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 AduroT wrote:
Based on the first episode, the tournament isn’t so much an arc as the entire premise of the show.

I see. So its trashier than I thought

For Fans of DB Super, it looks like it is going on, at minimum, hiatus in April.

Pretty sad.... I've really enjoyed Super so far, and hate for it to end with the ToP.

Mleh. DB is, in my eyes, extremely overhyped.

About the only reason it's so popular is because it was one of the first Shonen titles to get a major release in the West. Had it been, say, Soul Eater instead, everyone'd be going gaga over that and dressing up with white hair and pointy teeth.

Finished Devilman Crybaby on Netflix.

Seems like pretentious nonsense to me.

Also watched SAO for the first time all the way through. I was pretty hooked while watching it but now that it's finished I can't help but notce all the stuff that made no sense at all.

Finally, finished The Devil Is A Part-Timer. This was fantastic, except whenever it got into the fantasy parts, which were terribly dull. The slice-of-life portions were exceptionally good.

So a mutual agreement between me and a friend was made. I would finally watch Trigun if he would watch Overlord.

Have to say, Trigun is so far not what I was expecting. It's much more light hearted then I was expecting. I like it though.

He likes Overlord as well.

 Grey Templar wrote:


Have to say, Trigun is so far not what I was expecting. It's much more light hearted then I was expecting. I like it though.
:

Did you reach about episode 10 or 12 yet?

 Manchu wrote:


Finally, finished The Devil Is A Part-Timer. This was fantastic, except whenever it got into the fantasy parts, which were terribly dull. The slice-of-life portions were exceptionally good.

That's the only series I have the anime, the manga, and the light novel.

The light novels and manga expand the fantasy elements quite a bit, so fair warning there. On the other hand it adds a lot of depth and intrigue, and mixes it in with the slice of life for comedic affect.

I like it, but ymmmv.

 CthuluIsSpy wrote:

 Grey Templar wrote:


Have to say, Trigun is so far not what I was expecting. It's much more light hearted then I was expecting. I like it though.
:

Did you reach about episode 10 or 12 yet?

Not yet. I'm told it gets darker.

Overlord today was delightful, I quite like that we're blazing through the Lizardman arc without any of the padding these arcs usually bring with them in other shows.

 BrookM wrote:
Overlord today was delightful, I quite like that we're blazing through the Lizardman arc without any of the padding these arcs usually bring with them in other shows.

Indeed.

Dat last line though

 Manchu wrote:
Finished Devilman Crybaby on Netflix.

Seems like pretentious nonsense to me.

I loved it personally. Still think the original is better but it was a fun ride. Although neither holds a candle to the manga.

Anyone checked out Darling in the FranXX? Do we have another Kill la Kill on our hands or is it just dumb fanservice?

Hard to say. I was expecting a Kill la Kill, but apparently Trigger’s only involvement is animating the action scenes.

 AduroT wrote:
Hard to say. I was expecting a Kill la Kill, but apparently Trigger’s only involvement is animating the action scenes.

Yeah, the fact A1 pictures is involved makes me wary. I think the character designs are from Nishigori Atsushi, who also did designs for Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann, Panty and Stocking and Idol Master. So at least the horny teenagers will be pretty.

 Manchu wrote:


Also watched SAO for the first time all the way through. I was pretty hooked while watching it but now that it's finished I can't help but notce all the stuff that made no sense at all.

Just move on to watching SAO The Abridged Series, universally hailed for being funny as feth and fixing all of the things that didn't make sense

Like that guy in episode three who was dual wielding axes that no one ever commented about in the entire series

 Co'tor Shas wrote:
I loved it personally. Still think the original is better but it was a fun ride. Although neither holds a candle to the manga.

That gets to the problems I had with it. It was totally preoccupied figuring out how to tackle the legacy. But how would it fare as its own thing, with no legacy propping it up?

 LordofHats wrote:
Just move on to watching SAO The Abridged Series

Too late, I had already marathoned SAO.

Watched through episode 14 of Melancholy of Haruhi Suzmiya ... and I'm not sure why. Watching all this anime at once, I get the feeling that inertia is the main force propelling me through episodes.

SAO for me was a mixed bag sort of ride. The first arc of the first season was good, the second arc less so. First arc of the second season was meh, but the second arc was pretty good. All IMHO of course.

I certainly enjoyed the SAO arc of SAO more than the ALO arc. But even so, I keep thinking about stuff from the death game portion like ... well, it just seems bizarre how the game works. I don't get why Kirito is so powerful. I guess this is stuff you are supposed to ignore because deep down it's just a romance plot. But even at that level, Kirito is so relentlessly boring.

Started SAO II but have given up on it so far.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Thinking about it, way back when SAO first came out for some reason I decided to jump into the middle of the series. The episode I watched is the one where Kirito goes on an adventure with Asuna's friend the weaponsmith Lisbet. It obviously didn't impress me much at that point because I didn't watch it again until 5+ years later ... but now I think that episode is one of the stronger ones in the series.

The on-line shooter arc is horrible at times, it has some good bits in there like Sinon's backstory, but ffffffff- it's drawn out at times. The second arc of the second season puts a focus on Asuna and boots Kirito to a supporting role, a great arc with some feels in there as well.

There is a third season coming this year, yay?

Another issue is performance. I watched dubs for both SAO and Devil Is A Part-Timer. SAO was fine (probably really helped the characters, TBH) but The Devil Is A Part-Timer is simply superb on this score. I was actually rewinding episodes as I watched them because the performances were so great.

Can't comment on that, I only deal with subs myself, for some reason I am a mutant who is capable of keeping up with what's going on while reading the text in the bottom.

 Manchu wrote:
Watched through episode 14 of Melancholy of Haruhi Suzmiya ... and I'm not sure why. Watching all this anime at once, I get the feeling that inertia is the main force propelling me through episodes.

It's a great show. It boils the noodles in all the right places. Season 2 is a mindfeth.

The concept that the world only exists insofar as a random girl unconsciously finds it engaging is already a bit of a mind feth!

FranXX is aparently good-ish. Someone I talk with on Discord sometimes was watching it, liked it enough. It's the steampunk-y looking one, right?


And SAO... I think I managed to figure out why it's so polarizing.

My hypothosis is that those who significantly enjoyed it are also big fans of classic Science Fiction, while those who didn't enjoy it as much are more Fantasy fans.

This is a little side-bit, too. When I say "Sci Fi" and "Fantasy" I don't mean whether or not there's magic or technology in the world, because that isn't, I think, the true determinator.

Science Fiction should, perhaps more appropriately, be called Speculative Fiction. The point of it is to take society, introduce something that doesn't exist, and ask "What would happen". It's things like "Ringworld" or "The Mote in God's Eye" or "I, Robot" or "Dune". "What if there were crazy aliens that didn't think like humans", or "What if we had true AI" or "What if Spice". But properties like "Tales of MU" or The Chronicles of Recluse, despite having Fantasy settings with magic and mysticism, are ALSO Science (or Speculative) Fiction.

Whereas properties like Star Trek, Star Wars, Conan of Hyboria, Harry Potter, all of those, are slap-dab in the Fantasy side of things.

And the big difference is this: Fantasy doesn't care about the changes to the culture and world except inasmuch as they impact the narrative. The fact that someone is throwing fireballs, or shooting a laser pistol, doesn't matter as much as the fact that they are attacking something.

Science Fiction asks WHY, Fantasy asks WHAT (drama asks HOW, mystery WHO.. etc etc...).


And SAO is hardline SCIENCE FICTION. (yaaay, back to the main point!). It doesn't care that the video game they're stuck in has magic, or guns, or Mr. Mime... it cares that FULLY IMMERSIVE VR EXISTS, and how that effects society.

This is why the GunGale arc is actually very, very important. Yes, the SAO arc is the introduction, but the action isn't a focus, the focus is people given the 'freedoms' of a non-modern society, suddenly. The Elfheim arc is important, not because what's-her-face is being imprisoned, but because it asks the question of "In a VR world, does who you are outside important?". GunGale is important, because it asks "What is the extent of a game, when you can live a life inside one?".

It's also why the Excalibur arc is utterly extraneous filler that doesn't matter.



But yeah. SAO is hardline scifi, whereas almost every other anime out there (popular, at least) is Fantasy of one kind or another.

And that's why I like it. And that's why I don't think the characters matter one whit.

Functionally there is no meaningful difference between Fantasy and Science Fiction except for the surface motifs, which is probably why you'll often find both in the same section at Barnes and Noble and both are generally classified under Speculative Fiction.

I think the big difference for SAO really comes down to how much can you enjoy a sappy teenage love story and can you like it enough to overlook all the bad writing in the series itself. Kirito was pretty Mary Sue throughout the whole series, so that rubbed lots of people the wrong way. Asuna came off as naive a lot of time. Worst of all there was only kind of iffy character development for either or them. Consider for a moment that Sword Art Online was turned down for publication when the author first wrote it, and only got released at all following the success of the much more well written and engaging Accel World.

Doesn't help that for a show about people stuck in a video game the series was very clearly not written by someone who'd played any as opposed to the ever popular .Hack franchise and the not that long after Log Horizon.

That's also in turn why I think SAOA ended up so successful for Something Witty. They rewrote the entire series with Kirito as an internet troll and ran from there filling the series with the kind of characters and behaviors you'll actually find in online games.

I've always viewed Science Fiction as a sub-category of Fantasy.

I think Fantasy has been incorrectly interpreted as narrowly meaning classical "Wizards and Knights" type settings because that makes up a huge chunk of the overall Fantasy genre. Sort of a stereotype if you will.

I believe that Fantasy is itself a subtype of fiction which takes place in a setting which does not exist. And that itself can then divide into a myriad of sub-types. Completely fictional worlds and settings. Worlds based on the real world with some "magical" elements added in. Settings in the far future with fantastic levels of technology such as to be indistinguishable from magic.

I think Grey Templar has the way of it.

Speaking of Log Horizon, are we getting more seasons of that one?

 AduroT wrote:
Speaking of Log Horizon, are we getting more seasons of that one?

If there was any justice or benevolent deity in this universe, the answer would be Yes, along with Spice and Wolf season 3. Afaik there isn't anything concrete.

Unfortunately when adapting other works the Anime is often seen as a merchandising/advertising opportunity and there is rarely an interest in adapting the full series unless it's something monstrously popular.