No Time for Shorts
GBS: Surprisingly, this season all of the simulcast short series struck out with me. There was no adorable cat (Poyopoyo), no cute android idol (Miss Monochrome). The three shorts I tried, Tonari no Seki-kun: The Master of Killing Time, Onee-chan ga Kita, and Strange+ all wound up being early drops, no more than an episode or two for each. Strange+ was just a little too…strange for my tastes and Onee-chan ga Kita was a one-joke borefest that was actively annoying. The whole brocon thing has really gotten out of hand, I think. Enough is enough, Japan. Please. As for Seki-kun, while I know many probably like hearing Kana Hanazawa being shrill every week for a few minutes, there’s a limit to that for me.
BM: I did follow both Wonder Momo and Robot Girls Z through to the end (while Crunchyroll rolled RGZ eps into 25-minutes bundles, it was broadcast in Japan as a short, so that’s what I’m classing it as). Momo was… awkward, is probably the best way to describe it – it felt very ‘off’ in its timing and presentation, and wasn’t what it could have been. Liked the idea, but not the execution. Robot Girls Z was a good amount of fun, though, with its rather daft premise helping rather than hindering.
GBS: Those two didn’t really come onto my radar, especially since Wonder Momo was a late pickup for streaming. I think I read over the premises and just passed over them.
The Magic Wasn’t All There, Either
GBS: It’s interesting how the magically-themed shows were hit or miss for me this season. While I still enjoy, though perhaps not quite as strongly with the later arcs, Strike the Blood and am fully on board with Witch Craft Works, the other two shows with strong magical presence, Magical Warfare and Wizard Barristers, struck out very quickly. Magical Warfare was a “one and done” show: the moment they were transported to an alternate world and all became magicians…I knew I had had enough. The other one had slightly more promise, but the problem I have with Wizard Barristers is that it bored me too quickly. I developed no interest in the characters, so I didn’t care what could happen to them. So I stopped watching.
BM: Wizard Barristers started with a bang, which immediately had me worrying it would follow the example of one of its director’s (Yasuomi Umetsu) previous outings, Mezzo DSA. That started with one of the most impressive opening episodes I think I’ve ever seen, but it quickly became clear that pretty much the entire budget had been blown on it, and it was all downhill from there. Wizard Barristers followed much the same pattern. I wanted to like it, but between the drop in excitement levels, the Magical Court seeming little more than a kangaroo court in the first place, and as you mention the lack of any real hook with the characters, my interest dropped rapidly. If we’re going to go through a “200 shows with a magic theme” phase, can we at least persuade Trigger to do a Little Witch Academia TV series..?
GBS: Amen to that last thought. That would be a nice follow up to Kill la Kill.
And, Seriously, Enough With the Brocon
GBS: I tried to watch Recently, My Sister is Unusual, but I just couldn’t keep up with it. The pervertedness was not a problem (though how in hell they got away with this stuff is slightly amazing). After 4 episodes, however, of seeing Hiyori try to take over Mitsuki in order to get into Yuya’s pants…I had to throw in the towel. At least Onee-chan ga Kita had the decency to keep it short. Recently compounded incest desire with “I’m going to wet myself” humor–if we can dignify that with the word humor–a little too much in its early episodes, which led to an early exit from my weekly watching list.
BM: Both shows were one-and-done for me. My Sister is Unusual in particular I couldn’t help but think should’ve just been made as a hentai series – would’ve been more up-front about what its main hook seemed to be (if I’d been writing headlines for one of the more salacious anime sites out there, it’d’ve been ‘Imouto Masturbation Anime!!’) and been able to skip any pretense at plot. Fine, there’s a chance it could’ve improved in subsequent episodes, but the first episode was scraping the bottom of the barrel so much I wasn’t going to bother any further. And in general: yes, enough with the brocon. That particular trend can’t wear itself out quickly enough.
