Fall 2021 anime

That was my issue with it, too. I don't think it's going to be only a two-cour anime, probably, but it's also not a 400-episode anime like the original Inuyasha - and yet it's been pacing itself like one. It doesn't help that the three main characters have exactly one big internal secret/problem to deal with, and it's all the SAME internal problem - where their parents are - and none of the rest of the recurring cast of adults seems to care. So in order to keep the Dream Butterfly or parentage plots going, they can't address either one except offhandedly.

I think the big problem that Yashahime has is how they shunted off most of the original cast except Kohaku, Miroku, Sora, Kirara, and Sesshomaru.

I mean, Kikyo is long dead by the Yashahime happens so she’s exempt from this. But Inu Yasha and Kagome being unable to raise Moroha, Rin being inside a tree, Shippo still unconfirmed, Koga and Ayame being revealed to have adopted Moroha and then being dropped after that reveal.

Sango is probably the only character that somewhat made sense to shunt off as she’s a housewife and her son inherited her weapon. It’s still weird to me that we haven’t seen how her and Miroku reacted to their best friends suddenly disappearing. And I also would have liked to seen them adopt Moroha, considering that Miroku and Sango are like siblings to Inu Yasha and Kagome (seriously, seeing Kagome and Sango act like sisters is one of my favorite things across both shows).

One of the things that I’m excited for with Season 2 is that we’re gonna see the girls with their parents.

Edited by powerpuffbats on Sep 30th 2021 at 10:12:04 AM

Yeah I've seen episodes of Yasahime and I agree its like really boring stemming from the incredibly lethargic pacing.

There's nothing wrong with an episodic show....... well aside from the numerous issues surrounding the lackadaisical attitude of the disappearance of the trio's parents but the slow execution of everything just makes the show overall feel very hollow and weightless.

Its just lot of doing fuck all.

Edited by slimcoder on Sep 30th 2021 at 8:27:51 AM

Yeah, there's that too. A slow approach to the myth arc could be forgivable if the monster-of-the-week stories were exciting... except the Big Four are exactly as flimsy and disposable as any other run-of-the-mill demon they encounter. I know the whole stock footage special attack thing is just something anime does, but they do it every episode.

Plus, Moroha is best girl and she gets knocked out of every single fight because there's no variant of the stock footage with her attack mixed in.

Edited by RedSavant on Oct 1st 2021 at 1:48:47 AM

Yeah Moroha is the best of the three just because she has a fun personality.

Though as far as the wider Inu Yasha franchise is concerned, Sango will always be best girl.

Moroha from Yashahime is literally my daughter and I want to pamper her with treats. And street Brawls, because she'd probably love them.

I just realized that when it comes to the OG protagonists, people haven’t nearly universally agreed upon who is the best of them (though Shippo is usually regarded as the worst). No one has universally agreed if Inu Yasha, Kagome, Miroku, or Sango is the best.

When it comes to the daughters though, Moroha is easily the fan favorite. An interesting inversion as to how Sesshomaru is more popular than Inu Yasha, yet Sesshomaru’s daughters are less popular than Inu Yasha’s daughter.

Anyways, the next season starts tomorrow.

Initial Reactions: Isekai Shokudou 2

Starting my reactions to this cour with this yummy gem. One thing I noticed off the bat was that they changed the style of the food intros from last season. Apart from that, it's mostly the typical food anime that I've binged before. Can't wait for more!

Edited by thuse on Oct 1st 2021 at 7:58:44 PM

Sesshomaru at least has the advantage of having sporadic appearances and plus when he shows up he's generally a huge badass.

By contrast his daughters are main characters and as a result are very fallible warriors meaning they don't have the cool factor of their father.

Edited by slimcoder on Oct 1st 2021 at 5:04:34 AM

True. As Sesshomaru wasn’t a lead he was able to stand on his own better.

Towa and Setsuna are the main leads like their uncle and aunt, with Moroha filling the deuteragonist role that Miroku and Sango filled.

And I feel the group dynamic with the girls is not as comedic as the OG group is. With the girls, all comedy is given to Moroha whereas comedic moments were equally distributed across Inu Yasha, Kagome, Shippo, Miroku, Sango, and Kirara. Now whether or not they were all funny is up for debate. (the “SIT” gag should have been dropped. Sango smacking Miroku however I still find funny.)

Heike Monogatari: Hm, not quite clicking for me. I think my problem is that the script is a lot more bombastic than I feel works with the art style or direction

Selection Project is perfectly competent, if not too terribly exciting. There's a twist ending, but it's probably not moving out of the idol niche

YuYuYu S3: Good! Which is nice, since I didn't think much of the other sequels

Yashahime I’ll be watching tomorrow as Hulu won’t have it until then.

First Impressions

• Yakunara Mug Cup mo: It’s noticeably goofier than the first season, but not to the point that it ruins the down-to-earth appeal. The MC’s late mom is an absolute unit. Continuing.
• Selection Project: Was expecting this to be another happy-fun-times moe anime, the sort that Dogakobo likes to make, but this seems to be aiming a little higher than just cute girls doing cute things. Having the viewpoint character lose in the preliminaries was interesting, though somewhat predictable and I’d wager that result will get overturned somehow. Trying out until episode 3.
• Yuuki Yuna: Aww, it was nice to see the girls enjoying themselves like they’re in a CGDCT show. “Let’s enjoy Kagawa life” indeed. On an aside, wow the band scene at the start was so nicely animated. Anyway, of course the fun times doesn’t last long. This episode seems to take place between seasons 1 and 2 so I reckon we’ll only really learn what the plot will be in the next episode. Continuing.
• Isekai Shokudou: The food looks better now, which is the big thing I wanted from this new season. This is mostly a reintroduction to the concept of the series, which is fantasy world people gushing over delicious food from modern society. Glad to see Master, Aletta and Kuro again. Definitely continuing.

So, let's start a new season (I don't count short series like Tawawa and Douki-chan that started mid september).

Isekai Shokudou 2. Nothing changed here (besides artstyle). Stuill great and comfy show that can be action-packed or heartwarming sometimes. I want to see more character and stories and more delicious food and I got it.

86 (second cour): Great contionuation after S1 cliffhanger. the staff has more eps now, probably but they also need toadapt more material (2 LN volumes if they want a satisfying ending). And considering we already got some anime-original scenes as LN almost omitted Lena's part of the arc... I think I like new OP more, though, it still does not fit with other OST.

May watch Yu Yu Yu if I manage to finish S2, but not yet. From Summmer I will carry with Aqautop but may drop Jahy.

Edited by Nachtwandler on Oct 2nd 2021 at 2:57:58 AM

Initial Reactions: 86 2nd Cour

Already starting this secound cour with an epic first episode that had my heart racing and relieved at the same time! This'll be a looooong cour...

Muteking: Fun sense of style, but... not really good? Writing is unfocused, the characters annoying, most jokes miss. And it's directly attacking my taste in music

Ghost Game: ...I appreciate the franchise trying something a bit different, but this is basically a worse Kitaro. Not terrible, but I'm negatively comparing it to something I never finished...

Well, I'll definitely be sticking with Eighty Six S2, though there's a lot to take in in this first episode. I don't trust the President, and of all the series that don't need a no-ja loli type (which is all of them), this one needs it the least, perhaps.

First Impressions

• Ganbare Douki-chan: Cute I guess, but mostly unremarkable. Dropped.
• Muteking: This show comes strolling in decked out in the most garish threads, and it’s half charmingly stylish and half terribly tacky. It’s clearly trying to be funny by being ridiculous, but comes off as a tryhard. It’s also part sentai I guess, with our MC transforming into a rollerskater who defeats goo monsters through the power of dance. Which sounds amazing on paper but the actual sequence is bollocks. And the music, ugh. Trying until next episode.
• Digimon Ghost Game: After the tepid reimagining of OG Digimon, this one came as a pleasant surprise. It’s a fresh idea for the franchise to brand the Digimon as urban legends that the MC and his pals have to go Ghostbusters on. This will probably take a Monster of the Week format while the main cast is being assembled, so it’s a test of whether it can maintain my interest until the plot actually kicks in. Continuing.
• 86 Season 2: Oh man, there’s a lot to discuss, but I will be making a separate thread for this anime. Suffice to say that the first season was an absolute banger and there’s no reason to think this one will be any different. Lena looks fierce in her new look, and I love the way she's biting back at her superiors. And I expected them to survive, but I’m still so relieved that Shin and the others are alive and well. I doubt they’ll leave the battlefield, but at least they have found a semblance of peace, and maybe something new to fight for. Glad to have this anime back. FUCKING GLORY TO THE SPEARHEAD SQUADRON! Definitely continuing.

Edited by fillerdude on Oct 3rd 2021 at 6:15:34 AM

Initial Reactions:

Mieruko-chan: School girl that can see a lot of the supernatural and is thus scared on the inside... A rather bland premise, but I might as well see how this unfolds. Hope I don't get a heart attack from this...
Sankaku Mado: Ok... So the supernatural parts of this seem to be rather gory, and the BL parts of this seem to check out with only a few scenes on the borderline. Poor Mikado though... Well this'll be interesting...

• The Heike Story: This is going to be one of those shows I don't have any real issue with, but I can't really say what makes it worth watching. So far, so fine, I guess? Biwa's cute, hope nothing makes her cry too much, stuff's going to go badly isn't it.

• Selection Project: It's an idol show about idols doing idol things. Like singing. And is of the slightly serious variety, I guess. Watching mainly because Doga Kobo's involved, though aside from the slight twist, can't really comment a whole lot yet.

• Yuki Yuna S3: Had a lot of fun with this, even though I feel like I've forgotten a ton of important info. It took me way, way too long to remember who Sonoko was and why she was around. One thing I do remember is the climax of any given season mashing the reset button super hard to undo the ridiculous amounts of suffering that occurred, so... hopefully the rest of the season will make up for that?

• Yashahime: Fine enough first episode. I just want to know what Shippou's been doing all this time, please tell us already.

• Mieruko-chan: ...Okay, I swear the manga was not this lousy with fanservice. How many ass shots did they fit into this one episode? There was also an oddity where it felt like Ani Mieruko has only just started seeing all the spooky stuff, yet one of her lines implies it's been an ongoing problem like how the manga started? In general, it feels like a few things have been shuffled around to make the start seem less... slapdash, I guess? The manga did feel a lot more episodic at the start before it shifted to a real plot. And the ghosts themselves look jarringly out of place, which is great. There's some spectres later on that should be interesting to see animated.

• Digimon Ghost Game: Well I certainly enjoyed this more than 99% of Adventure 2020, so that's a good sign. Clockmon was probably the most outright creepy thing the frnachise has done since the back half of Tamers, at least on the anime side. It'll be nice to enjoy Digimon again.

• Jobless Reincarnation S2: Rudeus' creepiness was massively toned down once they got this current arc, so it shouldn't be too bad right? ...Oh. Sigh. Well anyway, production values are as high as ever, which I guess is nice. Story still relies on literal divine intervention to get moving apparently. Eris continues to be great and deserve far, far better than Rudy.

I am wondering why we haven’t Shippo after Yashahime episode 1.

Seems odd that of all the original characters, he’s the only one that we don’t know what he’s been up to.

Initial Reactions: Tsuki to Laika to Nosferatu

We meet our protagonists and the world of post-WW2 pseudo-USSR in the Space Race. In here, most of the concepts of vampires are treated as misconceptions (thus hammering the prejudice aspect), and the language is a mix between pseudo-Slavic characters and Anglicized words. The one kudos I can give so far is that they aired this near the anniversary of the launch of Sputnik 1.
This'll be ome long series...

Edited by thuse on Oct 3rd 2021 at 8:56:19 PM

Tricorner Window: This is boring

Mieruko-chan: The whole thing is (rather effectively) directed for horror... but there's parts of it that're absolutely written/storyboarded to be funny or sexy. Feels weird

Tesla Note: Not awful, but not good either. The animation isn't quite up to what they're attempting... and I just don't like the writing

Vampires in Spaaaaaaaace: Ali Project! Haven't heard anything from them for a while! Anyway, show's okay. Might follow if I'm low on interesting stuff

Mushoku Tensei, I don't really have all that much to stay about this one yet. Except for Kishirika being drawn in a more cartoony way than other characters. If it was there during her only appearance in the first season, it definitely wasn't as noticeable. And to me it doesn't look like something intentional to highlight her as a demon lord. And the other thing is Roxy nearly running into Rudeus's group several times while in that city.

Speaking of Roxy, how long did her voyage to the Magic Continent take? Unless the afterword of season one was way after the main action there, it would be a few months. Which makes me wonder, just how much those coins the "return" journey costs are actually worth. No way they will feed you for a couple months on just 4 coins.

Tsuki To Laika To Nosferatu: Well... Not as great as I hoped it would be, not as terrible as I feared. Our vampire girl being constantly annoyed by how people believe in myths about vampires and their weaknesses (garlic necklace in preview of episode 2 is just outright hilarious, especially since we're in a very blatant USSR expy country) is funny, but it won't carry the anime on its own throughout the entire season.

Also... That caviar eating scene... >_<

I'm also very conflicted about the depiction the Space Race milestones. On one hand, it did get a lot of things right (including thermal control system failure during not-Laika mission), on the other hand... That very conspicuous CG of R-7's core stage going suborbital without detaching the payload...

Edited by NHunter on Oct 3rd 2021 at 2:05:50 PM

This season looks way better than last two for now in terms of number of titles that at least picked my interest.

Mieruko-chan: it is pretty good in building up the suspense, though to slow for my taste and the comedy part is not that funny. I would give it at least a couple more eps. but not sure yet.

Tsuki to Laika to Nosferatu: for someone from former USSR I really hate when other countries make some presumably decent fiction about USSR expy and overuse "bad commies" stereotypes. I really hope there will be not that much of this shit here. For now, production is not the greatest but not bad and the author at least know the facts. Plus the cast is decent.

Another thing that bothered me is that US licencor once again oversimplified the title. It is a bit cringy as I heard Russian subs on Wakanim also just translated the Funi title despite original novel having official Russian title.

Edited by Nachtwandler on Oct 4th 2021 at 2:59:57 AM