Weekly Seasonal Watches: Winter 2020 Anime Week 11

Not much to comment here at the moment. Just that usual “the shows are ending and we are wtching this shows sink or swim in their final moments” thing. This is where we see what the shows trully are. Will they fail? Will they stick the landing? Each one is getting closer to the ground and you can see them getting ready and bracing for what comes next. Woo.

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Chihayafuru Season 3 Episode 22

Read my thoughts from yesterday here.

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Blade of the Immortal Episode 22

This was one of the few episodes of Blade of the Immortal that completely confused me. It’s been a week since the last episode, right? Do you know how strange it is to see people you don’t know a lot about on each side fight each other? It took me a while to figure out what was going on completely. Like until half the episode. This was the fall out of the Itto-Ryu members we don’t know because they are at the lower tier against Habaki’s crew the Rokki-dan who we don’t a lot about either other then we know who they are sort of because we saw them on screen a little bit. There was some swapping of personalities here and there, but that’s about it.

I didn’t become that emotional invested in the episode itself until Hyakurin and Giichi show up to fight against some Rokki-dan. Giichi takes the front against the strongest member present on screen while Hyakurin waits until necessary to fight because she’s carrying a baby. She helps save Giichi with her poison darts and then gets threatened with rape by a younger member who has a mother fetish. That was uncomfortable but not unexpected in this show (gag). Lastly, Rin and Mr. Manji show up in the end when Habaki is killing tons of people at a port searching for the Itto-Ryu. Mr. Manji shows up to save a female fighter and then Rin wants to wander down and save Manji. The episode ends with arrows being shot in the air.

This episode felt like the ultimate “you need to read the source material to know what is going on” thing. I’m not saying that it didn’t feel like this in other parts of this anime, but seeing people you don’t know fighting against other people you don’t know is a pretty massive calling card, do you think? In general, there has always been enough context to tell you enough of what is going on to at least get an understanding. Can’t say that here. Other than that, was a decent episode with some good fight scenes and such. Gives me a lot to think about in who I want to cheer for and everything. That works for me.

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Bofuri Episode 10

The third event is really reaching some dramatic points in this episode. Especially with Sally feeling tired from her running around, but yet still doing it to acquire pearls from other groups. This time though, the tension ratches up when Sally is actually caught in a corner, completely exhausted, yet still fighting for her right with ten pearls on her. Of course, Maple drops in to cause a lot of chaos in that segment and somehow our two young girls held out long enough for Maple and Sally to return and save their already captured pearls.

This was also an episode where other people got to show off their strengths too. Kasumi had her duel with someone we don’t know, but she had a great time showing off some of her hidden abilities. Also, our male shielder and artificer who I forget their names had a fun showing too. There was enough time to eat least develop these characters a little bit while also ratcheting up the danger here and there. Now Maple invades the #2 guild to get their orb. I wonder what it going to happen. There is always something exciting going on in this series to watch. I do like how this show is moving, but I do wish it was slower from time to time. That balance is pretty hard, but Bofuri is very enjoyable.

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Somali and the Forest Spirit Episode 10

This was an episode with some alright content and just sets up some drama for the end of the show. Well, at least this saga. The first half showed up Somali and Gollem met. Somali being the slave girl and only survivor from an attack and Gollem not carrying about this girl following him until he started getting invested in her too.

He took her chains off, gave her food, and become the real dad instead of the cold person he was. In the episode itself, our guys are off screen a lot while Somali and someone else stay home. Eventually one creature notices that Somali is a human and prepares to have her abducted. So a very solid set up episode with some ok emotional stakes. I wonder how this will be handled.

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Toilet Bound Hanako-kun Episode 10

An alright episode really because it still goes into that Nene gets thrown into a situation she can’t understand again and has to be saved by Hanako. At the same time, this isn’t her fault. This time. After solving ghost arm’s problems so they get disappeared, Nene gets dragged into the third wonder of the school, a mirror that looks at your most negative thoughts.

So Nene gets stuck in mirror land where everyone she knows makes fun of her legs she is self conscious about while Mitsuba is there being his horrible self. He does eventually support Nene when it comes to the mirror’s dark thoughts though. The episode ends with Hanako-kun coming in to save the day. I’m kind of curious to see where this mirror land things ends up going.

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Haikyu!! TO THE TOP Episode 10

After episodes of development and a lot of things, I feel like this episode was wanted out of Haikyu really. The perfect pacing, the perfect character information, the action, some awesome scenes here and there. What’s not to like about it? Shimizu got her moment to shine when she ran back and forth to get HInata’s shoes. We saw who she is as a person, her motivations to being the manager for Karasuno, and how dedicated she is to the cause when asked by Daichi. It’s great.

Then the starting of the match itself was great. Seeing Kageyama working on his timing and effort while the other kids did their own thing to make sure their team kept up with Tsubakihara even if they were always behind by two points. Plus, that moment where Kageyama finally synced up his timing with everyone else was completely perfect visually because we can see how Kageyama thinks. It’s just so fun. I’m hoping for more of that through the rest of the show itself too.

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My Hero Academia Season 4 Episode 22

Besides the three minutes in the beginning of this episode that were devoted to some quick moments of the fashion contest and that one moment where Deku said his power doesn’t belong to him, I just can’t help but continually feel bored by My Hero Academia still. Ok, that’s not completely true. I did appreciate Gentle’s backstory because it seems like what I am going through now, but I did like how he went about everything at all. You can also say that Gentle and La Brava’s relationship is very similar to Deku and Eri’s down to how power works? At the same time, who cares?

So there was a good amount of concepts here and everything, but the execution was just bad to me. You know, just like the rest of the season so far? I know that this is a light hearted sort of arc and the everything and the stakes are supposed to be low, but the second other heroes started walking towards them, the match was over. Gentle and La Brava never clicked for me ever and even this episode with their backstories only sort of helped me understand them. It would be nice to know more about the festival Deku was protecting besides the three minutes of festival preparation we’ve seen each week. Also, what was the point of the time stamp last episode? It didn’t mean anything in this episode at all.

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Magia Record Episode 10

This felt like a little bit of a step back from episode 9’s development with Ai saying goodbye to Sana, but the feelings were still there. You know, besides Alina going insane by releasing the Wam and then Mami appeared out of nowhere with a gunshot entrance. (Also, Alina is hot. OMG, those stockings and such? Do I just have a thing for evil girls sometimes? Probably.) I’m sorry for being randomly horny.

This was Sana’s episode. While Iroha and others have accepted Sana to their home and even went mug shopping to make her feel more welcome, Sana had to make the stay at Yachiyo’s house herself. The other guys allow Sana to wander out of Yachiyo’s apartment complex and make that connection for herself when she says goodbye to her old family. The family that just leaves food outside her door thinking she’s a shut in. I do think that Sana just saying goodbye to her family without saying a word is bad because that makes her a runaway, but in this world of anime with childless kids it’s probably fine. I hope. Very solid episode.

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Fate/Grand Order: Babylonia Episode 19

Two episodes to go and the self-sacrifices to stop Mother from destroying the rest of human kind are still helping. Each one is just as emotionally crushing as the last one. Tiamat’s didn’t last very long, but still motivated Fujiwara and Mash still. Same with Gilgamesh’s goodbye and Kingu’s goodbye. Still motivating each other to the end and still barely animated too. Finally, with Ishtar’s help, mother was sent into the underworld where she’s still a problem. Still can destroy everything and almost did. Still, this is also a great reappearance too. Merlin saved the day. I wonder who else will come back to the underworld to finish mother off.

This show has just been a thrill ride and this episode was no exception to that whole experience. The animation has been great and that just wasn’t for the action scenes. That moment when Mash and Fujiwara grasped hands as they fell into the underworld and Fujiwara trying to grasp Gilgamesh’s hand was fantastic. Honestly, that’s my favorite part of the episode itself. That doesn’t take away from anything like Gilgamesh’s greatness in continuing to fight, Kingu’s self-realization moment, or anything else. That moment was just good.

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Keep Your Hands Off Eizouken Episode 11

This was a little bit of a slow down episode where there is goofing off then playing around, but all of that came to a good point eventually. Oh, the school held down their believes on clubs only getting finances from inside the school despite the Eizouken having some good press with the city itself due to Kanamori’s efforts on social media. That’s going to be interesting. But yeah, the major point was this anime’s story was finally finished. After encountering their gaming advisor, Midori and Tsubame dragged Kanamori down the city through the water ways to see the sites we haven’t seen until that point.

All that culminates after a quick flash back where we see Kanamori and Midori meeting each other in class for the first time with Midori’s fear of people. She rides the train with Kanamori for the first time after helping Kanamori with cutting leaves for a restaurant. Tsubame asking if they were friends or not was completely answered here. They aren’t friends because they don’t care about each other’s personal lives that much. At least that’s what it seems like to me. Midori and Kanamori are like Adam and Jaime from the Mythbusters. They only work together and care about each other’s well beings, but that’s it. Tsubame is the build team. With a visit to a sick Kanamori, Midori unveils her plan from their adventures around the city. There is a vision now, so they are all good to go.

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ID:Invaded Episode 12

There is way too much going on in this episode for me to describe it well enough for it to make sense. Like the entire building is covered with a Mizuhanome, people are transported to different ID Wells we’ve seen before and dying, the investigation crew is sent to one where rocks fall on them, and our John Walker kills himself in the real world so he can live in an ID Well? Our guys did follow him and got caught in their own problems and such, but it’s all crazy. Did any of you understand what I just said? Probably not, but it goes deeper then that. I liked it though even though it was a little too fast? A lot of good, pivotable character moments happened in cheap stock footage from previous episodes. I’m pretty excited to see where it all connects in the end.

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