General Anime/Manga Discussion 16: In Another Thread With My Smartphone

[Dragonus45]

You can do that without fetishy rape ****.

Also it's cool to get confirmation that apparently in universe Goblin Slayer the person is actually just broken stupidly powerful to the point that he breaks all the rules, apparentely.

I don’t see anything fetishy about the rape.
And yea, like most anime protagonists he is op af. Just in a way that prioritizes planning and tactics over raw power.

[Reddish Mage]

The double-standard of violence being more okay to show than sex (let alone nudity being equated to sex) is complete arse-backwards ridiculous; and I say that as someone for whom the current status quo (i.e. where it is more okay for dismemberment than naked people) would be the preferrable way around! So, go right ahead and make your titilating thing. But just, y'know, bear in mind that Consent Is Not Optional*.

*Obvious, likely needless, but stated anyway clarification of "must be of appropriately adult age as well as being able to unambigiously communicate said consent.")

I note that, from your post here and well, everything we know about you, its quite clear you are more excited by the prospect of dismemberment than naked people. Also, consent is likely not asked for in those situations and I’m pretty sure it doesn’t matter. However, if dismemberment happens its likely overly clean (those lightsabers certainly make the process efficient) and for reasons, its unlikely children will be the target.

[Lethologica]

Goblin Slayer does have a point to make with it’s incredibly vile main villains and their actions. The first is the dangers of apathy. You see the setting sure does have all those demon lords and devil kings or what have you that pop up here and there, but no one ever actually has serious trouble stopping them in the end. But there is always a race to be the strongest best paid adventurer you can be so you can get the prestige and the money. Meanwhile a race of what is implied to be literal alien rapist sociopathic monsters incapable of making peace that multiply like rabbits continue to decimate rural villages and the poor in cities because no one considers them a big enough problem to pay enough to send anything but the weakest and least experienced newbie adventurers, who then die en masse unprepared for the real threat of the goblins. That leads into the second point the series wants to make, that adventuring if it were a real job would deadly dangerous and that unless you were one of the lucky few to start picking up levels fast and get some good die rolls to survive those risky early levels you are just gonna die. Preparedness, maintaining your equipment and bringing the correct weapons for the correct situations, wearing proper armor, checking your corners, and never underestimating even the meekest or enemies, and above all lateral thinking are all keys to success. Its an actual plot point that in cosmic terms the Goblin Slayer never actually rolls dice, because if he did he would never roll above a ten. Instesad he just prepares and trains and shapes the situation until he never has to roll dice and that’s why the gods find him fascinating. Not the kind of D&D game everyone likes but it’s something I’ve always appreciated from my players when they do it. The last important thing, about why having the goblins be so unabashedly vile is important, is that what the main character plans is genocide. The goblins really truly are the worst of the worst because if they had even one sympathetic moment or one goblin who didn’t seem to be just as bad as the rest then the plot falls apart and the main character loses all sympathy. I get it if Goblin Slayer is to much for someone, or if it’s just not your cup of tea whatever. But saying it is just edgy for its own sake and has nothing to say because you don’t like it is insulting.

You bring up a lot of elements that are in fact in the story, but while you claim they're communicating some kind of point, they are actually contrivances which prop up the actual point: making a story about how awesome the protagonist is for slaughtering Tucker's Kobolds.

The goblins are vile, yes, so that we don't have to question whether we should root for a slaughterbot. The rest of society is apathetic and/or oriented towards misaligned status so that our slaughterbot has (a) room to operate and (b) the Tragic Lone Righteous Man template, not because it has anything interesting to say about apathy or status. The system sacrifices newbies in the name of Proving The Goblins Are Vile And Dangerous And Our Hero Is Awesome For Slaying Them, not because there aren't natural and obvious measures to counteract this (at least one of which is implemented in the series itself the second it becomes inconvenient to keep throwing away newbies), and not because there's anything interesting to say about feeding newbies into the meat grinder. And goodness knows the series isn't riding on deep characters or clever dialogue. Sand off the edge, and you have an utterly generic fantasy world/story with no distinguishing features whatsoever (except that the goblins are from the moon, I guess).

So, sure, the edge isn't the point. It's there to justify the straightforward nerd power fantasy "Dude kills Tucker's Kobolds." That still leads us back to the conclusion that the show has very little to say which is worth dealing with all the edge. Watching Goblin Slayer for what it has to say was never the point.

[ellenate]

watched ep 1 of goblin slayer


first impression:

It's boring and from that ending scene i don't see that changing.


as for the...

Spoiler

Show

rape.


wow, were you guys blowing it out of proportion.

it's all in the dark, nothing is really shown. If the characters didn't confirm it, i wouldn't have even thought it had even occurred.

My biggest complaint is how stupid the characters are.

Spoiler

Show

Yeah it was a setup for the mc to shine but still... painfully stupid. they were asking for something bad to happen and well they got it.

Also, mc didn't seem that op. Unless commonsense, is as rare as i think it is, in this show.

(was the ost stripped away for tension or something? some music would've helped a few of those scenes.)

definitely dropping it. which puts it in my exclusive club of ep.1 drops!


horizon in the middle of nowhere
fuuka
The asterisk war the academy city on the water
campione
mars daybreak
trinity seven

I was actually thinking about this recently. People wanna dog others for their tastes, and I figured out that I could put together a list of shows I hated that would make me just seem like a troll.

I feel my taste in anime is pretty generic.

[Reddish Mage]

Its an actual plot point that in cosmic terms the Goblin Slayer never actually rolls dice, because if he did he would never roll above a ten. Instesad he just prepares and trains and shapes the situation until he never has to roll dice and that’s why the gods find him fascinating.

The point is that Goblin Slayer researches his prey and plans his destruction of their colonies carefully. He doesn’t “roll the dice” in the sense that his plans are supposedly flawless

You can do that without fetishy rape ****.

Also it's cool to get confirmation that apparently in universe Goblin Slayer the person is actually just broken stupidly powerful to the point that he breaks all the rules, apparentely.

Actually its the opposite. Goblin Slayer does not have huge attribute modifiers or any great magic ability or special technique. He just uses basic weapons and cheap tools with brutal efficiency, occasionally supplemented by creative uses of magic is either minor, or not made to be weaponized.

That is literally the point of the story. The Goblin Slayer is not a typical anime protagonist. He doesn’t have a special talent or anything like that, he simply has a single-minded dedication to his genocide and is willing to undertake it in the most efficient way possible with no qualms about burning, or poisoning, or drowning entire goblin colonies.

However, the point of the fetishy rape is well taken. Its more of a hentai-porn video game style than gritty-realist. They are careful not to maim and marr the girl’s beauty as they engage in careful stripping and groping that happens all too easily. It really isn’t consistent with the rest of the theme of how brutal the world is and took me out of the show whenever it happened.

[Ibrinar]

Karakai Jouzu no Takagi-san (avg rating 7.89): Starts off cute and funny, quickly becomes repetitive as all hell and completely predictable. Actual relationship progression is light at best.

Annoyingly the series that plays when they are married (not by the same author but officially sanctioned) implies it never really develops behaviour wise. (Well that apparently gets better in newer chapters)

[uncool]

Kaguya-sama: Love is War (avg rating 8.47): two very unlikable characters, jerkasses to the max. Both in love with each other but try to "trick" the other into confessing. Repeat. So it's Takagi-san, but the characters suck. Also, the narrator having the majority of the dialogue is stupid. I don't need the narrator to tell me what the characters are thinking and feeling.

I definitely agree with the narrator thing, but it does get toned down over the season to let the main characters grow. I disagree on the unlikability - the "tricking" is more because of insecurity on both parts than because they want to be superior. The "love is war" thing is overemphasized - the challenge, most of the time, isn't to get the other to admit their feelings, but rather to deny their own. One thing I really liked about it was the way it leaned heavily into the theme that love is more about the little things than the grand gestures (although the grand gestures matter, too).

On a side note: wtf was the point of the "4 Ramen Kings"?

[gomipile]

On a side note: wtf was the point of the "4 Ramen Kings"?

That that guy and the chef were taking ramen Extremely Seriously™. Also, it provided a bit of setup for the second half of the full version of Chika's alternate ED theme, Chikatto Chika Chika.

So, not much? Other than being funny.

[uncool]

On the topic of disliking a series and sounding a bit like a troll:
What is it people like about Shield Hero? I watched to the end of the first resolution of a mini-arc (4 episodes), and to me, it was just awful, plot-wise.

Spoiler

Show

The scene that did the most damage, in my opinion, was surprisingly minor: the "silver-flinging" scene. Not only did it waste the setup where he put money into the shield, it actively negated the feeling the episode was supposed to set up: desperation and despair, the making of a broken man. In a competent series, that scene would show that he's still defiant, that some principle that was set up beforehand as one he took pride in will continue. In a series that kept the feeling, that scene would only be the start of a much longer humiliation conga, and would be brought up again later as an error in his ways - prioritizing pride over survival. But it ends up meaning nothing.

The scene that convinced me the setting of the show wasn't going to ever be good was the setup to the duel. The setup made no sense. Clearly, the king had the power to take Raphtalia without a duel if he wanted to. But instead, he orders Naofumi to duel. So why wouldn't he? The duel would only make sense if the king had to have Naofumi lose a duel to take Raphtalia. The setup would have been far better if it went along the lines of the king trying to take Raphtalia, only to have Naofumi be the one to challenge for a duel. Then, at least, the king's motivations make sense.

And that's the problem I have with the series. Things don't happen because they make sense. They happen because they get Naofumi to the next plot point - and paper-thin rationalizations are added on after the fact. This isn't a world - it's a myopically Naofumi-focused narrative. The elites screw Naofumi over, not because it makes sense for them, but because it screws Naofumi over, as the plot requires. The armor shopkeeper doesn't "change his mind" and help Naofumi because Naofumi said or did anything convincing, he does so because Naofumi will need him later. The only character that makes sense is Naofumi himself, and even that's somewhat thin.

[Silfir]

Kaguya-sama's characters do come off as unlikeable in the beginning. What makes it work is when the cracks in their respective personas start to appear, and you get a look at who they are under it - extremely vulnerable and frankly adorable people who've had a hard time just being themselves and therefore did everything they could to force themselves to be someone else. And you do actually get to see the cracks get wider and wider and eventually burst, and what happens after that. And as a result, they stop being anywhere near as insufferable. Well, arguably.

It's completely unlike Takagi-san in that regard. There's progress, and it's well-handled and interesting. I actually made a similar mistake as Pendulous did - I assumed that "Never confess, ever" was the gimmick and the series would only ever be that gimmick. But they're not stuck like this forever. If the reason you abandoned Kaguya-sama is that you suspected it was going to be like Takagi-san, you might very well want to hop back in, because it's not.

That being said, it's a comedy series, too, and there's little reason to watch a comedy series you don't think is funny.

[Rynjin]

On the topic of disliking a series and sounding a bit like a troll:
What is it people like about Shield Hero? I watched to the end of the first resolution of a mini-arc (4 episodes), and to me, it was just awful, plot-wise. All of the elite are out to get him, no matter how little sense it makes for them.

Spoiler

Show

The scene that did the most damage, in my opinion, was surprisingly minor: the "silver-flinging" scene. Not only did it waste the setup where he put money into the shield, it actively negated the feeling the episode was supposed to set up: desperation and despair, the making of a broken man. In a competent series, that scene would show that he's still defiant, that some principle that was set up beforehand as one he took pride in will continue. In a series that kept the feeling, that scene would only be the start of a much longer humiliation conga, and would be brought up again later as an error in his ways - prioritizing pride over survival. But it ends up meaning nothing.

The scene that convinced me the setting of the show wasn't going to ever be good was the setup to the duel. The setup made no sense. Clearly, the king had the power to take Raphtalia without a duel if he wanted to. But instead, he orders Naofumi to duel. So why wouldn't he? The duel would only make sense if the king had to have Naofumi lose a duel to take Raphtalia. The setup would have been far better if it went along the lines of the king trying to take Raphtalia, only to have Naofumi be the one to challenge for a duel. Then, at least, the king's motivations make sense.

And that's the problem I have with the series. Things don't happen because they make sense. They happen because they get Naofumi to the next plot point - and paper-thin rationalizations are added on after the fact. This isn't a world - it's a myopically Naofumi-focused narrative. The elites screw Naofumi over, not because it makes sense for them, but because it screws Naofumi over, as the plot requires. The armor shopkeeper doesn't "change his mind" and help Naofumi because Naofumi said or did anything convincing, he does so because Naofumi will need him later. The only character that makes sense is Naofumi himself, and even that's somewhat thin.

There is actually a legitimately solid reason for the way Naofumi is treated.

The king personally HATES Naofumi. Or more accurately, he hates the Shield Hero.

There is a surprisingly complex mess involving this country's religion (the Three Heroes Church), the treatment of demihumans, and the king's own backstory that explain his and the rest of the nobility's motivations.

That much isn't really a spoiler, but I'll spoiler details for people who care.

Spoiler

Show

So, the previous Shield Hero was much like Naofumi. A "hero of the common folk" who took umbrage with the way demihumans were treated in Melromarc; as second class citizens at best, and slaves at worst. The Shield Hero led an uprising that led to the founding of an entirely new country of demihumans (Siltvelt) who owe their lives and freedom to the Shield Hero.

The king hates demi-humans for killing his parents, so bears a personal grudge against the Shield Hero, and is a staunch adherent of the below mentioned church.

The issue is exacerbated by the national religion of Melromarc: the Three Heroes Church, which recognizes only the Bow, Spear, and Sword Heroes as legitimate, and leaves the Shield Hero out. The Shield Hero is their Satan allegory, since apparently the Shield Hero has a reputation of being alternately worthless or, when they do gain power, insanely disruptive to the status quo of the world.

When you summon the Heroes to defend you from the Waves, you MUST summon all 4 of them; it doesn't work otherwise. So they summoned the Heroes and set to spreading rumors about Naofumi and handicapping him at every turn. These rumors are easily believed by anyone part of the religion, since as mentioned the religion paints him as evil by default.

They don't want to just murder him outright; that would cause other countries to go to war with them for endangering the safety of the world for their own petty desires. But their goal is to arrange it so that the Shield Hero dies fighting a Wave, in which case they are blameless.

I'm probably forgetting some details, but that's the gist of it.

TL;DR: A combination of religiously fueled spite, politics, and petty grudges is what Naofumi's treatment is based on.

[LaZodiac]

So I realized literally only me cares, but the final epilogue chapter of Hell-Warden Higuma came out a bit ago.

It's a good conclusion to the series, but god do I wish we got to see the whole thing. This series was so good. It's art was amazing. There was so much depth to it. The characters where fun and the action was creative and great. And no one read it but me, so instead a bunch of ****ty garbage like Yu Kamui Let's Loose and whatever the **** nonsense cyborg samurai bull**** Kishimoto is making gets to continue despite being completely without merit or interest.

[uncool]

There is actually a legitimately solid reason for the way Naofumi is treated.

The king personally HATES Naofumi. Or more accurately, he hates the Shield Hero.

There is a surprisingly complex mess involving this country's religion (the Three Heroes Church), the treatment of demihumans, and the king's own backstory that explain his and the rest of the nobility's motivations.

That much isn't really a spoiler, but I'll spoiler details for people who care.

Spoiler

Show

So, the previous Shield Hero was much like Naofumi. A "hero of the common folk" who took umbrage with the way demihumans were treated in Melromarc; as second class citizens at best, and slaves at worst. The Shield Hero led an uprising that led to the founding of an entirely new country of demihumans (Siltvelt) who owe their lives and freedom to the Shield Hero.

The king hates demi-humans for killing his parents, so bears a personal grudge against the Shield Hero, and is a staunch adherent of the below mentioned church.

The issue is exacerbated by the national religion of Melromarc: the Three Heroes Church, which recognizes only the Bow, Spear, and Sword Heroes as legitimate, and leaves the Shield Hero out. The Shield Hero is their Satan allegory, since apparently the Shield Hero has a reputation of being alternately worthless or, when they do gain power, insanely disruptive to the status quo of the world.

When you summon the Heroes to defend you from the Waves, you MUST summon all 4 of them; it doesn't work otherwise. So they summoned the Heroes and set to spreading rumors about Naofumi and handicapping him at every turn. These rumors are easily believed by anyone part of the religion, since as mentioned the religion paints him as evil by default.

They don't want to just murder him outright; that would cause other countries to go to war with them for endangering the safety of the world for their own petty desires. But their goal is to arrange it so that the Shield Hero dies fighting a Wave, in which case they are blameless.

I'm probably forgetting some details, but that's the gist of it.

TL;DR: A combination of religiously fueled spite, politics, and petty grudges is what Naofumi's treatment is based on.

Spoiler

Show

I'd read some spoiler things when I got fed up with the anime and had seen most of that and honestly, most of that sounds like more paper-thin rationalization added after the fact. It doesn't fit smoothly with the way characters acted, and largely read as "Naofumi needs another way to be screwed, how can I make that happen?" It doesn't match the ways in which the early episodes screwed him over. The only time the earlier Shield Hero is mentioned in the first 4 episodes is by Raphtalia's parents, if I remember correctly; if he were relevant to why Naofumi is hated, his acts should have been mentioned by humans, too. If religion were a large part, the reaction should have been disgust, rather than the bullying we see from the elites or the near-indifference from the peasants and merchants. I still maintain that the world is designed specifically for the plot points, not to make sense.

[Lethologica]

Love Is War is silly and kind of sweet, which is enough to get me through the show, but I'd only recommend it to people that like ham-it-up comedy with their romance.

Shield Hero feels to me like Isekai: Teenage Resentment Edition. Yes, everyone is against you! Yes, it is because they are bad people and/or sheeple and don't understand your pain! Yes, you get to do edgy stuff and be an ass because your Childlike Innocence has fallen away and you see the world for what it really is! Yes, the woman who led you on is an evil witch! (But don't worry, 'the people' and a growing collection of 'safe' women are here to affirm that you really are The Best Person!) And so on. For all the setup is kind of interesting, I just can't stand the direction in which it was taken.

[Saph]

On the topic of disliking a series and sounding a bit like a troll:
What is it people like about Shield Hero? I watched to the end of the first resolution of a mini-arc (4 episodes), and to me, it was just awful, plot-wise.

Can't speak for other people, but personally? I really liked the early setup and the impact it has on Naofumi. Watching him getting his naive optimism crushed right at the very beginning of the story was brutal but also really compelling, and I found it fascinating watching his moral compass waver around as he tries to survive without falling into despair. I'm also a sucker for a good redemption story, so I loved Raphtalia successfully pulling him back from the brink.

The story gets a lot less dramatic once Naofumi becomes less of an underdog, but it's still interesting watching the aftereffects of his earlier treatment – Naofumi's still carrying around all sorts of issues, and his behaviour hovers right on the line between 'justified mistrust' and 'shooting himself in the foot'.

Oh, and the art and visuals are great. Naofumi and Raphtalia look excellent, and the other three heroes are pretty well designed too.

[Pendulous]

Shield Hero is one of those shows that I really enjoyed, but I completely understand people who didn't. Unfortunately, I've heard it bombed in Japan, so the chances of more seems nil.

[Rodin]

It's not so much of a joke, really.

It's something that throws the premise of the series into relief, which is that the problems of the little people are still problems even when the big important adventurers are off doing their more important and glamorous adventures.

Of course the premise ran out of steam after about 20 issues and it should have been a limited series all along.

This is something I will say about Goblin Slayer - the 12 episode anime was great, but if they were to do a second season I don't know that I would watch it. They fulfilled the premise and had the payoff (the big time heroes joining in to save his home) in the first season. Trying to tell any more would go downhill quickly. Keep it as a completed story.

[ellenate]

The anime industry's talent is so mismanaged.


How did scum's wish get such great production values...? These unknowns get such an attention to detail, while showstoppers get the bottom of the barrel.


Like you could make the argument that, the big shows are just soulless cash cows. While, the smaller ones are passion projects, but no they feel just as hacky.

[gomipile]

The anime industry's talent is so mismanaged.


How did scum's wish get such great production values...? These unknowns get such an attention to detail, while showstoppers get the bottom of the barrel.


Like you could make the argument that, the big shows are just soulless cash cows. While, the smaller ones are passion projects, but no they feel just as hacky.

There are exceptions, of course. Fire Force is getting 2 cours, and it's gorgeous. Dr. Stone is also a heavily hyped 2-cour series, and it looks better than average, at least.

Vinland saga is hyped, has 2 cours and is also pretty.

[Excession]

How did scum's wish get such great production values...? These unknowns get such an attention to detail, while showstoppers get the bottom of the barrel.

Is it really unknown? Wikipedia says it's getting a live action adaption as well, so maybe it's better known in Japan?

From the synopsis I wouldn't watch it myself, but I assume some people like this stuff.

[mallorean_thug]

The anime industry's talent is so mismanaged.


How did scum's wish get such great production values...? These unknowns get such an attention to detail, while showstoppers get the bottom of the barrel.


Like you could make the argument that, the big shows are just soulless cash cows. While, the smaller ones are passion projects, but no they feel just as hacky.

This is completely misunderstanding quite a bit about anime production.

Scum's wish is a show that is barely animated. It's basically a colored version of the manga with voice acting. Aesthetically, yes, it looks great, because it leans very hard into the common shoujo aesthetic of very detailed shots with no movement, and the director made a ton of really great adaption choices. I loved Scum's wish, but holding it up as an example of "good production quality" is fundamentally mistaken. Studio Lerche is not a studio with an impressive internal team, or a studio with connections to impressive freelancers, and you can see it in their output. But it's not like they're trying to be a studio that leans on great animation, and they're not hired by production committees that want a flashy visual spectacle. They've instead made a name as a studio that makes unambitious safe boring manga/game adaptions without any production snafus.

On the other hand, a lot of "showstoppers" are properties that /demand/ technically difficult animation and will require simpler character designs, less complicated coloring and shading, and a lighter composite to make all of the movement and action something that can be drawn and something that's easy to follow. These shows will often be more uneven, with dramatically different amounts of resources given to talking scenes vs action scenes, will possibly need to rely on cheaper CGI for crowds, backgrounds, or certain fantastic characters or objects with the expected results for the show's coherent look, and will be more prone to simply not being able to finish the work on time, leading to a compromised vision airing on tv. AND a lot of these properties are very long, and fully adapting them will require far more than the single cour that a show like scum's wish will get. It's far more difficult to maintain vision and quality over 26 or 52 episodes than over a single 12, especially if there aren't any breaks in between.

The things that allowed Studio Lerche to make a great adaption of Scum's wish would not allow them to tackle anything you'd consider a showstopper. If by "industry talent is mismanaged" you mean that "the industry" should have "given" Lerche some showstopper that's completely out of their wheelhouse instead of scum's wish and that Scum's wish should have instead gone to whoever bungled some show you were hoping to be prettier, that's completely and totally wrong.

The circumstances that cause shows to look great or terrible are way more complicated than "industry talent is mismanaged". That phrase raises my hackles in a way that made me actually post in this thread for the first time in basically forever. To me, that phrase implies something like "Well if only some large corporation like Disney just owned the entire industry and "managed" it intelligently, then good artists would work on good shows, and concepts that don't resonate with me could get the dregs they deserve.

I think that if you want a better idea of what goes into great shows looking great, this article on the sakugabooru blog about a current season show: FIRE FORCE: THE BACKSTORY OF A DAZZLING PRODUCTION would be a great place to start, especially since it includes a bit about actual mismanagement in the animation industry, which has nothing to do with which shows end up produced by which studios.

-----

Since I'm here, I guess I should also do some positive chatting about current stuff.

Symphogear XV has been amazing so far. It's everything I wanted from the final season, and quite a few things I didn't know that I wanted. I feel like some of it's impact has been muted in the wider fandom because of how s4 didn't get legally simulcast, but for me it's easily AOTS and I'm eagerly trying to convince more of my friends to watch the franchise.

Granbelm has been refreshingly . . . character focused and nuanced? Late night timeslot magical girl shows obviously inspired by Madoka Magica have been pretty uniformly bad over the years. Shows like Daybreak Illusion or Yuki Yuna were pretty flawed, while dreck like Magical Girl spec ops asuka, or Magical Girl Site is just embarrassing. I also wasn't sure what to expect from "team Re:Zero makes an anime original". Either way, I've been pleasantly surprised and thought that most recent episode was a great climax. It's helped quite a bit that the show has great aesthetics, and knows how to leverage it's combination of magic and mechs into great looking and tactically interesting fight sequences.

Detective Waver or I guess I should call it by it's ridiculous proper title Lord El-Melloi II's Case Files: "Rail Zeppelin" Grace note has been an enjoyable popcorn show to watch despite completely failing as a mystery. Even though it talks in text about ignoring the whodunnit and howdunnit to focus on the why, it still often amounts to stuff happening and then Waver spouting some nasuverse worldbuilding nonsense, and everybody else applauding him. That said, the creative clearly knows what everybody actually came for, which is watching waver get embarrassed by his students, and having fan favorites like luvia get the screentime they deserve. Now just hopefully Bazette can manage to sneak on screen for some reason before her rendezvous with fate. Would not recommend to anybody that isn't already neckdeep in the nasuverse.

Sadly those are the only shows I'm current on. I have a whole pile of other shows like Vinland Saga, Fire Force, O Maidens in your savage season, Carole and Tuesday, Fruits Basket, that I /should/ catch up on . . . but instead I've been finally binging Hunter x Hunter. Which is just as fantastic as everybody always claimed.

[ellenate]

There are exceptions, of course. Fire Force is getting 2 cours, and it's gorgeous. Dr. Stone is also a heavily hyped 2-cour series, and it looks better than average, at least.

Vinland saga is hyped, has 2 cours and is also pretty.

With what happened to one punch man, i don't think that really means much anymore. (The whole process just seems really volatile)


Is vinland saga, vagabond saga?

Is it really unknown? Wikipedia says it's getting a live action adaption as well, so maybe it's better known in Japan?

From the synopsis I wouldn't watch it myself, but I assume some people like this stuff.

It felt like a Josei (i'll be honest though, i have no idea who this show would appeal to). It probably has some niche audience but i can't imagine it's huge.

edit: so apparently it's a seinen, "marketed toward young adult men". And with that i begin to question the whole genre system.

This is completely misunderstanding quite a bit about anime production.

Or perhaps it was a generalization...

If you want to "argue", you should at least try to first fully understand my rationale, instead of just guessing at it.

{Scrubbed}

FIRE FORCE: THE BACKSTORY OF A DAZZLING PRODUCTION

Saw the first chapter of it, felt like a ripoff of blue exorcist... I didn't like blue exorcist btw, it just felt like the show was lazily written. All the "heroes" designs borrowing so heavily from fire fighters wasn't helping that case either. Why you would base, what I'd assume to be a fighting anime, around one of the most cumbersome uniforms ever created?

I've been finally binging Hunter x Hunter. Which is just as fantastic as everybody always claimed.

I feel like if it was my first shounen i would've appreciated it more.

[gomipile]

Is Hensuki ▽ licensed by anyone in the English speaking world? All I see on Funimation is the main Hensuki series.

[LaZodiac]

Fire Force is a decidedly mixed bag because it's got a lot of interesting and weighty ideas, and it's just not executing them as well as they could and should be. Feels a little derivative of My Hero, and if it could find it's own thrust it'd be fantastic. Arthur needs to have his brain fixed for his character to stop being insufferable though, though him being dumb enough to "I'm not left handed" himself is great in one of those "I hate this but it rules" sorta ways.

[Lord Raziere]

I feel like if it was my first shounen i would've appreciated it more.

Eh, I'm kind of the opposite. To me, once you watch HxH its flowers of algernoning your shounen taste, theres little to go up from there or equal it, so I'm thankful that I watched things like Naruto and DBZ before it.

[Lethologica]

Eh, I'm kind of the opposite. To me, once you watch HxH its flowers of algernoning your shounen taste, theres little to go up from there or equal it, so I'm thankful that I watched things like Naruto and DBZ before it.

When does HxH kick into gear? I was pretty dissatisfied with the early going and let it drop.

[LaZodiac]

When does HxH kick into gear? I was pretty dissatisfied with the early going and let it drop.

I've always heard it starts being good at York New or thereabouts, but I can't judge the series myself since I've enjoyed basically none of it.

[ellenate]

Eh, I'm kind of the opposite. To me, once you watch HxH its flowers of algernoning your shounen taste, theres little to go up from there or equal it, so I'm thankful that I watched things like Naruto and DBZ before it.

You think HxH is the top of the shounen food chain?


I think the greed island mess alone takes it out of the running for best.

When does HxH kick into gear? I was pretty dissatisfied with the early going and let it drop.

mid way through the anime's last arc, from what i could tell... lol

[Lord Raziere]

When does HxH kick into gear? I was pretty dissatisfied with the early going and let it drop.

Yorknew and Chimera Ant Arcs are the best, especially Chimera Ant. like I'd almost recommend skipping the rest of the anime just to watch Chimera Ant arc. none of the others really compare to it.

[Rodin]

You think HxH is the top of the shounen food chain?


I think the greed island mess alone takes it out of the running for best.

Out of curiousity, what would you consider the best? To me, the only competition is My Hero Academia (which has the advantage of being written 20 years later), and Fullmetal Alchemist Brotherhood, which is unlikely to be beaten by anything ever.

So my list is #1 FMA, #2 HxH, and #3 MHA. DBZ, Bleach, and Naruto are all in a jumble further down the chain. Stuff like Fairy Tail doesn't even register.

I will admit that the Greed Island arc is the weakest point in the entire series. The dodgeball game is almost enough to redeem it, but not quite...and mostly because of how well the 2011 anime portrayed it. The dodgeball game is far less interesting in the 1999 version.