Development was pretty amusing, much better than I expected. I'll keep watching this one for at least a few more episodes to see if they manage develop new material. These types of shows have an unfortunate tendency to get stuck in a rut.

I also tried to watch the preview of Kenja no Deshi, but the copy I found was terrible, so I'll just wait until it actually airs.

[bassgs435]

Will the Monster Development anime have an uncensored version?

Not in TV. Maybe in BD’s

[NMR-3]

Digimon Ghost Game: man, this episode suddenly brought on the plot. The new evolution sequence was cool and GrusGammamon was properly evil.

[LegalLoliLover]

Not in TV. Maybe in BD’s

In other words, no ATX version?

[Skull]

Digimon Ghost Game episode 13: Wow, 13 was definitely Hiro's unlucky number lol. I suppose I should just rip the band aid off and say this should have been what the Clockmon returns episode was. As it stands that episode feels completely pointless now other than the introduction of Bokomon.

Anyways, onto the actual meat of the episode. Sealsdramon is here and he's killing Digimon left and right. I did roll my eyes at the crew not knowing that Digimon could be killed, guess the writer wasn't watching last week's episode with the Zassoumon getting slaughtered by the heroes. I was very bemused that Jellymon's habit of wandering off got her comeuppance with her being used as bait by the others. The fight begins and you could tell a new Evolution was coming as once again Hiro doesn't try to Evolve Gammamon until the plot says he can. I'm actually hoping Angoramon will acknowledge and lament the fact that Gammamon got four Evolutions before he got a single one. Speaking of, I wish Gammamon's Evolutions were better spaced out as we only got half a fight with Wezen last week and Gulus has totally stolen the thunder now. When the silhouette first appeared to take the knife blow, I actually thought it was Tailmon Uver so I was genuinely shocked to Bokomon get stabbed. As expected the shock unleashes GulusGammamon and I really liked how they animated the scene, they made it real clear that it's nothing to do with Hiro. After checking against Gulus' Reference Book entry, I have a theory that the relationship to Gammamon is something akin to Yuya and Zarc in Yugioh where a villain (Gulus/Zarc) was defeated in the past and forcibly reincarnated back to the state of an innocent child (Gammamon/Yuya) but when the kid gets pushed into despair the fragments of the villain leaks out in an attempt to reclaim their body. It would certainly explain why Gulus is so much more intelligent and powerful than Gammamon normally is even in Adult form. Gulus shooting a hole in the "Digital Space" was interesting and shows it won't always be the safety net to protect humans. It was also interesting how he "expects" Hiro to shout out the attack name but when Hiro can't he simply does it himself showing that while the symbiotic relationship is still there to some extent, it's much weaker. BlackAgumon cameoing at the end has me scratching my head as I don't see how it fits in, unless maybe he's connected to Uver? But regardless it wouldn't be Digimon without a Agumon/Greymon appearance lol.

Unfortunately, despite how good this episode was, the preview suggests we're going back to monster of the week which if so is major disappoint.

- - - Updated - - -

Digimon Ghost Game: man, this episode suddenly brought on the plot. The new evolution sequence was cool and GrusGammamon was properly evil.

FYI, the official romanisation is "Gulus"Gammamon. His Champion forms all have a "brightest star" name motif of Betel(guese), Kaus (Australis), Wezen and (Re)gulus.

[Mattias]

Weakest Crest really did speed through a lot of material, [....] it's pretty standard, with the one exception that most people in the world have brains. But don't expect much more than that.

I don't know. The "Devilus is really a Devil?!" bit really calls their intelligence into question.

[Toranth]

That's really a language thing, IIRC, as 'mazoku' is the term used, whereas 'devil' is never used at all. But yeah, it comes off as pretty dumb in English.
Of course, I can't check. I wondered why I hadn't seen any updates to the web novel in a while... turns out the author deleted the entire thing a year or so ago, probably when the anime bought the license. 11 volumes of the novel out, and then delete it?

[bassgs435]

SMT does have Lucifer walking around under names like Louis Cypher or Louisa Ferre

[Mattias]

Yeah, but no one's ever surprised when that reveal happens.

[Mattias]

Watched like three things last night, and I can't remember a single one. Then tonight I sit down and it's one good thing after another. Sabuski Bisco was strange and great, Princess Connect S2 was more hijinks, and Gay Isekai was really funny. From Space Ishtar, to the Kaguya-sama style mind games, the the Thing Bear, to the "What do you mean I have powers? Doesn't exercise let everyone punch through bears?".

[Mattias]

I tried giving Love and Kill a try. I figured hey, rival assassins rom com sounds like a fun thing. But it just fell so flat. The MC doesn't succeed in a single thing all episode, and the rival is way too...stalker-y, I guess? It would be one thing if the show told us that the MC was competent, and all his attempts could be easily rebuffed if she wanted to, but every attempt she has to show off she's beaten by Rival before she can do anything.

[LegalLoliLover]

In Platinum End, while red arrows can be used to control people, that control cannot bypass survival instinct. With that in mind, the reason for Metropoliman's death is quite simple. He failed to associate "fair fights" with "death". In other words, somewhere inside him, there still existed a notion that fights can/should be won fairly. That chain was still binding him. Let this be a lesson that being "honorable" at the worst time can be fatal. Boethiah from Elder Scrolls teaches us that we must "cast aside ... honor and strike with the hidden blade". And Sima Yi (3 Kingdoms) was totally willing to be called a sissy to defeat Zhuge Liang at Wuzhang Plains (that whole "wearing women's clothing" provocation). Also, why did Metropoliman even "hire" that Heavy (Team Fortress 2) expy anyway? None of the Heavy weapons killed anyone, except Metropoliman himself. If that were the goal, it would have been better to use droids (because the plot seems to imply that Metropoliman's wealth is infinite, so he could totally afford them), who are immune to arrows (because they have no beating hearts or brain chemistry), than flesh-and-blood soldiers to carry mundane weapons.

[LegalLoliLover]

Season 1 of Vanitas had Vampire Jeanne. Now we have Hunter Astolfo. I guess Vanitas is going the route of "all historical figures are vampires or hunters".

[bassgs435]

Keep in mind Astolfo isn't the first Hunter we see bearing the name of a historical figure. There's also Roland and Olivier. It's fair to guess the 12 paladins in Vanitas will have the names of Charlemagne's 12 paladins

[LegalLoliLover]

True, but Astolfo is a very unique name, while Roland and Olivier are fairly common. I mean, Jurassic Park had a Roland... But you know, hunting dinosaurs, rather than vampires.

[bassgs435]

In other words, no ATX version?

AT-X, despite it's rep, doesn't always air uncensored anime. They air lots of anime that have no nudity to begin with, and some shows wait for BDs and aren't uncensored even there. HxEros is a good example. There is an AT-X airing for Kuroitsu-san, but it's censored the same as other airings

- - - Updated - - -

True, but Astolfo is a very unique name, while Roland and Olivier are fairly common. I mean, Jurassic Park had a Roland... But you know, hunting dinosaurs, rather than vampires.

True, but when you have a group named the paladins, who are 12 people and 2 of them are friends named Roland and Olivier, it isn't hard to guess they're referencing Charlemagne's 12.

[AmADo VII]

even in Vanitas not!Astolfo is a pink haired pretty boy lol.

[LegalLoliLover]

As well he should be?

[Rafflesiac]

ARIFURETA THE GOAT RETURNS

Can't believe it's 50% of the shows I'm watching this season. Yue's eyeshadow is strangely unflattering; it's too thick.

As for the other 50% of the shows I'm watching this season, Bisque Doll's lovely as ever. God, the ending and the beginning where Marin's talking about heartwarming Shizuku is as she ahegaos are gutbusting.