This might well be the week I finally figure out what my beef is with Azur Lane. The show has been going for 4 episodes, and each week, I find something in it to get frustrated with. I won’t go as far as calling this a curse (like my Summer Curse™), but something similar does tend to happen in the Fall season of a lot of years. I’ll take the show Flip Flappers as an example: I gave that one up after only a few episodes, but I’m kind of glad I did, as I found it a frustrating show to watch…just as like Azur Lane is.

Perhaps I should begin this week’s column with something I genuinely am enjoying…

Kandagawa Jet Girls Episode 4

Kandagawa Jet Girls is my current favorite stupid show, and this episode highlighted the epic race for…a yellow dolphin keychain. It is also at this point in the show where it dawned on me how uncomfortable some of the fan service can get here.

Heck, even Misa, quite possibly the most reserved character in the entire show, feels weird about it all.

Kandagawa Jet Girls

While the battle for the keychain was the basis of this episode, it was more on how Misa is beginning to trust Rin more. If it were down to me, I would have kicked Rin out of the house by now and left her to find somewhere else to live, so there’s obviously some magic trick that she’s got that is winning people over: Misa, the student council president, teachers at school, and now Jennifer and Emily.

Kandagawa Jet Girls
Kandagawa Jet Girls

We get to see more Jet Racers this week, which leads me back to the uncomfortable fan service this episode has. Weird breast shots and movements, suggestive dialog, and even more suggestive eating. Watching one of them lick a taiyaki pastry slowly (and no, I’m not going to screenshot that) means I’ve just about seen it all now, although I wouldn’t be surprised if this show gave us something even more ridiculous.

Kandagawa Jet Girls has become a bit of a oddity for me, as I really don’t have any clue as to what this show’s overall plot will end up being. I’m sure we’ll end up getting some kind of happy ending, since all of this activity has suggested that we won’t be getting the opposite. I think it would be pretty funny to learn that the staff just made it up as they went along though; this is the kind of show that wouldn’t be negatively affected by something like that. You see…the plot doesn’t really count here, as all us viewers are concentrated on is keeping that fan service tally accurate.

This week, Rin got to hear her sweetheart call her by her first name, which she seems to take very seriously.

Kandagawa Jet Girls

Azur Lane Episode 5

Okay so while a show like Kandagawa Jet Girls can have no issues with a plot that is just made up as it goes along, what about something like Azur Lane, which is just as silly? As I keep saying, I’m struggling to find stuff that I like here.

Azur Lane

This week, it seems that a squad from Azur Lane has acquired a cube device belonging to the Sirens that the Sakura Empire are very interested in. And so this entire episode is devoted to looking at all perspectives: the Sakura Empire who are eager to get their cube back (whatever it is), Enterprise still wrestling with the idea that she is nothing other than a battleship, and Laffey and Javelin still trying to be moeblob girls.

Some reasons for me not enjoying Azur Lane could boil down to how the show began. The first episode just overloaded us with a lot of information about the franchise. Instead of drip-feeding it us over an amount of time, it gave us pretty much everything we needed to know in the space of 25 minutes. It’s now been 5 episodes, and what plot this show is supposed to have hasn’t really gone in any tangible direction. In addition to this, there are so many characters we are supposed to remember in this show, I just end up overwhelmed, and so I’ve just given up on remembering who is who now.

This show is clearly meant to appease the mobile game fans, because they know who is who, and what faction is what, and who the Sirens are, and so on. The rest of us are just meant to sit here and stay frustrated with a show that is, effectively, going nowhere.

Azur Lane

We Never Learn s2 Episode 5

Now for something totally different from Azur Lane: another a show that I actually am enjoying.

We Never Learn

I will admit that it has taken me a long time to warm to We Never Learn. Sure, this is nothing other than an episodic harem show full of low-key sex jokes, but the reason I do enjoy this is that the character design is so much better than anything that Azur Lane has to offer. Also, we don’t need to know everything about these characters and the plot right from the very beginning; the fact that all of them get to know each other episode-by-episode is better.

Here in this week’s episode, we are put in two more awkward circumstances. The first is how Fumino reacts to the first time a boy gets her something for her birthday. It’s meant to be a ballpoint pen designed for left-handed people, but…well…because it wouldn’t be a fun harem show without things being swapped around…

The second is Nariyuki being pushed into working at a day spa that has just opened, and…well…guess who are his first customers…

We Never Learn

…because it wouldn’t be a silly and entertaining harem show otherwise. Jeez, Nariyuki, I would have thought you’d have figured this out by now; I mean it has been 17 episodes already. In any other circumstances, I would have just switched off by now, but We Never Learn really does have something that I can’t quite put my finger on that keeps me going.

Houkago Saikoro Club Episode 5

For episode 5 of Houkago Saikoro Club, the quest to get Miki out of her social anxiety shell continues, as summer break arrives, and the three decide to stay at an inn in Kanazawa run by Miki’s aunt.

Houkago Saikoro Club

Once again, a rather simple plot for this story, but I think we have our solid character designs to keep us going. On the day they were meant to head for the beach, it suddenly pours down with rain, and the three girls and a vacationing family are stuck inside. Luckily for them, they have a game that’s kept in the inn that they can all play: Goita.

Houkago Saikoro Club

A classic Japanese tile game that’s far less formal than Shogi, Goita is a 4-player game (in two teams) that relies on strategy and memory. The goal is to get to 150 points before the other team does. I thought it was a little interesting how they talked about the history of the game, and how it’s a game that was only really played in the Noto peninsula of Japan, and that other games similar to it were (and still are) played in other areas of the country, only instead of these tiles, actual shogi tiles and even karuta cards are used. Was that maybe a slight nod to a certain other show that is in its third season now?

*of course, you know I’m talking about Chihayafuru, which I won’t be watching this season*

Chihayafuru

I think that, even with the little flashbacks we are getting each week, it is still a little too early to predict big plot points in Houkago Saikoro Club. I don’t see it becoming a highly detailed kind of show, though; just a cute school slice-of-life show that so happens to teach us that video games aren’t the be-all and end-all in the gaming industry, and that other games exist and are fun too. When this show is over, I hope to make a list of all the games that were both played and referenced here; depending on the number of games, it may or may not appear here in this column.

Girls’ Last Tour Episode 5

Now I understand that Girls’ Last Tour did not win everyone over when it came out. But I still can’t quite understand how White Fox have made this otherwise bleak, desolate and apocalyptic landscape that Chito and Yuuri travel in so pretty to look at. Episode 5 ends up being a bit of a trippy episode, with us being treated to a very bizarre dream sequence, as well as big hints that this world that the two of them are travelling in isn’t the world that once was (as in, before whatever destroyed it).

Girls' Last Tour

This episode, in fact, has become my favorite one so far. It’s this one where I have strong suspicions that this world that Chito and Yuuri are travelling in is, in fact, some kind of purgatory or afterlife. Despite being so desolate, this world is so fascinating to see. Buildings fit together to make art, electricity and water works somehow where there shouldn’t, and even though we’ve seen other people there, it feels like only Chito and Yuuri were put here to…what, exactly? Enjoy it? Suffer in it? Survive it? I get the feeling that this is the kind of question that’ll remain unanswered, as this is the kind of show where we’re meant to let our imagination run wild. Heck, my purgatory/afterlife theory could be way off.

Oh well, here. Have a funny gif I found on Reddit:

So another mixed bag for me this week. At least I’ve figured out what my beef is with Azur Lane. So what about your Fall season? How has it been treating you? Feel free to hit that like button and air your opinions in the comments below!