Still seems weird that 2019 is ending soon. Well, this weekend will be the weekend where I’ll be away in Edinburgh to attend the Scotland Loves Anime event. And as I keep saying, I’m looking forward to it so much. Not sure what I’m looking forward to the most; I’ll be catching some new movies (Weathering With You and Ride Your Wave being just some of them), and I’ll be meeting Studio Trigger staff who are busy touring the planet and promoting Promare. Well, I guess I’ll just wait and see. I’m also forgetting the fact that this is my first time going to Scotland.
Anyway, enough of that, time for some shows…and let’s start off with one that I’m hoping will get better over the coming weeks…
Azur Lane Episode 2
I’ll start with Azur Lane, and considering how disappointed I was with its opening episode, I was hoping that its second episode would end up faring better. Even if this week gave us some new characters – characters that are, apparently, popular names in the Azur Lane franchise – I’m not any more impressed than I was last week.
While the Eagle Union makes ‘repairs’ to their ships, the Iron Blood make their debut. Prinz Eugen and Z23 make an assault on a scout squadron, along with Sakura Empire’s Shoukaku and Zuikaku. And all while this is going on, Azur Lane’s reinforcements arrive, in the form of the rest of the Royal Navy.
I’d like to reiterate what I said last week about this show; these are very dull and unexciting characters to watch. This was the same complaint I had when I watched Kantai Collection. I think it was because there are so many ship girls for us to keep track of, we kind of lose focus on who are the ‘main characters’, if there are even meant to be ‘main characters’. One point, we’re meant to feel sorry for Javelin, Laffey and Unicorn, in how they can’t be moeblob buddies with Ayanami, and another point, we’re meant to follow how much Enterprise is pushing herself. Not even the hidden messages of “why are we fighting?” resonates too well in this show.
I don’t have a favorite ship girl here, and I don’t even have a favorite side to follow. Heck, I even had to look up online to remember the names of these ship girls – that’s how unexciting this show has become to me. And so if it’s going to keep on being like this for the rest of the season, is this going to be the first show I drop this year? I don’t like dropping shows, but I’m being pushed to the brink here.
We Never Learn S2 Episode 2
In this week’s episode of the new season of We Never Learn, we see the return of both Asumi and Kirisu-sensei; both of which have their own side-stories this week.
We begin with Asumi and her old position as a part-time maid to help her pay for her post-school tuition. We’re given the story that the cafe she works in is branching out into a new business venture: home housekeeping, and for some reason, Nariyuki is dragged into this, which can mean only one thing, being sent to the homes of the harem.
It’s Kirisu-sensei’s turn later on, and this little side-story came as a nice turn for me. In nearly all of the situation that Nariyuki and co. are put in, a lot of sex jokes are added to show us how much all of the girls are pining for him. When it comes to situations that wholly involve Kirisu-sensei, it’s usually different. Sure we can all joke at these crushes that Fumino, Rizu, Uruka and Asumi all have on Nariyuki, but at least the show recognizes that Kirisu is out-of-bounds…kind of.
I certainly don’t want to be reminded of how much Domestic Girlfriend liked to show the deep relationship that Natsuo and Hina had. Sure enough, Kirisu’s own friendship with Yuiga has developed into something much stronger as this franchise has gone on, and we can ship her and Nariyuki together all we like. I suppose she gets him because he understands what the responsibility of being a teacher is as much as she does (or likes to at least).
If you’re watching We Never Learn too, I’m curious to know who your Best Girl is. While I’ve enjoyed watching Fumino, my favorite often changes, and while it’s good that the show recognizes that a Nariyuki x Kirisu ship could never happen, giving her these mini-stories where the two of them interact in the way they do is still fun to watch.
There. I gave a good compliment to the show.
Houkago Saikoro Club Episode 2
On now to Houkago Saikoro Club, and what game am I to obsess about this week? Well let’s introduce our new semi-main character Shouta first: the token boy of the group who not only is a ‘childhood friend’ of Midori, but has a massive crush on Aya, who is completely oblivious to his very clear interest. This proves that Aya is not only hopeless at these ‘analog’ games that we see, but rather hopeless at reading people in general.
Shouta himself is rather standoff-ish, and I originally thought that he was going to be the ‘reformed-delinquent’ kind of character that shows like Toradora! and Rascal Does Not Dream have. Instead we have a rather dull and extremely scruffy boy who will likely end up getting into these games, but his only goal will be to confess to Aya.
This week’s game is Kaker Laken Poker, or Cockroach Poker. It’s a card game that requires the players to use bluffing skills to avoid losing. Players must avoid getting all 4 cards of one particular insect (whether the insect is cockroach, fly, stink bug, etc.), and even though this episode stretches the game that these four (Miki, Aya, Midori and Shouta) have for a long time, Kaker Laken Poker is the kind of game that doesn’t require that much time.
Some more character development is brought in this week, which is great. The show’s opening episode really emphasized on Miki being a very non-social girl who would eventually develop a deep interest in these kind of ‘analog’ games, and this week we notice that Midori has some kind of intuition when it comes to this, on seeing like-minded/fellow non-social people who can get into board/card/tabletop games. Aya still feels a little left-out though…or rather while we see Miki and Midori getting to know each other through gaming, Aya sticks out a little like a sore thumb, being the loudest of the group. Not that that is a bad thing, of course; I guess I still have some time to get to know her.
As for Shouta? Well he needs to work a lot harder for me to like him.
Houkago Saikoro Club is doing well so far, by putting its chief focus on these games (that actually exist in real life, and are not just made-up for the show), and not entirely on building highly detailed characters that have deep plot points. By that I mean we could have had some weird plot detail where, for instance, Miki’s mother or father or whatever was some professional card gaming ace back in the day, and just didn’t tell her. Heck, for all we know that could actually happen here. I mean, this is only the second episode…
Now, my coverage of Kandagawa Jet Girls here is going to be a little off, and this is purely because each new episode comes out on HIDIVE on Tuesdays, and it’s usually before that day when each week’s Otaku Theater post is completed and ready to be published. Surprisingly, after years of being on the OASG team and doing this column, this is the first time this has ever happened. This means that coverage of episode 2 will have to be in next week’s column post. This might not be a bad thing though, considering how I was surprised how much fan-service was in this show; seriously, the studio turned the fan-service up to 11 here. Also bear in mind that HIDIVE treats us to a censored version of the show each week, due to the show’s nudity and suggestive positions; I mean this is a show about very pretty girls riding on jet skis, getting wet while riding them, and getting shot with laser guns, all of which while showing off how yuri they are, so…did you expect anything less?
Girls’ Last Tour Episode 2
Away from horny ecchi anime now, let’s move on to episode 2 of Girls’ Last Tour, which I am really enjoying so far.
At this point, Chito and Yuuri find a power plant that has hot water; this means the two of them can have a decent bath at last. Later on, they take shelter from a storm and use the opportunity to use the water from the snow to wash their clothes.
Like I said last week, I think that when this show originally aired a couple of years ago, people were divided on whether having so much ‘minimalism’ was a good thing to have in an anime show or not. I guess the studio (White Fox) could only do one of two things: remain loyal to the manga, or write a new script that keeps close to the original story, but has more ‘action’ in it. They couldn’t have both.
This begs the question then on whether we’d rather the shows we watch be filled to the brim with action, or instead use minimalism/metaphors to impress us. I could talk for ages on stuff like this, but I won’t, because Girls’ Last Tour is a show that I want to sit and watch, and ‘relax’ to, even if this is the type of show that can be analyzed in every detail. Maybe there will come a time where I watch this show again and decide to dig at it, but this is not that time.
Horny girls riding jet-skis will return next week, I promise – it’s just how the show schedule has been dealt. I’m also aware that the big franchises begin this week too. Not that I’m even going to have a clue on what goes on in My Hero Academia (I’ve only ever watched one episode of it), but I do sort of know who is who in Sword Art Online – I did marathon seasons 1 and 2 and reviewed the Ordinal Scale movie after all. Anyway, if you like what you see here, feel free to hit that like button and air your opinions in the comments below!