Okay so I really didn’t expect WordPress to change as much as it did. Almost like how Tumblr tries to be a better social media platform by cutting its pornographic content only to lose users’ faith, and so with these massive changes to our editing sections, some of us at OASG are in a bit of a ‘what-do-we-do-now?’ moment.

A reset would be kind of cool. I think that’s something Akane is wanting to do right now but something’s definitely holding her back. None of us know what exactly though.

Not 100% sure on how to react to this week’s SSSS Gridman though, considering what we all saw and realized last week. Akane’s depression continues; perhaps it stems from a mixture of being lonely as a ‘deity’ and losing control of the world she created. Yuta, Rikka and Utsumi have learned a lot about themselves at this point, and now want to find a way to help Akane, even if she is above them all.

What exactly can they do? Kaiju keep on coming, Gridman keeps on defeating them, leaving Akane struggling to find a purpose in life, and with the other three knowing that they are not what they initially thought they were, I suppose the only thing they can do is convince Akane to ‘spare’ them if/when she ever decides to reset the world.

As I said, this was an unusually odd episode to digest, leaving me a bit clueless on what to expect in the final weeks but at least I am looking forward to what is to come in the future, as SSSS Gridman ends.

…so here is me, pleading for Release the Spyce to end soon, and it only goes and drops an episode like this. With so much new information thrown at us in the space of 25 minutes, I’m not entirely sure what will happen next. Not that my lack of caring has gone though. Okay, so a part of me wanted these campy villains to have some kind of victory because all of these moe high-school spies were being irritating, and all needed some kind of punch in the gut to wake them up.

Predictably, /r/anime has gone absolutely crazy over this episode, throwing insults, death threats, and hate messages left, right and center, and it’s all a rather cringe-worthy read; best to avoid that place if you’ve never been there. These are the same Reddit users who were like me, and found little entertainment in this show as a whole too. So what will happen next week? Well as we’ve reached the stage where filler episodes are pointless, maybe the plot that this show originally has will show us something decent.

“What’s this? You’re throwing shade at a show with an epic plot twist like this? Cos of this twist, this show is officially awesome now!!! o.o”

Plot twists don’t change the fact that this was a disappointing and mediocre show to begin with. You can turn to some of the people who have been watching this new (and overlong) season of Sword Art Online to confirm that, who have just been treated with an episode that is not only extremely poor in quality, but very gross to watch (Crunchyroll even chose to add a content warning at the beginning of the episode – something they don’t usually do). This sort of proves that this 4-cour season idea was a terrible one…but of course that won’t sway the super-loyal fans (and there are a lot of them). Someone has already remarked that Sword Art Online has now been Mahouka-fied.

At least Bloom Into You won’t fall to that fate; it has been consistently good every week that it is almost incapable of having a not-so-great episode.

After what Touko did to Yuu last week, I’d be trying my best to avoid her as well, but as the draft for the school play is completed, Yuu notices clear similarities with the main character, a girl with amnesia struggling to decide what kind of person she should be to the people who love her, and Touko, someone who is already so consumed with trying to emulate her golden girl of a deceased sister that she’s lost touch with everything else, seems to embrace the idea of playing the MC, strangely.

I don’t envy Yuu at all right now. Summer vacation has come up, and the student council have decided they should all go on a study camp to rehearse the play…or rather…Touko has decided they should all go on a study camp. This shows something that Yuu has already known, and something we all kind of guessed already: Touko is calling the shots in every aspect of this relationship. She initiates any hugs or kisses, she is the one who demands time to see her, she is the one who gets the last word in, and Yuu is currently stuck between her old habit of not minding and just being ‘meh’ about it all, and getting extremely frustrated.

Right now she is having these fleeting thoughts of romance that she has never ever felt before, and with the other person taking complete charge, Yuu feels absolutely powerless.

“Is this right? Is this how relationships are meant to be? Should I love someone who demands so much from me?”

And finally, have I reached the beginning of the end for The Tatami Galaxy as well?

In this episode’s timeline, our protagonist doesn’t join any circle. In fact he doesn’t even go out and meet anyone, or even leave his 4.5 tatami room, which is what this episode (#10) is about.

As a proclaimed supporter and endorser of the 4.5 tatami room, he builds his own little utopia in the one he has. As time progresses though, he finds himself unable to leave…because each way out only leads him to another 4.5 tatami room that looks almost identical to his own one. At first this is something he embraces, as he has a world all to himself that never ends, but ultimately he ends up going mad.

He also discovers each 4.5 tatami room is different, because another version of him lived in that room, having joined their own unique circle and trying to have their own rose-colored college life. Are these other versions of him the key to helping him escape?

These episodes I’ve been watching this week all have a little something in common, in that they have all left me pretty darn clueless as to what could happen next. How can Yuta, Akane, Rikka and Utsumi get out of this fantasy world Akane created? Will the moeblob spies find a way out, and a happy ending at that? Will Yuu accept or reject these fleeting thoughts of hers? And will our nameless hero of The Tatami Galaxy ever escape this timeloop? With the Fall 2018 season wrapping up, I’m hoping for some good finales.

You guys chose Kemono Friends as my classic/out-of-season show to watch beginning January…just as the second season of it begins. I still haven’t decided what shows I want to watch in the Winter 2019 season yet though as, to be honest, nothing is really grabbing me just yet. Feel free to hit that like button and air your opinions in the comments below…