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[NotMyProblemAnymoreCunt]

It's true.
Japanese animation is a dying art. We only have cheap outsourced mass-produced "anime" now.

Better than most western entertainment or whatever passes as entertainment over here

 

[SlimeGooGoo]

Better than most western entertainment or whatever passes as entertainment over here

I would argue it's on the same level

 

[Delphisage]

Better than most western entertainment or whatever passes as entertainment over here

That's more an indictment on both than a callout against one.

Man when are we getting another good anime?

 

[Doom85]

That's more an indictment on both than a callout against one.

Man when are we getting another good anime?

There’s like over 200 anime series that come out every year at this point. I can’t even fathom someone not finding at least one good anime each year (and I’m being really generous with that, it should be more like a bunch of good anime). If they honestly can’t, well, you do you, but I’m not really going to consider them a reliable opinion on quality anime.

 

[NanaMiku]

This is interesting video about the current anime industry

 

[NotMyProblemAnymoreCunt]

I would argue it's on the same level

That's more an indictment on both than a callout against one.

Man when are we getting another good anime?

I tend to stick to reading manga nowadays lol

 

[SlimeGooGoo]

Started reading Yotsuba. What an adorable manga.

Fuuka is best girl though

 

[STARSBarry]

It's true.
Japanese animation is a dying art. We only have cheap outsourced mass-produced "anime" now.

sounds like you need to stop watching garbage then. There's more anime per season these days, but its not like there's not one or two per season to take note of in terms of animation quality.

you know recently I went back watched an old favourite of mine, Higurashi. Even back in the day some things just had bad animation, I think its just so noticeable now because how many studio's focus on light novels which have obvious bad writing, as any teenager just picks up a pen without any idea where their story ends, some blatantly don't have any idea how to get to the middle past a concept of "I was resurrected as [insert boring everday thing] in another world". Outside of maybe Tappei Nagatsuki, but its become apparent in recent novels he's also hit his limit and has written himself into a corner versus his prior planned novels.

 

[darth.shrimp]

Started reading Yotsuba. What an adorable manga.

Fuuka is best girl though

Funny, I just finished watching Azumanga Daioh (for the 4th or 5th time?). While I still absolutely love it, I'm starting to understand why the author didn't like the anime, to the point that she(?) refused for Yotsuba to be adapted.

~edit: I forgot to add, that Yotsuba is so far the only manga I've actually bought in paper. That's how much I love this one.

 

[SlimeGooGoo]

Funny, I just finished watching Azumanga Daioh (for the 4th or 5th time?). While I still absolutely love it, I'm starting to understand why the author didn't like the anime, to the point that she(?) refused for Yotsuba to be adapted.

~edit: I forgot to add, that Yotsuba is so far the only manga I've actually bought in paper. That's how much I love this one.

 

[NotMyProblemAnymoreCunt]

Started reading Yotsuba. What an adorable manga.

Fuuka is best girl though

Best girl is Yoko Littner

 

[Delphisage]

Finished Eureka Seven. Good show, took until it was halfway through to really start doing things that weren't forgettable, and it's surprising how much its ideas work despite how totally corny they are. Shame that I've heard the rest of the franchise after this sucks.

 

[darth.shrimp]

Finished Eureka Seven. Good show, took until it was halfway through to really start doing things that weren't forgettable, and it's surprising how much its ideas work despite how totally corny they are. Shame that I've heard the rest of the franchise after this sucks.

I really liked that one too. I think I watched it 15 years ago, when I was in my "humongous mecha" period, and I enjoyed it a lot more than Evangelion, that I had watched right before and, honestly, didn't like; I thought it was like "Evangelion but with cool surfers instead of annoying emos" lol.

For the funny anecdote, my habit of reading TVTropes after watching every series made me discover some real weird stuff, that shared common tropes with mecha anime without being mecha themselves, like Nanoha, which in turn started my "magical girls" phase (which didn't last long - not even long enough to watch the original Pretty Cure to the end).

Back to Eureka Seven - if you liked it, you might want to watch Bounen no Xamdo and Overman King Gainer too.

 

[ValiantTraveler]

Finished Eureka Seven. Good show, took until it was halfway through to really start doing things that weren't forgettable, and it's surprising how much its ideas work despite how totally corny they are. Shame that I've heard the rest of the franchise after this sucks.

I like Eureka Seven quite a bit. A shame they don't make 50-episode mecha shows anymore. It had a lot of original concepts and some dope animation. I didn't bother with the sequel and movies cause I, too, heard they're bad, but they have some cool mecha designs.

I really liked that one too. I think I watched it 15 years ago, when I was in my "humongous mecha" period, and I enjoyed it a lot more than Evangelion, that I had watched right before and, honestly, didn't like; I thought it was like "Evangelion but with cool surfers instead of annoying emos" lol.

For the funny anecdote, my habit of reading TVTropes after watching every series made me discover some real weird stuff, that shared common tropes with mecha anime without being mecha themselves, like Nanoha, which in turn started my "magical girls" phase (which didn't last long - not even long enough to watch the original Pretty Cure to the end).

Back to Eureka Seven - if you liked it, you might want to watch Bounen no Xamdo and Overman King Gainer too.

TVTropes can be a huge rabbit hole to fall into. It's easy to sink hours into the pages made for shows that you like.
Overman King Gainer was really cool too. Great opening and ending themes.

 

[Delphisage]

I use TVTropes a lot. The YMMV pages are my best source for what consensus opinions are across the internet.

Oh well, time to go back to being paralyzed in indecision for what to watch next. I've heard good stuff about Spice and Wolf, but I don't know if it's gonna meet my "Better than Naruto The Last" quota for romance, since E7 ultimately didn't. Until then, it's a whole lot of Regular Show and maybe Bleach if I cave in.

 

[STARSBarry]

Finished Eureka Seven. Good show, took until it was halfway through to really start doing things that weren't forgettable, and it's surprising how much its ideas work despite how totally corny they are. Shame that I've heard the rest of the franchise after this sucks.

Have you played Armored Core 6 yet? It's funny how mechs and coral feature in both of these.

But yes sadly just enjoy the what the show gave you, the rest of the franchise sucks.

Better to move onto brighter things, but as a mecha fan I did pick this up recently.

I like Eureka Seven quite a bit. A shame they don't make 50-episode mecha shows anymore. It had a lot of original concepts and some dope animation. I didn't bother with the sequel and movies cause I, too, heard they're bad, but they have some cool mecha designs.

This was one of the reasons I was disappointed in witch from mercury. The characters didn't get time to breathe because the plot had to happen, it needed anouther 24 episodes of being in the school so characters could be built up before throwing them all into the important shit. People don't give the audience time to connect with these shorter series, it's why Iron Blooded Orphans really grew on me, it had multiple characters focussed on and have growth which means that the ending hit that much harder.

Witch by comparison suffered because no one makes 50 episode mech animes anymore, and it shows.

 

[Pejo]

Any of you guys check out Dark Gathering? I've been enjoying it. Yayoi is a fresh breath of air for an anime protag, IMO. Funny and capable without being mary sue, and the show constantly subverts what I think is going on.

 

[Labolas]

Hey there's a new FOTNS announced.
https://www.animenewsnetwork.com/ne...f-the-north-star-manga-gets-new-anime/.202260

Any of you guys check out Dark Gathering? I've been enjoying it. Yayoi is a fresh breath of air for an anime protag, IMO. Funny and capable without being mary sue, and the show constantly subverts what I think is going on.

Nah, I haven't, I just have been reading manga. I'll be checking it out soon.

 

[DareDaniel]

I highly recommend Blood on the Tracks. Read it all in 2 nights, what a ride. Oshimi did it again. My 2nd favourite manga from this author, just behind Flowers of Evil, my favourite manga ever. Luckily his other manga, Welcome Back Alice, has also finished recently, I'll finally read that one too.

 

[Labolas]

I Am A Hero by Hanazawa Kengo

Welp, finished another manga. And boy, this was quite the ride.

Synopsis (from Manganelo): Hideo Suzuki is a thirty-five year old mangaka assistant struggling to be the hero in his own life by breaking back into the lime light with a new serial all the while juggling his relationship with his girlfriend and his own delusions. However, as hard as Hideo may try, the world seems to have a different set of plans for him; sinister and dark machinations that completely overturn his reality as he knows it.

I initially read the comic a few years back and didn't get back to it. Now I have come back to finish reading it and there's a new epilogue released for it and I have to say it does have a great but bittersweet end to it. What brought me back to reading the manga was watching the movie. While the live adaptation is somewhat decent, it doesn't hold a candle to the original source material. All the characters are NOT virtually good people, all of them say and do some despicable things in some fashion, in short, they all are morally gray characters and the manga is better for it. Unlike the manga, the movie does make Hideo (the main character), a cowardly character, but is relatively a good moral character. Not to say that the manga counterpart doesn't do any good or moral but he definitely isn't some moral compass. I will say I did like parts of the movie but it's mostly how the zombies look in it, beyond that it's a typical zombie movie from Japan.

The characters are really fleshed out and are given a lot of characterization. You have Hideo who is trying to break out to become a big mangaka but struggles with his mental deficiencies and is stuck being a manga assistant. Hiromi is another character that gets introduced early on in the story. She's a high school whom Hideo finds in a forest and while she may appear as a pure high school girl, she does have dark impulses as seen throughout the course of the manga. Other characters that Hideo interacted with early on in the story pop up again and sometimes interconnect with Hideo or other characters.

The story, like I said earlier, has characters dealing with the zombie apocalypse and sometimes their paths intersect with other characters. That's what I appreciated about this manga is how it connects the little things in the story without making it grandiose. While the zombies themselves started off as typical zombies, later on, the infection becomes something much more and it's hinted throughout what it might be. Also it was quite funny some people react to zombies and get infected. Hideo, I found to be more cowardly and delusional compared to the live adaptation. Hell, you can even call him a pervert because he does perv on Hiromi, a highschooler. But it was handled in a really mature and adult way. Man, a lot of the characters' situations are handled really well. But to Hideo and other characters, I have to give Hanazawa props, he made compelling characters, hell, he made a compelling manga.

The art. The art is something I can see some people not really liking. I will admit it took me a minute to adjust to how the characters are designed in this. The characters, while they do look realistic, are drawn with very exaggerated expressions that often look ugly compared to other modern manga characters. Even the more good looking characters are drawn like this as well. Especially when they're transforming into zombies. A character like Oda comes to mind, who is better looking than most of the characters in the manga but sometimes drawn with an exaggerated expression and looks kinda silly. But in my opinion, that's part of the manga's charm and I even come to really appreciate the artstyle. Reminds me of Dragon Head. But to me, the best part of the art would be the background, exterior, and paneling. I really love how great the landscape of Japan looks in this. From the mountains and the forest areas to the buildings, they look great. The paneling is so dynamic. Especially when there's action. Like how Hideo reloads his shotgun. Very kinetic. Easy to follow and keeps the reader engaged.

Oda, the blond girl in the panel, is drawn even more expressive than this and I can see that turning some people off.

Overall, I could not put this down. Despite having over 200 chapters, it didn't feel that long and I ended up finishing it within 2 days. The epilogue helped put a really good ending to this story and is much better for it. This is a fantastic manga, I haven't been engaged by a manga like this since King of Eden. Easily the best zombie manga out there. I can not recommend it enough. 9.2/10 (finished)

Positives:
+a lot of characters that are relatively grounded and are believable
+one of best zombie stories out there
+Engaging, never a dull moment
+some of the reveals and inner dialogue is really interesting

Negatives:
-how characters look may turn some people off

Other manga recommendations: 20th Century Boys, King of Eden, Gantz

I really do like seeing spreads like this. So damn good.

 

[SlimeGooGoo]

Studio Ghibli acquired by Nippon Television

Netflix/Disney diversity live actions incoming.