First Impressions: Anime of Spring 2017

- WARNING: THE FOLLOWING POST MAY CONTAIN SPOILERS -

We back in it.

MyAnimeList
Final Thoughts: Anime of Spring 2017

Zoom Zoom Guys:
Eromanga-sensei
Re:Creators
Renai Boukun
Rokudenashi Majutsu Koushi to Akashic Records
Saenai Heroine no Sodatekata Flat

Eromanga-sensei (1/?)

I Rate: 7.4
One Sentence: Like a better OreImo (the MC is a Kyousuke clone).

You know what, this isn't half bad. Despite the weak willed main character, obvious loli pandering, and uncanny similarities to OreImo, I think Eromanga-sensei could go somewhere. Granted, I think it's more probable that it won't, but I found myself enjoying the first episode more than I thought I would.

Let's begin with the art. I like the clean and conservative style that the show uses, and the animation seems to be of good quality as well. There wasn't anything that I noticed in particular about the soundtrack, but some say that no news is good news. The characters are pretty shallow and I don't have high hopes that they'll have massive development later on, but Sagiri can be funny sometimes.

Yeah I don't know why I gave this such a high score. That's alright.

Best Girl: the girl who literally shut herself in her room for one year


Re:Creators (1/22)

I Rate: 8.1
One Sentence: Art from UBW, music from Aldnoah.Zero, and a story line that makes me feel like I've been playing too much FE: Heroes come together to make a great pilot.

The premise in Re:Creators is a little spin-off of what we've been seeing a lot lately: main character is suddenly transported to a random world and is forced to adapt and resolve some sort of conflict. Instead our main character, Souta, bears witness to characters from his favourite anime coming to life in his world. Re:Creators starts off with my favourite pilot of the season. We get a little taste of everything, from some incredible animation in several fight scenes to an epic and fitting soundtrack.

The one part where I felt the anime falter in was its characters. Celestia undergoes a very drastic change in a matter of minutes, and for no apparent reason. It's also quite bizarre to see how quickly the anime characters adapt to their new world, seeing as they can recognize and express a desire to purchase what should be foreign goods and snacks.

All in all, I'm hoping that the longer season for Re:Creators will help remedy some the lack of depth and development in characters. The story is certainly interesting and all the other elements for a strong show are present, now it's time to sit and have faith.

Best Girl: Celestia for reasons other than her costume


Renai Boukun (1/12)

I Rate: 7.2
One Sentence: Story is fun and the gag humour works occasionally, but Renai Boukun is easily forgotten.

Renai Boukun is a comedy that is definitely out there. From the first episode alone we're greeted with the Love Note, a not-so-angelic angel, a yandere who can duel wield kukris (I'm not sure what they are), and a step-sister with incestual feelings towards the yandere.

If the characters each represented a television they would all be flatscreens.

No comment on the music. I kinda dislike the art, but maybe it'll take some getting used to. It just doesn't look very clean and I am definitely not a fan of the eyes. To be honest, I don't like the character designs in general. I don't particularly like the VAs either. There's a lot of stuff I don't like basically.

Watch it if you want to see if it will make you laugh, but I don't think you'll feel like you get those 5 hours of your life back after you finish it all. Who knows though, maybe I'll be wrong and it'll blow my socks off.

Best Girl: Akane - she's pretty crazy, but then again everybody else is


Rokudenashi Majutsu Koushi to Akashic Records (1/12)

I Rate: 7.3
One Sentence: Meta comedy won't save the overdone and boring "single guy in a magic school full of skimpily dressed female students."

While I think it's kinda neat that Glenn is a somewhat of a "bad" main character, I don't think that can save what Rokudenashi Majutsu Koushi to Akashic Records is at its fundamentals. From what I've seen in the first episode (and the school uniforms themselves), there isn't a whole lot going for it. Actually, it can be funny sometimes.

The art is pretty standard, and so is the music. As for the characters... well, you get what you came for, asides from Glenn. You have your "ojou-sama" from a super prestigious family that has ties with the academy, then you have the sidekick, who tends to be one of the better and more likable personalities later on, and then you have some sort of mysterious older lady who is some sort of magic god but doesn't get a whole lot of mention besides being the reason why this strange and improbable situation even exists. Anyhoo. Yeah.

As of the time of this posting (the show is on its third week), ratings on MAL are pretty high so maybe something great happens in the next episode.

Best Girl: Lumia cause Sistine sure isn't getting it


Saenai Heroine no Sodatekata Flat (1/11)

I Rate: 8.3
One Sentence: Man I'm so glad this got a second season.

If you were a fan of the first season of Saekano, the second season is a must watch. The pilot gives a very refreshing change of pace, and the majority of the episode is dedicated to learning the backstory of the intense rivalry between Utaha and Eriri. I'm excited to see if the anime takes a more serious approach with the relationships between the characters, but in the end I think that's a tall task for 11 episodes.

The very clean and vibrant art style returns for this season, and the opening is my favourite for this season. The characters are all your specific archetypes, but in my humble opinion, they're done exceptionally well and have grown past their cookie cutter stage.

Alrighty time to wrap up this post and go watch the second episode of Saekano Flat, I can't put it off any longer. Goodbye, and see you next time!

Best Girl: KAAAAASUUUUMIGAOOOOOOOKA UTAHA (but actually, she got a lot of time with Tomoya for the fan service episode)

Real(ish) Talk

Buckle up because this is going to be some of the worst writing you've ever read

First of all, it's pretty surreal that I'm actually writing a post a day after I put one up. I'm not sure what's gotten into me, but guess it's best to ride out the wave and go with the flow. Anyways, slap on this song that I've been listening to the past two weeks and let's gooooooooooooooooooooooooooo!!!

Assumptions

Let us dip back to last Sunday afternoon. Every Sunday I work a full day (nine hours) at a sushi restaurant, and while it can be tiring and affect me negatively, it's good for the most part. Anyways, enough about that.

Our place, like many others, run a special, where you can choose any three items and get a miso soup with it for around $10. A group comes in with three adults and four kids, and the waitress I was working with tends to them. I don't know what I do for the next few minutes or so, but she has taken their order and asks me to help her prep and serve miso soup to that table.

She asks me to prep five full bowls and two bowls that are half full. When I ask her why the two bowls are to be half full, she responds that they are for the kids. Anyways, I'm left to my task and also thoughts about whether what I am doing aligns with my moral compass. It's humiliating, but from this one thing I started thinking negatively of my workplace.

With the whole thing still not sitting well with me, I run to the computer, where the Point of Sale (POS) system and all the orders are, and see that there are only five lunch specials on the order. It turns out that the two small miso soups had been requested by the customer, and as far as I'm aware, the waitress hadn't charged her for it.

I'm not sure what I'm trying to say, maybe there's something profound like, "Even the slightest doubt can ruin a perfect track record," or even, "Assuming isn't good for you dude," but I don't know. Take what you will from this little anecdote. To me I discovered how much impact and change can be caused by an assumption.

Don't stop (not that you can)

I've been looking back at my posts (to get ready for my Student-Led Presentation, which is tomorrow!) and I have to say, there's not a whole lot keeping me from razing everything down to the floor. There's a lot of embarrassing content, but hey, it was me who wrote it.

In a serious light though, I think that one goal that I need to become a better and stronger person is to be able to fully embrace the more cringey parts of my past. Sometimes I try to write posts with the intention to make it as cringe-proof as possible, but maybe that's not what I'm supposed to do.

Maybe it's just some wonderfully beautiful way of living life. Maybe it's about the struggle, and maybe when I feel embarrassed about other posts, it's a good thing because I feel motivated to one up myself. So yeah, don't stop doing what you're doing. Quite possibly you're already doing that, and I'm just the weak one. Embrace as much of yourself as you can, take it, and own it.

Maybe I'm just dumb and this all has no meaning to you.

Thank you for reading.

Updates (Part 72?)

Wait, what? There's another post this soon??@@>#?
I don't know why, but this morning I just felt like writing up a high quality blog post for my dearest readers. But yeah, I'm pretty much going off an impulse here, so the writing is going to be horrendous (as usual).

Anyways, it's nice to have you back! Much like a random teenage boy writing a post for a blog that he has kept running for several years for whatever reason, I will write a post for my blog that I have kept running for several years for whatever reason.

It's coming (Anime of Winter)!
I stated in Summer 2016 Final Thoughts that I was considering to stop the anime reviews for a bit, at least until everything calmed down a bit. Now things are much more certain, in terms of school, uni, and extracurriculars. I've been accepted to both of the places I applied, so now all that's left is for me to enjoy the last few months of high school and try my best to keep my marks up.

With that said, you can expect an overview of the upcoming winter anime coming up in the next week or two (the second season of Saekano isn't airing until a week from now, so it'll probably be two weeks until the post).

Spring Break
It's been a week since spring break but I gotta say, it was a fantastic way for me to kinda "reset" and approach the rest of the school year with a fresh breath. I got to lounge around home all day, I went out a few times, and I just had a really nice, carefree break.

Students' Council was also planning our event, Striker, during the break, and that ended today, so it really does feel like I've dropped off quite a bit of baggage.

That's All!
I'm going to try for a post tomorrow, but knowing me there's a good chance it won't be up. Tomorrow is going to be a pretty good day for me, since I'm off on a French field trip for more than half the day, I get to come back to a relaxing fourth block, and then there's ultimate practice. Pray for no rain.

Uni Bound!

I've been accepted!
We maaaaaaade it! In mid-February I received an admission offer from SFU and just about a week ago I got an offer from UBC out of the blue! When I received my SFU offer I started writing up a post on it, but I never got around to finishing it.

It's been a surreal and thrilling experience this whole time. The amount of immense relief that flooded my body when I got my first offer was incredible, and I could hardly contain my excitement when I got contacted by UBC.

My parents are super thrilled to see that I'm headed off to university very soon (crazy how it's coming in just a few months), and I'm glad that I could do at least this much for them. I have no idea how I'm going to go from a comfortable high school existence to one with lots of new places and people, but it's definitely something to look forwards to.

On a sadder note
I'm pretty sure I've talked about the difficulties I'm having with Students' Council at least once, but if not, well, now you know I have difficulties with the group. With the development of me getting into university, I've been struggling to find a reason to not give up with the group.

A large part of it comes from the general atmosphere from Students' Council: nonchalant, uninterested, and far too reserved. I wonder what happened to the sparky group that was present a few months ago, and at this point I wonder what I've done to create such a dead collection of students.

I'll be honest as well: I haven't been putting in as much dedication to Students' Council as I used to. I find myself forgetting to fulfill some duty or obligation and while I'm tempted to use the excuse that I'm naturally forgetful, I know that I should be prioritizing my responsibilities on council more.

I don't know. It's difficult to find a reason to not give up.

Until next time
Sorry for not posting anything lately. It's been a blur since the last time you heard from me, and I'm pretty sure that I didn't write anything for Februrary, so that kinda sucks. Anyhoo, off I go to wallow and brood for a bit. Hope everything's going well for you, and if not, hopefully it'll turn out fine.

January update!

Hey there! Today I'll be dropping in and throwing together a little post to keep you updated! It's been extremely busy lately, more than ever, and my last few days of high school are just burning away. My grade 12 year has been so much different than any of my previous years, and it's a surreal experience to be in the middle of it all. I'll also be using this post to kinda look at everything and take a breather, so hopefully both of us finish this post more knowledgeable.

School
My courses are pretty decent this semester, I consistently get homework from one of my three classes and usually it's not too bad to finish. Computer programming, while it isn't providing the growth and education that I sought, is a good block to unwind and relax. Physics is a challenging course that requires a lot of dedication and effort into the work that you do, but I've been doing surprisingly well! English is where I'm most worried because my mark isn't as high as I'd like it to be and it may dip even more after the provincial exam. Not sure what to expect next semester, but I'll get through it all.

Grad stuff
On top of the regular classes all grads are expected to fill a whole bunch of requirements for graduating: graduation transitions, 30/90 hours of work experience, and student-led interviews to name the biggest ones. This winter break I just completed my 90 hours so I'll be looking to finish off my grad trans sometime soon and be free! Not sure what to expect from student-led, but from what I hear it isn't that bad and it's definitely not something I should be worrying about right now.

Uni stuff
Right now I'm applied to UBC and SFU, and I don't think I'll be trying for any other place. I applied to the science and applied sciences faculties for both schools, however I applied for early admission for UBC, so I'm really hoping that I'll get an early offer. It would really take a load off my shoulder, instill some confidence in me, and give me a very realistic goal to work towards. My application to SFU is completed, however my Major Entrance Scholarship application for them is not.

Lacking
Recently I have been feeling like a mediocre Students' Council member, and even as a student. There are some people around me who are doing some really cool and profound things and I'm kinda just flopping around going by each day. It sounds sad, but right now I've settled for mediocrity and I'm not pushing myself nearly as much as I could be. Somewhere my drive and motivation was lost, and I'm having trouble finding it. It's one of my biggest problems at the moment, if not the largest, but now that I've written it out and accepted it in a way, it feels better.

That's all!
I'm going to wrap up this post and prepare for a nice long sleep - at least until I have to get up and get ready for a day of work. I'm working on a weekly basis and it really takes a chunk out of me, physically and mentally. A long and tiring day of work has me starting the school week fatigued and a one day weekend isn't the greatest to look forward to. However I think that even working such a small amount (compared to those employed full-time) is an amazing way of stepping into a different pair of shoes, and it really does help me appreciate the hours of work my parents put in. They don't get the simple pleasure of freedom after 3:00 p.m., let alone the weekend off.

Sorry for keeping you here even though I said I was going to end the post! Until next time my friend.