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Forums - Movies & TV - Super Official Anime Discussion Thread

Okay, so, the past few days, I started watching an anime called Dog Days to take care of the wait between the few seasonal shows I'm waiting to finish out. It has three seasons, and apparently the last season was actually part of the previous winter anime season after a 2.5 year hiatus. I find I have a lot to say about this particular show, so here's a full mini-review that covers each season. I apologize in advance for the wall of text. There are no plot spoilers, so no spoiler tags necessary.

As a note, Dog Days is an anime first and foremost. It is an original work made for television, and that means there is no source material it is working off of. There is no material to draw a comparison to, so I'll simply talk about each season individually kind of as their own volumes.

Season 1: WOW. SERIOUSLY GOOD. Season one was very well done. Not top tier stuff, but definitely worth watching. I was surprised at how good it was. The season is strongly focused on Cinque (later Shinku) who gets transported from modern day Japan to a fantasy world, his growth as a hero in a world that treats war as an athletic festival, and his budding romances with several of the animal girls of Biscotti. The season ends on a high note with a dramatic battle, and has a nice plot woven through it from beginning to end. There is a goal, and that goal is reached in a great way. It finishes out with an emotional yet happy ending, opening the door for future seasons.

Season 2: Okay. At this point, we start introducing more characters into the mix, and the now spelling changed Shinku taking more of a backseat. He's still somewhat prominent as his budding romances become numerous enough to be considered a harem. Overall though, he is around less to a noticeable degree, the season is sillier, and even with the main goal, it doesn't feel important. It does get credit for still having a central plot though from beginning to end. I just wish there was more focus on Shinku and his fighting. This is also the season where fan service becomes less of a side thing and more of a focus.

Season 3: Shinku? Where did you go, Shinku? Our first hero takes too much of a backseat in a season with no central plot to push it along. The season starts with a bang, then quickly fizzles down to a decent mix of action, comedy, and fan service galore, by far trumping the amount in the first two seasons combined. Some episodes were certainly better than others, and the final arc seriously disappointed me for basically being a rip off of other material. Seriously though, I missed having Shinku be a central character, and one of the primary supporting characters that fought alongside him, Eclair from seasons one and two, is all but completely gone. The season was too directionless with new characters and fan service attempting to make up for a lack of plot.

Season three is really only bearable because of the foundation from seasons one and two. Without it, season three never would have stood on its own. Honestly, even season two is only really bearable because of the foundation from season one.

For an overall rating, I'd say that 7.3 is fairly accurate. If I had to rate each season individually-

Season 1: 8/10
Season 2: 7.4/10
Season 3: 6.8/10

As an original work, it started off with a lot of promise, but the fact that only one season was ever really planned becomes increasingly obvious as the show ceases to have any real direction past the first season. They begin inserting more characters and fan service to make up for the lack of a season long plot that can exclusively focus on the once primary MC. These new characters aren't nearly fleshed out enough for me to really care about them, and only make me more disappointed that the main hero gets relegated to support character levels of screen time so that these useless characters can have screen time instead.

Ultimately, if there is a season four, I hope, I really hope, that they change direction, focus more on Shinku, and get a good central plot going that actually feels like it has some impact and relevance. There is definitely a downward slope for quality and enjoyment, but they haven't completely pushed me away yet. If they make a season four that is as lackluster, or somehow even worse than season three, they will have completely lost me.

Maybe it's best if they quit before they're too far behind.



 

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Ka-pi96 said:
Versus_Evil said:
Ka-pi96 said:
Versus_Evil said:


Crunchy roll.

For an 'uncensored' anime there seems to be a whole lot of censorship... dropped!

Are you watching the correct version? They have both censored and non censored.

Oh, that explains it. The uncensored version is for premium members only. Guess I'll just keep hating on crunchy roll then


Hmm, is that everything is censored on there? ugh.



I watch My Wife is the Student Council President for...reasons. My illicit streaming sites of choice have been hosting it uncensored since episode one, so it all works out for me.



 

Non Non Biyori will be missed. It was my weekly dose of happy. Both seasons were excellent.

The new anime I followed this season were:

Wakaba Girl - very cute and endearing.
Joukamachi no Dandelion - Not bad, not great.
Classroom Crisis - Quite surprised and pleased with how different this turned out. Not what I expected.
Shimoneta - Interesting. Got a little annoying at times but it had an awesome twist.
Rokka - I enjoyed it. It was different from the battle anime I expected, which was nice.
Sore ga Seiyuu - Nice and enjoyable.
Overlord - Kind of strange, kind of interesting. I can't even tell if I like it yet.
Monster Musume - Not really that good but I liked some of the characters. I'm pro-centaur.
Akagami no Shirayuki-hime - Really nice heroine. A bit preachy but still relaxing.
Jitsu wa Watashi wa - Best new comedy by far.

Continued to follow:
Cinderella Girls - Quite good.
Gintama - Absolutely hilarious.
Miss Monochrome - Peachy.
Working - YAMADA.
One Piece - Awesome.
Kyoukai no Rinne - It's relaxing and I love the heroine.

Dropped:
God Eater - It's not even bad, I just lost interest somewhere. Might watch later on.
GATE - I've read a lot of the manga but, honestly, it has a lot of problems, such as being an ad for the JSDF.
Prison School - Read a lot of the manga and there are things that I hate about it.
Charlotte - I can't stand writing where the author doesn't care if anything makes sense.
Aoharu x Kikanjuu - It was okay, might pick it back up.
Ushio to Tora - It was so ... standard. Might try again later.
Himouto Umaru Chan - I loathe Umaru.
Ranpo Kitan - Lost track somehow, might pick it back up.

Also, I've dropped Fairy Tail. Again. I want to like it. I like several of the side-characters. But, really, the show itself sucks. The writing isn't very good, the battles are disappointing and predictable, I hate Natsu so much, and I'm struggling not to hate Lucy.






Versus_Evil said:
Fairy Tale looks awesome but I just can't start an anime I'm hundreds of episodes behind, it's like a mental block.

I've watched most of Fairy Tale. It's....okay, I guess. Animation quality is noticeably sub-par, half the characters seriously suck, the characters that suck get 90% of the screen time, two characters are stupidly OP from the very beginning, the story is a lot of power of friendship tripe, and some of the action scenes are seriously lazily animated.

Overall, it's really only a 6.5/10 for me, and I usually really like shounen anime. I mean, god damn it, I've watched over 700 episodes of One Piece. Fairy Tale is just so meh.



 

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LuckyTrouble said:

I've watched most of Fairy Tale. It's....okay, I guess. Animation quality is noticeably sub-par, half the characters seriously suck, the characters that suck get 90% of the screen time, two characters are stupidly OP from the very beginning, the story is a lot of power of friendship tripe, and some of the action scenes are seriously lazily animated.

Overall, it's really only a 6.5/10 for me, and I usually really like shounen anime. I mean, god damn it, I've watched over 700 episodes of One Piece. Fairy Tale is just so meh.

Seriously, you'd think that an anime that's based around fighting would put some effort into making the battle sequences interesting.  Instead, they're like the definition of blah.  They're phoned in and cookie-cutter to the point that you know exactly what is going to happen.

I remember during the magic games arc, I was looking forward to the battle between Gray and that guy who could memorize the magic of others.  I mean, the guy was pretty bad-ass during the group stages.  So, of course, the guy beats the tar out of Gray, hitting all kinds of attacks on him.  Then, bam, Gray channels THE POWER OF FRIENDSHIP and knocks him out with ONE blow.  I was just like, really, what the fuck.

If it's Natsu, it's pretty much the same, except he'll say something about 'protecting Lucy's smile' or some such and eat the other guy's attack, even if it has NOTHING TO DO WITH FIRE.  It's just such a waste.  Every episode, I pray that Natsu dies and someone even slightly interesting takes his place.

As far as anime with hundreds of episodes, I used to be daunted by them, too.  I always avoided One Piece because of that.  Then one day, when my friend and I were looking for new anime to watch, we decided to give One Piece a try.  Now I envy people who have hundreds of episodes of One Piece to look forward to.  I wish I could forget the whole thing so I could watch it all again from scratch.  That's how good it is.



Versus_Evil said:

Been a great summer of anime for me. So what about you guys!?

Nice list! 

Mine isn't nearly as impressive, though I tend to only watch a few shows at a time. I'll likely watch some more of this season later on. I do read a lot more manga at the moment, though I won't get into much detail, since I imagine several people in this thread are anime-only fans.

What I watched (this season)

Charlotte: Technically this isn't over, but as of episode 12, I love it! Some plot holes here and there, but overall it was just a great experience. Plenty of feels, fun characters, and the OTP was superb. Definitely plan on rewatching this.

Rokka no Yuusha: I wouldn't say it was terrible, but overall, it didn't really leave much of an impact on me. I liked how it twisted the usual fantasy story, but most of the characters weren't all that interesting to me, and I didn't care for the way it ended. High points were Flamie and Hans, and Adlet's backstory. I liked it enough to keep watching, and likely to watch the next season if it comes out, so I suppose that's saying something. I don't plan on rewatching this season unless a new season calls for it.

What I watched (catching up)

Gintama: The humor style hits all the right notes with me. I'm moving through it pretty slowly, but I love it. 

Durarara: Moving slowly through this as well. Great story, though the huge cast of characters is a little bit hard to deal with. Kinda reminds of an anime version of Arrested Development, at least in terms of story structure.

Ouran High School Host Club: I watched this with a friend who loved it. It was a fun little story, with some nice shipping for me.

What I watched (misc.)

Toradora!: Decided to rewatch this at the beginning of the summer. One of my favorite rom-coms, and the ending still wrecked me even on the rewatch.

One Piece Films: Strong World, Z: Tbone recommended I try watching these, since I recently caught up on the manga, and apparently Oda produced these particular films. Both were great action flicks, though I liked Z a little more. I want to see which Shichibukai cut off Z's arm @_@

What I'm reading (told with emotes to avoid spoilers)

One Piece: @_@

Fairy Tail: :D

Seven Deadly Sins: ;_;

Bleach: -_-

Magi: @________@

Sinbad: o.o

Nisekoi: *_*

Ao no Exorcist: ? (I keep forgetting what happens cuz this is monthly)

Ouran High School Host Club: 8D (Technically this is over, but I heard how it ends and wanted to see my OTP form)

If I'm reading anything else, I can't remember it and probably isn't that important.



NNID: Zephyr25 / PSN: Zephyr--25 / Switch: SW-4450-3680-7334

I'll do mine on saturday, most of my shoes would have ended by then.



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LuckyTrouble said:

I've watched most of Fairy Tale. It's....okay, I guess. Animation quality is noticeably sub-par, half the characters seriously suck, the characters that suck get 90% of the screen time, two characters are stupidly OP from the very beginning, the story is a lot of power of friendship tripe, and some of the action scenes are seriously lazily animated.

Overall, it's really only a 6.5/10 for me, and I usually really like shounen anime. I mean, god damn it, I've watched over 700 episodes of One Piece. Fairy Tale is just so meh.

I don't watch the anime, so I don't know how well it's executed there, but I had a friend who quit the manga during the Magic Games arc, so I suppose I can't defend it too much. FT is definitely one of my top action shounen still...but it does take shounen tropes to the absolute limit. 

Still, I suppose I differ from you in that I really enjoy the majority of the cast, particularly the main trio (Natsu, Lucy, Happy). Erza sorta bothers me in the later arcs, though when she's not in ultra-nakama mode I don't really mind. Juvia is annoying, but mostly because I don't care for her character-type. Other than that, I find most of the cast pretty fun for the most part.

Arc-wise, it kinda jumps back and forth for me. Again, not sure where the anime is, but the next big arc after the Magic Games is one of my favorites in the series. The basic formula doesn't change too much, but it stands out for actually resolving one of the major plot points of the series, and even killing off several 2nd/3rd tier characters (vague spoiler, but I'll hide it for the benefit of anyone that's worried).

Still, it's hard to defend it all the time, especially with all the asspulls, but overall I still really enjoy it. The final arc has recently started in the manga, so it might be a good idea to wait and watch it all at once, if you care enough. Overall, FT is really similar to Hiro's previous work, Rave Master, for me. Lots of shonen tropes, loooots of asspull victories, but a great cast of characters, and some of the most emotional moments I've ever seen in a manga. Still...just my own opinion of course. :)



NNID: Zephyr25 / PSN: Zephyr--25 / Switch: SW-4450-3680-7334

Disappointing season overall, the last one was arguably better ...

The only anime this season that managed to meet my expectation was Gate ...

Gangsta is another mindless clone of Black Lagoon which is a series I already don't like ...

Gatchaman Crowds Insight is way less interesting than the first season and there's hardly any tension ...

God Eater, who doesn't know what I thought about it ?

Ranpo ? It's chuckle inducing and not in a good way ...

Rokka no Yuusha is the one on this list that came out the least disappointing but it had some pretty severe pacing/plot progression issues, only a couple characters got some development/background (Adlet and Fremy) and I still don't understand why some guys here hate the new character design ...

Overlord just surprised but I still don't have much of an impression of it ...

This is a pretty sour year for anime as far as I can remember ...