Anime What was the last anime you watched before posting in this thread?

[WyndonCalling]

It's Western animation, but Castlevania is bursting with anime influences and it's a lot of fun. It's an interesting case study in how much a show can get wrong, but still be elevated by a few key qualities - the animation is sometimes janky, the plot meandering and confusing, the ending utterly saccharine and the sound mixing is abysmal at times, but the quality of the voice acting and the script behind it are through the roof. The wit is so dry you can use it for flood defenses, the highlights being Malcolm McDowell as a foul-mouthed death effigy ("Is there a point to this? Are you dictating your fucking obituary to me, Belmont?") and an equally crude-yet-charming Bill Nighy as a mad sorcerer. Marvellous stuff.

 

[fumikage tokoyami]

MHA (my hero academia)

 

[Beth Pavell]

Higehiro, episode 8. Beginning to get fed up with the repetitive conversations at this point

 

[Tactician Karina]

Cestvs: The Roman Fighter episode 7. So we see Cestus and co. working on building roads for around two months, though it's also part of their training according to Zafar. Though it seems Cestus has been scouted (and personally required to to join) by the emperor Nero, because of course Nero wants him to fight (if their interaction before and from snippets I've seen in the manga affirmed for me, this one tidbit definitely reaffirmed why I ship them lol); poor Cestus though, he feels he can't get away from him. Also let me just say that Pedro is a really fun character, he's probably my second favorite out of the main group now. Anyway we see the qualifier arena and fights towards the end, Cestus stomps his opponent Zain easily; he shouldn't have been mocking my boy anyway, so I definitely laughed when he went down fast. Hopefully Cestus gets his thoughts together next episode though, the small arena is messing with him psychologically so Zafar is right in that he can't let that get to him, or else the opponent will use it against him. The ending of the episode was pretty funny, a group of men gambling on the fights at night and one of them got shit on the head by a crow lol, that "Lucky Man" Felix got a point about it being bad luck though; so a new character introduced for the fights, he looks strong so I can't wait for next week to see more of him hopefully.

 

[Ryoma Maser]

Super Cub Episode 8

SSSS.DYNAZENON Episode 9-
THE DEBUT OF KAISER GRIDKNIGHT, this show's version of King Gridman thanks to introduction of Chise's new Kaiju friend, Goldburn as the secret fifth part of Dynazenon. I wonder if Goldburn can add a new mode to Dynazenon by itself or Dyna Soldier or they need one of the Gridmen (Gridman, Gridman Sigma, and Gridknight) to activate Goldburn's power

I've Been Killing Slimes for 300 Years and Maxed out my Level Episode 8- Two mini episodes in one basically and Flatortes first episode as fully part of the cast, I'm unsure if I like her that much.

Cardfight Vanguard overDress Episode 8- War between the best girls, Megumi and Tomari along with the latter's first Cardfight of the show. This probably one of the funniest matches we've had in a while in the Cardfight Vanguard franchise and at the same time confirms that the units and the sakuga animation we see only shows up in the amusement parks carousel for some reason which has only been acknowledge once by Tohya in Episode 1.

 

[Tactician Karina]

Today, episode 9 of Combatants Will Be Dispatched. The fact that Alice wasted her points on sunglasses is both funny and facepalm worthy, tbh; but they admittedly do look good. Rose is getting hungrier, and it took me a bit to realize that Rose kept looking at Grimm's body because she wanted to eat her corpse. And Six is racking up evil points obviously lol, and it seems that Kisaragi may be an evil organization but even they have standards (all probably because of Six that a certain policy is in place lol). It seems next week they're going to the ruins where Heine and Russel are, so that's neat.

Yesterday I watched episode 8 of Pretty Boy Detective Club. I'm hoping that Mayumi becomes friends with the first grader demon, I want to see some banter come out it. I liked that the beginning had a silent movie-style to it, probably my favorite so far. Also I find it funny that the school doesn't ask Mayumi why she's wearing the boys uniform, but reassigns her from the soprano section of choir to the boys section.

Friday was episode 9 of Burning Kabaddi. Okay Masato has some impressive counters, taking the tanks down of the team like it was nothing. It also seems like most of the team don't want to play kabaddi, are they blackmailed into it or something lol; Kei got some interesting blackmail material if that's the case. So there's 3 episodes left and we're only at the second practice match, not enough time for an actual match, so hopefully there'll be a second season.

And on Thursday it was Fairy Ranmaru episode 8. Well Chilka and Ranmaru's past certainly interest me now, and I want to know which one rebelled against the Queen originally. Speaking of the Queen she's kinda suspicious, and Takara seems to be her main pawn amongst the group. Hopefully she doesn't turn out to be some sort of big bad and Takara becomes an antagonist, that'll hurt me. Also Uruu and Homura! Last week Uruu saved Homura, and now he tries to strangle him lol. Juka's clothes being melted off by the plant monster was funny, and his soul gem broke like Homura's before but it seems there's no consequences to this; why even add it if they're apparently not too important?

 

[Juliko]

Mewkledreamy episode 10. Ehhh, not one of the better episodes. Felt more like filler to me.
Eden episode 4. A nice end to a relatively nice series. Definitely better than most CGI anime Netflix has put out recently, that's for sure.
Tropical Rouge Pretty Cure episode 14. Whoa, an anime episode about the girls visiting a kindergarten that doesn't royally annoy the piss out of me?! Thank God!!!
Grimms' Fairy Tale Classics, the episode about Bluebeard.

 

[Fatima Shadow Frost Witch]

Bofuri I don't want to get hurt so I'll max out my defense

This one is slowly growing on me cause it's easy to lose yourself in the story

 

[Tactician Karina]

Cestvs: The Roman Fighter episode 8. First thing we see is Cestus pummeling his opponent, the rest of the group are also mentioning how he's been kind of unapproachable ever since he's been back to training with the pickaxe. I can understand why Cestus is stressed though, being scouted by the emperor specifically and practically forced to enter the qualifiers, then having to do more fighting after that just to win his freedom; hell I'd be angry/stressed and occasionally lashing out too. At least Zafar came in during Cestus' training time to tell him that from now he won't be teaching him anymore, and he must find and master what is important to himself, I think Cestus does need to open his eyes with that advice. Luckily he does though, so it's great to see Cestus taking down his opponent quickly with few punches this time. Also nice how he apologizes to his friends for lashing out at them, and Pedro's speech on how they're always there to hear Cestus out is sweet, just reaffirms why he's my second favorite of the group. And Felix from the last episode makes his appearance again, he's definitely pretty strong, I mean he's literally a professional gladiator. Though I think that it's unfair he's in the qualifiers since most of the opponents there fight for freedom, not for the rush of winning a gamble (maybe some but not all). So next episode it seems that we may get a Felix vs Cestus fight; though there are three episodes left, not enough time to progress past the qualifiers if this fight takes the whole episode, maybe two, depending on how it's paced (so hopefully they don't rush it too much). Once again, another series I hope will have a second season.

 

[Emmy]

I heard a rumour that Arc-V might be coming to Duel Links soon so I binged season one of the anime so I wouldn't be immediately spoiled if true. I've heard some divisive opinions on Arc-V overall and just from the first season I found it to have a rocky start with only GX's first season being particularly weaker.

Where to start? I guess with the main character. I do like Yuya Sakaki, he's a good middle ground between the goofy Jaden and the serious Yusei. Reiji is my favourite Kaiba-clone so far between his D/D/D monsters and his morally dubious "all part of the plan" scheme to overthrow the Fusion Dimension. Yuzu and Gogenzaka I'm less keen on, someone on this forum recently mentioned how achieving one's goals does not automatically count as "character development" and I think that applies here. They both failed to defeat the LDS students in the turf war and so they had a semi-off-screen training arc to improve themselves but like, they were never lacking anything as people so they didn't change as a result, all that happened was they acquired stronger cards to overcome the inevitable rematches. In tremendous contrast we have Sawatari the school bully who the script demands he jobs in every duel he participates in against a named character and so they instead had to resort to showing his growth as a redemption arc which made him easily one of the best characters in season 1 because of that.

In regards to the actual plot, I enjoyed it but it really suffered from trying to have the cake and eat it. It was seriously bogged down by trying to balance the "everyday school life" whilst trying to also set up the dimensional war coming later on and it hampered the pacing. The qualifiers for the Junior Youth Tournament was the biggest offender by far, a mini-arc of eight episodes featuring four duels against mostly minor characters, each duel being a two-parter. It really need trimmed down to half the length since by the time we finally got to the Fusion warriors invading it was less than ten episodes left of the season and so felt extremely rushed.

As for the generational gimmick, I actually really like Pendulum Summoning as it doesn't feel like it's replacing previous gimmicks but rather tries to support them with stuff like Pendulum-Fusion, Pendulum-Synchro and so on being the upgraded form of the gimmick. Action Duels were also an entertaining switch-up to the traditional duelling format though as I mentioned earlier, it worked better in single episode format with the only Action Duels I thought genuinely needing to be two-parters were the Yuya/Reiji duel and the Yuya/Sawatari rematch.

Side note, Crunchyroll using the Dub Terms for the cards was cool but somewhat confusingly they in contrast used the JPN names for characters - including the JPN's wonky romanizations. "Yusyo" for Yusho is fine and I'll even accept "Hugo" for "Yugo", but no way in hell could I wrap my head around "Ute" when the characters are clearly saying Yuto.

Side-Side Note, I normally supress the feeling of advertisement when I'm watching Yugioh but I couldn't help but feel that Sawatari drew the short stick in having to promote cards since in one season alone he goes through four complete deck changes in order to show off four different archetypes of cards - making him second only to Chazz from GX who holds the record at five different decks. It's a real shame as I adore his Yosenju archetype and knowing that he only uses it for a single duel pains me so much.

 

[Neo Blaze]

Both seasons of Hibike! Euphonium and its spin-off film Liz and the Blue Bird.

 

[Juliko]

Yoru no Kuni episode 2
Poketoon: Yume no Tsubomi

 

[Mr. MoonStone]

Re-watched Yuri!!! on Ice as part of my usual tradition

 

[Tactician Karina]

Episode 10 of Burning Kabaddi. Well this episode hit hard, Manabu's backstory was tear-jerking. Dementia is a difficult disease to handle, especially if your loved one has it; being treated as like a stranger by them is truly hard to accept, I don't blame him for being demoralized when taking care of them (and it shows when family situations can affect someone's ambitions and dreams). It's nice to hear that Manabu says his friends are his anchor though, and Hiromoto is certainly an amazing friend; if only everyone can have a friend like him tbh.

Yesterday I watched Fairy Ranmaru episode 9. The fight scene in this episode was pretty dynamic compared to the others, loved it! And we see Uruu's backstory, we see why he's messed up and projecting his issues on his clients (mothers cheating and the issues that can come with it); and we see his grudge over the Ignis clan as well cause of it. I really disliked how after the clients mother killed herself after the man she was sleeping with leaves her the father/husband requested a private funeral, and pretty much implying no one else should grieve cause she's a cheater. Yeah it was wrong she cheated, but come on that's too much and messed up, she's still a person. Well as a bright side, we see a cute clueless Homura lol.

 

[Tactician Karina]

Watched episode 10 of Combatants Will Be Dispatched. Nice fanservice episode that also fleshes out other characters in Kisaragi Corp. a bit, seeing that the leaders even use the evil points system. And it's nice seeing them treat their employees with appreciation parties and caring about said employees' job security, can I work there lol. Six is great, it's no wonder that Astaroth fell in love with him; we also see he isn't evil enough to climb up the corporate ladder, he doesn't do enough, if any, bigger schemes that's needed of an operative.

And yesterday was episode 9 of Pretty Boy Detective Club. Kodaki's design is cute, but I really dislike how condescending she is to Mayumi, but the fourth wall break she did was great in regards to Kodaki's language "If you use such filthy language, you'll get yourself censored!" Not really keen on her being Nagahiro's fiancée though, not because of the difference in age but because of her inferiority complex. I'm glad that it wasn't true that she pushed Manabu down the stairs though, I would've really disliked her majorly then, still not my favorite and she's low on my list though. Also not a fan her crush on Manabu tbh, so I'm happy he rejected her offer to join the club cause of that. And I'm like Mayumi on after hearing Kodaki's sad backstory, "My impression of her doesn't change much".

 

[Mr. MoonStone]

The Sailor Moon Eternal Movies (parts 1 and 2) and I can't say I was a big fan of them. While I appreciated the story elements being much closer to the original manga, Crystal as a whole just seems to try and be as faithful to the source material as possible, which I don't think translates well in animation. Sailor Moon benefits from that sentai-esque approach in the arc-structuring and whatnot. Too many characters are left under-developed or rushed. That's just part of the reason why I prefer the '90s anime over the other adaptations (and lowkey the manga too).

 

[Ryoma Maser]

Catching up on what I missed when I was away visiting my sister.

Cardfight Vanguard overDress Episode 9-The freakin backstories for these characters are out of this world.

Super Cub Episode 9

SSSS Dynazenon Episode 10-A brief return to SSSS.Gridman as we see a little of the past, so close to seeing Akane again.

I've Been Killing Slimes for 300 Years and Maxed out My Level Episode 9.

 

[Tactician Karina]

A few hours ago I put Love Rice on my planning list, but I found out all 12 episodes were 4 minutes long so I decided to binge it a few minutes ago. It was... something alright. I'd say I was more confused at the end then at the start, and the show really got melodramatic towards the end with the last minute kidnapping of one of the main character's sister; yeah I don't even remember their names, not great tbh (and I agree with one comment on CR, "they look like rejected YGO protags" lol). The only characters I liked were the Blast Resistance group, mainly cause their schtick was BL lol, sucks that their spotlight was only in one episode though, I'd rather watch an anime about them. Also not really liking how while two of the five guys in the main group were voiced by women, they didn't even bother trying to sound boyish, at all; honestly should've just made them girls instead. And episode 8 confirmed my suspicions of the cast being personified food (and uh, I'd rather watch Hetalia or Touken Ranbu for personification pretty boys; yeah they're countries and swords respectively, but it's done better in those series imo). Overall it's meh, there is also a second season... for some reason, and I might watch it but not anytime soon; there's only so much terrible rice jokes and puns I can take. Honestly just watch it for the credits, it has rice recipes (except ep. 12 sadly).

 

[Tactician Karina]

Watched episode 9 of Cestvs: The Roman Fighter. Not liking how the recap this episode was a bit longer than previous ones, cuts off much needed progress imo. I think they changed the OP a bit cause Felix was seen, unless I haven't been paying attention for the opening and he was always there lol. Anyway we got the first part of the Felix vs Cestus fight, as I suspected it's going to last two episodes; or at least partly through episode 10. Regardless there'll definitely need to be a season 2 if we want to see Cestus fight for his freedom in the main fighting event, so hopefully they do make another season. I'd say this fight certainly had me on the edge of my seat though, seeing Felix faking Cestus out and getting him close to the temple, and we see his wide stance in blocking his opponents and getting them with pincer attacks; no wonder Felix is called the Red Storm in the arena, he's unpredictable.

 

[Fatima Shadow Frost Witch]

Bofuri episodes 1 to 7