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The Spring 2019 Anime Preview Guide


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Rika Hue



Joined: 19 Dec 2015
Posts: 147
PostPosted: Sat Apr 13, 2019 8:53 am Reply with quote
MarshalBanana wrote:
I haven't seen Bungo Stray Dogs: Dead Apple, is it worth watching?


I'd say it is, and it's not necessary to have seen it first before watching season 3.

Dead Apple was entertaining enough and the action scenes were good. It also depends on what characters you like, as the appearance and importance of a BSD character seems to corrolate to their popularity with fans? Don't ask me how, but maybe that's the power of a mega company like Kadokawa.

Which brings me to BSD season 3. Unlike dear Merida who earlier in the thread posted how the less Atsushi there is the better, I find it difficult to stand Dazai. '15 years old'? I don't care. So I'm in no rush to watch season 3 at the moment. I'll be back when this arc is over.

Other shows I've watched are Fruits Basket, Isekai Quartret, OPM S2, Kimetsu no Yaiba, and Sarazanmai. I started but couldn't finish Afterlost. I'm going to wait for a few weeks of daily streaming reviews to see if there will be anything else worth watching.
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John Thacker



Joined: 28 Oct 2013
Posts: 1006
PostPosted: Sat Apr 13, 2019 11:31 am Reply with quote
BodaciousSpacePirate wrote:
I agree, although as time goes on, I wonder whether YuriKuma Arashi's most lasting legacy will unfortunately end up being the demonization of the 20th century works of queer Japanese women who were often unable to produce mainstream depictions of romantic relationships between teenage girls through the lens of anything but Class S works.

Based on the limited amount of Class S from the 1910s and 20s that I've read, some of the earliest and most influential pre-WW2 Class S works included pretty decent depictions of early 20th-century relationships between young adult women. Even the stuff anime fans most strongly associate with late-20th century Class S media (Maria Watches Over Us and Dear Brother, for example) seem to still be fairly well-regarded for their (admittedly problematic) depictions of young adult lesbian experiences.

I worry that Lesbian Bear Storm has caused a lot of anime critics (especially Western critics who haven't seen these earlier works) to paint the whole genre with the same brush, and to condemn it all as male gaze-y.


Especially considering that it's not like Yurikuma Arashi completely avoids having its cake and eating it too. It's certainly great to criticize the genre and conventions and, as Dragonsandphoenix said, portray lesbianism in a way that queer women actually find erotic (see also Justin Sevakis's similar comments about not finding BL in general erotic for him), but there's no doubt that the portrayal still is titillating to the heterosexual male eye as well. Ironic male gaze can still function as male gaze; in fact, anything you think is "ironic" is undoubtedly enjoyed on the level by many people, and even to some degree by yourself.

That's an unavoidable fact of demographics (the potential het male audience for yuri is always larger, same with het female audience for BL, so there's always strong incentives to make crossover appeal, especially when trying to finance something mainstream), and the impossibility of preventing people from fetishizing or sexualizing something. There's a long history of doing so with uniforms that were originally chosen specifically to be demure and not sexual; it's sort of a euphemism treadmill effect.

On another note, we can certainly see that some of the yuri/BL "excitement because it's taboo breaking" appeal gets pushed onto other types of forbidden or discouraged relationships, whether age differences, differences in power, teacher-student relationships, or various degrees of blood relation/incest/in-law/step relationships. I don't share the apparent intense moral disgust of a number of the reviewers for all of those relationships-- I know people who precisely did the "(young, recently graduated and hired) teacher, we'll wait until I graduate to start dating," and they've been happily married for decades. Many sixteen and seventeen year olds are perfectly capable of consent, and I don't think that a "times were different then, I'm going to fully adopt the new eras moral standards and be outraged by it" stance makes sense for me. (Honestly, I view the recent efforts to raise the marriageable age everywhere without exceptions to be based on the same logic as the popular idea that all sex workers are being trafficked.)

Then again, my maternal grandparents were happily married for over 60 years even though they married when she was 17 and he 28 (and her sister lied to the justice of the peace about her age so she didn't have to get her parents' permission.) Yet, despite not sharing the moral disgust for the situation in general, I certainly get how a show where that is the immediate hook is probably not going to be great because of how they're likely to explore the situation or use it as a fetish. I don't go so far as to say that I'm opposed to people having shows that appeal to their fetishes, it just can limit how good something is as art. On the other hand, e.g., Marmalade Boy was fine, even though I have an ex-girlfriend who was the product of one of the second marriages in an exact Marmalade Boy type situation (except she also had half-brothers from one of the pre-swap first marriages.)
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Super_M



Joined: 08 May 2018
Posts: 201
PostPosted: Sat Apr 13, 2019 3:36 pm Reply with quote
BodaciousSpacePirate wrote:

I worry that Lesbian Bear Storm has caused a lot of anime critics (especially Western critics who haven't seen these earlier works) to paint the whole genre with the same brush, and to condemn it all as male gaze-y.


Well anime are made mainly for japanese audience so probably western critics have little importance for them. Plus even if more and more revenue come from outside Japan, secund biggest market for anime is China who ban gay content.

John Thacker wrote:

That's an unavoidable fact of demographics (the potential het male audience for yuri is always larger, same with het female audience for BL, so there's always strong incentives to make crossover appeal, especially when trying to finance something mainstream), and the impossibility of preventing people from fetishizing or sexualizing something. There's a long history of doing so with uniforms that were originally chosen specifically to be demure and not sexual; it's sort of a euphemism treadmill effect.


Media and Internet can create queer audience as big group but in reality are small group. Even in America who create gay character more for representation than Japan know that are small audience. I mean Love Simon and Batwoman have gay protagonist and producer know main audience. Women are main costumers rom-coms on west and accept more gay male character than gay female character. Men are main costumers superheroes/action shows and accept more lesbian character than gay male character. YA books (Six of crows) have more prominet gay men characters becouse main costumers are women. Superhero comics and video games (The Last of Us: Part II) have more prominent lesbian characters becouse main costumers are men.

Sorry for my bad english.
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Terrible90sDub



Joined: 14 Jul 2017
Posts: 168
PostPosted: Sat Apr 13, 2019 4:08 pm Reply with quote
Super_M wrote:


Well anime are made mainly for japanese audience so probably western critics have little importance for them. Plus even if more and more revenue come from outside Japan, secund biggest market for anime is China who ban gay content.


Oh, regardless of what the Chinese government may want, you'd be surprised if you ever look into Chinese fandom and see how large the fujo base is.

I suspect it's also why so many Chinese co-productions have BL elements. (These never take off in the west, but the Spiritpact one is probably the recognizable example of that. Then there are ones like... whatever the randomness in A Centaur's Life was)

You could argue that fujos aren't always (but sometimes can be) queer people, but there's definitely a demand for non-straight content there.
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DangerMouse



Joined: 25 Mar 2009
Posts: 3980
PostPosted: Sat Apr 13, 2019 9:38 pm Reply with quote
Chrono1000 wrote:
The Helpful Fox Senko-san (4.5 out of 5) - This is the most adorable show of the season. Senko is cute, kind, and clever as a fox. The basic outline is similar to Dragon Maid but with fox girls and even the local convenience store was called VolpeMart. The episode has comedy to it but it is mostly a soothing anime and a good portion of the show is a nice motivational speech. In that sense the show is a great value since you can spend a $100 going to a motivational speech and and none of those speakers will be half as cute as Senko.

Yeah. I'm really glad this got picked up for a simuldub.

Rika Hue wrote:
MarshalBanana wrote:
I haven't seen Bungo Stray Dogs: Dead Apple, is it worth watching?


I'd say it is, and it's not necessary to have seen it first before watching season 3.

Dead Apple was entertaining enough and the action scenes were good. It also depends on what characters you like, as the appearance and importance of a BSD character seems to corrolate to their popularity with fans? Don't ask me how, but maybe that's the power of a mega company like Kadokawa.

Cool. Been really looking forward to seeing the movie, so hopefully the blu-ray will get announced soon, feels like it's been a long wait.

Sounds like I can still start watching season 3 which I've also been excited for since it's starting in the past.
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Blanchimont



Joined: 25 Feb 2012
Posts: 3426
Location: Finland
PostPosted: Sun Apr 14, 2019 8:45 am Reply with quote
James Beckett wrote:
Kicho was a real woman, only here she's fourteen, and the heavens sent her to our Nobunaga because of some kind of clerical error or something, so here she is, offering her body to our bewildered protagonist.

Eh, not to nitpick, but Kicho was born around 1533-35 and married Nobunaga in 1549. Agewise it does match...
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meruru



Joined: 16 Jun 2009
Posts: 470
PostPosted: Sun Apr 14, 2019 11:02 am Reply with quote
I finally got around to watching Fruits Basket, as someone who's read the manga and watched the original show. The original show played up the comedic aspects quite a bit. I was surprised to see the new show matches much of the first shot for shot. Multiple times it was clearly copying the original anime rather than the source manga. For example, the shot of showing the characters as mostly black silhouettes, and Yuki shoves a girl away, and does a strange tippy toe walk away is EXACTLY the same as the first anime. The manga does have that scene, but the anime changed the way it was shown to make it even more visually humorous. Other visual gags were shot for shot copied as well. This both makes me happy, because I honestly preferred the original anime over the manga for its comedy, and concerned because it makes it likely that once this anime starts really diverging, it's quality will drop for no longer being able to copy the original anime for its gags. The original had a very superior sense of comedic timing and hitting all the right beats that it already seems obvious, the makers of this one cannot reach.
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kotomikun



Joined: 06 May 2013
Posts: 1205
PostPosted: Mon Apr 15, 2019 5:56 pm Reply with quote
Blanchimont wrote:
Eh, not to nitpick, but Kicho was born around 1533-35 and married Nobunaga in 1549. Agewise it does match...


Which, apparently, is their excuse for making a (presumably ecchi) romantic comedy starring a 14-year-old and a 28-year-old. At least they're being honest about their desire to roll back marriage maturity standards by 500 years. (Going by those dates, they went with the youngest possible age, so that's also pretty telling.)
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mangamuscle



Joined: 23 Apr 2006
Posts: 2658
Location: Mexico
PostPosted: Tue Apr 16, 2019 12:18 am Reply with quote
kotomikun wrote:
Blanchimont wrote:
Eh, not to nitpick, but Kicho was born around 1533-35 and married Nobunaga in 1549. Agewise it does match...


....At least they're being honest about their desire to roll back marriage maturity standards by 500 years.


I think 500 years is a gross exaggeration, from what I can find this page is very telling.

last paragraph

So 14 isn't even the lowest age and this kind of practices declined just 150 years ago. If anyone wants to read the whole book, here is the link
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residentgrigo



Joined: 23 Dec 2007
Posts: 2404
Location: Germany
PostPosted: Tue Apr 16, 2019 8:55 am Reply with quote
The still unreleased and repackaged Gundam The Origin (8,5/10) is a known quantity. 7 Seeds is even further of and Netflix at least managed to mostly impress with the already reviewed Ultraman (8/10).
A rare example of a good CG TV anime and it may end up as the best of their 3 new “originals”.
The overall anime seasons is a success yet someone needs to cart off Kunihiko Ikuhara to Arkham Asykum. The 2nd half of the pilot to his all-boy kappa-anal-adventure (I ain´t even kidding) nearly shut my brain off despite being at least better than his sleep-inducing lesbian-alien-bears show. No more for me, thanks.

Carole & Tuesday Mr. Bebop is “only” the chief direct which worked out great on Space Dandy yet I already have a deja-vu. This pilot is better than that one but not by much. The show should have started with the bridge meeting with Tuesday´s ridiculous origin being coved in a short montage during that song. I am a bit worried for her due to the extremely bland characterization. Carole already works on the other hand. The animation budget doesn’t seem that high and I don´t get why the vocalists aren’t the VA´s but their first song was at least good enough. The show could easily pick up soon, even if the 24 ep. run-time seems overlong but I wouldn’t be surprised if this ended up being a 2nd Michiko & Hatchin. Meaning that the art direction, the diversity (at least by anime standards) and setting could carry the anime even if the scripts don´t. We´ll see but Watanabe earned my time. 7/10

One Punch Man No one would have complained about J.C.Staff´s perfectly fine animation if S01 also looked like this but it doesn´t. The real problem is the direction as there is little flow or logic to the movement. I would even say that the manga is more kinetic -much more that is- and the anime´s facial expressions are lifeless, despite the fact that the story will remain in slice-of-life mode for quite some time. Ho boi. The season’s story will be a noticeable improvement on the last one, so one step forward and one back. It´s a shame that the Madhouse team didn’t have time to return, as we got this side-grade and their outright embarrassing Boogiepop adaptation for the price of one. The future success or failure of this mess will be fascinating to watch. 6?/10

Shingeki no Kyojin S3.2 comes out on April 29 but this is mostly a panel by panel adaptation so I already know what I will think of ep.50. 8,5/10

JoJo Vento Aureo and Dororo are ongoing for me. (The new Dororo manga is alright btw.)
So are DuckTales, The Simpsons and Teen Titans Go.

Penguin Highway is about to get its international home release and I highly recommend the film, as it was the beast anime film of 2018. It´s kind of Contact (1997) the anime, just with different 3rd act problems. Justice League vs. The Fatal Five was a fun return to the JLU canon and will hopefully lead to more. Batman is also about to meet the Ninja Turtles in animation. How come the Turtles haven´t gotten an anime since the early 90s? The Afro Samurai/Batman Nina team(s) should get on that!
Till next season, which looks downright abysmal.
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AJ (LordNikon)



Joined: 14 Apr 2009
Posts: 502
Location: Kyoto
PostPosted: Sun Apr 21, 2019 7:46 am Reply with quote
Quote:
Jin who moves from Tokyo to Nagoya, which is located in Aichi Prefecture; it's a part of Japan that has a some unique customs and a dialect that many Japanese people apparently find to be humorously odd.


To be fair. To anyone who lives in Tokyo, the same is true for ANYWHERE in Japan. Tokyoites make the same claim and same exact statements to anyone living in Osaka, Okayama, Kumamoto, Sapporo, Hiroshima, OR anywhere that is not Tokyo.
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KitKat1721



Joined: 03 Feb 2015
Posts: 952
PostPosted: Thu Apr 25, 2019 5:52 pm Reply with quote
I kind of wish ANN stayed a bit more on top of simuldub premiere dates/reviews, because I feel like they get lost in the shuffle (understandably so, given all the different premiere dates). Mix was a same-day dub weeks back when it premiered. And while I didn't watch it, the Isekai Quartet dub was fairly noteworthy just for getting all the returning casts from different studios.
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NELOTTO



Joined: 25 May 2019
Posts: 1
PostPosted: Sat May 25, 2019 6:11 am Reply with quote
I don't think it empowers that the style to change makes it look so characterless, and this early part at any rate is as immediate as it might be. I'm contemplating whether this creation may wrap up making what its known for look dated, despite when it gets that far.
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Alan45
Village Elder



Joined: 25 Aug 2010
Posts: 9808
Location: Virginia
PostPosted: Sat May 25, 2019 6:53 am Reply with quote
@NELOTTO

What show are you attempting to discuss?
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gridsleep





PostPosted: Sat May 25, 2019 1:58 pm Reply with quote
Who is the girl in the armored suit with the white binoculars?
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