Needy Girl Overdose, Witch Hat, and reading Hyakkano

Too much! There's a lot of promising anime this season, and I'm also watching an older one. Also slowly chipping away at the manga Yuri Espoir. Got a couple volumes at Kinokuniya last month, but I prefer to read it on my e-reader.

Kaiba — Super neat setting and art style. Two-thirds of the way through and I think it's really handled the single cour limit well. Hopefully it doesn't fall apart at the end.

Kamiina Botan — I've been watching this with a friend. I'm a sucker for variety in art style and yuri so it's no surprise I like it.

Marriagetoxin — It's pretty fun.

Needy Girl Overdose — No idea what to make of it. Probably still won't by the time it ends.

Nippon Sangoku — It's an intriguing concept but so far I'm not sold on the characters, and there's too much tonal whiplash.

Witch Hat Atelier — Easily would recommend this to anyone. I'm going to pick up the manga after this season is over.

Yomi no Tsugai — It's entertaining shounen.

HELL yeah for Cardcaptor. And I've been curious about The Orville, so maybe I'll check it out!

Reading

I finished volume 1 of Handa-kun. Kinda meh tbh. The anime was decent but I guess (1) the jokes work better in animation; (2) the jokes often don't land as well the second time; and (3) I'm just not the same person I was when I watched the anime.

The other comic books on my shelf haven't really been enticing me at the moment, and so I've sort of turned to my e-reader instead. More specifically, I've started reading a manga called Sweat and Soap. I felt sort of embarrassed/awkward about trying S&S at first, because based on the description alone it Really Sounds Like A Fetish Thing, but I was reassured by the fact that it's actually a pretty long and well-rated manga that even got a live action TV adaptation. I mean, it does have plenty of stuff that will make you blush, but on the whole it is a genuinely pretty solid office romance story with themes like communication and shame and all that.

In terms of non-comic books, I also finished The Catcher in the Rye and I must say it is a very good novel, I highly recommend it.

After finishing TCITR I tried getting back into Crime & Punishment but the fourth chapter has not a single paragraph break (and also contains a surprise N word!) so I'm not really feeling it right now. Nor am I really feeling Ulysses or Sub la Meznokta Suno, or rather I haven't really dug into them yet. I just got a nonfiction book about the Norwegian labor movement of the 20th century as a gift today in anticipation of Labor Day, so that'll be interesting to check out.

With me mum

We're continuing Scooby-Doo: Mystery Incorporated, Kodocha and Sailor Moon R, although Moon has largely been displaced by Kodocha. We really love Kodocha.

No progress on Serial Experiments Lain in the past month, but now that we've finished Steins;Gate (OVAs and the second season notwithstanding) we might start coming back to Lain.

We finished the third and final season of Furuhata Ninzaburo, but this doesn't mean we're out of Furuhata content as there's still a number of specials and TV movies for us to go through.

We're nearly done with the first season of Ojamajo Doremi. Top tier magical girls!

We started watching Mono recently, and it seems like it's gonna be a very special show. Same mangaka as Yuru Camp and similar vibes to that manga, except it's about photography and filmmaking instead of camping.

I showed my mom two episodes of Fullmetal Alchemist (2003), namely episodes 6 and 7, the latter being the episode with {The Thing, IYKYK|"Edward… friend…?"}. She responded very well to it. I think she'd sort of assumed that FMA was Just Another Shonen, and was pleasantly surprised that the show actually has Themes and Good Worldbuilding and Intrigue instead of just being a bunch of pew pew dudes brawling or whatever. So she wants to watch FMA with me some time, but who knows when that will materialize.

Obama's Elf

I have at last finished Tokyo Mew Mew, and I must say…… Not the best magical girl show I ever watched? Obviously it was good enough for me to finish — I wouldn't be watching it if I didn't enjoy it — but out of all the magical girl shows I've liked enough to finish, TMM probably ranks dead last. Frankly, animated TMM fanfiction by preteens goes harder than TMM itself, which makes me curious about how the 2020s reboot, Tokyo Mew Mew New, compares to the 2000s anime. But it'll be a while until I'll feel like checking that out, I think.

I've also seen a bit more of Maison Ikkoku, but I've really been prioritizing TEPPEN!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Laughing 'til You Cry lately, which is an anime about all-girl manzai trios competing to see who are the best comedians. But a bit like how Joshiraku isn't Really about rakugo, Teppen is less about manzai so much as it's just an excuse to put a bunch of kyawaii schoolgirls with eccentric personalities in the same building and see what happens. Fans of Osaka-ben will be delighted by this one.

No progress on Avatar: The Last Airbender in the past month.

Others' Blorps

Garg/Grebgreb finished showing the first season of Magic Knight Rayearth and moved onto the second season, with a brief intermission to show Blue Submarine No. 6. I didn't get super much out of Blue Sub because I missed a lot of it to deal with my dog, and I was sort of distracted in general, but if nothing else I can say it has a nice ED. Rayearth is something I continue to have mixed feelings about: I found myself genuinely enjoying it by the end of the first season, but I sort of lost that energy with the start of the second season. But we'll see if I'll get it back!

I saw a bit more of Tatsuki Fujimoto 17-26 but didn't really care for most of it. I only really joined for the gender swap episode.

I stayed up very late for the Soviet short film "Film Film Film", which was nice to rewatch. Angel's Egg was also good eats.

Clara/Carcharodonna has been showing Daria and 31 Minutos, but I've sort of lost interest in them, or rather I didn't really care for Daria to begin with, which is a shame when it is such a classic of old Seppolandic adult animation. Clara has also been showing Panty & Stocking with Garterbelt, which I'm much fonder of: she recently finished showing season 1, as well as the OVA and some BTS for the English dub, and has now moved on to season 2. She accidentally showed the first episode of season 2 in Japanese, and IMO that was a double-edged sword: English dubs are easier to follow when you also have to pay attention to the chat, but P&S S2 has a completely different English voice cast compared to season 1, and I'm expecting to find that incredibly jarring. Switching from dub to sub is far less jarring IMO.

Clara also recently showed the pilot for Hazbin Hotel, and I'm not sure what to think of it. I was surprised by the style since I've only seen still images and promotional art, and the writing was a mixed bag… But it is a pilot, so it's gonna have some jank, right? So we'll see where it goes from here.

Own Blorps

With @AernaLingus@hexbear.net I've been watching The Idolmaster and it's been a much bigger hit than Watamote. We were also both pleasantly surprised to find out that The Idolmaster is the source of the music for the "De-De-Death Dekomori Desu" MAD/meme.

On Saturdays I've finished showing Turnabout Storm — very solid Phoenix Wright x MLP:FiM fan miniseries. I also finished showing the first season of The Owl House and have moved on to season 2. This coming Saturday I'll be showing the first three episodes of Star vs. the Forces of Evil and the first two episodes of Uma Musume: Pretty Derby, and I'm excited for both, but especially SVTFOE, which I was a big fan of as a teenager.

On Wednesdays I've been showing Squirrel & Hedgehog, a furry military drama from the DPRK. I also recently showed some fanime, including Terrance Terribly Troubled, PRISM, Magikí Akarí, Crystal Hearts: The Movie, and we're also continuing Magic Heart and the Magical Warriors. Terrance and Magikí are the best of these fanime: the former was rated as the best fanime of 2026 thus far by Cuban and Doggo, and the second best by myself (after Panties Warfront), and Magikí was rated as the third best by myself and Cuban. Magic Heart is something I can really only recommend as an oddity or curiosity rather than as something strictly Good.

As for my own fanime, Blazoner Narazen, I've finished prescoring ~70% of episode 1 (~8.3 minutes out of 12 minutes total), or ~60% if we don't count the intro, outro, and eyecatch (~5.4 minutes out of 9 minutes total). The deadline is July 15, i.e. 76 days from now, and the days seem to slip by quicker than I expect. Yet I remain confident that I can get episode 1 to a presentable state by the deadline, i.e. prescoring and storyboarding if nothing else.

I've finished showing all of classic Fireman Sam and so I recently showed the first episode of the 2005 version, i.e. when Sam was modernized but still stop motion. Cuban called it "Fireman Sam: Shippuden". I didn't really care for it tbh. Classic '80s/'90s Sam has this really nice slice-of-life atmosphere and timeless all-ages appeal that I think was lost in the 2005 reboot, and certainly the 2008-to-present reboot.

And so I've now started showing Joshua Jones instead of Sam. I describe Josh as having a relationship to Sam comparable to the relationship between Tamako Market and K-ON! — i.e. same studio, same style, similar vibes, but still their own things. Joshua Jones is notable for having a Romani protagonist. Once I finish showing Josh I guess I'll stick with Bumper Films and move on to Star Hill Ponies.

Manga

Continuing Greatest Estate Developer and that's it. Still pretty solid, nothing more to say really.

Anime

Witch Hat Atelier has been neat so far but not a lot has happened. Very pretty, and the restraints in the magic system leads to clever problem solving generally being the path to success rather than just casting the bigger fireball.

Ascendance of a Bookworm season 4 has pacing issues because they're apparently trying to adapt quite a lot in a fairly short number of episodes, but I'm enjoying it. It was discovered to have AI-generated backgrounds in the OP and the studio was forced to change it. A good sign that even otaku hate AI and don't want to see slop.

Started Katanagatari and it has some good bits, like the guy who is so good at iajutsu that when he attacks nobody can see it, which is portrayed by not animating him, or that one of the "twelve swords" they're hunting down is actually pair of handguns. Unfortunately so far (the first two episodes) the female lead seems to just be generally incompetent as a joke, which is sadly unsurprising for anime.

Ikoku nikki is lovely, thank to comrade who recommended it

and i’ve had random thought (probably due to re:zero going again): why there is no isekai in the maw of madness type deal, where hero is constantly killed in different worlds, and becomes baffled by settings

Dorohedoro s2 10/10. The manga succeeded as a dark shonen long before jujutsu kaisen and chainsaw man dropped the ball.

The climber manga. Really weird manga but I really liked it. I think reading the authors previous and even weirder works (innocent and innocent rouge) made it less weird, relatively speakin. It's like an examination into the mindset of someone with a singular obsession, climbing.

Atelier 10/10. Liking it more than Frieren and they got a souls borne composer for the music. A bit random but the fact the author is a woman means the chance that we get Japanese sexual weirdness is a lot lower thank god. I'm so over that shit. Before I could white noise and ignore it. Now its just so goddam offputing. I think I'm just tired lmao

Demons of the shadow realm. Not sure how to rate this one but I'm really liking it so far. It's by the author of full metal alchemist so I have high hopes. And it's very entertaining

I finished Magi Labyrith Of Magic anime; I would not recommend it, mostly because of the fanservice. Its hard for me to view this in the lense of 1:1 with real world metaphors, because there is simply rarely anything or even maybe nothing that reflects the hideousness of colonialism verbadim. This does get pretty close, but I haven't read the manga so who knows. The anime doesnt continue Aladdin's story from here.

I am so happy that Witch Hat Atelier is out. I can't believe its only been five episodes already! I really want to check out Eniale & Dewiela by the same author.

I am so happy that Dorohedoro season 2 is out 🥹

Solo Dungeon Farmer

Is anybody here watching the ~~Rome total war~~ release the witch anime? Is it any good? I was planing to watch it after the first season finished airing, but apparently it got cancelled?

Also, how have I forgotten to mention it?!

I've been watching Outlaw Star, and it's a run of the mill 90s sci-fi adventure, with all the usual tropes. Fun, but nothing groundbreaking. B (12 episodes in)

Witch Hat Atelier, Marriage Toxin, One Piece, and Kagurabachi

Manga

I got distracted from Dorohedoro and haven't progressed from the 3rd book. Hopefully this month I can get through more.

I started reading the Ghost in the Shell Manga and its very silly but good. When there are serious scenes its honestly has more of an impact, probably because I can focus on the page and analyse whats happening. I may try to read a chapter alongside a book of Dorohedoro this month.

Anime

I watched and completed Angel Beats along with its special episodes. Its an anime I tried watching many years ago but couldn't complete. I'm glad I finally have as it was worth finishing. It was a very bittersweet ending but the following OVAs were very silly so it didn't end up as sad.

The Soundtrack is very, very good and I found my old playlist that I downloaded. Still a good listen to, though some of the songs in the playlist I didn't hear in the show. I remember some rumour that the show was originally supposed to be 26 episodes but cut down to 13 against the interests of the director or writer. Looking again I have no idea where I saw that as most information says it was always written to be 13 episodes.

Blorps

Stalin has continued to show the Berserk shows and I'm very much enjoying the universe. The Memorial Season of the original 1997 series was a bit too fast paced for me mainly as it skipped a few of the early episodes of that original series. Being a CGI anime the animation was serviceable but worse that the original. But the series did tie up its ending and sets up for the following arc, unlike the original.

Now we are continuing with the 2016 Season that follows on from the Golden Age Arc previously shown. The animation is similar quality to the Memorial Season. Guts in this series feels extremely different to all the other characters in this show, the only way I can describe it is that the rest of the cast are from a 2010s anime while Guts is still from 1997.

Garg showed Blue Submarine No 6 a 4 part OVA. It was an decent watch with a combination of CGI and 2d animation but the CGI is really dated.

Others

An animation not an anime, I watch the Soviet Versions of Alice in Wonderland and Alice through the Looking Glass. They were a really good watch with very smooth animation and an amazing art style. Also a good soundtrack in both.