Hello, everyone! Matthew here. I have been given the honor of closing out this calendar year in anime with one final adieu to 2017 and the things we here at Beneath the Tangles have been privileged to accomplish with your help and support as readers, whether you support us through your generous Patreon donations or by simply (though certainly no less generously) reading our words and going along with our antics in this quaint little corner of the anime blog– o’–verse. There are many anime-related content creators doing great work out there, of whom we are fans ourselves, and so we are always flattered when any of you end up over here to listen to our ramblings. We love to do this stuff, and it makes it that much more worth it to us knowing that you think we’re worth your time.
As for our articles and musings this year, we’ve been all over the board. We’ve pitched our two cents in every now and again as we (the staff) tried to remain up to date on the furious flurry of new shows like Kino’s Journey, Boruto, Miss Kobayashi’s Dragon Maid, Attack on Titan, Elegant Yokai Apartment Life, and Boku no Hero Academia. Some of us, including yours truly, have even braved our “Plan to Watch” lists on your behalf, covering past series like Assassination Classroom, and even throwing it as far back as Clannad and Cardcaptor Sakura in some of our “revisit” articles. Our staff is blessed to have fairly broad interests, genre-wise, and we hope to continue branching out to address some of your favorite shows, both current and classic, in the coming year.
It’s our policy, when watching anime, to ask ourselves what else there might be, if anything, beneath the super-powered violence, cute girls doing cute things, and tournament arcs. By doing so, we found a considerable amount of applicable, everyday wisdom in each of the shows we chose to follow this year. Some of those shows dropped actual and entire Bible verses into play , and other times wisdom met us in quite unexpected places. But the thing I love seeing on the blog most (which anyone who’s been reading my articles can testify to) is how these sometimes zany, sometimes grotesque, sometimes kawaii, sometimes kowai Japanese animations testify to the lordship of Jesus Christ in often complex and intelligent ways. And that’s not because there’s some secret Christian conspiracy among anime producers (not to my knowledge, anyway…), but because – we believe – God really is sovereign all the way down to Japanese cartoons. All of us over here at BtT think that’s just awesome and we’re grateful you are willing to humor us when we say so. So, thank you, readers. Here’s to you, to anime, and to a blessed 2018.
If you would, please comment below with the things you most liked about the blog this year, things we’ve done that you wish we would do more often, and/or things we might change. Is there a genre or specific show within it on which you’d like to hear our opinion? Are there certain social media platforms on which you’d like to see more of our content? We would love to hear back from you so that we can improve the site and make it as interactive and enjoyable as we can. Helping us out with your thoughts below would be a great place to start on that quest. Huzzah!
- Missing the Forest for the Chainsaws - 01.16.2023
- Let Them Eat Cake: One Piece’s Study of Narcissism - 07.13.2022
- Berserk Chapter 362: The Old Gods - 10.28.2020
Happy New Year! 🙂
And to you as well! Thanks for reading!