This week brought some fairly decent episodes, but nothing entirely breathtaking either. Log Horizon managed to confuse us with a rather weak plot concept, Rolling Girls finally did what it should have been for a long time and failed at it consequently and we now know that remodeling for human-formed ship girls means getting bigger (literally)...
It's March, it's getting warmer (here at least... granted we never had a real cold winter to begin with) and here is another batch of episodes closer to the end of the season. The plot is certainly thickening in many of them.
Go Princess Precure: And Kirara continues to be amazing. About the only thing that I could say which irks me a little bit about this season so far is how the victims are practically picked at random and have almost no relevance to the story aside from Haruka's roommate in the beginning. I guess that is a tradeoff for focusing more on the main characters, which I can live with, although in that case it might have been better to create a scenario with monsters that don't need a human victim (like the original duo and group). If that is all though and this season can keep the pace for once, I may as well believe that we have another Precure on our hands that can be counted among the Pre-Smile period ones. And I really, really wasn't sure I would ever be able to say that again and I won't for certain just yet and probably not for quite some time.
Absolute Duo: It seems someone has heard my plea from last week. Finally the much needed focus is back on Toru and Julie, finally we get an answer to the hanging thread of Julie's backstory. Unfortunately it is almost too late after teasing and then all but forgetting about it in favor of transforming the show into a harem trope festival. The actual content was also rather... dull and not exactly fleshed out. I like Julie's character and as such I really don't think she got her money's worth here after all the promise of the first few episodes. This, too, is a direct result of focusing on Lilith and the others instead of carefully developing the actual main "Duo" more. The plot is also still incredible intangible. Only with my experience of watching anime like this for so long, I can pierce together some semblance of the story after this episode but otherwise Absolute Duo still manages to throw around terms we barely understand (because they are not even remotely explained or hinted at), characters that just appear out of nowhere again and again, supposedly tied with all the non-explained backstory... It's all very confusing and whoever is doing the storyboard for this needs to go back to school (or wherever else he learned his craft). At least next episode SEEMS to be giving us some answers, judging by the prologue. Still, a good story builds up its plot and revelation slowly instead of just dumping everything on the viewer in some unrecognizable and barely coherent format.
Yuri Kuma Arashi: Oy... Oy! That's just awful. After last week's cliffy they are making a synopsis episode NOW. Very, very bad timing. And apparently we don't even get to see the accompanying interview... I'd say this deserves a downgrade for sheer audacity.
Shinmai Maou no Testament: So, it really happened. Dear Maria is in league with the "enemy" (an opposing faction at least). Not quite willingly apparently but still... I had dreaded this since last episode. Otherwise, this episode once again hurt even more with the censorship. Frankly, when not even fully naked scenes get censored, that's bad. If it gets censored when Mio's "father" gets slain by the demon but then it's okay to show all the blood splatter, I really don't get what decides the censor here anymore. Everyone getting to watch this on disc later may not notice but as a means of getting people to even buy it, this censorship REALLY starts to hurt its prospects. I know, I am repeating myself but... it is such a shame because it could be so much better.
Kantai Collection: I suppose I can agree that this episode had the emotions down well and made some progress past the thin source material. I just couldn't really get over the remodel part early on. That was just plain... freaky. Otherwise, a step in the right direction again. When the anime tries it can be a show standing on its own, too bad it does so only sporadically.
Assassination Classroom: A fun episode. But the most amazing feature this time was the utterly casual way the real plot bomb was dropped in the middle of an unassuming conversation towards the end. If you did not pay full attention at this point, you could easily miss it. In any other setting this would be questionable at least, here it feels right somehow and is an interesting way to bring in such a juicy bit of plot.
Fairy Tail: Is that the beginning of ANOTHER filler ARC? Please don't. I can stand it being a two-part one seeing as the episode was somewhat funny but if I have to suffer through another 10+ episodes the likes of what we've just been put through, I swear I will quit and wait for the next main arc.
Rolling Girls: Holy...! Character development! Of the main cast! Lots of it! In fact, for once the next road stop did not feature much of the characters here but instead almost fully focused on the main cast! Now I have no idea how to feel about it as I have always stated that the lack of development and focus for the main cast was one of this show's biggest weaknesses. This on the other end feels too sudden. After almost the entire run with very little, we suddenly have an episode that dumps a whole lot of stuff on us in just one episode. While I am glad about some direction and overreaching plot for once, it feels rushed as if the creators suddenly realized that they are nearing the end of the season and still haven't done much with the main cast or established much of an actual central plot, which now has to be done right away. The buildup is off and the substance to actually make the initial "fight" of the girls an emotional investment is not there. This anime has so downplayed its supposed "main" cast that what is attempted here does not work and feels rather alien to the setting so far.
Dog Days: Looks like this will be the final arc of the season. Finally the Dragon Priestess is back. I could have almost sworn Aria was the Sky Priestess while I was watching this, guess for once they actually threw us off nicely. I wonder if anything REALLY bad will happen... nah, probably not.
Log Horizon: I feel a little cheated by the final revelation. And that's really all I am going to say to this. No, really or so I thought. An alien race arranged this? Needing to harvest "energy"? That's not quite correct. It was never said that the "aliens" created this situation, only that they took advantage of it for their purposes. This at least needs to be clarified. However, the concept by itself tying to one of the bigger issues – a possible way home – is not sitting well with me. After all this anime has managed in terms of world-building and exploring and all the questions that have been posed along with it, THIS is one the ultimate answers? Seeing as the season is nearly over and going on a similar stretch of setting itself for the next like last time, we are unlikely to get any more answers. Adding to that, the anime seems to have reached the light novel as well, so another season may not come as fast as this one. I feel disappointed... and just a little disillusioned. While I retain some faith that Log Horizon will do something with this premise. The concept used here while NOT providing the "big answer" is still an incredible weak one for a show that so far has actually excelled in such elements.
One Piece: AGAIN on break. Probably because the manga took one too, but still that's now twice in a row with the two week break.
Seiken Tsukai no World Break: I say it again, in terms of adhering to the genre, World Break is perhaps turning out to be the most genuine harem/fantasy show this season. While certainly one can probably find a lot of issues with it, I never look to deep at these shows as this will certainly ruin the experience. So far, on an improvement scale World Break is threatening to pull past Testament unless the latter gets its act together.
Nanatsu no Taizai: And the plot is thickening once more. Just as we thought everything resolved (no, really, did you REALLY think it was with several more episodes left?), Hendrickson isn't dead (duh!), that demon blood infusion is finally showing its true purpose and now Ban's on his personal vendetta at the worst possible moment! Well, that question posed by him was not THAT surprising by now. I am having a blast with this show, really. Especially in absence of One Piece, my joy of Sunday evenings along with Maria.
Maria, the Virgin Witch: I do not quite know what to make of this episode, especially that final bit. It was an interesting spin in the beginning where everyone was expecting the assault on Maria in a rather different manner. That the priest was already fairly tinkering on the edge of sanity should be obvious by now but those last scenes REALLY pushed things up a notch.
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