It lacked the creeping sense of dread and paranoia from the original and just degenerated into gore for shock value. And the answer arcs were far too drawn out since the first one answered the central mystery of "why is it different this time?" with "because Lambda-Satoko kept injecting different people with the refined virus" and didn't add anywhere near enough to justify dragging out everything for an entire cour.
It was very funny though.
There were numerous points in Sotsu that were definitely intended for humor and Ryukishi07 even describes Gou/Sotsu/Higurashi in general as a "tragicomedy."
Final Impressions
- Night Head 2041: The CGI isn’t half bad. They don’t utilize it much for the action scenes but they do get creative with the camera. However, the script tends to string together high concepts without giving each idea the time it needs to breathe, and dialogue has an annoying tendency to go around in circles. Characters talk so much without really saying something. This all results in a messy, rushed story that pretends to be more complicated than it actually is. Could have used more episodes. Or maybe watch Night Head Genesis instead.
- Sonny Boy: I get that it’s supposed to be disorienting, but I don’t really like how it abruptly introduces and speeds past new plot points. Plus it loves to take liberal skips forward in the timeline. That said, this erratic story does have a discernible structure beneath all the randomness. The animation, while not high-fidelity, is always thoughtful and evocative, and the overall visuals are dense with information. I very much enjoyed dissecting the mystery of the drifting, but while I was able to follow the logic of the story, I wasn’t able to feel its heartbeat. It’s a coming-of-age story for both Nagara and Mizuho and I didn’t resonate with them until the last two episodes. Most of the characters are plot devices prattling pseudo-philosophy, more pieces of a puzzle than people with personalities. Overall my academic interest far outweighed my emotional investment. But know what? That still makes it an anime worth watching. It’s an esoteric experience with elements of greatness.
And with episode 13 of Aquatope, we enter the second phase of the story. Most of the cast ended up at Tingarla Aquarium. Which seems like a shitty place to work in. It didn’t seem like they properly oriented the newbies, workplace bullying is rampant, the chain of command seems disorganized, hell the new glasses guy even notes that the work environment is toxic. In real life this place would probably go under quick. Of course this is probably because a more dramatized portrayal of the work environment at the aquarium works better for the story than something more realistic and reasonable. We’ll see.
Edited by fillerdude on Oct 1st 2021 at 6:48:15 AM
I'm really not sure what the plan is for Aquatope. The two most likely scenarios - that Kukuru learns to keep her head down and realizes that this is all just part of being an adult and working somewhere, and that Kukuru manages to turn the place around with the same kind of love Gama Gama had, both seem like they would be missing something thematically.
It's been fun. Final Reactions:
DCTM: This anime was able to wreck my emotions while also being a bit contrived and unnecessarily edgy in some areas, more so in the finale. Overall, it was pretty decent for a 3D anime, but it was not unbearable. Would wanna see a S2...
RE-MAIN: A sports anime leaning more on the drama than the sport. At least I was able to see character development (ish...).
EDENS ZERO: Typical Mashima, except this time, it seems like the writing is slightly more mature than before. I would wanna be excited about next season, but apparently, the director died mid-production
, so I think it would be best for me to indeed take that intermission.
To Summer Cour 2021:
I saw the abstract, the badass, the tearjerking, the heart-wrenching, the dense, the action-packed, and the comedic this cour. This cour might just be added with Fall 2020 as one of the best cours in my book! Though as much as I want to wish that everything could ever feel this real forever or feel this good again, I must once again hop over to the next season... Overall, this was one wacky summer.
Edited by thuse on Oct 3rd 2021 at 3:48:25 AM
For people complaining about Aquatop above (and I saw similar complaint on some other portals). Has any of you worked in a big company? It does not seem so to me. Just to be clear, I do work in a local division of a huge US IT company. And I did not find anything in ep. 13 as bad as you do.
Of course, some things are exgagerated as it is an anime, not documentary. And things are different in Japan as in US or on the West in general.
So let's analize some points here.
1. Complaints about lack of training.
a) We were only shown 5 newbies this ep. And only 3 characters were in focus. I am sure both Kai and a new guy receive actual training. And it was clearly shown that other "Tingaara" employees had a practice in different places before aquarium opened. b) The only one who were sort of left to her devices is Kukuru herself, but: - Her manager explained from the start that their department is still short-handed (and it is not because noone wants to employ, the reason is probably because they just recently opened and some other departments have a priority); - He was promissed by the director that he will get experienced people because of it. Kukuru should have been one, but because she hates her new position, she totally lacks any effort; - Related to the former. I compare it here with my own company and I don't see any issues here. In our company there is a training program for the most basic position (customer support). Members of training center also receive one. But if you apply on any other position, the best you can get is some inner online training courses. And after getting it you will receieve the same thing Kukuru got: general overview of your work and a bunch of documernts to read. If she tried to read anything from the start instead of wasting most of the day complaining about her position, things would have gone way better.
2. About Kukuru herself.
a) Because the ep. is from her perspective she is in sympathetic view, but objectively, she bahaves the same way Chiyu did during her practice in "Gama-Gama". Instead of trying to learn new things most of the time she just does everything her way and complains that she did not recieved that she wanted for her position.
b) Regarding why she was put in PR. I personally think that both "Tingaara" director and her grandpa see Kukuru as an actual director of her own aquarium in future or in similar position. Shew also literalry spent the first half of the series trying to attract more customers to "Gama-Gama". So being in PR should help her to improve this skill and make benefit for "Tingaara" also.
c) This position also requires her to communicate with people from other departments (including the unwilling ones) instead of relying on herself only (and a few friends sometimes), which she currently lacks. The whole task this ep. was not to humilate her but to test if she can handle it (which she failed).
3. About general company enviroment.
a) The only people complaining about it or calling it toxic is a clearly antisocial guy and Kukuru herself.
b) The fact that animal care team was indifferent to the task sent by marketing. Seriously, guys? From my own experience. People in other departments often miss emails about events or some other minor things sent if we are busy with work. Or we read them but put them on later. And we also sometimes complain about just another marketing campaign because of which we have to deal with extra work or about just anoher decision of product team that is not clear to us. So the reaction when Kukuru came and ask them about the rehershal was absolutely natural.
c) About the scene with Umiyan and ice-cream. It was not to show "Tingaara" is a toxic workplace, more to show that "Gama-Gama" was a lax one. And Umiyan said it himself. As director exaplained, he personally is fine with it, but there are rules and other employees may complain.
3. About people being mean to Kukuru.
a) Chiyu is indeed mean to her as she is meant to be a foil to Kukuru here. And even when she never did anything extream this ep. Even her scolding in the end was totally justified.
b) Her manager explained his position from the very start. He is passionate about his job and he hoped for experienced team, but they already lack people and Kukuru is unmotivated.
c) About the scene thre he sdcolded her and started calling names:
- This is not a US, there for scolding an ubderling directly you risk to get sued or receive a community outrage, so you have to use a very roundabout phrases. In Japan it is normal. Damn, even in our company despite being US-based, team-lead or manager can tell you directly "why the heck despite working for this long you made this mistake" or "your skills are not fit for this position you try to apply".
- Him calling her names was odd, but she did not mind and this part was meant to be comedic. It looks odd for us because of different culture.
- The scolding itself was 100% justified as she had a clear tasdk but decided to do everything her way without asking the people she should.
I could probably add more, but it is enopugh for now. In short, the point of the ep. was not to show that "Tinngaara" is bad or that Kukuru shouldf became a corporate slave. The point was to show that big companies were differently and have their peculiarities and if Kukuru wants to grow andv fulfill her dream, she should learn how to deal with it and not just complain and try douing everything as she did before.
Edited by Nachtwandler on Oct 3rd 2021 at 1:23:04 AM
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I don't mean to be rude, but if you're going to make such a long post, you should check it for typos. That was painful to read.
In any case, this being the culture in Japan doesn't make it acceptable. Dressing down your employees in public for a mistake, even a relatively sizeable one, is not something that should be done in any culture. In particular, Kukuru was given no training whatsoever, assigned an extremely time-sensitive task in a way that was not clearly communicated at all, and then publicly reprimanded for not knowing that she had to reach out to multiple department heads for the task that she was not informed of.
We're talking an apparently large-scale, inter-department project that had been on the books for at least a week (according to the attendants who were not prepared at all), that Kukuru was given with no specific notice, at less than 24 hours to the scheduled time. Handing that off to the brand-new hire, without having already done the legwork himself, makes Suwa a failure of a boss.
Tingaara's been open for like three weeks. Their departments don't communicate, the workers are already clique-y and defensive, they have no staff for training, and the people who are already settled in are significantly behind schedule. This place is extremely poorly managed, and that's clearly the point given that Glasses Boy specifically calls it out. The show writers don't expect this to be seen as normal or acceptable.
Edited by RedSavant on Oct 3rd 2021 at 1:01:56 AM
It's been fun.
Dude, I just got up and I have no spell-checker installed. Fixed the typos now I hope.
You are exagerrating the managers incompetence. We don't know for sure how big or complicated the task actually was. And Kukuru was presented as someone experienced. There is also noone else he could deligate it to at the moment.
And about the public scolding, there were like 1 or 2 people present.
My pouint was that you are trying to judge the company from Kukurus perspective and, probably. without actual experience working in a big company. It only looks bad because you do not look at the big picture. Like talking about cliques just because some co-workers agreed with Chiyus position or discussed why there are so many former "Gama-Gama" employees here.
I've worked at an office with fifty employees, in Japan, for the past four years. My workplace is also extremely cliquey, has poor task and inter-departmental communication, and uses public scolding for minor mistakes. "Kukuru's perspective" doesn't change the attitude Suwa showed or the words he used, the way he fobbed the task off on her with no briefing, or his reaction to her attempting to make it work despite the lack of support.
Like I said, I think Eiji explicitly pointing out that Tingaara's workflow is dysfunctional should indicate that the writers don't consider this to be healthy behavior.
It's been fun.![]()
That I'll agree with, yeah. Though I don't blame Kukuru for her lack of motivation either - they assigned her to a marketing desk job when it should be clear that that's not where her skills lie. While she's probably not officially certified to work with the animals directly, that's still not a good fit for her passion and her skillset.
Edited by RedSavant on Oct 3rd 2021 at 2:15:03 AM
It's been fun.
Oh, and the entire thing was a callback of her own treatment of Fuuka their first day together, throwing her to the penguins without real training. Maybe Fuuka will remind her of that one, it would give Kukuru a chance to see the boss' perspective.
Kukuru is definitely part of the problem, but her failings do not excuse the incompetence of the management. If an event that was planned one week beforehand fails to take off just because the new hire that was hired only the previous day forgot to do it, then something is wrong with the chain of command.
Sorry, Nachtwandler, I've worked for various organizations and institutions and Tingarla reminds me of some of the worse ones. And of course I know that a lot of it is Rule of Drama, but I'll still make fun of it, dammit.
Also, thank you Red Savant for spelling out the problems with that aquarium.
Anyway, my final impressions for Re-Main: definitely a unique take on sports anime with how it handles the main character's amnesia, particularly how he struggles with his former personality as an abrasive douchebag. Is it good, though? Well... I did not enjoy it much as a sports anime, but it's sort of interesting as a character drama with a sports twist.
And with that, I 'm wrapping up Summer 2021, which is by far the weakest cour for this year so far. Sonny Boy and Kageki Shoujo were probably the two standouts, and even then I don't think either of them quite matches up to anything in the previous two seasons.
Continuing Aquatope, Fena, Love Live, and Scarlet Nexus for Fall 2021, which is already looking stacked. My free time budget shudders in both fright and anticipation.
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Agreed, it seems to me that he might be focusing on the "Gama Gama failed" part of Kukuru's backstory and experience, and not the "it was going down no matter, and the staff kept it great and fun despite that" part that we as an audience saw. Someone who looks at the results first and not the context can easily miss little things that matter. Suwa is not doing anything to help, which is the opposite of good leadership, and he is supposed to be the experienced one here.
Edited by MagnumForce on Oct 3rd 2021 at 2:55:08 AM
I imagine (as some folks on the Reddit suggested) that Suwa may have been part of another aquarium that failed like Gama Gama, and that's where he got his (admittedly correct) view that the atmosphere doesn't matter if the budget's in the red... but that's some tragic-backstory bull and doesn't give him a reason to treat Kukuru badly in front of her coworkers over an entirely internal training exercise.
I will say that I fully expect things to improve; you have to set your characters back a ways if you want to have character growth and progression in your story, after all. But I think their goal was to make an unpleasant workplace, and they succeeded.
Edited by RedSavant on Oct 3rd 2021 at 3:26:29 AM
It's been fun.

Blue Reflection Ray - It was fine, if kinda low budget. Good character work. The big issue is that it's main moral is "Don't magically remove peoples emotions, because they'll fall into a coma and die". Absolutely zero real-world relevance
Love Live Sunshine - Started off very strong, but I've been less impressed with each passing episode. Feels like it doesn't really know what to do with the characters once they join the group. Well, not that it's finished. Could pick up again
Sonny Boy - Huuuuuuuuh. Each individual episode was interesting and well made, but the constant time skips and disinterest in holding the viewers' hands made the overall experience rather incoherent
Idaten - Stylish, well animated... I didn't really like any of the cast. They were pretty much all either boring or kind of appalling. Also—Too much sexual violence. Would not watch a second season
MagiReco - Actually kind of amazing? Great style, good animation, excellent direction, largely sidestepped the first season's problems. The story is still kind of weak, but it's triumph of pure craft