For one day at least, it really is the most important meal. I love breakfast – namely, eating breakfast out. Especially at hotels, especially hotel buffets. I love hotel breakfasts even if I’m not staying at the hotel. They mean something a little different in Japan of course – Japanese […] Read more
Somehow, it seems only fitting for Punchline to end with an episode that leaves me totally exasperated. I’ll cut to the chase: I hated the way Uchikoshi ended this series. And that’s despite the fact that I smelled it coming for several episodes and wasn’t remotely surprised by it. But […] Read more
Forgive me for ever doubting you, Rumiko. Kyoukai no Rinne isn’t second-rate anything. Every season, it seems, there’s one series that blows the field out of the water when it comes to the gap between quality and attention. This season it’s Kyoukai no Rinne, almost universally ignored by the English-language […] Read more
It’s becoming quite the problem to blog this show, though it’s through no fault of its own. Let me preface this by saying that my affection for Ore Monogatari!! isn’t waning at all – I’m still enjoying the series very much. But as it’s becoming clear that this is mostly […] Read more
Trust is the theme here lately, make no mistake about it. There’s a thing in sports called a “trap game”, and for Inashiro, Ugumori was definitely a trap game. Maybe when you’re the defending national runner-up every game is a trap to a certain extent, but with a Seidou rematch […] Read more
My early take on Summer 2015? With apologies to Marty Feldman, “Could be worse.” Spring has turned out to be pretty good, though not the breakthrough season anime has been hungrily searching for since 2012. The top tier mostly held up their end, Kekkai Sensei comfortably exceeded expectations, and there […] Read more
Confirmed : this is turning into one of the strangest harems ever. Fate/stay night: Unlimited Blade Works – 24 I guess when a series delivers up a perfectly competent, attractively produced and well-paced conclusion (though not finale) that wraps up the major storylines in exactly the manner it’s built up […] Read more
Well… Seven is a more auspicious number than six, I suppose. This was a pretty important week on Arslan Senki, it seems, as several events of considerable importance took place even if the immediate plot wasn’t advanced all that much. On the latter point, we’re nearly at the end of […] Read more
Once more, Baby Steps puts on a sports anime clinic. Apart from the animation, of course… That episode seemed to last about eight minutes, in the way these kinds of episodes often do in sports series. And as is so often the case, the most powerful matches can be the […] Read more
Well – with the name “Macbeth”, what were you expecting out of life? The thing about Kekkai Sensen is that it’s like the weather in Chicago – if you don’t like it, just wait a little while and you’ll get something completely different. This is a series that’s danced to […] Read more