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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!
My Neon Genesis Evangelion rewatch continues with less than stellar results. It's kinda amazing that a 26 episodes show can have fillers. Still, love it to death, but it was hard to keep watching in binge.
So I went back to Mob Psycho 100. That is a great anime about a kid that fights evil entities with his psychic powers. The relationship between Mob and his scumbag "mentor" is hilarious and sweet, and Mob himself is a great character overall. I identified a lot with his detached personality, especially in the episode where everyone was trying to make him to smile... That hit close to home.
I'm also watching My Hero Academia. This is more of a "standard" shounen in my view, with a bunch of common tropes really well executed. It's cool and all, but I probably won't keep watching if it doesn't get more original soon.
I also saw the first episode of Kakegurui – Compulsive Gambler. It's pretty good, but more of a guilty pleasure.
Interesting. My rewatch actually improved what I thought of the series. Episodes that I thought were fillers at first seemed to be much more important. I felt that I finally got that 100% understanding this time around, largely because I've studied a lot more philosophy since the last time I watched it. More than anything it made the new movies seem really poorly put together, specifically because it spends less time character building.
Oh, I'm not saying it's bad. Not by a long shot. When Evangelion is good, it's mind-blowingly good. But it's certainly uneven. Episode seven (The Works of Man) is kinda useless, for example. The first time I watched I was just a kid, now I'm a film major with experience in the field. It's only natural that I notice things, both positive and negative. But I think Evangelion has some of the best shots I have ever seen. Most people concentrate on the story and symbolisms, but there's not enough praise for the direction itself.
Yeah, I re-watched Evangelion a few years ago too, and one of the things I noticed was how off the pacing felt at time, and how dramatically the tone shifts in a few episodes too. I still came away from the experience with a much deeper appreciation for the show than I had when I first watched it as a teen, and still love it, but it's far from perfect, as you have effectively pointed out IMO.
Gunnm Last Order, I'm liking it so far, there's some really good bits (the part with the vampire lady).