Weekly Roundup Spring 2019 Week 3

We are at episode 3 of the spring 2019 roundup, and 11 shows remain in the arena. As we journey into the horrific nightmare hellscape that is seasonal anime, let us all take a moment to reflect and remember that at least we aren't covering "Why the Hell are You Here, Teacher?".

Seriously, don't watch this. It's trash.

RobiHachi

I swear, this is the stupidest dialogue I have ever seen and I love it.

Leading us off we have Tengen Toppa Hizakuriger. In episode 3, Robby and Hatchi's journey to Isekandar is interrupted yet again, as their ship is forced to land by the chief of Pluto's tourism bureau. He had been taken advantage of by a shady advertising agency who had tricked him into using failed mascot characters from Earth to promote Pluto's quest to once again be recognized as a planet, and was hoping to convince the heroes who save Martian tourism to help him as well. Robby is convinced thanks to the gigantic breasts of the chief's daughter, and they launch a campaign to make Pluto's heart shaped iceberg a romantic getaway. But when the representatives of the advertising agency unveil their latest effort to push the failed mascot on them. Robby and Hatchi have to drive them off with Hizakuriger, and then leave to continue to their journey soon afterward (forgetting to accept their consulting fee). Meanwhile, Yang learns on Mars that Robby plans to head to Isekandar and decides to head straight there to ambush him, and a mysterious group starts tracking Hatchi's location.

I liked this episode quite a bit, but it felt a bit stale since it was so similar to last week's episode. Though considering that Robby and Hatchi immediately pointed out that it was just the same as last week, I'm thinking that that feeling was intentional and part of the joke. Plus it helps that the actual jokes are still making me laugh every single time without fail. Hearing the Plutonians get all defensive when reminded that Pluto isn't a planet reminded me about the absolutely absurd negative reactions when it was reclassified in real life, and that's absolutely hysterical. The mech fight in the ending minutes was so anticlimactic that I actually snorted soda out of my nose. And of course, everything Yang and his henchmen do are comedic gold. Next week we're leaving Earth's solar system, and I cannot wait to see some truly alien creatures!

Sounds of Life

This is a show about traditional Japanese string instruments.

Next up is Hibike! Koto. In episode 3, thanks to Hozuki's manipulations, three of Kudo's former delinquent friends (Mittsu, Sane, and Kota) decide to join the koto club as "warm bodies" who don't need to play, so that the club has enough members to not be disbanded. Upon hearing this, however, the vice principal threatens to disband the club if the delinquents aren't actually able to play anything. Hozuki convinces him to give them a month to prepare a performance in front of the school, and picks an ambitious and difficult piece for the club to show off in front of the entire school and justify their existence. As Kudo and the newcomers struggle to learn the basics of playing the koto under her strict tutelage, she becomes frustrated and blames them for the whole situation. The next day, she apologizes to Takezo for chasing away their new members, but he surprises her by saying he has faith that they won't quit, and sure enough, Kudo gives the others homemade practice kotos so they can practice their parts away from the club room and "make her speechless."

I was kinda down on this show at first, but it's really starting to win me over. The three new boys  that just joined the club are the exact kind of lovable idiots that this group needed to fill out the club and add a bit of color to the group dynamic, even if they are a bit interchangeable at this point, and our main trio is already getting some much needed development as well. Hozuki has some hints at backstory, where her prodigious nature and serious demeanor left her alone and friendless as she shot ahead of her parents' koto school and was resented for it. Seeing that the boys were still willing to stick it out and play with her probably shook her to her core, and it may lead to her opening up in the future. Kudo continues to be the best character in the show, having plenty of softer moments underneath his hot-blooded nature and a hell of a flashback of him defending Sane and the others from a gang that jumped them. Takezo still is the weak link overall, even though he's been presented as the protagonist so far, but he showed a bit of backbone in last week's episode, so it's not like he's a one-dimensional wimp either. Hell, even the animation is getting a bit tighter than last week, and a few of the shots were pretty enough to make me think I was watching a show from a better studio than the relatively new Platinum Vision.

Fairy Gone

I love how they act like this is a new discovery when we've seen fairy possession since episode 1.

In episode 3 of I Cannot Believe this is Real, Dorothea receives word that the famed scholar Cain Distarol has managed to get his hands on a page of the Black Fairy Tome, and Free and Marlya  are sent to retrieve it. However, things are complicated when they find the mafia affiliated businesswoman Bitter Sweet cosying up to Cain to get the page for herself. As the three factions engage in verbal warfare, each trying to get information about the Tome, the page is stolen by a thief from a rival mafia family named Axel, and Bitter and Dorothea take off in pursuit, as Veronica and her colleague Damien look on. After deciding the job isn't worth his life, Axel throws the page on the ground between Free and Bitter and retreats. Bitter seems to take the upper hand, but Marlya intervenes. Frustrated, Bitter summons her Fairy and attacks Marlya, leaving her somehow stunned. Meanwhile, Axel is cornered by Wolfran's employer, Colonel Bevee Liscar.

Much like how last week's episode was an extended fight scene designed to be as ridiculously over the top as possible, this week we have an extended chase scene with the same level of bombastic nonsense throughout, and I loved every second of it! And even though nearly all of the runtime is devoted to mostly mindless action (very pretty and fun action, but mindless nonetheless), we get a few juicy worldbuilding details as well. Learning that there are at least two rival crime families in the fairy mafia is a very believable detail that adds more factions to the conflict (so far we have Dorothea, Veronica and Damien, Wolfran and Colonel Liscar, Bitter Sweet and the Gui Carlin family, and Axel and the Arcame family so far) and I have a weakness for stories with way too many different factions opposing each other. I blame A Song of Ice and Fire. There's also the revelation that Wolfran's wife and child were killed during the war and that Free's country lost the great war in the backstory, meaning that he is now working for the government that invaded his home and killed his comrades. Does this mean that Free and Wolfran's conflict is a more ideological one than we first thought? That would provide a nice contrast to Marlya and Ver's more personal conflict. Finally, we learned that the Black Fairy Tome is only a piece of a larger Fairy Tome, though that doesn't really mean much in the grand scheme of things. I have no idea what happened to Marlya at the end of the episode, but Free seems pretty worried, so I'm guessing nothing good, and I'm sure we find out next week. I'm sure it will be equally ridiculous and awesome.

Hitoribocchi no Marumaru Seikatsu

Up next is My Little Bocchi: Friendship is Magic. In episode 3, Bocchi wants to invite Honshou to walk home with her and Nako, but she struggles to approach her when Honshou is constantly talking to someone else. After a bit of prodding from Nako, though, she manages to get it done, and the three friends start a daily routing of walking home together. Bocchi decides to take the next step in her friendship and invite the others to her house, where she is so anxious to get everything right that she writes a script and panics every time something even slightly unexpected or inconvenient happens. Such as when Honshou has to cancel at the last minute for tennis practice or when Nako tries to surprise her by bringing snacks when she already had prepared snacks.  All the stress and excitement leads Bocchi to overwork herself and she ends up missing school the next day due to illness. Terrified of her friends forgetting about her, she bombards them with text messages, but she is pleasantly surprised to see them visit her school to drop off her homework and wish her well.

This is the best episode so far, with some gags that made me pause because I was laughing so hard I would miss the next line of dialogue. Bocchi's anxiety of ruining what she already has by saying or doing something to offend or bore her friends is so real that it occasionally physically hurts to watch, but that's also what makes it so easy to laugh along with. Like, I won't say that I ever wrote a script for when my friends visited, but I have had moments of panic when I thought they weren't having a good time and would end up tripping over myself to offer them snacks or a drink or something. It's also nice to see Nako and Honshou put an effort into getting to know each other just so that Bocchi doesn't have to worry about her friends not having a good time together. And speaking of Nako, what the hell is up with her teacher being afraid of her? She isn't intimidating, she's adorable! Not to mention that she treats the teacher with more respect than anyone else in the class. Do all blonde kids in Japan automatically get labelled as delinquents or something? Not that it doesn't lead to some funny moments, because it does, but I just don't get it.

Demon Slayer

Next up is Training Montage: The Animation. In episode 3, Nezuko has been unconscious for the entirety of Tanjiro's training, and though the doctor says there is nothing wrong with her, he cannot help but worry. But Sakonji gives him no time to fret over her, as every minute of every day is devoted to a harsh training regimen of sword drills, avoiding booby traps to train agility, and mastering special breathing techniques that are similar to but legally distinct from Hamon from JoJo's Bizarre Adventure. After a year passes, Sakonji tells Tanjiro that he has nothing left to teach him, and gives him one final test: to cut a boulder in half. No matter how hard Tanjiro tries, however, he cannot manage to even make a scratch. When it seems like he may give in to despair, though, he is attacked by a boy named Sabito. Sabito challenges him every day to measure his progress, and his adopted sister Mokomo gives him more advice about mastering the breathing techniques. Six more months pass, and when he finally defeats Sabito, the two children disappear and Tanjiro stares in awe, as the boulder has been split in half.

So, wait, were they ghosts? That's the only thing that makes sense to me.

This was a decent episode, but it kinda feels like the weakest episode of the bunch. Like, nothing was really wrong with it, and it was easily more engaging than some entire action series, but compared to the last two episodes, I am a bit disappointed. I get that it's just a training episode, but there didn't really seem to be the same amount of character development that a typical training arc would have. It feels like most of the runtime was just jogging in place, and it didn't come alive until Sabito and Mokomo showed up after the halfway point. I know that, objectively speaking, this episode was great, better than most of the episodes that aired this year so far, but Demon Slayer has already spoiled me, and I expect more from this show.

Fruits Basket

Insert Cotton Eyed Joe joke here.

We're at the halfway point, and so far we haven't had any bad episodes. Let's keep that good feeling going with Zodiac Furry. In episode 3, the cultural festival is approaching and the class plans to open a rice ball stand. When Kyo's outlandish suggestion for hosting a battle royale with rice balls as the prize is rejected by the class but Yuki's reasonable suggestion of mystery flavors is instantly approved, he gets jealous and storms out of the classroom. Later, Yuki uncomfortably shoots down a love confession and is called unapproachable, and then stumbles upon Kyo playing cards with Tohru and her friends, prompting feelings of jealousy of Kyo's more natural ability to interact with people when he tries to keep everyone at a distance. Tohru speaks with each of them individually in an attempt to get them to realize their own self worth with the hopes of mending their ongoing feud, though judging by Yuki's violent reaction to Kyo not enjoying her sample rice balls, she still has a long way to go. That same morning,a very shy girl knocks on their door, looking for Kyo...

This episode made me cry. The story itself isn't anything special, but the way it explores the themes of self worth and envy really resonated with me in a deep way. Tohru's analogy about people being like rice balls confused me at first, but as she explained it to Kyo it just made more and more sense. Basically, people have a hard time seeing what is unique about themselves because introspection is difficult and it's easier to look outward at other people and see what is admirable or unique about them. Thus, she posits, people only see themselves as the plain white rice without being able to see the filling that makes them delicious because they can't look inside themselves. It's a clumsy metaphor, but it fits her character perfectly and, as someone who frequently struggles with self-loathing to the point of having contemplated suicide, it's something that I needed to hear. Does that mean I'm overstating the episode's worth? Maybe, but the art direction, dialogue, and voice acting have been top notch since episode 1, so I don't think it's an exaggeration to label this as one of the best episodes of the season just because it happened to explore subject matter that resonates with me and I'm a crybaby. We also saw two new characters: the mystery girl at the end of the episode and the German girl who picked up the flyer for the cultural festival. I'd say it's fairly good odds that each of them are members of the Soma clan, and I'm gonna throw out a prediction that the German girl is the boar and the shy girl is the sheep. Like all my predictions, I have no real evidence to support this and I'm really just going with my gut, so come back next week to see how wrong I am.

Dororo

I swear, he's staring directly into my soul.

Next up we have episode 15 of How Good Narrative can Make up for Poor Animation. As Hyakkimaru tracks Sabame to learn more about his relationship with the demonic moth Maimai-onba, Dororo investigates the village to learn more about the ruined temple. As she wanders into a lone storehouse, the suspicious villagers lock her in a cellar with the demon's spawn "for the village". When the spawn corner her, the baby ghoul appears, ready to repay Dororo for her kindness, revealing itself to be the collective ghosts of the children from the orphanage, who were all innocents sacrificed to Maimai-onba. The ghosts destroy the spawn and lead Dororo to safety. Meanwhile, Hyakkimaru knocks Sabame to the side, declaring him to be the same as Daigo, and kills Maimai-onba. As the village burns and the villagers fight over the little food that remains, Sabame lies dead and Dororo wonders if they did the right thing. Hyakkimaru shrugs it off and unknowingly leaves her behind, and Dororo is kidnapped by Itachi, who is after her half of the map.

This was a solid episode that helped to further the themes of moral grey areas and the horrors of war. Hyakkimaru and Dororo's quest to kill the demons and restore his body may be sympathetic to the audience, but the villagers don't care. Why should they? Why sould they care about some stranger getting his body back when it means that their children have to starve? Dororo dumping the oil so that no more orphanages can be burned may sound like a good idea on paper, but when it leads to an entire village burning to the ground is it even worth it? I don't know what I can even analyze here. I mean, it is worth noting that the animation is at a significantly lower quality than previous episodes, but at the same time, the actual character art looks to be a bit sharper than usual, so I think this was a compromise that was made to save resources in a less action-heavy episode than usual. Generally speaking, the episode is not very special, and just felt kinda like the story was slightly too long for one episode but not quite long enough for two, but the implications of Hyakkimaru and Dororo abandoning their original goals and hunting for treasure instead are...interesting, to say the least.

Senryu Girl

Eiji is me.

Up next is Haiku Brilliant Park. In episode 3, after a game of charades between Eiji and Nanako leads to reminiscing about memories at the amusement park, the Literature Club decides to take a club outing to the amusement park. At the last minute, however, club president Amane backs out at the last minute with a sudden schedule conflict (she just wants to spy on their date with Koto), leaving the two lovebirds by themselves on a pseudo-date. Eiji doesn't really think anything of it, but Nanako reads the situation and takes advantage of his obliviousness to trick him into sharing a special couple's soda. But when the park closes she tries to trick him into spending more time with her, and fails because he has no ability to read social cues.

This is the cutest thing I have seen all season so far. And let's not forget that we have two other romance shows and Hitoribocchi, so that's saying something. The date reminded me a lot of the amusement park scene from Comic Girls, which, lest we forget, was so good that it inspired me to rewrite the entire show as a yuri romance, but with its own unique gags such as Nanako being more comfortable on thrill rides than Eiji and the park mascot being so afraid of Eiji that he licked his shoes. I loved this episode and this was the first great episode this series has had so far!

Cinderella Nine

She feels like she walked in from a completely different show.

Up next is episode 3 of Let's Bring the Happy Feelings to a Crushing Halt. With a club room and a budget, the baseball team's future is looking bright. And as the team continues its practice and recruitment efforts, things look even brighter as two new members --I can't keep anybody's name straight, there's the blonde cheerleader who dresses like a JoJo character and the pink-haired gambler girl-- join the team and a would be journalist for the school's apparently nonexistent newspaper decides to follow them and write a story about them. As the girls head to the batting cages for a training session, they bump into a girl named Shinonome, who had actually lost to Tsubasa in the final round of the national little league tournament. Tsubasa is overjoyed to see another baseball player at her school and offers her a place on the team, but Shinonome refuses, expressing disgust at the idea of "playing around with a bunch of rookies".

This episode is an interesting case study for the show as a whole. On paper, the plot is moving forward and an interesting character dynamic has been introduced between Tsubasa and Shinonome. These are all good things, and I'm happy that we're getting closer to the end of the "forming the team for the first time" story that I dislike in sports anime, but in practice? The only reason I didn't fall asleep while watching this is because I watched it during my lunch break at work and I didn't want to drop my phone. All of these characters are so bland! Suzuki has lost all of the personality she had last week and has been reduced to a cookie-cutter smart girl. Sure, Shinonome is interesting, being an elitist who looks down on a person who is better than her at baseball because she doesn't look at it in the same hyper competitive way she does (almost like a sports anime Vegeta, if you will), but Suzuki was interesting last week. Who's to say Shinonome won't lose all that makes her interesting when her story comes to an end? None of the characters make any sort of lasting impression on me, so why would she? The only reason this isn't being dropped yet is because we still have something worse this week.

We Never Learn

Can we all just agree that Rizu in her restaurant attire is really cute?

But before we get to that, let's have a nice happy review with This Title Lies, They Are Actually Learning. In episode 3, Nariyuki is given yet another ultimatum by his headmaster (for the 3rd episode in a row, by the way): if Fumino and Rizu fail to at least match the class average in the midterm exams, then he will be relieved of his tutoring duties and the scholarship will be revoked. After a special one on one study session at her family restaurant, Rizu, whose test if first, is shocked to see that all the material she covered only makes up half the exam. But spurred on by Nariyuki's faith in her and a little bit of luck, she manages to get an above-average grade. Fumino falls ill on the night before her test, and because of the school's idiotic policy of docking a student's grade by 20% if they take a makeup test, even when they have a legitimate excuse by illness, Nariyuki and Takemoto have to visit her and tend to her at her bedside, leading to many accidental pervert moments. All the teenage awkwardness pays off, though, as Fumino recovers in time for her exam and also gets an above-average score. Later, in support of her crush on Nariyuki, Takemoto's friends force her into a dress and basically trick her into having a pseudo-date with him. The date ends with Takemoto accepting the femininity she had been repressing thanks to her self-consciousness with her muscular body, and she feels more confident to pursue her crush on Nariyuki in the future.

Okay, I'll admit it. I was wrong about Takemoto. She fits into the theme of the other two love interests perfectly. The theme just turns out to be a bit broader than what I originally thought it was. Instead of being about pursuing your passion regardless of what other people may say about how suited you are to it, each of the girls are connected in a similar, but broader way. They are just trying to be themselves and overcome the learned bias that they are not suited to it and have no talent for it. Rizu wants to express herself and understand human connections, but she is just seen as a living computer. Fumino wants to break stuff down and analyze systems, but she is seen as a poet. And Takemoto wants to be seen as a traditionally feminine young woman who just happens to be athletic, and has practically been forced into being a fulltime tomboy because that's what people expect from her. Hearing her call herself a princess was simply wonderful because of this realization, and I loved it. As for the other two girls, while I still love Rizu more than anyone else, they're feeling a bit underdeveloped. Now that they're making progress academically, I hope that character development will soon follow. But I'm not nearly as worried about this anime as I am about some others this season, and I have faith that it'll build on the strong foundations we already have.

After Lost

Me after watching this episode.

Alright I already spoiled that this was gonna get dropped, so let's get this over with. In episode 3 of Why Are Idols Taking Over this Sci-Fi Franchise?, Takuya, Yuki, and Geek stray too close to Lost and end up traveling through a rift in space-time to a concert that was held by the idol group SPR5 three months before Lost. Takuya tries to keep Geek focused on the mission and tries to leave the rift, but the trio is trapped in a time loop as they watch the idols fracture and argue after one of them, named Yua, overhears her producer Seiji say that they are "fated to disappear". While Yua interprets this as a plan to disband the group, Takuya thinks that Seiji knew that Lost was going to happen ahead of time. And so, as Yuki and Geek help the girls make amends in time for the concert, Takuya tries and fails to learn more information about Seiji and Lost. The trio leaves the rift, only to learn that their actions in the past did not change the future, and that they were really trapped in a world created by a Tamashi born of Yua's regrets. Later, the spirit of Yuki's brother Soma attacks Takuya, planning to "rescue" his sister from him.

Studio Madhouse is a very prestigious anime studio with several classics under their belt, including but not limited to: Death Note, the Hunter x Hunter remake, Hellsing Ultimate, High School of the Dead, Black Lagoon, Trigun, Cardcaptor Sakura, A Place Further than the Universe, Monster, The Girl Who Leapt Through Time, Paprika, Paranoia Agent, Perfect Blue, Hajime no Ippo, and the first season of One Punch Man. They are rightly regarded as one of the best anime studios still in the business. Until now, I have never seen a Madhouse show that I didn't enjoy, and whenever I saw their logo, I knew that I could expect quality.

Until now, apparently. After Lost is a disaster that was only skating by with its over the top attitude, and this episode in particular is nothing less than a slow motion train wreck. I cannot remember the last time I saw running animation this pathetically incompetent, and for some reason the camera occasionally switches to a first person perspective that fails to make me feel tense or excited an d just reminds me of how bad the background art is as the camera awkwardly bobs up and down in the laziest attempt to simulate what running actually looks like. The sound design is complete trash as well. Seriously, in what universe does grabbing someone by the hand sound like being lightly slapped with a wet towel? Why are the footsteps so loud I actually struggle to hear the bad voice acting? Why is the supposedly world famous idol group's breakout song the most boring thing I have ever heard? Why are we three episodes in when every character and story beat is so BLAND? Takuya is just a meathead with no personality, Yuki is a mysterious girl whose neverending complaining  makes me want to bang my head against the wall, and Geek is such a creepy fanboy I want to kick him in the groin. This used to be fun to laugh at, but after an episode this terrible, I'm not laughing anymore. Consider this dropped.

And that wraps up the 3rd week of the roundup! What will happen with the 10 shows remaining? Will Robby and Hatchi get lost in an asteroid field and end up back on Earth? Will the koto club master their piece in time for the performance? Will Marlya survive being attacked by Bitter Sweet? Will Bocchi make another friend? Will Tanjiro be welcomed into the ranks of the Demon Slayers? Will Tohru meet more members of the Soma Clan? Will Hyakkimaru rescue Dororo? Will Eiji realize that he and Nanako are basically already dating? Will Nariyuki be given a break by the headmaster? Will the members of the baseball team actually grow as characters? Will Zoro and Brook manage to stop the execution of the Witching Hour Boy? Will the defenders of Winterfell defeat the army of the dead? Will you manage to see Avengers Endgame without being spoiled? Find out the answers to all, some, or none of these questions next time!