Juuni Taisen had the lamest ending I have ever seen. My daughter and I were enjoying the series and than the ending was a huge disappointment.
Looking forward to in Winter 2018:
Karakai Jouzu no Takagi-san (I love the manga very, very cute - a girl constantly teases her male schoolmate and he is always trying to one up her and loses).
Gakuen Babysitters (another heart warming manga look forward to watching with my daughter).
Overlord 2
Saiki Kusuo no Ψ-nan 2 (this is the funniest anime I have ever watched)
Just added this to the watchlist on Amazon Strike, thanks.
Currently watching Speed Grapher (Gonzo show from 2005) and Darker than Black. Darker than Black is quite good, with some nifty storytelling and a sensibility that reminds me of Cowboy Bebop in some ways. Similar to what @Bandersnatch was describing, this has a lot of 2 episode arcs. Not a fan of the dub, and just realized the Japanese version is available, just listed separately on Netflix for some reason,
In case you were planning to do otherwise, I strongly recommend against watching the second season of DtB. It’s nearly universally regarded as completely inferior to the original. I’d be remiss if I didn’t say something right now.
I’ve heard that before with respect to other shows (Psycho-Pass comes to mind) and generally don’t find it to be true. Heck there are people here that love the second season of Attack on Titan and I thought it was so awful I stopped watching it, so personal taste makes a big difference.
I liked Darker than Black but it’s been a while and I don’t remember a) if I didn’t like season 2, or b) if I even watched season 2. But I do recall DtB being really good, especially given what I was expecting given the edgy af name. :P
I just had a chance to watch Ping Pong, the animation. It’s a series I’d highly recommend for a number of reasons. The style of the animation is very different from other anime I’ve been exposed to - it’s sometimes very rough, sometimes almost rotoscoped, but can be very fluid and dreamlike, and often the frame is cut into many smaller panels, like reading a comic. It’s a very interesting visual style.
The story and characters are really what sell me on the show. While it’s a sports show centered around ping pong, often the matches between two rivals turn into something else entirely, with one character reliving memories of an earlier time, or interpreting the match in a very different way. It’s a coming of age story for many characters, and also tells the story of a few of the older generation, who turn out to not be so different from the kids they coach.
The sound and soundtrack are also really good, from the rhythm of many games of ping pong at the same time making complex beats to the punk rock intro song. The whole show is polished, tells a complete and satisfying story, and wraps itself up in 11 short episodes.
Is anyone watching Recovery of an MMO Junkie? I heard from some other sources that it was very good/amazing. I’m two episodes in, and it’s…cute, but not something I’m excited about so far.
A friend of mine and I agree it was one of our favorite shows of the season, mostly for the characters and their interactions being rather entertaining. I’d say that it has its groundwork laid by the end of episode 4, so if you get to that point and still aren’t all that enthused then it might not be your thing.
Speaking of Ping Pong, the director brings that art style over to Devilman Crybaby, just launched on Netflix. This is a reboot, closer to the original manga than the 70s anime, and it is very much not for kids. Expect lots of uncensored violence and sex in this one, end of the first episode goes places.
FYI, Amazon Strike has been collapsed into regular Prime due to lack of subscribers. So folks might want to check and see if there is anything newly available to them.
Thanks for pointing this out. Binged it the last couple of days and it was pretty good. It doesn’t fuck around, it progresses the story very quickly with each episode, and the parts which aren’t action/sex/spoiler are pretty good. Like, I would like to watch a slice of life anime with these characters as a prequel to this series good.
I started watching Sword Art Online and it’s been interesting. I don’t watch a ton of anime at all so trying to ease into the genre. Kind of curious how everyone’s being kept alive in the real world but not sure if that’ll ever be answered or not, or if it’s spoilerish, etc.
This is one of those cases where the first season of the anime vastly outweighs what comes after and I would advise stopping after the first season. Loved the first season of SAO. That question will get answered for you, FYI.
Yeah, Log Horizon is great, though it felt like the second season had significant pacing/floundering issues. I wish we’d get more, but the author got themselves into some tax problems iirc.