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The Spring 2016 Anime Preview Guide


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JacobC
ANN Contributor


Joined: 15 Jan 2008
Posts: 3728
Location: SoCal
PostPosted: Fri Apr 01, 2016 3:35 pm Reply with quote
v1cious wrote:
Too bad you guys aren't doing shorts. Luluco Space Patrol is great.


We are actually writing up shorts this time! It'll be at the very end of a preview guide, a little "what I liked from the shorts slate" from our staff. A couple years ago, shorts kinda started being neglected in the preview guide for good reason, but now they can be some of the most interesting and artistically bizarre stuff of the season, so we just had to figure out a good format for including them this time that wasn't "write up each one." Very Happy
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zrnzle500



Joined: 04 Oct 2014
Posts: 3767
PostPosted: Fri Apr 01, 2016 3:57 pm Reply with quote
Nice to see shorts will be covered this season. Not sure what the reviewers reaction to Luluco will be. Glad to see other people watched it. It is so very Imaishi. I enjoyed it and it's only 8 minutes so you don't lose much time either way. I loved the scene where her space patrol suit activates.

Ushio and Tora makes a nice return after taking a cours break. Ushio and Tora's dynamic is great as ever. I'll be happy when spoiler[everyone remembers Ushio again. That is quite aggravating though I don't hold it against the show.] Just waiting for the reviewers to get to it, if they haven't already by the time I post this.

I was smiling from the time Jojo started. Probably the show I was most excited for, and I'm not disappointed. Was anyone else waiting for Jotaro's Yare Yare? I just love Ono's performance as Jotaro, and it's almost hard to believe he voiced Jyushimatsu. Speaking of Hustle, Hustle! Muscle, Muscle! Which is what I will say to those who haven't watched the show or series. Also just a casual fan of Jojo? A bit of an understatement, don't you think?
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chito895



Joined: 22 Jan 2015
Posts: 512
Location: Lima, Peru
PostPosted: Fri Apr 01, 2016 3:59 pm Reply with quote
Oh great news, then. I really wanted a Shorts preview guide or something along those lines!

EDIT: Is there any news about Flying Witch? I was expecting Funimation to license it. They really are throwing all their money in My Hero Academia. Those shows, apart from the leftovers, aren't that exciting to me.
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CheezcakeMe





PostPosted: Fri Apr 01, 2016 4:38 pm Reply with quote
Yay anime season start, my 4 favourite times of the year!

Glad to see shorts are going to get some attention this time around, though I totally see why they were dropped in previous preview guides. They used to be either terrible or so heavy on wordpuns they were literally impossible to understand if you weren't fluent in Japanese, but they really upped their game last season.
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RestLessone



Joined: 02 Aug 2009
Posts: 1426
Location: New York
PostPosted: Fri Apr 01, 2016 5:20 pm Reply with quote
Jojo's return was great. That first minute or so especially; the atmosphere is all there. Fridays are gonna be awesome~

Ushio and Tora was about what I expected, essentially continuing with where it left off. No bombastic introductions or animation, but enjoyable nonetheless.

Count me as another happy that the shorts are being covered again! It's nice that they'll all be done together, too. Doing individual write-ups for them is a bit difficult when some are only about 3 minutes long.

Luluco was cute. Kagewani 2 was more of the last season. I got used to that somewhat blurry look it has, even if I don't particularly like the choice, so I'm happy to see a continuation. The titular monster remains my favorite, and I'm sure we'll see more of it.
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Ambimunch



Joined: 30 Aug 2012
Posts: 2012
PostPosted: Fri Apr 01, 2016 6:46 pm Reply with quote
We're back baby! JoJo is always fun, the show is so wild and unpredictable. I'm also liking the 'murder mystery' approach.
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Thatguy3331



Joined: 18 Feb 2012
Posts: 1790
PostPosted: Fri Apr 01, 2016 7:14 pm Reply with quote
Well I liked just about everything I saw so far and it was all loud, over the top, simplistic stuff, which sure while not mind challenging, feels like a breath of fresh air after a season where really the only show worth talking about was a slow, historic- drama piece (I love Rakugou but I do have to prepare myself for it)

Luluco: That was definitely an Imaishi product, which is to say, yes it is a HUGE matter of taste and it can sometimes be off putting, but if that doesn't bother you then you're likely to have a good time. And a good time I did have. I liked that this first episode was soley focused on Luluco and I was a bit worried from the posters that the titular character wouldn't have much in terms of character aside from "likes alien boy". I mean granted she's not a terribly complex character in anyway and my guess is that crush will eventually become a huge part of the character as well but I liked that fact that contrary to her design she didn't really like her living situation. It's something to attach to amiss all the usual Imaishi styled zaniness and it made the short a lot more likable on my end (it also helped that I found it funny as well so yeah)

Ushio and Tora: I'm alright with U&T but I never found it to be as much of the hot shit I see everyone else call it. In terms of basic battle magnga series I could think of a lot of others that I liked right off the bat that managed to stay consistent, and as the show progressed it didn't seem to do much to really attach myself too it other than having Tora and a few cool things that happened near the latter half of the show, of which I only got to because I'm stubborn.

Thankfully a lot of those cooler aspects were packed into this episode and while the pacing was so fast it felt as if I was reading the cliff notes version of a story, I wasn't bored and I'm interested in what's happening next since the stakes are raised pretty high. I mean yeah they're obviously gonna win the day in the end, but I like to go along for the ride and I'm willing to stay on for a bit longer.

Jojo Part 4: I'm glad to see I liked this as much as I thought I would and that I wasn't just being too positive for no reason after having mixed feelings on stardust crusaders (Still fun jojo but felt too long for it's own good at times) the characters, the color design and the 90s aesthetic, I loved it all.

If Bones doesn't let me down, MHA will be on my watch list for sure so it's nice to have a solid set of shows right out of the gate. I felt this way at the beginning of the winter season as well so I'll keep my guard up, but that was only because of what I felt of 2015 as a whole than the shows necessarily being all Top tier.
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daichi383



Joined: 16 Sep 2009
Posts: 313
Location: England
PostPosted: Fri Apr 01, 2016 7:26 pm Reply with quote
The situation with Terraformars seems interestingly similar to when Michio Fukuda was brought on to fix a show in its second season when he directed the second (and infinitely superior to the first) season of Nura: Rise of the Yokai Clan.

I remember a lot of fans of the Nura manga hating the first season because of a number of weird decisions made by that seasons director which ended up with the show focusing more on the uninteresting human cast than the Yokai people came to the show to see.

Fukuda's season on that show also ended up way better animated than the first and after seeing the first episode of Terraformars Revenge, that seems to be the case with this show too.

Mildly amusing to see Fukuda do this for a show a second time though i doubt even he can elevate material with as many problems as Terraformars.

Rolling Eyes
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walw6pK4Alo



Joined: 12 Mar 2008
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PostPosted: Fri Apr 01, 2016 8:23 pm Reply with quote
The Imaishi-ness of Luluco really makes enough of an impact in less than 6 minutes, which is all a show like this needs. On the topic of shorts, the best thing is even if they don't turn out fantastic, you've hardly wasted much time per week. I find the problem being so many good shows are the shorts, like the recent Galko-chan.
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Blankslate



Joined: 30 Jun 2015
Posts: 425
Location: Atlanta, GA
PostPosted: Fri Apr 01, 2016 9:24 pm Reply with quote
The Lost Village - 1.5/5
This show loves to throw a lot of "deep and meaningful" themes at the audience even though it's clear that this is going to devolve into Battle Royale. Besides the clumsily written script that feels like it's trying to impress its professor, all of the characters are overblown caricatures with little rhyme or reason to their actions. I'm dropping this one.
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RestLessone



Joined: 02 Aug 2009
Posts: 1426
Location: New York
PostPosted: Fri Apr 01, 2016 9:36 pm Reply with quote
I can't quite grasp the tone that The Lost Village is going for. On one hand, it definitely seems like it wants to be a mysterious thriller about people who want to redo their lives. It tries to add a creepy factor, whether it be the weather or the music or the isolation.

However, the characters clash with any seriousness. About half the cast (and oh god why is this cast so huge, are they just gonna kill them in a couple eps?) is so quirky or exaggerated. The dialogue is similar. I'm going to keep with it, but I have a feeling it's gonna slide into grating dumbness pretty soon. Aspects of it were already there.


Last edited by RestLessone on Fri Apr 01, 2016 10:17 pm; edited 1 time in total
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Kadmos1



Joined: 08 May 2014
Posts: 13541
Location: In Phoenix but has an 85308 ZIP
PostPosted: Fri Apr 01, 2016 9:40 pm Reply with quote
I will be watching 3 broadcast dubs this season: Academia, Endride, and Netoge. However, only Endride will I also watch the subbed version. This is because I will be a watching 10 subbed spring shows in addition to the current broadcast dub shows I am still watching.
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Muffum



Joined: 09 Mar 2016
Posts: 100
PostPosted: Fri Apr 01, 2016 11:13 pm Reply with quote
Well, just comparing the first days, spring is better than winter by miles. Not that that means much, since in this case that just means it has anything worth watching, but I can hope it's an indicator of things to come.

Jojo: Part 4's one of my favorites, so I went into this with heightened expectations. It didn't blow my socks off like I'd hoped it would, but the artistry's great, the characters are fun, and there's a lot of plot threads being set up. This early in the game, I'm not sure I can ask for much else. 4.5/5

Luluco: Honestly this hardly felt like 8 minutes; it felt like I blinked and missed a ton of it. That makes me kind of sad, since it meant I was getting really into the insanity of the series and wanted it to keep going. Not every joke really hit its mark, but I think that's just something I should expect with Imaishi. 3.5/5

Terraformars: This episode felt like filler, which is a weird thing for a first episode to feel like. IIRC, the battle this episode was about was concluded at the end of last season, so this seems more like an excuse to establish how this'll be different from the first season. It didn't do a terribly good job of that, since the animation doesn't look great, and despite the greater presence of humor, none of it's that funny. Yaeko's cute, though. 2/5

The Lost Village: The series being promoted as having an enormous main cast made me worry, and apparently those worries were entirely founded. I found myself laughing at the absurdity of it all more than I was in any way engaged, and despite the episode being almost entirely introductions, I still don't feel like I know anything about most of the characters. Judging it as a comedy, 3/5. If I'm supposed to take any part of it seriously, 1.5/5.
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chito895



Joined: 22 Jan 2015
Posts: 512
Location: Lima, Peru
PostPosted: Fri Apr 01, 2016 11:51 pm Reply with quote
Luluco (3.5): it's like Kill la Kill had a little sister! I had a lot of fun with its first episode. It's a short, so I guesa there won't be much of a story, but if the following episodes keep being as crazy as this first episode, then it'll be my short of the season!

Mayoiga (2.5): this was a heavy info dumping episode, giving names of people I won't remember and that most likely will be dead or something shortly. Anyway, it's difficult to judge this one based on all that info, but I guess following episodes will actually be better than this one. MC-kun is kind of bland (his crazy dream scene was nice, though), vomit-chan may end up annoying (and dead) if she keeps acring like that, and Lion, well, she looks like the cool girl of the group. And yeah, as Zac said, Mayoiga seems to want to be the most thriller of the season. Hopefully next episode will be more entertaining.
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Arale Kurashiki



Joined: 24 Aug 2015
Posts: 744
PostPosted: Sat Apr 02, 2016 12:08 am Reply with quote
The Lost Village... from what I'm hearing, it sounds like it's going to be an interesting incident even if it's not a good show. So maybe I should try it.
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