#i gave examples from ep 12 only but the whole anime is like that
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tiedsh0es · 2 years ago
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i still think Tristamp is silly its own way, with how outlandish and exaggerated some of the movement and expressions can be 
like when Wolwood picks up Meryl and just scrambles away with her jumping from building to building to some guys face, or how Knives practically throws himself against the entire window to go after Vash
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papers4me · 4 years ago
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Fruits Basket Reboot: Analytical  Overview of the Anime
Fruits Basket’s reboot is one of most successful anime reboots since it has:
Amazing story that celebrates human weakness, digs into the depths of human identity & doesn’t shy away from depicting child trauma & abuse. Teaches the values of letting go & walking forward.
The author’s blessing, nostalgia factor from loyal fanbase.
Fixed scheduled 3 season comeback with 63 eps in total planned from the very beginning.
Finished source material with its ending approved by manga fans.
Anime follows the official manga ending.
The “slice of life/shojo” genre doesn’t need budget for fight scenes or big scale realistic animation for its lore.
All these factors contributed to its success, however, this doesn't mean the anime was a masterpiece. It is very good but had issues aren’t in the writing, but rather in the format, overall vision & its effect on characters’ depths.
1. Format:
a. ( Is Fruits Basket an episodic anime or a plot-driving story?) 
-The anime couldn’t decide how to adapt the manga content, should it follow it literally & combine two chapters together each time, or take the core plot & drive it by character, or focus on its vision or what? they KNOW that can’t adapt everything. They have 63 eps in total so they have good number of eps to do any choice. However, since the anime is advertised as “ a faithful adaptation” they wanted to cement this announcement in se01 & chose “character of the day” format. Once, the manga fans are assured & hooked, they can drive the rest wherever.
-Se02 was slightly less episodic (minus the beach arc which had perfect pacing). Afterwards, the yuki content was approached similarly to se1 but centered around “ episodic themes”.  Lots of characters arcs are pushed to se3 to keep the “mother” theme of se2. that’s why all eps ended happily minus few eps such as tohru’s nightmare ending in isuzu’s ep.
-Se03 is where the anime really had the biggest issues & couldn’t decided between keeping themes or rolling like a true well-written drama-infused story. Thus we see them trying to keep the episodic themes as long as possible in 5 eps & once ep 6 starts & they can no longer label a flowing plot into themes, they rolled into the climax. The entirety of tohru’s neglected issues outside of her role as a mother was condensed in one ep via audio narration, since ep 7 should drive akito into the climax spot, ep 8 is kyo’s & ep 9 is female antagonist vs female protagonist clash. The rest of the eps focus around wrapping the growth arcs of kyo, akito, yuki & tohru.
I wish they kept the episodic forma for se01 only. Se01 is episodic by design since you can’t maneuver around character introduction, but they should’ve let season 2 & 3 flow smoothly without imposing episodic themes that a junior high schooler could detect, simply because the theme will choose which character fits this ep & which must be cut. Hardly a smart decision for a drama-focused story. Example: Se02 post-beach arc, being “mother tohru” themed meant the cut content of any “teenage girl tohru content”, focusing only on her role as a mother & shoving the rest of “tohru” into the unbelievably packed se03.
b. ( How the seasons are divided & which one is best?)
Lots of fans believed that: se1 (kyo focus), se2 (yuki focus), se3 (tohru focus), I don’t think this is the correct official anime format at all, but rather the fans wishful thinking, here’s why:
se01 isn’t kyo’s focus at all.  Kyo has ONE focused ep each season: se01:ep24, se3: ep9, & se03: ep8. He gets more screen time in se03 to deal with the aftermath of ep8 & to mark his growth & close his arc. But, yuki had more focused eps in se01 than kyo. Example, se01, ep 12, yuki tells the audience abt his dream of new friends, home & new self, sth he achieved gradually ever since that ep ended, thus, Kisa’s ep is a yuki centered ep as well as it marked the beginning of (a) “mother tohru” issues, (b) him deciding to join student council & get out of his comfort zone which is the beginning of “ new yuki”.
se2 is indeed a yuki centered season.
se03 is not a tohru’s focus at all, we still had (akito, shigure, kyo, kureno, momiji, isuzi, haru, machi, motoko, & more yuki) to start or finish their arcs & it is 13 eps only. tho, Tohru had a self-focused role at last which is good.
-I believe the following format better describes the anime’s seasons’ division since it is driven by themes:
se01: Life teachings for the youngsters, due to the direct format of advise given by mother kyoko thro her daughter to the characters/ audience.
se02: Life teachings thro a coming of age story. The trio are struggling to choose a future, afraid & burdened by their trauma’s. Yuki with the help of “mother tohru” , leaves the nest “youngster stage” & sets his foot into the future & struggles to: have fiends, express himself, face his parents, be honest with himself, form an identity & understand himself.
se03: Life teachings of mature issues to those who have already chosen wrong once or twice. bigger issues are presented such as: guilt, death, trauma, extreme self-loath, self-destructive tendencies (kyo), grief, lack of self-esteem, refusing to let go of the past, abandonment issues, constructed polite girl identity with false happy mask (tohru), superiority complex, false forced identity, sins & misdeeds (akito), other themes such as adultery, manipulation, passiveness & enabling can fit the other characters.
So, naturally, season 3 is the richest in content, extremely entertaining story-focused, plot-driven, multi characters depth, plethora of themes, issues & variety of fascinating character writing to distinguish between various arcs & wrap ups. Honestly, se03 carries the whole success since it IS the story of Fruits Basket ( a basket of different fruits & we get to hear/see them all, including the rice-cake!). Still, se03 suffered from the issues of pacing & format I mentioned above, plus condensed content due to short number of eps dedicated to 12 characters.
2. Overall Vision:
Tohru being the main protagonist carries the story’s vision, however, I think Taklaya-san wanted the vision to expand to all her characters. I duno abt the author’s true vision since I haven’t read the manga, but if I were to guess based on the overall story: it is “the acceptance of human weakness”. Yuki isn't the perfect prince, tohru isn't the angelic mom, kyo isn't the horrible monster. These assumptions are the OTHER characters’ perspective of them. Not their true identity or reality. We later even learn that the abusive akito herself, chose a healthier identity, the atoned family head. However, in the anime, characters’ weakness isn’t the center of the anime’s vision, rather its vision is abt the “nurturing effects of the mother figure”, which is supported by the writing as well, but shouldn't be the core driving plot. The anime is more centered around mothers & more narrowly guided. The characters’ weaknesses takes a second seat until the focus on the mother role is over. This does not affect tohru only, but all characters including yuki himself.
-Tohru being the female protagonist shouldn’t be angelic as this contradicts the core theme, thus tohru is given her own set of (human aspects):  trauma, frustrating character traits, faulty coping mechanism: the fake happy mask. Her role as yuki’s mother is only ONE part of her, as big as it is his life & as huge as it is from his perspective. It should NOT be what the audience can only see & feel from tohru. If it is, then Tohru is forever the 16 year-old mother of her peers, sth a normal teenager shouldn't, contradicting the basic existence of the human aspects mentioned above.
a. How does the overall vision being focused on “tohru’s motherly role” affect characters’ depths?
-For Tohru: In the anime, tohru being yuki’s mother lasted for 2 seasons, during that time, we are ONLY allowed to see HER from HIS perspective. Everything abt her human weakness is either vaguely hinted “ few scenes here & there” or pushed to se03. In se01 & 2, tohru is only allowed to act as a “teenage girl” in front of two male characters: (kyo & momiji):
How is tohru depicted in front of kyo & momiji? If you re-watch the anime, once tohru is around these two, her character is very different & she stops giving advice & instead “listen” to them. She is shown more lively & drawn younger & girly, asking more than talking, receiving advice, they both look at her as a normal girl with burdens on her shoulder rather than “savior/care taker”. Kyo complains to her few times abt that & calls her out on her self-denying antics, momoji takes a different approach & subtly provides chances for her to be a “teenage girl”: going to a hot spring & vacation. She opens up to kyo slowly in all her scenes with him, but while she doesn't open up to momiji, she allows herself to show vulnerability & throw her mask a bit in front of him (se01, ep12: she listened to his talk abt his mom, related to him, cried & hugged him with NO advice even tho she didnt tell him abt her mom), se02, she listened to his talk abt his sister, related to him, cried & gave NO advice even tho she didnt tell him she thought abt her mom).
The anime’s heavy focus on her “motherly”side, contradicts showing her as vulnerable & traumatized, hence her backstory lasted for 4 minutes in her own ep, se03, ep6. Later when she faces akito, tohru’s growth kicks in & she starts relating to her issues of abandonment but all this growth came from those 4 minutes of backstory in ep6. In ep9, in front of akito, tohru was depicted just like how she is depicted in all yuki centered eps, ( giving an advice, smiling, a hallow of light around her, the sun rises, the rain stops & she shines her kindness to heal the wounds). 
-For Yuki: In the anime, Yuki is shown seeking a mother & all the right monologues & issues are perfectly presented. However, his weakness isn’t only wanting a mother!! yuki is depicted as a prince by others, so a huge part of his growth is to leave the princely persona behind, which is sth that was not focused on in the anime. Outside of his issues on viewing tohru as a mother & wanting friends, yuki continued to be depicted as prince & wasn't much allowed the freedom of being “a normal teenage boy”. Machi narrated that part of his growth, motoko too, but it wasnt depicted much on screen & yuki continued to have dashing bubbles, sparkles, hair flowing on wind & extreme focus on beautiful face. Him becoming a dynamic character outside of his “finishing my tohru-mother confession to my friend” is very short lived. This would’ve easily been fixed if less attention was given to his “mom tohru” phase. He is more than “I used to look at tohru as my mom”.
-For kyo: In the anime, kyo never looked at tohru as a mom, hence from the beginning kyo didn’t fit the overall vision. Hence, all his issues are pushed into se03 when tohru’s “mom role” is finished. There is a reason we have ONE kyo centered ep in se1 & 2. it IS contradicting the current tohru-image of being a mom. Also, kyo’s thoughts are blocked completely for dramatic purposes but he didnt need to be absent from tons of eps which he was, even his growth ever since se01 finale is very subtle in order to not derive from tohru’s image as a mom. We have some scenes of kyo & tohru interacting, but they should be sparse se01, ep 23 (soup ep) or se02, ep2, or short scenes such kyoto scene or tohru’s worried abt her grandpa scene in se2, ep14. Most of kyo’s & tohru’s scenes aren’t solely romantic in their nature but they provide in depth peek into their true personality & identity as humans. With her kyo isn’t angry or annoyed & with him tohru isn’t bubbly with the “I’m okay” mask.
Side Notes:
There is no doubt that the anime was made with respect & love to the source material & the author. I can see this clearly & I don’t deny it at all. This isn’t meant to ridicule them at all. I respect them all plenty.
There is no doubt that the anime team were trying their best & if you like everything, then good for you, if you like some parts & don’t agree with others, then that’s fine. Criticizing is a form of loving, too. Just be respectful.
Preferences, tastes, visions, & outlooks, all differ from one human to another. This is normal & healthy.
The director or decision maker in the anime having different vision from the author is fine, too. After all, he’s a different person. His perspective & understanding of her characters is different. Disagreeing with him is fine. All medium of art are exposed to the audience perspective. I disagree with him on lots of creative decisions such as reliance on monologues, wide shots on intense moments, lack of zoom on facial expressions, most parallel scenes are very in the nose, need for exaggerated drama & over dramatic drawing of tohru & akito at times.
You can even differ with the writer herself on some parts of her writing, that’s fine, too.
I enjoyed this anime lots, it helped me make new friends, discuss lots of fascinating content, & practiced writing short critical reviews, which is sth I’ve missed from my college days!
I love the writing for the main male characters: Yuki & Kyo. I love their arcs so much! Yuki got the best focus on his core issues. Kyo, in particular surprised me as I used to think, due to the minimum content on him, that he’s only the secondary rival of the main male protagonist. But kyo’s story turned out fascinating & very psychological informed. 
Still, the anime is lacking to me for its depiction & presentation of women. The main female characters (Tohru & akito) are lacking realistic depiction of their core issues & time dedicated to that.  The focus on tohru’s mom role steals from realistic existence as a character on her own right. Akito is a villain for so long & her atonement is quick & her love story is quicker. Both females didn’t get to tell us their traumatic backstory in detail like the boys & they didn’t have enough focus on their human side.
Altho kyo had (1) way less screen time than yuki or even tohru, (2) his true backstory was only revealed in the climax, (3) his inner thoughts were blocked for suspense, he was written wearing his emotions on his sleeve from ep1, so, we grew to feel for him & dreaded what could’ve broken such endearing boy, hence, once it was shown we understood the psychological trauma that destroyed him. One third of the puzzle of his story was revealed each season gradually. (1) se01 (true form), (2) se02 (his bet with akito, knowing kyoko & loving tohru), (3) se03 (His whole backstory including the abusive father).
I wouldn’t say, I wish tohru was given the (yuki treatment) cuz then we’ll need more than 13 eps for se03, I just wished her story & emotions to at least be given the (kyo treatment): Divided into clear thirds (parts).
The anime is a lovely treat that I can recommend to lots of ppl with ease. You dont have to be into shojo to get into it, but it’ll undoubtedly trick you into its subtle main love story that subvert most shojo tropes. The other love stories are good as well, there’s a type of love for every fan!
There’s a number of platonic friendships which is very refreshing! 
My Final Verdict of the anime: Very Endearing as it tugs at my heart!
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stanharu · 4 years ago
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beastars episode 24 thoughts!
this post got kinda long i have Many Thoughts on this one
Overall I had fun watching this ep but I could really tell it was rushed and there was so much that got cut, which makes me super sad. our fears about the finale having pacing issues due to all the added scenes & rearranging were confirmed & it rly sucks, but i'll elaborate more on that in a bit.
this week's ep covered the end of chapter 92, chapters 93-97, and included small bits of chapters 98 & 99.
so the ep starts with the ED and the latter part of the tunnel scene with ibuki and louis. i liked the visual effect they used to show that they were in the dark. louis' voice acting was also On Point. for the most part i think this scene was done pretty well but I can tell it's being rushed also. I really wish we got more buildup and narration instead of just jumping straight to ibuki telling louis to shoot him. the way it is in the anime feels less impactful imo.
also im sad we didnt get to see this in the anime
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before i move on, i wanna talk a bit about louis and his relationship w/ the shishigumi and ibuki. i feel like in the anime quite a few of the lil moments that really endear you to the shishigumi and also ibuki were either cut or kinda glossed over, which is strange to me considering how much effort and care went into the ED. it's very emotional and good but i feel like maybe anime onlies are missing out only seeing the anime and the MV. but idk.
legosi and riz's fight was quite rushed as well. there's so much narration and dialogue missing from it and that really rubs me the wrong way. It wasn't all bad but compared to the manga I just don't think it's as good. I will say tho that I really liked the sequence w legosi and the moths. I thought it looked really nice and was pretty well done.
also i liked how the backgrounds had some anti-yahya graffiti, its a nice touch imo
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it says "high quality horse meat"
I was happy to see legosi do the "tell me more" pose but I'm honestly disappointed that the anime took out the whole exposition about why legosi did it. like i feel like without that it's just legosi being weird when he has a reason for it!!! This is just one example of the anime taking out crucial narration during the fight.
I also think it's kinda weird how they changed how louis shows up at the fight. im not sure how i feel about riz just charging at him like that, but i liked how legosi kicked him before they ran lol.
i dont have much to say about pina's small scene but I did wanna say that during my first watch thru of the ep i was too distracted trying to read the graffiti behind him that i didn't notice him getting his phone out of the dumpster and calling the cops lmao
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it says "devour yahya"
and now... here we are... the predation scene.
overall i thought it was pretty well done but, like the rest of the ep, i could tell it was also being kinda rushed. some important beats werent given enough time to really sink in, and there's a few bits of narration taken out of this part as well that i find disappointing :^(
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tho i did like how the anime called back to this scene in s1 when legosi mentions utilizing his strength.
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also this part where louis is remembering ibuki had me like😭
I also really liked seeing louis cry. I was crying too sjdflskjdflsjkdf. i thought that scene was really good, its prolly my favorite part of the ep tbh. getting to hear the whole predation scene voiced made me kind of a mess lol. i really liked louis' expressions throughout this whole ep too. studio orange used their whole louis expression budget on these last 2 eps lmao.
seeing legosi instantly get all beefed up was great too. he looked a little ridiculous but i kinda loved it lol. he's so huge and poofy. i love him.
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big pomeranian
anyway, im also sad they took out louis' line about being reduced to a flashback character lol. instead he tells legosi "be a hero" again which... im not sure about that change. i liked the part with riz thinking back about tem tho. tho imo the way riz realizes he's in the wrong feels pretty sudden. again adding to how rushed the whole ep feels.
before i move on again i just wanna say legosi looks so cute. even all puffed up and covered in blood. how does he do that
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baby boy baby. i wanna ruffle his cheek floofs.
i think one of the things im most disappointed about from this whole ep was how the fight got wrapped up. i really like how the cops show up and totally shift the tone in the manga jslkdfjskljdf. im also really sad we didnt get this interaction
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tthe anime really took out most of the sillier moments from the finale, which makes me pretty sad to think about. i know the anime and manga have different tones but pls let the boys be silly sometimes!!
the next part where legosi and louis finally establish their friendship was really cute tho ❤️ even tho it was pretty different i enjoyed it a lot.
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BABIESSSS 🥺😭❤️❤️
the wrap-up for this arc and this episode gave me whiplash sdjlfkjsdf. it literally speedruns thru legosi's predation conviction, being released, louis & haru's graduation, and legosi deciding he's going to drop out of school. that is SO MUCH AT ONCE. also i was holding out hope that legosi would have his new years call with haru after the fight instead but that didnt happen!! so it just got cut!!! kinda mad about that tbh. legosi and haru having a lil scene at the very end made up for it a lil bit but that's still one of haru's few moments in this arc that's just not included.
we didnt even get the part wher legosi learns he can't marry haru bc of his conviction.
ive been really hoping for a season 3 announcement once this season ended. with all the background allusions to yahya, the added plot point of someone stealing elephant tusks, and sebun and melon's lil cameos in this season, it seemed to me that studio orange was kinda teasing a 3rd season. but now, with the dismissive way the anime ended, and paru's note from earlier today, im less sure about the possibility of a 3rd season. i'd still like to see the rest of the series animated, but i guess we'll just have to wait and see if more anime is announced in the future.
if we do get another season in the future i just hope that we swing back around and actually address the things that got completely glossed over in the last couple minutes of this episode instead of charging forward w/o touching them again.
i really think the finale for this arc should've been two episodes at least. not including the tunnel scene. i think then things wouldn't have felt so rushed. people have been saying this season really would have benefitted from at least 1 extra episode and i cant help but agree. some have even suggested a whole 24 episodes just for this arc, but i think that this arc couldve been done properly with 12 or 13 episodes if there was some better prioritizing on what to include and what to cut.
like i dont mind not getting the parts about legosi's family if they can be addressed somehow in a future season (or if theres no more future anime seasons thats a plot thread that doesnt have to be worried about). i could have lived w/o seeing sheila & peach's chapter animated if it meant more time for the focus of this arc. and was the kangaroo red herring really necessary?
adaptation wise, i dont think this season was as good as the first. i still think it did fairly well, but i know that it could have been much better. ive been excited to watch this season with my friends once the dub releases, but now im wondering if i should just tell them to read the manga instead. sighs idk. perhaps it comes thru better as a bingewatch, or perhaps im being a bit too harsh. idk. at some point ill do a rewatch and see how i feel about the season as a whole, but that wont be for a while.
if you've read this far, thanks for reading my ramblings!! it's been fun to make these posts every week and im gonna miss getting new episodes every week.
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chibimyumi · 5 years ago
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Hi I have a question I was curious what you thought about the episodes about Jack the Ripper episodes 3-6? And about the anime season 1 and 2 and the other series? Thank you for answering the question
Dear Anon,
In general I am not quite positive about any animated rendition of ‘Kuroshitsuji’, so if you’re interested in reading my mostly negative opinion, please proceed ^^
TL:DR
Season 1 - Ep. 3-6 - Personal rating: 2/10
Season 1 General - Personal rating: 3/10
Season 2 - Personal rating: N.A.
Book of Circus - Personal rating: 8/10 
Book of Murder - Personal rating: 8/10 
Book of the Atlantic - Personal rating 6.5/10
Season 1 - Episodes 3 - 6
Personal rating: 2/10
I personally despise the anime version of the Jack the Ripper arc because of multiple reasons.
1. The manga portrayal of Grell in that arc wasn’t great to begin with, but it was the anime that ultimately caused many people to believe Grell is a psychopathic gay, crossdressing man. The heavily gay-coded visuals (both manga and anime) alone of course were already pointing to Grell being a flamboyant male, but the additional gay-coded voice to her may have been what delivered the ultimate blow. Because anime is voiced, it often leaves a more lasting impression on people.
2. it’s not just for Grell’s portrayal. I also despised how the anime basically signal-boosted the corset scene that presented the sexualisation of a 12 year old as something that is part of a serious murder investigation. And when the sexual tension was later denied by showing ��it was just a corset’, it was supposed to be ‘a comedic tease’ rather than a major sigh of relief.
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Yes, it was just the faithful portrayal of canon. I am not saying the manga is less guilty; I am saying that the anime signal-boosted these two very harmful things without explicit warning.
Season 1 in General
Personal rating: 3/10
The good things:
In general the first season did have some fairly nice parts, hence the marginally higher personal rating. I quite liked the scene where anime!Sebastian shoved the visitor into the oven (+1pt) , for example. And I also liked the adaptation of the mini arc where O!Ciel was kidnapped by the mafia. (+1pt)
The finale makes little sense, but I did like the charm and atmosphere it delivered. I understood that the 24 episode series had to deviate from the canon storyline in order to tell a whole story within so few episodes.
The season finale managed to bring an ending that befits the theme of ‘Kuroshtisuji’: a suitably dark, ominous conclusion of a demon receiving the payment for his part of the contract. The choice of only showing Sebastian closing in on his prey from 1st person perspective before the screen blacking out was fantastic. It really reminded me as a viewer that in the end, I am but a helpless human; that regardless of what we may think Sebastian is, the last we’ll see of him is him being a predator to his prey. (+1pt)
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The… not so good things.
Curry bread shuriken? (-1pt) The child king and prince arc? (-1pt) Pluto? (-1pt) **Angela/Ash!? (-2pt) The reaper library? (-1 pt. What was it even trying to achieve?). Ruining the most epic revelation of our protagonist’s arch enemy and spoiling the manga!?!?!?! (-1pt)
**They wanted to portray the genderlessness of angels, and so they decided to…. make this angel bi-gender in the loosest sense of the word? And then there is the EXPLICIT intention of giving Angela small breasts… because she can’t be “too much of a woman” (their actual words). PSA to women with small breasts!! Hear that!? You’re not too much of a woman!!
The rest is self explanatory.
Season 2 in General
Personal rating: N.A.
I deny its existence. If this season had existed, I would have said it took everything I hated about season 1, amplified them multi-fold, and… shoved all of those ingredients into a worse context. It ruined the significance of the S1 finale, and shoehorned ‘reasssssonsss’ to insert the new characters.
Also… apparently a contract now is as binding as a pinky swear between toddlers?
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Also, I’d like to add how even both voice actors of the two demons hated it.
Ono Daisuke (Sebastian) was asked for his opinion of season 2, and he said that: “even I, Sebastian, learned of new sides of this character that I never expected to see”. Sakurai Takahiro (Claude) in turn, was asked why he thought they cast him for this role, to which he replied: “because he wears glasses, just like me. I think it’s called the glasses-casting-method.”
Book of Circus
Personal rating: 8/10
The animation itself felt quite static, but it was nice to finally see something animated almost perfectly faithfully to canon. The voice actors poured in so much more life and passion, and the cinematic record of Joker was very powerful.
Book of Murder
Personal rating: 8/10
I liked it, and the soundtrack chosen for these OVAs were great and fitted the theme perfectly. The animation, just like BoC, was quite static, but otherwise it is faithful to canon and represented the atmosphere quite well. First when Jeremy was introduced in the manga, many people really had no clue that he was Sebastian; the result of theories flying around in the fandom was quite nice.
In the anime, because Jeremy’s eyes were red, and because Ono Daisuke has a rather distinct voice, it was almost an instant giveaway to people who didn’t read the manga. But it’s fine. Ono Daisuke pulled everything out of his sleeve, and it was charming.
The French. I loved hating it. I don’t think I could have done a better job, but I loved hating it. French speakers out there, what did you think? ( ´艸`)
Book of Atlantic
Personal rating: 6.5/10
I actually didn’t like it a lot, even though I went to the cinema for it THRICE!(σ^罒^)σ━━━!!
The good things:
Even though I didn’t really like the addition of the Double Charles, I did like love how they inserted a burn by Sebas at Grey’s expense. I think it was a wonderful re-introduction of Trash Demon™ being the salty prick he is, and how it tied back to the events of BoM.
The soundtrack designed for the movie was also great in my opinion, and the scene where Lizzie revealed herself was very touching. Me and many in the cinema were sobbing like babies, and the times that I went with people who don’t read the manga were also great, because they shock on their faces was ART.
Finally, I really liked how they concluded the story with everyone on the rescue ship. It really gave this very nice feeling of the survival of a big adventure.
The bad things:
The number 1 sin has to be how they trimmed Sebastian’s cinematic record, even though that is easily the biggest highlight of the Campania Arc. HOW COULD THEY!? ヽ(`Д´💢)ノ
The second thing is the ATROCIOUS animation. For the anime I understand why it would have limited budget, but the movie though? The movie was marketed SO big! some city buses in the city where I lived at the time wore the BotA skin! All Animates were PLASTERED with commercial for the movie… and then… this ⇊. I think EVERYONE agreed the CGI was jarring at least, and turned something so threatening into something nobody could take seriously.
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This ⇊ was not necessarily bad animation, just a very dubious choice that I personally find quite tacky.
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The third thing is - like I said before - the insertion of Double Charles who didn’t seem to add anything to the story. The time that went to their screentime could much better be spent on Sebas’ cinematic record.
Welp, that was all! Thank you for reading my rant!!! What did you guys think of the animated adaptations?
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simonjadis · 5 years ago
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Anon I’m ASSUMING that these are from the same person; apologies if they are not
I would say that my feelings are similar to yours, but not quite identical ...
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Disney’s handling has been imperfect, and some of the mistakes have been made the highest level (I know that people give Kathleen Kennedy a hard time, but if rumor is to be believed, some of the interference that made IX kind of weird came from higher than that)
for example, Kennedy said in an interview that she tries to find people who just make big, successful movies to make sure that these are also big, successful movies. I can understand that as being a safe bet from a business stand point, but that’s not the same thing as finding someone passionate about very specifically telling good, new Star Wars stories, which we did not really get in the Sequel Trilogy
(one of the most common theories that I saw from TLJ apologists was that people didn’t like that it was new/different than what they were expecting, which was really not the issue for me or my friends. Also it was just a speedrun of parts of Episodes V and VI)
I think that I’m “too close” to Star Wars to see it as a financial asset rather than a beloved universe full of characters and stories that I adore, but I don’t think that “literally just rehash the Original Trilogy for two movies and barely acknowledge any other part of Star Wars until IX” was a good idea
Rey deserved her own story. and Luke deserved to not be retroactively robbed of his
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as for George Lucas, I do think that years of backlash over the Prequels sucked the fun out of it for him. Also, who doesn’t want four billion dollars? it was a sweetheart deal for Disney, of course
the sad thing is that this meant the end of Clone Wars, because Disney took one look at Lucasfilm’s budget and was like “OH NO YOU CANNOT SPEND THAT KIND OF MONEY ON A CARTOON” which is why Season 6 was paid for by Netflix and why Maul: Son of Dathomir was a comic
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I love Star Wars Rebels and I’m not trying to knock the show at all, but the budgetary difference was palpable. Clone Wars did have it a little easier because of the Clone Troopers (all having the same face), but on Rebels, you notice that 90% of the Imperials are the same guy wearing a hat with his visor obscuring most of his face. market scenes show just a few people (but plenty of Storm Troopers)
the designs of the main characters -- Ezra, Hera, Sabine, Zeb, Kallus, Thrawn, Kanan, etc -- are great and loving and detailed and most of those change a little over time, but there’s a reason that we only see so many planets on Rebels. look at the huge armies and crowds in Rebels. my friend @drunkkenobi​ is the first who pointed out to me that in Clone Wars, you sometimes see lines of ships (Space Traffic) and each ship in line will be unique, distinct from the others
it’s not Rebels’ fault that they didn’t have that kind of budget. that’s also why their space battles (and space ships) never quite look right. meanwhile, for Clone Wars, if they wanted a particular scene or ship that went over their planned budget, all that they had to do was ask Uncle George
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eccentric billionaires funding expensive media isn’t necessarily the most sustainable model for storytelling, but it sure worked out well for Clone Wars and for The Expanse
(Jeff Bezos personally called up the head of Amazon Prime programming, who had already been considering acquiring the extremely good but expensive show, and was like “hey the cast from this show is at a thing where I am, I’d love to just tell them that their show is saved, give me it?” and we saw as many new locations in Season 4 as we did in the first three seasons)
but streaming -- where you actually get money directly from customers who then, through their activity on your platform, show you exactly what they want to see aka what is keeping them on your platform -- offers a new opportunity for high quality genre media. remember, scifi and fantasy were EVERYWHERE in the ‘90s and the early aughts, and then because too expensive for regular TV unless they had huge audiences. only through streaming do we have these new Star Treks, The Witcher, and the real possibility of a new Stargate series
why do I bring up streaming? because
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The Mandalorian goes to show that Disney can 100% do good Star Wars. Rebels was good, despite its budget, but can you imagine how much better it would have been if it had aired on Disney+
as with the DC movies (three of which are good and I’m also excited for Birds of Prey), the solution to the our-movies-made-a-lot-of-money-but-aren’t-strictly-speaking-good is literally just “let the people who do the cartoons make the movies”
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and now we’re getting a final, seventh (half) season of Clone Wars! twelve episodes looking better than the show has ever looked!!
if you’re like me, you probably thought to yourself “gee, only 12?” and, cynically, you figured that it’s a trick -- announced at ComicCon in 2018 to build up the first wave of hype for Disney+
and it is ... but it 100% worked on me, I signed up for Disney+ and will pay anything for Clone War
my HOPE is that this is a test run to see if people really like high-quality animated Star Wars stories enough to continue with it. there’s only so much clone wars that one can cover (my suspicion is that we will see Ahsoka fake her death during Order 66 in these eps, so yep, that’s the end of the Clone Wars right there)
imagine a well-written series with everything that Clone Wars had in terms of content and visual quality, but it’s set after Episode IX. to my frustration, IX ends with effectively the same worldstate as VI which essentially means that nothing much happened in the Sequel Trilogy. but imagine a series set after IX. we could see a new set of (Force-wielding) characters. we could see Rey, Finn, Poe, and Rose during some episodes. Rose could finally get to do something that’s not an insulting fool’s errand (she deserves so much better!!!!!)
we don’t need a new Big Scary Empire/First Order thing, just organized crime and pirates and Hutts and bounty hunters and individual planet systems going to war as the characters try to assemble a NEW New Republic (gods I hate the unchanged worldstate)
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now, I know that Star Wars Resistance is not ... reassuring. this is the only screencap that I have from it because I couldn’t get into it. it’s not the animation (I enjoyed Tron Uprising and Iron Man: Armored Adventures and this is the same kind of deal), but three things:
-I watch Star Wars for the Force primarily; other stuff can be cool but I need the Force
-I will never care about ships racing and really I don’t care about an individual ship flying; I’m a Command Ship kind of space nerd
-apparently the writing doesn’t improve much during the first season. people tell the main character to not do something, then he does it, and disaster ensues. that’s ... it’s fine, it’s fine to exist as a show, it’s just not for me
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obviously, not all Star Wars media is for me, but when something -- like TLJ or the Sequel Series as a whole (even though VII and IX are enjoyable) or Resistance -- disappoints me, I would never accuse it of “ruining Star Wars”
Star Wars is a whole franchise. the breadth of canon isn’t all wiped away by some disappointments. was the MCU ruined by Age of Ultron? no. it was a bad movie but from the same franchise that gave us The Winter Soldier and Thor Ragnarok. hell, Dawn of Justice doesn’t “ruin” Wonder Woman or Aquaman or Shazam. bad movies aren’t contagious
for the past several years, the Entitled Dude crowd has felt empowered. they were radicalized in the altright/redpill/MGTOW/meninist/nazi/gamergate/comicsgate/etc spheres of the internet and now they just have a reflex where they see any sort of representation and decry it as “SJW,” which they also seem to think is a bad thing
in the same way that well-meaning people on tumblr can get radicalized into being antis/puriteens, people with certain vulnerabilities on reddit or youtube can get sucked into a world that tells them that they are the default and that other people existing is “political” in media and in real life, and that people being upset by outright cruelty towards them is both funny and means that the cruel person is the victor. they need therapy and studios need to not listen to them
unfortunately, sometimes there are movies that are bad despite having things like solid representation. Ghostbusters 2016 was a delight, but my friends and I with whom I saw TLJ (all of us queer feminists) left the theater angry. we’ve bitten our tongues a lot (even if it seems otherwise) because publicly criticizing the film too often leads some incel monster to chime in with agreement, and we’re just like
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the redpillgate crowed et all is a natural ally of conservative white evangelicals, even though the former group is generally made up of New Atheists (the short version is atheists who hold socially conservative views because racism/misogyny/transphobia benefit them without using christianity as an excuse). it’s kind of like how terfs will side with conservative hate groups because, though they’re natural enemies, they both despite trans people just for existing
unfortunately, when you’re looking at who went to see a movie or who hated it, not everyone posts with an ID card saying exactly their demographic. which is only going to make studios like Disney even more nervous about including queer content in Star Wars and in the MCU (I mean real queer content with characters whose names don’t have to be searched on a wiki)
that was a bit of a tangent, but yeah. sorry if I missed anything
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yuexuan · 7 years ago
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QuanZhi GaoShou/The King’s Avatar review
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Disclaimer: All comments are my own opinions. Also, this review is directed towards the first season of the animation, not the original novel.
Bearing the titles QuanZhi GaoShou 全职高手, The King’s Avatar (abbreviated as TKA here) or Master of Skills, this series had generated substantial hype prior to its release in April 2017. The story opens with Ye Xiu’s forced retirement as a professional gamer from the competitive gaming arena. He immediately found employment as a web manager at an Internet Café, and reestablishes himself as a highly skilled ‘amateur’ gamer in Glory’s tenth server. From there on he played with/against other players, formed transient teams and conquered dungeons, thereby quickly gaining fame in the tenth’s server.  
Before the animation’s release, I’ve been recommended the novel several times, but didn’t read it due to time restraints. So I pretty much dived right into the animation when it was released. Here are my thoughts on some of the highlights and shortcomings of the animation below the cut.
Highlights
1. Animation: The series employs a blend of CGI for background sceneries and traditional 2D-animation for foreground characters, which is a clear leap in animation skills from previous China-productions such as Reikenzan and Fox Spirit Matchmaker. Other outstanding points: the occasional switching of third- and first-person point of view (reminiscent of gaming viewpoint), camera rotation at different scenes (e.g. going from close-up to a distant view of Hangzhou in the trailer), fighting choreography and detailed drawings. My favorite animated segment in the whole series is the fight scene between Han WenQing and Ye Xiu at the end of episode 12, a culmination of great fighting choreography, camera panning and music.
2. Music: Some of the OSTs in the series are superb (e.g.: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h_sksGn_iGA **spoiler alert**). Also, the voice actor for Ye Xiu sang the OP, how cool is that?
3. Character:
This might be a low point for others, but I appreciate the lack of romance in the series. I like the idea of the characters developing individually and as a team to become great gamers without having romance weighing down relationships and affecting professional career pursuits.
Another highlight for me is the relatively ‘calm’ characters, without over-exaggerated behaviors that we tend to see in Japanese animations. I wouldn’t attribute this as being ‘mature’ per say (as some other reviewers had), but just different personality types that are more unique to the Chinese fiction culture.
While there are not a lot of female characters, I like the juxtaposition of the female characters and Ye Xiu in real life and in game. Yes, Ye Xiu is a battle god and master tactician in the game, and the girls’ skills dull in comparison to other professional gamers, but outside of the game, they are more financially endowed. Su MuCheng is apparently a huge success in the professional gaming scene as a female player. Tang Rou - although not revealed in the animation as having a job - but from how lavishly she used money while betting against Ye Xiu, I’m pretty sure that she’s got some background. And of course, Chen Guo is the freaking owner of the internet cafe. What more can I say?
Game avatar designs are gorgeous, really loving the diversity of classes shown.
4. Plot: The series opens with a strong and engaging start by revealing an unfair exchange in the professional gaming industry. Many of the topics they touched on are realistic such as professional gamer age range, unemployment and violation of contract terms. I’ve also heard a lot of comments about how the series pulls in elements of eSport and MMORPG gaming tactics. Being neither a gamer nor an eSport fan, I don’t have strong opinions on those aspects.
Shortcomings
1. Animation: Excessive repetition of action scenes. I am not sure if this is the standard in the animation industry nowadays because I’ve seen the same problem in other series (e.g. Yuri on Ice with the same ice skating sequence), but it wears out the viewers quickly. Kudos to the animators though on at least making the effort to flip the directions of the attack sequence xD
2. Voice Acting: There are a few moments where the voice acting is awkward (e.g. when Huang ShaoTian obtained the enemy’s sword in ep. 11 and laughed – that seemed sort of forced). Perhaps it is because the VAs are used to covering real life drama series rather than animations, so they didn’t adapt as nicely? I don’t know, but I’ve definitely heard more natural voice acting in online dramas (广播剧).
3. Characters:
There were not a lot of character developments. Many characters made brief appearance for only one episode, which makes it hard to develop strong attachments to the characters. Cutting down on the number of new characters and fleshing out existing ones would have been great. Granted, the novel itself is 1,000+ chapters long, so there must’ve been more character developments there.
In Gintama episode 100, Gintoki gave a lesson on creating characters that are recognizable by their silhouettes: 
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The characters’ avatars in GLORY definitely achieved this effect, but outside of the game, they look too much alike at first glance. At first I confused Ye Xiu with Qiao YiFan and Wang JieXi, and then confused Yu WenZhou with Zhang XinJie……Definitely not easily recognizable ><
Lack of female characters. True, majority of the gaming population is constituted of male players, but the imbalance of male:female character ratio is…...extremely imbalanced. I know there is a large population of female gamers in China (evidenced by the popularity with games like WangZhe RongYao, Jian San, YinYangShi), so more representation would have been great.
4. Plot: Despite the exciting start, the plotline and narration falls short on many other aspects. After briefly touching upon the issues of unemployment etc. that I mentioned earlier, little has been done to discuss these topics in further depth. Likewise, I was hoping that the game setting and how the competition works would be explored further, but was disappointed with the cursory treatment of these subjects. The animators are definitely relying on preexisting familiarity with MMORPG gameplay, and even previous reading of the novel (I’ve read a few chapters, and already noticed many important aspects of character and plot left out). Otherwise, as a standalone animation, this series lacks definitive plot development.
In general, I’ll say that if you are looking for suspense and huge developments and crescendos in a plot, this series might seem bland. However, if you’re looking for a small taste of everyday gamer life interspersed with a few laughs, then by all means, enjoy the show!
5. Sponsorship: How ironic is it that the main character refused to commercialize when the whole series is filled with McDonald advertisements. =w= It’s....everywhere…...literally...
Side note: On the translation, the first two episodes in the official channel are done by a less experienced translation group, but the translations definitely improved thereafter. Personally I think they made an awesome job of translating the game avatar names. That said, there are definitely some contexts that got lost in translation. An example that comes to mind is Huang ShaoTian calling the other player ‘jian ke’ in ep. 11. It was translated as ‘trash master’, which seemed like a normal dissing joke. But it’s more than that: jian ke贱客 is pronounced the same as jian ke 剑客 (blade master), so it’s a clever play on words. Furthermore, it would not have made sense if simply said, but because Huang ShaoTian employed speech bubbles, the joke fits nicely with his character.
All in all, I would recommend watching it for a change in pace and as a lighthearted, slice-of-everyday-life series. Also, definitely checking out the novel later on to see how different the animation adaptation is.
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