I’m back from UK con hell and am ready to take a look at this week’s offerings. There are hit and miss, really, like every other week, which is sad to say.
For Love Live! Sunshine!!, this week was Yoshiko/Yohane’s episode, and on how she shouldn’t be so affected by chuunibyou, even though Chika’s ‘Honkers’ way of thinking eventually wins her over and brings her back to the dark side. Personally, I think she’s better without the fallen angel thing going on, but despite her being rather popular among all of the aqours group so far, and with new girl Hanamaru winning the yokel award…zura, neither she or Yoshiko didn’t quite make this week completely interesting. Instead…
One minute you see her…
…the next you don’t.
Mari has been both an anomaly and an annoyance in the show so far. Her character is kind of based on Nozomi from the original show, but she lacks the flair and intelligence, and seems more selfish so far. To be honest, I genuinely don’t care about the episode she will have. There is one thing she and Nozomi share though: they both disappear in the show for unknown reasons. In one episode of the original show, her BFF/lover Eli was hugging her, and in the very next shot, Eli was hugging someone else instead!! Studio Sunrise’s award-winning editing skills are back once more. Okay, so Nozomi wasn’t the best singer or dancer, but that’s still a little unfair…
Speaking of ghosts, the occult, and chuunibyou (okay so not that), it’s class rep Lucia’s turn this week in the show with my favourite school uniform. No really, these kids in Rewrite really pull off white uniforms well! Anyway, we discover why Lucia wears gloves all the time and decides to change into her goth loli outfit to tell Kotarou the truth about her rather creepy curse (even by Key’s standards) in a dimly-lit chapel in an abandoned orphanage…only for us to find out that, in fact, this entire show is a potential copy of Charlotte.
[There, I said it! That’s $1/£1/€1 for the jar!]
Truth be told, I actually forgot what Shizuru’s ability was. Like last week, my feelings for Key shows are now gone. Sadly, Key is everywhere now in the show; canned coffee is called Key, the antagonist is now apparently called ‘The Key’, and I think I saw a McDonalds’ clone in the show called Key somewhere a couple of episodes ago (McKey maybe…).
I feel compelled to bring science and the mysterious once again; just when I thought The Butterfly Effect didn’t apply in a show like orange, it only just crops up out of nowhere. Naho is doing a mixture of things the letter she received is telling her to do, only to discover new things are happening instead; new things that didn’t feature in the letter. Now that she’s in this dilemma, and that she has kind of played along with Sensei’s idea of alternate realities, Naho now has to work on her own…to do what she thinks is right in order to save Kakeru.
Just when I thought this would get dull, it’s gotten a little interesting. I hope the six of them end up fighting later on though; all that saccharine niceness in the last weeks made me want to switch off.
There is one thing that hasn’t made me want to switch off though and this is the Despair Arc of Danganronpa. It has so many subtle slice-of-life elements to it (despite the fact that it’s suddenly turned so dark so quickly)…it’s as if I’m the one cursed myself. I can leave slice-of-life, but slice-of-life will never ever leave me. I think that now we have genuine voices attached to all of these characters, that has made the show much more…I don’t know…watchable than Future Arc. Kids from the Reserve Course are now dying, so everyone in the show is getting concerned. People who know Danganronpa know what eventually happens to every kid in Hope’s Peak Academy, but it’s as if, for this short time, we have the luxury of accepting these Ultimate Students as human beings, with all of their flaws. Chiaki said something very apt in episode 1 (which echoes here too), stating that it was because she was the Ultimate Gamer, she feels tied down by her games, just as the other Ultimate Students are with their respective talents. Because gaming is all she knows, she can’t be free like her new buddy Hajime is.
Saying that though, I really do not understand Studio Lerche felt the need to overlap Future Arc and Despair Arc; so far, it has only served to make the entire show confusing and inaccessible except for the fans. I would have not minded watching Despair Arc on its own, completely separate from its counterpart, as the latter is not sitting well with me anymore. Monokuma will ultimately lose, Makoto/Kyoko will ultimately triumph, end of story. Despair Arc on the other hand is new territory, I’m very interested in pretty much all of the characters so far and what will happen to them. As a fan of the franchise, even I am finding Future Arc monotonous and dull to watch. At least Despair Arc both offers something very refreshing and sticks to the story. If anything, I feel like abandoning Future Arc altogether, because this arc is so much more fun.
Moving on, when I watched episode 1 of this current Prisma Illya season, I was expecting it to stick to its brand-new slightly-darker and more mature fantasy theme…well I was certainly proved wrong. I have to admit that reviewing these episodes have actually become harder than I anticipated, and I think the reason for this is because we are presented with an entirely new world with entirely different characters, without Miyu, one of the main MCs, in the picture anywhere. I was initially worried that season 4 would fall flat, but I have become very very curious.
While season 2 of Shokugeki no Soma is basically an extension of season 1 (albeit a 12-episode extension), what’s happened so far has given me so much happiness.
I have unfortunately run out of space. Some truly epic coverage for both shows promised.