Transcriber: Isabel [00:00:00] INTRODUCTIONS STILTS: Alright, everybody, welcome to Random Curiosity's Spring 2013 Retrospective Podcast. We got a great program for you today but first we're going to start with a song chosen by Zephyr. Guren no Yumiya by Linked Horizon, the opening to Shingeki no Kyojin. Take it away. [Guren no Yumiya - Linked Horizon] STILTS: And, we're back! Now, like I've said, we've got a great podcast for you today. We're going to be going over a few shows from this past season and looking forward to the coming one as well as something a little special in the second half. First of all, I want to introduce you to everybody who is going to be yakking at you today. First of all, we have Takaii. TAKAII: Hi there...Stilts. STILTS: Would you like to introduce yourself? TAKAII: Hi. ENZO laughs. STILTS: Would you like to elaborate? Who are you? TAKAII: I am Takaii at RandomC (underscore) Takaii. Just one of the senior writers here having fun blogging anime. AnimeExpo is in two weeks, so I hope if anyone who is listening caught that, I will see you there. I will be wearing my awesomely embarrassing shirt, and I will give you a hug if you see me. Actually I probably won't give you a hug, but I'll say hello to you. Maybe give you a hug. I don't know. Maybe. I don't know. STILTS: Now that we've started that off on that delightfully awkward note, maybe we tell people what we're blogging or something? TAKAII: I am blogging Yahari ore ga iru (Yahari no Seishun Rabukome wa Machigatteiru) for the site as well as Haiyore Nyaruko-san W. Both of which are ending soon, and really quick, it's going to be in my post later, but for all you haters out there, the 13th episode is a bonus episode, so just take it how you'll take it. ZEPHYR: Wait, thirteenth episode, you mean for what? TAKAII: Yahari ore ga iru. ZEPHYR: Oh, yeah, right. It's a side story episode? ENZO: Twelfth was the ending? ZEPHYR: Yeah, twelfth was the unofficial ending theoretically. ENZO: Well, it's going to sell pretty well, looks like, so maybe we'll get a second season. STILTS: Very cool. TAKAII: Yeah I made the mistake or half-mistake of saying that I thought it was only 12 episodes long. ZEPHYR: This guy. TAKAII: Technically it is! Technically, it is! ZEPHYR: You know what? You know what? Let's move on. STILTS: It's okay. Takaii is fired. Next, we have Enzo. TAKAII: What? ENZO: Ohayou gozaimasu! TAKAII: Herro~ ENZO: It's Monday morning in Tokyo. It's the rainy season, and it's raining. So, it's truth in advertising on that. I'm Enzo. I've been blogging Chihayafuru Season 2 and Arata Kangatari. Thank you to the 3 people who are watching that one. I'm very excited about the shows we're all blogging in the summer, which I guess we're not going to talk about yet, but I'm still very excited about it. STILTS: We're trying to keep it a secret, by which means we haven't figured it out yet. ENZO: Well, yeah, I'm very excited about the shows I think I'm going to be blogging in the summer season, let's put it that way. Apart from that, it's good to be here and [I'm] looking forward to an interesting conversation about one of my favorite directors. STILTS: Ooh, now we go with Zani. Want to say something about yourself? ZANIBAS: Hello. I'm- TAKAII: Hello. That was the weakest hello ever. Redo. ZEPHYR: Hello! ZANIBAS: HELLO. ZEPHYR: Oh man, what was that? ENZO: Let's do barber shop style. TAKAII: Hello-o~. Dammit. ZANIBAS: I'm Zanibas. I'm a blogger. I blog stuff for over a year now. I've been blogging stuff for over a year now. This season, I'm wrapping up on OreImo (Ore no Imouto ga Konnani Kawaii Wake ga Nai) and Henneko (Hentai Ouji to Warawanai Neko), although I will not be able to cover those finales. Stilts will be doing that instead. STILTS: I was about to say. You're wrapping them up? ZANIBAS: Ha-ha-ha. STILTS: We also have a special guest with us today. I don't know if he's talked yet, but our resident tech guy and now contributing editor to the podcast, Xumbra. XUMBRA: Hello. I'm Xumbra. I'm a part-time tech dude. I do techie things sometimes. Hello. TAKAII: That's a pretty bitchin' title. STILTS: It is. He's got a way better title than the rest of us. The rest of us are bloggers. We blog. That's a fun word. Anyways, I am your host- TAKAII (laughs): Stilts, I think you missed one person before the host. STILTS: Did I? ZEPHYR: Yeah, I'm going home. I'm out. I'm done. TAKAII: I have Zani on my left. Xumbra to his left. Enzo to my 17000 mile to my behind me, and to my right, I have my good friend Zephyr over here. STILTS: Zephyr, would you like to introduce yourself? ZEPHYR: Who am I? What's my name again? TAKAII: Are you a blogger? ZEPHYR: Seriously, I forgot I blog for this site. Very strange. I just came back from BonChon Chicken. I'm sitting here, [thinking] I'm supposed to be doing something tonight. I forgot what it was. Anyways, this is Zephyr. I'm covering Railgun S, Shingeki, and Gargantia this season. Yes, I blog. I do blogging things when people don't forget my name or my presence. STILTS: It didn't seem that important. TAKAII: We should make an anime about bloggers doing blogging- ZEPHYR: Attack on bloggers. STILTS: Actually, I would blog the hell out of that! ZEPHYR: Actually, someone made the icon on photoshop and shoved it on the comments on my recent post. TAKAII: Shingeki no blogger-san. STILTS laughs. STILTS: Anyways, as I was saying before I had to go back and agree that Zephyr existed, I'm your host Stilts. Now with that extremely long and winding introduction out of the way, let's head into our first half. [00:07:04] SUISEI NO GARGANTIA STILTS: During our first half, we're going to talk about a few different shows that are wrapping up from this past spring season. First of all, we are going to start with Suisei no Gargantia. ZEPHYR: Wait, the season is over? What is this? STILTS: Almost. ZEPHYR: No way. STILTS: Almost. ZEPHYR: No. STILTS: So, Zephyr, you want to give us a quick intro? ZEPHYR: Well, Gargantia....Didn't I go over this last time already theoretically? ENZO: Theoretically. TAKAII: Theoretically. I'm going to step aside while I can catch up on this show. I'll be right back. ZEPHYR: This guy. TAKAII: Sorry! ZEPHYR: So, Gargantia is pretty much the show that a lot of people were excited to watch this season, because of a certain butcher (Urobuchi Gen) present. Of course, his butchering hasn't been really that present lately. Generally, it's a reverse sci-fi mecha show, so instead of someone being thrown into a war, you have someone thrown out of a war. At this point, if you haven't watched it yet, there are problems. There are big problems. STILTS: How far forward can we talk here? Has everybody seen the most recent episode yet? ENZO: No. Everyone has not. STILTS: Has Takaii watched- ZEPHYR: Takaii hasn't even watched it. TAKAII: I will get another cup of soy milk as you guys talk about this and I will just (makes a sipping sound) ZEPHYR: If he choked on that, I would've- ENZO: Seriously, if you're going to talk about (episode) 12, I have to leave the room. ZEPHYR: We'll just go to 11 then. ZANIBAS: Really? By the time this is posted, 12 is already going to be watched by everyone. ZEPHYR: Let's get this posted faster then! Play the edit time. Let's go. We're getting this out tomorrow. ZANIBAS: We're releasing this raw. TAKAII: We could just not edit it and just throw it up there, and everyone will know how awesome we are. ZEPHYR: In all its unedited glory. STILTS: I don't think awesome is the right word. TAKAII: I was trying to just complement everyone, okay? ZANIBAS: Fine, we'll start from 11, and then we can talk about 12. Then, we will. STILTS: Enzo, any comments? Any commentary? Any sexy scenes? ENZO: Well, not about 12. STILTS: Obviously not but in general. ENZO: Yeah, my feelings about the show have not changed that much since the last conversation we had about it. It started out, to me, looking like it was going to be a great show, looked for a while like it was completely going in the tank, and now it's going to go down as a very good show. I find the execution in the last couple of episodes up through 11 have been inconsistent, but the ideas that they're putting out are quite interesting, and I think one of the most interesting parts about this show, and I think that usually true with or against, is the conversations and arguments that it has prompted among people who are watching it. I broke down the conflict in the show to space Nazis against Daleks, because that's sorta what it was like. You have these two very dramatically different views of how to extend the human race in bad circumstances, and I think it exposed a lot of the prejudices in the audience judging by how many people pick one side absolutely and said the other one is flat out evil. I don't think that's the message that the author was going for particularly. My question with Urobuchi Gen is always, 'is he going to give us an actual ending where he goes out on a limb and tell us what he really thinks or is he going to introduce a bunch of problems and leave them sitting out there and not really make a kind of effort to resolve them?' ZANIBAS: Where's the healing, Gen? Where's the healing? ZEPHYR: The healing has arrived. ENZO: Even if there's no healing, at least, I would like to see some intellectual commitment on his part that he's willing to try to answer all these interesting questions that he raises. So, for me, with two episodes to go and plus there's going to be some blu-ray eps, I guess. I guess, for me, it's just a question of waiting to see how he finishes. Some series come along, and you say, well, how this show ends is going to be a big determining factor in what kind of legacy it will have. I think this is definitely one of those shows. STILTS: I can understand that. Not so sure about Psycho Pass. I guess that he just doesn't really go the full way to answer anything he sets out there. He's like, 'you decide!' ENZO: I think that's all he ever does, in my opinion. STILTS: So, how do you all think the mood swap from partway through to the second half was handled? Or should have been handled? Or should it have been doing that the whole time or what? ZEPHYR: Nah, I think it was pretty good in general. People can argue until the end of time that maybe they spent an episode or two too much on just hanging around, but in general I don't think I'd have it any other way for the most part, because you needed the story to start off the way it did. You need to have that contrast, that war in space to start things off, in the first place, to have him learn what he has on Earth and then get to the point where the Commander suddenly comes back. All the philosophical questions are there. If he didn't have this journey the way it's shaped out to begin with, there wouldn't be any meaning to it. It wouldn't be the same. I think, in most part, it's like what Enzo said, the execution here [has] been inconsistent at times but the general consensus you can say is that it's been pretty darn good. He hasn't watched episode 12 yet, but having watched most of episode 12, it's really something that's true. STILTS: I actually need to break in and have to spoil one thing about episode 12 for you, Enzo. It's extremely important but minor. Pinion looks way better with his hair down. So much less douchey. ZANIBAS: It's all about the symbolism and the character development. ZEPHYR: Yes. ENZO: I was worried about how that character was going to come off with his image, so yes, that's a big spoiler. ZANIBAS: It's like when the characters remove the hair clip. You know that's when something's happened and then it changes them. STILTS: Here's one thing I'm curious about. How did you all either react or feel about that whole Hideauze are people reveal we've had a few episodes back? ENZO: I liked it. I wasn't surprised by it but I thought it was an interesting turn. I think, like I've said, this prompted this whole schism in the viewing audience [with] people saying, 'Oh, they're not humans anymore. They've given up their identity because they don't look like people. They're just mindless animals. There's nothing wrong with exterminating them.' Then, there are other people saying, 'The Galactic Alliance are obviously Nazis.' That's exactly what Gen does. He's a provocateur. He puts interesting ideas out there that worm their way into your head and get people arguing with each other. I think that was the essential thing that did it with this series. I'm fully in favor of it. I think it's a great development. ZANIBAS: I like how it switches back and forth with what we're supposed to think about the Hideauze. At first, they're just a mindless alien race that's destroying everything, Zerglike, and then we get the revelations about in that episode. Then, all the feels for Ledo. What I liked after that episode is Chamber stepped in and he clarified logically why the two are different and why Ledo should support one over the other. I loved that because it keeps you constantly switching. ENZO: From his point of view. Logically. STILTS: So, what are all of your points of view? ZANIBAS: Everyone should just get along. ENZO: I think this might be a tough topic for those of us who hasn't seen this episode, I'm guessing? Or at least a dangerous one? ZEPHYR: No, not really. The muse stays the same. The general philosophy behind it is still the same regardless. ENZO: My take on Gen is [that] his default perspective is a pox on both your houses. His view is usually that both sides are wrong. I think that's definitely the view he's taking here. Both sides are wrong. Neither one of them is blameless. First of all, what I think Chamber, that speech Chamber gave, was very well-written and completely pedantic in a mechanistic way. It was all about circular logic and semantics, getting back to 'basically, because this system gave birth to me, it must therefore inherently be the right way of thinking'. From his perspective, I'm sure it makes perfect sense. From mine, it was pretty laughable. Based on what I saw through 11 episodes, I didn't see anything in those episodes to make me conclude that the [Hideauze] had surrendered their consciousness or that they weren't sentient. Even the whale squid weren't sentient. I think it was just a lot of people making a reaction, 'well, geez, they gave up their human forms, so they're not human anymore'. I think it's a little deeper than that. STILTS: Well then again, they have always acted analystically. Except for that one whale squid and the smush who- ENZO: Ika Musume? STILTS: Aside from her, they've all seemed to be, 'You've encroached upon my territory and attack me, so I'm going to violently repel you'. ENZO: Unike what the Gargantians do when the pirates come at them. STILTS: There is some of that but there's no sign, and actually as I say this it could be just that they haven't delved into it, of art or building anything. All those things we've ascribed to sentient- ZEPHYR: Civilization. STILTS: Yes, civilization. ENZO: But they're not us. ZEPHYR: They wouldn't actually need it. They don't even need it. ENZO: The whole point is that they're beyond machines. Rather than involving machines to allow them to survive, they have their bodies to allow them to survive. STILTS: Are they beyond art? Are they beyond culture? ENZO: We don't know. STILTS: Because I think way more than machines, that's what makes humanity, 'humanity'. It's stories and art and culture. ENZO: Well okay. We don't know the answer to that question. ZEPHYR: After all this argument, there's that third side. People are arguing what the definition of 'human' is and whether one side is more human than the other. If you really went down to it, you can argue that neither side is human. In its own way, both of them are no longer human in their own ways. The Hideauze, you can say that they're not really human because they don't look human. They might've given up some of the things we've ascribed to being human. Then, you go to the Galactic Alliance and they look human on the outside. Their culture is pretty much they're machines. They're all cogs in machines. All that we have here is pretty much them living some kind of robotic society. That's it. You order them to do something, and they do it. You can argue that that's not really a way of living. That's not humanity. ENZO: The last time I checked, we haven't seen the Hideauze or the whale squids kill their own children when they deem them unfit to fight. STILTS: That is true. That would be a good argument for why the humans, or at least the Galactic Alliance, aren't, if not humans 'cause they probably are, not very moral. ZEPHYR: Yeah. I was talking about this in my previous post too. Theoretically, if you want to say that the one of the big points about Gargantia themselves is that they are the real humans here. This is what humanity should be, compared to in a realistic way. They're there to contrast between the two sides. STILTS: Yeah. Xumbra, have you watched this one? XUMBRA: Yes, I have. STILTS: Give us some thoughts. XUMBRA: I think you guys covered a lot of the points so far. STILTS: We got to get you on these things sooner next time. XUMBRA: That's true. STILTS: Alright, anybody got any final parting shots, I mean, thoughts about Suisei no Gargantia? Rackage has awesome- ENZO: Rackage? TAKAII: I think I may have something. Regarding a point you guys said earlier, although I think you've touched upon it before, but it was during the final reveal. Not final, but when you revealed that the Hideauze were actually human and everyone was like, 'Oh I liked that. It made you think, that maybe killing a Hideauze was wrong or no, killing Hideauze is fine because so-and-so.' I did like that turnaround of opinions. What is right? You can't really decide anymore. All these thoughts are coming in. You can't figure out which should dominate or not. STILTS: That reminds me of what I think was evocative to me about the whole thing was the moment I realized.... and, I expected it all along. You have like Enzo said, who decides who's really right? You have that that they're humans or were or at some level are. This whole conflict is like every war that's ever happened on this planet. It's human fighting humans and dying stupidly. TAKAII: And it's really messy. STILTS: Yeah, really messy. ENZO: Just as Gen likes it. STILTS: Yeah. okay, we'll move onto the next one. Next one is Shingeki no Kyojin. [00:21:10] SHINGEKI NO KYOJIN TAKAII: Shingeki no Kyojin~ STILTS: I guess Zephyr, you get to give the intro again. ZEPHYR: Here we go again. Alright. We’ve intentionally pushed this from a few podcasts back because it’s a two cour. We’re finally talking about this, this time. Quick synopsis. A few hundred years ago, humans were nearly exterminated by big, giant things called titans- STILTS: With moe faces. ZEPHYR: With moe faces. What was that guy’s face that showed up a few episodes back that people were going, ‘ugh.’ Anyway, these guys are a couple of stories tall. At least 12 meters high for some of them. They just eat humans for fun. After a while, the humans managed to build giant walls to wall themselves in and keep them out, but after a hundred years, they finally busted down that wall and [stuff] goes down for the most part. Coming into the season, this was probably one of the more hyped shows of the season, and after watching it, it’s no surprise why. In general, the pacing recently has been a bit slower than expected. I feel like- ENZO: Really? ZEPHYR: Right? ZANIBAS: We’re on Trost part seven now, I think? ZEPHYR: Part eight! Get it right! XUMBRA: How many parts are there? ZEPHYR: There’ll be a part nine. Wait for it. XUMBRA: As I was watching it, I’ve noticed there’s a part one, part two, part three. They should really stop at part three. They just keep going. ZEPHYR: They’re going slow. I’m not really sure the reasoning behind this. They have a second season coming, and they’re likely going to have more once more material comes out. So I actually don’t see the reason why they’re doing this, but I guess it emphasizes certain parts. It’s not particularly bad in my opinion, but at the same time I’m not sure if I can say that it’s something that should be done at this point in the game. STILTS: I got to break in really quick. Enzo, we have a little chat we have going on in this, so we can point and laugh at each other when we say something stupid without interrupting our call. Enzo just said something entertaining. Want to read that comment, Enzo? ENZO: Trost part nine, Eren coughs. STILTS: At this point, I can see that. ENZO: Here’s my theory as on why they’ve ground the pacing to a halt. This is kind of a formulation from back and forth with commenters and stuff. The reality is that this show, if you believe pre-sales, it’s going to sell around 60,000 or more for the first volume. Those are Monogatari type numbers. So, there’s no question that it’s going to be hugely successful. I think the problem Is that there isn’t that much source material right now. They have plenty to do a two episode season which is what they signed up to do. STILTS: Two cour, you mean? ENZO: Yeah, two cour. I think they’re milking this as far as they can. I haven’t read the manga, but part of this, I assume, is to have a good stopping point, which they don’t really have if they go faster. The other part is that they want to make another season as soon as possible and the more they stall now, the more the manga has time to get ahead of where they are now and the less time they have to wait to do a second season in 6 months or a year. From what people have told me, it might be almost two years until they have enough material for another season. When a show is making as much money as this one is making, they want to do that season as soon as possible, but the problem I have with it is basically as Zephyr said. I think my opinion is roughly the same, only a little bit harsher. They’re adapting right now roughly one chapter per episode, if you look at where the manga is right now versus where the anime is, which is almost unheard of in anime adaptations. That’s really slow. For the first five or six episodes, that was okay. As I’ve been watching for the last month or so, what strikes me more and more is [that] there’s a lot of noise and a lot of ruckus and a lot of people yelling and shouting and screaming, and then you get to the end of the episode. But, nothing really happened. I sorta accepted it at this point, that this show is a thrill ride. It’s not about interesting complex characters. I don’t think that’s going to change. That’s fine. But, if you’re going to do a show that’s an action-packed thrill ride with an interesting conspiracy plot, you actually have to have meaningful action and movement on the conspiracy or else it’s just a bunch of sound and fury signifying nothing. I think that’s what the last four or five episodes have been. A lot of sound and fury signifying nothing. I don’t know how long that’s going to keep up, but I’m not looking forward to another cour of this type of episode, what we’ve seen in the last four weeks. STILTS: Yeah, it kinda reminds me of a problem that you see with a lot of really successful things. I could throw out a thousand names, but whenever they start making too much money and just want to milk that, they stop doing their duty as a storyteller to give their best story possible and they get scared that they’re not going to milk this cow, so they just stretch it out and then they stop telling the best story they possibly can. You get [stuff] like that. In that kind of situation, if it keeps being this slow, I would actually prefer, and this will get me no fans, them to try to do filler. ENZO: Me too. Absolutely. STILTS: As long as they try. I was talking to a friend about the original Fullmetal Alchemist the other day, and I was saying, it was anime original, but it was done pretty well. I was impressed by that. I would rather have shows try to do that. F--k it up gloriously. At least they’re not pissing away our time, doing half the speed of what material would be amazing if they sped it up. ENZO: The flip side of that is Magi, which apparently did a lot of material for that purpose and then completely jumping the shark. STILTS: There’s a threat in it. ENZO: There’s a risk. STILTS: Yeah, there’s a risk, but I would rather they take that risk than slow it down. ENZO: The way they’re going now, there’s certain doom. At least that way, there’s risk, but at least there’s hope that you might get something better out of it. STILTS: Exactly. There’s always a risk in telling a really great story, and we might get a Magi. You might also get something remarkable, and I’d rather have that shot. I would respect them more for that. TAKAII: I totally agree with all you guys, but I haven’t watched episode 12 yet. I was really hoping that it’d be better but now I’m just disappointed and I haven’t even opened it yet. ENZO: Sorry. You should’ve said something. STILTS: I haven’t either. I asked ahead of time. Was that a spoiler? TAKAII: No, that’s not a spoiler. It’s more like, maybe it’ll be good again. Maybe it’ll be awesome again. ENZO: Play it for yourself. You might like it better than we did. ZEPHYR: Yeah. XUMBRA: There’s still plenty of good things in the episode. You might want to watch. TAKAII: No, the past two episodes, I rushed through the whole thing since I just caught up a couple of week s ago. It was really good, and then I saw episode 8 or 9, it’s kinda- STILTS: Your reactions to watching that were amazing. ZEPHYR: That was true. STILTS: We were sitting just there, [and] he was going ‘oh my god, oh my god!’ TAKAII: So, for those of you who don’t know, I have speakers set up downstairs. Really big speakers. I think it’s episode 11, 10 or 11, when you see Armin give that speech when he’s trying to stop them from doing something to someone. See no spoilers? See! ENZO: That was pretty good. TAKAII: So, when he does his salute and you have that epic (swoosh) sound, he yells his speech out and he’s ferociously speaking. I’ve don’t that before with other animes, where I’ve just blasted it and you feel like your house is shaking. I think I said it on IRC, but I think I may have f--ked up the foundation of my house with that scene. It was crazy. It was a great scene. STILTS: Armin salute shakes the foundation of the earth. TAKAII: Literally. ENZO: I just laughed uncontrollably at that. I couldn’t help myself. I don’t know if I was supposed to or not, but I found that scene absolutely hilarious. TAKAII: He finally manned up for once, man. STILTS: He’s such a small little kind of wimpy guy that him going up there and being a badass for once is kinda laughable, but it’s also admirable. ENZO: It’s just that in context, the whole thing was preposterous. In the middle of this war, to have this little homunculus of a guy step up there and give this ridiculously 1940s World War II film propaganda of a speech, it was great, but- TAKAII: What? Wait, are you confusing people? Or was that a spoiler? ENZO: That’s what it felt like. It felt like an army recruiting film from the 30s or 40s on black and white news reel. STILTS: He was just that gung-ho. ENZO: It really was. I was really expecting him to finish up by saying, ‘now go buy bonds.’ STILTS: Buy titan bonds! It’s the right thing to do! ENZO: Exactly. ZANIBAS: I sell titans and titan accessories. ZEPHYR: The way he worded in particular… Half of the speech wasn’t actually him explaining stuff. It was just him asking for permission to explain. You know? You’re sitting there, and theoretically, he could’ve explained, but no, I’m going to say all this epic stuff just so you can let me explain. TAKAII: In that kind of hierarchy, army type situation, America might be a little different, but you got to remember, when you’re talking to your superior, you can’t explain your shit to him. You gotta say, ‘can I explain my shit to you?’ ZEPHYR: It makes sense, but at the same time, when you just think about it, when you combine the whole scene and his gestures and everything, part of it makes it look like what Enzo said. It was a mixture of you were smiling at that and kinda not smiling at the same time, just because this epic stuff just asked for permission. It wasn’t even the speech itself to explain. You’d think you’d save that moment for it. Some super epic speech. It was epic but wasn’t that epic. TAKAII: Everyone’s first time is never that great, okay? He was still pretty good, okay? STILTS: Wait, what are we talking about? ENZO: Hey, listen, I enjoyed it. I’m not complaining. I thought it was hilarious. TAKAII: No, that was just a really dirty bad joke I made, but it’s okay. No one really got it. So, let’s continue. STILTS: Oh no I got it. ENZO: No I got it, but I didn’t think it was worth calling more attention to it. STILTS: I got another thing I’d like to talk about. So, one of the reasons we delayed talking about this last time, and I’m glad we did, was because up to that point, some interesting stuff had happened, but you can get a lot of it from the premise, whereas but up to this point, the really interesting part that I thought could’ve sunk the entire series- TAKAII: You mean how the main character is dead and hasn’t come back yet? STILTS: What is all of your opinion about the whole Eren can become a Titan thing? TAKAII: It makes episode 2 make a lot more sense or episode 3, whatever. ZEPHYR: You want my opinion? My opinion is that titans are the worst mecha ever. XUMBRA: Yes, worst mecha ever. ZEPHYR: Just saying that. Just getting that out there. ZANIBAS: Get in the titan, Shinji! ZEPHYR: I mustn’t run away. It’s going to run away from you. STILTS: If Eren says, ‘I mustn’t run away,’ I will lose my shit. XUMBRA: You know the thing I find most annoying in Shingeki, when Eren turns into a titan. Okay, sure he can do that, but I don’t know why he can do that. TAKAII: Hold up. Hold up. The last thing I saw was he could turn into a titan and he apparently lost his shit. He tried fighting someone who can kill them really fast, and the episode ended. STILTS: Xumbra, you’re basically getting all sci-fi on that because that’s a thing t I said a while ago. Shingeki struts around like a sci-fi series, but it’s actually a fantasy. So it doesn’t explain it. If you think about it, where does all that mass come from for that giant body? XUMBRA: No, I’m not thinking about the size. It’s more like why is Eren the special guy. Why can’t anyone else do it? TAKAII: That’s why I said episode 2 or 3 explains it. ZEPHYR: Episode 2 or 3 had the shot from Eren’s dad, who was all- TAKAII: I’m going to stab you! You’re going to get cut! ZANIBAS: It messes with your memory, so we can’t explain it yet! ZEPHYR: I hope that they actually explain it. I presume that at some point in the future they will actually say that this caused this. It’ll be some point, fifty years from now, when he gets to the bloody basement. TAKAII: Right. I have a question. I’m raising my hand, but you can’t see it. STILTS: Go ahead. TAKAII: You know how during the episode when the titans attacked the outer wall? It’s like episode 1 or 2. They go on the boat and get to the inner wall, right? There was no key on his neck, and then the episode after that, we had that flashback. Then, the key was on his neck, but the key wasn’t on his neck! So, did that mean that something happened in between episode 1 and episode2? It only felt like a day or two passed. STILTS: He put it in his pocket? ZEPHYR: There was a time skip. There were multiple time skips in between. TAKAII: In one episode? It looked like he just woke up and then- STILTS: His dad went off in episode 1. TAKAII: He took the key with him! ZEPHYR: No, I’m pretty sure that he took the key with him. After they escaped into the inner wall- TAKAII: Eren has the key, a nd you’re like what the f—k! It feels like in between those two episodes, only a day or two passed. It was before the crusade. They just got into the town. ZEPHYR: But the timing is really hard to pin down. Even in the cadet training arc, a few years passed, if I remember correctly. You didn’t even feel it. If you actually didn’t even read the year popping up, and then suddenly, it’s a couple of years from now. You’d be like, ‘did this happen overnight?’ That was one of the things. I guess we’ll find out at some point later, because they’re bound to revisit at some point. XUMBRA: Yeah, they really need to do an explanation soon. TAKAII: That cadet scene when- ZEPHYR: That basement! They need to get to that damn basement! TAKAII: What’s that girl with the blond hair? Is it Annie? What’s her name? STILTS: Annie, I think so. TAKAII: The one who’s like the lone wolf. XUMBRA: Yeah, that’s Annie. TAKAII: I love how she f--ks Eren up and then that other guy is like, ‘This is what happens when you get complacent! You get your ass handed to you by me, who got my ass handed to me by her, so try harder!’ STILTS: Anyway, I think, Zani, want to say one last thing? Then we should probably skip on to our next show. ZANIBAS: It’s a little big, but it shouldn’t take too much discussion. Since we know that Eren can instantly change into these titan form things,…am I allowed to talk about this? STILTS: You’ve already started. ZANIBAS: So, it instantly appears, right? So, if this is the case, doesn’t this kind of hint at how these other special titans- ENZO: I’m just assuming that’s the case, yes. TAKAII: Are you saying that the other titans are humans who don’t like other humans? So, they’re fucking up human mankind just to fuck with them? ENZO: All we know is that the armored titan and the super titan appear out of nowhere and then seem to disappear into nothingness. What explanation on this show have we been exposed to that could explain that? TAKAII: I’m going to go read the manga now! I hate all of you! ZEPHYR: Actually, I’ve heard about the manga is that some of the stuff hasn’t been explained yet. You can read that all you want, but you’re going to end up waiting a month between each manga chapter, and you’re going to get screwed either way. ZANIBAS: Just mug the original author and threaten to blackmail him for information. STILTS: Random Curiosity does not condone mugging original authors of any works. ZEPHYR: Mugging, ransom holding or anything negative of that nature. STILTS: If so, we would like a cut. TAKAII: I don’t read manga on the computer. I’d prefer to read a book. I have Yotsuba in Japanese in a book. I’d prefer to read that. It takes something really awesome for me to pull it on the screen. I’ve only read Air Gear or Usagi Drop, like the manga. ZEPHYR: Usagi Drop! TAKAII: Anyways, I want to go read the manga now. I hate all of you. ENZO: You may not find out as much as you want to find out. ZEPHYR: You’re going to end up being like those guys after they’ve watched Evangelion 3.0 and they’ve- TAKAII: I’ve never watched any of it. Don’t hate me. XUMBRA: What? ZEPHYR: Let’s just say, there’s a lot of people who came out from [watching] Evangelion 3.0, saying, ‘Oh, now we got to wait 2 years to see if we might get an explanation about half the stuff that happened here.’ STILTS: Say no more. I’m waiting until they all come out. ZEPHYR: Yeah, you should probably do that. One last thing about what Zanibas said, I spent multiple posts on this a couple weeks back, talking about theoretically how it opens up a whole can of worms for the most part., because if you argue it really down, you can actually say now that there’s a potential that some guy was just messing around and tried to do a really crappy way of uniting humanity by doing titan experiments in the first place and midway through he realized he [messed] up. Now, you have a bunch of people that want to trash everything. TAKAII: So now all your friends are basically an accident. ZANIBAS: Who is more human? The titans- ZEPHYR: That doesn’t count. It’s not the same. STILTS: Zephyr, it’s totally the same. ZEPHYR: No. STILTS: Let’s move on and get to our third show, which is Kakumeiki Valvrave. [00:40:20] KAKUMEIKI VALVRAVE ZANIBAS: I’m going to get something to drink. You guys have fun. STILTS: Since Seishun isn’t here, I guess I will intro it. This is a giant series full of noise and sound and break the cutie. It’s basically taking every nice character and then twisting them painfully and murdering them while they have some really awesome awesome battles. Are you all current to the most recent one? ENZO: I am. ZEPHYR: I am. STILTS: God, that proposal! ZEPHYR: At least, he’s taking responsibility, I guess. The problem of bringing that up is that no matter what you say here, you’re screwed. STILTS: I wish Kairi was in here, because we had really interesting conversation the other day, but Enzo, you first. ENZO: Are we worried about spoiling here with this show? Are we just going to assume anyone listening has watched up to current and say whatever we know? STILTS: I think I already kinda screwed that up. ZEPHYR: We’re going to have to assume that at this point. Please have watched all episodes before listening to this portion. ENZO: I started off thinking that this was a really stupid but fun show, and I took a lot of heat for defending this show in the beginning actually on my blog, because a lot of people were like, ‘Dude, that show is terrible. It’s Guilty Crown; how can you like it?’ My reaction was, ‘Well, if you can’t tell the difference between this show and Guilty Crown, then maybe you should be doing something else in your spare time but watching anime.’ That’s really another issue. STILTS: Damn. ZEPHYR: Anyway. ENZO: The problem I had with Guilty Crown as compared to this show is just how seriously it took itself. That’s why Valvrave totally worked with me because it did not take itself seriously at all. STILTS: Agreed completely. Go on. ENZO: The problem is not a problem, but that has all definitely changed in the last couple of episodes. Valvrave has taken the approach of, ‘we’re going to take every plotline from every mecha show ever and put it all in a blender and then suck it out with a straw.’ It’s like that booth where you have all the things flying around in the air and you have to grab one ticket. Whatever that guy grabs, that’s this week’s plot on Valvrave. My big thing, I think we should just jump right to it, because for me, we can’t talk about Valvrave without talking about the rape scene, which I think- TAKAII: Woah, woah, what? STILTS: You should’ve run away. ENZO: I did warn you. TAKAII: No, no, I’m going to watch the show now. There’s a rape scene? STILTS: There is. ENZO: Let me just say my piece on the rape scene, and then you guys can say whatever you want. The first thing is that I don’t have a problem with this being used as a plot device in anime, if it is done in an intelligent and sensitive way. It’s legitimate in other words. So the existence of the plot twist, I don’t have a problem with. My concern with this thing from the beginning has been that they played into two very very mainstream myths about rape, which is ‘A, she had it coming, and B, if it’s inevitable, just lie back and enjoy it.’ If there’s two repugnant myths about rape that a lot of ignorant people tend to believe, I think those are the two most popular. In America, we’ve had politicians lose elections because of [that]. ZEPHYR: Oh, yeah. Oh my god. ENZO: So, Saki’s behavior worries me, because I think that it invites that reaction from the audience, even if that wasn’t how it was intended. That was my concern with it. A lot of the comments I saw after the episode backed that up, that a lot of people were saying, ‘Oh no, it’s not really rape. You could tell. She wanted it. She really liked him, so that wasn’t rape.’ That kind of thing. I don’t know that you’re doing the world any favors introducing that kind of thinking into the conversation. As far as the effect it’s had on the series, for me, I still enjoy the show a lot, but it’s harder for me to just laugh and say, ‘God, that was a great asspull Valvrave comedy moment,’ now that that’s out there. They’ve upped the ante. They’ve chosen to make it more serious, and I think that now they’ve introduced this thing, they have a responsibility to deal with it in a serious way. So far, I don’t personally think they have, although it’s not too late for them to do that. STILTS: Let me break in. We got another writer to jump on the call at the most awkward time ever. Kairi is joining us. Would you like to introduce yourself really quick? KAIRI: Hey everyone, it’s me again. I’m really really late. Fashionably so, I hope. STILTS: Want to throw out the shows you’ve blogging this season? KAIRI: So, my shows are Hataraku Maou-sama and Karneval. Sorry for jumping in last minute. STILTS: We’ve been talking about Valvrape, I mean, Valvrave. ENZO: Valvrape. KAIRI: That’s pretty much it. STILTS: I was actually talking about the conversation you and I had about this the other day, and Enzo was talking about the unfortunate implications of that whole scene. What were your two, Enzo? ENZO: Well, there’s a whole rape mythology that exists among certain people, and I think the two pillars of it are ‘A, she had it coming, she was asking for it,’ and ‘B, if it’s inevitable, just lie back and enjoy it.’ That’s the two myths this scene invites people to speculate on. STILTS: It does really almost seem, and I hate saying this [or] generalizing it because it’s not true of all men, but it does seem like some guy was writing about rape and he just got it totally stupidly wrong. I wanted to talk about what you and I were talking about the other day about the apology or the lack thereof from Haruto. KAIRI: What I was saying? STILTS: Yeah. KAIRI: Basically, I had this long conversation with a friend, and we’ve beat this thing to death. We started talking about Haruto and how he takes responsibility. Obviously he takes responsibility in a really outrageous Valvrave fashion, but we also talked about how he doesn’t apologize. My friend was at first, ‘Oh, that’s kind of lame, he doesn’t apologize or anything,’ and I was like, ‘I wouldn’t want to be apologized to if I was raped.’ I feel like that’s not something that you say sorry about. So, I feel in not making him freak out about whether he should apologize or not, I thought [that] was really good for his character, because he was like, ‘I’m not going to insult her after the act. I’m not going to say sorry, as if that’s something I could say sorry for.’ STILTS: Yeah. That’s something you can’t possibly apologize for. It’s like you said, him doing so would’ve been insulting and would’ve denigrated her. I did like how there was no hemming and hawing and stupid angst about it. They decided they were going to do that and they were like, ‘okay, we’re not going to have him go Shinji for 3 episodes and then come out and go with the next thing.’ They just moved on with it. ENZO: Kairi, on that topic, I don’t know if you can hear me. It sounds like you’re having some issues with the connection, but I don’t have a problem with Haruto’s reaction to this, because I agree. In that instance, an apology would’ve been completely meaningless. In fact, an apology would’ve been insulting actually. So I don’t have a problem with his reaction. KAIRI: The problem is Saki. ENZO: Yeah, exactly. It was her reaction during the event that I had a problem with and it was her reaction after the event that I have a problem with. Not because I’m hating on the character, but because of the signal it sends. So, yeah, I agree. Haruto, in the first place, I’m on the side that feels that he’s not really at fault for what happened. He was not in control of his body when it did that. It’s very clear who was in control of his body when it did that. That doesn’t mean he shouldn’t feel horrible about it, but the point is that I think that he does feel horrible about it. They’ve effectively showed that he feels horrible about it. As you’ve said, the response was wildly overreacted Valvrave asspull response, but it was okay for what it was. It was her reaction that I have more of a problem with than his. STILTS: I agree with you there. Most times when you have rape as a plot point in something, there’s really no question that it was meant to be done. This was one of the few times I’ve ever seen where it wasn’t meant to be done, but that way, it’s more like a character in a war that accidentally kills somebody. That’s also relevant in Valvrave, but regardless, that’d be almost the more direct thing. I didn’t mean to. He didn’t mean to, but this happened and I still did this. He still feels like he has to take responsibility. It was his fault to a degree, so I don’t disagree. ENZO: It was his body. STILTS: Yeah, he’s right to do something. He would otherwise always have that, ‘I could’ve been stronger,’ ‘I could’ve caught myself. ‘whatever the hell. KAIRI: What I really like about this, in terms of Haruto’s depiction, is that he doesn’t spend the whole time, saying ‘Is this really my fault? Should I have apologized?’ He just automatically said, ‘Okay, I did this. It doesn’t matter if I wasn’t in control of my body. It’s my problem. I have to do something about this.‘ I really liked that about him. He just shot up [in] my character poll this season because of that. STILTS: What I don’t really like is what Enzo was saying earlier. Haruto does come out as well as he can in that situation, but I always get uncomfortable and dislike it when you have the Asuna effect from SAO (Sword Art Online). A strong female character who is quietly whittled down. Saki starts off being pretty awesome, and then now not so much. It feels like her character has been warped a little bit and lost some of what made her so amazing. KAIRI: Like Enzo said, I don’t really like what happens in her depiction after this. Even before, I wasn’t the biggest fan of Saki. I didn’t hate her or anything, but for me it’s uncomfortable to watch her right now. Far more than just because of the rape. Her reactions are just really weird to me, and it doesn’t feel right. STILTS: It reminds me of talking about Sakurasou. We had Sorata who a lot of times I felt like he was in character, but sometimes they’d throw him the idiot ball and make him do something stupid. This wasn’t him anymore. That’s the same kind of thing. I don’t feel like it’s her anymore. I think it’s the writers. KAIRI: I don’t know. There’s a message in what she’s doing, and I just don’t like it. STILTS: On other points on that, did anyone have anything else they want to say about rape? Which is a statement I hope I never have to say again? Good. I do have to say that the combat at least, and all the fighting, in Valvrave is pretty entertaining and really vivid and colorful and mildly seizure inducing. TAKAII: I don’t want to say anything on that topic without sounding like an idiot. STILTS: Fair enough. We have any more comments? Thoughts? Dirty jokes? Anything? No dirty jokes. About Valvrave? TAKAII: Dirty jokes? ZEPHYR: Well, the thing about Valvrave for me is that I was previewing it before the season started, and I said, ‘Well, this is one of those straightforward mecha plots for the most part.’ After the first few episodes, I was pretty surprised at what the show actually was. It’s hard to really pinpoint but in general it hasn’t been what I expected, I guess. It’s fun to watch, but in general, it wasn’t really what I expected. It’s one of those things where I could’ve gone on with it, just watched it and gone on with it, but then that whole thing with the rape from the previous episode, I’m sitting there and suddenly everything changed. You guys were talking about how Saki’s character was warped, and I think in many ways, you can apply that theoretically. I feel like that in some ways, the series has warped in some way, because now they’ve introduced something so serious that shouldn’t be taken lightly. They can’t really go back to the entertaining lighthearted action. STILTS: They can’t go back to the good old days. ENZO: That’s exactly it. They can’t put the genie back in the bottle. They’ve made their choice. ZEPHYR: Yeah. For me, the whole thing now, I’ve been watching, it feels like a fun ride. It’s fun to watch. It’s exciting. It’s over the top. It’s everything a mecha show should be, at least in the mecha versus mecha fighting action scenes. Now that you’ve introduced this, you better carry it and if you don’t carry it, the series has the potential to really bomb at this point. It’s not even fun anymore. STILTS: Yeah, this is the point where even though I got fairly destroyed about this when I wrote a post about it, this can go from what was a good train wreck to a straight f--king crashing. KAIRI: I still like it. STILTS: I don’t hate it yet. KAIRI: I‘ve been really enjoying it. I technically didn’t enjoy the scene or anything, but I wanted to know what happened next. So I guess it worked. STILTS: I’ll give them this. They aren’t scared. They were talking about Shingeki, about how they slowed down, so they don’t have to risk doing original material or run out. They’re being conservative. At least Sunrise isn’t scared to do something that might fail gloriously. I respect that from the studio, although there’s a lot of questionable stuff that went into that execution. ENZO: They have the glorious freedom of being an original series. There is no template that they have to stick to in terms of pacing or anything else, which I think is why original series on average probably tend to be better than adaptations a lot of the time. I agree with Kairi. I still like the show. In fact, I really liked the last episode. Even though I did not like the way Saki behaved in the aftermath of the rape scene, I thought that the overall episode was really action-packed and really well-paced. It was just a strong episode, and that’s why my feelings on watching it were very conflicted. This may be the second best episode in the whole series, but I’m not having as much fun as I should be, because they put that thing out there now and they can’t get put back. There were certain qualities about Valvrave that it was just completely random goofy. They could do dumb things, and you could smile at it in an affectionate way and say, ‘That’s just Valvrave being Valvrave.’ They don’t really have that armor anymore. Now they have to be really good or else. Like you say, it goes from being a likeable train wreck to just a train wreck. STILTS: It’s either a go for it all or go broke at this point. ENZO: Yeah, I think so. I don’t think we have to worry. They’re going for it all. They always do. STILTS: They’re definitely going for it. Any last thoughts on Valvrave before going on to the next thing? KAIRI: Can it be Thursday already? I want to know what happens. STILTS: Seriously. Alright, we’re going into our next one. Unfortunately, this is going to make it to where we have to hear from Zephyr again. Sorry. It is Railgun. [00:57:00] TO ARU KAGAKU NO RAILGUN S TAKAII: Biribiribiri~ STILTS: Zephyr, give us a quick intro. ZEPHYR: Alright. So, Railgun S is pretty much the continuation of…. Well it’s another Railgun series,it’s not quite a continuation per se from the previous season. It’s a focus on the Sisters arc that was introduced and solved in Index originally. What they have here is a more detailed view into the events leading up to it from the viewpoint of Misaka instead of Touma. Generally, starting off here, the big thing for me is that Railgun S has been actually pretty darn good. It’s one of those things where theoretically even though some of the stuff you knew is coming. You know what’s coming. You’ve watched some of the stuff before from Index. Well, most of you have, but it still doesn’t make it any less enjoyable. The general thing is that this series is darker. The action’s better. The animation is sharper than was in the previous Railgun. This is one of those series that was hyped and rightfully so. It’s not exactly per se a masterpiece but it’s been something fun to watch. It’s something worth watching as a weekly show to pick up when it comes out. STILTS: Here’s a question I have, and I haven’t watched the latest episode. The one prior to that is where Touma shows up again. I was left thinking on that, that the whole Sisters arc would be really really powerful, and it is really powerful, but I think that it might actually be actually screwed up by the fact that it was originally an Index arc, and in Index, Touma is the main character and he resolves it. Spoilers for anybody who hasn’t watched Index. Sorry. TAKAII: It’s okay. You didn’t say how he resolves it, so it’s okay. STILTS: True. If Biribiri goes in and did it all herself, or resolved it herself, then it could be extremely powerful, but since it’s not, I don’t know. TAKAII: She can’t resolve it herself because Touma- STILTS: I’m just going hypothetical here. Index isn’t a thing. This is a standalone story or whatever. Then, I feel like, yes, she can’t within that world, but if the world they’re in where she could, then it could be evocative. All these different road blocks in her way, and she’d be saving…. It could be really great, but since basically someone swoops in and solves it all for her. TAKAII: The way I feel about it after watching Index 1 and 2 plus the first Railgun. I think that because we know what happens in 1 and 2, especially what happens in the future with the Testament and the- STILTS: Don’t go too far on that by the way. I’ve only seen as far as Index 1 and 2. TAKAII: Because we know what happens with Testament…. It is Testament, right? Or is it Last Order? XUMBRA: It’s Last Order. ZEPHYR: Last Order. TAKAII: Because we know what happens, combined with the fact that we see a stark difference from what he was to what he became, I think the second season of Railgun really helps accentuates these points. It’s technically a side story. For a side story, I think it’s doing a great job of holding its own and being an awesome watch every week. ZEPHYR: The big thing is pretty much that- STILTS: I think Xumbra wanted to say something. XUMBRA: Yeah. I just wanted to mention that since most people have seen Index, they already know what happens. So when you see in the most recent episode, Touma meets Mikoto and they were getting the drinks out of the vending machine, it’s like, ‘Oh yeah I’ve seen this scene before,’ but then you have it from the perspective of having seen Misaka deal with trying to shut down all the laboratories on her own and when her clone comes out and when she talks to her clone, it really put into perspective from her side of what she’s been going through versus seeing the same scene from Index. She’s just probably talking to her twin or something. I don’t know what’s happening there. TAKAII: You don’t know why she’s pissed off all of a sudden. STILTS: It’s like what Tak-kun was saying. A side story should, if it’s supporting the main story which this one does more or less, take a facet that wasn’t explored a lot and dive into it deeper and draw in more focus. It does that absolutely. My only thought, like I said, was if it were a standalone, it could be amazing instead of just very good, which I do think it’s very good. TAKAII: One other thing, one of my friends is a manga reader and he caught up to the manga for Index. You know Misaka’s two friends, the two friends Saten and Uiharu? They apparently they make no appearances ever. ZEPHYR: In this part. STILTS: They better not. In Index, you mean? ZEPHYR: No, in Railgun S, right? TAKAII: No, in Railgun S, they got a lot more face time than compared to what actually happens in the actual [source material]. ZEPHYR: I heard that as well. TAKAII: They’re both cool. They’re both very flowery characters. ZEPHYR: Wasn’t Haruue also one of those characters that never showed up? TAKAII: I think so. Yeah, the friend that apparently got out of the hospital. ZEPHYR: She never showed up in the source material, like ever. STILTS: I thought that we were going to talk about how Saten and Uiharu never shut up in Index. I’m always happy about that, because as soon as they get close to Touma, they’re probably going to get a crush on that old bastard and then ‘Aww.’ TAKAII: I read this somewhere. You know what Touma’s power is, right? You know his right hand? STILTS: Yeah the part you’re thinking about is that he severs his own luck. TAKAII: Yup exactly. They would like him but- STILTS: But, he also severs his red string of fate. TAKAII: That is true too. STILTS: He collects all the girls by accident. Bastard. Any other thoughts on Railgun? ZEPHYR: Yeah, generally you could say that it could’ve been really really good if Misaka ended up solving everything together, but the big thing here is that on the flipside is the fact that we know what’s going to happen and that perspective changes everything. It makes the biggest difference. Arguably, the big thing I was mentioning from the previous episode’s post is [that] this recent episode changes everything. By putting everything into perspective, it arguably strengthens both Railgun S as a series and the original Index. I feel that makes bigger impact and is more important than if it was Misaka solving it herself. That’s about it, but really the big thing that surprised me was how emotional I still felt even though I knew what was coming for the most part. STILTS: This kinda goes to something I heard or read about a while ago, that spoilers don’t actually lessen someone’s enjoyment of story. ZEPHYR: It depends. It’s really dependent. XUMBRA: I think that they did a study on that. I think there’s a study. You have some people [and] you tell them what happens, and then you tell them to read a story. Now that they read the story, do they enjoy it more? Yeah, I do because now I look forward to what’s happening. STILTS: I don’t know if they went into the reason. They just basically spoiled some people, and then they rated it higher. I think the natural human thing to say is that ,’Yeah, it depends,’ but at least in this particular study, it depends. TAKAII: I think the study said that because they already were spoiled, they weren’t already waiting around to be excited. They already knew it’d be good so they were more focused on the actual content and enjoyment. STILTS: I think it simplifies it to enjoyment. Horror is scary, but a lot of people enjoy it in some way even though they might not be screaming. TAKAII: I love the horror movie. I go (makes fart sounds) and go to the bathroom. STILTS: I do not know what you just said. Enzo, you want to jump in? ENZO: I never thought I would jump in on a Railgun conversation but I don’t dispute the results of the poll. Personally that’s a complete B S, because I hate being spoiled. I think that might be a self-fulfilling thing because people, once they’re spoiled, their expectations are much lower, so it takes a lot less for them to feel satisfied. In some sense, I think that just by spoiling those people, I think you’ve spoiled the results. STILTS: You think that it’s skewing the expectations so that maybe if you’re unspoiled, the feeling of how much you might enjoy it might be higher. ENZO: Yes, I completely believe that. I think it’s the Heisenberg principle in action. By the act of observing these people, you’re affecting the results. You’re not getting a clean result. I think a good example of this is…. I don’t know how many of you either watch or read Game of Thrones. STILTS: I haven’t started it yet. ENZO: There was a huge scene in the penultimate episode of this season. I won’t spoil it, because maybe a lot of people will eventually get to it, but the impact of this scene on the people who have not read it and didn’t know it was coming was so great that people actually filmed their friends and families watching this episode just so they could Youtube video how they reacted to this thing that happened in this episode. This was how amazingly shocking it was. They would’ve never had that experience if they had been spoiled to it. I’m sorry, I read the books. I think they’re great books. I’m glad I read them and I still enjoyed the episode, but I am, on a certain level, disappointed that I’ll never have the experience of seeing it on screen and not know that was coming. STILTS: Yeah. ENZO: Real quick. The latest example is the latest episode of Hunter x Hunter. Hunter x Hunter did have a scene like that. I haven’t read the manga on that quite intentionally, and I did have the experience of being shocked by that. I’m glad. I would not have wanted to be spoiled for that scene. That’s just my two cents on the spoiler question. Back to your idiot Railgun show. STILTS: Hey! Had to bring up Hunter x Hunter, did you? I’d just like to say before I let the other people talk. That study does break it down to just enjoyment, and I think that there’s more to storytelling than just enjoyment. There is shock, teaching, scaring, and all these other things that a good storyteller should do. That’s an example of it. It technically might not be as “enjoyable,” but it’s going to touch that viewer for Game of Thrones or for other things more than just straight enjoyment. I think that’s just important. Zephyr, you want to say something? ZEPHYR: Yeah, about the spoiler thing mentioned before, I’m sitting here and would like to call B S on that too. The problem with a study like that is there are too many variables to actually consider here. The kind of spoiler, the timing of the spoiler, who’s involved in the spoiler, and everything there. It’s too much variables to say flat off the bat that it won’t affect your enjoyment. STILTS: Non-scientists can say that. I know that I’m saying that to actually the only one who is some kind of scientist. I don’t discount it. There might be certain variables that, like you said, your expectation level. I give more credence to it, because that’s the kind of thing that runs counter to what people actually say and think, but it might actually be true. Just because we think it’s true doesn’t mean it isn’t. ZEPHYR: If it’s true, they really have to have some nice study backed up with multiple variables. STILTS: There’s going to be a few more of those. ZEPHYR: There’s going to have to be a lot of studies for that, because- STILTS: There’s going to be a few more of those before I take it as science fact. As somebody who’s writing stuff, I’m not going to spoil it for people just to make it more enjoyable for them. XUMBRA: As far as I know, there’s only one study about the spoiler thing, so it doesn’t seem like that anyone else has done any more studies on this. It doesn’t seem very scientific to me. STILTS: It was a singular one, but it was recently published too. ZEPHYR: As a science guy here, I shake my fist at it. STILTS: One does not mean fact, but it is interesting. Does anybody else have anything else on this? We’re running slow here. Yes? No? Yes? No? Good. We’re going to go through a quick one on Aiura. [01:10:12] AIURA STILTS: Who wants to intro Aiura real quick? ZEPHYR: You should do it, Stilts. STILTS: Alright. In the recent preview and also in one of My Way or Anime posts, I said the four different aspects or facets of slice-of-life, them being atmosphere, characters, cuteness and comedy. In Aiura, I think it’s all atmosphere, this kind of calming atmosphere, and also a lot of pans on characters’ legs. But it is very calming. ZEPHYR: That is true. STILTS: There are a lot of leg shots in that show. ENZO: They should put that on the blu-ray box. STILTS: They probably should. ZEPHYR: They probably will. STILTS: More pairs of knees. All my money! Who else has been watching this? ZEPHYR: I’ve been watching it. I picked it up pretty late. I was wandering around one day, looking for a show to watch, and then realized, ‘Oh, hey, this was four minutes long?’ I might as well. Actually, I watched it, and I was really surprised because I really liked it. It might be a stretch but out of all those shorts that I’ve watched, this might be my favorite one. The problem is that it’s pretty hard to pinpoint why, because theoretically they don’t really do much. What can you do in a 3 minute show where 1 minute and a half is an opening? I guess, in general, the big thing is first of all, the animation is sharp. The art style is nice. It’s unique. It’s there. The second big thing is the voice actors. I was looking up the voice actors themselves, and I realized that many of them haven’t had much roles in general. STILTS: A lot of the main ones are newbies, until you get to Yukarin (Yukari Tamura) and Sugita Tomokazu being teachers. By the way, they’re the best characters. ZEPHYR: That is true. The main characters themselves are people that are newbies and haven’t done many roles. I was surprised because I’m sitting there, and they’re doing a really darn spectacular job. You listen to them right there in the first few episodes, and you are like, ‘They are not new. There is no way that they’re new.’ I think that played a really big part in my enjoyment of the series. It’s worth watching especially considering how short it is. STILTS: It is really good atmospheric [show]. It’s one I like to watch right before bed. I have just gotten off Valvrave or something else and need to calm down. ZEPHYR: That crab opening, man! That crab opening! TAKAII: Spiked crabs? ZEPHYR: Crab crabs. STILTS: Not that kind of crabs. TAKAII: Admiral Crab Pants. STILTS: Anybody else watching Aiura? Was it just Zephyr and I? ZEPHYR: That’s messed up. STILTS: We’re the only ones with good taste? Bite me, Enzo. I’ve said it! That one actually went pretty quick. Let’s go on to our very last show. Zani, Hentai Neko (Henneko, i.e., Hentai Ouji to Warawanai Neko)! Give us a really quick- [01:13:15] HENTAI OUJI TO WARAWANAI NEKO ZANIBAS: Okay! Good stuff! Hentai Ouji no Warawanai Neko. You can put twenty wara’s in there. It’s a train wreck! Yeah! TAKAII: What? It’s really that bad? ZEPHYR: What? ZANIBAS: It depends on what you’re looking for. If you’re looking for something that’s really light and silly and where there’s a lot of fanservice and crazy stuff. If you like things like that, then it’s all good, but if you’re looking for any semblance of meaningful plot, then this is not the show that you’re looking for. TAKAII: Anime is not where I go looking for plot though. I go to anime so I can talk to Stilts about it and just yell at the screen. ZANIBAS: Okay, Enzo points out that he liked the first two episodes, and that’s good, but after that, after the kind of main fiasco where we think, ‘I guess this is the whole thing,’ they start going into these little mini-arcs that don’t really make sense, where the cat gods keep getting powerful and they keep granting bigger and bigger wishes until suddenly- STILTS: It’s basically an entire series where they don’t really want to explain themselves and they’re just going to do [stuff] because it seems awesome at the time? Yeah, it is awesome a lot. That’s probably the show that I end up cracking up the most, but I can’t say that my intelligent portions of the brain, some nice friends say that I don’t have, are engaged. ZANIBAS: This whole wishing with the cat thing, it seemed alright for the first two episodes, where it was nice and controlled and it involved a balance between what you get and what’s taken away. But, as soon as they got into those later episodes, oh my god. Oh my god! What’s going on anymore? TAKAII: Zani, should I watch Valvrape, Suisei , or Hentai? ZEPHYR: Did you just say Su-i-sei? I’m going to smack this guy. Can we get this guy over here on the East Coast, so I can smack him? Su-i-sei? What is this? This is not a game. Remember me, okay? ZANIBAS: Takaii’s angering a lot of people today. TAKAII: I know, right? I’m on a roll. ZEPHYR: My priority is Gargantia. There we go. STILTS: It probably is the “best.” ENZO: You can take the quotes off. TAKAII: Zani, you’re supposed to say,’ No, you’re supposed watch my show, because it’s awesome and great. ‘ ZANI: Actually, I wouldn’t endorse it. I don’t know. ZEPHYR: No, Zanibas, don’t. Don’t say anymore. You shouldn’t be saying that. We have to cut that out. The writer cannot hate the show that they’re covering. TAKAII: Yes, they can! Yes, they can! KAIRI: I just covered Amnesia - ZANIBAS: I don’t hate it. I just don’t recommend it as the first priority in his watching list. TAKAII: I’ll watch all of it now just because you said that. It’s the first show that I’m going to watch right now. ZANIBAS: Okay, way to be a rebel. STILTS: I have to break in, and we have to talk about one of the best parts about the show. I’m not talking about Azuki , though she is the best part. ZANIBAS: I don’t know. People liked the older sister. STILTS: Oh yeah, that’s who I was going for. TAKAII: Real quick, Hentai Ouji to Warawanai Neko? That one? ZANIBAS: Yeah. TAKAII: Alright, downloading right now. ZEPHYR: Oh god. STILTS: Kotetsu-san, what’s your opinion on that one, Zani? ZANIBAS: Is she the one who constantly calls her prince, the hentai? STILTS: No, that’s older sister, Yukarin. ZANIBAS: Wait- STILTS: Older sister. ZANIBAS: Tsukushi? STILTS: Yeah, I can’t say her name. I don’t even try. ZANIBAS: Oh. What do I think about her? STILTS: Yeah. ZANIBAS: Oh. I think she’s alright. Of all the skits that are played out in the series, because I try to pay attention to how well the comedic timing goes, and for her, she has some of the better skits on her side. I just like her character. STILTS: She’s being voiced by Yukarin. That’s cheating. She’s hilarious. ZANIBAS: That’s true. I think that she gets narrowly beaten out by that girl who calls our prince a hentai all the time. STILTS: Which one is that? ZANIBAS: The ponytail…No, they all have ponytails. Wait, not all of them. ZEPHYR: Who doesn’t call him a pervert? TAKAII: I want to just throw this out there. I went to some place to try to find this, and without thinking, I searched for the word, ‘hentai.’ ZEPHYR: Oh geez! TAKAII: Hold up, I searched for the word, ‘hentai,’ and surprisingly- ZEPHYR: RandomC popped up, right? TAKAII: Surprisingly, the first couple results all say, ‘Hentai Ouji to Warawanai Neko.’ I was like, ‘Oh.’ It then occurred to me that I searched for ‘hentai’- ZANIBAS: Takaii is just trolling us all. ZEPHYR: So then we can actually search it ourselves and then realize that it’s not true. TAKAII: You guys give me too much credit. I’m not that good of a troll, but thanks. I appreciate it. ZEPHYR: On a slightly random note, you know how there’s a record of the search terms that lead to RandomC? For some reason, some of our top ten is always something hentai. It’s like ‘RandomC hentai.’ STILTS: These are our readers. ZEPHYR: ‘Hentai neko hentai.’ TAKAII: You know what makes me mad? I search for ‘Takaii,’ and I’m not the first thing that comes up. I’m the third that comes up. That pisses me off. ZEPHYR: If you search ‘Zephyr,’ we get the west wind, okay? We’re good. STILTS: That’s close? ZEPHYR: Moving back, I think we’re done. STILTS: Yeah, I think we’re way too off topic here. I want to wrap up this section with everyone’s short twitter-like impressions of this season. I’m sure none of you are prepared, so that makes it more fun. TAKAII: I’m actually prepared. Do you want to hear mine? STILTS: I was actually going to ask you first, Takaii. Go ahead. TAKAII: My impression of this season was that it was surprisingly good. I expected a lot to be not good. ZEPHYR: Oh my god. STILTS: Spoken like a true sage. Enzo! Real quick! Give it to us. TAKAII: You said twitter, man! STILTS: That’s true. ENZO: Eh. How many characters is eh? It was okay. ZEPHYR: Alright, he’s done. You’ve already used 150. STILTS: I’ll give him a little more. ENZO: Spring Is supposed to be the best season. In that sense, I’m disappointed to be honest. I don’t think it’s a particularly good season. Most of the shows were better in the first half than they were in the second half, which is not the greatest trend in the world. It’s not a disaster. There are still some shows that I like. I don’t think there’s any shows this season that’s going to get stamped as a classic. It’s just not as much depth of really good shows as I would hope we would see. It feels more like a summer season than a spring season to me. STILTS: That was about 12 tweets. Zani! ZANIBAS: Skip me really quick! I got to do something! STILTS: Oh he sucks. Zephyr! ZEPHYR: Just one thing about Enzo’s tweet. I remember you saying a while back that last year , I believe, for the Spring, I think? You were talking that one of the trends was that many of the shows actually had great endings. ENZO: I don’t remember the conversation, but I do think it’s true. ZEPHYR: Yeah, right? That was an interesting trend. I don’t know. I just felt like bringing it up. ENZO: I don’t see that trend happening this season. ZEPHYR: Yeah, definitely not. STILTS: Not a fun trend we’re seeing, especially with two cours. Zephyr, your synopsis of this whole season. ZEPHYR: Basically, the Spring [season] has been good. I feel like it’s been better than Winter. It’s just like what Enzo said. I feel like it’s underperformed a little bit. It’s a tad bit disappointing. There are some good shows, but they’re not exactly the same as what we got last year or the year before in the Spring. That’s about it. Generally, the Spring [season] is supposed to be the best season these days, and I’m slightly worried if this is it for this year. STILTS: Eh, I wouldn’t go that far. Xumbra, how about you? XUMBRA: Reversed expectations. There are some shows that I didn’t think highly of at all but were really good like Hataraku. ZEPHYR: That is true. XUMBRA: Some other shows that I thought would be really good are agonizingly slow. ZEPHYR: I see what you did there. TAKAII: Shingeki no Attack on~ XUMBRA: Gasp, how did you guys know what I was talking about? STILTS: Gasp! ZEPHYR: Attack on fastness. ZANIBAS: Next time on DVD! ZEPHYR: That was not appropriate. STILTS: I’m not sure which you’re insulting more. ZEPHYR: Let’s Kamehameha this guy. STILTS: Kairi, how about you? ZEPHYR: She’s too busy laughing. KAIRI: I’m not laughing anymore. I liked the season. It’s not amazing. It’s not epic, but it’s still pretty good. At least, I’m really enjoying Hataraku. I’m really enjoying Dansai (Bunri no Crime Edge). There were a couple other shows that I really like, and there were some that were really great and then they lost their steam. Pretty much the same thing. TAKAII: But you do like Maple Story the best, right? STILTS: Anyway. Zani, you want to go? ZANIBAS: So, it has to be in a tweet-like format, right? ZEPHYR: No. Write an essay. STILTS: About that short would be nice. ZANIBAS: Okay. So fairly weak season for comedies although there are few good ones out there. Fairly strong for sci-fi. We got a lot of sci-fi. In terms of everything else, it was an alright season. STILTS: Alright. I will go last. Mine is something I will actually tweet. Well, part of it. Enjoy the little things. Also, whiskey is delicious. ZEPHYR: That was not helpful at all. ZANIBAS: I feel like we’ve shifted away from anime at this point. STILTS: To explain the first part, it’s the same thing as Xumbra was saying. I was not expecting Maou-sama to be so amazing. That was just showing that execution really does reign supreme over everything. XUMBRA: So good. STILTS: Yeah. If you execute a pretty good premise or a fairly good premise really well, it will transcend above all. TAKAII: Fairly? Pretty? You know what I’ve said in the last podcast! STILTS: I think I was the one who introed that. Takaii previewed it. It came in, seeming I’ve seen this before, and there’s nothing that I haven’t seen before. TAKAII: You’re telling me that you’ve seen an anime that focuses on a demon lord who runs away from his world and becomes a part-time manager? ZEPHYR: Get it right, man. Shift supervisor! Let’s go! TAKAII: Temporary shift supervisor! ZEPHYR: No, not temporary! TAKAII: He’s a permanent employee! He’s an Assistant Shift Manager, sir. Assistant Shift Manager. ZEPHYR: Now missing his Dullahan TAKAII: No, Dullahan! ENZO: My last mini thought on Spring is that Seishun is covering, (Ginga Kikoutai) Majestic Prince. Just a quick plug for that. It’s a really good show. It’s the mecha show that time forgot. Everyone was talking about Gargantia and Valvrave. It’s not as flashy as either of those two shows, but it actually has the most traditional mecha plot out of all the mecha shows this season. It’s really quite good. It’s one of those tortoise and the hare deals. It never impresses you with how blazing fast it is, but if you watch it, it grows on you. It has a lot of heart to it. It reminds me a lot of Symphogear in a way that it’s a little clumsy a lot of the times, but it’s very emotionally transparent and the heart is in the right place. It’s a good show if you like mecha. You should be watching it. ZEPHYR: Yeah I have to agree with that. I’m watching Prince as well. It’s pretty much what a mecha show should be. You ask for the definition of mecha, and you can just point them over to Majestic Prince. There, you have it. STILTS: Fair enough. Any last thoughts? Yes? No? ZANIBAS: I want to just clarify something on Crime Edge, because I previewed it, and I just got around to watching it all. Most of it. I will say that the comparison to Nazo no Kanojo X, I did not expect that Crime Edge would be that saucy. Oh my gosh! ENZO: Oh, it’s saucy. Best show of the season, no question. ZEPHYR: Now I have to watch this show. STILTS: It’s very saucy. ENZO: It’s very saucy. ZANIBAS: That’s all I had to say. ENZO: It’s naughty. ZANIBAS: Naughty doesn’t even begin to describe….Aw, geez! ZEPHYR: Time for the euphemisms. STILTS: I’m not sure if the voice I want to hear talking about naughty is Enzo’s or absolutely is Enzo’s. TAKAII: I just love how he said the word naughty. ENZO: Oh trust me it is. STILTS: Oh, it’s very naughty. TAKAII: I know, right. I was like, damn. ZEPHYR: You’re not on Santa’s list this year. STILTS: Oh anyway, we’re going to head into the second half now. While we take a quick break to get our [stuff] together and be a little serious- ENZO: I don’t think a quick break is going to work for me. STILTS: The midpoint song will be Seno, the OP for Yuyushiki, sung by Ookubo Rumi, Taneda Risa, and Tsuda Minami and chosen by yours truly. Take it away. [01:26:52] INTERMISSION [01:28:24] SHINKAI MAKOTO DISCUSSION STILTS: Alright, everybody, we are back with the second half. We are going to introduce a new little section this time. We call it the backlog. This will be usually the mid-season podcast. We’re bringing this out a little early this time. We’re going to go through some older series or movies or anything that maybe some of us haven’t watched or some of you haven’t watched. Let’s talk about them so we can slowly chew through our backlogs and watch all those old goodies that we’ve all been meaning to make time for. Now the first one we’re going to talk about is a category of them. It’s going to be the movies of Shinkai Makoto. TAKAII: Oh you guys wait until we get started. I’m going to make people hate me. STILTS: We’ll wait for that, but I would like to get an intro to movies of Shinkai Makoto by Enzo, the man who eventually shamed me enough to start watching them and thank you by the way. ENZO: You’re welcome. What can I say about Shinkai Makoto? I would say that the most important thing about Makoto as a director, [well] the most obvious thing about him as a director is that to me his visuals are the best of any anime or animation director in the world. I know that’s a big statement but- ZEPHYR: No, it’s true. ENZO: His movies for me are the most beautiful animation to look at of all the animated movies I’ve ever seen and I’ll even love Fantasia and films like that. This is a guy who started out basically making all his movies on his Mac and getting his friends to voice the characters. He was still able to produce some great looking films by doing that. Voices of a Distant Star is basically him and his Mac. Eventually people noticed him, and it sorta grew into something else. I think there’s more to Shinkai though than the visuals, and it’s best displayed in 5 Centimeters per Second. The guy is a poet. When he tried to make a movie that was too much of a story, too prosaic, he made Children Who Chase Lost Voices (Hoshi wo Ou Kodomo), which I liked a lot but It seemed very much like Shinkai trying to make a Ghibli film. That’s not him. His most recent film, Garden of Words (Kotonoha no Niwa), I would say maybe his second best film. It’s really wonderful. I’ve seen it in the theater. Ideally, that’s how his movies should be seen, and the last couple [of movies] have gotten releases worldwide, limited, but they have gotten some, so you have a chance to see them on the big screen. The guy just tells really simple but beautiful stories about basic human emotions. He’s definitely a romantic. He has a Japanese view on romance and it ties into his visuals too. The Japanese concept which many anime fans are aware of as mono no aware, which is this appreciation of the beauty and wonder of things that are about to lost. It doesn’t really translate well into English. It’s the idea that you get this sense that everything is transient. He’s someone who could’ve been a great painter, if he had chosen to be an oil on canvas painter. His visuals are not photorealistic. They don’t look like you’re looking at digital photography. I call them more real than real, because that’s how they feel to me. It’s like he’s captured the essence of what makes something beautiful, and that’s what he brings to the screen. We were talking about a scene in the most recent movie, where someone is using chalk to draw on a blackboard. ZEPHYR: Yeah! STILTS: We’ll get to that. Keep your pants on. ENZO: You can’t imagine a more mundane scene than that, but there is no mundane scene in Shinkai’s vision. His vision is everything is beautiful, and it’s not just that he has the ability to capture that beauty. He also has the ability to make you understand what his vision is. When you put those things together, that’s what makes him a genius in my view. Like I said, I think you could make a strong case for Hosoda Mamoru as being maybe the greatest anime director of his generation or current generation, but in terms of visuals, Shinkai, I think, is in a class by himself. He does have a beautiful poetry to his stories too when they’re really good as they are in…. I think 5 Centimeters per Second is the best of them, but Garden of Words has some of that as well. So, that’s my introduction to Shinkai. STILTS: That was pretty comprehensive, but I’ll riff on a couple of parts there. First of all, your part about him doing things more real than reality. I think that was on your more recent post on RC? I think you said that there. ENZO: Yeah. STILTS: I read that and it really resonated because it’s very much true. I always think about paintings and other stuff like that. I wonder, why do people still paint when there’s photographs now? It’s because you can capture the essence more than the reality of it. As I go through reading stories and watching stories and telling stories, I’ve come to realize that reality is overrated. Whenever you can evoke the essence of it in animation or words or whatever else, you can tell a story that can touch a place, as I go into really weird to say this, that is way deeper than reality ever could. Shinkai really does that, and I agree. I saw 3 of his [movies]: 5 Centimeters per Second, Kotonoha no Niwa, and then Hoshi wo Ou Kodomo. I love my pronunciation. I really did feel that 5 Centimeters and Kotonoha no Niwa were more way up his real house, because I just watched Hoshi wo Ou Kodomo today and it was good. It wasn’t- ENZO: It didn’t feel like him. STILTS: It was good. The anime was great, but it wasn’t amazing. It didn’t reach in and grab my heart and twist it. 5 Centimeters per Second did that. Actually, I think, for my personal preference as a viewer and not necessarily as a critic or a storyteller, I kinda liked Kotonoha no Niwa a little better because it wasn’t quite as tragic. ENZO: Spoilers! STILTS: Yeah, we’re going into spoilers here, people. It’s not quite as tragic. It’s got a little hopeful note at the end, which I always really like in a tragic story. We’ve talked about that earlier with Urobutcher (Urobuchi Gen), you can choose. I think Urobutcher always goes, you can choose what has happened. With a really good storyteller, you can choose what will happen next. I think that was with 5 Centimeters per Second and Kotonoha no Niwa. He did that. I don’t know. It was so simple, but it really sucked me in and left me not wanting to move because that would break the spell. ENZO: Simple, I think, is the key to his appeal as a storyteller and why Children who Chase Lost Voices doesn’t have that same magic because it doesn’t have that simplicity. It’s too complex. It’s not his style. It feels like him trying to be someone else. STILS: Yeah, the way you put it as a poet really does work really well. You can write really long poems, [but] most of them work in very short fragments. I thought his short movies are way more powerful than his long one I saw. ENZO: Yeah, I agree. ZANIBAS: I agree. ZEPHYR: Yep. ZANIBAS: I kinda actually want to touch on that. STILTS: Go ahead. ZANIBAS: So- ENZO: You want to touch on Stilts’ special place? ZANIBAS: Yes, I do. STILTS: We are going to save that for like 30 minutes from now. I’m getting impatient. Sorry, go ahead. ZANIBAS: Anyways, I’ve been monitoring Makoto’s works for a few years now. Obviously, there is the art form where you can take a screenshot of any scene in his movies and it’ll work as a wallpaper, but what I find to be a little…. What he needs to develop on and what he’s been working on, [and] I’m happy with his current work Kotonoha no Niwa, is that he has this trouble with pacing issues, especially with his endings. It first started with 5 Centimeters per Second where the first two parts were really fleshed out. They had something meaningful to say, and then you get to Part 3 which is literally just like a music video. STILTS: It did drop in on that end song a little quick, I thought. ZANIBAS: Yeah. A lot of things go wrapped up really quickly, and it’s all left very ambiguous? I guess that’s okay but it just leaves [us] wanting a little bit more. They could’ve used that third part to really hit it home, but what happened was when he moved onto his work, Hoshi wo Ou Kodomo, I feel that, in terms of pacing, was really really bad, because once we got to that scene where the wishes were occurring and all that stuff, it just ended very abruptly. Beforehand, he was creating this very vibrant [and] really beautiful world full of intrigue and lots of creativity. Not much of it is touched upon. Not much really affects the conclusion that much. So it ended really badly. I thought to myself for the longest time that if he had more time, he would’ve definitely been able to develop this story better, but with this newest movie, the Garden of Words, that really proved me wrong. In the span time of 45 minutes, Makoto really outdid himself in terms of pacing. Although the story might not be that deep, it was told quite beautifully and it was paced much better in my opinion than his previous works. Thoughts on that? STILTS: I do agree that Hoshi ended a little abruptly. It wasn’t necessarily the time he had. It was how he chose to use it. I thought it was pretty lackluster until they got down to Agartha. Once again, spoilers. The first second they step into the water that wasn’t water and breathe and then go down into this amazing world, I was like, you have my attention. Before that, I was just like, I’m going to talk about this in the podcast later today, so I should probably keep going. Enzo, you want to say something else? ENZO: I know that there are other folks who want to jump in on this. I agree, Zani, with what you said, but the thing is that Shinkai is not a sophisticated writer. Everything in his films is him. He’s the writer, he’s the director, [and] he’s the producer. He obviously has a staff now, and he gets Miyu Irino and big named people KanaHana (Kana Hanazawa) in his movies, which I don’t necessarily think is a good thing for him, but that’s another conversation. One of the charms for him to me is that there’s almost a vulnerability in his storytelling. He can be a little clumsy and it can be a little awkward but a lot of times, that works for him. There’s an innocence to him. His vision both as a writer and as an artist is very innocent. It’s almost childlike in a way. STILTS: Is it very flawed and human? ENZO: Yeah, in terms of his movies, the ones that hold together the best as a whole, I think, Is his current one Kotonoha no Niwa and then also one of his older films, Kumo no Muko, Yakusoku no Basho, which is The Place Promised in our Early Days, which is a wonderful short film. I think [it] holds together really well as a story. I think that one’s about an hour or something like that. I just want to say that with 5 Centimeters per Second, in defense of that film, which I consider to be his best work. The subtitle of that film is ‘A collection of stories about their distance,’ and I think that you have to realize that he never really intended that to be seen as a seamless narrative from start to finish. It’s sorta semi-related stories, I think. I agree that the third one is not as successful as the first two, but over the years as I’ve rewatched and rewatched that film many times, I’ve come to appreciate what he was going for with that last chapter, but I also think [that] if you look at each one of those as individual short films, the first part of 5 Centimeters per Second is for me the most perfect 25 minutes of anime ever created. ZANIBAS: Wow. ENZO: It’s incredible. That train journey sequence. The whole way the relationship is set up. The way that journey happens on the train. The tension, the details, and the drops of the rain that are the snow condensing or dripping down the windows of the train. The feelings that he manages to get across with so little dialogue, just him, with the incredible background music as well. Tenmon’s soundtrack is amazing for that film. That to me is the perfect marriage of a very simple but beautiful story, incredible visuals, and a great soundtrack. I would rank that first part of 5 Centimeters per Second against any anime ever. That’s how much I think it’s fantastic. ZANIBAS: That’s interesting. Oh, Stilts? STILTS: At the risk of remembering something later on after this is done and taking this back, I would agree? I didn’t watch any of these until we decided we’re really going to do this, because I suck at watching movies. I actually wrote down some impressions I had while watching it. During that first one, it only took me ten minutes before I wanted the two main characters to be together and another ten minutes for it to really viscerally hurt when the trains were late. It took that little time for him to suck me in. Kotonoha no Niwa did that as well. It took a little more time. I think almost that might be because I’ve only recently watched it, and 5 Centimeters per Second was more of an adult story. It’s not as happy and hopeful and all those other things we’d like to think in a story, but it might be one that needs to age with you a little bit to really appreciate the story that it’s trying to give you. Takaii? TAKAII: Hello. Okay. I just want to throw out there. 5 Centimeters [is] the only movie of his that I’ve actually seen fully. I want to start my statement that I hate that movie, but at the same time I love that movie too. Let me explain why. I saw it at least a couple of years after it first came out, and I was really hyped up about it. People were saying, ‘Oh, it’s a wonderful movie. It’s great. There’s all these things.’ One of my best friends who is also into anime and things of this genre said, ‘Here, I have it. Let’s go watch it,’ right? I said, ‘Okay, sure, I’ll come watch it.’ The thing is [that] I asked him, ‘Am I going to like this movie or am I not going to like it?’ Me being a fan of happier endings and not things grounded in reality, right? He was like, ‘Oh yeah, things will go well. Good things happen.’ STILTS: Oh! TAKAII: Yeah, right? So, I sat through this movie, and I go to the first part. I understand exactly what you guys are talking about. It’s great. I got to the second part, and I was like, ‘Okay, I can see where this is going.’ Then, you get to the third part, and you’re like, ’No! Why?’ STILTS: It evokes strong feelings. TAKAII: I was under the impression that something good was going to happen. ENZO: That’s not Takaii’s fault though. STILTS: Yeah, you got a little screwed on that. TAKAII: So, the movie ends, right? The train’s passed, and he smiles, because he understands. He’s finally getting past as a hub, but I wasn’t expecting that. So, I sat there for a good minute after the credits rolled. I remember, I went to my friend. I was just cussing and yelling at him. I was so f--king angry! STILTS: I think that really speaks- TAKAII: It was a really good movie. ENZO: That’s how brilliant it is. STILTS: Yeah, when you want it to end…. I did the same thing. I didn’t have anybody over to scream at. I knew inside that this wasn’t going to end like I wanted it to. I just didn’t want to believe it though. TAKAII: Exactly, I believed that it would end well. It was just really good storytelling. I just got f--king trolled. STILTS: Yeah. It really evokes strong feelings, which does speak very well of it. TAKAII: It’s the only movie of his that I’ve seen fully, and I f--king hate it at the same time, I really like it. STILTS: You hate to love it and love to hate it. TAKAII: No, I just hate it and at the same time I love it. STILTS: Zephy, you’re up. ZEPHYR: I’ve been listening for the past 20 minutes or so. I’m sitting here, trying to find words to actually describe my feelings when watching all his movies. I’ve watched literally every single one of his movies so far. I think Enzo really hit the nail on the head. A lot of his charm is how simple it is. I think the biggest thing for me that can really summarize how good Shinkai just does things is that he can do more in the 40 minutes or the hour he has in each of his movies than many people can do in an entire series of 12 episodes or 24 episodes. I think that’s pretty much the only way I can describe Shinkai’s works and the feelings it evokes in me. STILTS: Being able to compress all that in that short amount of time without really feeling that it’s been compressed? ZEPHYR: Yeah. It’s just there. He does more in that short amount of time than most people can do with way more time. You think that it’s easier to do something with just a tad bit of time instead of 40 minutes, but he does so much in those 40 minutes or an hour. You can argue that part of the reason why some of his stuff is good is because it’s short, but at the same time, it feels like he puts so much into it. STILTS: I would argue that. You put that kind of limit on yourself, and you don’t pull a Shingeki and piss all this time away doing stuff that you could do quicker and would be better quicker. It forces you to edit down and tells the essence of a story. Whenever he does these really simple stories, that really helps him. ENZO: I would take it even further and say that I don’t even think that he’s not really editing himself down. I think he’s figuring out what the basic story he wants to tell is. However long that ends up being, that’s how long it is. Trust me, I think that the studio people would have preferred Kotonoha no Niwa to be longer, because it’s a lot easier to market. You make more money on a 90 minute film than a 45 minute film. In fact, they had to package another short film with this to make people feel like they weren’t screwed on their ticket price. So, I don’t think this is the case for him- STILTS: I think he did it because that’s the best way to tell a story. ENZO: Yeah, I think he figured that out and resisted the urge to pad it. If he started out and said that he needed 90 minutes to do this, I think that’s what he would’ve done. I think that’s what happened with Children who Chase Lost Voices. He probably knew that story shouldn’t be as long as it was, but he padded it out because he was trying to make a commercial film. ZANIBAS: Oh, let me speak on that. I think what the result here is that Makoto is recognizing, like you guys said, the limits. Stilts said it was the basic story that he wants to tell and how long he wants it to be. He constructs stories the he can tell at a reasonable frame. I feel like for Hoshi wo Ou Kodomo, it aspired to be something really big but he just didn’t have the ability to tell it in that movie time frame, so it felt rushed at the end. With this newest one, I’d hate to say that he didn’t aspire to as much, because it’s still a beautiful story. ENZO: No, he didn’t, and I think that’s fine. STILTS: That was two minutes. ZANIBAS: I don’t want him to aspire high. We all do, but he understood what his limits were. That’s what I liked about this most recent film. He recognized that. He told what he could in the time that did, and he did it remarkably well. ENZO: Really quick. I think that Shinkai sets out to communicate a feeling, and the plot is merely the device he uses to communicate that feeling. However much plot he feels he needs, that’s how much he uses. STILTS: Yeah, I agree with what you were saying. He aspired very high with Kotonoha no Niwa, but he didn’t aspire to a lot. He told a story and a very evocative story very well. He just didn’t want to jam so much into the story to dilute what he was doing. ZANIBAS: He didn’t bite off too much that he couldn’t chew at all. STILTS: Exactly. He tried to say something very profound and done very well, and it was. Zephyr, did you have something to say? ZEPHYR: No, that’s about it. STILTS: Kairi, I think, had something. ENZO: Kairi? KAIRI: Okay, well, I really liked Kotonoha no Niwa, but I have this thing with Shinkai where I really like his [films] but at the same time I sometimes feel that [they’re] a little bit somehow lacking because of how simple they are. I remember how I got 5 Centimeters per Second spoiled for me. My sister told me how it ended. When I watched it, I knew how it was going to end. It feels really pointless while I’m watching it. I felt very bored because of it, even though it was emotional. I loved the emotions and I loved the story but at the same time, I was like, ‘Oh, this is going nowhere. I know how it’s going to end.’ TAKAII: That’s kinda the backwards of what happened to me. Shoot. STILTS: I don’t know. I’ve had this discussion with somebody before, and it actually feeds into our conversation about spoilers from earlier, but some stories are impervious to spoilers. I can’t even say this one without spoiling people, so hopefully you’ve all seen it. Kanon. ZEPHYR: Oh pass! KAIRI: I haven’t seen this. TAKAII: If you haven’t heard this, you need to leave the room. Potato! ZEPHYR: You’re not saying this one. STILTS: Anybody needs to take off their headsets? KAIRI: I haven’t seen it. No, wait. TAKAII: Take off your headset right now. ZANIBAS: Are you talking about Kanon 2006? STILTS: Only the most recent one. TAKAII: Don’t listen if you haven’t watched it. I swear to god, you’re going to cry. ENZO: This might not be a good place to go. STILTS: Really? ENZO: I don’t know. ZANIBAS: Oh my god, wow, so many feels. STILTS: There are a lot of feels. Okay. So, I’ll be broad. There’s a certain point in it where something happens that is not very happy. They foreshadow up to it very very well. When you know it’s happening, you’re like, ‘Oh god. Oh god. Oh god!’ TAKAII: There’s this one scene where there’s an animal involved, and wow, it’s like the feels are just too much. ZANIBAS: Really? TAKAII: There’s an animal involved and the feels you get, you just lose your mind because oh my god- STILTS: All true. The point is very good foreshadowing when you run up to it, and I’ve been spoiled for it. TAKAII: I need to take it into consideration that in chat for what we’re talking about, Zanibas needs to go on the record. He doesn’t have enough feels for Kanon. We must make him feel more. ZANIBAS: I didn’t like it as much. I’m sorry! STILTS: Have you watch Clannad? ZANIBAS: I loved Clannad a lot more. TAKAII: Okay, we’re still friends. We’re still friends. STILTS: You’re not fired. ENZO: Kanon is way better than Clannad. TAKAII: We’re no longer friends, Enzo! ENZO: I’m sorry! Kanon is way better than Clannad. TAKAII: Clannad first season or Clannad in its entirety? ENZO: In its entirety. TAKAII: Oh, wow, my heart! Oh god! ENZO: It’s a good show. Kanon is subtler, and I think it’s deeper. TAKAII: Okay, that’s true. It is subtler. ENZO: We were talking about Shinkai. STILTS: The point is that certain things, I think, are timeless to spoilers. Sometimes, it can make you dread it more because you know it’s coming. You don’t want it to come. ENZO: It’s like you said. I knew how 5 Centimeters was going to end. Even I wasn’t spoiled, but I knew how it was going to end. I was hoping that it wouldn’t end that way. I never stopped hoping it wouldn’t end that way until it ended. Then I felt like that was probably the only way it could’ve ended. STILTS: You looked at it from [the perspective that] I’ve watched a lot of anime or stories in general, and I know in my logical self that this is probably what’s going to happen, but you don’t know because somebody has told you. That’s a little different thing. KAIRI: Yeah, I didn’t have that hope. I just knew what was going to happen. STILTS: Though, again, part way through, I would’ve thought, ‘No, my friend has got to be screwing with me,’ because god, I did not want it to end like it did. It is what it is. ENZO: It is what it is. STILTS: Any other thoughts on Makoto Shinkai movies? ZANIBAS: Hosoda is the master? No, I’m kidding. TAKAII: I like his movies when I’m not trolled about them. STILTS: There is that. Alrighty. Well then, we will move onto our second half of our second half and talk about the upcoming Summer season. [01:55:50] SUMMER SEASON DISCUSSION TAKAII: Summer~ ZANIBAS: Free is going to be the hottest show this season. TAKAII: They don’t have nipples, man. [laughs] STILTS: Oh they make me so jealous. I need to go do a bunch of pull ups after this. Who wants to start? Any shows you’re especially looking forward to? Especially not looking forward to? Takaii, you got some? TAKAII: Okay, because I was strong-armed into working on the preview, I actually learned about….I have to make sure on that, so I don’t pick the wrong show because then I would sound retarded. ZANIBAS: Are we talking about Neptune? TAKAII: Okay, two shows. So Genshiken, right? I felt so bad that I had no idea that this show existed. I read the manga for this for the research, but man, is this a great idea stuffed into a manga and show! STILTS: I still sad that I haven’t heard of Genshiken before. TAKAII: I know. I was so disappointed in myself. ZANIBAS: I’m so disappointed. TAKAII: I just didn’t know what to say. The other one, because I think that Zani brought it up, Choujigen Game Neptune or Hyperdimension Neptunia. Oh my god! I can’t believe that it’s becoming an anime. I’ve only played the first game. In the comments, someone said that [in] the sequels they fixed a lot of problems, like the game sucking. I remember when I was playing through the game, because it’s a game from NIS America down here in the USA. I was like, ‘Oh, I’ll buy that game because it’s from NIS America, and it has Japanese voices and it’ll be awesome!’ It wasn’t, but I remember [as] I was playing through, I thought that if this was an anime, I’d really enjoy this. Apparently, my wish came true. ENZO laughs. STILTS: I want to go back really quick and mention something about the backlog section, because Stilts has been drinking whiskey for a while now and that makes me forget [stuff]. We’re actually going to try doing that every Mid-Season podcast, I believe? ENZO: You said that. STILTS: Normally, we’ll say what we’re going to do the next time so all of you can go through and watch them and then hopefully join us in talking about it, but we screwed around and didn’t really decide what we’re going to do next time. ZANIBAS: Hosoda! STILTS: I think that we’re probably going to talk about Mashiro Symphony and FLCL, but there might be more, and you’ll only find about that when you see the post in a few months here. Sorry, we suck! TAKAII: One last thing I want to add in before it goes to someone else is in this season, both shows that start with the word Kami, I’m very excited about. STILTS: That’s true. ZANIBAS: Starts with what? TAKAII: Kami. ZANIBAS: Oh. Kami’s a very common- TAKAII: No, in this season, the two shows that start with the word, Kami. STILTS: I think that’s a good segway into Kairi talking about the one she’s excited about. ENZO laughs. TAKAII: I wonder what that one could be. KAIRI: Yeah I’m halfway thinking that maybe I should sing the opening, but I’m not gonna, because I don’t want to scare you guys. STILTS: Go ahead. KAIRI: I’m not going to do it. ZANIBAS: Come on. We can make it our OP. KAIRI: No. Stop. STILTS: Alright. Go ahead. Talk about your shows. KAIRI: Yay! I’m really really excited about Kami Nomi (zo Shiru Sekai Megami Hen). I don’t really know why I like it, but I love it! It’s one of my favorite manga. It’s probably the only shounen manga I’m following on a weekly basis. There’s a lot of stuff that I shouldn’t like about it. There really is, but for whatever reason, I just really enjoy it. I’m looking forward to the third season a lot. There’s my favorite arc in there. I’m so pumped for it. STILTS: You’re not worried about the whole Manglobe thing? KAIRI: I am, but it’s just more Kami Nomi, so who cares. STILTS chuckles. TAKAII: It’s like I finally get the pattern. So Divine did season one, I, in my justice, always do sequels, and now Kairi! Well, maybe do it when decides are picked later. KAIRI: Yes! STILTS: She’ll do it. We’ll go ahead and spoil that one right now. Xumbra, did you have something to say on Kami Nomi? XUMBRA: Oh no, this is for a different show. STILTS: Oh, I’m not paying a lot of attention clearly. Keep going, Kairi. What other series are you excited about? KAIRI: I’m excited for not that much, really. There’s a lot of shows coming out, but I don’t really know a lot about them yet. TAKAII: I think she meant to say, Free? KAIRI (laughs): Actually that’s pretty good, but there’s nothing on my list that’s blaring at me right now. I can give it a go and hopefully there will be some really good stuff in there? STILTS: Fair enough. Fair enough. Let’s go with Xumbra. What are you really excited about? XUMBRA: I’m really excited about Monogatari, because- TAKAII: Hey! XUMBRA: Hey! TAKAII: Wait, isn’t that a sequel? XUMBRA: I think so. TAKAII: Not a sequel but a second season, so technically a sequel-ish. STILTS: It’s a sequel of a sequel, add another sequel, and then a sequel movie sequel. TAKAII: If it’s a sequel, oh god, I feel my sequel sense is tingling. (“detected”) Or that. STILTS: What? Anyway, go on, Xum. XUMBRA: Yeah, I watched Bakemono and then Nisemono and all the others. I really liked the ‘save the girl of the arc.’ You got these arcs, and you have to solve their problems. It has this really good storytelling in it, though I feel recently for Nisemono, it shifted from good storytelling and mythology to more fanservicey things. I don’t know whether it’ll continue to do that in the second season. I hope not, but if it does, I guess it’s okay because then you’ll get scenes like that toothbrush scene. TAKAII: That was the best thing I’ve ever seen. XUMBRA: That was totally unexpected. ZANIBAS: I really wonder how many people who watched the show really started to experiment with that. TAKAII: I will tell you, if you ask, ‘Can I brush your teeth?’ They’ll look at you and they won’t let you touch their toothbrush, because they’re very protective of their toothbrush. Not that I would know or anything! XUMBRA: I’m almost afraid to find out. STILTS: I plead the fifth. TAKAII: I’m just saying. If you ask for someone’s toothbrush, you’re not going to get very far. STILTS: They think you’re going to do something else with it. What were you saying? TAKAII: So random quick story, I have a friend who has a girlfriend, and his girlfriend doesn’t respect his privacy. She’ll use his toothbrush and he’ll get pissed off. He made a compartment in his drawer in his bathroom, where if you open it and pull something, it comes down and he has a toothbrush sitting in there just for his use only. STILTS: Wow. XUMBRA: That’s intense. ENZO: That’s love. STILTS: That is love right there. TAKAII: He’s like, ‘That’s gross. She uses my toothbrush, so I’m just going to hide mine forever.’ STILTS: Just going to go all James Bond on it? Secret compartments? TAKAII: Yep. STILTS: Fair enough. ZANIBAS: Retina scans. All nine yards. STILTS: Super serial, guys. Other shows you’re interested in, Xumbra? XUMBRA: Free? STILTS and ZANIBAS laughs. STILTS: You’re just doing that to make Takaii happy. TAKAII: He knows! XUMBRA: It’s a bit weird, because KyoAni normally does cute girls doing cute things, but then now you have guys- STILTS: Cute boys doing cute things? TAKAII: Guys swimming with no nipples. XUMBRA: So, that should be mildly interesting. STILTS: It will be interesting. At least for a few episodes, and then we’ll see what we’re dealing with there. Who knows. Alright, Zani, what’ve you got? What are you excited about? ZANIBAS: Well, on a gut reaction, in terms of pure excitement, I’m looking forward to Servant x Service, only because I really like Working! and their OP’s. I listened to the OP for Servant x Service, and that’s really catchy. I’m just totally pumped for it. In terms of anything that I can talk about real substance about, apparently I’m surprised by how many people are looking forward to GATCHAMAN Crowds. It looks like it could be fairly interesting, considering the people who are working on It, the art style and the fact that it’s based on a really old franchise. It could go anywhere but yeah. STILTS: Is that the Tsuritama one? ENZO: Yeah, I think that’s why people are interested in it. You’ve got both the writer and director of Tsuritama working on it. Frankly, I don’t know Gatchaman from a hole in the wall. I had really no knowledge of the franchise at all, but as soon as I saw those two guys working on it, I was like, ‘Okay, this goes to the head of the list.’ STILTS: Fair enough. ZANIBAS: I only …. Oh, Stilts, go ahead. STILTS: I just wanted to say that when you said that you really liked Working! I didn’t think you were talking about Working! the manga [or] anime. I thought you were just happy to work. I don’t understand that, but okay. KAIRI: Whenever. STILTS: Go ahead. ZANIBAS: Anyways, the only thing I’m worried about for GATCHAMAN Crowds is the lack of any PVs or lots of information on it. The character designs that they’ve released so far look really amazing. In terms of how that’s going to translate into moving picture, I’m a little nervous about. In terms of other shows I’m looking forward to, Uchoten Kazoku, which is PA Works’ latest work. I think that one definitely has a lot of potential. From the promotional videos that came out, there’s definitely a lot going on and it looks like one crazy party. TAKAII: It looks really good. STILTS: I don’t think a lot of people are really looking forward to that as much as I hoped that it deserves. ZANIBAS: Gatchaman is looked forward to the most apparently according to the poll, but I think it’ll surprise. It’ll surprise. STILTS: Any others? I’ll take that as a no? Zephyr, what are you looking forward to? ZEPHYR: If you’re looking down the list right now for the Summer preview, I’m pretty much watching everything. It’s hard to say particularly one show that I’m really really looking forward to. Obviously, there’s Monogatari and all the other big stuff as usual. In terms of shows aside from that, I’m not really sure exactly. I remember Kami-sama (no) Inai (Nichiyoubi) was one of those big things. Well, I previewed it and it was pretty interesting, so that was one show for me. Aside from that, there’s Fate/kaleid liner Prisma Illya. STILTS: Yeah! ZEPHYR: There’s a few other shows that are interesting, but I’m not sure what to expect. I can’t say that I’m particularly looking forward to it, but there are quite a few shows that are potentially interesting this coming season. I don’t want to quite elaborate at the moment aside from whatever I’ve already mentioned here. GATCHAMAN Crowds was one of them as well. STILTS: Fair enough. Enzo, how about you? ENZO: For Summer, I think it actually looks pretty decent. Summer is usually the Death Valley for anime, but this year, it doesn’t look half bad. I’m also looking forward very much to Servant x Service, because it got the Working! connection and it’s an anime that’s not about high school students or middle school students which is a remarkable change, so that’s good. I’m also looking forward to Uchoten Kazoku. I’m a PA Works’ fanboy. I agree. This looks really good. Hopefully, it lives up to that. Maybe my number one show is probably Gin no Saji (Silver Spoon), because it’s Arakawa Hiromu, the mangaka for Fullmetal Alchemist. Unbelievably well-reviewed manga, award after award. It’s a huge seller in Japan too. This is one that I think could combine some really interesting elements of traditional shounen with more almost very subtle character-driven material, so I think that this could be really good. My track record with game adaptations is not that great, but Danganronpa (Kibou no Gakuen to Zetsubou no Koukousei) looks more interesting than some of them do? STILTS: Oh yeah, the premise is really interesting. ENZO: Yeah, it looks interesting. The new Rozen Maiden. I’m not a huge fan of the old Rozen Maiden series, but the writer of this one is the writer of House of Five Leaves and Zettai Shounen, which are two of my all-time favorite anime, so that immediately gets on the list. Then the other thing I want to say about Gatchaman Crowds is that in addition to the writer and director being from Tsuritama, it’s also being done by Tatsunoko, which is doing Muromi-san this season, which is a great old-school anime studio back from the glory days of Gainax and BONES. That’s when they were big. I’m always interested in seeing what they do. They seem to have evolved into a post-Gainax vibe with their shows, so I’ll be very interested. There’s no question [that] Gatchaman Crowds is the most intriguing mystery on the schedule, because as Zani said, we have very little to go on. It seems like a very odd choice for these guys to go for. It’s this very old franchise that was never all that popular to begin with, so I’m very much looking forward, because I don’t know what to expect and it could be really interesting. So those would probably be the headlines for my list. STILTS: So, you’ve also talked about Gainax. Are you also excited about Stella (Jogakuin Koutouka C3-Bu)- ENZO: No, because I think Gainax completely screwed the pooch. At this point, I’m not interested. GAINAX hasn’t really done anything that interests me since Dantalion no Shoka, which that even didn’t really feel like a Gainax show most of the time to me but I still quite liked it. There’s no one left at Gainax that says Gainax to me. STILTS: It’s not really the flavor of Gainax anymore. I think they can still potentially….I’ve liked what I’ve seen about that, but it goes against my grain of assuming that a Gainax adaptation is going to be [terrible]. ENZO: I looked at it, because it’s Gainax. Gainax used to be one of the studios that was like an automatic for me, no matter what. I would give that at least a few episodes. I’ll watch the premiere, because I watch the premiere for everything. I don’t go into that with high expectations. The previews and the synopsis doesn’t light my fire, and the fact that it’s Gainax means nothing to me at this point. I don’t have high expectations about it. If I’m looking for Gainax, I’ll look to Tatsunoko or Trigger, whatever they come out with, more likely. STILTS: Fair enough. I’m going to do my own and then I’m actually going to call out some other ones that will get some entertaining reactions from people. First of all, I’ll do my own. I’m looking forward to Fate/kaleid liner Prisma Illya. Do you guys know how I like to say things that make it to where I can’t run for public office later? ZANIBAS: No, not all. STILTS: I’m going ahead and do that right now. It’s the season of the lolis! ZANIBAS: Isn’t that every se-? No, I’m kidding. ENZO: That seems to be every season, yeah, doesn’t it? STILTS: It’s this one especially at least for me. ZANIBAS: Okay, especially. STILTS: I’m still looking forward to High School DxD because boing. Three of my top shows I’m looking forward to are Prisma Illya, Ro-Kyu-Bu, and Genei wo Kakeru Taiyou? However you say that one. ZANIBAS: What? STILTS: I’m calling the dark horse right now but it’s the mysticism, tarot cards- ZANIBAS: You mean the iPhone sliding technology thing where they select their transformation XUMBRA: I think that the action in that PV is pretty good. STILTS: Are you confusing it with Fantasista Dolls? ZEPHYR: Yeah, I think he’s confusing it with Fantasista Dolls. ZANIBAS: Oh. ZEPHYR: That’s the iPhone summon thing. STILTS: That’s a different one. This is one where they go through mirrors and a lot of tarot cards. Yeah. It’s really stylistic. XUMBRA: That one looked really good. I remember [it] because I was ripping out the PVs for it and it was very painful. The PV looked very good. STILTS: La-la-la, we don’t do anything to PVs. No, and then I really do enjoy Ro-Kyu-Bu, because it’s really a good sports anime. I swear. Everyone laughs. STILTS: It is! The stuff that I really do, legitimately as I was thinking back to the first season, that I remembered the most. I’m going into slight spoilers for the first season here, not that anybody but me was watching it anyway. When they were trying to get one of the characters being comfortable in the center and teaching Hinata how to shoot better. Switching out who was point guard. Stuff like that. TAKAII: Oh, hang on, Ro-Kyu-Bu? Sorry, I lost focus. STILTS: That was all the stuff I remembered. TAKAII: I watched that show! It was a fun show! STILTS: It was a fun show. TAKAII: It was. STILTS: The other thing I’m looking forward to are all the slice of life [series] and Love Lab for being the better yuri than Yuri-Yuri. ZANIBAS: Oh the irony. STILTS: Seriously. It has all the same crew. It should be done well. They know how to do that for sure. Now I’m going to do a few shows just to see what the reactions are, because I think they might be funny. First of all, Fantastista? ZANIBAS: iPhones! STILTS (laughs): Are you looking forward to iPhones? ZANIBAS: I don’t know. I just want to see what they do. Transformation sequences are very funny. ZEPHYR: I’m hoping that they don’t get sued by Apple for this. STILTS laughs. ENZO: Everyone else has been. ZEPHYR: Right? TAKAII: I’ve seen a lot of iPhones around in this show, Hachiman Hanaharu (?). ZEPHYR: I think that might’ve been sponsored. TAKAII: I don’t think so. ZEPHYR: Product placement! There we go! STILTS: Here’s a really good one. The town where Everybody Rages. ZEPHYR: The town where rage lives. ENZO: The town where you rage. ZANIBAS: I don’t get it. Tell me guys what the rage is with this show. ZEPHYR: Woah, woah, we’re not going into that. TAKAII: Someone has dropped a big…. That was a pretty big ‘woah, woah’ there. STILTS: I will only say that I’ve read one of the mangaka’s previous works, Suzuka. I started off liking it, and by the end, I was pissed. So, I’m not surprised when people say- STILTS: Is Suzuka the running one? STILTS: Running happens, yes. ZEPHYR (laughs): Running happens, yes. By the way. STILTS: That’s not the part that pisses me off. KAIRI: Are you guys talking about The Town where you Live? ZEPHYR: The Town where you Rage is the correct word. ENZO: The Town where you Rage is the full title. KAIRI: God, I remember starting that back in the day. Yeah. ENZO: And, it’s Gonzo to boot! ZEPHYR: It’s Gonzo, meaning it’s Gonzo. Literally Gonzo where your brains go gonzo after this one. STILTS: That can only mean there’s more rage. How about the Inu show? I’m not going to try to say its name. ENZO: Oh Inuyasha? STILTS (laughs): Yes, Inuyasha. Inu to Hasami wa Tsukaiyou. TAKAII: The guy who turns into a dog? STILTS: There’s the one! ENZO: Oh god, no. ZANIBAS: I swear, from season to season, there are these really random trends in anime that seem to follow. We’ve seen the (?) trend but now we’re seeing the dog that’s also a detective trend. Also, people’s obsession with scissors. Don’t you notice that? People’s obsession with scissors! ZEPHYR: It’s true. Every season, there’s always a strange trend that you notice once you’ve watched half the shows and midway through the season. You realize that there’s some trend that people don’t really notice. STILTS: It’s only you and me, Zephyr. We’re the only ones who watch all of the shows. ZEPHYR: A couple of seasons with the new Kore wa Zombie season, I’ve never realized it but until mid-season, that there were a lot of zombies that season. ENZO: Yeah I noticed that. Absolutely. Season of the zombie. Sankarea was that season? ZEPHYR: Right. Yeah. The next season, there was some other big trend as well. I forgot what it was, but there’s a small trend in every season. XUMBRA: Woah, what you’re saying is that every season, all the big animation companies go together and huddle in this one- ZEPHYR: Sometimes I wonder. XUMBRA: They say, we’re going to have this trend and they all agree. They all put that trend in all their shows in each season. STILTS: No, they put it in some of their shows. They’ve got to spread it out. XUMBRA: Hm, I see. ENZO: I might disagree with the timeline just a little bit on how it happens, but you do see these happen. You do see these trends. I think it’s because these guys just so desperate to be current, and they’re so desperate to find the right material that is going to push the magic button and sell blu-rays. I think there’s a group think that happens. They all come to the conclusion at the same time. Hey, you know what really seems to be in now. Let’s realize this show. ZANIBAS (laughs): Scissors. STILTS: I’ll agree with zombies, maybe, because there was a zombie zeitgeist, as much as I hate saying that. ENZO: I was trying to avoid saying zeitgeist but thank you for putting it out there. STILTS: I’m going there, but that was more worldwide practically. Scissors is a little more incidental. ZANIBAS: Let me give you examples. There’s Monogatari, this season with Inu, this current season with Crime Edge, and then there’s also Pumpkin Scissors. XUMBRA: Kanojo X thing? ZEPHYR: Oh right! ZANIBAS: Kanojo X! Scissors! ZEPHYR: Yeah. There’s undoubtedly a mini-trend in every season at least. There’s always something. When you really think about it over long term, it really creeps you out a little bit. ENZO laughs. ZEPHYR: Woah, what are these guys doing there? Linking together to screw over our minds? It’s like, this was a blank show also! STILTS: That’s a great segway into the next show I was going to have us talk about. Watamote. ZEPHYR: Oh Watamote. ENZO: It looks interesting. It looks very interesting. ZANIBAS: Stilts is totally hating on it. Totally. STILTS: Like I said, humor is always subductive, er subjective. ZEPHYR: Subductive? What is this? Earthquake plate, man? Okay. STILTS: It is always subjective, and it just didn’t do anything for me. Then again, I’m a little bit away from my awkward teen years. Maybe someone else will enjoy it more. ZEPHYR: The thing about Watamote is that it’s one of those series that purely got an adaptation because people on 4chan really liked it. Theoretically, they singlehandedly popularized it. It’s the only reason that it got an adaptation in the first place. ZANIBAS: So it’s like Free but it actually happened? ZEPHYR: Yeah, it actually happened. There are a fair amount of people that are hyped up wanting to watch that series. ENZO: There is a middle step here though, which I think is important. That may be how it started but the middle step is because of that, the manga got really popular. I think that’s the direct reason why it got an adaptation, because every time I go into a bookshop anywhere in Tokyo, that’s one of the manga for the last year that’s been prominently placed out for displays and all kinds of stuff. It’s definitely a strong selling manga for its genre. STILTS: It might’ve got a word of mouth on 4chan. ENZO: Yeah. STILTS: Regardless, anybody else have any other shows they want to talk about? ENZO: Anybody watching Makai Ouji? Does anyone know anything about that one? ZEPHYR: Yeah. STILTS: I’m actually kinda excited for it. ENZO: It’s interesting to me. It’s a possible sleeper there. STILTS: It could be. Like I said in my preview, I really like the main character. Actually a couple other characters too seemed solid. They weren’t perfect, but they were pretty bishie, a little flawed, and interesting. ENZO: It looks like this season’s Goth entry to me. STILTS: Well, other than Rozen Maiden. ENZO: Well, that’s true, which is the ultimate Goth show. STILTS: It really is. Alright. Anybody got anything else? Alright, then, we’re going to go into our shout outs. [02:21:00] A MISCELLANY STILTS: Does anybody have any shout outs? We do not prepare very well for this, do we? ZANIBAS: Shout out to all our readers- TAKAII: Shout outs! ZANIBAS: To all of our fellow writers, for supporting us. TAKAII: You guys sound so sincere about it. You got to be like, shout outs to all our loyal readers who make writing on this website worth it every time we do it, right? Right, Zani? ZANIBAS: Right. STILTS: That would’ve worked better if you hadn’t said right beforehand that you have to act like you’re sincere. TAKAII: But I am sincere. STILTS: Oh okay, well obviously. TAKAII laughs. TAKAII: Go Enzo, go. ENZO: My shout out is to every Chihayafuru commenter who doesn’t try to turn the series into a shipping war. Thank you. GROUP: Ow. ZEPHYR: Aw, we love shipping though. Wait, what? TAKAII: I love shipping. I do it all the day. ZEPHYR: We ship for a shipping company. KAIRI: I ship for when I play Fire Emblem. STILTS: Do you have any shout outs, Kairi? KAIRI: Not really. It’s my 13-year old cousin who I kinda want to strangle right now, but yeah. ZANIBAS: Wow. STILTS: Not the kind of shout out we were looking for. KAIRI: I hope she hears this. STILTS: Oh my. TAKAII: I have a shout out to anyone going to Anime Expo. KAIRI: Yeah! TAKAII: Kairi will also give you a hug. Then I will also give you a handshake. KAIRI: Wait, are you selling out my hugs? ZEPHYR: Woah, snap. TAKAII: Woah, we’re not selling anything. KAIRI: Woah, well, f--k you. STILTS: He’s giving it away. There’s a difference. ZANIBAS: I have a shout out. KAIRI: Wring him when we see his costume. ZEPHYR: If my block had fights, that’s what it would start with. Right there. Free hugs. STILTS: Zani, you had a shout out? ZANIBAS: I have a shout out for Luxor for giving me and Xumbra free Random Curiosity shirts at FAnime. Oh yeah, you are the man. I wear that every day now. XUMBRA: They were not free by the way. STILTS: You should wash that occasionally. TAKAII: Washing clothes is good. KAIRI: Sometimes. STILTS: Occasionally. Well, I would just like to thank... Now, usually it would be Zani but now it’ll also be Xumbra as well, people who edit all our stupid bullshit. I can roll in here, get drunk and not try too hard so always thank you. ZANIBAS: I also want to thank sakura_lily for volunteering to do the transcript again for the last podcast. She has initiative, and she really wanted to do it, so I really wanted to thank you for that. Cool beans. STILTS: Cool beans. TAKAII: I have a shout out to all the people on IRC. You guys are awesome. Keep rocking on. STILTS: Fair enough. Then, we will go and end this with our ending song. It’s going to be Rain by Hata Motohiro, chosen by Enzo….chosen by Zephyr, from- ZEPHYR: I’m taking a lot of credit today. I’m not here. I shouldn’t have come. I ran all the way from Manhattan back here just to get back in time and this guy. STILTS: Oh, we were doing so good until then. Chosen by Zephyr! It is the Kotonoha no Niwa insert. With that, have a good day. GROUP: Bye!