The Anime Thread

Some more random anime fun

Oh man. Sentai Filmworks released a trailer promoting the English dub they've done for Monster Musume, and some of the voice casting seems hit-or-miss.

Granted, I've watched the original more than once and may have been expecting something different for their casting, and we are dealing with only bits and pieces of the dialogue so it's not the whole picture. But some of the characters in the promo seem a little more subdued than the original, and the "over-the-top" nature of the characters was a big part of the appeal for me.

Kimihito, Ms. Smith and Meroune seem about right (Shelley Calene-Black as Ms. Smith nails the flirty part of that character), and Monica Rial as Suu should work well. But there's something about the casting for Miia, Centorea, and Papi that doesn't quite seem to work for me. It's especially surprising because they cast Brittney Karbowski as Papi, but it's like they're all lacking some of the enthusiasm the characters showed in the original. Rachnera's casting is something I'd have to see more of, though.

It's got me a little worried about some of the secondary character casting now. Thinking about it I honestly would have expected Monica Rial and Brittney Karbowski to be cast as Manako and Zombina respectively. Guess I'll have to wait and see. I love the series and I'll probably be picking it up regardless, and I'll at least give the English dub a shot.

It's just one of my frustrations with Sentai's dub releases. There were more than a few "swing and a miss" moments for me in the English dub of Is It Wrong to Try and Pick Up Girls in a Dungeon? (why re-dub the cool monster sounds, for crying out loud?!) and the casting seemed WAY off on Love, Chunibyo and Other Delusions. Even with shows where the casting seemed to match the original better (Mysterious Girlfriend X and Monthly Girls' Nozaki-kun) there were still some of those "not the choice I would have made" moments.

Anyhow, enough of my "voice actor casting" ranting. LOL I'd post the video itself but considering the nature of the show I'll refrain. It's easy enough to look up and I'll take the "better safe than sorry" approach any day.

The tournament of power starts in Dragon Ball Super episode 96. It would be nice to see this guy fight beside the rest of the Z fighters.

Had some fun watching this week's My Hero Academia. It was time for the students to choose code names for their upcoming internships, and watching the choices (good and bad) that popped up was fun enough as it is. I even got a kick out of the flashback that showed how Eraserhead got his code name.

But then I started thinking about all the very interesting name choices I see in DCUO, especially on the hero side, and I got a whole other layer of amusement out of the episode. Bakugo's initial name choices in particular drove that home for me.

Not a new series, but because I am a sucker for the harem genre, I ended up giving OniAi a try.

It's definitely rough, considering the running joke is that one of the girls is the protagonist's younger sister who REALLY wants to be with her brother. That's due in large part to them being separated due to family circumstances (which are never really gone into) but also because of some "forbidden romance" novels she's read in their time apart. The jokes of her declaring her love repeatedly and trying to get intimate while he deflects those advances does get old pretty quick. The reveal that he's been writing the novels that influenced under a pen name in order to help support them in their time apart doesn't help.

The rest of the characters are kind of "one-note" as well, including the "she'll aggressively go after anyone" class president, the weird-super-rich girl and the childhood friend he's clueless about. Heck, even the protagonist's editor gets factored into the group a bit as she starts worrying that he's the one obsessed with getting together with his sister (rather than the other way around) and makes some attempts to entice him. There's some good bits here and there but I think they go to the well one too many times.

Unfortunately that goes on for most of the first half of the show, so trying to stick with it is a challenge. It isn't until the latter half of the series that we start to see some character development in the girls with some backstory and explanations for their actions, and while it isn't enough to fully redeem the first half it does make for some more interesting episodes. There's also a reveal at the end that tries to eliminate the "ick" factor from the main premise, but because it comes so late in the series (as the credits of the last episode roll) it's debatable how well it works.

There's definitely better harem shows out there, I won't deny that. There's some slightly interesting stuff in there, but you have to get through some crud to get there, so consider that a fair warning.

I haven't seen OniAi but I have heard of it. I'll have to check it out. However, a funny harem anime that I saw not long ago was Shomin Sample. I'd say its up there. Not as a great one but entertaining.

Seen it. I liked it enough that I wouldn't mind a second season, while I can't really say the same about OniAi.

The "cultural obliviousness" jokes were done decently in Shomin Sample, and Kimito's cluelessness about Hakua (her age and interest) always makes for good harem humor fodder. I think they went overboard with Karen's interest/obsession over Hakua, though.

There were two things that left me wanting to see another season though. First, I wouldn't have minded seeing the childhood friend of Kimito (Eri) learn that it was her comment about his preferences that sealed the deal for him disappearing from her everyday life, or at least a little more involving her. Second? Kujo's interest in and/or possible past with Kimito. That jaw-dropping little reveal partway through the series changed the whole dynamic of her "I wish you had never woken up" greetings to him in the morning (I even posted about that episode reveal in this thread LOL) and cast a whole new light on all her interactions with him prior to and after the reveal.

And yes, I know there's both a light novel AND manga series so I could find out that way, but I've already got enough physical manga just with the volumes of Mysterious Girlfriend X and Monster Musume I have that I'm hesitant to start collecting more. LOL

One more to add to the harem comedy "seen it" list, and that's Majikoi Oh! Samurai Girls.

It's a bit of an older show and not all that bad but I think they tried to juggle too many themes, and that just ends up clashing a bit as they try to tell the overall story. Trying to combine typical harem hijinks with musings on corruption and whether or not a country is worth defending (among other things) means you can get some shifts in tone that stumble. There are some good story elements in there, both with the villain of the piece and the girls coming to terms with and expressing their feelings towards the protagonist, but the shifts in tone and which part of the story they're telling can make it tough to stick with it. Even so, it does come together decently by the end, and the reasons for each girl having feelings for the protagonist are put forth solidly enough in a late episode that the harem set-up doesn't feel completely contrived.

The action and the humor in the show is pretty good. Since the setting is a school that teaches and promotes various martial arts, you get a variety of combat styles that are fun and over the top and a lot of good combat sequences. The first episode alone is a huge battle between two of the classes at the school, and it sets the tone both for some of the humor and the action you see going forward. The humor does go into the usual harem situations, but it works for the most part. There's one sequence where all of the girls have expressed their feelings towards the protagonist (unconscious at the time) in front of one another and are pushing each other out of the way to cradle him, with each push resulting in a solid "THUD!" as he keeps getting dropped. LOL

All in all I'd have to classify the show as kind of an odd duck. The overall story is decent but getting there isn't exactly easy, even with the humor and the action. It's worth a look if you're a fan of the genre like me, but not really anything to bust down the door to see.

Well, though it's not exactly a harem anime but Hideki aka Rusian has his own harem within the show. It's Netoge no Yome wa Onna no Ko Janai to Omotta? aka And You Thought There Is Never a Girl Online? which I can surprisingly relate to

Finally stumped me a bit on that one. LOL I started watching that one but I haven't finished it yet.

You can relate to being in a harem?

Well, the Star Sapphire league I'm in pretty much is full of female toons

and is led by a guy whose toon is based off the Predator

So I guess you can say I'm in a harem

Wait, so The Predator (no relation to the movie safari hunters) is a transgendered Carol?

So because it's in an anime thread, now I gotta ask: is there a tsundere among the group, or worse a yandere?

We actually have a couple of tsundere members, LOL. They were always doing pvp when pvp was still a thing but now they're on once in a blue moon . However, when you first meet them, they come off as the typical tsundere, hot headed and mean . Two in particular. One is Areto, an Amazon Sapphire who can be the biggest jerk and the other is Mero, an Atlantean Sapphire, who is sweet and helpful but for some reason can flip her lid especially during league runs , XD.

Well, not exactly, it's based off when the Predator entity possessed Abraham Pointe in the comics

I think I'm just gonna be chuckling over the idea of a tsundere Star Sapphire for a while, especially when one of the regular Star Sapphire NPC lines you hear in the WOTL 2 open word content is, "You can't deny love!"

It's kinda what tsundere's do, denying love. LOL

Couple more new shows finished up, Love Tyrant and World End (Suka Suka).

Love Tyrant was just fun. It takes on a lot of harem tropes in a fun way, not to mention poking fun at a lot of other properties out there (anime and non-anime) for their jokes. Heck, just in a "test of courage/walk through the haunted school at night" episode there were references to MANY horror films and I think even a call out to the Luigi's Mansion game. LOL Even so, there's a nice amount of heart in there in when talking of romance and love. I'd go on more about the fun weird stuff in the show, but I'm afraid I'd be spoiling things. It's definitely a show I'd recommend watching, and likely one I'll be picking up in the future.

World End was a completely different animal in terms of tone, but still a good watch. The story itself unfolds slowly over the run of the show, so the pacing might be an issue for some but I did like the story that was told. Normally I don't go for stories that lean towards the sad, bittersweet or even slightly tragic, but there was something in the telling of this story that held my attention. The cute humor in some spots does help balance out the sad/bittersweet elements. The ending was somewhat ambiguous in some respects, but it wasn't done in a way that upset me and I felt they told the story they wanted to. I don't know if I could give it a wholehearted recommendation like with Love Tyrant, but between the setting and the story I think it's worth a look.

Just another batch of random anime

LOL, Love Tyrant was hilarious. I second your recommendation