Archive for the English Anime Category


KIRA KIRA☆Pretty Cure A la Mode

October 8th, 2020

Ichika is a normal 2nd-year in middle school, who loves to make desserts, when she becomes a legendary pâtissier/guardian, Pretty Cure, Cure Whip. In the normal way of such things, Ichika gathers around her a number of other teammates and friends, science-minded Himari, rock singer Aoi, older girls cool, boyish Akira and stylish Yukari and, eventually a famous pâtissier from France, Ciel…and that’s not all, in KIRA KIRA☆Pretty Cure A la Mode, now streaming on Crunchyroll.

It’s my habit of many years to at least give the first few episodes of every PreCure series a watch. That’s fallen by the wayside in recent years, so KIRA KIRA☆PreCure is the last one I actually gave a few weeks to. I liked it well enough and was very pleased when Crunchyroll picked this series up. I’m still hoping we get Heartcatch, as so far, I consider it the best season to date. But Kira Kira is pretty solid.

This time the PreCure fight Noir-sama who steals the color and sparkle – the “kira kira” of the title – from sweets. As legendary pâtissiers, it is PreCure’s job to protect sweets from losing their kira kira and making sure everyone in the world gets to be happy through sweets. The co-branding possibilities with candy and pastries are endless and I’m sure dentists were happy, too.

There are a few narrative beats here that were actually interesting. Our first nemesis is Rio, a boy who obviously knows a lot about sweets, but won’t cook. His true identity was kind of fun and it set the tone for the various redemptions, back-stabbing, evolutions and other crisscrossing of the characters’ various stories. I also quite like evil little Bibli. I won’t spoil, because frankly, it’s a cartoon for little children with a good 10 minutes of repeated footage for every 20-minute episode and there’s little else to draw your attention, so you might as well wait for it. ^_^ This season the PreCure are both sweets and animal related, so you’re gonna have plenty of time to get up and get a drink while they transform, especially towards the end. ^_^

One other draw is the aforementioned cool, boyish Akira and stylish and elegant Yukari who make a nice couple. I think it goes a little far to say they are an established couple, but as far as they can carry that without overt expressions of mutual love, they get pretty far. Akira does have the chance to tell Yukari she likes her and they are partnered in attacks and other ways that makes it plain to those who want to see what they see.

Most telling to me is that Akira’s transformation to Cure Chocolat places her clearly on Takarazuka-like stairs as an otokoyaku. Later she will be Prince to Yukari’s Queen at the school festival. There are any number of moments when their voice actresses play the roles like its an obvious pairing. Akira’s voice actress, Mori Nanako played coffee-shop owner and adult lesbian in a stable relationship, Miyako in Bloom Into You, and Yukari’s VA, Fujita Saki has graced such Yuri anime as Sakura Trick and Yuri Yuri, and she’s Attack on Titan‘s Ymir, so we have solid Yuri cred from both, as well.

As PreCure goes, the music was not bad, although so far nothing has touched the end theme to Heartcatch PreCure in my completely biased opinion.

A pretty solid, if super sweet, season of PreCure.

Ratings:

Art – 6 Coloful, rather than good, but totally acceptable
Story – 6 It had some elements of interest.
Characters – 8
Service – well, I guess constant shots of potential toys are a kind of corporate service
Yuri – Hrmmm, well give Akira and Yukari a 7. You can see if you want to, and also kind of ignore it if you don’t

Overall – 7

Kudos to the translator who nailed Jaba’s “Nan ja to?” by translating it as “What the ja?” Outstanding.





My Next Life as a Villainess: All Routes Lead to Doom!

July 10th, 2020

Sometimes you start a thing for one reason and end up finishing it for a completely different reason. My Next Life as a Villainess: All Routes Lead to Doom!, streaming on Crunchyroll, is just such a thing.

2020 has been the worst-written disaster film of all time, with one crisis messily folding directly into another, and no neat resolution on the horizon. So, when my wife suggested I watch a wholesome feel-good anime I tentatively began watching this series, unsure what I might find. What I found was an an Alice-in-Wonderland story, flipped on it’s head, spun around a few time while blindfolded, and let go to comedically stumble it’s way through a plot line to a charming resolution.

An otaku destined for a lifetime of mediocrity is killed one day and wakes up inside the world of the game she was playing. Not as the lead character, but as the villain – a villain who comes to a bad end in every possible route. To ward off the many possible bad ends, she uses her knowledge of the game to change the scenario.

As you might guess, otome and bishoujo games are well outside my interest. Any story that makes me work at it in order to get to the end of a plot is not terribly appealing to me. That’s the author’s job, IMHO. ^_^  So the idea that this series takes places in an “other world” trope was moderately amusing, but no more than that. Immediately, howver, Uchida Maya’s loopily sincere Catarina Claes sucked me in. So why did this ridiculous story work for me when others of it’s kind have left me cold? I believe it’s a combination of several things.

Catarina’s guilessness is played as a charm point, which generally annoys the daylights out of me, but while she is a doofus, she’s not an idiot. Instead of her bumbling her way through the plot, she’s energetically striding through it, engaged in her own improvement and actively seeking ways to sideline the dangers. The only thing she’s oblivious to is her own charm. This works extraordinarily well. Like the characters in the story, we can see her earnest friendship, her steadfastness and caring as well as her genuine hard work, and allow that her silliness is really only in regards to herself. Catarina spends her energy on uplifting those around her, rather than being carried by them. This small change in focus keeps you coming back over and over.

Secondly, the creator marked out an incredibly intelligent path by having Catarina usurp not only all the love interests’ lines, but also by having her become the protagonist at the same time. There I was, actually enjoying a harem anime for the first time, with no reservations.

Yuri being part of the plot definitely helped. No matter who your “type” is, you’re going to have someone to love and root for. By mid-series, both my wife and I were firmly on Team Mary. ^_^  And, in this too, the voice acting went far above and beyond, as Okasaki Miho really sold Mary’s feelings for Catarina. I didn’t dislike any of the characters, which is always a plus for me.

This is a truly wholesome series, as well. I didn’t have to watch it around tiresome service, or ignore a creepy character’s unwholesome behavior. This is a series I could happily suggest to just about anyone without warnings or even too many explanations.

It was a really fun watch that happens to feature sincere Yuri.

Ratings:

Animation – 8 Not world shaking, but enjoyable
Characters – 10
Story – 9
Yuri – 6
Service – 0

Overall – 9

And, in the end, I found myself thrilled at the announcement of a second season, and started to read the Light Novels, so the anime did it’s job and created a fan…who is is still rooting for Mary. ^_^





Sailor Moon Stars Limited Edition, Part 2, Disk 3

May 18th, 2020

There is no chance that this is the last post I ever make about Sailor Moon, but it may be the last post I make about the original 1990s anime. For the last time, we are going to talk about Sailor Moon Stars Limited Edition, Part 2, Disk 3, in which no one listens to either of the Princesses they have sworn to defend, because 16 year olds make shitty decisions.

Because no one listens to Usagi and Kakyuu-hime, and no one else suggests they all work together, they are picked off by Galaxia, whose backstory isn’t as much of a surprise as she apparently felt it might be. No Sailor Cosmos here to clog up the works, just another Senshi blundering around with mostly no idea what to do.

Which makes me wonder how I would have ended it. Let’s do that at the end.

On the positive side, Seiya gets to say what needs to be said to Usagi. This time, I was really glad about that. Once Mamoru’s fate was revealed, it was a lot easier to forgive both of them for everything they didn’t do right.

Haruka and Michiru spend the last few episodes being really gay, in case you didn’t know they were a couple.  I felt and still feel that this was specifically directed at the corner of fandom who just would not admit that they were really together. Their final moments are both heart-wrenching and extended and good heavens there were still people who just would NOT believe they were together. (I bet those people are all gay now, if you know what I mean…)

And then the epilogue comes and everyone lives happily ever after. For real.

Until 1000 years in the future when Crystal Tokyo is destroyed. Because just as no one thinks “Hey, let’s listen to the Princess,” no one would say, “HEY, we know what happens, let’s not be defeated by the Black Moon.”  I’m looking at you, Ami. You’re supposed to be the smart one.

Ratings:

Art – 7
Story – 6
Characters – 9
LGBTQ – 5 Michiru and Haruka are very, very gay.
Service – 3 Does Galaxia’s hair count? It’s really great hair. Oh, right, and some nudity

Overall – 8

So, how would I have ended it? How about this…

Sailor Moon and Kakyuu-hime would have convinced the Senshi to work together. They would have combined their powers and healed Galaxia, reuniting her with Chibi-Chibi. Hell yes, I would have included Sailor Cosmos – that’s a great costume. SHE would have told the combined Senshi Galaxia’s backstory and would have accompanied Sailor Galaxia home, by way of healing the planets she destroyed.

We would have had two epilogues…the one we got and one in Crystal Tokyo in the future where everything was shiny and perfect and Princess Small Lady was a little older, playing with the Asteroid Senshi, Saturn and Pluto at the Doors of Time, while the rest of the Senshi attended Queen Serenity and King Endymion in Crystal Tokyo as other planetary Senshi visited.

But no one asked me.

Viz has done an exemplary job with this classic title. I want to once again thank every person who worked on this release. Your love and attention was greatly appreciated. This is the definitive Sailor Moon.





Sailor Moon Stars Limited Edition, Part 2, Disk 2

May 5th, 2020

Sailor Moon Stars Limited Edition, Part 2, Disk 2 has some good and some bad…and some annoying, upsetting, frustrating, bittersweet, sweet and a host of other feelings. It’s like an M&M bag full of feels.

Sailor Lead Crow realizes that the absence of her “rival” is a hole she may never fill. The Three Lights learn that being hard-asses doesn’t really pay off. The Outers don’t learn a damn thing and the Inners learn that Usagi has been lying by omission. Both Seiya and Usagi learn that Seiya’s feelings are very sincere and everyone learns that Kakyuuu-Hime was hanging out in an incense burner watching them. That’s not weird at all.

We all learn the high stakes of Galaxia’s attacks. Are we worried? Not really because even aside from this being 23 years old, we know Sailor Moon will win the day. Which is why her emotional is torment especially upsetting, because why?!? What benefit is there to do this to the audience?

On the positive side, we spend some time with each Inner Senshi for the first time in a while. Minako, particularly, has a moment to shine bright, as we might expect from Venus.

I have to eat my words and say that while Seiya had stopped jokingly hitting on Usagi, he (for I will continue to refer to Kou Seiya as a “he,” as Seiya’s actions and behavior still read masculine identifying to me, while Taiki I think would just have been better off not having to pretend to be a hard ass guy, and Yaten remains Yaten) has terrible timing. I sympathize with Seiya, but no, you cannot be enough when she doesn’t even know whether or not she should be sad or angry. So, yes, I acknowledge that Seiya might have, in an entirely alternative timeline, been a decent choice, but he loses all the points for poor timing and inappropriateness.

The art has pulled itself up a tad, too, as if everyone knew they were coming down to the wire.

Ratings:

Art – 6
Story – 6
Characters – 8
LGBTQ – 4 Michiru wants you to know that she and Haruka are very gay. They have one scene, and its gay.
Service – 1 Seiya shirtless, I guess, works for some people

…and here we are. It’s down to 6 more episodes, 4 of which will be everyone dying. Whee! Grab the hankies, we’re going in…

Route Venus is one of my favorite of the Senshi image songs. Here’s Fukami Rika not murdering it for plot purposes.





Sailor Moon Stars Limited Edition, Part 2, Disk 1

April 30th, 2020

Sailor Moon Stars Limited Edition, Part 2, Disk 1 enters what only can be considered the grind portion of any Sailor Moon anime season. The plot is established, we know what the deal is and the most sensible thing in the world would be to just team up and do it together.  But, that isn’t going to happen. Instead we grind through Monsters, while never just sitting down with everyone and saying, “Okay, time to huddle, let’s figure out what is going on here and how to deal with it.” This is my least favorite bit, where everyone ignores their Princess and just wastes their own time and energy.

This is why magical girls have to be 14, not 44.  Otherwise the story would be very short. ^_^; 

This disk contains several remarkable scenes, among them the day when all of the main cast shows up at Usagi’s house for reasons. Artemis is not wrong when saying that them all playing cards was pretty wholesome. This disk is also home to the moment when Aluminum Siren sees the rose petals that accompany Sailors Uranus and Neptune appearance. I wish that had been given some deeper thought beyond a momentary gag – but I’ll take the gag. ^_^

On the positive side, I will admit that Seiya stops hitting on Usagi, confining himself to role of bodyguard. I’ll never love the Lights, myself, but I can kind of see the appeal.

You can see that this series was not making money, the animation is frequently poor, sometimes frighteningly so. But as always Viz’s remaster is as good as something this badly drawn can be.I think I’ll watch the next disk as a dub; I have no doubt that that is well done, as well.

Ratings:

Art – 4, sometimes 3
Story – 4
Characters – 8
LGBTQ – 1 Pretty much nothing but crumbs
Service – 2 The art tanks hard and not even the Phages are fake-sexy.

Now the grind continues until we run out of Sailor Animamates and we have to befriend Galaxia to death. ^_^;