I’ve decided to make another post on the anime I have watched and anime I’m currently watching. However, unlike previous posts, I will not discuss the entirety of the anime I’m currently watching, but instead I will comment on the reactions of anime watchers on certain anime (or their reception). I will also open the vault in this post to give my thoughts on a pre-2011 anime.
Winter 2017 Anime
First, I’d like to discuss the latest episode (as of writing) of Miss Kobayashi’s Dragon Maid. There are three parts to this episode. The first part involves Riko inviting Kanna to her house… and telling her to bring the maid as well as the Saikawa maid wants to speak to Tohru. When they arrive (along with Kobayashi), it turns out that the Saikawa maid, Georgie, is actually a maid otaku like Kobayashi. The main issue many viewers had with this part was the significant yuri undertones between Kanna and Riko (I won’t go into the details, but a game of Twister is included). The point the viewers made was that Kanna is supposed to be a child in dragon terms (even if she is actually older than Kobayashi), and acts the part (unlike the commonly-used trope of the “seven-hundred-year-old loli”, where said character often acts like an adult), and Riko is a child, which makes the scenes rather uncomfortable for many to watch.
The second part is the “busty woman with young boy” thing the original author tends to use, while the third part involves the two male charaters. I found the two parts to be rather okay (the third part, with Fafnir getting used to living with Takiya… and playing video games nearly the entire day, I liked better). I only discussed the first part as it is clearly the most controversial, due to the aformentioned scenes.
Now, I will discuss an anime I’m not watching (but rather, its reception, and the reaction to its reception). If you haven’t noticed, in Japan, Kemono Friends has exploded in popularity, something which has baffled Western anime fans. This blog post discusses the anime itself and the possible reasons it has become popular, but from what I know from those Westerners who have watched it, the reception of the anime has been mixed, and lukewarm at best. Indeed, on MyAnimeList, as of writing, the anime only has an average rating of around 5.0 (below the midpoint of 5.5; only one anime in the same season has a lower average rating) and only four thousand members (in comparison, the second season of Konosuba has nearly 150k, and Miss Kobayashi’s Dragon Maid has 77k).
From what I’ve heard from those who’ve watched it, the main criticisms related to things like the CGI and animation (and one person mentioned the voice acting), and those who couldn’t stand the animation dropped it almost immediately. However, some who’ve stuck with it were able to find some good points about it. I haven’t watched it, so I can’t comment on these opinions.
I only found out how popular it became after seeing that several manga artists whom I follow, such as Shōtarō Tokuno (New Game!) and Kaori Hanzawa (Comic Girls), were tweeting about it, and the number of related drawings on Pixiv increased dramatically. Namori (YuruYuri) herself drew fanart of it.
The Vault
Finally, the vault. I may not open the vault for every anime-related post, but the vault is a chance for me to give my thoughts to any anime which have aired before 2011.
The anime I will be reviewing in this section is Kanamemo. Based on the manga by Shōko Iwami, it aired in the Summer 2009 season and lasted 13 episodes. It follows a young girl named Kana Nakamachi, whose parents died well before the beginning of the story, and at the beginning, her grandmother had recently passed away as well, leaving her by herself. As she is left without a guardian, she cannot even get a job to allow her to fend for herself, until she enters the Fuhshin Gazette. It is there where she finds not only a way to make a living as a newspaper girl, but also a place to live.
The anime has a fair amount of comedy, often involving the quirky individuals of the Fuhshin Gazette. It also features an actual romantic relationship between two girls (namely, Yume and Yuuki). However, a fair amount of the story is dedicated to the challenges faced by the main character, ranging from things as mundane as learning to ride a bicycle, to things such as moving on after her grandmother’s death. The Fuhshin Gazette also has its own backstory, involving a young woman (Marimo) who once worked for them as a newspaper girl, and who left.
Overall, I enjoyed this anime. I really liked the character-to-character interactions, particularly those involving Haruka (whose lolicon tendencies at one point ended up with her tied up and sitting in front of a police officer). The characters all had their quirks (for example, the chief, Saki, is an elementary schoolgirl who takes things seriously and seems too mature for her age). There were also moments I found heartwarming, in particular episode 8, which is a flashback episode that shows that, despite what Saki thinks about Marimo, she still cares for her enough to go out at night, in the snow, just to find Marimo, who went missing. The art style might deter some people (mainly due to the eyes), but I found it cute. I’d give this anime an A.
One thing I noticed is that the anime deviates from the manga in several details. For one thing, they changed Kana’s personality somewhat, and made a more realistic interpretation on how she handled her grandmother’s death. They also cut out most of the school scenes, and had six anime-original episodes.
I might do another vault review in the future, but to be honest, I haven’t watched that many old anime, and currently, my progress through my backlog is extremely slow. So it’ll be a while before I do another one (in fact, I finished watching Kanamemo months ago).
That will be all for now.
P.S. Happy birthday to Aoi Yukimura of Encouragement of Climb!