And that, ladies and gentlemen, is the art of “clickbait”.

Well, if you’re in to that sorta thing, at least. But what does this have to do with my week so far? Actually, I’ve been pretty into following up on what’s going on with the Nintendo Switch, so much so that it’s come to the point that a big chunk of news articles online — from “reputable” sources, at that — are creating poorly-researched articles just to get in on the hype surrounding the reputed hybrid-console. Then there’s the over-hyped coverage of Trump’s recent executive order that’s got people bawling their heads out in agony. But don’t get me wrong — I’m not undermining the repercussions of these news articles in general. I’m simply trying to highlight the fact that there’s always an underlying message that is being communicated in the way all things are presented — be it politics or, you guessed it, anime.

And for the anime, at least, I think if they aren’t trying to push for a meaningful message, then they’re probably just toying around with the mainstay stropes that people have grown accustomed to. And that’s all fine, I can live with that. But that, in itself, has made me toss aside some titles in favor of things that offer more than pure self-gratification.

So what the heck happened this week to make me say all that? Well, let’s find out! Continue reading →

Be unproductive. Be lazy. Be Edna.

But seriously, I had such a lazy weekend. That and the fact that I have so many deadlines, so yeah that’s definitely not a good thing. Still, Edna is just chill as f**k.

Quite similarly, things have been pretty “chill” during the third week of Winter. It’s funny in that the shows seem to be pretty comfortable quite early on, regardless of how quirky each of them might be. And that’s probably because one of them is the venerable March comes in like a Lion, which is by far just owning the pack at this point. But even without its head start, shows like Shôwa Genroku Rakugo Shinjû and, yes, even the prodigal Tales of Zestiria the X are re-proving their worth as the weeks go by. That almost makes the newer titles in this group, Demi-chan wa Kataritai and Urara Meirochô, pale in comparison.

So what just happened? Let’s run ’em down! Continue reading →

Gaaaah… That’s what I get for saying things and then end up jinxing the situation. As much as I wanted to get out a week in review a bit earlier this week, lab work had me fully decked and basically coming home too exhausted to write, let alone even watch anything.

But yeah, so is life. C’est la vie and all that jazz. I’m happy I can get back to writing. So like I said, I’m splitting up my weekly thoughts into two parts, which have been re-named somewhat and are labeled “Side A” and “Side B”. Not to sound patronizing, but in case some of you out there might be too young to remember this, we used to listen to music on audio cassettes that had you flip it around when it got to the end. There were also things called laser discs, which were basically the spiritual predecessor of the DVD — and yes, they had two sides, as well. Likewise, my thoughts have two sides to them. Neat, huh?

Anyway, that’s enough history for one post. So let’s get down to it then, shall we? Side A of the weekly thoughts — let’s do this! Continue reading →