Sep 27

Sep 27 008 - The Anime Episode

YO WHATS UP WITH ANIME

This week’s article, I am calling, “Yo, Whats Up With Anime”. One, because it’s always fun to cover anime, and another – because I can butcher all the words on the audio podcast and upset more people.

Netflix recently put out a Cyberpunk Anime, and, you know, Netflix raises their price to be $15 a month or so, but I just gotta see what the hell this new series is, plus, now I have a backlog of shows like Sandman and the new Great British Bakeoff. Cyberpunk is such a weird universe, but Netflix has put out great animation in the past, such as Arcane, and really tough to sit through shows like Cuphead – so what’s my consensus?

Well, honestly. I will say, it is probably one of the better shows to come out in quite a while. Cyberpunk: Edgerunners tells the story of David, a high schooler, yeah, it’s anime, high schooler, who is taking care of the mom, but because illegal terms of service doohickeys and copyright claims and other great tech problems, loses it all and becomes a Netrunner, who is essentially a bootlegger in the Cyberpunk Universe. This is essentially what Cyberpunk 2077 attempted to be with it’s story, but instead of the awkward NPC clipping through wall and Cybertruck fascination, it’s actually more dour, and more drab compared to other “Cyberpunk” universes, including Blade Runner – but it honestly reminded me so much of series like FLCL in it’s fluid animation, and Gurren Lagaan in it’s character design and soundtrack, and then you have these amazing visual effects, that make it feel also very much like a westernized television series, than an animated program, that it just has so much to talk about, in such little time. With emotional beats around every corner. I honestly, can say not since Season 1 of Jujitsu Kaisen on HBO Max, has an anime pulled me right in, quite like Cyberpunk: Edgerunners.

In any other universe, that would’ve been a “complimentary comic book” that came with the pre-order of the pretty boring video game, but instead, you got a full fleshed out anime series that caught me by surprise, and without spoiling much of the story, Episode 6, Girl on Fire, is probably the best episode of the season, and did make me pause and cry over the real troubles going on in my own life. When a cartoon can make a guy like me stop and think, it’s done something right and it’s worth applauding.

To keep the Netflix viewing alive, I also watched just one episode of the “Stone Ocean” chapter of Jojo’s Bizarre Adventure. What I love about this show is it’s not really afraid to make it’s frames into individual pieces of art, and be very expressive in a way that isn’t just the standard reactionary anime faces we come to expect. Jolene continues to be a powerhouse character as she continues her jailbreak story, with the really really buff muscle boys. I haven’t really gotten involved that much into the latest series, but as they say on the internet “I love it’s vibe”, I’ll probably get back to it after this podcast, but who knows.

And finally on Netflix, I tried to watch the new Shaman King, because hey, look, it’s a generic shonen anime, and let’s see what the kids are into. And one thing is for certain – it’s certainly not the 4kids version I remember so much, this one still has that over-expression anime style, but in many ways, it has become somewhat of a sleeper hit for Netflix, and I still have no idea why – is it because Beyblade is Hard to Find? I can however, see children getting really interested in this version of Shaman King over the earlier ones, especially when it comes to it’s fight sequences.

But then I realized – wait a minute, I actually have a Disney Bundle, which means I have Hulu, and Hulu has anime, so I wound up stuck over there, and I watched two animes – Spy x Family (Jordan, Please Call It Spy And Family, not Spy Ex Family or Spy Family in the Recording, Thank You) and Bleach.

Spy x Family has it’s first season right up there on the Hulu, and I know this week is Season 2 of the show, and I only watched one episode of this show this week – but I honestly think, this show is pretty good. One of my favorite shows of recent era was “Millionaire Detective: Unlimited”, but it was sadly a short lived series, that had this level of crime fiction and serialized drama, and for some reason. Spy x Family features some of those same beats that I love about that show, but instead of cops, it’s, spies. When I saw the show’s description, it felt like “Mr and Mrs Smith, but with a daughter” and while there is spies and counter spies in that family sitcom, I did not expect to enjoy the daughter character so much in this show. Usually, that daughter character in the anime is always this piece of shit character that ruins a perfectly good thing, But it’s actually a great balance, as you see the mom’s point of view, the dad’s point of view and then her point of view in different scenes, watching the show, it brought out laughter, and then proceeded to do “the cool action scene” and honestly, if it was done in any other medium, would feel like a really crappy Disney Channel live action sitcom, but given some of the dramatic beats about assassination missions, while still breaking out at random times into “family sitcom” – it struck a balance, that somehow, someway, brought a huge smile to my face. And now I have to check to make sure I have the subscriptions for later and it’s on my list.

The next, was Bleach, the last time I watched Bleach was on Adult Swim back in High School in 2008. And it turns out, unsurprisingly, the show is still around, and still has seasons and arcs, and while there was this really cool movie trailer I saw recently “Bleach: Thousand Year Blood War” with this cool animation, I wanted to peak on over to ask that really dumb question – “Do I have to watch the TV show to understand the standalone movie tie-in” and the answer, unsurprisingly, is no. The animation from the show is exactly how I remembered it from decades ago, however because I foolishly watched episode 4,319 or whatever was most recent and have missed probably 2 decades worth of info, I was so out of the loop, and all I know was Ichigo is there, and Rukia is there, and they still are shinigamis, but I think much like watching Survivor Season 1 and a recent Survivor, it’s really tough to compare the two – lots have changed, lots of updates, and it’s really difficult to keep track.

Finally, while it’s not out yet, I saw this trailer for Chainsaw Man that all the internet people have been going “oh shit!” about, but I am not getting crunchyroll anytime soon, I am very very passive with anime viewing, but seeing this trailer, of a chainsaw headed monster, I am laughing and enjoying what I saw and do wonder if there is a place to see this, like a movie theater or an amazon prime thing?

Anyway, as I try to sort out my Verizon plans as apparently my new phone plan includes the Disney Bundle for Free, and that means free anime, I will stop recording this segment, and figure that out. I hope you all have a great week, and if you’re a Patreon, stay tuned, because I think I talk about game shows for nearly twenty minutes.