Tbh, the ending wasn't even that bad. It was okayish. But the second half was such a mess that the series was dragged down to the filth and there wasn't any way to save it and satisfy the fans. Also, severe lack of air/mecha fights.
So what's worth picking up this season anyway. Still got a hell of a backlog so I'm not terribly fussed for things to watch but I aim to populate the backlog.
And NO I am NOT watching BNHA. I might consider it but only after both seasons get BD releases.
So looking at the chart, which is full of sequels and meh, I see that for some reason there is a Seitokai Yakuindomo movie coming in the summer. I assume it's one of those fake OVA-style movies that they're just dumping out because they can't be bothered to make a full series, but the manga is still popular enough to get the band together for a 40 minute special. lol
I can't think of many examples, other than the bit about Diana not being able to use magic when she was younger and the general hate for Chariot or why she abandoned that name. Also, I suppose it's partially a reason for the decline on Luna Nova's students. It's not that much of a foreshadowing, it's like there were some weak plotthreads and that twist managed to make the most out of them and connect everything. It's kind of cool that there's a legitimate explanation for Akko's incompetence though, that makes it a fantastic twist.
I can't think of many examples, other than the bit about Diana not being able to use magic when she was younger and the general hate for Chariot or why she abandoned that name. Also, I suppose it's partially a reason for the decline on Luna Nova's students. It's not that much of a foreshadowing, it's like there were some weak plotthreads and that twist managed to make the most out of them and connect everything. It's kind of cool that there's a legitimate explanation for Akko's incompetence though, that makes it a fantastic twist.
the impact frame of Shiny Chariot at the show being green and black. I remember at the time thinking that it looked kind of evil and villainous but thought that was stylistic more than anything else. That shade of green is associated with 'sickly' and in conjunction with Shiny Chariot being overlaid in black, it's a very ominous image.
I can't think of many examples, other than the bit about Diana not being able to use magic when she was younger and the general hate for Chariot or why she abandoned that name. Also, I suppose it's partially a reason for the decline on Luna Nova's students. It's not that much of a foreshadowing, it's like there were some weak plotthreads and that twist managed to make the most out of them and connect everything. It's kind of cool that there's a legitimate explanation for Akko's incompetence though, that makes it a fantastic twist.
the impact frame of Shiny Chariot at the show being green and black. I remember at the time thinking that it looked kind of evil and villainous but thought that was stylistic more than anything else. That shade of green is associated with 'sickly' and in conjunction with Shiny Chariot being overlaid in black, it's a very ominous image.
I looked up the "twist", and while the show appears to have gone far afield from the fun adventure I would have wanted I have to admire its dedication to tricking the audience.
Since I'm lazy, I'll avoid doing a lengthy writeup or whatever and just quickly break down why the LWA twist is great.
-It justifies previous character behaviour that previously seemed mystifying.
-It recontextualizes previous events.
-It was properly foreshadowed both visually and repeatedly through the plot.
-It changes character dynamics in a permanent manner going forward.
-It adds thematic depth to the show. Now that I think about it, LWA is a very cynical show.
Yoshinari's comment about the show being about the animation industry has even more weight. Shiny Chariot represents the old animators who suckered in the youth with all these flashy images, only for those young animators to end up being broken. An animator's believing heart is their magic but it ends up being stolen by a system that takes everything from them.
-It plays on the audience's expectations of what sort of show this should be.
Since I'm lazy, I'll avoid doing a lengthy writeup or whatever and just quickly break down why the LWA twist is great.
-It justifies previous character behaviour that previously seemed mystifying.
-It recontextualizes previous events.
-It was properly foreshadowed both visually and repeatedly through the plot.
-It changes character dynamics in a permanent manner going forward.
-It adds thematic depth to the show. Now that I think about it LWA is a very cynical show.
Yoshinari's comment about the show being about the animation industry has even more weight. Shiny Chariot represents the old animators who suckered in the youth with all these flashy images, only for those young animators to end up being broken. An animator's believing heart is their magic but it ends up being stolen by a system that takes everything from them.
Since I'm lazy, I'll avoid doing a lengthy writeup or whatever and just quickly break down why the LWA twist is great.
-It justifies previous character behaviour that previously seemed mystifying.
-It recontextualizes previous events.
-It was properly foreshadowed both visually and repeatedly through the plot.
-It changes character dynamics in a permanent manner going forward.
-It adds thematic depth to the show. Now that I think about it LWA is a very cynical show.
Yoshinari's comment about the show being about the animation industry has even more weight. Shiny Chariot represents the old animators who suckered in the youth with all these flashy images, only for those young animators to end up being broken. An animator's believing heart is their magic but it ends up being stolen by a system that takes everything from them.
Just stuff like guys running kickstarters for a house to give animators a place to live and wacky stories like that.
Well, that and the fact that their offices, even the ones at Sunrise, look like the sad Korean animator cubicles that they made fun of on The Simpsons compared to Western animation studios.
Just stuff like guys running kickstarters for a house to give animators a place to live and wacky stories like that.
Well, that and the fact that their offices, even the ones at Sunrise, look like the sad Korean animator cubicles that they made fun of on The Simpsons compared to Western animation studios.
Of course there are significant systemic issues relating to the working conditions of animators, but your fantasies about everyone working in the industry hating their work, themselves, and everyone around them sound like "bizarre fetishization of the anime industry's problems".
Anyway, I hope that Jarmel's theory is not actually what Yoh Yoshinari wanted to go for with LWA, because if so it would lessen my respect for him.
You know, I've been thinking about LWA all day after watching the latest episode, and while the twist therein does fantastically recontexualize so many elements of the show as a whole, I can't help but feel it pushes two issues I've had with the show into the limelight.
First off, it's become abundantly clear this show has become about two different Akkos, or more accurately, this show flip flops between two different writing styles: a linear narrative about Akko fulfilling the dream of her idol, Shiny Chariot, and an episode comedy show about light-hearted stereotypical characters at a magic academy. The problem is the show is clearly too long for Akko and Chariot's story to carry the two-cour show, so they've broken up that narrative with one-off episodes focused around a particular individual or a fun, archetypical episode that feels at home in the magical school genre.
Yet, unlike something like Stand Alone Complex (a show that has a very similar alternating plot structure) where the episodes outside of the Laughing Man plot felt like they gave you a significant amount of information about particular characters or real insight into how this future world operates, I feel LWA's episodic episodes did not have the same amount of craft and care put in as the central narrative clearly has. This coupled with their prevelance, especially in the first half of the show, only serves to hinder that narrative's pacing.
And secondly, while there were some hints earlier on regarding the twist, I feel that specifically because of its flip flopped nature, there wasn't enough groundwork to lay out throughout the show to properly set this up. While it's pretty obvious that Croix
is conducting experiements regarding powering technomagic with emotions
, the true nature of what she's doing is only properly explained two minutes before the twist that requires that framework already be fully understood before turning that understanding on its head.
I feel like despite feeling like everything making perfect sense, the rate at which hints were laid out was backloaded to the last third of the show without any hint of a mystery present, making the presense of many episodes of the central plot early on to feel at odds with the lighter tone of the episodic one-offs, leading to the dissonance early on that drove a lot of people here away.
That said, it's also nice that they waited this long to pull the Trigger (haha) on this plot device as long as they did. Less confident shows would've used this as the bait to keep people coming back at the end of the first cour, so I'm proud they waited until the most affecting moment to do it, because damn, that hit me really goddamn hard! Here's hoping they can follow through for the rest of the last act
Also,
the idea of Shiny Chariot as a representation of Gainax is kind of amusing now that I think about it, haha
Got 4 episodes into New Game! and I'm finding it decently enjoyable, but i kinda wish there were people from more parts of development, seems to focus too much on the art side of it.
I also wish one of the girl's gimmick wasn't going around in their underwear lol
