A lot of kids on Anitwitter seem to have gotten on the ‘Anime Bingo’ bandwagon, and so have I. I added some 2018 shows already to it, but here’s mine, along with the shows I really dislike (note that Revue Starlight is already there…):

While Revue Starlight has already made it on a list, will any Summer 2018 shows make it on my top anime of 2018 list? Well, we’re not even halfway through the season, so it’s way too early to tell. We’ll start with a strong contender for it though…

Like I said last week, I was very concerned that this dark psychological drama in Hanebado! was added unnecessarily, and I still stand by that decision. Has it become a bad thing though? Well look at it this way: if the adaptation was a direct copy of the manga, would we enjoy it as much, and would we be talking about it as much as we have? Ah, who am I kidding? Being truthful now, I am really not sure if I can enjoy this direction the show is starting to go in.

This week focuses on the most underrated girl of the show, third-year Riko. She has a bit of an inferiority complex, living in the shadows of her colleague Nagisa. We have reached the point of the tournament, and this will be the last tournament for both Nagisa and Riko before they graduate. After discovering who she will be up against, Riko herself begins to question why she should take part. Her part of the story, thankfully, has a positive ending, however it is this episode in particular where something is the most evident. There are in fact two stories going on in this show: the school badminton club and what happens to them, and Ayano’s trials and tribulations. And these two stories are getting further and further from each other, now that Ayano has begun to change her mood…something that not everyone watching this show is appreciating.

You don’t need to look hard to see how much Ayano is not only getting bullied unnecessarily by other badminton players big-time, but is beginning to separate herself further from her teammates. I think that this has become a result of her loss against Connie last week. The attitude that her mother had towards badminton is slowly (and unconsciously) beginning to appear within Ayano, and while we will no doubt see her win some games, it will probably take someone to slap her in the face (either Elena or Nagisa) for her to see what this PTSD is starting to do to her. It could take a couple of episodes to do this, but Ayano will find out by herself that she is beginning to turn into the person she despises the most. It’ll hit her like a truck, she’ll hurt some people along the way (some who probably deserve it and some who don’t), and it’ll take the people around her to get her to change her ways and play badminton for her own sake, and not to try to emulate her mother.

Speaking of the mother, now that she has arrived to watch the tournament, I don’t even know where to start on what could potentially happen when they reunite. At this point, I would probably write some op-ed about it all, like I did with Darling in the Franxx, but considering what kind of reaction that post got, I won’t. I’ve learnt my lesson. What I will say now is that Hanebado! has already become the most depressing shows I’ve seen in a long time.

Time for some happiness now. Nothing much changes in Harukana Receive though, and I don’t expect it to…and that is actually why I am enjoying it as much as I do.

It’s Haruka and Kanata’s first tournament as partners, and their first game is against the two that ‘stole’ Haruka’s favorite swimsuit. More focus is on Ai and Mai this week, and their origins story is actually very sweet, and by the end, you actually want them to win this match, for Mai’s sake. Sadly, aside from the short origins story, this week’s outing doesn’t really offer us much. We already know that Kanata wants to put more faith and trust in her cousin, who is still effectively learning the ropes of beach volleyball, but we also know that, in time, the relationship between the two of them will get even stronger. I think Kanata just needs to come out of her shell some more.

I will tell you, though, the ecchi in Harukana Receive is starting to intensify, like the eurobeat in Initial D. From the opening episode, I seriously didn’t think it would be an issue, and although it doesn’t actually bother me, I can understand now why people are kind of put off by all the bikini and butt shots in this show. Could you say that this ecchi is just a part of the charm in this show? Well, it’s not like it’s necessary or anything.

But who is this person? Why is she so engaged as a spectator? Does she know Haruka, or Kanata, or Claire & Emily, or all of the above? Why does she look so moody? I know all will be revealed in time, but it’s always something to speculate.

Time for a show that makes little sense in comparison to the others. This week’s Asobi Asobase sees how detached and sheltered Hanako actually is, when we learn that her take on Harajuku fashion makes her something to fear (at least in the eyes of the everyday Japanese person). Also, the three begin to panic when Olivia suspects one of the girls in school could be a she-male, only for them to discover that she only said it to a guy so she could break up with him. Oh, and we also discover that the three of them are quite clueless on what sex actually is, and how babies are made.

But best girl (at least right now) is Oka, from the Occult Club. She has become the only member since everyone else either left or graduated, and is currently that girl in school that creeps everyone out. In anime, it’s always that girl in shows that I have a lot of empathy for. She has hobbies and interests that are way different from everyone else, and unlike the likes of the chuunibyou kids that we see in other shows, this is something that is bound to stick in her school life.

Oh hey look…it’s me looking too deeply into shows again…

Asobi Asobase is random fun, that is starting to get a little ruder with more obscene (but not disgusting) jokes, and compared to the super-depressing Hanebado! and the saccharine Harukana Receive, a show like this is very welcome in my weekly anime watch list.

Finally, to Serial Experiments Lain, where things are beginning to take a turn to the more surreal.

Episode 5 is essentially split in two, with one side concerning Lain’s growing connection to the Wired in which she begins to have hallucinations of inanimate objects and her parents who teach her what the Wired actually is and what could potentially await her there, and the other side focusing on her older sister Mika. I genuinely did not see this coming, as my initial thoughts (when I began this show) was that Mika would just be a background character, but this episode sees her in a different light.

Mika is beginning to have hallucinations of her own as well, but ones that are far different from the more passive ones Lain is having. Her ones follow her like some curse, calling for her to “Fulfill The Prophecy”. After some digging of my own, I have learned that this new terror that she is having is the result of the Knights somehow getting into her head and making her see things that aren’t there. One thing that I don’t quite get is why did they choose her? Could it be down to her own relation to Lain? She did have that encounter with the Men In Black a couple of episodes ago, so could that be related? Mika is otherwise a very typical high-school girl who has a boyfriend, goes shopping in Shibuya, etc. so this is something I don’t quite get. I’m sure that there is a good explanation for this, but knowing what I’ve seen in this show so far, this could be a question that’ll stay lingering in the air, making the viewers speculate and form their own theories.

Serial Experiments Lain is starting to become a very interesting show. I can understand why the old-school fans love it so much; not sure if I’ve reached that mark yet, but we’ll see…

We’re approaching the halfway stage now. Do you think Ayano needs to see the error of her ways before it is too late? Is the ecchi in Harukana Receive getting too much for you? Do you think Asobi Asobase’s insanity is starting to wear thin? Feel free to air your opinions in the comments below…