Continuing my round-up of last season’s series:
You and I Are Polar Opposites - Season 2
More fluffy, wholesome romance like in season 1. And not just of the main couple, but the side couples too! I gotta say, having gained the familiarity of its formula in season 1, some of its magic has fizzled out for me by th. This is meta but it’s kinda like the ennui of romantic relationships, isn’t it?
However, though formulaic, it still does its bread-and-butter well: its deep characterisation of the main cast. There were also some peak moments sprinkled throughout the season that made for great highlights.
Overall, I still enjoyed this season of Polar Opposites a lot. And it’s nice to see a complete adaptation of a story, which is quite rare AFAIK.
Mushoku Tensei: Jobless Reincarnation - Season 3
Honestly, one-third of the way through, I was convinced this season of MT is an interlude - a bridging season between arcs where things actually happened.
So I was pleasantly surprised when we reach the climax of the season and drama started happening. And as other participants in the weekly threads never failed to remind us, it is peak fiction alright. It’s somewhat twisted but I was hooked watching the misery porn.
spoiler screenshot of MT S3
Without going too much into spoilers, Rudy still has much growing up to do. We have seen him grown as a person, overcoming his past traumas, but his maturity (if that’s the right word) is still stuck in the past. Excluding that one initial trigger, everything else that happened thereafter was all his own doing, nobody else to blame.
Since Saga of Tanya the Evil is also airing this season, I was wondering if Tanya could have done better than Rudy in the same situation. After all, Tanya is smart unlike Rudy. But I quickly perished that thought when I realised that Tanya is lacking in wisdom too. He/she would have easily been baited through some other means.
Anyway, to sum things up: peak story and story-telling.
P.S. I don’t think the characters’ flaws are reflective of the author’s personal flaws. I think they are just that good at writing flawed characters.
It has somewhat went out of fashion by now, and nobody asked for it, but here’s a summary / recap of my post-season thoughts in the form of a tierlist. After all, it’s not very often that I am following this many series in one season.
Notes:
- series are tiered (and scored) based on how much I enjoyed them, or how much I looked forward to each new episode
- series are sorted by alphabetical order within each tier
- if an anime isn’t on this list, that means I didn’t complete it - either because I did not start on it, or because I dropped it
- long-series running series like Pokemon Horizons are excluded
I “binged” Pokémon Origins - easy considering it is only 4-episodes long.
Well, turns out it is one elaborate ad for Pokemon X and Y😅 They were even released around the same time: October 2013.
Having said that, barring the inclusion of the Mega Evolution mechanic in this anime, I’d say this is the most faithful adaptation of the games I’ve seen. Pretty much everything is lore-accurate. Heck, they even included some references!
(Pity that they couldn’t squeeze in Youngster Ben’s quote about comfy shorts at some point😔)
Also, despite being an ad (or perhaps exactly because it’s an ad?), it was produced with such high quality.
It’s not the first time, but Pokemon was able to secure the big guns when it came to the casting of voice-acting roles; there were some sexy male voices😏
On the animation side of things, maybe it’s because my expectations were low (Pokemon Horizons doesn’t always have the best animation), but I was impressed by how well-animated this anime is. There is so much movements in what is clearly properly choreographed fight scenes. It was a treat to watch.
Lastly, when it revealed itself to be quite a faithful adaptation of the Kanto storyline by the first episode, I knew not to expect anything different story-wise. In fact, anyone who played one of the games should know roughly what to expect in each episode based on the titles alone.
But the onion-cutting ninjas still got me in episode 2. I am no good at handling
mild(?) spoiler
death of fictional mothers,
so it hit me hard.
As mentioned earlier, Mega Evolution is where this anime materially differs from the games. But, the way it was handled was rather smooth IMO. Not only did it not take away from my enjoyment of this anime, I’d say it actually elevated it.
In a nutshell: I enjoyed this a lot. It is clearly nostalgia-bait, meant to funnel old players into the new games, and I see it working. It had only 4 episodes to work with, but it still got many things right. At least a 9 / 10 for me (recency bias means 10 / 10 for now).
I wish we can see more of such adaptations from the Pokemon franchise. It need not be an adaptation of the games; it can be an adaptation of the manga too.
(I am aware it’s a pipe dream.)
Edit: just found that I am not the only one coping.