Slime 300 is a bit misleading because it does the bare minimum to consider itself an isekai. This can be seen by the start of the story, which only asserts itself as such to set itself up before moving on and quickly forgetting about it. The setup involves an ephebophiliac deity who takes pity on a woman named Azusa who dedicated her life solely to her job. She dedicated so much time to her job in fact that she just collapsed then and there due to the amount of both physical and mental stress she underwent. She took the literal saying of “don’t work yourself
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to death” and collapsed with it. Afterwards, the deity asks the now incorporeal soul if she has any wishes, to which she expresses her desire to be both youthful and immortal. And so, her wish is granted, and past life as an office worker, which has been cut short, can be reshaped to form an idealized life free from stress… or so she thought.
In her newfound slow life (in her words), she is spawned into a world that allows her to live the life she pleases. Now reincarnated as a witch, she moves into a large unoccupied house with many rooms. Given that she isn’t quite adjusted to her new slow life yet, she passes the time by making it a routine to kill slimes. Upon killing a slime, a handful of blue crystals would drop, which leads her to inquire about the currency in the city’s adventurer’s guild. To be a bit misleading again and to play around with the semantics, it’s not as much of a killing slimes anime because it’s more akin to a found family CGDCT. Semantically, “I have” would suggest that the slimes have already been killed. However, the story has to be set up in order for the killing to happen, so it strays away from the brief mention, even for a brief moment. The thing is, the story addresses this matter in a really uninspiring manner because it just skips over everything. Obviously, not all 300 years can be shown, but a little bit of scenery or a small compilation of time skips could’ve helped. The story is set up in a way similar to that one kid in school that would claim they did 100 push-ups but only claimed to do so because they started at 97. Regardless, Azusa gets caught up on killing slimes and unknowingly maxes out her level, hence the title.
After the time skip, she possesses both a great amount of powers (or perks) and respect from anyone around her, much like any other generic isekai protagonist. Being a witch, most of these perks pertain to witchcraft, with the most notable of these (besides immortality) being elemental powers resembling witchcraft. She was so caught up in her work that she neglected checking her progress with the adventurers guild for 300 years. It’s unclear why she was unable to check for level for over 300 years, but it at least adds to the overall absurdity of the plot itself. The world seems like a time capsule because it's remained practically unchanged for all 300 years. The only notable event that occurred throughout the three centuries was a plague, which is historically appropriate for a medieval-esque European village. Given Azusa’s reputation in the village, her quest for a slow and easy life slowly diminishes. As the series progresses, more and more otherworldly beings “take an interest” in her and join her family. Parenthood is appealing to a lot of people, but its practically the antithesis to a slow and easy life. Basically, she got set up.
Azusa as a character mostly ties into the story’s theme of “don’t work too hard and take it easy.” She’s also a humble person that doesn't like to brag, even though she can be a bit assertive here and there. Most of her character focuses on finding a balance between work and leisure. Given the tragedy in her previous life, she encourages others to not work too hard as well. This can be seen by her very hospitable nature, which makes her question the possibility of starting a “found family” under the pretense of acquiring both companionship and an easier life.
***Episode 1 spoilers***
The first character she meets, Laika, helps to demonstrate this. Much like those before her, she attempts to challenge Azusa in an attempt to make a statement that she is the strongest in the highlands after catching word of a spilled secret. The only difference between her attempt at it and other measly humans is the most notable, she’s a red dragon. Azusa attempts to dismiss this challenge under the pretense that it was simply a rumor and that she is simply seeking a slow life. However, Laika’s juvenile and prideful attitude makes her insistent in the face of hesitancy, which makes the unwilling Azusa give in. As the battle commences, Laika is shown to naturally possess the ability to breathe fire in her dragon form. Additionally, her size would prove that a good deal of agility would be needed in order to defeat her. Considering the witch’s newfound powers and humble attitude, she handles this in a timely manner. After playing defense for a bit, combining the elements would prove to be successful. Afterwards, a bit of dizziness causes her to collapse on Azusa’s house, which rightfully pisses her off. Laika, scared by her confrontational tone, pledges to repay her by helping rebuild her home. To her surprise, she shows up the following day in human form. The endeavor of reconstructing her house is a time consuming process, and without Azusa’s instructions to prevent Laika from exhausting herself, it wouldn’t have been done. Upon completion, she transforms into a dutiful maid to help Azusa ease into her new slow life. The message of not overworking oneself to death is transmitted from disciple to pupil.
***End of spoilers***
There are six other characters that join the family, but they’re either cute or forgettable. As of now, a well needed second season is in the works to hopefully flesh out the characters, since a good chunk of them join Azusa’s family halfway into the series. Despite the basic description provided earlier, I do have a favorite out of the seven, and that favorite would be Flatorte. Much like Laika, she too is a dragon. The most notable differentiator distinction that is found between the two would be Flatorte’s blue color and tail that pops up in her human form. In relation to the color blue, she also has weird hair loops that are reminiscent of Satania’s from Gabriel Dropout. Nevertheless, it is her personality that makes her stands out from the rest of the girls, mostly because she’s the most brash of the bunch. Much like Laika, she joins the family after losing a battle towards Azusa, the only difference is that a moral code was broken. Rather than be dishonorable, she pledges her oath towards Azusa under the ruse of fulfilling any of her orders. Given that Azusa is more adjusted to her new life as the series progresses, she finds a loophole and instructs Flatorte to live in any way she pleases. She mostly exists to compete for Azusa’s attention with Laika.
The audiovisuals are good because it aligns with the series’ intentions to be a cute moe thingy. Since its purpose is to be cute, the character designs must be well designed. Well, the series excels in this regard, since the character designs are Slime 300’s most commendable aspect. Excluding the slime twins who have similar character designs for obvious reasons, the rest have a distinct style that sets them apart from each other. Were it not for Azusa’s design, I probably wouldn't have picked up the series to begin with. In a few instances, her design would be swapped out with something more formal, with the only downside being the loss of a hat. Additionally, the backgrounds use a lot of soft colors that help the characters pop out. The only downside to the art itself is the dip in quality when it uses a bunch of different camera angles, because it makes the outlines vary in thickness. The animation also has a few dips in quality depending on the scenery, but it’s not as notable as its overall decency.
In conclusion, Slime 300 is a series that succeeds due to its simple premise and character designs. As the genre suggests, it’s an isekai by its name, but the premise of it is almost alluded to which can be seen by the brief mention of it at the beginning. Afterwards, it’s not mentioned at all and only serves as a motivator for change for the main character and her seeming subordinates. The message of a slow life is simple as its told, but after the first episode, it’s reinforced visually instead of audibly. The characters tie into the themes; Azusa even more so, which is why her character could be considered thematic. Not to suggest that her character role is limited to conveying these themes, because while it is important, the series does a good job of making her character seem human, which can be seen by a great deal of both her egotism towards herself and compassion for the people she cares for. The artwork, which uses soft colors stands out because the series understands it’s the main appeal. Overall, Slime 300 is a bit juvenile since it’s the basic moe slice-of-life shtick, but it works wonderfully based on what the series is trying to achieve.
If Azusa didn’t have a witch hat, the series would be a 6/10.
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Mar 16, 2025 Recommended
Slime 300 is a bit misleading because it does the bare minimum to consider itself an isekai. This can be seen by the start of the story, which only asserts itself as such to set itself up before moving on and quickly forgetting about it. The setup involves an ephebophiliac deity who takes pity on a woman named Azusa who dedicated her life solely to her job. She dedicated so much time to her job in fact that she just collapsed then and there due to the amount of both physical and mental stress she underwent. She took the literal saying of “don’t work yourself
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Reviewer’s Rating: 7
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Mar 13, 2025 Not Recommended
I watched this exactly a year ago and retained practically nothing of substance, so I was tempted to watch it again. Unfortunately, my feelings on this series remain unchanged, even just after finishing it. Hellsing only seems memorable because of Alucard and Seras, but it was for their designs rather than their personalities. When it comes to both the story and the characters as people, they honestly can’t be regarded as anything more than decent or fairly average. Hellsing is a clear depiction of style over substance that doesn’t stand out in any sort of way.
Hellsing somehow managed to make its story both largely repetitive ... while still being random and directionless throughout. The story itself is fairly straightforward because a large majority of it is mindless action composed entirely out of vampires, blood, and guns-a-blazing. The organization known as Hellsing is tasked with targeting and eliminating monsters of the supernatural who are ravaging England. Alongside the fight with the Hellsing organization, an officer by the name of Seras is critically wounded. Were it not for Alucard who appears out of thin air and saves her, her story would end right then and there. From here, most of the story switches back and forth between Seras’ new life with being a vampire and the overarching enemy releasing the ghouls. Or, that’s what was supposed to happen, due to the amount of random scenery that persisted in between the supposed main storylines. Besides that, the series has no clear direction with the amount of random plot points that can be seen. Essentially, a crap ton of things simply happen for the sake of happening. At times, this series felt episodic with how disconnected some of the episodes can be from each other. The subplot about Seras’ adjust to the vampire life is present, although minimal. In contrast, the main “plot” is prioritized, and yet it lacks any suspense or tension which in turn made Hellsing rather dry and boring. To top it all off, the ending takes the cake for being anticlimactic. Alucard is the reason why most people are probably here, but he’s more of a background character. In turn, his character lacks a lot of depth since he only exists to fulfill two purposes. One of those is to fulfill the role of being a Gary Stu and the other is to save Seras whenever she’s in danger. His only notable personality trait is his “coolness” which is why he’s both lauded after and seen as the main appeal of the series. To expect the badass as promised by his super-vampire capabilities would only lead to disappointment, because not even he has a kryptonite. Much like Alucard, Seras as a character (writing-wise) still suffers from a lot of the same shortcomings. She mostly fulfills one singular purpose, which would be unintentionally putting herself in danger. While doing so, she repeats her own “catchphrase” much like a Pokemon creature to the point of it being the only notable aspect of her character. Her character arc involves her slow adjustment, but more-so “cope” with her new life as a vampire. She is initially accepting towards her new master as her life was saved, but as the series progresses she’s actually shown to be more hesitant to act. This may seem like her slow realization that her old life is now gone, but this is type of behavior is only seen in the very beginning. Essentially, the aspects that are shown versus those that are told contradict each other. With the exception of Integra fulfilling the same characteristic of being cool, the entire cast doesn’t have much going for them. Hellsing’s only real strong point is the art, even though it’s dated for the time it was made in. Despite being made in 2000, it looks like it could’ve been made a decade earlier. The heavy emphasis on style benefits the art in a way that wouldn’t benefit the overall narrative. Notably, this series does know how to maintain a consistent aesthetic. Much of the evangelical and vampirist imagery is as present as the series’ blood. Everything in this series looks British as well, since even a quick glance confirms this. Additionally, this series has a bit of shock factor, but the only psychological aspect of it is found in the OP where some dude puts a knife up to his tongue. In contrast, the animation’s quality is inconsistent and it looks rushed. While certain shots, particularly those that are up close and focus on lip syncing were visually done well, the running animations look like they were animated only using a few frames per second. Much like the story and the characters, the art could mostly be described as cool. Hellsing doesn’t even do the bare minimum. While it can be enjoyed mindlessly there’s nothing worth investing in. The main issue with this series is that there are a lot of elements that aren’t memorable at all. This is mostly due to the substanceless nature of the series which prioritizes aesthetics over a coherent and enjoyable storyline. The story itself is seemingly basic but it’s made convoluted by the amount of random scenery flashing by (even with the slow pacing) in a “well, that just happened” kind of fashion. With one of the characters being the main appeal, one could expect that he’s well done, but he’s not. The art is the only saving grace, but even then, it’s not enough. Hellsing works if a flashy war between ghouls and vampires sounds interesting in itself. If not, consider watching something else. Some of the other reviews are saying that Hellsing Ultimate is better; I hope it's not as much of a disappointment.
Reviewer’s Rating: 4
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Mar 6, 2025
Shinsekai yori
(Anime)
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Not Recommended
Shinsekai Yori, also known as Shinsekai Yaoi and/or Shinsekai Yuri, is a series that can honestly be described in one word, and that word is boring. It’s a series that’s only redeemable in one aspect only and that is its worldbuilding. If that is the only thing you seek, then there is certainly some enjoyment to be found. However, the series mostly suffers when it tries to get its ideas across. Shinsekai Yori can’t really be described as a story, because the methods used to convey it are executed so terribly that the entire series honestly resembles a very boring documentary. In an attempt to
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combat this, the story attempts to make its rather boring storytelling more entertaining by adding in both cheap shock factor and homoerotic romance, all of which involve really uninteresting characters. Shinsekai Yori tries to be a slow burn but it simply fails because it takes all of the fun out of storytelling.
The only strength of this series is the concept of its worldbuilding. Its a strength that expresses itself as more of an “idea” rather than the quality of it itself because the execution is so mundane and boring to the point where it complicates the process of confirming whether the setting makes logical sense or not. Notably, the story routinely doesn’t follow the idea of “show, don’t tell.” There is so much the story wants to tell the viewer, many of which relies on unnecessary details in a “don’t blink or else you’ll miss it” kind of fashion that it makes the viewer question if the worldbuilding is that great in the first place. Frustratingly, the story allocates long stretches of time towards spoonfeeding the viewer with information. This can be seen by multiple episodes where an unspecified number of kids would simply stand in one spot and listen to someone who doesn’t matter in the grand scheme of things lore dump. To make it convenient for the story, only the correct amount of information will be told to the viewer so the “mystery” aspect of the story doesn’t instantly end. Rather than actually fleshing the world out by dotting itself with its lore here and there, it’s expressed in the most boring way possible. Its method of storytelling takes away from all of the potential mystery and suspense the series could’ve had. Thus, whether the worldbuilding was good or bad, it doesn’t really matter in the grand scheme of things when compared to the execution of it alone. Shinsekai Yori’s story in a nutshell: Arc 1: Brave New World but ran by an incompetent Buddhist academy + exposition dump Arc 2: “Cantus is dangerous” + lore dump Arc 3: Queerat racism/discrimination from the perspective British colonial surveyor in the 1880’s. IMO: Arc 1 > Arc 3 > Arc 2 (It was initially interesting... I guess) Additionally, the series also has a habit of constantly reminding the viewer about events that already happened. Notably, the glowing robot dog loves to rehash the same line about bonobos fucking each other to calm down. Holy shit, bonobos fuck each other to calm down, we get it. This would’ve been fine it were explained twice perhaps, but the series itself makes multiple times references to bonobos which is really grating. Additionally, the loredumper thing feels the need to explain every little action the characters do, even the more mundane action of the characters’ implied sex. It ties back into the worldbuilding itself, which relies on being easily forgettable because it’s but not fleshed out in a unique way. Mainly, the story lacks a sense of cohesion because it mostly throws concepts at the viewer and hopes they stick. It takes Shinsekai Yori six episodes for something to either not be either a setup or a lore dump. Even then, the first ¾ of the story is really boring and unsuspenseful (this doesn’t make it a slow burn by the way, this is just wasting the viewer’s time), mostly because it follows a constant pattern of: >Nothing happening >Everything happening all at once (usually just someone monologuing a boring ass lore dump) >Nothing happening (again) >Reminding the viewers of what has already happened previously >Nothing happening (again) The characters themselves aren’t even characters, they’re just pawns of the plot. The story fails to provide any reason for the viewer to care about them as individuals. Excluding Saki, the rest of the characters fulfill the sole purpose of moving the story along, only to be discarded later. Saki is the only character I ended up remembering at the end because she was the only character who couldn’t entirely be described as a pawn. Though, her only personality is that she is nice... and occasionally sad when she is involved with of the series’ lore dumps. The characters within the main group are practically indistinguishable from each other, and their similar character designs don’t help at all. At first, there was one kid who was mean to one of the other characters (I think it was Satoru and Saki). However, this was simply transient and he quickly assimilated into the hive mind. Despite the characters starting out as children (who are known to develop), they don’t mature in any way whatsoever despite the characters’ motivations to explore the outside world. The main character Saki is the most disappointing of the bunch because she’s still hinted at being brave but is still same whiny sensitive brat she was at twelve years old. The writing constantly hints at her being some “great leader” but the story don’t demonstrate (show, don’t tell) this at all. When pertaining to the third arc, she’s supposed to be portrayed as a kind soul in order to bait the viewers with the treatment of the queerats but there are actually very few instances where it’s shown that she is actually kind (niceness and kindness aren’t the same thing). Overall, the characters being bland soured a lot of the forced edginess and homoerotic makeout sessions, since the series loves to add a twinge of both. As if the world didn’t already lack any meaningful substance, (with all of the world’s substance found in a select few and all), large parts of the world are painted in a gross drab gray color. While it is better and more refreshing than all of the bright lighting other anime tends to use, adding a bit of saturation here and there won’t hurt. The only hint of color in this series are reserved for both the beginning of the series and the yuri/yaoi scenes. Additionally, the character designs are creepy looking and uncanny, which makes the characters look lifeless. For example, when the glowing robot dog is lore dumping in the fourth episode, the group of kids would all have either a rodent-like death stare or that face old people make when they suffer from dementia. There’s also some bloody shock factor but it’s only featured for one minute out of the entire series. The animation itself is pretty awful because it has a noticeable dip in quality after the fourth episode. It looks like it the series was swapping out art directors with how inconsistent the quality of it is, which makes it seem like this series has been made with a really small budget. At times, the characters’ lips don’t match up with their dialogue, even during moments when the characters are shouting. Additionally, the series frequently uses awkward close up shots of the characters’ bodies that mostly focus on their limbs and lips. Regarding the lip animation, it resembles the style of a Muppet when the characters are excited given how wide their mouths are. The animation also uses a lot of shitty GCI when it comes to animating trees, arrows, and boulders during the battles with the queerats. Shinsekai Yori simply lacks a compelling narrative. Most of the story’s time spent on screen is dedicated to reciting its own lore to the viewer. The intention behind this being to create connections within the story, but even the writers seem to think that the viewer might fall asleep which is why the story repeats itself a lot. When pertaining to stimulation of the eyes, the audiovisuals are quite bad which makes it difficult to engage with the setting as a viewer. Additionally, the characters are also bland, which is possibly the worst aspect of the series because the story can be considered at least decent if the viewer feels the need to engage with it. A never ending series of autistically explained loredumps don’t make good storytelling.
Reviewer’s Rating: 3
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Mar 3, 2025 Mixed Feelings
Genocyber was a bit of a surprise. While it’s mostly a generic mecha anime with the added shock factor, it’s messaging is very disjointed. To expect an all out gorefest would be delusional. I had been naive once, but upon completion, the story itself is weirdly cryptic and nonsensical. Genocyber isn’t one linear story; rather, it’s divided into three parts that don’t necessarily feel connected together. The only thing that helps string it together is the creation of the new weapon of mass destruction itself.
Genocyber tells the story about how man’s creations can lead to his own downfall. The story itself is seemingly cryptic because ... there’s a lot packed into a five episode series. As suggested by its title, the main focus of the series is on the Genocyber, a mechanized alien-robot with psychic powers. The researches behind its creation help a girl who behaves like an animal named Elaina pilot the new mechanoid. However, this wouldn’t be possible without her older sister Diana, who is no stranger to the concept of having the body modified by technology. The mad scientist who forced Elaina to undergo extensive experimentation, often inhumane, results into her descent into madness. Consequentially, she loses her control and goes on a destructive rampage that kills dozens. As the story continues, the stakes get higher as more die, which forces humanity to take more drastic measures. To combat the Genocyber, humanity does whatever it can and begins the construction of new technology in order to neutralize the machine. Humanity gets desperate and irrational as the Genocyber continues its rampage on Earth, which causes a lot of infighting as the human race clings onto survival. Essentially, all hell breaks loose. Though Genocyber’s messaging is cryptic, and at times nonsensical, its purpose can be seen as a revelation to the uglier side to human nature. For one, the amount of blood and guts should be a dead give away. Furthermore, human behavior can be modified in times of crisis in ways that are harmful for everyone, with the exception of a select few. This includes the acts of murder, betrayal, and internal conflict. Much of the fight against the Genocyber and the need to shelter humanity is in the hands of a select few. A closer look at the last arc reveals that humanity took dictatorial measures in order to ensure their survival. Those who challenge authority are killed. In response to this, gangs and cults emerge as a “last bastion” for humanity. Overall, the desperation of all humans are noticeable after the shift in tone. While it may seem like any other mecha anime because of its super generic setup, there is the psychological component as well. However, Genocyber mostly suffers from a lack of direction. This can be seen by the fact that the writers tend to make stuff up as they go along. For example, random design choices would be made, which would affect Elaina. Her body at the beginning of the story was just that of another girl’s, but the next episode reveals half of her body being cybernetic (including when she isn’t fused with the Genocyber). The psychological component mostly focuses on Elaina and the remorse she faces after going on a rampage. She has a soft spot for children and is reminded of their deaths though images of their hallucinatory ghost-like bodies. It mostly feels as if it was present just to be present, because Elaina’s reflection on her actions only go as far as further deepening the mental scar. The audiovisuals are pretty good even though they are a bit dated. The best part of it is the overall eerie feel to it. Indeed, the city scapes and the Genocyber are cool, but it’s no match when compared to a few of the shots in space. There’s also a lot of flashing lights, but it doesn’t even compare to the scenery itself. Much like the story’s concepts there’s a lot of flashing lights and explosions that are thrown in for no reason other than to be flashy. The ending music sounds really cool, it fits in with the story well and it practically screams 90’s. It really shouldn’t be anything special, because it’s simply a product of its time. The series is known for being pretty graphic, so it indeed delivers. Obviously, it’s going to depict more than blood resembling red paint. Especially at the start of the series, it doesn’t hold back and throws in a barrage of gore, even when it doesn’t make any sense for it to be there. The human body and all of its organs are nearly displayed in its entirety, just with the mechanical aspects to it. Occasionally, there would be the a realistic display of some flesh and eyeballs, but its more weird than shocking. It’s quite minimal in the last arc, so don’t expect the entire anime to be a gorefest. Genocyber mostly delivers when it comes to the main appeal. The only main difference that stood out was the unexpected cryptic and mostly hashed together storyline. Overall, it’s not noticeably disappointing or appealing in any sort of way, but it could be a bit boring sometimes.
Reviewer’s Rating: 5
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Feb 26, 2025
Kimi no Na wa.
(Anime)
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Not Recommended
Kimi no Na wa is an illogical, pseudoemotional, slogfest of a movie.
Slogfest: The first part of the movie is kind of a time waster, because it primarily serves as a really long and drawn out exposition focusing on a concept that if removed, wouldn’t meaningfully change much of the movie. Nevertheless, the story must begin somewhere, so it gets its foot in the door with as a basic slice of life as lived by two highschoolers of different families. The additional premise to the scenerypornographic slice of life would be the body swap. Well, given the lack of setup and the fact that this film is ... rated PG-13, the writers can only go as far as making it a cheap gag. Near the end of the film, it receives a cheap explanation, but it ultimately contradicts the two characters’ behavior (but not motivations) in the beginning (see paragraph 2 title). Additionally, the characters aren’t even endearing or interesting in any sort of way because they’re barely indistinguishable from each other. It honestly feels like both of the characters were added in to be [generic male protagonist] and [generic female protagonist], to make the writing easier. At best, the body swap premise works as a simple plot device to both waste the viewer’s time and move the plot forward. Illogical: The second part of the story is frustratingly illogical because it relies on characters written to be stupid for the sake of drawing the story out longer than it needs to be. Plot conveniences are practically everywhere, so, without delving into spoilers, the generic male main character (not even gonna try with this one) is written to coincidentally forget certain past events, with none of them being vital or necessary for the story to continue. Additionally, the second "plot twist" (yes, there's two) relies on the [generic male protagonist] being functionally illiterate since it relies on something that needs him to read to realize, which reinforces the grating nature of his inability to remember things. Given that he is written to be mentally retarded, he is somehow able to remember one of the special places he's been with the [generic female protagonist], which then makes him remember one specific clothing piece that belongs to her. Basically, the explanations provided in the series only goes as nothing other than random astronomical bullshit thrown in for the sake of conveying a really corny message. Pseudoemotional: The movie tries to be emotional, but it just fails. For a romance to be heartfelt, the characters need to be interesting. The main issue with the characters is that they aren’t realistic and the “emotional connection” between the two is extremely forced. This can be noted by the characters’ lack of chemistry with each other. I mean, the generic male protagonist had already developed feelings for his coworker. Surprisingly, the story handles this in the most hilarious way possible (funnier than all of the other “comedic” moments of the series), because the generic female protagonist helps set up a date between the two. This would only make sense if she has a weird cuckoldry fetish or something, but even then, she needs to firstly convince him to indulge in the same depraved fetishes she does. In addition to this, writing can be seen as being incredibly corny. Barely any of the dialogue spoken by the two felt natural and grounded in reality. For example, the generic female protagonist, after helping the the generic male protagonist with a girl, texts to herself “it’s all thanks to my feminine side,” or whatever. Firstly, the [generic male protagonist] is already a spineless pussy indistinguishable from his female counterpart, and secondly, no real human writes like that. Oh, a lot of the astrological bullshit also ties into both of the characters needing to save the day together and stuff, as if the movie couldn’t be any more of a mess. The art is phenomenal, but that’s all Kimi no Na wa has going for it. This film really loves to shove it in the viewer’s face as well, hence the “scenerypornographic” appeal. If this film even had good, but not amazing audiovisuals, it certainly wouldn’t have the sky-high ratings it has currently. At the end of the day, the entire story is a generic teenage “star-born lovers” and “we were just meant to be together,” garbage. The movie is incredibly boring, characters as well; their motivations, behavior, and romantic feelings for each other don’t make sense. To top it off, the only explanation this series offers is utter nonsense. I felt absolutely nothing from start to finish, I was just immensely bored.
Reviewer’s Rating: 4
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Feb 23, 2025
Tenshi no Drop
(Anime)
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Not Recommended
Is it cute? No.
Is it funny? No. Is it insightful in any way? Take a guess. Tenshi no Drop is not where one would typically find it, so I had quite the experience of watching it firsthand without any proper recommendation. Despite this anime only being five minutes along however, I was bored to the point where I was just hovering over the pause button to watch the red bar slowly scroll by. At least it’s still harmless for the most part, because it’s just substanceless lolicon humor for five minutes. It gets a 2/10 instead of a 1/10 because at least the animation is decent.
Reviewer’s Rating: 2
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Feb 23, 2025
Elfen Lied
(Anime)
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Mixed Feelings
Original review date: 2024-10-18
This is a rewrite, again, since my priorities have changed for better or for worse. This is mostly due to the fact that my previous review was largely incoherent and edgy rambling with a few grammatical errors, so rewriting this review is an attempt to remedy that. That review should be long gone by now, but essentially it touched on Elfen Lied only being redeemable because of the copious amount of gore and fanservice it offers. Besides that, it had very little redeeming qualities so it was only really enjoyable if its consumed mindlessly. Surprisingly, I was a bit harsh towards the ... quality of the gore and fanservice itself; however, this was merely a manifestation of my high expectations for it. This review will largely keep most of the same points, since the purpose of rewriting this is review is to make it more coherent than the last. I’m going to get this out of the way now, Elfen Lied is… kind of stupid, and it is very difficult to take seriously. However, this is mostly found in its strange method of storytelling. It’s a series that seemingly takes the approach of being “so bad that it’s good.” Although the primary appeal can be described as definitely good or bad, the secondary appeal is more difficult to assess. Therefore, it earns its notoriety as one of the goriest anime ever to be produced. That was, is, and probably will be, the main appeal of this series, at least for a while. It’s difficult to conceive of someone that wouldn’t pick up this series up other than that reason alone. Elfen Lied benefits in its subjectivity by either off-putting people by its distastefulness, or appealing to the more emotional crowd that somehow gets off (emotionally “getting off” would be more implied in this case) to a lewd and edgy romance. In addition, there was a third “more hidden” way to view this series that involves firstly becoming numb to everything (which was surprisingly easy) and embracing the inner philistine. This may seem counterintuitive at first glance, but for a series as illogical and riddled with plot conveniences as Elfen Lied, it appeals to the extremes. It’s quite melodramatic, and the amount of gore helps reinforce the idea that this series overexaggerates everything. Indeed, it’s exaggerated, but it can get to the point where it’s almost grating. Therefore, only the feral side of me can be partially satisfied for what its worth which is a given for what series hoped to accomplish. The melodramatic appeal of the series can only be enjoyed once the feral desires are ascended. Though, this never happened to me because the appeal was undeniably elsewhere. As a consequence, Elfen Lied tries to appear as an emotional sobfest, but it just fails. Prepare to be shocked, or absolutely numb from a series that can either be seen as both/either stupidly mindless and/or emotionally manipulative. The series’ melodrama and method of presenting itself can be seen as a main problem for the series. Elfen Lied communicates its themes through practically one way alone, shock factor. The series relies on it so much to the point where it’s easy to become numb to it, which includes even the more questionable undertones of the series. Therefore, a lot of the shock factor can be seen as overdone and annoying, which makes the rather convenient plot structure as visible as a clear day. As the series begins to establish itself, it can be seen that it’s a series whose themes rely on how they’re being presented rather than what is being communicated. The storytelling’s primary objective is not made to seem purposefully ambiguous as to be innovative or whatever, but it’s also a series that doesn’t need to spell things out for the viewer, which is a nice bonus. Nevertheless, it shares a familiar similarities in which it’s supposed to evoke an innumerable amount of emotions through its atmosphere (in the foreground). Well, the issue with this that the mind-numbing shock factor muddies the water when it comes to the “what.” Due to the mind numbing nature of it, the outcome of this is contrary to what could be expected to the faint-hearted. In fact, most of my feral nature thought it was funny, which was due to most of the entire execution of Elfen Lied being absurd and silly. It’s a series that is universally regarded as not holding back when it comes to its shock value. This assertion is quite absurd, edginess aside, because it assumes that there is no hypothetical limit when it comes to the limited amount of run-time the series has. It does have limits, but it benefits from because an unlimited amount of “anything” would retract from the series being actually watchable. It’s not entirely devoid of merit, with a huge plunge into the deepest darkest pit of degeneracy. The darkest pit of (legal obviously) degeneracy has yet to be found. At times, I found myself thinking that the entire premise of this series its so absurd that it was almost ludicrous to think that actual people animated it. Well, I had the pleasure in viewing it, so here we are. In turn, and in a weird sort of way, the professionals do have a set of standards. Without these standards, the law will kick on soon enough, ya sick fucks. As previously stated, the main appeal is shock value galore! The quality of itself is more ignored and often overlooked compared to the mere presence of it. With all due respect, it is more shocking than ninety-nine percent of animated media and it respects human anatomy to a reasonable extent. For one, it can’t stray too far from it, or else it wouldn’t retract from the cutesy Chinese cartoon artstyle. In terms of quality, the quality itself is mostly numbing because it’s not slow. Even the first few seconds of the series showcase how bloody it can get. For one, it’s off-putting enough to turn the faint-hearted away but humorous enough to disregard much of the themes the series hopes to convey. In other words, Elfen Lied gets to the point, almost too quickly. Most of the facility workers skipped the unfortunate circumstance of succumbing with a not-so-quick death. In other words, it’s quickly paced shock factor. Again, it could be argued that it’s present as more of a melodramatic tearjerker, but its debatable depending on the appeal. The few seconds of it are off to an abrupt start with all of the blood flying everywhere. It’s much like airport full of planes taking off on schedule with the amount of red paint flying everywhere. I had originally thought of it as very clean which made it appear cartoonish, but I see now that it functions as a bit of a set up, but only in terms of quality, not quantity. The specifics of its shock value includes, but is not limited to: decapitations, teared limbs, eye-gouging, guts, animal abuse, child abuse, tits, ass, and a numerous amount of paraphilias. As quick side note for the paraphilias, they’re the more tame of the bunch. Contrary to popular belief, paraphilias can also only affect a singular person because the term only goes as far as describing an atypical sexual attraction. The more “tamer” paraphilias are honestly just disguised fetishes if anything that’ll make someone think “oh, he/she is a bit weird.” That is, if you exclude the taboo of mentioning sex to certain familiars at all. Paraphilias are more known as something that involves other people being directly touched and/or harmed. Stating that this series only contains the more harmless of the bunch is... a bit of a stretch. Inasmuch as the shockfest known as Elfen Lied, the least tame of these would be the incestual undertones, wait… scrap that… they’re in love… kind of. Occasionally though, one of the characters in the incest dynamic is Nyu, who has same amount of wits as a dog (which will be elaborated on later). The main character (aka Miss Plot Convenience, but again, it will be elaborated on later) has a strange “found family” dynamic. Elfen Lied could be vaguely confused to be an “I can’t believe it’s not hentai,” series. It gets close, but it’s still in the realm of ecchi. Despite what some may claim, it’s not nearly as lewd enough to be considered pornographic, or “hentai” for the non-philistines and true connoisseurs of high art. It still pertains to the realm of ecchi since it censors itself when it needs to. For example, in Elfen Lied’s bathing scenes (there’s multiple from what I remember) they’d be covered in the “right places,” either by bubbles or another part of the character’s body. To provide another example, when it’s not convenient or practical for the girls to be covered up, the animators will just simplify the art a bit. Still, the character’s bodies are largely proportional. As a bit of reiteration, the cutesy artsyle helps put a lot of the lipstick on a pig. The character designs help bridge the gap between both the shocking and beautiful aspects of the series. Not to suggest that the character designs are great, it bridges the gap in the transitive sense. Absolutely shocking, not what I expected them to look like at all. Lucy looks like an absolute badass on the promotional cover of the series (I still don’t know what this is called, so I suppose it’s safe to coin the term). The thing is, it’s a bit of a half-truth considering her split personality. Besides Lucy and select members of the special team that was sent out to look for her, the character designs aren’t that great. Yes, it’s the eyes, they’re really buggy, like a bug, ha. They were designed to be cute, especially on Lucy’s split personality, but it’s just not, the series overloads the cuteness aspect to the point where it’s barely cute anymore. Really large eyes tend to be a stereotype for the medium, but oh wow, Elfen Lied really takes it up to a ten-point-five (eleven). Minus the eyes however, the characters all look pretty indistinguishable from each other. Elfen Lied’s strengths are geared more towards the lower and middle parts of the body, to be specific. The rest of the visuals are decent, they don’t stick out in any sort of way. The backgrounds are fine, the amount of light is fine, and the colors are fine. Although it’s not as dark as the promotional cover seems to suggest, it didn’t retract from the overall experience at all. The sound is pretty notable compared to other series for a few reasons. Notably, the opening theme Lilium sounds beautiful, it’s one of the best I’ve heard so far and it still gives me goosebumps, from the first listen all the way to my relistenings of it. This is really the only instance in which the series’ attempts at being a tearjerker succeed, since my uncontrollable and utmost feral reaction to it was just a furless body reacting on an emotional and primitive impulse. There’s no other way describe it, music is too subjective and meant to be felt. Stepping away from the nicer bits of the sound, the dubbing is an unfortunate stark contrast because the characters sound really annoying. Lucy’s split personality has to be the most grating of the bunch, with her caretakers as a close second. (sub) Shock value is the name of the game, so it persists. The causer of this can be traced to be Diclonius (debatable), a mutated species with small horns, pink hair, and psychic powers. Due to the danger they pose to humans, they are kept in a facility where they are experimented on. One day, one of these Diclonius, Lucy, decides that a life of being experimented on is a life she doesn’t want to live, so she breaks free. While doing so, she causes a wreckage that sheds a ton of blood and kills dozens, all while wearing no clothes. This dramatic sequences relies on Lucy using her psychic powers, which includes both being immune to gunfire and killing people from a far distance without any weaponry, which looks like telekenesis. After a squelching bloody slap on one of the worker’s shoulders in the facility, it is revealed that she possesses far-reaching invisible hands. It’s an interesting choice, but it seems like a more random one… element of surprise I suppose. Throughout the series, the invisible arms look really cool, with the realism in the design being kind of unsettling and all. Unfortunately, there’s no lore specific reason I can remember as to why they’re important… element of surprise I suppose (part two). To finally exit the facility, she picked up one of the guard’s keys and opened all the door in front of her. The few remaining facility workers try to stop her, but to no avail, their presence is practically absent anywhere else. Surely there’d be at least a minimal amount of presence on the mainland, no matter how insignificant it may seem. The British Empire for example surely had a minimal presence in all of their inhabited colonies, even if it’s a mere few hundred. Anyway, Lucy should be easier to catch now since she injured and essentially “nerfed” herself and acquired two split personalities. One of them is still Lucy, and the other one is infantile and animalistic. The second personality poses as a bit of an issue because the story changes between her personalities change whenever it is convenient for the plot to continue. This is really annoying because this entire premise is unrealistically coincidental and only exists to “level the playing field” for the people trying to hunt her down. Thereafter, Lucy washes up on a beach in her mentally retarded state. She is found by two cousins, Yuka and Kohta. Given that Lucy is unable to communicate and take care of her self, the cousins clothe her and take her back to their home. She also acts like a pokemon-esque creature only capable of saying one thing, “Nyu,” and so, the cousins name her Nyu. A good chunk of the early half of the series delves into a weird harem thereafter, with the few prior paraphilias mentioned earlier. Since “Nyu” breaks the weird incestual dynamic and sentimentalism the cousins have with each other, it pisses of Kohta, who gets mad and scares her off. Lucy is wanted by the special task for still, unbeknownst the cousins, so they safeguard her since they believe she is the one in danger. However, the search for Lucy continues on, ever changing between her two personalities whenever it’s convenient. The main premise still focuses on the manhunt for Lucy, because she’s still motivated to kill humans, so the action appeal is there. The later portions of the story, in all honestly, are super forgettable minus the ending. The narrative is difficult to take Elfen Lied seriously, because it seems like Elfen Lied doesn’t want to take itself seriously. For one, I think it’s really hilarious how a series that begins with a beautiful opera abruptly ends to a scene of Kohta changing Lucy’s panties or whatever because she pissed herself. Word of advice, I’d strongly recommend investing in a litter box, you two. Her sister is pretty retarded and she acts surprised knowing the type of people Kohta and Nyu temporarily are. Imagine a mother slapping a father for helping his daughter out, I mean, are you supposed to laugh or cry in this situation? Apologies for spoilers, but this comment was absolutely necessary to illustrate how the series can be both stupid and unexpectedly funny. Thereafter, the next scene immediately that wants the viewer to feel sympathy for of a diclonius that is tied up, covered in blood, and sort of “begging for her master” in the unkinky kind of way. It seems purposeful, and emotionally manipulative to an extent, but with the amount of times this series likes to frequently change tones, it’s honestly hilarious. As if that wasn’t enough to both bewilder and desensitize the viewer to practically everything the series has to offer, perhaps the next visualization will drill it into your head. Imagine a puppy, a golden retriever to be specific, with round beady eyes and a button nose, careless as a pup can be. Now, envision a time and place where this will be. Perhaps this puppy will grow into a dog and make itself at home as a staple of a nuclear family in the 1950’s, proudly encrowned by dog tag in the shape of a bone with four letters, all strung into the name “Fido,” with the help of industrial machinery. Given that canines are a limited species, a dog can only reside in certain times and places. Imagine a new place and time in which a dog can reside, anywhere that a dog can realistically reside. Now, envision a person, anyone, who may approach this puppy in the new set time and place. What was that person Lucy? Someone out there, please see what I’m getting at. Also, yeah it’s probably easy to guess what kind of life the puppy will live (or not) thereafter depending on who you thought of. That is, if Lucy came to mind, because type of behavior is present multiple times throughout the series. Overall, it’s an emotionally heartbreaking and emotionally manipulative string of scenes at worst, and a stupid mistake at best. After that, much of the setup is just a muddied canvas of different genres hashed together. The emotional appeal of the series is still present, which can be seen by the numerous amount of flashbacks are used to give the characters more depth. It moreso benefits the humans rather than the diclonius, because the flashbacks involving the cousins give them character in which they would otherwise have none. It still connects with the themes on the dynamic between the two species. Therefore, the flashbacks are mostly a “everything is connected to each other” kind of thing. There’s also a decent amount of action for the people that are into that kind of stuff. Sure, there’s practically zero stakes, but it benefits by appealing to the gorehounds. The story itself, and notably the last episode in particular takes the cake for being unbelievably stupid, because it’s completely illogical and tries way too hard to be deep and emotional. Without spoiling it, it’s essentially a transformation between the characters behaving in one way, and then quickly completely changing their views about each other. It’s more on the corny side than the melodramatic side. The characters are a notable weak point of Elfen Lied. However, there is one character which is at least decent, and that is Lucy. She’s the only character that isn’t either one-dimensional or annoying (when she isn’t Nyu obviously). For one, her character has a decent amount of depth, it’s just that the way it’s communicated is handled a bit poorly. The viewers are supposed to sympathize with her due to the amount of psychological stress she underwent inside the facility she was being held in against her own will. Since, even though she resembles the form of a human (minus a few small features) she is frequently dehumanized throughout the series and is thought of to be non-human. Her backstory alludes to her rarely being seen as human at all, despite her being a member of a mutated species. She is still shown to have human desires for the most part, but it aligns with the more animalistic of the bunch, which includes the more “nastier” desires, which includes murder, and yes, an additional one. A lot of her torment, both physical and psychological are unknown, so how quantifiable it was is unknown. Therefore, it’s difficult to know who to “root for” in the first place, human biases aside. The question on “who tormented who” first is also not really answered. It’s sort of a “who came first, the chicken or the egg” type scenario. Additionally, she is vaguely connected to the other characters through a few flashbacks. Though Lucy’s character and backstory is intriguing, it poses a few issues. Notably, it would be difficult for some viewers to empathize with her from the human perspective because she resembles an animal that acts on instinct alone. Also, she frequently kills and tortures animals throughout the series, as previously mentioned, which doesn’t really help her case at all. Sympathy for animals is largely conditional, with it only under the pretense that they’re both the “correct” species, and possess the right amount of wits while still being nearly entirely instinctual. This is largely biologically hardwired into people, which is why the entire animal kingdom, and the entire structure of the natural order (the food chain) disregards this. Humans are a bit different because they possess sapience. Sapience corresponds both with a larger opportunity for violence and sympathy. The second reason manifests as a notable difference between a pet and a wild animal. For example, dogs are typically protected under animal abuse laws because they are thought of as being useful to humans. This would obviously exclude usefulness as being tasteful or nourishing as other animals (typically farm animals) are typically thought of as. Much like a wolf however, dogs still rely on instincts. If a dog (and to be specific, a pitbull. Do a web search for dog bite statistics by breed, it is almost never the fault of “bad owners.”) were to go on a violent rampage, it would be sympathized with unlike a wolf because they are believed to be domesticated. Thus, it is believed the community was failed rather than the species itself that was never meant to coincide (bred) with humans in the first place. There would also be more hesitation towards euthanizing violent animals, which is unlike a wolf. A wolf will be not be tranquilized or caught and given the same treatment as a domesticated animal. Instead, the animal will simply be shot on site. Both of these examples not speciesism, but merely self defense given human culture and the situation at play. This isn’t a suggestion to put post-aggravated animal down in a humane method, because that would be illogical. For example, ten dogs are doing on a rampage, well, you’d just shoot them, because it’s not like I’m the one taking the bullets or anything. What I’m trying to get at is… it’s not speciesism, again, it’s self defense. A better example of outright speciesism would be some animals, despite similar in intelligence and composition, are treated differently. Pigs can be just as smart as dogs, and are treated differently despite both of their potential as both companions and taste. The answer would be cultural reasons, but practically any methodical way of thinking, which is intangible, are related to cultural reasons. She’s locked up for a reason, because despite the horrible conditions the facility may put her under (punitive justice), it’s to keep the public safe. These themes suggest a contrast between nature and nurture, but even so, the series suffers from being unintentionally vague in its themes. The main issue with the start was that it was introduced way too fast, and perhaps suffered from having no background on the situation. Therefore, whether the viewer should sympathize with either Lucy or the people hunting her down. This would’ve been beneficial if the series elaborated on the background more as it progressed, but it doesn’t. If the series hinted more towards her being a nurtured antagonist, perhaps the series would benefit by having a clear “side” to take, which could help the sentimental moments more. Now, there’s nothing wrong with sympathizing with the “antagonists” of the series. However, for a series with as much of an emotional appeal, which comes off as melodramatic, it’s grating when the romance subplot gets brought up. Oh yes, the romance subplot, which was super forced. Romance involves characters, obviously, so the forceful romance plagues some of the characters a bit. The two that are plagued by the romance subplot are the cousins. For one, they are already in a relationship for some reason, even though it wouldn’t logically last long since they knew each other since childhood. This would allude to a “don’t shit where you eat” type of scenario, or gratingly, “friends to lovers,” after the longest possible stretch of time ever. Most of the romance was wasted on the two cousins rather than Lucy, because the latter would’ve fit the story’s themes more. In addition, the cousins are barely indistinguishable from each other with the exception of a trait or two. They’re also infuriatingly annoying because much of their time together is spent arguing with each other. The best way to describe the cousins would be “emotionally immature” because they can only express themselves through anger, the sobby and snotty kind of anger. The addition of Lucy, or “Nyu,” really made the relationship between the two more complicated. Calling a relationship “complicated” is just the characters being overdramatic though, get real and tell it to the viewers like it is. Kouta is the cousin that complicates the dynamic between all three, so it’s best to start with him. When he isn’t angry, he’s really boring. He mostly exists to be the “harem protagonist” with the amount of times Nyu fondles him. Besides that, there’s nothing else really going for him. This pisses of his cousin Yuka, who’s also a snobby and snotty mess. She also exists for the occasional fanservice here and there, much like Nyu. Basically, the cousins exist to shelter Nyu, which includes wiping her pee puddles up. All in all, their romance is pointless and they are way too easy to hate. The side characters are mostly just unfortunate enough to get caught in the chaos, because the “side characters” are just the special task force. Take director Kurama for example, who is referred to as a father by his creation Nana, another diclonius. His number one motivation is to save humanity from Lucy yes, but protecting Nana seems to be actual number one priority of his. He’s an all around flawed father driven to sanity by the world around him. This forces him to act irrationally, which prompts him to enact rather unusual ways to capture Lucy, which adds both the plot convenience and entertainment to the series itself. The background characters are mostly tie into the shock factor of the serious. For example, there is a group of children that are briefly on screen that torture a dog to death. Casting children as cartoon supervillains is indeed a unique choice. It’s purposeless, but their presence was brief enough to add onto the never ending violence in this series. Some of the background characters can also serve as a torture playground for Lucy herself. “Wait I’m supposed to take this story seriously?” Whereas Kill la Kill was self aware, Elfen Lied has zero self awareness at all. Both anime have the raunchiness appeal to them which is why they can be enjoyed mindlessly. However, both of them are plagued by a rather weak story and convey their themes in a poor manner. Kill la Kill was enjoyable, yes, but it kind of got old because it is too self aware and thus doesn’t have a lot going for it. Elfen Lied’s wide variety of genres and lack of self awareness contributes to the comedy, because it bears a resemblance to something, or someone being “milked” for laughs. (side note, one might consider the different genres to be “antics” instead). This is a subjective interpretation if anything, because I tend to like “unintentional comedy” rather than one liners. People who are more easily able to amuse people, or rather onlookers, are initially funnier because while yes it’s unconventional, it can quickly snowball because they typically don’t know when to stop. The snowballing effect can be largely attributed to the amount of gore the series has, which makes it less impactful as the series continues. It’s not as present in the comedy factor, but it tends to drop off harder after a while. Unsurprisingly, both the gore and fanservice can be comedy in itself, which sounds cheap, but Elfen Lied mostly relies on a timely delivery. The amount of times I had to restrain myself from laughing when a correctly timed “Nyu” appeared was way more than one. Essentially, it’s not a series that says “laugh here,” because it doesn’t want the viewer to laugh at all. I have become numb to the unintentional comedic masterpiece known as Elfen lied. Yes, it can be a comedy, you just need to look at it in the right way. Ergo, it’s so bad at times, it’s good. To reiterate the sort of appeal of this series, because ramblings aside, this actually has some merit to it, excluding the “third” appeal of the series. As, I do firmly believe that there’s more to Elfen Lied than just being an edgy harem anime with the occasional sentimentalism, despite what others may claim. For one, it can be enjoyed as more of an emotional and philosophical piece rather than be nitpicked for its unsatisfying and logically inconsistent story, like I just did. If this seems like a cheap way to back out and hide behind the fact that the story is awful, you wouldn’t be the first to realize this. At its core, it’s meant to be “felt.” The viewer is intended to feel sympathy for Lucy because she has been subjected to torment most humans can’t imagine. The viewer is supposed to be immersed in a peculiar found family story that exists between Lucy and the cousins which have empathetically founded her. The viewer is supposed to feel a sense of sorrow in response to the characters reacting to being put in distressing situations. That for every tear Lucy shed, the viewer shall shed one too. The viewer should feel deeply saddened upon the revelation that speciesism, discrimination, and hate run rampant in a world so hostile. The viewer should know that a species capable of harboring much hatred, with a capacity to inflict a great deal of pain on others, are also capable of nurturing and cherishing one another, simply for who they are. Had I not been wracked by my philistinism, the appeal would no doubt be in a series that attempts to convey a profound statement on the indomitable human spirit. Elfen Lied is an acquired taste, which is why it’s controversial. For one, Elfen Lied could be described as way too sweet because it overloads the viewer with too much at once. Sweet seems like an inappropriate term, but it fits in the sense that upon completion, it feels like a massive sugar crash. It’s tolerable if shock value is the only thing you seek, since you will be gratuitously by the amount of times Elfen Lied delivers when it comes to quantity alone. However, the story itself has many weak points that can be seen once Lucy’s titties are out of the way. Fun fact, humans are drawn to sweets when they’re little because breast milk is sweet. A little bit of natural sugar wouldn’t hurt a baby, but processed sugar sure would be something sweet enough to kill a Victorian child. While watching is was generally a wild ride, the series suffers from one too many weak points to consider it recommendable. The story seems to prioritize animating the girl’s tits rather than actually telling a coherent story with well conveyed themes. The series could use perhaps a little bit more setup that doesn’t rely on gore and fanservice alone. Lucy is definitely really cool, I won’t deny that, but the other characters don’t help with her development much because their priorities are more aligned with wasting the viewer’s time. At times, the entire series is so absurd to the point where it is hard to take seriously. However, I do see why people would have a strong affinity for a series such as Elfen Lied, edginess aside, it’s just that I’m not that type of person. Personally, I believe that Elfen Lied gets way too much hate, since appealing to viewers who seek a wide variety of different things would be both a struggle and a hassle. A series with a rating of 5/10 could be described as “average” or “middle of the road.” Elfen Lied isn’t like that at all, so a 5/10 would be hilariously inappropriate, much like the series itself. +1 for making me laugh at times. My final rating: 6/10
Reviewer’s Rating: 6
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Feb 19, 2025
Kobayashi-san Chi no Maid Dragon
(Anime)
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Mixed Feelings
The basic premise of these types of series is the alleviation of stress. Whether it’s the cute art style, the wholesome character interactions, or the light hearted comedy, it succeeds by being an easy watch. Dragon Maid, for the most part, succeeds in its appeal. For one, it’s a basic episodic slice of life with a moe art style. Additionally, the series takes a light hearted and comedic approach to a the family dynamic. From the very get go, it plays out as a wholesome story involving a relationship between an eccentric dragon and a tired office worker. While it’s all fine and dandy, the
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series suffers a bit by essentially being a bait and switch. What was initially captivating was great, as seen by the first two to three episodes, takes a turn as a lot of seemingly unnecessary elements are added in to retract from the appeal. Mainly, the series has a bit of a fetishistic appeal. It has not one, not two, but three fetishes (possibly more), most of which involve characters whose entire purpose is just a cheap gag. It’s the same story as before, but with the added hit-or-miss comedy and fanservice.
The story itself is simple and benefits by having a unique setup. The story begins as a day that is seemingly like any other for the life of an office worker named Kobayashi preparing for work. As she opens the door however, she is greeted by dragon girl in a maid outfit. The dragon, Tohru, requests to enter her home upon a promise made earlier. Kobayashi is confused at first, but a flashback reveals the once drunk office worker stumbling into a dragon sleeping in a forest. Upon bumping into her, the not-so-sober Kobayashi utters a phrase that requests the dragon to stay with her. She’s hesitant, but obliges, as Tohru promises to be a dutiful maid; “holding the fort,” if you will. After a quick adjustment, the two go about their daily lives until they meet adopt a smaller dragon named Kanna. Much of the story’s strengths are found from Tohru learning how to adjust with the human world. So, after another adjustment, Tohru and Kobayashi parent the new child, adjustments galore. This is where the bait and switch is found, it’s more of a childcare story now than it is a cute crush story. Nevertheless, sacrifices shall be made as they all adjust in a world full of both wholesome moments and mundane errands, which are mostly fulfilled in a dragon-esque nature. At its core its a slice of life series, but it also function as a comedy. Much of the comedy relies on the characters and their respective gags, to the point where it’s difficult to praise or criticize their respective moments without bringing up their characters just yet. However, the comedy was way better and more refreshing when it's easily characterizable without relying on cheap gags. In one of the episodes, Tohru turns invisible and repeatedly trips Kobayashi’s boss over and over again. It’s comedic because Tohru handled the situation in a comedic way that was appropriate for her character. There are other comedic moments as well, with them mostly tying into the dragons taking their likeness towards the human world. However, many of the other character’s comedic moments rely on a singular gag, which can be in any given episode multiple times. Honestly, a good chunk of the series’ vast array of characters could be summarized in a single sentence, no, a single word. I shall now begin with the dragons (plus two humans), best to worst: Tohru: (she gravitates towards two dimensions, so unnecessary) She’s fun and she’s cute, plain and simple. To illustrate this, her bombastic and endearing personality mixes with Kobayashi’s stoic and sarcastic nature very well. The way in which she handles professing her love for Kobayashi and large doses, while still having a superiority complex over humans, is a fun mix. She can be quite destructive when it comes to both household chores, as she handles them as a human wouldn’t. In addition, she’s also overly emotional when it comes to her rivals, which mostly stem from her affection towards Kobayashi not being appreciated as other characters would, even if it’s only for a brief moment. Despite her rather otherworldly methods in holding the fort, her duty as a maid is still appreciation by Kobayashi nonetheless. Throughout the story, her superiority complex diminishes as more people become involved in her new life as she adjusts to the human world. The only downside to her character is that she also has a recurring gag which involves her cooking her tail. However, it benefits at times since it wasn’t as annoying like many of the other “fanservicey” gags. Overall, she’s an endearing choice for a maid. Kobayashi: (she gravitates towards two dimensions, so unnecessary) Yeah, she’s kind of boring, but she more-so exists to be either a mediator for the group or a headcannon for all of the wageslave viewers out there. She’s the most rational of the bunch, as she spends most of her time teaching the rest of the dragons how to adjust to their newly found house-life. Her sober nature is a but moody, but after a bit of alcohol to cope with being a wagie, she lightens up to Tohru’s antics a bit more. Given her occupation, she seems financially stable enough to buy a brand new apartment out of nowhere to support two dragons. She mostly has her moments here and there when her chemistry with Tohru is shown. Fafnir: Edgy Despite him being way more of a side character in the series than Kanna, he is a better character overall. For one, he’s funnier than all of the other side characters. He often gets confused for a normal human, which pisses him off. He also plays video games with one of Kobayashi’s coworkers. Occasionally, there would be a reference or two thrown into one of the games Unfortunately, he is not on screen much so the series honestly doesn’t change much, with or without him. Kanna: Child Her presence is mostly just felt to win the audience over through cuteness alone. Basically, she just exists. Her entire character, which encompasses her desires, only go as far as fulfilling the role of a child. For example, she had the desire to go to school only because she saw other kids attend as well. It’s grounded in reality, yes, and many kids who don’t go to school desire to, but it’s a bit of a “the grass is greener on the other side” type scenario. It’s more of a positive than a negative, since the fulfillment of her desires benefits the series by giving her some sort of purpose. However, her character ultimately falls flat because she’s boring and doesn’t do anything endearing or funny that Tohru already doesn’t do ten times better. A series like Dragon Maid could benefit from a comedic child character, as children are typically thought of as “not holding back” when it comes to their brutal honesty. Lucoa: Boobs Her entire character exists to bring attention to her breasts. Whenever they move, its exaggerated, because boob physics or whatever. To make it worse, it is accompanied by a really annoying wobbling sound effect. Occasionally, there would be a purple haired kid named Shouta (which is oddly close to Shota), whose a part of the story because Lucoa “saved” him from summoning a demon while he was casting a spell. Unbeknownst to him, Lucoa is a succubus, so whenever she’s in his presence, she harasses him by rubbing her boobs on him. She has some redeemable qualities here and there. For example, she’s surprisingly chill when it comes to her interactions with the other adults. Though, it’s not clear why she is unable to demonstrate the same level of maturity when it comes to leaving a child, who clearly doesn’t to be bothered, alone. The story never explains much of her thought process, if she even has one, of course. Also, medium sized boobs are better, because it gets to the point where it’s not hot, it’s just gross. Elma: Hungry She is introduced to the household in the middle of the story, so she felt the most irrelevant of the bunch. She doesn’t do much, either than the fact that she randomly decides to work with Kobayashi for some reason. Oh, she also likes food, hence the word. Riko: Ahegao She makes weird blushing faces whenever she touched Kanna. That’s her entire character. The audiovisuals are good, as there’s no real complaints to be found. It was with the moe artstyle that drew a lot of people into the show. In addition, much of the backgrounds have a nice pastel watercolor touch to them. They clash with the brightly colored character designs quite well. In addition, the animation sticks out as being notable for a slice of life series. For example, series has the occasional fight scene that is well animated. Moreover, to provide an example of more eye candy, the series has more tasteful fanservice in its self aware beach episode. The only issue is the repetitive background music, it’s much like wobbling sound effect, but less annoying. Overall, the art works for what Dragon Maid was going for. Kobayashi’s Dragon Maid is only really worth watching for Tohru and Kobayashi. While yes, Fafnir could also be thrown into the mix, he’s not as present to make it worth the watch, unlike Tohru. Dragon Maid fulfills most of its promises by showcasing its cute characters, fun character dynamics, and the occasional wholesome moment here and there, all topped off with some fluid animation. Unfortunately, the large and untimely addition of one-dimensional characters ruins the dynamic Kobayashi and Tohru had with each other. Moreover, the more useless characters were basically just cheap plugs for some tasteless fanservice and unfunny gags. However, the series still delivers when it comes to the two aforementioned characters alone. Overall, Dragon Maid is both a fulfilled and unfulfilled rollercoaster of expectations, which makes the series a bit of a mixed bag. I was going to give it a 6, but the negative aspects of this series are more hard-hitting than the positive ones...
Reviewer’s Rating: 5
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Feb 16, 2025 Not Recommended Preliminary
(3/12 eps)
Why yes, I skimmed the synopsis and watched three episodes just to lower its score (kind of).
Oreimo’s full name, “Ore no Imoto ga Konna ni Kawaii Wake ga Nai” literally translates to “My Little Sister Can’t Be This Cute,” which is hilarious because it couldn’t be any less true. Yes, I dropped this, because three episodes should be enough to realize that this anime isn’t good. Notably, two things about OreImo immediately stuck out to me regarding its characters. One: The characters are annoying This is mostly due to the fact that the two main characters are annoying tropes. Kirino is an annoying tsundere, but even then, ... that’s just slapping a coat of paint on it. Truthfully, she’s just a bitch, and not even the cute kind of bitch like Gab. She also has the added trope of being a good student, so only a few people know that she’s a bitch. Her brother, Kyousuke, is as flat as a cardboard cutout. He only exists to either “give counseling” to his sister, or give into her demands. This is mostly due to the fact that he is retarded. Oh wow, some game owned by his sister with themes of incest in it. Hmm, I wonder who it belongs to… I’m really scratching my head with this one. The other characters aren’t much better, since they only have the added benefit of not being as annoying as the main characters. Two: The character designs are awful I can’t be the only one who thinks the character designs are just… atrocious. I don’t know if it’s the colors or how flat the characters look, but it’s really off-putting to me. Apparently, Kirino is a model which is really ironic it’s almost funny. This aspect is way more jarring than it is on the promotional cover of the series, since the backgrounds are rather plain. Every other character, which includes both the side characters and surprisingly the background characters, somehow look better than the main characters. Hypothetically, if this issue is fixed, it wouldn’t change the series’ overall quality much. The two points alone have already summarized the characters and a notable aspect of the art. Besides that, there’s no story. It only does as deep as (in the most prude way to phrase this) “big brother finds out about little sister’s secret.” The series has incestual undertones, which should obviously be kind of a given. Indeed, that’s the appeal of the series, but at most it’s just shitty fanservice here and there. Its attempt at comedy is futile, since it mostly ties into the characters either being retarded or annoying. So, just to reiterate, the two aforementioned reasons above infest every other aspect of the series. Well, that’s over with, it was a huge chore to watch, even if it was only for three episodes. Anyway, I’d like to thank OreImo for introducing me to possibly my new least favorite trope. That being, annoying little sister harasses her one dimensional brother, because it’s supposed to be funny or whatever. Himouto Umaru Chan is a similar series, which was barely tolerable because Umaru’s character design was decent and she was at least occasionally nice. To be honest, I’m not even sure why I decided to watch it in the first place, since I’m not even the target audience. OreImo is basically a sexually deviant sister’s power fantasy.
Reviewer’s Rating: 3
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Feb 13, 2025
Serial Experiments Lain
(Anime)
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Serial Experiments Lain is weird. This should not come as a surprise. The series’ weirdness seems to be universally agreed upon, but it also has the added benefit of functioning as a good attributor for it. Weirdness can be applied as both a positive and negative attribute. The former may serve as a descriptor for the series’ achieved pursuit of its avant garde status. For example, entertainment that is positively weird can be celebrated for bringing fresh ideas to the table, but still largely conventional enough to be attributed to “established standards” for what makes media enjoyable. The latter of being weird more so applies
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to any noun that is perhaps too unconventional to be tolerable. It’s a series that prides itself in its convoluted nature. Therefore, minus the guy maniacally laughing at the concept of time, the beginning of the series had a rocky start. However, the approach it took thereafter made me change my mind about a few aspects of the series. The level of enjoyment one gets out of this series will be vastly different from another, due to the subjective nature of it. Serial Experiments Lain is a series relies on viewer interpretation, it is what you, the viewer, make of it.
Serial Experiments Lain employs a unique style which relies on its atmosphere to convey a few disjointed messages. Much to the series’ dismay, it’s unique and weird in the good way. For one, it foregoes the traditional structure of a story. There’s very little plot to it and without a clearly defined beginning, middle, or end, Lain relies on the viewer to coherently piece it together. The term “rabbit hole” is used to serve as a subtle reminder to encourage the viewer to explore the few themes it presents deeper. The understanding with this is that the viewer will hopefully follow suit afterwards. It is a series that, for the most part, prioritizes style in an unusual kind of way. Mostly because the themes this series conveys are presented in a manner that upholds aesthetics more than anything else. While yes, the aesthetics of Lain are phenomenal, at times random surreal imagery is randomly thrown about to maintain the overall appeal of the series. To give it the benefit of the doubt however, a lot of the substance-less nature of the series isn’t as exaggerated as some make it out to be. Serial Experiments Lain employs a few messages that have a common theme to them. These messages, which exclude the few that Lain receives in the beginning of the story, largely pertain to “the wired,” an allegory for the internet. The advancement of the internet is fast approaching, and Lain hopes to convey some of the consequences to it. The natural, or unnatural, consequences could include internet addiction, misinformation, and the loss of identity. Its messaging is vaguely reminiscent of a mixture between Ted Kaczynski’s critique of industrial society, and “phone bad” boomerspeak, your call. It’s intriguing in the sense that it hopes to captivate the viewer through its conspiratorial storytelling, as if they were to say “tell me more Grandpa.” Much of the purpose of this style is set up to provide social commentary and insight rather than entertainment. Serial Experiments Lain is a series where, what you see is what you get. The story itself is ambiguous in nature and only provides the viewer with so much. The beginning of the story starts out with a high school aged girl committing suicide by jumping off of a building. After a while later, her peers receive an email regarding her suicide. The email contains the her realization that she has found God, and that she must abandon the flesh to reach him. The few students who read the email question its validity, since it got sent while she was already dead. It is assumed that emails could not be schedually sent back then. Lain’s interest in computers (though this is debatable, I can’t tell you why due to spoilers) spirals out from there. The plot thereafter also spirals out into a constant looming threat over the main character Lain’s head as she seems constantly catatonic. While the presentation of these ideas are intriguing, a few of its concepts are a bit surface level and it relies on a few tropes to be communicated effectively. The most notable of these tropes is a special team tasked with hunting Lain down, because she’s actually special and most of it concludes with it “being right all along.” In addition, the writing is exaggerated to paint a picture that the internet is some omnipotent boogeymonster. For example, it is believed that the internet itself is causing a mass amount of deaths, but its cause only goes as deep as being loosely connected to some hacker organization. While Serial Experiments Lain does rely on a trope here and there, for the most part, these instances work because they’re thematic. Lain is also constantly catatonic, so I believe the writers inject their sort of delusion into viewers’ heads quite well. Besides that, the story is pretty broad and , and, “lateral,” as to purposefully psychiatric labels, which has no basis in reality and is a false and imposed label by psychiatrists. By “lateral,” the term “lateral thinking” is applied. It’s the parallel to linear thinking, which focuses on one concept deeply and fleshes it out. Lateral thinking draws a lot of parallels are connected together by seemingly unrelated themes, strung together on a vague basis. Lain does the latter... lateral… ladder. Serial Experiments Lain does a good job at engaging potential viewers, although through an albeit long exposition. The vagueness of the series works since it makes me feel like Lain, not in terms of personality, but in a confused state. While it’s overall a satisfying watch, the final episode is a bit different because the ending screws with Lain’s “undeveloped” character in episode one, thus making her “character development” pointless. Overall, the story fulfills its purpose in being vague and conceptual. Looking past all of the vague messaging, much of the scenery focuses on the slow downfall of Lain. She is a safe, but good choice for a protagonist. To relate her character to “the wired” in some sort of way, she shares a few characteristics with a would-be silent protagonist character. The only notable difference is that silent protagonists tend to be morally righteous people. Lain herself tries to do the “right thing,” but it doesn’t come naturally to her and is held back by her own ego. Besides that, she typically fits in with the purpose of a silent protagonist, since their purpose is to allow people to “headcannon” their own thoughts onto them. Lain’s personality also fits in with the possible interpreted theme of pushing back against the evermore blurring line between the real world and the digital world. She isn’t someone who “lives life” as much as her peers at school. Notably, she doesn’t have many friends, she doesn’t go to parties, and she is shown to have little interest in technology at the beginning of the story. Her life outside and inside the wired is blurred as technology infests her room, which gets exaggerated by the time skips. She has little contact with reality in both the literal and figurative sense, she seems dissociated at all times. In addition to all of this, she also wears a cute bear hat and bear onesie when she’s snug at home... awww how adorable. The other characters are good and reinforce the series’ themes. There are two others who aren’t background characters but only one is a human character. Lain’s only friend is Arisu, who has her own friend ground and encourages Lain to be more social by tagging her along. She’s more sociable than Lain but still has a shy side to relate to Lain with. They’re almost two peas in a pod. The way they handled the series’ “god,” or the personified internet was unique too. Though, he mostly exists to cause trouble and make the episodes feel more connected together. The art itself is the most notable part of Serial Experiments Lain, even if it’s a bit dated. It’s the most “make it or break it” part of the series due the series’ heavy emphasis on its atmosphere and visuals. In addition, there are also some trippy visuals. The most jarring part of the art could be described as hallucinatory. Notably, the most jarring part are the occasionally shown and weird watercolor bits (not even sure what to call it) with red text. Occasionally, the Chinese cartoon will show some three-dimensional humans here and there when it comes to explaining historical events. Besides that, the art isn’t harsh on the eyes and it doesn’t have to rely on being overtly edgy and drab to communicate the general pessimistic tone of the series. However, it does use a lot of the same elements. Indeed, Serial Experiments Lain has a thing for power lines, but it takes the spotlight away from the more “meaningful” of the meaningless bunch. Each episode begins by showing the cityscape from a few different angles; the people walking, the light’s colors changing, the cars driving… and the power lines!!! Search for the symbolism all you want but the curtains are certainly “blue for a reason,” as if they aren’t just blue to be blue. The pacing tends to be more bothersome for people. Due to the amount of reused imagery, and with one of the episodes being a weird recap, Lain likes to waste the viewer’s time a bit. Lain could’ve easily gotten away being six or seven episodes or so. However, despite the snail pacing of the series, I didn’t really mind it all that much since a lot of the stimulating imagery cancels the slow pacing out. By all means, Serial Experiments Lain is pretty good, but it’s far from a masterpiece. Most of the series’ fault are due to it perhaps being a bit too ambiguous for its own good. It doesn’t have much of a plot, so it doesn’t have much of a base to flesh out the concepts it introduces. Furthermore, its concepts are a bit surface level, even if the internet’s presence is more widespread today with the advent of web two-point-o. The story exaggerates its themes a bit, but its primary purpose appears to be emotionally manipulative as it’s either to scare the viewer or get the viewer to sympathize with Lain. Again, it’s not a series that draws its own conclusion on its concepts, so it’s designed at most to lightly push the viewer in the right direction so the viewer can interject their own delusion onto the series, much like the writers. The concept of lateral thinking could apply, since it’s a broad scope of ambiguous concepts relating to the net. The series heavily relies on its atmosphere to convey its messages with its trippy aesthetic pertaining to the early web. These concepts are vague enough to elicit interest, but not to the point where it’s seemingly episodic and hashed together. The characters have some depth to them, with bear girl being a safe choice for a protagonist since she’s thematic. It’s more of a theme/plot driven anime so the characters tie into the themes rather than undergo traditional character development. The audiovisual department is notable, it’s really good, but it’s presented in a way that might be off-putting to some viewers, All in all, Lain is a weird one. I got something out of it, so I recommend it.
Reviewer’s Rating: 7
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