It is at least anime-adjacent. The actual definition of anime can get blurry sometimes and debates have been had over whether a show like Avatar the Last Airbender is an anime or not. I am glad that you enjoyed the show! When it comes to a form of media like anime, there are as many different types/genres of anime as there are any other medium, so it can get tough to find something that clicks right away. If somebody asks me for recommendations to start getting into anime, I usually ask them what kinds of shows/movies they already like and then pick anime in a similar genre or with similar themes.

Also, Time of Eve sounds really interesting.

This past week, I didn't really have too much time to keep up with seasonal stuff. I still haven't watched the latest episodes of Kanojo mo Kanojo or Dekoboko Majo. Also, I haven't yet had a chance to check out either Pluto or The Apothecary Diaries. I have time off around Thanksgiving (in the US), so hopefully can catch up on stuff then.

For non-seasonal stuff this past week. I did manage to finish the first season of Zombie Land Saga. Overall it was really enjoyable. I do think it started the season off stronger than it ended, but there was a nice plot reveal pertaining to Kotaro to end the season that makes me excited for the second season (when I get a chance).

Finally, I am still slowly working through Rurouni Kenshin 2023. Just got to Sano's introduction and really feel like they are taking their time with the pacing. I am not really sold on whether it is a good thing or not, but the show feels unnecessarily slow sometimes. I am torn on whether this is a good thing or bad thing though. I suspect that it just feels slow right now since it is still early in the story and this beginning portion is just not very strong. But that the slow pacing will pay off later in the story when the action picks up. Time will tell!

@ram@lemmy.ca if you would be so kind as to do the pinning once again.

The spoiler is rendered correctly in lemmy-ui and in Jerboa. However, it is not really a standard markdown way of doing spoilers and completely prevents inline spoilers. I really wish lemmy did spoilers with the >!spoiler here!< syntax.

edit: Looks like lemmy won't even allow the < character at all inside a code block. Lots of rough edges to lemmy's markdown syntax.

We have begun the next arc now featuring fan favorite John Smith; Cid's most recent alter-ego in which he fancies himself a super secret agent tasked to destroy and then rebuild Mitsugoshi. I actually think the anime did a pretty good job of motivating his actions here. I remember the first time I read the LNs I was a bit confused as to why Cid decided to destroy Mitsugoshi. If you are confused, his thinking is basically this:

• Mitsugoshi have become too successful too quickly, making enemies of established powerful entities like the Major Corporation Alliance (MCA)
• Being an upstart, Mitsugoshi won't survive the fight against the MCA
• So, in order to save his friends (Shadow Garden), he plans on destroying both Mitsugoshi and the MCA and reforming under a new name with the help of Yukime and her resources in the Lawless City
• This conveniently puts him at the top of the new organization where he can directly make lots of money instead of his friends making money off of his ideas
  • It is important to remember that Cid doesn't realize that all of Mitsugoshi's money can be his if he asked. He just thinks that Gamma et al are running a business off his ideas but still play "pretend fight the cult as Shadow Garden" with him at night sometimes
• All the while, he is hiding his identity as John Smith from Shadow Garden because...it's cooler that way, duh

The anime also certainly added quite a bit of Delta fanservice this episode. I especially like the bit where he was mindlessly feeding her his food from the counter. Additionally, we got a tiny bit of Delta's backstory through her meeting her brother. If there is one complaint I have about this series, it is that I wish we knew more about the Shadow Garden girls and their backstories. We have gotten some glimpses here and there (especially if you include mobile game content), but there is a ton more that could be told.

The ED this week is sung by Mayu Minami (voice of Kai). We also briefly saw Kai (along with Omega, Nu, and Alpha) when they sprung their sting operation in the cold open of the episode.

Welp, can't say you couldn't see it coming. I hope everybody is strapped in for what looks to be a fifth full episode of Helck's backstory. Maybe the strategy was to have the giant exposition dump this far into the story so that you keep watching out of a sunken cost fallacy. This is such a huge chunk of the story, it might have just made more sense to start the story with young Helck/Cless and tell the story chronologically.

A whole chapter devoted to the leader of Urumin's group. This is the kind of backstory that the author can spend time to tell now that the story is serialized. I have recently been watching Zombie Land Saga and Airu here reminds me of Saki from that show. They are both former delinquents and the leaders of their respective groups.

It was also nice to see our brave MC Kimiya on the last page. He must have been a fan from the very early days.

This past week saw probably my favorite episode of Frieren yet (Episode 7). That show keeps delivering each and every week. I went back and re-read part of the source to see how far it has adapted so far and the current episode ended partway through chapter 15. So, that means that they have only adapted 14.5 manga chapters in 7 full episodes. For some perspective, the most recent Frieren chapter published was 115. Incredible show with probably one of my favorite EDs in recent memory. If you have yet to check it out, I cannot recommend it enough.

The other thing I watched this past week I wanted to mention is Suzume no Tojimari. I am a bit late on checking it out as I wanted to wait and watch it together with my wife and our schedules don't often align in a way to watch a whole movie together (she works more on weekends while I work during the week). I had two main takeaways I wanted to discuss. First, the movie is absolutely gorgeous. If you are a fan of animation as an artistic endeavour, then this movie is right up your alley setting everything else aside.

The second thing is that I felt the story really let down the rest of the movie. Keeping this general and spoiler-free, there are too many things the story was trying to accomplish in too little time. So, it never really spent long enough on any particular story beat or explained things enough to make the viewer get invested. I have lots of thoughts about this, but don't have the energy to write it all out. Overall, and this might sound harsh, I thought Suzume was kind of like the anime version of Avatar (the movie). Everything about its production was stunning, but the plot didn't live up to the rest of the audio-visual sensory experience happening on screen.

I know that second take is kind of spicy given the overwhelmingly positive reception the movie has received, so happy to elaborate behind spoiler tags below.

@ram@lemmy.ca, @N3DSdude@lemmy.ml would it be possible to pin again?

I think that if they mess with his brother he could snap pretty easily. One of the only things we knew about Helck in the early part of the season is that he was supposed to have killed his brother. So, I fully expect the humans to force some kind of confrontation between Helck and Cless or just kill Cless and frame Helck so that Helck doesn't spread the truth about the demons.

I had to look up Yuzuki Family as that show was not even on my radar for this season. There are so many shows coming out each season that it is hard to keep up. On the flip side, that usually means that you can always find a couple shows that really click with you each season. It certainly sounds wholesome from the synopsis. Might be one to queue up when it's been a while since I talked with my brother.

Are you watching Trigun (1998) or Trigun Stampede (2023)? My wife loves Trigun and we are planning on watching it soon (working through another show right now). However, she was really put off by Stampede's art style and gave it a pass.

In my opinion, Your Name is an excellent movie. I am not sure how much you know, but if possible, I would recommend going in as blind as you can. I have read some reviews that criticize the plot being convoluted or full of holes, but I feel like a lot of those come from a place of wanting to be contrarian for the sake of it. There is a reason it has 98% on RT and is #1 most popular title on AniList. Also, if you are a fan of animation as an art, the movie is absolutely gorgeous.

Enjoy!

I hadn't heard of Only Yesterday previously and it definitely looks interesting. Glad to hear you are soldiering on through your HBO Max catalog and that you are enjoying Eminence! They have really done the adaptation well through enhancing the humor through anime-only additions. Looking forward to some of the upcoming arcs which are some fan favorites.