Amph All-Encompassing Anime/Manga Thread

I did not know there was an anime adaptation, but the spin-off comic it’s based on is great because it’s basically just Araki reflecting on being an artist through the lens of the best side character from Part 4 doing weird Part 4-esque stuff. I’ll have to check that out.

 

^ I finished it yesterday, it's really good stuff.

Punk I'm watching Demon's slayer as well !

I like it so far, but I'm starting to wonder why in fantasy stuff they love so much the archetype of the young boy with a lot of potential who loses the family and then meets the mentor and starts training to become a super badass. I mean come on, that's not the only way to tell a story, writers could try alternative plot ideas once in a while, or not?

 

Demon Slayer is kind of infamously cliché ridden so I don’t think it’s going to get much better on that front.

 

The issue I have is that as a cliché this one precisely is not that good, to deserve to be essentially made the only template available for fantastic story-telling.

 

So, I was thinking of finally diving into Lupin III, and was wondering where the best place to get started was. For reference, I've already seen The Castle of Cagliostro.

 

Series 2, where he has a dark red jacket, is basically the template for most understandings of the character, so if you’re okay with older television animation it’s the go-to. You’ll quickly get a handle on who most of the main recurring cast is and how they usually act. Plus it’s episodic so you can stop when you want.

Now, Series 1 (green jacket) is kind of fascinating given it’s where Miyazaki actually did some work, but the problem is it’s a mess, where for about half the episodes they don’t really know what they want to do (I count at least one of the early episodes as one of the worst television episodes I’ve ever seen), and then when Miyazaki takes over he’s basically scrambling to salvage it, and the results are just... fine. It does introduce Goemon, but everybody else just shows up, so you’re not even really getting backstory. Cagliostro is, for my money and Miyazaki’s, his definitive statement on the matter, so S1 is not worth it until you’re sure you actually like the damn franchise. Series 3 (pink jacket) is just Series 2 but worse.

If you want modern stuff, Part IV: The Italian Adventure is very good, and really gets the character, so it could be a fine place to start as well even if it isn’t quite so iconic. It’s usually talked about as an effective “synthesis” of the character from previous adaptations, and I agree. It also gave us the iconic line “Everyone in the world is a cop now, huh?” Some people praise The Woman Called Fujiko Mine, but I thought it was obnoxiously queerphobic and obsessed with being edgy (ironically this maybe makes it the truest to the manga), so I can’t really recommend it when Part IV is right there.

The films, television and theatrical, are all pretty take-it-or-leave-it and will generally assume you’ve seen some of the television material. For what it’s worth none of the other movies aside from Cagliostro really stand out in my mind as must watch masterpieces or anything like that.

All in all, Lupin has no metanarrative, so you can kind of freely pick and choose whatever you want to watch when you want to watch it.

 

Demon Slayer is rather pretty looking. It's pleasant to watch, the main characters are decently made, and the design of the places is quite impressive. The plot is a bit simple perhaps, in the sense that in the anime it all reduces to these guys going from place to place to kill demons, but I guess the manga contains additional layers to the story, so I should read it before telling that for sure.

 

Finished Jojo's Bizarre Adventure Part 3. So far I'd say it's my least favourite part. It had some great moments and the last ten episodes are excellent, but there's an awful lot of superfluous nonsense in the earlier episodes. Did they really need the first D'Arby brother or Mondatta and Zenyatta? It just dragged on for too long. Gonna move on to Part 4, but I don't have high expectations.

 

Part 4 (DINC if you’re nasty) was my favorite part until I sucked it up and read SBR. Something about goofy dumbasses wandering around accidentally getting into life or death struggles over noodles or whatever really did it for me. It definitely does live or die based on your enjoyment of slice of life, however.

My least favorite part is 5, but I need to reread it because I suspect some of that is down to how terrible the fan translations that were available at the time... were. There’s obviously something there with how gah gah everyone went over the anime.

Edit: Also I’m very excited to see what happens with spoiler free anime only fans when they get to the end of this upcoming Stone Ocean adaptation. Very, very excited.

 

A long time ago I bought Spirited Away for a good friend’s kids. He’s not into that kind of thing at all... at all.
His daughter is now in college and I hadn’t seen her in years. She showed me her new No Face tattoo

 

RIP Kentaro Miura.

Gone too soon, leaving an amazing unfinished masterpiece. I've heard he's been setting up so the story can be completed but it won't be quite the same without him.

 

I don’t even see the point without him. His art is too tightly ingrained in the feel of Berserk. Other formats or other manga creators can’t do it justice.

 

I am relatively new to the Anime, but am starting to get into the whole thing. Am currently watching Ghost in the Shell Stand Alone Complex, rewatching Neon Genesis Evangelion and Psycho Pass

Need to check Berserk.

 

I just recently started watching the new Eden anime series on Netflix. It's definitely YA-oriented. It's about a post-apocalyptic world where there are no humans walking around Earth but it's being cultivated and flourishes with AI robots. One day a pair of these robots discover a pod out in the field, and when it opens there's a human child. They proceed to raise the child as their own, and moving forward the show focuses on the teenage girl's adventures in discovering what happened to humanity. The animation is kind of wishy-washy IMO; it's computer generated in the same aspect as the Disney+ show SW Resistance. I prefer animation that is either pure hand drawn (that is not Disney Pixar quality) or at least resembles it with a modern touch like the Violet Evergarden series.

 

The original Mobile Suit Gundam is on Netflix. This is a film that is a collection of the first 3 episodes right? Seriously, this is good!

 

Way more episodes than that (as a reference point, all the Garma stuff is from like episodes 8-10). The trilogy movies are basically the director’s cut of the original series, despite being shorter: cleaned up animation, fewer weird “enemy of the week” suits, an expanded finale, etc. I was pretty happy to see they’re likely on in a pretty long term capacity since Netflix clearly wants to funnel people to Hathaway via the trilogy and Char’s Counterattack (a doable if extremely patchwork viewing order).

 

Watching anime again.

Thinking of trying out a new manga (like from 2020 or 2021).

Any pointers?

 

If you like Jump’s output, the Shonen Jump app is a very good way to try out various new series they put out. It’s one of the few legal resources for day and date manga chapters.

Though the usual issue with any new manga is that there’s a pretty high risk of sudden, unsatisfying cancellation (particularly nowadays as Covid seems to be impacting sales in Japan, but there’s always been a lot of this). For example, I was enjoying a series called Nine Dragons Ball Parade, which was basically a goofy version of “Moneyball” approaches to baseball, and it got ****canned and had a total non-ending.

 

Anyone watch Cells at Work? I saw clips years ago, but now that I know there is an English dub I'm going to watch it. On amazon I'd have to buy it...so what the heck I am. Its really praised by the medical community for its accuracy and everything, so that's another reason its intriguing to me.



Also the platelets are adorable.

 

So after so many tries, I'm FINALLY watching Cells at Work. I'm on episode 3 already and of course I freaking love this show. I'm still in the beginning of episode 3 but the Macrophage has a freaking sword like Cloud Strife and I'm almost falling out of my chair laughing at it.

 

I watched the series last year; there actually is a Season 2, but to date Netflix hasn't given any hint to when it will become available on their channel.

 

I had to buy the season on amazon. I'll probably have to do the same for season 2

 

I have a Netflix subscription of course, so I'm banking on them eventually releasing the new season.

 

Guess I can post this here



But I seriously do what to do the Red Blood Cell costume idea. I plan to blow up balloons, put O2 on them, and give them to people