As much as Sankarea has stymied my attempts to understand it at every turn, it can be no surprise that it ended in a stubbornly mysterious manner. Sankarea is definitely a series that proved the old “don’t judge a book by its cover” adage (and MGX is certainly another). With […] Read more
Any anime fan should fervently hope that Watanabe Shinichiro doesn’t wait nearly so long to direct his next TV anime. As a viewer, my relationship with Sakamichi no Apollon has been a lot more complicated than it has with its NoitaminA stable-mate, Tsuritama. I think Sakamichi’s highs have been the […] Read more
Whatever else you might think of the final episode – or of the eleven that preceded it – I think it’s hard to argue that Watanabe-sensei isn’t a directorial genius of the first order. It wouldn’t be unfair to say I went into this final episode with a good deal of trepidation. […] Read more
If you distilled pure happiness into 22 weekly minutes of sight and sound, you’d have something a lot like Tsuritama. There was an interesting moment during a Twitter Q & A today where someone asked the Tsuritama staff if they had any belief that the show would be commercially successful. […] Read more
What’s the worst thing about falling in love with an anime like Tsuritama? It ends. Leave it to the show that got pretty much everything right to triumph over the top boss that menaces every anime with aspirations – the ending. Needless to say, endings are really, really, hard – […] Read more
This week Shirokuma Café proved beyond any doubt that it can do a serious episode very well. My question is: will the fans consider that a good thing? There’s just something about Tanabata that makes the Japanese go all doe-eyed and sentimental, if the festival’s many depictions in anime are […] Read more
A funny thing happened on the way to episode four of Kingdom… If you’ve been following my posts on this show, you know my biggest gripe has been with the excessive use of CGI in the scenes that one would normally not expect it. Well, there’s been a slow decrease […] Read more
As we end the first season of Jormungand – as we should, with Jonah and Koko squarely in focus – my thoughts are right where they were when I read the manga: there’s nothing else quite like this series. As is my usual practice I won’t do a “Series Review” […] Read more
“From up on Poppy Hill” One thing’s for sure – it can’t be easy being Miyazaki Gorou. Anyone who pays close attention to anime in its theatrical form has spent plenty of time listening to directors being called “The next Miyazaki”. Makoto Shinkai (cold) and Hosoda Mamoru (a little warmer) […] Read more
Anime’s fastest-moving adaptation in ages screams to a close with a finale straight out of the Alan Moore playbook. I’ll give you my usual Zetman disclaimer – I really have no idea how much of that ending is from the manga, and how much of it is anime original. Given […] Read more