As if there is any chance in Hell of Sera turning out to be bad.

Because of "circumstances," I find myself dropping about half the shows I was following this season. Well, perhaps not so much dropping as putting on hiatus for the time being. Maybe I'll catch back up during a particularly lousy season that coincides with greater anime-watching opportunities. (Won't be next season, because next season looks pretty sweet.)

I'm pretty sure this is how cooties are transmitted.

I only started watching Inou-Battle wa Nichijou-kei no Naka de because of Studio Trigger. Thus far, it comes across as fairly unremarkable, although the basic setup is sort of amusing. This is no Little Witch Academia or Kill la Kill, so I'm left judging the show on its merits. It's fine, but the turbo-dere crazy girl was the only one I really liked. Since she's basically never in the show, what's the point? This is an easy one to put on hiatus, because I don't expect any spoilers down the road to ruin my chances of enjoying it. If it turns out to be a stinker, then I'll have dodged a bullet by ducking out early now.

Succor.

As much as I enjoy watching a runty old man brazenly fondle a nubile, 16-year-old princess who suffers from poor depth perception, I'm dropping Nanatsu no Taizai because I'm already reading the manga. There are currently more than 100 chapters out, making it a cinch that even a two-cour show will just trail off at some convenient stopping point without resolving anything. The anime adaptation is pretty good, and the fights have been entertaining, but I need to clear up some room in the ol' anime block.

Oh ho ho.

I'm putting both Magic Kaito 1412 and Detective Conan on hold. I consider Magic Kaito to sort of be a Detective Conan property anyway, even though that's not technically accurate, and I've got a huge backlog of Conan episodes numbering into the hundreds, so it's easy to set both shows on back burners. Really, most of y'all should probably be watching both of these shows. It just goes to show that "nobody watches shows if they're really popular."

Bad dream?

I haven't been enjoying Amagi Brilliant Park nearly as much as most viewers, largely because the current flavor to Kyoto Animation's work doesn't quite agree with me. That said, I have enjoyed it more than Hyouka (which I think most viewers would describe as vastly superior), and I've definitely liked it more than the episodes of Chuunibyou demo Koi ga Shitai! that I watched. (I skipped Kyoukai no Kanata, Free!, and Tamako Market entirely.) Kyoto Animation is very good at what they do, and I can tell the original light novel probably would have fared much worse had it been adapted by most other studios. Nevertheless, I can't ultimately care too much about the show and was mostly watching for Ayako. 50 Cent was pretty good until the series decided she needed to fall in love with Kanye West. The dude simply isn't charismatic enough to get me to care about this relationship angle. Even if he is at least better than the typical Potato-kun, that's a low standard to reach.

I'm pretty sure the entire thing is Hitoe's fault somehow.

I will definitely undrop selector spread WIXOSS at some point (providing it doesn't get another season). I intend to follow this suffering to the end (of this cour anyway), even though I basically get no enjoyment out of the show anymore. These are broken characters stumbling their way through an asinine situation for implausible reasons. I'm mostly just waiting to see if Akira is going to kill somebody before Hanayo gets pregnant. She is going to get pregnant and spawn stupid playing card babies, right? Oh, like you have a better reason to watch this show.

The Lion King.

I was going to pause Sword Art Online 2 because I've read the Mother's Rosario arc and already know what happens. Still, this arc should be about as good as Sword Art Online ever gets, so I might as well keep watching. I'm not sure how standard (read: Kirito) fans will react to the Asuna-led focus of these remaining episodes, but I hope they at least enjoy these episodes more than they like the second half of the first season. (You know, the one where Asuna spent all of her time sitting in a chair and waiting to be rescued when she wasn't too busy being sexually assaulted.) Unfortunately for people watching the anime, there are spoilers for this arc that will be difficult to avoid because they're of the variety that detractors of Sword Art Online won't be able to resist revealing.

Aim for the face.

Actually, there's a good chance I'll place Sword Art Online 2 on hiatus anyway.

P.S. Asuna dies.

That is totally the Sailor V costume from the back...

...but it changes to the Sailor Venus battle
costume when we see it from the front.

Bishoujo Senshi Sailor Moon Crystal was an easy one to put on hold because it only airs every two weeks and because I frankly don't like it. I like the idea of Sailor Moon, but I can't claim to particularly enjoy the manga, the 90-some episodes of the original anime that I've watched, or the Crystal Bullshit episodes of the remake that I've seen so far. With Chibi Usa about to make her appearance, this was a no-brainer. I still haven't officially dropped it (or the original anime, for that matter), since I feel I should watch the entire thing as a matter of principle, but it is a slog.

Busted. P.S. Spoilers.

You know what show I'm not putting on hold? Motherlovin' Cross Ange. This is some good shit, yo. Week after week of solid entertainment. Two cours, baby!

This heist might be a little too easy.

Because the manga dates back to 1987, Magic Kaito actually predates Detective Conan, although its kohei quickly overshadowed it. Kaito occasionally makes guest appearances on Detective Conan, and, in fact, got 12 excellent Magic Kaito specials of his own spread amongst the Detective Conan broadcasts between 2010 to 2012. These re-tell the origin of Kaito Kid and probably tested the waters for a standalone series. The new television series which began autumn 2014 retreads a lot of familiar ground, but includes a few cast and story changes (and different character designs compared to the Detective Conan appearances). It airs in the half-hour family slot immediately preceding the weekly broadcast of Detective Conan

Slaine has seen some shit.

Aldnoah.Zero was far and away the best show from Summer 2014. I know a lot of viewers disagree with this opinion, but I thoroughly enjoyed all of its episodes. I've written a lot about it. Probably too much, considering I don't like it thaaat much even though it did almost get a perfect score on my little chart jobbie.

It helps that Sera has awesome hair.

I'm finally caught up with Detective Conan again. (Well, I'm "caught up" if you disregard the hundreds of episodes I've missed from several years back.) I'm rather pleased that Sera is appearing more often. In the current episodes, Sera is growing more prominent as the mysterious and previously vaguely threatening girl detective of the group. Naturally, this is likely leading up to some revelation about her mysterious background (alternatively, an effort to drag it out indefinitely), but it's a good excuse to have another detective on the show so Conan doesn't have to solve every single convoluted murder in Creation by himself. Contrary to some unconvincing red herrings when she was first introduced, it's pretty much guaranteed that Sera will not have any sinister motives, even if it turns out she has ties to nefarious unpleasant types. She is far too likeable as a character and too embedded with the group already for the show to suddenly transform her into a credible villain—not even a halfhearted one. It ain't Urobuchi Gen writing this story, you know.

This cat is so chill.

Just a few months ago, I noted I followed an unusually large (for me) number of shows. This time around, I tried following too many shows and ended up DNFing on shows I wanted to follow but didn't get around to finishing even though I never officially dropped them. Apart from that, there were no major deviations from my expectations addressed during my initial impressions.

Also, he has a ponytail.

I'm dropping Kindaichi Shounen no Jikenbo Returns at episode 13 even though there's at least one more episode in the current arc. Somehow, the allure of knowing who The Real Killer is isn't compelling enough to make me watch even one more episode of this detective show. It's not that Kindaichi Returns is necessarily bad in the usual sense, but it's just not very engaging. The biggest problem is none of the characters are particularly charismatic.

Nanana looks okay for a dead girl.

Despite being consistently good and reigning as my top-rated show all season long before being nipped at the very end by Hitsugi no Chaika (indeed, it would get a No Bad Episodes ribbon except I've decided not to award that anymore for shows with less than 20 episodes), there's something unsatisfying about Ryuugajou Nanana no Maizoukin (Nanana's Buried Treasure). Don't get me wrong, I certainly liked Nanana a lot as a whole. I was particularly impressed with its master detective character character, Tensai, and relieved that the male lead, Juugo, wasn't a passive, craven, potato. However, I was disappointed in its titular character, Nanana herself.

The Best Girl in Nanana has a silly name.

There's nothing actually wrong with Nanana, and perhaps that's the real problem. She's the ghost of a murdered genius now stuck haunting a tiny apartment on the island she helped create, but nothing about her seems particularly genius or spectral. She spends all of her time playing video games. (Being a ghost, she doesn't need to sleep.) Aside from that, she doesn't do much else except eat pudding and occasionally dole out hints about her "buried treasure."

Nanana actually isn't very aggressive for someone with
lingering regrets keeping her from the afterlife.

About that first part: Why does she eat if she's a ghost? How can she eat? Since she can eat, why does she eat only pudding? I guess she eats pudding because she likes how it tastes, but she has no interest at all in any other food? Did she enjoy nothing else when she was still alive? In a way, I guess Nanana's pudding diet is allegorical of Nanana herself. No matter how much you love pudding, anyone alive would get sick of the lack of variety. Likewise, no matter how much you might like Nanana, you'd want to see her display some other facet of herself. She might as well be an an A.I. or a Dutch wife.

Nanana and Juugo should have fought more often.

Tragically, this is one of the rare examples of "girl roomie" anime, and it completely goes to waste. I'm grateful the show did not devolve into stupid mishaps testing Otaku Virtues or degenerate into something hopelessly contrived like Nozoki Ana (which was technically also about challenges to the Otaku Virtues). I didn't watch enough Bleach to see how it handled the situation, but I heard Rukia eventually moved out of Strawberry's closet. Aside from Rizelmine, I can't think of any other "girl roomie" shows off the top of my head, but surely there some example that occupies a zone between constantly freaking out about the girl in the room, and spending every waking moment ignoring her. (Oh, wait, IS <Infinite Stratos>.)

I'm going to start planting screenshots from totally unrelated shows in my blog posts.

Anyway, Ryuugajou Nanana no Maizoukin is really a lot better in basically all the areas I expected it to stumble, but I'm still left somewhat disappointed because it turned out to basically avoid everything I thought the show would actually be about. I suppose it's better this way. I'm not quite optimistic enough to believe it would have been a better show by focusing on either the "girl roomie" or "ghost girlfriend" dynamics. I certainly can't complain about getting a Grade A detective out of the affair. If only there were fewer jumping puzzles....

Hajime:Miyuki::Seki::Yokoi.

I'm watching three shows about detectives this season: Detective Conan, Kindaichi Shounen no Jikenbo Returns, and Ryuugajou Nanana no Maizoukin. All three are pretty good, but I'm most pleased with how Nanana is progressing.

I hope one of Nanana's treasures is a Buster Machine.

Of these three, Nanana is my clear favorite this season, largely thanks to its master detective. This is fortunate, because my original reason for watching the show appears determined to spend all of her eternal damnation playing video games. I guess ghost hands can't cramp up. Between Detective Conan and Kindaichi Returns, I definitely enjoy Conan more. However, I'm not sure if that's due to the strength of the show itself, because of my pre-established familiarity with the characters, or because I just happened to discover Meitantei Conan before I learned Kindaichi Shounen no Jikenbo even existed.

It helps that Juugo is sort of a punk.

I've basically been on board with Nanana as a matter of principle since I heard about its premise. There's no Ghost Girlfriend Clause, but perhaps there ought to be. It's also not a exactly a detective show, although there's a detective in it. Through four episodes, she's stealing the show. I'd be pretty okay with her as the lead instead of Juugo.1

She probably swiped through all of your pictures, too.

I am exceptionally pleased with the character Ikkyuu Tensai, a self-described master detective with a ridiculous name. Specifically, I'm astonished she actually is a master detective, and apparently stays that way the entire time, not just when the plot requires it. It's too early in the year to know who's going to win, but I think it's pretty likely Tensai will at least get a nomination for the title of 2014 Girl of the Year.

Ran has better hair than Miyuki.

I'm putatively watching Detective Conan this season, but actually following it will depend on whether or not the current episodes get fansubbed. The usual suspects are falling quite behind again, or they've taken their work to the Dark Web. Yes, that insidious DARK WEB which you have surely heard about from a television news special report. The DARK WEB which teems with pornography and hacktivism and unofficially imported family-friendly cartoons STRAIGHT FROM JAPAN. Actually, there's probably still that one dude on YouTube who's subbing Detective Conan as a goof. I haven't fully embraced streaming video yet when it comes to anime distribution, though. No, really.

Ran bends over again.

Luckily, Kindaichi Shounen no Jikenbo Returns has, well, returned from an extended absence with this season's aptly named show. I was wholly ignorant about this franchise, but its description reveals a lot of similarities with Detective Conan. Based on what the Wikipedia tells me, the Kindaichi manga actually predates the Detective Conan manga. I don't know if Meitantei Conan copied the Kindaichi formula, but there are a lot of similarities, at least based on the few Kindaichi episodes I've watched so far. Detective Conan isn't a total ripoff, though. At a minimum, it made the Kindachi elements more accessible by (eventually) toning down the crimes (even though someone still dies in some horrific manner basically every week) and by making it less realistic via reverse-aging formulas, implausible techno gadgets, Ran's youthful lack of lower-back problems, and Professor Agasa's amazing ability to periodically cram five neighborhood children into his wheezing Type 1 Volkswagen Beetle and drive them into the wilderness without attracting any attention.

Ah, now I see.

Even though Kindaichi may have come first, Detective Conan is clearly the better established leader in the high school detective genre and probably better known to all but the most ardent Kindaichi fans. The similarities are undeniable: Teenage master detectives solve crimes the police cannot. Loyal aerodynamic childhood friends serve as putative love interests. Perhaps as a tongue-in-cheek reference to Detective Conan, the first episode of Kindaichi Returns features a man trying to flag down Miyuki by calling her "Ran" during a moment of mistaken identity.

Note 1: I've seen others accuse the male lead of being too generic, but that's patently unfair. In my view, "too generic" should refer to cretins with zero distinguishing positive characteristics such as Junichi from Amagami SS and all the various harem comedy leads who spend every waking hour trying to become the leading chickenshit stupid asshole champion ever since the last dude scorched off his balls by clumsily handling the Chickenship Stupid Asshole Torch. Tragically, there's at least one important objective distinction that immediately separates Juugo from Potato-kun: He's not afraid of touching girls—not even dead ones. It's tragic that this simple quality is now sufficient to segregate worthless members of the Otaku Virtues congregation from the increasingly less common non-craven punks, but that's a separate blog post altogether. I was going to write about detectives.