EvaChero wrote:I thought it finished a little weakly in it's first season but Higurashi Gou season 2 opened up nicely the first 2 episodes with plenty of gruesome goodness!

Have you seen the old Higurashi anime? If so, how do you feel they compare?

No I haven't , I would really like to see it. The current one is somewhat refreshing to me for the most part, It would be interesting to see the original as you say for comparison.

Been marathoning Teknoman today and have to state the obvious: Balzac the reporter is an idiot but in terms of absolute being of no redeemable qualities, the honor goes to General Galt. As for Blade socializing with both Space Knight and regular military, he's guarded for obvious reasons but several encounters help him lower his guard. Anyway, I hope that they start giving a bit more screen time to Star since she does end up being Blade's girlfriend so anything that doesn't involve the usual flying the spaceship and sharing banter with Ringo would be fine.

C.T.1290 wrote:I recently watched Godzilla Singular Point on Netflix. I’m just a few episodes in, so I haven’t covered the whole thing yet.

Watch out, the techno-babble goes to warp speed about halfway through, and it's nigh impossible to keep up with.

Godzilla also becomes a side character throughout the whole thing; other than being among the disasters going on, I'm not certain he matters.



The show is still enjoyable, it's Kaiju meets Kado: The Right Answer dimension-bending vibes, with a heavy dose of nostalgia (Jet Alone inspiration Jet Jaguar is a featured presence).

There's no real emotional through line, no character development to speak of. It's high concept, sci-fi troppiness thrown in as an excuse for monster bashing.
And while the monsters I thought were the reason we're here, the series really wants you to think it's the high concept.

Meh. Godzilla roars, the AI characters are fun to watch, and I like the rethinking of the premise. That and the grounded way Jet Jaguar fights (mostly) makes me give the series a lot of leeway.

Blockio wrote:

pwhodges#925172 wrote:Although 86 - Eighty Six has ended for now, it is advertised as a split-cour show with another twelve episodes to come later to finish "season 1". What we've had so far is the whole of the first book of the original light novel series, but without the epilogue, and part of the second. My guess is that the next cour will use the rest of books two and three, ending up with the epilogue of book one (which they lead into). I agree that it's well worth watching (I'd originally missed it in the listings - thanks to Bagheera for pointing it out to me). The handling of the racism theme is not as brutally on the nose as it is in the books, where it's spelt out again and again, perhaps to a level that spoils it! There are many more books, so if this season is a success there is plenty of material for a follow-up.

I'm super looking forward to that; 86 is definitely one of the best shows I've watched recently

It's like Valkyria Chronicles meets Zoids Assault... so I think I'd be interested to play the game, but as presented, the show kind of fell flat for me.

The pilot's main recourse for how he wins fights seems to just be "I'm batman" logic, he outfights his opponents through use of bullet-time maneuvering between shell fire. Not because of superior tactics or positioning (implied, not shown). A least, not in the first 5 episodes I watched.

I also recently watched Obsolete, and I'm kind of amazed in hindsight how much that series conveys character depth despite fairly minimal storytelling, with not much continuity.

It also conveyed really well how the mecha changed the landscape of the battlefield; what advantages and disadvantages they had against conventional weapon systems. Maybe my thirst for that kind of technical depth is why I can't look past the Light Novel-tropeness in 86's action.

To be fair, I didn't get past episode 1 of Girl und Panzers or Valkyria Chronicles anime for similar reasons.

Alaska Slim wrote:Watch out, the techno-babble goes to warp speed about halfway through, and it's nigh impossible to keep up with.

Unlike the usual Star Trek technobabble, the talk here was written by someone who has a grasp of real science and it shows. I love the nerdery of it all, and I actually don't mind having Godzilla held back and used sparingly as a creature of apocalyptic destruction, or the lack of character development in favor of science. The brief appearance of the real-life JMSDF ships JS Kirishima, JS Teruzuki and JS Asahi made it all the sweeter for me.

Feel free to debate me about this in the Godzilla thread in the Film and Video section, O Great Husky! (The original Alaska Slim was a famous husky, wasn't he? Or did I misremember that?)

I really liked Singular Point. It really compares favorably to something like Primer to me- like it may not be character driven, but the characters still have distinct, definable enough personalities (Some of that may just come down to design & actor performance but you know what, that goes a long way). The expository dialogue is easy enough to follow and feels directly connected to what I'm watching etc.

It was certainly better than Urobuchi's half-hearted Gargantia retread in his Godzilla trilogy anyways.

UrsusArctos wrote:

Alaska Slim#926291 wrote:Watch out, the techno-babble goes to warp speed about halfway through, and it's nigh impossible to keep up with.

Unlike the usual Star Trek technobabble, the talk here was written by someone who has a grasp of real science and it shows.

Oh I fully agree, the solution to the crisis was never just "fire MUR tachyon beamZ!", even though Tachyons are actually relevant here.

The archetype felt well-articulated as both concept and threat, and (thanks to relevant conversations by Lex Fridman), I could follow why JJ's AI had to regress before....



The only hole I could poke in the premise felt like nitpicking.

Alaska Slim wrote:Oh I fully agree, the solution to the crisis was never just "fire MUR tachyon beamZ!", even though Tachyons are actually relevant here.

Good one!

The only hole I could poke in the premise felt like nitpicking.

SPOILER: Show

If the creatures don't need to eat because they're made of the Archetype, why do they still look like creatures we recognize? The change in evolutionary pressures would mean they'd lose much of the machinery for digesting external matter, and the drivers for mating, territory protection, and environment suitability would take center-stage.

Or... do they not procreate? Are they infertile immortals? Even then, wouldn't the adaptation mechanism Godzilla displayed still mean they were changing iteratively, until they were all the 5th dimensional equivalent of an apex-predator?

Teknoman episodes 11-14

The battle becomes more personal due to the appearance of Saber, Blade's brother, and the issue of the 30 minute maximum limit on when Blade has total control of his capacities. Maybe Evangelion took some inspiration about the 1-5 minute energy cable from this show. Either way, by episode 14 the stress of battling Saber was so severe, Blade turned against his Space Knight allies and it took a resemblance of his sister Shara on the junior member Tina who socialized with him a bit earlier to bring him back to sanity. I especially loved it that Blade and Tina officially declared themselves friends which means he's starting to loosen up.

Latest Teknoman marathon of episodes 15 to 21 made me very happy because among other things like Blade suffering from Shinji Get In The Robot syndrome but not as whiny, Blade and Star have officially started playing the game of romance in which Star does things like wear perfume which everyone notices as an attempt to attract him. When Shara made it to Earth and transformed for the first time, I felt like a certain censor issue such as her nipples appearing on her naked breasts would have easily detected and censored by Saban Entertainment and Tatsunoko Productions, right?

Life Lessons with Uramichi Oniisan



In the grim darkness of 21st century children's educational programming, there is only cringe.

Watching Teknoman episode 23 was such a moving experience because not only does it finally establish the tragic backstory of Blade and his family but his relationship with Star evolves even more since his flashback is so touching she cries for him.

New footage for the upcoming Bandai/Sunrise IP, Kyoukai Senki. Looks like the lovechild of Code Geass and Gundam IBO as far as the overall aesthetic and vibe of the world is concerned, to which I say inject it directly into my veins

Started "Happy Sugar LIfe" last night after finishing off a ho-hum "Beatless" and I'm wondering what I've gotten myself into.
Some serious twisto stuff going on with these characters. I'm not sure who the voice of normalcy is supposed to be but I must
have missed it. Can't really say if its good or bad, I'm mostly stunned atm. Despite the lack of gore it makes "Higurashi"
look tame. Has an 18+ rating on Hulu

I'm watching Bloom Into You because a friend recommended it. I like it so far.

Doing the home alone thing through next week so power watched "Happy Sugar Life" and I'm speechless - found it very depressing (ah the irony considering the title). A bit off the beaten path for me is all I can say. Gonna have to lift myself up with a "Big O" re watch I think.

I found Bloom into You OK, I guess - I watched it through, at least.

Happy Sugar Life, OTOH, I dropped after a couple of episodes.

Late thoughts on things that finished:

Battle Athletes: ReSTART! – Started badly, got worse, and surprisingly... ended terribly, too.
One noteworthy thing to take away from the show (besides the lesson never to revive dead franchises without a good reason or plan) would be its rare depiction of a heroic black character in an animay:



The good guys dress in blac hideous green, remember that.
They also fly around in Doc Brown’s DeLorean with Axel F playing on the radio.
Oh- and his name is Jeff.

Think I'll go rewatch the 90s originals. See if they still hold up.

Don’t Toy With Me, Miss Nagatoro – Average. A lot of high-schooler sexual tension with the occasional half-chuckle, usually during the cold openings.
In the trilogy of the “girl teases boy” titles, Nagatoro earns a distant silver medal.
Teasing Master Takagi San >>>>> Nagatoro > Uzaki Chan wants to hang out

HigeHiro – Was fine. Drama peaked fairly early. Thankfully it didn’t go Usagi Drop. The kohai woman was an oddball, people don’t talk like that.

I've Been Killing Slimes for 300 Years and Maxed Out My Word Count For This Stupid Light Novel Title – Harmless, forgettable fluff.
Another one of those blink and you’ll miss it Isekai shows, where instead of being a straight-forward fantasy about a witch living a quiet life, there simply had to be a 2-minute opening scene explaining that the main character has in fact been reincarnated from another world. Does it affect the plot or her decisions in any significant way? No, of course not.
The main character takes in a dragon, who transforms into a cute woman, who dresses in a maid outfit, and is moderately gay for her… amusing that this played the season before the latest Miss Kobayashi’s Dragon Maid series started.
Biggest laugh occurred in episode 9, wherein the intelligent Slime who communicates by hitting printed characters on a wall, had to hit backspace mid-word, because they made a mistake.

I’m willing to bet this is the most anybody has ever typed about this show on the internet.

=======

Things currently showing:

Girlfriend, Girlfriend – Still a junkie, and I need to get my harem comedy fix from somewhere.

My Next Life as a Villainess, second season – I listed this as my “biggest missed opportunity of 2020” title. Here’s hoping that something interesting is actually done with the established characters this time. 5 Eps in and so far, so good.

Remake Our Life! – I enjoy time-hop stories like Erased, and so far this one looks like it won’t likely involve child abduction, which is a comfort.
First couple of episodes were a little disappointing in how they fell pray to lazy tropes like: the main character waking up next to a pretty young thing on his crotch… because she wandered in during the night… and sharing a futon with a complete stranger is a sensible thing to do for a defenceless young woman I suppose.
If I had a penny for every time that happened to me during my university days…

The Duck of Death and his Maid – This is the one I’m looking forward to the most each week, and I worry it’s flying under most people’s radars.
Rom-Com with a dash of tragedy. The Duke and his Maid are an adorable pair, but the Duke is cursed with the death-touch, and they cannot share any physical contact.
The maid decides to play an amusing and very dangerous game of teasing with him, leading to some sweet moments like a no touchy-touchy waltz, and heartbreaking moments like refusing a kiss under the starlit night.

The majority of the animation is CG. The two lead characters look pretty good and there are times one can even be fooled into thinking they’re traditionally animated. Some side characters however look like they need more work…



Looking forward to seeing a happy or tragic ending for this one.

From Spring season, Crunchyroll underwhelmed by getting exactly zero of the series I'd been looking forward to (though to be fair, I knew they wouldn't have Shadows House), so all I watched was OddTaxi, which was a pleasant surprise. Summer's whole list was underwhelming, so there wasn't that disappointment -- all I'm following for the moment is Aquatope, though even that's hanging by a thread.

For fluff, I finished the original Digimon Adventure and 02, while : continues to meander through it's last handful of episodes.

Now that I possess the Megazone 23 Blu Ray, I finally saw the Japanese, ADV English, and Streamline English versions of Part 1. No matter what version I watch it in doesn't change the fact that out of all the OVAs, it's my favorite.

As for the character designs, the Macross team in particular Haruhiko Mikimoto who personally designed Eve the idol always deliver the style that is easy on the eyes.