Not yet, Kita Kita!

Bocchi the Rock! is great. It's way better than I was expecting. A huge part of this comes down to execution, though. This is not a slight against its source material (which I haven't read), but rather a reflection of how much I enjoyed the creative choices the anime used to communicate Hitori's discomfort and personal struggles. I also liked seeing "Bocchi" advance as a character, although a significant part of this progress was thanks to new friends dragging her forward. This does mean high school Hitori probably would have stayed in the same place as middle school Hitori were it not for some fortuitous encounters creating these opportunities for her, though.

She's doing it again.

This brings me to the subject central to the title of this post. (Alternate title: "The End of Bocchi the Rock! ~Air/My Purest Love for Kita Kita~." Do people even still get that reference?) For a while after her introduction, I was afraid Kita Ikuyo Kita Kita would be one-note character whose scenes mostly involved gags about adoring Ryou. Thankfully, it turned out she had a much more important role to play, even if her "Kit-Aura" may be a little too fearsome. Ikuyo is a good foil for Hitori, and I enjoy the contrasts provided by their characters. There's no shortage of amazing Bocchi scenes where her anxiety warps time and space or glitches reality, but I also like the gags involving Kita Kita's mabushii being sort of excessive.

This is not Mental Out. At least I don't think it is.

Possibly I just enjoy characters with high genki levels in general. In any case, I don't have a lot of complex reasons for explaining why Ikuyo is great. I guess I will add that—depending on how you feel about Kessoku Band's music—her position as its only vocalist also seems like the sort of thing that deserves more attention. As an aside, even though I said, "only vocalist," I do harbor suspicions Bocchi will be unexpectedly pressed into service to take Kita Kita's place during an unplanned contingency in some theoretical future installment. Maybe Hitori wouldn't feel up to it yet, but I'm confident her seiyuu could tackle this all day, any day. Aoyama Yoshino was a WUG!

I don't know why Komichi doesn't have more uniforms or do laundry more often.

Saying Akebi-chan no Sailor Fuku (Akebi’s Sailor Uniform) has a lot of fan service is not exactly a controversial claim now that we're eight episodes into the season, but I don't mean it as criticism anyway. Rather, this is an indirect segue to acknowledging the series is beautifully animated. It's remarkable how consistently gorgeous every shot looks, honestly. In particular, the setting is so exquisitely detailed it's basically pornographic.

I mean, look at this house.

In light of this, I suppose it is not exactly inaccurate to suggest the Akebi-chan no Sailor Fuku anime provides so many lingering shots examining its characters' bodies considering it basically does this for everything else in the show. Whether or not this makes it lewd is subjective, but I'm hardly the first person to comment on the sort of framing that pervades the anime. I've not read the source manga, but I have encountered claims the anime is toned down in comparison, so I'm pretty confident in concluding there is something there.

"Come with me if you want to live swim."

Like I said, none of this is meant as a criticism. The show is legitimately entertaining in addition to looking fantastic. Akebi's Sailor Uniform (like My Dress-Up Darling) has pleasantly surprised me with how good it is. This might not be the deepest-stacked anime season, but it's not a barren one either. Even though I don't believe I'm in the target audience for something like Akebi-chan, it's appealing enough that I enjoy it anyway. Oh, and I assume that "100 friends" thing was made up for the promotional materials or whatever. It hasn't come up at all.

This is product placement, isn't it?

Sorairo Utility (Sky Blue Utility) is only a single 15-minute OVA? That's it? You're kidding me! Well, that leaves me with one less show than I was expecting to follow during the Winter 2022 anime season. That's unfortunate, because it was nicely done. There is no shortage of shows about girls who obsess over a particular hobby, but this felt much more natural and realistic than the typical fare.

It happens.

I learned of Sorairo Utility from one of the hundreds of artists I sort of follow on the Twitter. Specifically, the director, Saitou Kengo occasionally mused about wanting to make a girls-playing-golf anime, and then suddenly it became a reality. I have no idea if there is ever going to be any more, but I'd certainly be in favor of it.

I did appreciate Reines sassing Waver.

Sort of unrelated aside from also coming out on 31 December 2021 is Lord El-Melloi II Sei no Jikenbo: Rail Zeppelin Grace Note - Tokubetsu-hen (Lord El-Melloi II's Case Files: Rail Zeppelin Grace note TV Anime's Special Edition), a short movie about magic shenanigans involving Waver's classmates from his pre-Fate/Zero days. I feel like I would have liked this more if I had a greater grasp on TYPE-MOON lore in general, but possibly not understanding is the normal and expected state.

There's also a Saekano connection.

When I first saw the announcement for a Miru Tights anime, I assumed it was only going to be an OVA. It turns out it's a series on the YouTube. There are five episodes so far, with about as much continuity as you might reasonably expect from a collection of anime shorts that exist pretty much solely for ogling-type purposes. It's loosely based on the work of this artist (Yom). Surprising no one, I'm sure, hosiery features prominently throughout each four-minute episode.

This is some combination.

With regard to other fetish anime, I suppose Miru Tights shares most in common with Aiura (which arguably is not a fetish anime at all). I'm not sure I've seen very many other fetish shows, for that matter, although I guess Anitore! EX and Anitore! XX count. Miru Tights is also doing that thing where various popular artists provide stylized end cards for the show, although they don't appear with the episodes hosted on the YouTube. You can find them at the usual places and (partially) via the Twitter. I don't have any idea how many episodes Miru Tights is expected to run, but it started late, so probably less than 10? Or maybe they'll just keep making episodes forever, like One Piece. That could happen, right?

Toonces, watch out!

If you've been paying attention to anime at all, you've noticed Kemono Friends exploded in the past month into an international phenomenon that's not entirely easy to explain. From the looks of it, it's popular because it's popular, but that's not to say this popularity is unjustified, because the show itself is quite good.

It probably doesn't mean she has crabs.

I forgot to mention that I started watching Aiura. It's a pleasant enough show, but I don't have much to say about it because it's so short. (It's another one of those jobbies with four-minute episodes.) I guess I can say I also have no idea why crabs and Steve Jobs are in the OP. There has been some speculation that crabs refer to the zodiac sign Cancer1 since Steve Jobs died of cancer, but I'm calling that one a coincidence absent some more compelling reason why that would be in the OP either.

It's not easy being best.

I can also say that the show does appear to be the labor of love of somebody with a deep appreciation of the bare thighs of teenage girls. There is that. Oh, and it's the second show this season (along with Valvrave the Liberator) where the BEST GIRL is named Saki. If you include Saki from Natsuiro Kiseki, that makes girls named Saki three-for-three in shows from recent memory seizing BEST GIRL honors. When Genshiken Nidaime starts in a few weeks, girls named Saki will go four-for-four. I might be on to something here.

Note 1: Or possibly the genus, since hardly anyone in anime outside of The Melody of Oblivion seems to care about the western zodiac.

I'm surprised there wasn't a Momo POV shot immediately after this.

Vividred Operation is not exactly a high-brow show, but it is consistently entertaining and there have been no occasions to complain about its production quality or execution. I'm also very pleased with its pacing through the first three episodes. Some people felt Vividred rushed Wakaba's introduction and integration in episode three, but while I would agree in the context of a 26-episode series, I don't think there's any time to waste during what will almost certainly be a 12- or 13-episode run. Hopefully, Himawari's introduction in episode four will be similarly quick.

Where did her bow go?

After these introductions, Vividred can get down to business devoting the remaining eight episodes to unfucking Rei's shit, and befriending the Bejesus out of her. Or maybe Rei ends up killing them all. It won't happen, but I'd be okay with that. Rei is going to be the lynchpin behind the success or failure of Vividred. If you can suffer another not-necessarily-apropos comparison with Strike Witches, the Alone appear to be as unengaging and faceless as the Neuroi. I'm sorry, but you can't try to build action scenes around bland opponents that nobody cares about.

I re-watched this to confirm it was a sunrise, not a sunset.

Using cardboard bad guys didn't work in Strike Witches, it certainly didn't work during the Mahou Shoujo Lyrical Nanoha StrikerS training arcs, and it won't work in Vividred with the Alone if Rei doesn't instill some life into the fights. It's possible to have have emotionless enemies that the audience finds engaging (see, for example, the first two Terminator movies), but they'll at least need to be menacing or unique in some way.

I promise this is the last time I will make this joke.

As long as Rei ensures there will be an antagonist we care about in future episodes of Vividred, then the show will basically have everything. You want fighting? It's got fighting. You want flying girls hitting things with giant hammers? It's got that too. Standing-in-circles magic and fancy transformations? Yes. Bridge operators swiveling around to holler SITREPs to the commander? Well, yeah. Befriending enemies? Count on it. A talking weasel/otter/ferret/probably-not-a-mink thing? Of course. Butts? It's got butts. Fresh fruit? Holy shit, it's got fresh fruit. And how. (Tomato is a fruit, okay.)

Princess Tutu.

I'm finally catching up with Nodame Cantabile again. If this doesn't inspire me to start buying classical music records again, maybe re-watching Princess Tutu will. Not that I need another excuse to re-watch Princess Tutu, mind you. You see, I recently bought the Princess Tutu compilation box set, so I have a pretty convenient excuse already. I'm a little peeved at spending seven dollars more for it than I needed to (you can get the ADV box set now for $27), but the series is worth much more than that, so I'll get over it.

Rue displaces Ahiru for the Princess Tutu cover.

Regarding the box set, have you seen the cover art? Holy crap. Lest ye be misled, take note that this cover art is in no way representative of the contents of the show itself. Okay, the artists who developed Kraehe were surely working on a dissertation glorifying anime boobs, but aside from that, this cover art is nothing at all like the show itself.

Princess Kraehe.

Of course, ADV probably chose misleading cover art intentionally, because damned if I know how else they're going to market a show like Princess Tutu. A pretty box with frilly pink ribbons and prancing ballet dancers would be more accurate and appropriate, but accurate and appropriate cover art ain't gonna inspire impulse buys—discounting impulse buys from anime fans that know the fourth act of Swan Lake by heart, naturally.

Princess Tutu.

So how does one sell a show about a little duck that turns into a young girl who turns into a magikal girl who saves people with the power of ballet? (Which is a BRILLIANT premise, by the way, but likely only in the eyes of people like me.) Sure, its soundtrack is almost entirely classical music, with a little boost from the late half of Melocure, but that's not going to sway the kind of customers who like to allege, "Anime is a medium, not a genre." [Spoilers: Those people are full of it.]

Rue.

I guess racy cover art featuring an emo ballerina squeezed into a merry widow is one way to go about it, and Rue does have legs that go up to her neck, but I advise potential buyers to simply sample the first few episodes. Watching the HnK/a.f.k. fansubs convinced me to buy the Princess Tutu Complete Collection DVDs despite being discouraged about ADV's Ahiru/Duck jazz. (Look, I don't care what your reason is; you can't subtitle the lead character's name as "Duck," okay?)

Odile sympathizers, you know who you are.

Be advised that the series changes drastically mid-series by revealing the heretofore unknown nature of multiple characters. Nothing contradicts the first half of the series, but the lack of antecedent leaves me wondering if they concocted those changes at the last minute in order to extend the length of the show. I'm not really complaining, because the show makes the changes work, and I would have bought the complete series on the strength of the first half alone. In fact, the second half of the series is also quite good; it just goes off in a different direction. If I have a complaint at all, I guess it's that the show didn't take its numerous Swan Lake references even further and just turned Princess Tutu into an anime adaptation of the ballet for Odile sympathizers, straight-up.

In related news, clockwork > steampunk.