Covers February 12-18, 2023.
THIS IS MY LAST WEEKLY UPDATE
I planned to post this a day or two earlier, but I had a family matter to attend to. It’s been a really stressful couple of days.
I’ve decided to discontinue these “Weekly Recap” posts. This is mostly due to my lack of enjoyment in making them, and I’m facing a lot of stress in my personal life as well. I’m not quitting this blog, but I’m going to post less frequently. More details are at the end of the post.
My Hero Academia S6 #10-20
I’ve spent the first half of this week catching up with My Hero Academia Season 6, and it hasn’t been a good experience for me. I already wasn’t the biggest fan of these arcs when they happened in the manga, but without Kohei Horikoshi’s striking artwork, it’s been a dice roll whether or not I’ll be engaged in an episode. I wish I was better in my literary analysis, because I what to figure out exactly why this season urks me so much.
The one thing that I’m confident in criticizing is the infuriating social commentary. I might have my rose-tinted glasses on, but getting to see how this superhero society operated was intriguing in earlier seasons. MHA created a world where regular people put their full trust in these heroes, where if the mightiest of these heroes were to fall, the rest of the world goes down with it. What I dislike about this season is how fast the world went down, that it only took TWO DAYS for society to collapse because Dabi made a callout post on his Twitter.com. Granted, a bunch of villains got released from prison around the world to wreak havoc, but it still feels too short of time for people to lose all trust in heroes. A lot of these angry crowds of people are annoying too, throwing unnecessary insults at heroes just doing their job. For a show that spent its time exposing the cracks in this universe’s law enforcement, the way the civilians are acting is as braindead as a Copaganda film.
There are some good points though. I remember the first 4-5 episodes of this season being pretty good, as well as Dabi’s reveal and Deku’s rematch with Muscular. Outside of some samey environments, the art is mostly great with a lot of well-animated fights. Despite my issues with the plot, the character writing is still pretty solid, especially when delving into Endeavor’s relationship with his family. I originally rolled my eyes at Deku’s sudden edginess in the second arc, it makes sense considering Deku’s character. He’s always had a self-destructive sense of Justice, and now that the pressure of being the last weirder of One for All, as well as the threat of All for One hunting him down, it makes sense that he would cut himself off from his family and friends just to keep them out of harm’s way.
I don’t like being negative about My Hero Academia. This show was my gateway into mainstream anime, so I have a lot of nostalgia for it. I can look at screenshots of older seasons and remember the emotions I felt watching those scenes. When I watched the first couple of episodes of this season, I thought that the show I used to love had finally returned, but that ended up not being the case.
6.5/10
One Piece #1051
I didn’t watch #1050, but thank goodness I was able to check out this episode. One of the best episodes of the season so far.
While not reaching the animation highs of #1048 and #1049, this episode makes up by having consistently great sakuga throughout. Yong-Ce Tu’s segment of Luffy and Kaido’s clash was great. I especially liked how it flashed back to Roger and Whitebeard’s clash, stylized to look like ink drawings. My personal favorite bit of sakuga was Yooto’s sequence of Momonosuke falling out of the sky, which was both a great showcase of Kanada-style animation and visual comedy. The other cuts in this episode were great too, but it would take too long to talk about all of them.
When they introduced the 3D models for Kaido and Momonosuke’s dragon forms, I was worried that the animation on them would look really janky, judging from the previews I saw for #1050. Luckily, the 3D models were used pretty well in this episode, as you can see from the image above. I also noticed that they gave 3D Momo large eyes in one shot to show how scared he was, which was a nice touch.
Not much happened in this episode storywise though. I do like the moment where Luffy tells Momonosuke that if he took a bite out of an Emperor of the Sea, “What do you have to be scared of?”. Other than that, I can’t really remember everything that happens in this episode, since the perspective is switched around a lot. I can’t really call this a “stand-alone” episode in that respect. Still, as an experience, it’s the best One Piece has offered during the Winter season, and I’ll definitely be rewatching it when I update my Top 10 Winter Episodes list for February.
Bungou Stray Dogs S4 #7
Hunting Dogs vs Stray Dogs
Although I’m liking the new “antagonists” that were introduced in this episode, it feels weird to introduce them in the middle of the arc. It would have been better if the arc focused solely on the Angels of Decay instead. This is also one of BSD’s more comedic episodes, which is a bit of a tone-killer considering how dark the last episode was.
Still, as a standalone episode, this is pretty good. The comedic moments still got a laugh out of me, the Hunting Dogs are fun characters, and the animation is the best the season has to offer so far. I wish it kept the tone the previous episode had, but I had fun with it regardless.
Also, Kunikida stealing someone’s car is hilarious.
“Do you have vehicle theft Insurance?”
Kunikida
“I do. Why?”
Driver
“I see. Congratulations. You’re getting a brand new car.”
Kunikida
The season stays at an 8.5/10, but that might change depending on the next episode.
ONIMAI #7
I’ve criticized this show enough already, but this is the worst episode so far. The early shenanigans of forcing Mahiro to go back to middle school have already passed, and all we’re left with are boring stories with humor that wasn’t funny, to begin with. Every joke in this episode has already been told in better shows and those weirdly horny eyes catches separating each scene don’t help with my enjoyment.
It isn’t devoid of its good points; I liked when Mahiro asked what girls even talk about, and her friends advise her to just talk about what she likes. I appreciate the message that your interests should not be defined by your gender. I also like the mid-life crisis that Mahiro faces when she realizes her favorite video games came out before her classmates were born.
The good doesn’t outweigh the bad for me though. It’s a good thing that the show is pretty because there isn’t any other reason to keep watching. I would rather watch modern MHA, which frustrates me, but at least I would feel some kind of emotion.
I’m keeping the show at a 6/10, but I might bring the score down if future episodes are this derivative.
Cool Doji Danshi #18
The ending reminded me of some of the graphic design projects I used to do back in college.
I remember little else from this episode.
7/10
Soaring Sky! PreCure #3
I think this is the point where the production values start going down. Still, the show is pretty cute. It’s a solid kid’s show and already more fun than the previous season.
Side Note: Cure Precious appearing in the ED jumpscared me. I can’t seem to escape that season.
7.25/10
Backlog
Buddy Daddies #1
I watched the first episode of this show so I could have something to do on Fridays. It’s more original than “Spy x Family, but with dads”, but it doesn’t offer enough for me to keep watching. I’ll try a different show next week.
Space Dandy #7
Now that this season’s backlog is complete, I can finally get back to my New Year’s Resolution, which was finishing the first season of Space Dandy. This is one of the less memorable Dandy episodes, and it was still the best thing I’ve watched this week.
Instead of making weekly posts, I’m going to focus my energy on making monthly posts instead. Next week, I’ll be updating my Top 10 Episodes of Winter 2023 list, as well as the OP/ED list. That won’t be completed until after February ends, so you can follow this page if you want to be notified when those will be posted. Otherwise, I hope you enjoyed reading this anyway, and I hope you have great rest of your day.
(Note: This post might not be the best it could be. I’ll come back and make edits when needed, but I need to be in a better headspace first)
DanielSonic Talks About Stuff 