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Short review: Ishura is a good-solid show featuring a fun and compelling battle royale between Dark Souls style bosses and characters. What made it work for me aside from the great production is the substantial story progression and thematic development. I am giving it a 7.5/10. It could have been an easy 8/10 if not for the sparse middle section.

Expectation before watching: I knew nothing about the show or the light novel before watching the anime. I only had a vague sense about its generic isekai/fantasy setting which is the equivalent of toilet paper these days unless meaningfully differentiated from the run-of-the-mill stuff. I ... think it's fair to say that I had little expectations for it.

Actual experience: The 1st episode took me by surprise and hyped me for the rest of the show. As a huge fan of From Software games (the so-called "Soulsborne" games), the death-defying "human player" characters, the giant bosses whose every move is deadly, the tone of the world and the expectations for hidden bosses just clicked immediately with me. The middle section of the show can drag a little and come off as sparse, but the climax of Season 1, especially the more thoughtful final episode solidified the show as something for me to follow in the long-run.

Recommended to: fans of the dark fantasy/action genre (e.g. Claymore, Berserk, etc.). Fans of Dark Souls games.

What worked for me:

++ Great and captivating pilot episode and 2nd episode. The fantasy battles are not only visually striking with lots of details, but also impactful, suspenseful and white-knuckled. The fundamental tone set by the initial episodes is dark but captivating. It's easy to brush it off as another generic fantasy battle royale with little substance, but I'd encourage fans of action/medieval fantasy to give it a try.

++ Great climax and surprisingly substantial conclusion. EP7-12 feature great battle sequences, generally good character conclusions and developments for the major players/stars of Season 1. What elevated the show above other suspenseful battle royale shows for me is EP12 which not only reframed the subtext and meaning of the main battles in Season 1, but also tie up all the seemingly sparse clues and character themes together in a captivating way. The new premise after EP12 differentiated the show from the generic isekai/fantasy battle royales which are essentially cynical cockfights on inflated power scales. In any case, I am looking forward to Season 2 with renewed interest.

+ Generally solid VA performances and likeable star characters. The show casted many star VAs for the roster of characters in Season 1. Alus the 3-armed wyvern is a highlight for me. Supporting characters are not bad either.

+ Great Ending theme song which is a good fit for Reina Ueda's Yuno, the tragic connecting character who opens and closes the show with strong emotions.

What did not quite work for me:

- Somewhat uneven production value between the start, the middle and the climax sections of the show. The middle section suffers from reduced budget, and it shows in some sequences.

- Sparse character intros in the middle section without much story progression (EP3-6) can wear some audience's patience out, but those who sticked it out until EP12 are in for a treat.


Conclusion: overall a solid show for what it is.

The show is rated 9.37/10 on MAL at the time I am writing this review. Guess I should be grateful to all the Frieren fans for not ganging up on me when I posted on the discussion board of EP28 that "sorry, but this show is not going to be my anime of the year". To imitate what a YouTuber said, it's not Frieren, it must be me at fault here that the anime did not quite work for me as well as it did for the rest of you. But for the sake of discussion and for your entertainment, I will try to describe ... my experience and thoughts on Frieren after finishing Season 1.

Expectations before watching: As a huge fan of Madhouse Studio, I was very much hyped to watch Frieren before it aired last year. Never read the Frieren manga, I only vaguely knew the story as an "after-adventure" for LOTR archetypes. Having also watched Record of the Lodoss War, I could kinda appreciate the aesthetics the Japanese "high-fantasy" would go for, including the "longevity drama" everyone was talking about.

Actual experience: Yes, the stellar production value warrants my weekly following of the show. It was also fun to participate in the discussions with all the enthusiastic fans and Easter-egg-hunting YouTubers. However, somehow the harder I try to savor the story, the drama queen moments, the melancholic flashbacks and all the heavy-handed talks about magic talent/philosophy, the more I felt like Bilbo in his twilight years--"thin, stretched, like butter scraped over too much bread". At the same time, some elements became weird distractions for me in the show...in an annoying way. I will try to list out some notable things that worked or failed to work for me.

Recommended to: I am recommending this anime to Violet Evergarden fans despite myself. Frieren in many ways offered me a similar "vibe" and experience. It's honestly not quite my cup of tea, but I am sure the Violet Evergarden fans will find something to like here.

What worked for me:

++ Stellar production value. It must have cost Madhouse an arm and a leg to produce and refine this most ambitious package in recent years. 28 episodes aired across 6 months with almost every frame rendered like a classical oil painting. Fluid character animation and detailed character movement even in the most intense action sequences dwarfs even the equally impressive Jujutsu Kaisen Season 2 (though Jujutsu Kaisen's action scenes are far more energetic and dramatic). It would be a no-brainer winner for all the best production design/costume design awards in "anime Oscar" (for whichever existing annual anime awards you most respect). I really cannot fault the overall audio-visual presentation of this show. It warrants a watch no matter what kind of anime audience you are.

++ Ending theme song by Milet. It's one of the most mesmerizing anime songs in recent years, and I have been a fan of Milet since her song in Vinland Saga Season 1. It's part of the show's audio-visual presentation package, but I think the song deserves a special mention.

+ Some well-written story arcs and nuanced characters. The initial 4-5 episodes form the beginning/embarking of Fern and Frieren's journey, which is a testament to the thoughtful composition of now and then, new and old in this show. There are subtle subtexts reverse-nested into the current plot/story, e.g. Frieren's former team discussing the meaning of "boring" adventure and taking on a disciple paralleling her new team. I really appreciate similar narrative techniques in movies. Ang Lee's Crouching Tiger and Hidden Dragon and Bong Joon Ho's Madeo come to mind as masterpieces utilizing this technique. EP5-10 roughly form the "Demon's ploy" arc which discusses nature of beings and magical prowess in the midst of intense magic battles. This arc introduces the audience to probably the best written character in the show, The Great Mage Flamme who was Frieren's master. EP11-17 roughly form the "Team bonding and myth reconstruction" arc, which highlights the "feel-good" vibe of the show. For these first 3 story arcs in Season 1, I generally had a great time and would rate the show no less than 8/10.

+ Ambitious. If nothing else, an anime attempting to build a LOTR-type high-fantasy world and reconstruction of mythology in 2024 gets my respect and a slow clap.


What did not work for me:

-- Characterization. Having subdued main characters driving the story can be a tremendous asset to one's artistic vision instead of a liability. Brad Pitt was nominated for best leading actor in Oscars for his reserved and subtle performance in The Curious Case of Benjamin Button. Ryan Gosling in Blade Runner 2049 did similar magics with very few words. And I found both characters and performances phenomenal. Unfortunately, if Frieren went for a similar outcome with how it handled Fern and Frieren, I really cannot honestly say they succeeded. To quote a friend who really appreciated Frieren, the titular character is a "1000-yr-old teenager going through puberty". (*Holding my pukes back*) That premise can be fun, goofy, tragic and beautiful all at the same time, but Frieren's characterization just keeps falling apart for me. There is dampened melancholy, regret from past lives and her own way of reconciliation with her history all juxtaposed here, but the whole is less than the sum of all these parts. Case in point, Frieren gets trapped by the treasure chest mimics quite frequently. So OK she's got a goofy side. But that goofy-childish side never come together with her serious side to form a robust whole. At the end of the 2nd test for the mages (EP26), the mimic got her again, which should create some desirable levity for the conclusion of one of the gloomiest arcs so far. But all that sequence did for me was making me roll my eyes hard. Fern has similar problems. OK, she's an attractive and introverted tsundere with a heart of gold and enormous potential...who shoots "pew-pew" lethal sorcery at bad guys...and...occasionally punches her boyfriend...Uh, what else? Just some gal with a permanently empty gaze. Side characters sometimes have interesting backstories, but their exploits often creates annoying distractions for me.

-- Worldbuilding crumbles under the weight of the show's ambition and its glaring lack of substance. Medieval allegories and LOTR homages aside, Frieren's world feels...surprisingly empty. If the show meant to deconstruct/trivialize classical fantasy tropes/archetypes while also retroactively reconstruct them for a new generation, perhaps spend more time substantiating both the deconstruction and the reconstruction? This problem made the "feel-good" portions and the teary-eyed flashbacks a bit too forced and wishy-washy for me, almost as if they should feel good for the sake of feeling good. I guess just like Violet Evergarden fans, Frieren fans would argue that it's a "soft" worldbuilding which allows the characters to poetically emote or resonate. Unfortunately that did not work for me because main characters keep falling apart. In the show, all the talks about magic talent/ personal magical philosophy are a bit too heavy-handed without much substance. The magic system can be quite abstract or out of touch with reality. We got some jargons like "total mana", but the system never becomes robust enough to be regenerative (such as Hunter X Hunter's Nen system). For comparison, I am never the biggest fan of Harry Potter, but at least magic is interesting and intuitive in Harry Potter with its own regenerative logic. In the end I just found it the best to understand Frieren's magic power equivalent to Dragon Ball's power level. Frieren and Flamme are really just magical Freeza who happens to be "on the good side". Sorry, but I am honestly not impressed by that. While Frieren's cosmology superficially resembles LOTR, I find the author's view on power (and cosmic powers) very cynical and Nietzschean. That might not be a problem in itself. After all, many great manga/anime have similar cosmologies. But for Frieren, a show about retroactive humanistic reconstruction, that is a huge problem. I will discuss why in the following paragraph.

-- Pacing among other problems in the mage test arc. For an arc spanning 11 episodes which makes up about 40% of Season 1, it taxed my patience out while magnifying all the aforementioned problems and introduced new issues. Blatantly ripping off Hunter X Hunter's Hunter test arc, Frieren's mage test arc is hilariously inferior to the Hunter test arc in almost every way. In the Hunter test arc, the worldbuilding is phenomenal as it immerses the audience in the semi-anarchical world of Hunter. Survival is not guaranteed in the Hunter test, yet there are great mentors, reliable and loyal companions among various fleshed-out saints and scoundrels to befriends with or fight against. The audience quickly find many things to love about Gon, Killua, Netero and even Hisoka despite some of them having very limited screen time. But Frieren (and its author) just wants everything in their show. Semi-anarchical world like Hunter? Check. Feel-good conclusion? Check. Half a dozen sociopaths and yanderes among the competitors? Check. Chicken-soup style life-affirming messages? Check and check. Test rules which do not make much sense? Check and check. The main tester, the 2000-yr-old grandmaster mage who is just a gloating A-hole and downright unlikeable jerk because she wields absolute power of destruction? Check! (Note to the author: you do realize Serie is not that different from Sauron, don't you?) See, in my dumb understanding, the author is essentially saying that almost all the top mages are murderous psychopaths, but it's ok and life is good simply because they stop to smell the same roses on the roadside and listen to the same fairy tales like the rest of us. I am sorry but I honestly cannot buy into that sentiment, no matter how much chicken powder the author adds to this messed-up, deeply cynical chicken soup.

-- Annoying distractions. Like I mentioned above, dangerous sociopaths have a disturbingly high correlation with top mages in the world of Frieren. This means the mage test arc is flooded with unlikeable and cringey characters. To name a few, Ubel, Sense, Serie, Wirbel, Lernen and Denken. The author wants the audience to believe that beneath their murderously pragmatic side, they are all "deeply caring and sympathetic characters carrying their own regrets and torches". I am sorry but again I cannot honestly buy into that. Another annoying distraction might be my imagination, but am I the only one who find the exposing gothic lolita outfits for many characters overdone, distracting and at dissonance with the tone of the show?


Again, like I have always said. What did not work with me might work wonders for you, and there is no shame loving something that speaks to your heart in a very personal or private way. I just listed out some reasons why Frieren did not work for me, and I am open to concessions and future corrections when my anime-watching friends shed more light on Frieren's flooring brilliance for me. But for now, allow me to just say that maybe I am just weird and cannot vibe too much with Frieren.

Short review: Sustaining a narrative made up of 20 episodes split into 2 seasons across 1 full year cannot be easy, can it? Don't get fooled by this awful show which is an absolute insult to the big names attached to it.

Expectations before watching: script and series composition by Mamoru Oshii who made Ghost in the Shell 1995, directed by his Production I.G. colleague Junji Nishimura; theme song by Maaya Sakamoto. With such a dream team, what can go wrong?

Reality after watching: WTF did I watch?

Recommended to: No one but those with a morbid curiosity to see how bad it actually is.


Pros: ...
+ Maaya Sakamoto's song is not bad.
+ Premise from season 1 was intriguing at least for me to want to know how the story ends.

Cons:

--- Probably the laziest anime production ever, and yes I have watched Ex Arm. With Ex Arm, you have a team with nearly zero experience in making anime struggling to make an action series. Terrible compositions aside, you can actually make out some decent mo-cap fights at least in Ex Arm. With Hikari no Ou, you can't use the same excuse like Ex Arm because your project is spearheaded by industry legends. Yet barely any action sequences here in Hikari no Ou pass as "motion picture". Characters move in twisted proportions and tumble around the screen in random directions as if the team was going for a homage to Chargeman Ken. The suspenseful mystery in Season 1 at least sustained the narrative for me, but every new episode in Season 2 takes away a tiny chunk of hope and respect from me.

--- The story is a terrible ripoff of Shinsekai Yori (From the New World). While Shisekai Yori also had one poorly produced semi-coherent episode among its 25 episodes, imagine someone taking that one bad episode as the gold standard for their whole series. That is Hikari no Ou in its essence. The premise of Hikari no Ou is just a clone of Shinsekai Yori with its insidiously hazardous post-apocalyptic future and remnants of humanity surviving on the edge and at the mercy of the "god race". Yet the story of Hikari no Ou is ultimately a huge letdown, with all the incoherent jargons and poorly written mythology all stewed together in abandonment towards the end of the story. The grand finale is also one of the most inconsequential I have ever seen. I was going to give the whole series a 3 or 4/10 before getting to the end, but the ending made it even worse.

Like I mentioned, this show is an absolute disgrace and insult to the big names attached to it.

One sentence review: This is probably the most well-sculptured turd of an anime I have seen. Extremely well-crafted, but also totally cringy.

Expectations before watching: This popped up out of nowhere on streaming last month, and the premise looks very interesting at least. Also, MAPPA studio has gradually become one of my favorites over the years.

The reality: The basic worldbuilding and fantastical elements are very far-fetched, and the main plot is essentially a super cringy story about a toddler getting jealous of her mom for being madly in love with her dad. Seriously? You don't need a super convoluted "Spirited Away" type setting to tell ... a story about family love and pain of growing up.

Recommended to: people who have experiences similar to what was portrayed in the movie. (And by that, I acknowledge my own limitations. This movie did not resonate with me, but it might work for others)

What worked for me:

++ Overall superb art direction, animation and special effects. The colors really brought the otherwise bleak setting to life. MAPPA has again excelled as a leading animation studio of our time.
+ Some characters and their arcs are handled with care. The main leads and their romance are not all that bad.
+ Initial mystery about the world was intriguing...for a while.

What did not work for me:

-- Overtly convoluted plot and fantastical mechanics become disservices to the story. If we take Spirited Away as a point of comparison, well, Spirited Away did not explain everything in its mythical setting either, but at least the audience for Spirited Away were not misled to spend too much time cracking the mystery of the spirit realm. Maboroshi, on the other hand, just throws one jargon over another at the audience. At around half point of the movie, my brain went numb and I stopped caring about all the significances and symbolisms beneath it all.

-- Like I mentioned, the core of the plot revolving around family bound, love, pain of love, responsibility, growing up and regrets does not have to be so cringe-worthy, yet the way the movie handles Izumi is just too cringe-worthy for me.

-- Other awkward elements, including eye-rolling sequences of multiple love triangles and religious snobbishness ultimately lead nowhere. These can be both fun and integral to the story, but sadly they are mostly just there. Maybe if I try a little harder, I can force a coherent interpretation out of them. But I don't think it's worth it. This movie gets a very low mark in the department of coherence for me.

Conclusion: Well, maybe fans of this movie will try to defend it with arguments like "soft worldbuilding" "poetic vibe" or something in that line. I am fine with such perspectives. Like I always said, please take my review with a whole pack of salt, and there's no shame for you to love something that did not work for me.

Short Review (Spoiler-free):

Jujutsu Kaisen 0 Movie is a great, if slightly short of amazing, experience where the main purpose, introducing us to the soon-to-be important character Yuuta Okkotsu, is well served. As far as mainstream shonen goes, the movie is filled with stunningly animated scenes, blood-pumping action sequences and quite the moving conclusion.

Expectations and fulfillment: I did not expect much from this anime besides the excitement of action and some creatively weird supernatural visuals (after watching Season 1, I have taken these to be the bread and butter for this franchise). It certainly met those expectations and then some.

Baseline quality: 8.8/10. Slightly held ... back to 8.5/10 by questionable treatment of traditional themes such as love, dedication and friendship.

Recommended to: Fans of battle shonen. Fans of elaborate combat mechanics (such as JoJo and Hunter X Hunter). Fans of bromance. Fans of "pure love" (the show's depiction of this concept might make you facepalm though, so you are warned). People hesitating about diving into Jujutsu Kaisen franchise (some weird jargons might need some getting used to, but overall this is the best Jujutsu Kaisen experience so far for me, a non-fan. So that's saying something.)

Not recommended to: People who dive into the most typical and mainstream shonen looking for the most original experience (why would anyone do that? But seeing the scathing negative top reviews here on MAL, such people certainly exist and many people rushed to upvote their reviews). People who are allergic to elaborate fantasy mechanics. Faint-hearted audience who might find demonic sights in supernatural anime too disturbing (again, the movie is literally titled "Curse Battles", and that should be pretty self-explaining).

What worked really well for me:

+ Poignant and moving main plot involving lost first love. It's not the most original idea, but when it's treated with so much care and sincerity, it works, albeit with supernatural and morbidly demonic elements. The movie made sure that audiences are given enough time to let the emotions sink in. The one-two punch at the end of the movie, where one character made a decisive sacrifice and commitment followed a teary farewell, is quite powerful that I almost shed a tear.

+ Balanced and respectful treatment of a "Shinji archetype" MC that allowed him to shine despite the clichés. For those who already know the ABCs of Yuuta Okkotsu, this might not be a surprise. But for me, a non-fan, this movie works surprisingly where countless other anime frustrates (Yuki in Future Diary, for example). This goody-two-shoes crybaby (a side character called him out on that) should not be compelling to watch at all, yet for some reason he is. Perhaps this is what happens when an anime treats its central characters with enough care. Perhaps there are no inherently awful character archetypes, only indecent, hammy, overdone or otherwise misguided depictions of them.

+ Some side characters from the main series got quality screen time and had their uniqueness fleshed out. If you are a fan of Panda, Sensei Satoru Gojou or Maki, you are in for a treat. Panda is adorable, ferocious and hilarious as ever in this movie. Satoru got to shine in some moments more brightly than in Season 1.

+ Highly detailed and stylized animation, as mentioned above. Coupled with nail-biting supernatural sequences fighting choreography, the visual impact of the movie is quite impressive.

+ Jujutsu jargons are relatively easy to follow, and the elaborate mechanics, though clearly fabricated, are usually self-explanatory if you pay attention to the amazing visual storytelling. "Show, don't tell" is a frequently mentioned philosophy/technique nowadays. In my opinion, this movie is one of the best examples of appropriate application of this philosophy. Taking Toge Inumaki's scenes for example, Most important info about his abilities are shown through a very thrilling battle. The prowess of his secret technique and the toll it takes don't need much dialogue to explain.

+ Bold, wicked and hilarious lines. There's a line about love being the most twisted curse. Some quips and comebacks are also gold. You won't miss them. Given their contexts, I laughed out loud at their boldness and ridiculousness.

What did not work too well for me:

- Certain aspects of this core relationships could have been fleshed out a little better, but given the limited length of a feature-length movie, I was not bothered that much.
- A few pivotal moments seem too sketchy. An example is a pivotal scene where several characters get neutralized with serious injuries. Apparently they fought valiantly before falling, but only the result is shown.
- Like Fire Punch and Chainsaw Man, this anime likes to get wickedly playful with traditional themes such as "friendship" "undying love" or "mortal commitment" before hammering their point home in a pretty traditional way. I am not the biggest fan of such curveball stunts in storytelling, nor am I a hater though. I am just not sure if, for example, equaling love with curse/power sits well with my personal philosophy. Then again, this is an anime where heroes supposedly "fight curses with curses". I just hope the mangaka and writers know what they are doing and substantiate on these edgy elements in a meaningful way, eventually.

Like with Season 1, I still have certain reservations with the franchise. This prequel movie mostly overcomes the apparent identity crisis of Season 1. I just hope that trend continues with Season 2, which I am looking forward to thanks to this movie.

Short Review (Spoilers-free):

At this point, if you even search the Youtube for opinions on Lycoris Recoil, all you can find are endless praises. Some even labelled it "one of the best original anime ever". That might be the case for you if what matters the most to you is moe girls acting out their puberty/girly stuff all the time. However, if you value plot coherence/tonal consistency the most, you are probably like me--not the core target audience for this anime. In that case, Lycoris Recoil might feel like someone throwing all their favorite ingredients into a blender without much thought to proportions of ingredients.

Expectations/before ... I watch: according to the popular opinions, Lycoris Recoil is a "John Wick meets K-on". Well, since I like John Wick 1 and 2, plus I am okay with moe comedy, I wanted to give Lycoris Recoil a try. After watching all 13 episodes of Lycoris Recoil, I can safely guarantee you that this is most certainly not John Wick, even if all you want from it is just sleek protagonists mowing down 1000 goons in increasingly ridiculous fashions.

Baseline Quality: 6.5-7 for me. Uneven quality across the different genres it tackled. If the moe comedy department of the show is a 9/10, then its mystery/suspense department only gets a 4-5/10 from me. Action/thriller elements are 6-8/10 fluctuating across the episodes. Drama in this show is a joke which gets a 3/10 from me.

Recommended to: fans of moe comedy. Those who value anime graphics over everything else. Or if you are Hideo Kojima (whose game direction I have admired for decades by the way).

Not recommended to: those who demand some authentic stake/tension in the story, or those who take themes/messages in anime more seriously.

What worked for me:

+ When it gets moe, it really has some of the most effective moe/cutesy stuff in recent anime. Chisato and Takina kicking each other's butt as a homage to Stand By Me is a nice touch, and that's already iconic in a lot of anime fans' memory. You can feel the physicality of the main duo's bodies when they move stylistically.
+ Like the butt-kicking scene from OP, most of the motions/actions in the show are meticulously drawn, with character art being stable and smooth across the whole 13 episodes.
+ Some action sequences are gripping and tightly composed. These sequences are somewhat comparable to those chase/evade sequences from the Bourne movies, albeit with anime-ish outcomes.
+ Decent OP/ED songs. I like the ED song better than the OP, but taste in music can be very subjective, so your mileage might differ.
+ Its lighthearted overtone is sustained and handled with care.

What did not work too well for me:

- The show's single-minded commitment to moe comedy and relentless pace can be a double-edged sword. It tries to short-sell its moe elements a bit too hard that characters lose their believability in a high-stake underworld setting. I mentioned that the entire show feels like someone throwing all their favorite ingredients into a blender without much thought to proportions. Another metaphor is imagine yourself ordering a beef steak combo in a luxurious restaurant, and getting a very sweet and cute appetizer. However when the main course is served, you realize it's covered with gummy bears as if to conceal the burned steak. You still enjoy the gummy bears until the end, but you get a bad aftertaste in your mouth when you really think about it. To put it in plain words, the whole of the multiple genres Lycoris Recoil tackled is less than their sum. An example is a seemingly high-stake scenario in EP12 foreshadowed over previous episodes. Yet the crisis in the said scenario was averted so quickly and cleanly as if it's a joke. Same thing goes with Chisato's personal crisis. The melancholy/tragedy was hardly given time to sink in before over-the-top moe stuff hits your face every 3 seconds. Perhaps there is only a very subtle difference between lightheartedness and ignorance. Lycoris Recoil, in my opinion, leans towards the latter when it tries to tackle drama. "Shadow official organization training orphaned minors to be covert assassins" shouldn't be treated this lightly, but that's just my two cents.

- The themes and conspiracies don't make much sense. For example, you only get a very vague sense that the illuminati-like powerful conspirators pulling strings behind the scene are playing multiple sides and are up to no good. However, there's not much depth beyond that. The same applies to the main antagonist/boss characters. I get what the writers intend them to be at the end, but I don't really feel them.

- Personally, I found Chisato tiresome and annoying. Yes she is pretty and powerful. Yes there is a character twist explaining her reasons for always acting out with a hysterical and ultra-high-pitched voice (I need to express my respect for her VA though, it's not the VA's fault), but to quote the live-action Netflix series "Russian Doll", Chisato is literally "her own party", who does not need anyone else. I don't think the show would be that different even if they deleted most of the supporting characters. Also, a signature stunt she pulls (by this point it has become a popular meme) eliminated all the believable stakes or tensions in the anime for me. If your main character could just waltz casually in a blizzard of bullets, why even bother with CQC or any real-world techniques?

- Very predictable. By episode 9 and 10, I was already conditioned by the show to assume everything will be resolved in a lighthearted way. "Everything will be OK when you sprinkle moe stuff on it". With that in mind, I told a fellow anime fan that I wouldn't buy into any "Holy crap they really did that" moments in the climax. And now with the ending out, unfortunately that is exactly the case.

In the end, it boils down to this--if moe comedy is all your want, just ignore my review and go for the show. If you are a big fan of the show, please also take my words with a whole pack of salt. There's no shame for loving something that genuinely speaks to your heart.

Short Review (Spoiler-free):

Shadow House Season 2, like Season 1, is a great production with attractive main characters, beautiful art design, a unique gothic-styled song and some impressive action sequences. Its weakest department is the writing. This season's story is still recovering from the last seasonal finale's premature revelation of the core mystery on which the entire story is built. Fortunately, the 2nd season has a somewhat tighter narrative focused on the "Master Robe" case. Most of the issues I had with Season 1 still apply here, as Shadow House continues to closely follow the formula of "Qing-dynasty Palace Drama" popularized in Asian countries.

My ... expectations/reasons for watching:
Since I watched Season 1 out of curiosity, I was at least motivated to find out about Kate and Emilico's fate after their last face-off with Edward, though I did not have very high expectations for its story. I was also curious to know what new mystery they have in store for driving this season.

Baseline quality:
6.5-7/10. Not a bad production. The "Moe Gothic" OP song is pretty good. But I am still not a fan of all the palace infight drama. The allegory to real-world class warfare is a little too on the nose for me. There are clues of brilliance sprinkled across the episodes, but the detective procedure is pretty much by the numbers.

Recommended to:
Fans of "palace infight drama"; people who believe in the cosmic conspiracy that earth is just a giant prison for humanity; fans of "moe torture"; fans of Victorian aesthetics.

Not recommended to:
Those who don't like palace infight drama and those prone to be depressed by suppressive hierarchy.

What worked for me:
+ Good art direction throughout. Facial art is consistently good throughout the 2 seasons.
+ Interesting worldbuilding with commendable attention to details in the structure of the castle, social institution, etc.
+ Emilico is still adorable throughout the season, her relationship with Kate serves as the backbone of the story. I admit that is solid enough to warrant my continuous watching.
+ More focus on the narrative than Season 1.
+ Great OP song.

What did not quite work for me:
- As the show follows the formula of "Palace infight drama" too closely, it also inherited a plethora of issues that bothered me in that genre.
- over-demonization of the villains coupled with over-idealization of the main characters. Pitting sunshine-like Emilico against this pitch-black evil castle and its demonic/alien rulers creates quite some drama, right? However, that makes the scenario for Emilico/Kate's winning in the end less believable. Unless the show finds a clever way to deconstruct the "pure evil" of the titular Shadow House, this is always going to be a major hurdle for the writer. Otherwise, the story apparently risks falling into the most egregious power fantasy. In the most popular palace dramas, the main protagonist (usually a low-level maid or concubine) gradually gains power by their sheer will and wits. In this season of Shadow House, Emilico and Kate are on the track to be a couple blessed with all powers. Sure the writer can add wrinkles to their journey, but this trend is very apparent.
- Formulaic. Like in most palace dramas, the protagonist gains sympathetic allies and friends, but they soon suffer/die in the hands of the ruthless and all-powerful ruling villains, making the protagonist more determined to tear down this palace. I am not saying this formula is inherently bad, but how Shadow House handled it feels a bit too on the nose for me.
- A few too many fake-outs hurt the suspenseful moments in the show. In an early episode when Emilico was showing her prowess, you'd think she's in some authentic physical danger, but not really. When the fake-outs become the norm, the audience is also conditioned to believe that the main heroes will never truly be in danger.
- Ends on a rather bizarre and uninteresting cliffhanger.
- Whoever puts "slice-of-life" in its genre on MAL still deserves Shadow Grandpa's coffee, the whole pot please. On my book this is a most depressing thriller/drama set in a society with extreme power distance and cruelty, most certainly not a "slice-of-life".

As you can see, I am neither the biggest fan nor a hater of the show. I can appreciate certain aspects of the show but my appreciation is limited by the aforementioned reasons. If you are a fan, please just ignore my criticism. If you are hesitating about watching it, just take my words with a whole pack of salt.

Short Review (Spoiler-free):

Itou Junji: Collection is better described as a motion manga with decent voice acting rather than an anime. These adaptations of Junji's short stories have varing qualities, mostly from awful to serviceable, with a few good ones in the mix. I am not a horror fan to begin with, but I was able to finish Junji's original manga anthology out of some morbid and OCD-ish curiosity. This anime series can be a serviceable introduction to Junji's extensive works, provided that you can stand the unstable art and barely-moving animations.

There are many problems plaguing this anime series. Though to be honest some ... of these issues are inherent to Junji's original manga. Junji might have created a new genre (or that he perfected a certain style pioneered by H.P. Lovecraft)--"slice of darkness" or "slice of nightmare" (as I named it). His stories often starts and ends abruptly, without proper closure or epilogue. What were left in the audience's memory are usually the most nightmarish images, and those become slices of bad dreams looming in your subconsciousness. Adapting these stories into anime naturally invites problems of pacing, framing among other issues. With that said, Studio Deen could have done a much better job.

Baseline impression: 5.5-6/10. Many sequences show a lack of commitment that it becomes a bit repulsive.

Recommended to: only those who are curious to know what's Itou Junji is all about but find themselves unable to get into the manga. These short "motion manga strips" might give you a fair appetite for Junji's works.

Pros and Cons:

+ Mostly conveys Junji's art style and horror elements. Some sequences can be as effective as the manga.
+ If you ever want a motion manga from Junji with professional voice acting, your dream has come true.

- Ugly and unstable facial art takes you out of immersion a lot of times.
- Too many still frames. Many intense sequences are also made of a few sliding paper cutouts of characters. I don't think Junji Itou intended for his work to look like that in motion.
- Unsatisfying and fragmented adaptation of longer stories. You'd think the Intersection's Pretty Boy would last at least 3 episodes, but no, only about 20% of that story made it into the anime.
- Some masterful horror moments were ruined by cheap treatment or laughable timing/pacing.


Long Review (moderate spoilers):

This is far from the worst anime, but its low rating here is understandable. Then again how would you rate a horror show properly? If you soil yourself watching it, does it mean it's worth a 10? If it's somehow not scary enough, is it a plus or minus? In my case I prefer serious drama or tragedy with light horror elements.

In any case, the animation is faithful to the manga but also basic. Many sequences are just manga strips with still characters. Perhaps Junji's most works do not need to be adapted into anime in the first place. Likeable characters? Thoughtful themes? Those are not the reason his fans read him. And the anime has the unfortunate 1st episode of a obnoxious boy cursing others with Japanese hexes.

If this anime intended twisted humor, then I would say it succeeded. But I doubt that's the case. The timing of jump scares and voice acting sometimes created unintentional comedies. And I am not talking about the Souichi episodes which were intended as horror-comedies. Some of the most unnerving moments in the manga made me LOL in the anime, for some reason.

There are some short stories which are more accomplished and mesmerizing. "Lingering Farewell" in EP6 is one of them. Yet it's mind-boggling why they would not adapt more of these type of melancholic and thoughtful tales. However, this criticism of mine is also applicable to 90% of Junji's manga. Most of his works focused on disgusting body-horror rather than more human aspects of urban legends/ghost stories.

There some absolutely atrocious adaptations mixed in this anthology. "Second-hand Record" for example, ruins the most unnerving sequence/ending of the original short story. Perhaps animating corpses singing the harrowing song is too difficult to pull off? When read on manga, the "song from the other world" is all left to the readers' imaginations. In this anime adaptation, the song actually does not sound too bad, but much weaker than what the readers imagination can do.

Similar issues can be found in adaptations of longer stories. "Further Tales of Oshikiri", for example, are a series of urban legends revolving the main character's house which serves as a hallway to alternate dimensions. You'd expect the full storyline of Oshikiri from this anime, but it ended abruptly without any satisfying development.

There are some more interesting stories with spicy social commentaries (The Town without Streets, for example). You can sense Junji's talent for blending cosmic horror with societal issues of modern times, even when the anime quality is serviceable-to-decent at best.

Some stories will gross you out so much that you want to pinch yourself to get away from the ghastly visions depicted in the anime. the infamous greasy nightmare scene in "Glyceride", for example, still worked effectively despite of the poor animation/facial art. However, the facial art is often just ugly. No wonder why Studio Deen in recent years has garnered an awful reputation.

In conclusion, if you are a fan of Junji, do not mind this anime. If you are not a horror fan, do not bother watching. However if you happen to be a horror fan who miraculously never heard of Junji, then this might be a decent introduction to his works.

Short Review (Spoiler-free):

Before the final episode, I wanted to give the show a 4 or 5/10. However, after watching the ending while laughing at the painful absurdity of it all, I decided to give it the honor of 1/10, which is a score reserved for only very special shows (I only gave one 1/10 before, to Godzilla Planet Eater). Platinum End? More like Diamond Turd or Golden Butthurt!

Imagine a 12-yr-old watched or read Death Note and Mirai Nikki (Future Diary), and then wrote a philosophy/theology paper based on these two shows without any proper education or references in philosophy studies. That's what Platinum End ... feels like to me in its substance. What was not obviously problematic in Death Note is glaringly stupid and detestable here.

Is this show entertaining? Only mildly, which is unfortunate. A few twists and battle sequences still slightly resemble Death Note in terms of thrills and suspense, but I rarely went through an episode without cringing and rolling my eyes multiple times. Every good vibe or touching moment (which are rare to begin with) is immediately followed by something so hammy or awful that you will gasp in disbelief (or laugh at how absurdly stupid it is). Its ending is the cherry on the top, which is basically the authors saying "Fudge it, fudge you, fudge humanity, fudge life itself".

Baseline quality: 1/10. I went in with expectations of about 5-6/10, but was amazed and dazzled by this pinnacle of human art. I will take Ex-Arm over this series any day.

Recommended to: No one except those who want to lower their mean score on MAL by watching really awful anime. That's what I did but honestly it's still not worth it. (You know what, give it 20 years and maybe people will refer to this one as "anime Ed Wood".)

Pros and Cons: (minor spoilers)

+ Solid production value for the first half of the series (which unfortunately crumbles in the 2nd half).
+ Some intense and suspenseful sequences were done pretty well (but you have to go through tons of garbage to get there, and then have those winning moments ruined by the ending).
+ Visual designs for the angels are mostly solid and attractive.
+ Mukaido is a good character.

--- Total creative bankruptcy. This is one of the most obviously regurgitated/recycled plots ever seen in a mainstream anime (not to mention it was anchored by the iconic duo who brought us Death Note). The premise is exactly the same as Future Diary, and the ridiculous rules for using the angel powers are directly recycled from Death Note. The end result? Pure malicious garbage. Even if I can forget Future Diary or another 12 shows with this basic premise, it's still mind-numbingly bad.

-- Pointless, vile and objectionable philosophy/message. Even in the most ignorantly charitable interpretation, one could only say that the show took 24 episodes to tell a messy and confusing story about treasuring life and happiness. What the anime/manga actually manage to drive home feels more like "go throw yourself off a cliff". Maybe the authors aimed for some type of existential tragedy or spicy social commentary (about how the modern social institutions are inherently unfair, absurd or something), but it's obvious that they were hilariously out of depth. Maybe the authors considered themselves smart by slapping a few slogans at the end saying something like "it's death that made life valuable, so please treasure your life". It's comparable to a movie in which all the slick characters glorified smoking by their actions, while adding an end-credit slogan in bold characters "Smoking is detrimental to your health". Oh yeah why don't I believe you?

-- Empty talks/tiresome debates about pacifism, just war (justifiable violence/killing), the meaning and value of life, happiness, existence...... In the latter half of the show entire episodes were dedicated to such expositions. Not to mention most of these talks revolve around the worst Shinji archetype MC. (Rest in peace Yuki from Future Diary, for Mirai in Platinum End has taken your place in eternal torment.)

-- Tonally all over the place. This could have been a cheesy sappy show about actual angels helping desperate people (like the first arc of Yuu Yuu Hakusho) and I could have liked it. But no, the authors said fudge it. Alright, how about something like Gantz or Inuyashiki where we can at least enjoy the hyperrealist battles and teenager angst? But no, the authors said "we have to make it deep, while making the combat super lame". The end product is like a radioactive writhing mutant with none of the organs where they should be.

-- The ending. It's really beyond any reasonable defense. One of the top reviews tried to argue that it's been "grossly misunderstood". If that's true, then this show was only begging to be misunderstood. A famous anime Youtuber argued that its ending, unlike Death Note's ending, is actually thoughtful and meaningful (with spicy social commentary about how the whole society failed those who want to harm themselves and so on). His point is echoed by some positive reviews here and some viewers in the comments section. In summary, I don't think any of these charitable interpretations work. It's simple, you can't give a convincing lecture about table manners to the ones at your table before flipping the table yourself. I will try to address some of these defenses in the "extra thoughts" section.



Extra thoughts: (more spoilers)

Many people expressed disbelief at how the legendary duo of Tsugumi Ohba and Takeshi Obata could deliver such an awful work. But if you really think about it, Death Note already gave us some alarming signs. Amoral/villainous MC with a stunted ideology (whom the audience spent the entire series identifying with); Conveniently adolescent metaphysical rules (Death Note's rules tailor-made for high-school students)...... While Death Note was able to cover these issues with arguably the most captivating cat-and-mouse game in a manga/anime, Platinum End focused on ontological concepts without any respect for any philosophical traditions or systems. Traditional monotheism in Abrahamic religions does not work like that. The mindsets of religious communities (even the cults and fringe ones) do not work like that (in Platinum End, god-believers dropped from 50% to 10% of world population after Dr. Yoneda Gaku's public speech. That is another clear evidence that the authors know very little about how organized religions work. Most world religions with billions of believers cannot be simply deconstructed by blatant scientism, technological advancement or whatever a Nobel-prize winning sociopath has to say.) Enlightenment-era atheism also does not work like that. If the authors really cared to deconstruct or criticize any of these ideologies, at least learn something about them beyond Twitter or 4Chan?

Seriously, even neo-atheism pushed by secularists like Dawkins does not work like what was presented in this anime. If the Youtube channel Wisecrack does an "Deep or Dumb" episode on this anime, it would be the perfect foil for their episode on "God's Not Dead", also it would have to be called "Platinum End: Dumb or Dumber". If Angry Video Game Nerd makes an episode about this anime, the final verdict would be "eternal diarrhea...in space".

As to why the charitable interpretations for the ending do not work (at least in my opinion), let me first ask those who consider Platinum End a smart, subversive advocacy for self-harm care and de-stigmatization, would you really show this anime to your family or friend who struggle with self-harm issues? If the answer is no, then I think you essentially agree with me that even in the most charitable interpretation, Platinum is a confusing mess full of cynicism. (If by some miraculous chance, a person with self-harm tendencies watched this anime and gets better, I would be glad for them, but I don't think even that validifies it as a repeatable practice for others). If the point of the anime is "pacifists like Mirai should be more caring and assertive lest humanity really dies in the hands of nihilists like Shuuji", then why negate it with that twist ending where everything dies anyway (not to mention how Mirai is actually portrayed by the authors). If the authors were genuinely attempting to satirize one or all of popular real-world ideologies in our problematic modern world, perhaps they have forgotten that their ideology/philosophy as presented in Platinum End is only a shallower Frankenstein synthesis of those real-world ideologies. Again, when a writer builds a world with fundamentally cynical or nihilistic impulses by which they kill everything in the ending, this only reveals more about the writer's morbidity/ill-informed philosophy rather than whatever they tried to criticize.

Another possible scenario behind this manga/anime is Ohba and Obata being offended by Future Diary (which was, ironically, inspired by Death Note in its approach to deadly mind games), and decided to write something different with its basic premise and subvert its wishy-washy ending. But again, you don't get to teach table manners if you flip the table in the rudest, most over-the-top manner. Not to mention that the basic cosmology and premise of Future Diary are already the worst part of that show.

I am not saying the show has absolute no valid commentaries or insights. Yes, the collective indifference to the suffering in our real world is disturbing. Yes, our current society is prone to encourage and produce dispirited people full of existential dread (Shuuji and Dr. Gaku, for example). Yes, our online culture haphazardly abuses the word "god" (think how anime fans use "god-tier" "god-like" "god-awful" without an ounce of reflection or respect), as Shuuji in this anime frustratingly pointed out. Platinum End's problem is that it's choke full of self-contradictions in its own narrative that none of these valid commentaries are substantiated in a coherent or consistent way. The ending, while slightly reminds me of Devilman Crybaby, is unearned. It took away any weight or persuasiveness from any valid commentaries. Perhaps the anime, on a meta level, took in its totality, is an allegory to our confusing time in the 2020s. But it's not because it's written brilliantly.

Still, if anyone considers Platinum End their favorite anime, there's no shame coming from me. One person's garbage can be another's treasure. In any case, take my review with a whole pack of salt.

Short Review (Spoiler-free):

One word for this season and SAC_2045 as a whole: Wow.

I know, I know, there are so many valid criticisms one could level at SAC_2045 (2045 for short from here on). It still looks like bad PS4 game graphics (occasionally with ray tracing or other next-gen features turned on). Characters still look like polished plastic dolls, and Mokoto Kusanagi still looks like a super legal loli or something. With the first season taking hours to get to the important story and compelling mystery, my expectation for Season 2 was a 7 or 8 out of 10 at best. But wow, how wrong ... I was. Alas, we do not live in a perfect world where the best anime screenplays always get the best animation team. By that, I mean the story of 2045 completely blew my expectations out of water, and it deserves much better budget for the creators to realize their vision. In my anime philosophy, I stated that image quality/visual fidelity of an anime is not high on my priorities, and as long as the animation/visuals adequately convey the intended story in a consistent way, I would be fine with it. With that said, 2045 is about 85% there, with most important sequences rendered properly and sometimes even beautifully. Yes there are a few poorly rendered sequences where the 3DCG quality drops to PS3 standard but they don't totally ruin the show for me (unlike Togusa's over-the-top Bruce-Lee impressions in Season 1 which was painfully scorched into my brain), but most of the time I was pretty immersed into the story.

The story could have been a retread to all the familiar waters with the GITS franchise, and I would still have given the show a 7.5-8/10. They could have just pulled another Mokoto badassery final battle, with another Tachikoma heroic sacrifice which saves the day, or another 26-episode season riddled with philosophy and political exposition like the amazing SAC 2nd Gig. There are certainly familiar waters they treaded with this season, yes, but the final resolution and outcome are on another level. Had this season been in the hands of Wit Studio or Madhouse, it could have totally been a modern classic.

Baseline quality: 9/10 for me. Look past the awkward character models and you will find one of the best sci-fi stories in anime.

Recommended to: Viewers who prioritize story, thematic coherence and philosophy over visuals in anime. Fans of Philip K. Dick, fans of Deus Ex. GITS fans who loved analyzing sci-fi stuff.

Pros and Cons: (minor spoilers)

++ The writers took the risk to break the mold with the classic GITS story formula, and for me they hit the mark. I have never been a fan of transhumanism as a viable concept in reality, and have been critically appreciating the GITS franchise for more than a decade now. However, 2045 Season 2 was able to enlighten me in a different way and open my mind (a little more than before). One of the criticisms I had with Season 1 was how underwhelming the concept of "posthuman" gradually became towards the end of Season 1, as the more we got to know about them, the less original and horrifying they felt (in comparison to the first posthuman they encountered). Season 2 mostly overcame that issue and elevated the whole concept with its ending.
++ Great action sequences balanced with mystery and quite character moments. One of the common criticisms for Season 1 was how the initial episodes felt like an MCU movie rather than GITS. I am glad to say that Season 2 has both brain and brawls ready from EP1.
++ Consistently thoughtful and chewy. GITS as a franchise has been famous for the mind-bending, humanity-warping consequences and implications of technology (seeing the advancement of neural-computer interface in 2022, not too far from us). 2045 is no different, and in my opinion the most worthy sequel to the original movie and SAC series since 2004 in this regard.
++ Thrilling camera work and amazing editing. Say whatever you want with the 3D graphics, but one thing I cannot fault the direction of the show is camera work/editing which held the presentation together. Some sequences towards the end are as white-knuckled as the franchise has ever been.

- Character models and facial animations left a lot to be desired. Funny thing is there is something resembling a "cyborg zombie" in the show, as if lots of facial animations of human characters do not already remind people of zombies.
- There are no reasons (save for the limited budget) for certain sequences to be so cel-shaded or loaded with simplistic background geometry/textures, and those sequences can leave a bad aftertaste (Togusa's memory/dream sequence, for example). Again, like I said, for me it's not as bad as everyone said since 2045 Season 1.


Extra thoughts (heavy spoilers):

I have seen quite a few works in different media that tried to present transhumanism/technological singularity in a charitable light. Deus Ex 2 (if anyone still remembers the JC Denton human empowerment ending) and the movie Chappie are some of the examples. As fascinating as their depictions of this concept were, I never went like "yeah, that could totally happen" or "maybe it's not such a bad thing after all" until 2045 Season 2.