Don't let rabbit shit go to waste.

Sounan desu ka? (English title, Are You Lost?) has turned out to be reliably amusing thanks almost entirely to Homare, without whom the rest of the girls would be as fucked on that island as they would be on the moon. For perfectly valid anime reasons, Homare spent a considerable part of her childhood getting stranded over and over with her hyper-competent survivalist father. This provided her with the knowledge and experience to keep herself and the other girls who are stranded with her on a deserted island alive through an otherwise harrowing situation. Every other girl with her is basically dead weight, but Homare has managed to provide substinance and shelter with relative ease, so she's already advanced from survival basics to quality-of-life considerations.

Look at how happy she is to have metal.

In this respect, there are some similarities with Dr. STONE in that both shows are about pursuing makeshift improvements in a primitive environment, and applying science and cunning against the various threats posed by nature. Dr. STONE is significantly more ambitious in this regard as it also involves threats posed by man, whereas Sounan desu ka? takes a more matter-of-fact approach toward its concerns, many of which are inspired by whining teenage girls. Lucky for them, Homare is a treasure, and incredibly patient and accommodating. It is abundantly clear to me that she would be perfectly happy being stranded apparently indefinitely. Really, if you are going to be lost in the middle of nowhere, being lost with Homare is basically your best-case scenario.

I couldn't think of a caption that involved sex, DEBAN, or Mount Doom.
I think those buckles are just for show, though.

It turns out it didn't take me long at all to catch up with Sword Art Online. Perhaps it's because I already read through the corresponding portions of the light novel, but I found the show much less objectionable on a whole than most of its critics. The biggest complaints I see tend to fall into two categories. First, Kirito is accused of being a "Mary Sue," and second, Asuna is characterized as too compliant or unassertive or lacking independence. I agree there is merit to these complaints in that the factors exist, but I'm not convinced they qualify as reasonable concerns to care about.

At least Kirito is better than Tsukasa.

With regard to Kirito's "Mary Sue" qualities, it's true he has the abnormally good fortune of being better at basically everything than anyone else he encounters in the game, but that doesn't especially bother me. I guess anime has bombarded me with so many incompetent, weak-ass milquetoasts that even a potato with good stats is preferable to average spuds. So I don't care if Kirito's battles are tensionless because I know no real harm will to come to him. Other lead characters in various television shows and movies have plot armor too; he's no different.

Now you're gonna get fish juices in your hair and sweater, sweetie.

So what about Asuna? I guess as Primary Love Interest she doesn't get much opportunity to do much except carve up chumps and soy sauce the shit out of some fish, but nobody else does much when Kirito is around either. So to me, the criticism about Asuna's contributions aren't so much directed at Asuna, but more towards that first issue regarding Kirito again. At least Asuna doesn't spend all her time being wined, dined, and supined, despite being Primary Love Interest—a genuine concern given that Kirito not only has the mysterious pull of a harem comedy protagonist, but also the willingness to pick a Best Girl and go with her. Given my track record for lamenting about the notoriously asexual proclivities of ostensibly male anime protagonists as a whole, I'm all right with giving a pass to one of their main squeezes even if she's best remembered for shacking up with one of them. It can't be helped.

Tenshi, your slip is showing.

Angel Beats! is fun to watch because when it's bad it's fun to mock. Somewhat unexpectedly, it can also be legitimately good at times. I'm referring to gags like the broom bit during the baseball episode and the entire second half of episode seven. But yeah, when Angel Beats! is bad, it's dog shit. [I feel obliged to offer a spoiler warning at this point, even though everything revealed about the first half of episode seven will be transparently obvious to anyone with the slightest familiarity with Jun Maeda, Key, or anime clichés in general.]

Potato-kun kills his kid sister. Good job, guy.
Did you not watch Clannad? Kanon?

The first part of Angel Beats! 07 finally reveals Otonashi's back-story. Like the other previously revealed back-stories, it is a tale of woe and sorrow. It also happens to be a tale of idiotic melodrama. I don't know why Jun Maeda has a vendetta against snow. The sad-girls-in-snow motif has transcended its status as a mere trope and can now be considered a straight-up base anime stereotype. With that in mind, there couldn't possibly have been a single person watching Angel Beats! episode seven who thought it was a good idea for Otonashi to carry his sickly good-natured little sister (hospitalized for years due to some vague, undefined illness) out into the snow on his back on Christmas. Why not build an asbestos snowman while you're at it?

Otonashi trades his acceptance notice for a mapo tofu food coupon.

So, yeah, snow does to Otonashi's little sister what snow does to all of Jun Maeda's sickly girls. However, Otonashi finds new purpose in his life and strives to make something of himself so he can Protect Other People. Unfortunately for Otonashi, SNOW has different ideas. This brings us back to this present misery where the story makes a drastic change in tone and turns into a comedic fishing farce out of nowhere. Cue Operation Monster Stream, a "zetsubou no carnival."

There sure are a lot of Kanade petticoat shots in this episode.
[Spoilers: Petticoat shots are the new panty shots.]

Angel Beats! is getting a lot of mileage out of Tenshi Tachibana Kanade and her quiet deadpans. I haven't seen a fishing episode like this since Sky Girls. Like the Sky Girls fishing omakes, the second half of Angel Beats! 07 does not have any bearing on the plot as far as I can tell, but is instead merely an excuse for the characters to do goofy things for silly reasons. It works, as a matter of fact. Angel Beats! really needs a lot more of this sort of thing. Episode seven ends on a cliffhanger, so presumably the next episode will return to the main story and plot development. I'm not entirely sure that's a good thing.