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What have you been watching / reading this week? (Anime/Manga)
What have you been watching and reading this week? You don't need to give us a whole essay if you don't want to, but please write something! Feel free to talk about something you saw that was cool, something that was bad, ask for recommendations, or anything else you can think of.
If you want to, feel free to find the thing you're talking about and link to its pages on Anilist, MAL, or any other database you use!
I’ve been watching a lot of anime so I will come back to update this when I get home with those shows. But I wanted to share one thing now. I just got a shonen jump subscription so I am going to start reading more manga now that I can afford it.
Manga
One Piece: I’ve watched about 300-400 episodes of the One Piece anime. I knew the manga was better than the anime to a lot of people, and now that I am reading it, I definitely understand why. I almost feel like I am engaging with a different story. The pacing of the manga is SO much better than the anime. I understand all the reasons why the anime is the way it is, but between filler arcs, flashbacks to events that happened 1-2 episodes ago, etc, there ends up only being 7-10min of new content per episode, making everything feel so SLLOOOOOWWWWWW. The manga doesn’t have that issue at all. Not only does the pacing make the story flow better, but it makes the show feel much more approachable. It takes me somewhere between 10-15min to read a chapter of Manga, vs the 20-22min runtime for episodes (20 if we are excluding OP + credits). That means it’ll take me between 175-275hours to read all of one piece, vs 366 HOURS to finish the anime. I managed to read all the way through the end of Alabasta arc in a week for the manga. That shit took me MONTHS in the show. It’s a lesser time commitment to a better paced version of the story. There is still a lot the anime adds that I do miss and so I will probably continue to watch and read, especially once I get past the time skip and the animation quality improves. But I’m definitely going to be having my first exposure to arcs be in the manga. If you’re interested in One Piece but the anime seems daunting, a shonen jump subscription is $2.99/mo with a 7 day free trial. Definitely worth it IMO.
Anime
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One Piece has a fan cut called OnePace which significantly improves the pacing as it cuts out most anime only stuff and repetition. It's almost mandatory for an enjoyable experience.
Yeah I was looking on their page the other week and saw them say that one pace is 40% faster to watch, which is over 150 hours quicker. That’s… absurd. One Piece has more filler content than most shows have runtimes.
I got into My Dress-Up Darling because I saw so many cosplays of the heroine Marin Kitagawa and the characters that she cosplays such as Kuroe Shizuku and Rizu-kyun. It's popular among cosplayers because it's about cosplay. That name is not at all a literal translation of その着せ替え人形は恋をする which is written Sono Bisuku Dōru wa Koi o Suru in our system and means something like "That Bisque Doll Falls in Love"
It is one of very few anime that is about a romance between two people that is not some kind of a farce like Urusei Yatsura or The Melancholy of Harumi Suzumiya The hero Wakana Gojo is an apprentice Hina doll maker and gets impressed to make cosplay costumes by Marin, he turns out to be an absolute beast with a pair of scissors and rapidly works his way up in the cosplay world. In exploring this interest, Marin and Wakana fall in love which is beautifully portrayed with scenes that get into the experience of the characters and evoke the melty feelings of falling in love. Of course Wakana makes costumes for other girls, but everyone knows they are a couple even when they aren't so sure.
For something so sweet there are elements some will find less than wholesome: at the very beginning, Marin wants to cosplay as a character from an erotic visual novel despite being a minor who shouldn't legally be reading that. Themes like that are common in anime like Lucky Star but in this case they don't seem like "fanservice" tacked on for no good reason but rather the things you'd expect people who are learning to transfer erotic feelings to other people would be preoccupied with.
I'm reading Super Smartphone. It's really engaging. It's a short series, 23 chapters. I'm almost halfway through, but each chapter is really good. There's a sort of chess game starting between the MC and antagonist. They do a good job of making the "bad guy" capable and someone to root against. I forgot where I got this recommendation, but I'm glad I saved it
Started watching more anime to prep for a trip to Japan. I watched a bit back around 2002-2003 but my internet capabilities and lack of money made it difficult to source material.
Ghost In The Shell, from 1995 to 2006. I forgot to watch Innocence after the '95 movie, so I decided to just watch everything in release order. I don't think that hurt my viewing, but when I rewatch, I'm going to go SAC 1st and 2nd gigs, then all 3 movies. The 1995 movie and its sequel Innocence share a different timeline from the Stand Alone Complex series (almost like FMA and Brotherhood), but they're similar enough that it didn't hurt my viewing of them.
No spoilers thoughts on the series
SAC is fantastic. It makes every other show look bad by comparison, and that's not even hyperbole this time. The animation, the storytelling, the plots, the characters, the setting, the atmosphere, the aesthetic, the soundtrack, everything about the series is amazing. I can't find any faults in it.
The first season is the easiest 10 I've ever rated something. There's no question that it's the best put together anime I've seen yet. 2nd Gig is getting a 9/10 from me, because although there are some significant improvements over the 1st, I found it extremely hard to follow. I feel that's more of a me problem than a show problem, but it still affected my viewing. Solid State Society was the easiest 10 since the first season, for all the same reasons.
SSS felt in some ways like a sequel to both SAC and Innocence. I know they're different timelines, but everyone acts a bit more like their movie selves in this one, especially Batou and Kusanagi.
As for the movies (1995 and Innocence), there isn't much I can say that others haven't said better before. Easy 10s.
Spoilers for 2nd Gig
Y'all, Idunno if I'm smart enough for this season. 1st Gig and SSS were super easy to follow for me, but 2nd Gig went way over my head. Maybe it's because I was spending too much time thinking about how I should feel about the refugee situation, and not enough paying attention to who all the players were, what roles they played, and what their motives were. I feel like I grok the Laughing Man's whole deal, I could explain what a stand alone complex is, but after finishing the 2nd gig, I couldn't tell you what the Individual Eleven is. It's a terrorist organization made up of people infected by a virus made by Gouda? I feel like I remember the virus being a threat at some point, and I don't recall when that was resolved. Why did Gouda make it? Who was that guy he was talking to before he was killed?
I didn't have this problem with any of the movies either. Did anyone else have this problem with 2nd gig?
Maybe when I rewatch the series it'll make more sense.
Next on the list is either Texhnolyze, NieA_7, or Serial Experiments Lain. Or maybe I watch something awful instead, to cleanse the palate. It's been like 5 months since I watched something I didn't absolutely adore, and I need a reminder that shows like Gate exist.
Not sure why, but I've been thinking about Ghost in the Shell lately and feeling the itch to watch the movies and SAC again. I remember liking SAC because of the aesthetic, animation, characters, action, etc. but I distinctly remember not really understanding what was going on at some points, so you're not alone, maybe we're both thick? haha
This was a long time ago though, so I'm excited to watch it again and see if I understand more this time around.
'95 is absolutely one of my top movies ever, your review made me excited to watch SAC, seeing you rate it so similar to the movie.
I also finished reading the manga a couple of weeks ago (GitS1, I still have 1.5 and 2 pending) and that definitely flew over my head more often than not. It did have some very cool concepts and the art is amazing.
Solo leveling (yes I know its a Manwha), 86,Smoking behind the supermarket,
For folks who are enjoying the anime of "Solo Leveling", I would recommend the novel-turned-manhwa I'm currently getting caught up on: "SSS-Class Suicide Hunter" (renamed "SSS-Class Revival Hunter" but a lot of sources still use the original name so you'll find references to both).
It's easily become one of my favorites. I binge read my way through most of it in two or three days. If you enjoy the original premise of how Jinwoo started his journey in Solo Leveling, you'll find this series takes that idea and turns it up to 11. If you end up giving it a try, let me know what you think. I really hope that it will eventually be turned into an anime because it really is THAT good.
Beyond that? I'm not sure what to watch right now. All my favorites are in intermission and nothing on crunchyroll has really caught my eye. I might go re-watch Hunter x Hunter at this point.
I'm new to anime, but I'm enjoying the pacing and themes of Mr Villain's Day Off.
The joy is in the minutiae - and the absolute lack of interest in adhering to hollywood-style plot structure and expectations; the focus is very slice-of-life.
Very relaxing viewing! - if a little panda-forward at times.