This is a Crow’s eye view of the posts that caught my attention this week. I look for posts that celebrate amazing moments in anime or otherwise blow me away with their wit and charm. I check hundreds of sites, and I can tell you that the ani-blogging community’s quality and quantity of posts is amazing. I hope this article helps you find some of them.
What sites do I check every week? You can see the list of the sites here!
Review Order
This week, I reviewed the sites in reverse alphabetical order (Z to A).
Wrong Every Time
Keep Your Hands Off Eizouken! – Episode 1
Have you watched the first episode of Keep Your Hands Off Eizouken! yet? I didn’t intend to. Not at first. I’m already watching more series this season that most, and to be frank (which, I guess, is better than Shirley), the promo art I’d seen didn’t excite me. Generally speaking, I gravitate to series that look like The Asterisk War or Fire Force (I’d say No Game No Life, but nothing else looks like it!). Keep Your Hands Off Eizouken! looked more, I don’t know, artsy? But I recently had an hour of down time and figured I’d give it a shot. And wow, am I glad I did! There was one scene in particular that reminded me of why I started watching anime. Based at least on the first episode, it’s a series worth celebrating, and that’s exactly why I wanted to draw your attention to Bobduh’s article on Wrong Every Time. It’s a delightful read! The post just gushes about the show. Best of all? It includes a screen shot of that scene that stuck out to me!
A Richard Wood Text Adventure
My Hero Academia – Thoughts on the Shie Hassaikai Arc
I like My Hero Academia 4. I’ve watched the series since the first episode, and I like this season as much as any other. But it’s not a self-reflective sort of liking. I haven’t really asked myself if I like season 4 better than 3, because I don’t have time and some rabbit holes get pretty deep. But I came across a post by Richard Wood on A Richard Wood Text Adventure that made me pause. If I stop to think about it, season 4 is different than what came before. I think some folks have concluded it’s less enjoyable. So far, I enjoy it as much as I ever have, at least for now. I think Season 4 is trying something new, and this post does a great job of exploring just what that might be. Time will tell if it turns MHA into a classic or not. After reading this article, see if you can guess which it’ll be.
Fu-reiji’s Blog
Top 10 Tv Anime of the 2010 decade
I’ve seen a lot of posts celebrating best or favorite series of the last decade. They’re a lot of fun! Often, they remind me of series that I’ve forgotten about in the deluge of new seasonal anime. There have been a handful of these posts, though, that have featured series I haven’t forgotten at all, because I rewatch them (or part of them) all the time. This week, I came across a post that really surprised me: it’s almost exactly the series I would have picked! Fu-reiji of Fu-reiji’s Blog published a top 10 that I have to say is almost perfect (IMHO, of course!). Number 10 was a solid choice; number 9 guaranteed I’d check out the rest; number 7 was a no-brainer; number 6 was an over-looked gem that convinced me the writer was serious… I think you get the idea. Even the honorable mentions were spot-on! See if you agree.
Fan of a Certain Age
Cake Over Cleavage: more musings on asexuality in geek media
One of the things I find so attractive about anime is the breadth of characters it gives us. It can also subvert themes or value assumptions. Now, some of that comes from the fact most of it is produced in Japan, which is the product of a culture that is both very different and far older than mine. But often the writers simply want to present a perspective that’s rare in popular media. Just look at episode 8 of Zombieland Saga. A more recent series, Kemono Michi: Rise Up, is the jumping off point for this post by fanofacertainage on the site Fan of a Certain Age. Whereas my example from Zombieland Saga dealt with the representation of a trans character, this post discusses the representation of an asexual character. Most of you visiting my site already know this, but as a global society we’re not on a great trajectory right now. The only way we’re getting out of our current political situation is through mutual understanding and respect. I don’t think it’s in the least bit hyperbolic to say that posts like this one from fanofacertainage are part of the way forward.
100 Word Anime
Would Bofuri work if the protagonist wasn’t a cute female character?
Have you watched BOFURI: I Don’t Want to Get Hurt, so I’ll Max Out My Defense? It’s another one of those shows I wasn’t going to watch, but I’d seen other bloggers talking about it and decided to give it a shot. Liked it so much that I watched the first two episodes back to back! Even though I liked it, I had to wonder why it worked. Something about the construction felt unusual to me. Turned out that question also occurred to Kirandi at 100 Word Anime! But instead of just wondering about it, she invested the work to figure out what was going on. As you can see from the title, she focused on the question of whether the show would have worked as well if Maple wasn’t moe. Not only is the article itself interesting and fun to read — so are the comments!
Thanks for sharing my post. I’m glad you enjoyed it.
You’re welcome!
I liked both the question you asked and your line of reasoning. It certainly made me think about why I liked the show!