What have you been watching / reading this week? (Anime/Manga)

So up until recently I was just a casual anime fan but lately something clicked in my brain and I've been branching out into stuff I never really watched before. It all started with me being bored and watching Toradora and I realized I have a thing for Tsundere (which I had to figure out what the name for that was, it was a real Dean "this better not awaken anything in me" moment). But then I found that a lot of tsunderes romcom were also coupled with an uncomfortable level of sexualization of young teens and have been watching other shows.

My Hero Academia - I like to watch this while I'm working out, it's uncomplicated wholesome fun.

Chainsaw man - Probably don't need to say much about this one. I watched the first two episodes of this and had to read the manga, I crushed the entire Gun Devil arc in a week, now watching week to week is awesome.

Dorohedoro - Animated by the same studio as chainsaw man. A man that had his head replaced with a lizard is hunting for the sorcerer that did it by sticking their heads into his mouth to be checked by the man inside it. It's funny and weird. Probably my favourite part is the villains are wholesome and likeable.

Erased - Guy has the ability to time travel short periods when something bad happens, then his mother is killed and he ends up travelling back to when he was in elementary school shortly before a string of murders of kids around his age. Makes it his mission to prevent the murders. It's a rollercoaster of emotions, I really enjoyed it despite some conflicted feelings I have about the ending.

The Great Jahy Will Not Be Defeated! - This is just dumb fun, a magic girl destroys the "Dark Realm" and the 2nd in command of the lord of Dark Realm finds herself as a child on Earth trying to restore her power.

The Eminence in Shadow - Another dumb fun one, a parody Isekai/harem series following a guy that is sent to a fantasy realm. He makes up bullshit excuses/plans that just happen to be 100% right every time and his harem/army of elves, catgirls, etc carry out his will fighting the evil he made up.

Mangas I've been reading

Isekai Transporter - Speaking of Isekai parodies, I got clued into a manga about a man whose mission is to transport people people to their fantasy realms by hitting them with a delivery truck.

Don't toy with me, Nagatoro-san - I had already watched the anime, which was a rocky start, the bullying that happened in the beginning was almost a deal breaker for me, but as the story continued it got more wholesome and I decided to pick up the manga after finishing the anime and it continued along that vein.

In-order to have someone in real life to talk about animes I've been easing my wife into animes with the following

Spy X Family - It's got everything you could want, cute, wholesome, funny, suspense and action. International spy needs to infiltrate an elite school, so he enlists and orphan to be his child, that secretly has telepathy, and a woman to be wife, that is secretly an assassin. Hijinks ensue.

Komi Can't Communicate - Wholesome as heck, characters are for the most part one note tropes but done intentionally in a way that mostly works. Love that they have a non-binary character, Osana Najimi, that isn't a gross stereotype nor is their sexuality the focus of the character, they steal every scene they are part of (I've read that the English VA is also non-binary but I think I prefer the Japanese VA's style more). Also almost every character's name is a play on their trope (e.g., Tanado Hitohito sounds like tada no hito == just some guy, Osana Najimi == childhood friend).

3D Kanojo - I don't know what got me watching this show, I just randomly selected it. It has poor reviews on MAL and I think it mostly comes from people that only watched the first season. Which, on second watch, is pretty slow to develop, but the second season more than makes up for it. The thing that probably hooked me about it was that after watching a string of high school romcoms this one skipped the first two seasons of "will they, won't they, stop being embarrassed about accidentally brushing the hand of their romantic interest" and immediately gets into relationship problems of an insecure person with low self esteem and an ostracized loner that has never been loved for more than their looks. Once you get over the low-ish budget animation and the, albeit almost insurmountable, suspension of disbelief it's a really good series that will punch you in the gut. My wife wanted to watch it after she was wondering why I had been crying.

Your lie in April - a pianist prodigy that had given up is inspired to begin again when meeting an even more talented violinist, haven't gotten far into it yet but I've been told if I liked the emotional impact of 3D Kanojo I'd probably like this so here I go again.