Welcome to another general discussion thread! Feel free to use this thread to talk about things you have watched recently, questions you have, or recommendations you want to give!
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I watched quite a bit of anime last week so it’s back to longer (but hopefully not too incoherent) ramblings.
Currently Airing
Picked up 3 anime that are airing right now:
Chainsmoker Cat felt more depressing than funny at times. Addiction is no joke. But the slapstick humour hits perfectly for me.
Smoking Behind the Supermarket with You is yet another vanilla romance. I hope the writing is good because so far it hasn’t done much to differentiate itself from all the other vanilla romance stories.
Jaadugar: A Witch in Mongolia is basically Vinland Saga v2, so I know right away that it’s going to be peak.
With these latest additions, I am now following all seasonal anime with average rating of 80% or higher. I may be missing out on some sub-80%-rating anime though. Any seasonal recommendations based on my taste? https://anilist.co/user/Endmaker/animelist
Past Seasons
I am working my way through Mushoku Tensei: Jobless Reincarnation now, and have just completed the first season / part. I should be caught up to the latest season before long.
I can see why this is a controversial anime with the icky bits. Personally, those are a nothingburger to me, considering some of my previous watches.
I just find it a pity that people avoid this anime because of the controversial elements. They are missing out on the story, world-building, writing, etc which are honestly solid.
Yes, the protagonist is problematic, but
To elaborate on the second point, compared to anime that come to mind for isekai - Konosuba, Cautious Hero, Re:Zero - Jobless Reincarnation felt like a relatively “vanilla” isekai. It is set in a stereotypical medieval European-style fantasy world - no gimmicks, no parody. But it never once felt like wish fulfillment unlike the seasonal isekai slop.
In extreme cases of isekai slop, the loser protagonist would externalise their faults, blaming everyone and everything but themselves. They were just dealt a bad hand at life. So what do they need to overcome their hardship? A unique cheat just for them! It’s like striking the lottery - completely unearned. The anime would then degenerate into a power fantasy for similar-minded losers to indulge in. There’s no character growth at all!
Jobless Reincarnation is not like this at all. I have seen so much development through flashbacks, internal monologue and dialogue - and that’s just the first cour of season 1! I see no reason for them to buck this trend, so I’m confident that the protagonist would grow even more, which means the story would be continue to be good.
Anyway, I enjoy it a lot, and am looking forward to participating in the episode discussions.
P.S. I’m unsure how best to categorise this anime. Peak drama? Peak politics? I don’t see enough of either at the moment.
P.P.S. I bet half of the village’s kids are Paul’s.
The World Is Dancing has been the biggest positive surprise of the season for me. I’m not even into dancing, but the way it is presented in this show is incredible. The team behind this took a very artistic approach and some parts are absolutely hypnotizing. You’ll know what I mean if you watch episode 1 till the end. You liked Wandance and a bunch of newer Cypic shows, and while the style is nothing like Wandance (there’s no clunky 3DCG) it is also an anime about dancing so might be worth trying out
Another show that stands out and you don’t have it on your watching list is Goodbye, Lara. This is an anime original with an art style resembling shows from the 90s. The first two episodes were very promising.
There are some others that might turn out worth watching, but so far these two are the standouts, IMO
I started watching Chainsmoker Cat and holy crap it hit WAY too close to home for me as someone who was once very broke and smoked. Like in the first episode she was doing stuff that I thought only I ever did. celebrating over finding a “long one”, smoking butts that had a bit of grime on them, digging through butts to pick out the ones that were still “smokeable”, doing the whole “i have 6 smokes left and don’t get paid for another 6 days, i can do one a day until then” and then not doing that.
I had to stop midway through the second episode cause A. it was making me want to smoke again and B. it was reminding me of my past.
Yeah, I won’t continue with this anime because of that.