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Easily the most underrated Miyazaki film. Simultaneously a nostalgic adventure film and a meditation on the ways in which war creates wounds in some of us that can sometimes never truly heal. An absolute love letter to animation of both the east and the west and an utter delight to watch. Porco himself is pure Humphrey Bogart, brooding and full of a wry wit. Fio is a classic Miyazaki girl: strongheaded, noble, ambitious, and fiercely independent. And for the perfect cherry on top, Porco Rosso contains what may be Joe Hisaishi's best soundtrack to date; a beautiful combination of Gershwin-esque orchestral jazz and Old Hollywood ... film scores. Better than Howl's Moving Castle and even Princess Mononoke and I will gladly die on that hill.

Story/Characters: 9/10
Animation: 10/10
Music: 10/10

Overall enjoyment: 10/10, had a big dumb smile on my face for nearly the entire film.

Disclaimer: I was only able to read a little over half of this due to it being pretty obscure and the only English scanlation (that I know of) was incomplete.

This short anthology manga consists of various interactions between Kotone (FemC) and her various friends/teammates. It definitely falls into a lot of really basic shoujo tropes. The characterization is pretty poor in general, so fans of the original game's cast won't likely get much satisfaction from these short vignettes. Overall, it's only really worth reading if you're a diehard Persona fan (like myself) who's trying to check out as much of the auxiliary material as ... possible.

Okay, so this turned out to be so, so good. I read the first 4 or so volumes of the manga back when it first came out and I rapidly became enamored with the nocturnal world this story resides in.

Ko Yamori is your average underachieving insomniac that suddenly stumbles into the life of Nazuna Nanakusa, a vampire (and candidate for 2022 Best Girl) who apparently lives with a sense of slightly reckless abandon as she lives her life from night to night. Ko, world-weary and apathetic, finds in Nazuna the sense of adventure that is lacking in his everyday life. He becomes determined to ... become a vampire himself, which he can only do if he manages to fall in love with Nazuna. What follows is a cozy yet stimulating excursion into a world that is seeping with color and mood, a comfortable slip into the strange entanglements of the night.

I’ve seen some people complaining that this adaptation alters the mood of the manga too much with its frequent use of vibrant color and lighting. I understand how they feel; the manga did have a certain dark, almost noir-like moodiness to it that the anime has decided to forgo. However, the lively splashes of color used in the nighttime city environments create this lovely dreamlike vibe that really encapsulates the slightly off-kilter comedic tone the series maintains. The animation is stellar all around and perfectly incorporates the wackier funny moments into the overall atmosphere.

And then there’s the soundtrack: man! Creepy Nuts, the band behind the song that manga itself is named after, wrote the OP and ED themes, as well as a couple of other miscellaneous insert tracks, and THEY. ARE. BANGERS. Great soundtrack all around, really helps you feel even more immersed into the show’s overall atmosphere.

Ultimately, Call of the Night shows an unbelievable amount of potential and clearly has the makings of an endearing classic. I highly recommend it for any other fellow creatures of the night out there.

The original Pokemon anime is one of those series that is nearly impossible to view objectively if you grew up with it and the games. So much nostalgia is hopelessly intertwined with these childhood adventures. Overall it's a solid anime that anyone who is a fan of the game series should watch at some point, if only to understand the cultural impact of the franchise in the west as a whole. I can't say for sure how much a person who didn't play the games would enjoy this, however. All things considered, the Pokemon anime is a solid children's anime and a great snapshot of ... the nerd-culture zeitgeist of the late 90s.