Weakly Seasonal Watches: Winter 2023 Anime Season Week 3

Seasonal Watches

Last week was a pretty stressful one for me. Work went a little crazy due to a lack of people in certain spots which means working a bit harder. I think those man power issues at work have been evened out a bit. As a whole though, the anime has been very good for me this season. Even the lowest one here, Kubo ranked number nine, is still a good show. Though I have noticed that I am not watching as many seasonals as I did last season and that is definitely solid and ok.

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Vinland Saga Season 2 Episode 2

This episode is so hard to watch. I mean, people being enslaved is not something to watch an anime for at all. Especially when everyone is working their hardest to just survive the net day with the lousy conditions they are placed in. So Thorfinn and Einer can be free people if they cut down an entire forest to make awheat-field. Too bad that its an entire forest and Kitel’s crew sent to help them put them in a forest are still slaves themselves. The whole thing is share cropping with there being no way out. It just means getting a higher position in the farm.

It also really sucks to see what these slaves and servants have to do in order to possibly move up maybe. I’m not just talking about the handlers that eat Thorfinn and Einer’s lunch. But what about the young woman who is sleeping with Kitel’s son in order to get him to stay at operating the farm instead of going to war which the guy obviously knows nothing about. If she sleeps with him, the family will benefit by it if they get married. So a lot of politics of people stuck in all of these horrible situations. I think you know why its hard to watch know even when its good.

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High Card Episode 2

The balance to Vinland Saga’s heaviness. After the adventure at the Casino, Finn is joining a king’s man like group and/or a car company as a cover for an operation to acquire every card possible before they fall into enemy hands. That group’s name is High Card and Finn is now an apprentice with his 2 of spades card. Partnered with the dashing and womanizing Chris, Finn goes on his first case with car chases and people buffed by the cards they wield. Really fun and excellently action packed. It is everything I was hoping it would be.

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Kubo Won’t Let Me be Invisible Episode 2

This episode was a bit more spicy then I thought this show would be. I mean, Kubo putting on a special scent for Shiraishi to maybe notice him, her stopping at his home (thought outside) just to borrow manga that Shiraishi was going to read, and then the moment when Shiraishi took a shower in Kubo’s house after getting covered in dirt and then he put on her gym outfit. Plus the seeing a bra scene too. She is so head over heels for him and there must be a reason why because Shiraishi isn’t that interesting (on purpose). But it’s really cute stuff and Kubo is a 100% believable high school girl with a crush. I loved when her sister bugged her about it.

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Tsurune – The Linking Shot – Episode 3

Man, that was certainly adding some bit of tension into this season that has been comfy until now. Nikaidou and his unusual Kyudo group have seriously created a stir into the show group. Especially when Minato and others had their groove pushed over by all the unusual energy that Nikaidou and others had some sort of energy too. No one is sure why while Shu’s group were so much more experienced and normal by winning their round easily. So what will happen now that Minato can’t fire an arrow because Masa-san he couldn’t until he figured out why he is so unsettled? It’s kind of frightening to see all the comfy just broken just as smoothly of a pattern of this entire show to this point.

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Tomo-Chan is a Girl Episode 3

Too good segments placed in this show once again. I am really digging the vibes this show is just pushing along with these complete idiots that do and do not bounce for each other. For instance, the small bit of drama from Jun and Gundo dating for three days only was pretty hilarious. Same with the small bit of misunderstanding that Jun seems to have because he is such a horrible judge of character. Though, he is starting to enjoy being with Tomo-chan in different ways. I think the tom boyish outfit Tomo wore on their date clicked with him. Same with her just singing childish songs for three hours. I think his crush his real and just that he and Tomo are too ignorant about it to see anything.

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Bofuri Season 2 Episode 2

That was a lot of stuff to just happen in one episode. The episode starts with the rest of Maple Tree minus Maple defeating a boss to get into Level 5. Maple has a cold after all. Then Maple spends half the episode trying to get into 5 first by defeating a demon without planning to and then just obliterating the Level 5 boss with some guidance by friendly characters. No one spends a lot of time in Level 5 though because that boss is defeated leading to Level 6, a horror stage that Sally is afraid of, but soldiers on anyway. It is a very and calming kind of episode, but it is a lot. I thought this would have been two or three episodes and I think the show suffers a little bit for everything that occurs in it without a better focus.

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Urusei Yatsura (2022) Episode 14

This episode was a wonderful visual flex in the perfect combination of comedy and animation. Ton, Mendou’s “rival” came back to play base ball after many years of practice in the mountains. Practice that amounts to just failure, but he felt prepared. So the supposed duel between Ton and Mendou constantly gets interrupted by Ryoko, Mendou’s prankster sister, Lum, and Ataru. There is chaos everywhere and its amazing how it just works. Beautiful in all degrees too and I find it all amazing.

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Trigun Stampede Episode 3

Wow, that was a crazy episode. As in the horrifying kind with EG bomber planting virus on people that eventually explode and just murder people. It feels safe enough after he is stopped after murdering a few people by having the suicidal people next to him. So yeah, Vash tried to stop him like normal while Meryl actually came up with a solution to make the bombs stop functioning. Then all hope is lost when Nai shows up and murders people with his friends without even thinking about it. It’s horrifying what he can do without even thinking about it. Knives has upped his devastation compared to the original series. Good but horrifying episode too.

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The Fire Hunter Episode 2

I can already tell that the first episode must have taken this production crew’s time, because this episode was very minimalist. Locked in locations, post card memories, frames over the screen. The usual production saving measures, but its done in a way that feels pretty efficient. Especially since we see a bit more of the story and the writing which still props the episode up. Touko’s life on the train isn’t friendly because she either spends time with the three brides or cleans toilets. Yeah, and the minimalist framing shows how boring that would be until the demons attack in the later part of the episode where the animation kicks in a bit causing Touko to be tossed out soon.

Then the in between part of the capital which shows a society that is about to collapse and some more explanation about fire and the world itself. The son left behind by the dead Fire Hunter is given a chance to be adopted into someone else’s house which will solve a lot of his problems. This is also a part where we hear more about what fire from beasts does or how they are attached to them too. So yeah, good episode but not as strong as it could be too.

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Weekly Ratings

Last year, I started a small graph system that I used to rank the weekly episodes I’ve watched. I’m going to bring it back for this season and see how it goes. I just want to make my opinions a bit more clearer other then “I really like this anime episode that did those things?”. If this helps at all.

Now, this doesn’t mean that the episode on the bottom is bad. Just that that it wasn’t as good as the others. That’s it really. In the end, this is all arbitrary after all just like most of what I blog anyway. It’s just another thing, what is the difference?