An American Writer's Thoughts on Japanese Animation

Month: May 2024

Start Your Engines – Wish Upon the Pleiades Spoiler Review

Some series exist to push product. It’s true in Western animation and it’s true in Anime as well. Usually, the product in question is some manner of toy; I’ve covered a fair number of anime shows based on card games or plastic models, so this blog is no stranger to the sometimes desperate product tie-in side of the art form.

Yet even given that, Wish Upon the Pleiades is weird. Subaru – the car company – apparently decided that they needed an anime outing to their name, and got Gainax of all studios to put it together for them, first as an ONA in 2011 and then as a full-run show in 2015. The latter is what we’re looking at today.

Read More…Read More…

Second Quest, First Anime — Blue Reflection Ray Spoiler Review

Let’s talk about feelings.

But not any specific feelings. Feelings in abstract. The idea of feelings. Let’s ride the fine line between deeply exploratory science fiction and outright Care Bears as we treat feelings, categorically, as well-defined things and not aspects of mood, situation, personality, or so on.

And let’s make this talk at least somewhat interesting by having magical girls battle over the outcome. Let’s talk about Blue Reflection Ray.

Read More…Read More…

What. – Yohane the Parhelion: Sunshine in the Mirror Spoiler Review

Yohane the Parhelion: Sunshine in the Mirror is a show about a girl called Yohane, who is trying to make it big as a pop idol when… let me start over. Yohane the Parhelion is a show about a girl called Yohane trying to fit in in her small town home, alongside her giant talking wolf… let me start over. Yohane is a show about a fantastical world with mythical beings, talking animals… one talking animal… magic music and… hold on, I think I need to start over again. This is a show about the bonds between a group of special young women and how they can hope to dispel a dark magical calamity threatening their town, and… You know what, I’ll try the simple version.

Yohane the Parhelion: Sunshine in the Mirror is a show. Let’s talk about it.

Read More…Read More…