The last thing we watched, cartoon/animu edition

Piscian

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Watched the first episode of Arcane. Holy shit, this is a pretty show. Good acting, all that stuff, but it's the animation that really struck a chord with me.
It just keeps getting better, I wasn't quite sure what to make of it after the first episode, but each episode drags you in further. Its got a real breaking bad feel to it with the escalating tension.
 
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It just keeps getting better, I wasn't quite sure what to make of it after the first episode, but each episode drags you in further. Its got a real breaking bad feel to it with the escalating tension.
Arcena gave me more than Breaking Bad ever could. Bush league TV show.
 

Thaluikhain

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Do animated movies go here?

Anyway, Secret of the Sword is...not great. It did totally get the medium, you can put whatever weirdness you want on screen, not like live action (of the time), so they went all in. But it went on and on and kept tacking bits onto what should have ended.

OTOH, the first She-Ra transformation was quite decent, should have ended the movie soon after, on a high note.
 
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Casual Shinji

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Watched the first episode of Arcane. Holy shit, this is a pretty show. Good acting, all that stuff, but it's the animation that really struck a chord with me.
They managed to bridge what nearly all animated shows and movies fail at, which is to go from the concept art phase to the animated process and STILL retain that concept art beauty. There've been many times when I watched an animated show or movie, caught glimpses of the concept art in the end credits or whatever and think 'man, I wish it could've just looked like that'. And Arcane pulls that off.
 

meiam

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I'm so disappointed by this season of spy X family, not only is it doing the usual boring shift from comedy to shonen that sadly most comedy do, but it also completly ignore the fact that the thre main reason to watch this show are: Anya, Anya and Anya and for some reason decided to completely sideline her, even some minor side character have had more screen time than her. No idea if its the base material that drop the ball or the adaptation, but I can barely bother to keep watching.
 
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Finally saw Ruby Gillman: Teenage Kraken. This is a good movie. It sucks this film didn't do well in theaters due to an overcrowded market, but the critics that saw this weren't kind. The movie is in the style of a teenage superhero going through puberty and answering the call. It's what you expect, but it has a few neat twists. The animation is great and something you need to see in motion. Screen shots do not do this film justice. Buy this movie on Amazon, because it is on sale.
 

Drathnoxis

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I also have now seen the ending to Attack on Titan and, honestly, it's not as bad as I was expecting. Maybe the manga is worse, but it's not any dumber than the show has been for a long time. The Founding Titan is god and can do anything at all and a bunch of nonsense happens until the good guys win... or something. I really didn't care about any of the characters or anything by this point since nobody has any consistency and are constantly switching sides. The world both in and out of paradise seems to consist 90% of irrational lunatics bent solely on destruction and there didn't seem to be much worth saving. Levi finally killed the beast titan! ... after he had already given up and switched to their side again. Yay, big win. I don't really have much to say that I haven't already said about the show other than I laughed when Mikasa made out with Eren's severed head and the credits ended with that sci-fi city past Eren's grave getting nuked.

I still feel the show would have been faaaaaar better if it had been a more standard 'save the world from an impossible threat' because it just got dumb once all the conspiracies, magic, and time travel got introduced.
 

Bob_McMillan

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I'm so disappointed by this season of spy X family, not only is it doing the usual boring shift from comedy to shonen that sadly most comedy do, but it also completly ignore the fact that the thre main reason to watch this show are: Anya, Anya and Anya and for some reason decided to completely sideline her, even some minor side character have had more screen time than her. No idea if its the base material that drop the ball or the adaptation, but I can barely bother to keep watching.
Where are you into the season? The first quarter or so is pure filler, the manga content has just recently begun.
 

meiam

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Where are you into the season? The first quarter or so is pure filler, the manga content has just recently begun.
More or less up to date, can't wait for the ocean liner arc to be done. So the first few episode were anime original? Why would they do this?
 

Bob_McMillan

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More or less up to date, can't wait for the ocean liner arc to be done. So the first few episode were anime original? Why would they do this?
No clue. In general though, the anime has created quite a lot of filler. To the point that the mangaka even incorporated some anime only characters into the manga.

Anyway, I did just finish the latest episode and I found it quite uneven. The show has always had a pretty high standard for production value and this episode felt unfinished.

I also watched Scott Pilgrim. Fun enough show with fun concepts, characters, and action, but everyone is just an awful person that I can't take seriously. Scott fucking sucks, who Ramona falls in love with for no apparent reason.

Most of the enjoyment I had came from recognizing the weirdly star studded cast. Chris Evans and Brandon Routh were highlights for me, both sound extremely stupid and it's perfect.
 
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Johnny Novgorod

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Watched the Atom Eve special on Prime and really liked it. The Omni-Man stuff at the beginning and end doesn't really connect with Eve's story, but other than that I found the whole thing more or less self-sufficient and a good enough one-off even if it wasn't billed as Invincible filler. I don't remember much about the show outside the memes and haven't watched season two yet. But this was good for getting back in the mood. The emotional stuff works.u Fun fight scenes involving Green Lantern ish powers, which usually devolve into basic punching and blocking and throwing people around, but here were implemented creatively and with a satisfying sense of physicality to everything.
 

meiam

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I also watched Scott Pilgrim. Fun enough show with fun concepts, characters, and action, but everyone is just an awful person that I can't take seriously. Scott fucking sucks, who Ramona falls in love with for no apparent reason.
Well main reason is cause Ramona suck just as much, that's the point of the final couple of chapters of the books (and I assume the anime since its more focused on her).
 

Bob_McMillan

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Watched the Atom Eve special on Prime and really liked it. The Omni-Man stuff at the beginning and end doesn't really connect with Eve's story, but other than that I found the whole thing more or less self-sufficient and a good enough one-off even if it wasn't billed as Invincible filler. I don't remember much about the show outside the memes and haven't watched season two yet. But this was good for getting back in the mood. The emotional stuff works.u Fun fight scenes involving Green Lantern ish powers, which usually devolve into basic punching and blocking and throwing people around, but here were implemented creatively and with a satisfying sense of physicality to everything.
There were some really fun fight scenes, which makes Eve in season 1 and what I've seen of her in season 2 look silly. She should be one of the most powerful heroes in her world with what she can do.

Well main reason is cause Ramona suck just as much, that's the point of the final couple of chapters of the books (and I assume the anime since its more focused on her).
That's what my girlfriend said, but I am still confused about what this story is supposed to be if they're all just awful people.
 

Kyrian007

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I'm so disappointed by this season of spy X family, not only is it doing the usual boring shift from comedy to shonen that sadly most comedy do, but it also completly ignore the fact that the thre main reason to watch this show are: Anya, Anya and Anya and for some reason decided to completely sideline her, even some minor side character have had more screen time than her. No idea if its the base material that drop the ball or the adaptation, but I can barely bother to keep watching.
I haven't quite started on this current season, but I think I'm going to soon. Maybe today. One of the reasons I put it off, probably makes me the weird one following SxF. I could care less about Anya, I wanna see more focus on Twilight and Yor. I found the dipping into Anya's school day to be "filler" and the propensity for the show to spend whole episodes (or at least most of them) on the school and the kids was pushing me away from caring about the series altogether. I like Anya as a character, but only because she is a good narrative point of view because of her power. I generally could care less about what is happening at the school, mostly because all the other child characters just aren't interesting and somehow very annoying at the same time. So seeing here that Anya might be sidelined a little... I might actually enjoy this season a little more than I thought I might.
 

meiam

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That's what my girlfriend said, but I am still confused about what this story is supposed to be if they're all just awful people.
It's about them realizing that they're awful people.
I haven't quite started on this current season, but I think I'm going to soon. Maybe today. One of the reasons I put it off, probably makes me the weird one following SxF. I could care less about Anya, I wanna see more focus on Twilight and Yor. I found the dipping into Anya's school day to be "filler" and the propensity for the show to spend whole episodes (or at least most of them) on the school and the kids was pushing me away from caring about the series altogether. I like Anya as a character, but only because she is a good narrative point of view because of her power. I generally could care less about what is happening at the school, mostly because all the other child characters just aren't interesting and somehow very annoying at the same time. So seeing here that Anya might be sidelined a little... I might actually enjoy this season a little more than I thought I might.
You might not be able to get trough to the main arc of the season then, there's an episode entirely dedicated to the annoying school kid.

Otherwise I have the exact opposite view, I find twillight and Yor only interesting in so far as they are character taken straight out of their respective story (spy thriller and femme fatal assasin) to have Anya poke fun at their cliche and take them into unusual situation for their archetype. This season main arc decided to instead just have them star in one of their cliche story, where cliche happen, filled with cliche character. At best it feel like a rejected hunter x hunter side story.
 

Kyrian007

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It's about them realizing that they're awful people.

You might not be able to get trough to the main arc of the season then, there's an episode entirely dedicated to the annoying school kid.

Otherwise I have the exact opposite view, I find twillight and Yor only interesting in so far as they are character taken straight out of their respective story (spy thriller and femme fatal assasin) to have Anya poke fun at their cliche and take them into unusual situation for their archetype. This season main arc decided to instead just have them star in one of their cliche story, where cliche happen, filled with cliche character. At best it feel like a rejected hunter x hunter side story.
I though, would rather get a cliche spy thriller or femme fatal story than another anime focusing on a school, and kids. Anya's best stuff from season 1, her first appearance. Her being the only one in on everyone's secrets (at home.) And Bond's introduction. That stuff was great. The school was interesting enough with all of them there during the interview process. Beyond that, nothing of interest happens at the school.
 
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Xprimentyl

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Blue Eye Samurai (S1:E1-3): Decent / Great

After 17th century Japan closed its borders, anyone of mixed blood became looked at as unnatural abominations, and were persecuted and shunned by society. It's here we meet a blue-eyed samurai, the child of a Japanese woman and a white man, who has set out on a quest to find the white men who sullied their family.

I haven't been into any animation like this in a very long time, but this one is keeping my attention. It's got a lot of the blood and violence I loved in the '80s-'90s anime (Ninja Scroll, The Fist Of The North Star, etc.,) but also has a whimsical charm, almost like a Disney movie. It reminds me a lot of Samurai Champloo, just without the kickass soundtrack. Oh, and there's a lot of gratuitous nudity; it's a French-American animation, so I guess they're a little less prudish in that regard.

You lot know a lot more about this stuff than I do, so I'm sure you're probably better judges of its comparable quality, but so far, I think it's pretty decent. Will finish it.
 
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Xprimentyl

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Blue Eye Samurai (S1:E1-3): Decent / Great

After 17th century Japan closed its borders, anyone of mixed blood became looked at as unnatural abominations, and were persecuted and shunned by society. It's here we meet a blue-eyed samurai, the child of a Japanese woman and a white man, who has set out on a quest to find the white men who sullied their family.

I haven't been into any animation like this in a very long time, but this one is keeping my attention. It's got a lot of the blood and violence I loved in the '80s-'90s anime (Ninja Scroll, The Fist Of The North Star, etc.,) but also has a whimsical charm, almost like a Disney movie. It reminds me a lot of Samurai Champloo, just without the kickass soundtrack. Oh, and there's a lot of gratuitous nudity; it's a French-American animation, so I guess they're a little less prudish in that regard.

You lot know a lot more about this stuff than I do, so I'm sure you're probably better judges of its comparable quality, but so far, I think it's pretty decent. Will finish it.
Blue Eye Samurai (S1:E4-8): Good / Great

Finished this series today, and I must say, it was good. I enjoyed it way more than I expected. If you're a fan of The Equalizer/John Wick-type revenge fantasy, OTT violence, and also Japanese culture, this might be right up your alley. My biggest gripe is the same one I have about every series I start while it's still new: now I have to wait for the next season. But unlike most shows that have done this to me, this one I plan on keeping on my radar.
 
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BrawlMan

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My biggest gripe is the same one I have about every series I start while it's still new: now I have to wait for the next season.
Cope...

Or pick up on something else while you're waiting. A different new show, or to get familiar with an old one you haven't seen in a long time.