Kami no Tou: Ouji no Kikan (Tower of God: Return of the Prince) – 03

Tower of God, always a conundrum. A weird series, both in and of itself and in its place in my personal memory bank. As much as I enjoy it at these early stages it’s never been an easy one from a blogging standpoint. I may toss it in with the Patron Pick ballot, but I have a week or so to consider that before I make a decision.

At this point the basic formula of this phase of the story is pretty familiar. Introduce a bunch of new characters whose names I won’t remember, drop some hints about FUG and the politics of the Tower, have some sort of mind game test for the regulars. I must say I’m finding Miseng quite annoying, much more so than I did in the manhwa – I think she’s one of those characters who’re better when you can’t hear them. But most of this batch are actually pretty likeable and fun. Buzzcut (Hon Akroptor) has some especially good moments this week.

The main battle here is really between Love and Bam, and Love is pretty much acting against orders. The rest of these poor saps are just chess pieces for Love, and annoyances for Viole. Even Yeon – a full-fledged badass and member of one of the ten elite families – seems to have no answers for Bam’s preponderance of Shinsu (or indifference to her charms). Overpowered MC is an obvious danger here, but if there’s anything SIU is good at, it’s introducing ever-more OP characters…

Atri: My Dear Moments – 02

I don’t dislike Atri: My Dear Moments – I can see a certain easy charm here. But I don’t think it fits me. I have a dire track record with VN adaptations generally, and the quite literally incessant cuteness pandering with the title character is exhausting. Atri is cute, but I don’t need to be reminded of that every second I’m watching. Also, she’s seriously incompetent in operational terms. I get the whole wabi-sabi argument, but this is taking it to a ridiculous extreme.

The premise, while pretty eponymously VN in nature, is interesting enough. Natsuki and Minamo are fine as characters, and there’s clearly some depth to their backstories that hasn’t been fleshed out yet. But I don’t see this as a formula that’s going to hold my attention, especially where the blogging side of things is concerned. I might watch another episode or two before I decide whether to stick around, but in terms of coverage I probably won’t follow-up unless the show takes me considerably by surprise.