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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 started watching Dan da dan. Love the opening. I like the show, but I'm not wowed by it. Perhaps there is a name for the specific thing I don't like, but I really don't like what I feel like is almost breaking the fourth wall. What I mean by that is, I hate when an anime is super serious and working through legitimate plot and then cuts away to a funny scene or like overly cartoonish drawing of the characters and they are angry fake hitting the other character. Does that make sense? Another thing I hate that goes along with that type of thing is anime where villains become friends with the heroes without any sort of real reconciliation. I'm thinking about shows like Bleach where sometimes you're like "dude you literally spent like 50 episodes training and seeking out to kill this person and now that you guys had your main fight, not only is he not dead, you are now allies/friends". To me it just takes me out of the moment and detracts from the momentum and mood you were creating. It also makes me lose trust that you're not going to do this again and we aren't entering into a formulaic relationship.
I will say I do like spirit based anime in general, and I'd say I wish this were basically like Mushishi which has all the youkai and spirit stuff without any of the "funny" stuff.
Is this there a name for what I'm talking about?
Soul Eater is another anime that I feel is similar in vain, but has less of the silliness, which I prefer. Let me be clear, I realize Dan da dan has some sillyness built in by the whole premise of it, but I wish there was less of it when it doesn't even move the plot or develop the relationship (it's not character development for someone to always call someone baka and hit them on the head with a newspaper, for example, that's just boring and lazy writing, IMO, it's a crutch).
Other anime I like somewhat in the same realm: Natsume's Book of Friends, Kino's Journey(?)
Kaiji is another anime I enjoyed and is an example of an anime I like because there is no detraction from the plot or seriousness of the situation, there is no break in character. Maybe I just don't like funny anime lol, I really really really cannot get into Slice of life anime for the life of me, either.
I'm in the market for some food anime that focuses on the food a lot with good artwork. I have enjoyed Moyashimon, and when I was younger, Yakitate Japan. Started Kakuriyo: Bed & Breakfast for Spirits, it is, not my cup of tea.
Dandadan will not give you reprieve from the comedy, but it uses comedy to give you reprieve from the storylines that seriously tug at your heartstrings. Some storylines are seriously tragic and well written, but it'll take a few episodes to start digging into the serious plots.
Dandadan is notoriously hard to define or assign a label to but gun to my head, if I have to give it a genre I'd say it's a romcom over anything else. Which yes, that does mean it has its fair share of comedy.
While many comedy scenes in anime are as cheap as you portray -often just low hanging fruit or cheaping out on animation- I don't think Dandadan fits that bill. The comedy remains fresh and thoughtful throughout.
The enemies turned allies trope exists to a lesser extent in Dandadan too, but there's good motivation for these changes or defined as tentative teamwork at best. I don't think this will be a real problem for you, it's not even close to the ass pulls that Bleach does with their flip-flopping.
The show is absolutely crazy and plenty of people bounce off of the bizarre premise and plot. I think this show warrants a couple of episodes if you're still on the fence at episode 1, but it's really not something that has to be liked by everyone. Don't force yourself to like it if you bounce off the comedy, it's pretty relentless. I'm fully on board, this is probably the thing that ticks the boxes I find important (mature relationships, bizarre curve ball plotlines, beautiful animations, well written, good voice acting, spectacular fight scenes, and more).
Aside from that, yeah.. Mushishi is probably the gold standard of slow and serious Youkai stories. I don't know if there's something similar. Things I've found that may fit(but haven't seen myself):
Natsumes Book of Friends or Haibane Renmei?
Note that even people talking about these shows say that nothing exists that feels like Mushishi, just that those feel somewhat similar. Perhaps look into the Iyashikei genre, that seems to be slower and comparable in tone and feel.
Thank you for your response and reminding me that I can drop a show if it isn't working for me (I hate my compulsions to "see what everyone is talking about" sometimes lol).
Your comment and others make me realize that perhaps I don't enjoy romance themes more than anything. Comedy is also probably second on there as I can't really think of anime Comedy series that I like, although I do find Japanese Game Shows funny.
The premise is absolutely absurd, and something about it does keep me coming back to see what's coming next, tbh.
The art is also spectacular, so I see this as a show that I might just take nibbles from every so often, and not think too much about why I'm snacking.
*Edit
Thank you for this insight as well,
I had not considered this and I wonder if it is also a method for the artists themselves to express difficulty in presenting difficult topics. More and more I have been considering the perspective of the artist and the format or form of a piece of art, in addition to the content itself. Thank you for providing me with another way to view these cutaways!
I personally wouldn't think too deeply about the comedic style of the show by trying to assign greater purpose to it. I thought it was funny from the start. The characters, dialogue, and events reminded me of Spongebob season 1's random pure stupidity (in a good way). It's such a fine line between that and cringe, I was actually quite impressed by the writing.
I really wanted to like Dandadan, but it is full of problems. I gave it so many chances that I finished like 10 or 11 episodes and still couldn't bother to click the last few new episode notifications. And it's not like I have a high bar for anime. If you look through my history you'll see me watching a bunch of trash.
I could go on and on about why I don't like it, but my review would maybe be a bit harsh for the tone of this discussion. So what I'll add instead is that you shouldn't expect it to change or get better. The crass comedy and the tropiness just become more severe as it goes on. There isn't more to it that you're missing where you just need to push through until it gets good it just clicks.
There is one episode that is actually good though. The one episode that is taken seriously and is actually sad.
A chibi cutaway?
I used to think similarly when I was first watching Fullmetal Alchemist, which was more or less my introduction to actually watching anime. Then I realized I was just wrong and wasn't being fair to another culture's artistic language. It's an integral part of the medium, serving as a way to convey characters' thoughts and emotions (the same goes for voice overs). It's a more literary approach to storytelling than the Hollywood formula, which I appreciate, and also has roots in Japanese theater traditions.
The short of it is, well, it's part of what makes the medium what it is, and you're unlikely to not see that in any show that has even a slight comedy angle. Just like how you aren't going to see a shounen battle anime without people yelling the names of moves or monologuing about what they're thinking during a fight.
I'm pretty sure the umbrella term for those phenomena is "very anime" lol.
I'll just leave these here...
https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/SeriousWorkComedicScene
https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/MoodWhiplash
https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/BefriendingTheEnemy
https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/HeelFaceTurn
https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/DefeatMeansFriendship
My slow watch through of Taiyou no Kiba Dagram continues! I've watched through episode 45 so far.
This episode was interesting and carried right where the previous episode left off exploring the side character Rita and her relationship with Destin (who I previously referred to as Donovan, I should have double checked that since I hadn't watched in awhile).
Rita over hears Destin confirming he's a traitor while speaking to his handler and arranging his next job. She then decides to confront him and ask him to run off with her as she still appreciates all he did for changing her life. Destin then panics during the encounter thinking she had betrayed him and ends up shooting Rita.
The gorillas get a tip off that an incoming train has been loaded with a shipment of arms to give the federation forces a reason for an armed intervention into the area they are hiding. Dougram and the gang manage to get the weapons disposed of before they make it to the checkpoint and have a quick mech fight to round off the episode.
I've really enjoyed this anime so far, after 45 episodes we've only had one recap episode and no episode that feels like filler. There hasn't been a random beach episode or some contest with people in a random town. Each episode has built on the prior ones and I've enjoyed seeing the plot progress.
Started your lie in April with the wife. Just finished The Legend of the legendary heroes and Katanagatari where she hated both the endings so she got to pick the next one and is apparently aware of whatever is going to happen and ok with it
I read through all 28 volumes of Kaguya-sama over the past several weeks. I'd seen some of the anime before and thought it was funny, and I'd heard so many good things about the manga that I finally decided to dive in. It was good! I wasn't the hugest fan of the direction the ending went in, but overall I enjoyed it a lot.
Next I'm starting on Komi Can't Communicate, for similar reasons (I remember seeing some of the anime and I vaguely recall being amused). Only a couple volumes in, but enjoying it so far.
Finished Moribito the other day. It follows Balsa, a hyper competent bodyguard and survivalist, on an escort mission protecting a young prince from assassins. I liked it a lot. It's on the same shelf as Mushishi in my brain. A slow and deliberately paced fantasy series. Unlike Mushishi, it has some action sequences, and I liked all of them.
It's good to see a cast of entirely competent people acting rationally. The world feels very grounded, and the characters feel grounded in it. One point that sticks out to me is early in the series, when the main character explains that she can't take the payment she's being offered by a royal, because the palace crest is on the money. It would be too easy to track her down if she's spending royal coin in a commoners' market. It's not a very important moment, but I feel like it represents the attention to detail that the author put in.
Once the fantastical elements come more into play late in the series, it loses a little bit of my interest. Not by much, I just prefer a harder magic system, and the resolution to the conflict felt a little bit contrived. I'm giving it an 8/10. I might look into the light novels, but the anime has a solid enough ending that I'm comfortable leaving it here.