Category Archives: Franchises

November 17, 2020

TV Anime Thoughts: 2020 Autumn

By omo

Just freestyling about in and on a particular Autumn afternoon. A lot of shows I won’t mention despite that I am still watching them, and some I don’t watch might get mentioned.

Is this season good? I think so–Corona has done a number to a bunch of shows this year, so even these low-budget-feeling programs like The Boy Who Loves Slimes and Standing on a Million Lives anime with Lantis OP/ED but actually Isekai are surprisingly good Entries. Actually The 1M anime is worth a deeper look. It’s probably the most overflowing-with-kindness take on a pretty deep introspective subject, not to mention it’s one of the weird isekai anime that has a non-isekai slant that isn’t someone logging into an online game. Except it kind of is someone logging into an online game. Anyways, it’s odd and unique. Ever think about the Great Filter? This is getting to that.

Boy Who Loves Slimes, or By The Grace of the Gods, is like a male-centric take on the healing isekai subgenre. Kamihiro is basically a lot messy and clumsy take compared Iguchi Yuka’s little Myne (Main?) from Ascendance of a Bookworm. Koroazu is serviceable here (I guess it is hard to play a child who used to be a worn-out salaryman) but way less spirited than Moroha from the Inuyasha full-blown sequel. I mean this is how you do a proper franchise reboot. I kind of didn’t bother with the original Inuyasha but I am enjoying the Yashahime anime quite a lot. Maybe it helps that there isn’t this Fushigi Yuugi template it tried to walk on. Thinking back it is really hard to like a series when you don’t really care for the two main characters.

The new formula is also breathing life on Major 2nd. Major is one of those popular baseball manga/anime that I would never like despite it being a popular (in Japan anyways) baseball story. Because it is the most hollow, pointless baseball story that manga-fying everything came to represent. Like, you can (and people have) create a manga about just about anything, including various sports and even more mundane or weird stuff. However Major 2nd is not like Major at all in my estimates. It actually respects the sport instead of bending it for the services of its characters.

The other interesting thing about Major 2nd is the whole male-female physical development thing and how puberty is a weird time for athletes trying to compete, to say the least. Like, talk about a topic that isn’t represented much in anime. But this is great. This is the wholesome afterschool TV program that I crave, not that I care particularly about this one item, but the way Major 2nd pivoted completely from its diehard post-reconstruction rhetoric to something people would actually care about in the 21st century is a good study at any rate. In that it actually cares about its authenticity. If you are going to be a story about something extremely real, ie., baseball that everyday kids can play in school, it really helps to also be extremely real in the portrayal. At least, as translated into the medium.

This is also a thematic issue that I’ve seen in recent years. A lot of original TV anime programs fail to capture viewers despite being very interesting. I think two great picks here are Deca-dence and Listeners. But on the flip side you look at (really dumb) serial works turning into anime, they tend to have more of a pull. Major 2nd is good, to something more bling-y like Jujitsun Kaisen, or genre-changing to the likes of Tower of God anime. I think that other Korean cartoon adaptation is the epitome of this–God of Highschool is basically everything nobody cares about but would gladly turn off the brain and watch. It’s like, maybe something to fill the gap between Kengan Ashura adaptations (now that is a fun fighting “anime”).

(For a point of contrast, compare God of Highschool with Akudama Drive (an anime original), man, the difference is clear.)

Is it just that, having the first editorial and publishing go-around culls the silly stories that you’ve seen from top creators? Tomino needed G-reco TV to make the G-reco films, I guess.

There may be some types of works in which we can be easier on. Wandering Witch provides that once-a-year kind of experience, where you can also shut off the brain to enjoy some thought-provoking fable chill-vibes. In this particular case the stories don’t cut as deep as, say, Kino’s, but it is also somewhat positive. It’s like social media is full of luls, but people end up being more glam and positive than they typically are, just because it’s good for engagement. In other words: We live in a society. Indeed those works engage us from that side of life.

The pure-pure fantasy side of life is good this year too. Media-mix projects (original anime works, let’s not forget) like Sigururi and Assault Lily are bringing the heat and excitement, or as much as you can get with a bunch of girls. Sigururi is particularly noteworthy because it reminds me of Garupan without all the problematic stuff you get from, say, another season of Strike Witches.

Well, Road to Berlin is fine. I enjoy it and every girl is great in that show. It’s just a bit tiresome after so many years? Maybe my tastes have evolved since then–between Kancolle, Azure Lane, and the barrage of similar bin of things in this very niche. It’s not like “isekai” where a whole world of themes can be explored…literally. Strike Witches first aired in 2007, that is a long run for a limited set of themes!

(As an aside, the gay formula in all these Bushifam works and others just reminds me of Golden Kamui which resumes this season but it gets even gayer than before. In some sense these shows all follow the same formula? I guess even Aachi & Shimamura.)

Other media-mix original anime works also seemed to hit their stride this season for me. A big, big one is D4DJ First Mix. I should write about this separately. The third Bushi-fam-linked-work in anime for this season is NijiGaku anime, and that one is also turning out way better than its predecessors. On that note, even Ochifuru is a lot of fun and I’m enjoying this collective of personas. Drop Out Idol Fruit Tart is a bit like a wonky 00s show but with updated and modern sensibilities. The cast is interesting too, with the cross section of interesting new seiyuu-idol talents.

If there was a miss among all the big gun media mix shows this season, I would say that is going to be HypMic. But even as it stands, it’s serviceable enough and fun to watch. I guess it helps to explain the characters to people who are not neck deep in that fandom, despite the songs were so hype 18-24 months ago. And yes, it can be really CRINGE. But that isn’t anything we didn’t know going in from the very start.

That and Dai no Daibouken are the two shows that I didn’t expect to enjoy this season, but ended up following them beyond 3. It feels like Cygames really should learn from Dai no Daibouken in terms of how to create a compelling RPG story that is between all the Rage of Bahamut things they made (see above regarding interesting original stories that failed) and The Grand Blues which I support as an anime series purely on the Teekyuu Principle but it is the most extravagant waste of time and resource I’ve seen lately. At least the Cingekis and whatever Bushiroad made can serve on its face. This is utterly worthless for non-players and except eccentrics like myself.

Actually, the problem is pretty clear once you’ve taken a moment to think about it–Granblue and Cygames in general spends way too much time grandstanding on their own junk. Maybe it’s kind of atmospheric, but this is kind of a shell game that isn’t selling to people who were not already buying.

I really enjoyed the One Rooms this season so far. I really miss this particular version of Rietion, and that Tomita Miyu act is quite enticing.

The dogeza anime is amusing enough, once you remember it used to be shittweets and now it’s an anime short. But I think the Joy of Sugita Tomokazu can be better found in Sigururi because they’re their own unit there. I mean, Sigururi E4…

It’s a funny coincidence that we got Iwakakeru anime this season, which just reminds me of this. That said, the rock climbing JK team is compelling because it’s something I don’t know about (competitive bouldering in Japan) and the main girl is interesting. That it is over the top is OK, keeps things fresh I guess, but the other characters seems really oddball and maybe the tone of story has to play into it, which makes it also oddish and over the top.

If thinking about adaptation gets this rant to this point, the one main counterpoint this season is Tonikawa. It is also kind of a cringe show but if the entire original story is a mental gymnastic trick, what does the anime have left to do? That said, I liked the OP a lot (possibly my pick this season while Jujitsu gets the ED) and, well, the source content is solid. If I had a nitpick it would be just Akarin’s version of Tsukasa is not a great fit in my opinion. She does a fine job here, that said.

A fitting way to end this post is thinking about the Maeda Jun anime this season–it isn’t that frequently we get a show of this heritage or caliber. It’s decidedly less grim than Charlotte, but way more compelling already. I think that might be due to the animation and direction being really spot on? The timing works. The characterization works (especially on the supporting cast), that the low-key skit nature of the dialog between characters work. The Day I Became a God is probably both in the running for a late-inning comeback homerun, or forgotten to the test of time like other interesting, well-made, original anime TV series. That in itself is kind of exciting.

If there is a thing about finesse in telling a story via animation, this year showed it to us what it means. It’s hard!

Leave a comment | posted in D4DJ, Deca-dence, Dragon Quest, Golden Kamuy, Granblue Fantasy, Gundam, Honzuki no Gekokujou, Hypnosis Microphone, Kamisama ni Natta Hi, Love Live, Major, Modern Visual Culture, Rage of Bahamut, Senyoku no Sigrdrifa, Strike Witches

October 29, 2020

Deca-Dence’s Early Landing

By omo

The Deca-Dence twist was great, so why had I stopped caring by the end?

There is a simple answer to this question. It turned a movie-type plot into an anime series. In a way I applaud the Scamp summarizing the problem into a sentence, but it doesn’t quite unpack the full issue. Deca-Dence spoilers ahoy.

I too thought Dece-dence was a fun show that is quite compelling maybe up to the point where the plan was put together to blow up the monster farm. The narrative has already taken a split between POV of Heybot Kaburagi and POV of Natsume. In as much as the humans in the show are just there, or maybe better put, victims, Natsume gets relegated to that role which gave the beating heart of the story a bit too much emotional distance.

This means Kaburagi’s side of the story has to tag team, and frankly this Heybot-invoking story just doesn’t have the intrigue to carry the intensity the same way that Natsume-could-literally-just-die-any-time, while surf-spearing alien-looking bugs. In a way, the Heybot gimmick worked against it when you have this contrast and it isn’t consistently played for interest, as the second half of the story was mostly in Heybot-POV.

Which is to say, the final boss critter was a powerful monster but was way less fearsome than the doomed-to-fail-but-not mid-series mission where the game devs planned to kill off the over-accomplishing players and humans. Deca-dence was never a game in the first place, by playing up the game aspect, the story has emotionally cheapened its core asset.

Which is also another way to say, the story while had enough gas to go all the way, it was probably too introspective too quickly. The gimmick had to survive 12 episodes (roughly 240-250 minutes if you take out repeated parts), which is probably 120 minutes too long all said and done.

Leave a comment | posted in Deca-dence, Modern Visual Culture

October 28, 2020

NijiGaku Anime Visits My (Not So) Familiar Digs

By omo

Been somewhat enjoying the new Love Live anime this season. My take is not far from this take.

Let’s discuss the real-life locale aspect. Odaiba is this funky east-Tokyo zone with big shopping malls and other leisure complexes. This planned community is not that … community-y and most people go there to enjoy the sea breeze and the wide open park spaces, among the eats and shopping nearby. Zepp Tokyo and Zepp Diver City are the bookmarked ends of this zone for me, although I did walk around past both at least once.

I just find it tiresome that everyone wants to point out the stuff in Big Site’s central/west halls because it is the inside of the school, but that part is the dumb nerd part. I was more stoked about, in last week’s episode, the car museum inside Venus Fort, than anything thus far.

I mean, I get why people like to talk about Big Site because that’s their only reason of being in Odaiba as I am no different: Having spent hours and hours inside Venus Fort myself to attend events and waiting for people around the various Zepps is the only reason why I was there anyway. Having to go to Diver City to find food so I can survive a full day of eventing is not how I’d like to enjoy it. Like, I want to visit the Noitamina Store for once. I walked the whole stretch between the two Zepps, which is pretty nice, when the weather cooperates. And I’ve seen those food vendors. The big ferris wheel is great place to take bocchi selfies, but not at night.

Besides the (missing) Gundam outside Zepp Diver City, that entire area can be an outdoor stage for concerts and idol festivals. TIF is famously held there, plus other idol events. Other famous tourist things including riding the Himiko into Odaiba. It’s a great way to get a short night cruise when the weather might not be the most cooperating.

Which is just to say, if all you know of Odaiba is from Comiket, you really don’t know Odaiba. For one, Big Site is on the Ariake side, and it’s more residential/business. Second, there are a bunch of smaller event spaces in that the vicinity towards the Gundam. Setsuna performing on the steps outside Diver City is sacred idol territory being used by an idol. It goes on. Watching TIF earlier this year will give you a rooftop view of Odaiba’s skyline, much like what NijiGaku is trying to do at times (and will further invoke in the future).

Odaiba is wota territory, thin-book nerds from overseas probably should take note.

PS. On the anime itself, I think it is good. Only if Sunshine was like this I might actually love Aqours. It is also four years too late. In a post-Shinymas world this take on school idols is refreshing but only because the discourse is both divorced from that PreCure/Aikatsu/PriPara context yet it is dragging this otaku-centric franchise one leg into that public-friendly kiddy pool. I think it’s fun and fine, but it is one generation too slow to capture my imagination.

Leave a comment | posted in Love Live

October 27, 2020

Re: IDOLM@STER at Songs of Tokyo Festival 2020

By omo

Songs of Tokyo Festival is an annual1 special program from NHK World, as part of its Songs of Tokyo TV segment. Songs of Tokyo showcases Japanese music acts with translation and feedback from global fans. Now that its 2020 fest had the ON AIR moment last weekend, it is free on demand viewing online here. The VOD expires January 31, 2021.

While Songs of Tokyo and the associated festivals have been going on for some time, it’s always pretty wild to catch the artists on domestic TV that I had to fly to Japan to see. NHK World is commonly broadcasted as a community program in metro areas in the west, or as a freebie in world packages in bundled television services like cable. It’s weird to be able to see all that at 1080 broadcast resolution, where as the real-time web stream looks like, well, a piece of crap. I mean, it probably looks fine normally for NHK programs but these live shows have a lot of visuals going on, and there were just not enough bits. In fact the VOD has the same mushiness look, just much better than the stream.

For this 2020 edition of Songs of Tokyo Festival, instead of in-person audience, there are a bunch of people put on 2 big TV in the venue (NHK Hall), Zoom-style. They act more or less like your typical studio audience.

Enough leading up, I think it’s time to reflect on this 25-minute TV segment that I’ve watched 4 times already in about 48 hours. First of all, the visuals in the back is full blown Mai-Note production value. Fans of IM@S lives will know it well, but I think this is more cranked up than usual given the set is just a giant half-circle LCD wall.

The 15th Anniversary song survived the Coronavirus and we got a presentation of it at Songs of Tokyo Fest. It’s the first time everyone’s seen it performed. It’s not even performed by the original cast–but this is the kind of song that everyone will get to perform. Nandodemo Waraou is also the first IM@S group song with SideM, which means dudes and gals get to sing together, a first for the franchise.

It’s an hour-long TV program including Nana Mizuki, BanG Dream (Popipa, Roselia, RAS), and IM@S. So that they gave ~22 out of 48 minutes of the time to them is already pretty great. In usual JUNGO fashion, team IDOLM@STER’s performance is crammed with little things. Let’s try to unpack some.

Continue reading

1 comment | posted in BanG Dream, Idolmaster, Modern Visual Culture, Seiyuu, Idol, Pop

October 21, 2020

Flying Low With Ueshama

By omo

Over the years I’ve pondered on exactly how and why seiyuu artists do the major label thing. I understand it financially, but it isn’t exactly clear cut why that is a good deal for a large number of them–it seems like an advancement in career or at least an attempt at it, or as obligation to their fans and industry partners. As individual artists, they work with their managers and producers to come up with something that’s worth selling to the seiyuu’s existing and new audience. Some folks made it work, some didn’t, but even in the worst case these projects at still kind of interesting.

So, in comes Ueda Reina and her cute country songs. I’m going to just link to some music videos and briefly talk about what I think about this in general.

The 30,000-feet view is that anisong and seiyuu-idol as a music label business is basically churning people who are already primed as stage-quality performers (including actors, models and tarento generally–but the training for the latter 2 can vary a lot, affecting their readiness for it). Some popular TV personalities, cosplayers, and now youtubers can all get record label contracts and have a music biz–possibly on the side, or in the front. To take one example, Mizuki Nana is a mainstream musician working hard to still be a relevant seiyuu, as the exception to the norm. But outside of this type of exception and other exceptions, most are just trying to express artistically & tapping into the fandom built around their geinojin persona.

When it comes to voice, it’s hard to monetize people who love your voicework. Like, short of selling facetime, autographs and photos, there isn’t much else you can monetize from. The work product which is tied up totally separately from your voiceover contracts, the characters, stories, game and anime connected to that, is not yours to control, sell or otherwise directly profit from. It makes sense why some seiyuu agencies start idol groups and tropes, because it taps underutilized labor in this growing category of employment, as supply of seiyuu outstrips jobs available for them.

The 10,000 feet view is that different seiyuu artists go about it differently. I think it’s a fair criticism to say that a lot of musicians, especially western ones, have something more to draw from. It’s both the upbringing and the sample size. That while this is a nitpick, but diverse environments produce more diverse talents. Ueda Reina comes from the Toyama countryside and it’s a fresh breath of air for her to try to create something this way, even if it is at core something pretty close to who she is as an entertainment persona and as an individual. And even the ones that aren’t, do it in ways that brings out some originality crossed with, well, what the people want.

Give the people what they want is sometimes a winning formula, but not really that interesting if it’s all that you do. It’s understandable and it’s something everyone do to varying levels. In this case, though, it’s more like Ueshama wants to give you want she wants to give you, so you’ll gladly take it, or not. It’s a selfish but reasonable, and sustainable balance between something that is hardly marketable because it’s just so simply Ueda Reina, but also because that’s what some people want anyway.

Which is to say, when you connect the dots, a lot of seiyuu-idol artists pander to their core audience because they don’t have competitive offerings for the general audience. It’s like why Pixel 5 can be a very attractive phone is lost on the masses, to use a very orthogonal analogy. But what carries in a quality work of art is the conviction of the artist, and you can see it in the way Ueda behave consistently (or as the kids say, on brand).

Going down another level (1000 ft?), Ueda’s solo projects are just art projects. They can be fun, in the video which posts a bunch of fan-submitted flower pics.

It reminds me of her old Web Newtype column (for example) where she would do a photo shoot once every other week with the staff, usually at some low-key but stylish location–a cafe, an art exhibit, a park, etc. Each shoot had a color motif which she picked. At the end of the run, Newtype decided to make a photobook which can be customized by various images used in the column. It was a lot of work to do it, but I’m sure it’s rewarding for the fans who did.

In as much as it’s a business, it’s about engagement and ultimately, producing an artist. That’s where Ueda really leans on her orthogonal art branding here. Originally she was supposed to have her first solo concert in July, which was cancelled by Covid. But in conjunction with the original planning, they had various merch to go with it, including a whole set of artwork she drew in which fans can vote to select which will be made available for purchase. The results were 3 images available as canvassed artwork, and some sold as art for t-shirts or whatever. And then, there’s the Hana no Ame music video project mentioned earlier.

It’s not to say other artists don’t do this kind of arts and craft stuff–it’s actually not unusual. Like I said, engagement is a metric and this does drive that. But this is unique enough of a combination to be noteworthy. If Ueshama is going to be that art teacher persona, I guess there aren’t too many others in this same zone at least.

To close this out, let’s zoom in one more step. I think I’m going to wrap it up with this interview done as a promo for her latest single, which is used for the opening for Wandering Witch: The Journey of Elaina. Basically, some time after her last album, her manager got married and move away from Tokyo. Thanks to covid also, she wanted to see this friend/ex-coworker and couldn’t. Instead, she wrote the lyrics and performed the song with her (and her partner, who is another employee who met at work) in mind, making it cuter than usual. We’re way too close for aircraft metaphors at this point.

2 comments | posted in Majo no Tabitabi, Modern Visual Culture, Seiyuu, Idol, Pop