Nothing witty for me to say, just read that caption. Also, sorry for the delay.
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Well, summer has finally left us again, and can I just say that as of now, 2017 was a pretty underwhelming year for anime? I mean, I know that we still have one more season to go, but the first half of the year was not especially great for streaming anime. A deluge of titles that were mostly garbage, Netflix botching its distribution of titles, and just a general lack of anything truly exciting. I haven't been excited to watch anything for the past couple of months not because there wasn't anything good, but most of the titles were simply generic and safe, and the huge risks turned into colossal disasters that couldn't be ignored.
And that's kind of true for the summer as well. There were some great titles hidden away, but the great shows mostly played it safe. My mind wasn't redefined by any anime this year, and there haven't even been titles that I would watch just because they were comforting and pleasant. Most of the good titles I've talked about have been good, but nothing beyond that.
I suppose you can say that it's better to aim for being good rather than being redefining and that there's nothing wrong with doing a solid job, but at the same time, some of the greatest anime we're simply good because the creators thought good enough was passable. Heart and soul got poured into the classic anime that we love, but I don't feel any heart and soul from a bunch of these titles. I just see titles that exist because they exist. Sorry if that's a bit nihilistic, but you all have no idea how close I was to just not follow any titles this summer because of how underwhelming the Spring was and how little the summer appealed to me.
And yet here we are, with 5 titles I've seen that I'm glad I watched for one reason or another, but I'm not really attached to any of them, with maybe an exception or two here and there. So with that being said, let's dive into my apathetic look at the Summer Anime of 2017.
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| Gamers! |
For those of you wondering how much video games factor into the anime, the answer is very little. Sure they go to an arcade every now and then, there's a subplot about a mobile phone game, and for some bizarre reason there's a dedicated sequence in the second episode where two characters play Persona 4 Arena (seriously, that was whiplash inducing), but the games aren't really the focus of the show. It's about high school romance with video game fans as the backdrop.
And it's perfectly fine for what it is. The show doesn't raise the bar on comedy, but it's good at doing its job well. It's nice to see a slice-of-life that has expressive characters do expressive things with some great comedic moments sprinkled in, but at the end of the day it's pretty forgettable as an experience. I don't remember any of these characters or what their personalities are like. I know damned well what they think of everyone else, but not-so-much who they are as people. And I think that's a pretty big failing for a teenage comedy.
Gamers! is a fine show with some great moment throughout, but after I finished the last episode, which was pretty underwhelming at that, nothing stuck with me. The only thing that stuck with me was a mid series twist that changed the entire status quo, which was refreshing to see if only because the characters could do new things and act in new situations, but the characters were both the show's biggest strength and its biggest weakness. I don't know how you do that, but I'm still glad that I watched it and can easily recommend it as a decent comedy to watch.
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| Kakegurui |
Kakegurui is about Yumeko, a girl who transfers to an academy where only one thing matters; gambling. The more money you have, the more power you have in the academy. Instead, Yumeko doesn't want to get rich or gain power in the school. She just wants to gamble, and she'll destroy anyone that she gambles against all just to get that next great thrill. And by thrill, I mean nearly orgasming at the thought of winning it big or losing it all.
If there's one word to describe Kakegurui, it's bonkers. This is a show that keeps on ramping up the intensity with every episode until you're on the edge of your seat watching gambling antics occur, then instantly shirking in your seat when you see an intensely ugly, crazy face pop up on screen. Just look up "Kakegurui faces" on Google and see what happens. I wish I could say that Kakegurui has a bit more meat besides crazy faces and high stakes thrills, and there are some subtextual elements about addiction and gambling, but really, the show is fairly shallow all things considered. And that's perfectly fine.
Sometimes I'm not looking for high art. I thought I would get that with the first episode here, but after that I readjusted myself for a crazy 12 episode ride, and I wasn't disappointed (well excluding the finale). This is probably on par with Kill la Kill stylistically. Yes, it does have something to say, and maybe it can be a bit sloppy at times, but the show is still immensely satisfying because of it. Crazy faces, crazy games, memorable characters, and one hell of a protagonist make this a show you definitely need to watch.
...Oh wait, it's a show that's going to air on Netflix. Well, watch it in a couple months when Netflix actually decides to stream the damn show!
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| Little Witch Academia |
So most of the plot is still the same as the first half of the show, with one major exception. While the first half of the show focused on Akko becoming a witch and learning about different spells, we now get a storyline for her with the appearance of a new witch at Luna Nova; Professor Croix. Croix is a witch that uses machines to accomplish her magic, but she may or may not be on the up and up. Plus she has a history with Professor Ursula, making a fairly interesting storyline between the two of them.
So I'll get this out of the way right now. I did enjoy the second half of Little Witch Academia more, but it had a lot more problems then the first half. The strengths of the first half were in the characters that Akko explored with. Sucy, Lotte, Diana, and Ursula were all very fun and I loved the miniadventures and the characters they met up with. With a few exceptions, the second half of the show focuses solely on Akko, Croix, and Ursula. I think there are only three one off adventures, and even then Lucy and Lotte are relegated to cheerleaders for most of the show. But what we lose with the students, we gain with the professors. Ursula and Croix are very compelling, especially in their history with each other and a major revelation about Chariot that took me by surprise. I was genuinely shocked at what the show pulled by the end of its run and I couldn't believe what I saw.
Croix, as an antagonist, is kind of underwhelming, but she's a very human antagonist. She's deeply flawed and is selfish, but she still cares about Ursula and Akko at the end of the day. Croix is very intent on reviving magic so to speak, and because of that we get a huge can of exposition opened up about the world. We get the secret history of magic, the powers of magic, and how to unlock the secrets of all magic. Plus we get an action packed finale that reminds me a lot of, again, Kill la Kill. That makes sense because Trigger made both titles, but like that show, there's a ton of heart here that can easily be seen just by watching a single episode.
I wish we had more time spent with the characters I grew to like from the first half of the show, but the second half was still pretty damned strong and excelled by the sharper focus on Akko, Ursula, and Croix. It's the exact opposite of the first half, but both are still excellent to watch, dub or sub.
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| Made in Abyss |
In the city of Orth, there is a massive pit that goes so far down that no one has ever reached the bottom. That is called the Abyss, and the city of Orth thrives on the Abyss by sending Cave Raiders to find relics, food, and other objects to survive everyday life. One cave raider in training, Riko, while going through the first layer of the Abyss, finds a robot boy named Reg, who doesn't know where he came from. Shortly after Riko meets Reg, Riko is given letters from her deceased mother to meet her at the bottom of the Abyss. Spurred by this, Riko and Reg decide to trek down to the bottom of the Abyss, where no human has ever gone before.
I wasn't prepared for how dark Made in Abyss would get. I knew this would be an adventure series about some kids going down into an unexplored world, but imagine if that world is the world of Drangleic. The deeper they go, the more monstrous the creatures are, the more savage they are, and the more insane the humans are. They meet half human monstrosities, humans that are beyond ruthless, and they even have to go through the perils of going up higher in the Abyss. Even ascending a bit can cause vomiting, hallucinations, the loss of their humanity, insanity, and even death. The longer you watch this show, the darker it gets. You thought Madoka was dark? This is darker.
It's so rare to see a show like Made in Abyss produced during this day and age. It's gruesome, but it still has some light moments to it and there's still a sense of adventure throughout. Each episode was full of wonder and beauty, despite the darkness of said beauty. Riko and Reg are fantastic heroes, Riko in particular. She's so determined to see her mother and is the first one to inspire Reg whenever he gets down. And as for Reg, he's a great foil to Riko as the only person that can protect her while also being fascinated from a story perspective. Who is he? How was he created? Did he really come from the Abyss?
There are so many questions to ask, and Made in Abyss... doesn't answer them. The show ends on a cliffhanger, and a major one at that that I won't spoil. But the last episode is tragic because of the material it deals with. There are very obvious arcs in the show, about three in total, and each of them are satisfying to watch. I can't describe how much I enjoyed Made In Abyss because of how bold, unique, pleasant, and frightening it is and how I can't wait until we get more of it.
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| Re:Creators |
The second cour of Re:Creators deals with both our heroes and villains gearing up for a final battle to decide if the world will live or if the world will die. In between seeing fictional characters fight, we get drama between the human writers and their creations they made. But we also get a couple of new characters added to the mix that I don't have enough time to get to know or even like. And by the end of the series, all of the characters that came to live are pretty much rendered pointless in the grand scheme of things.
So you have a series that was built on fictional characters entering the real world, but by the end of the series, you have them admitting that they were side characters in their own stories. The main focus actually fell onto the humans to create literal deus ex machinas to fight against the Military Uniform Princess, and the humans just unleash them one after the other as the NEW trump card to beat her. There are about two or three of these examples. And by the end, it just feels like nothing was accomplished. It's a happy ending, the series makes some more meta commentary about writers and the products they write, roll credits.
I'm conflicted with the second half of the show, because after so much build up leading up to an explosive finale, it was more of a drawn out spurt of an ending. The fight kept going, new powers emerged, and at the end I just felt unsatisfied. You know how in the Transformers movies the focus was on the squishy humans instead of the massive robots fighting for the fate of the universe. Imagine an anime version of that. We get one character, Magane, who has an incredibly interesting set of powers and abilities and foreshadowing that she would eventually do something massive, maybe even usurp the Military Uniform Princess, but it never happens. She has a scene in one of the last five episodes, then vanishes for the rest of the series.
Re:Creators reeks of a show that was rewritten towards the end of it. I think that the writers spent so much time explaining their world that they had no time to really give it a proper conclusion. Re:Creators is a misfire, plain and simple. It's a ho-hum show that has a great premise, but took a few wrong steps in production that led to a middling finale. In fact, that's the best way to describe the show; middling at best, ho-hum at worst.
OVERALL RANKING
So it was a safe summer. That's really it. Great premises were led astray and good titles were only good because they played it safe. There were legitimately great titles that took risks, but they either failed or soared.
What failed was Re:Creators, but failed would be a bit too strong of a word. It just didn't do as well as it could have done, making it the worst title of the Summer for not sticking the landing on a premise that could have been really great. Gamers! escaped being the worst show of the season by the sole virtue that I enjoyed watching it, even if it didn't try to be ambitious like Re:Creators was. Little Witch Academia offered a different conclusion that the first cour, but the animation, characters, and twists let me enjoy the show just as much as the first half.
So then we have Kakegurui and Made in Abyss, two shows that couldn't be more different. We have a simple show that's based all on thrills and raising the tension in every episode, and a complex show that deals with deep themes and a compelling world and characters. At the end of the day though, I enjoyed both titles, but Made in Abyss is a show I want to see more of. A common complaint of Kakegurui is that once you've seen one episode, you've seen them all, and that's an accurate assessment. Made in Abyss is a show that makes you want to watch all of the episodes one right after the other. Kakegurui is a thrill, but Made in Abyss is an engagement, and I will gladly watch another episode of Made in Abyss this instant.
MADE IN ABYSS
KAKEGURUI
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LITTLE WITCH ACADEMIA
GAMERS!
RE:CREATORS
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