As someone who absolutely fell in love with Infinite Dendrogram after being introduced to it through the Light Novel Club, the series’s anime adaptation was easily the show I was most looking forward to this season. And it doesn’t disappoint. While not without room for improvement, it was a strong introduction. If you don’t already… Read More First Impression: Infinite Dendrogram (for Light Novel Readers)
Day 10: Hope Just as you know Dasher and Dancer and Prancer and Vixen, but may not recall the most famous reindeer of all, you probably know about the Sword Art Online anime adaptation’s Christmas episode, but you may not be familiar with Kirito and Asuna’s first Christmas in Aincrad. Sword Art Online Progressive is… Read More 12 Days of Christmas Anime: Sword Art Online Progressive, Vol. 3
Day 5: Gift Tally ho! The quest for off-the-beaten-path Christmas stories in anime and light novels brings me to Obsessions of an Otome Gamer, volume 1. If you’re not familiar with series, it’s a heartwarming tale of family, friendship, and…classical music. (I can only assume the author is a fan?) Protagonist Mashiro discovers that she… Read More 12 Days of Christmas Anime: Obsessions of an Otome Gamer
Day 1: Hero Beneath the Tangles seems to have slipped into an inadvertent biennial tradition of writing about Sword Art Online‘s Christmas episode (the third episode of the series). Others wrote about it two years and four years ago, respectively, and now I want to take a turn at it. I’m sure you already know… Read More 12 Days of Christmas Anime: Sword Art Online Episode 3, Take 3
Welcome back, ladies and gentlemen, to another episode of “That Anime/Light Novel Said Something So Well I Don’t Know How to Add to It!” Today’s thought comes from vol. 2 of Obsessions of an Otome Gamer. I was re-reading it and came across a passage I highlighted on my first reading, and it struck as… Read More Resisting an Otome Gamer’s Inner Ugliness
Sometimes an anime or light novel says something so well that I want to draw attention to it, yet struggle to know how to add anything new beyond what it said. Most recently, this occurred with a passage in The Devil Is a Part-Timer!, vol. 1. If you’re unfamiliar with the series or its anime… Read More The Curious Case of Devil King Maou
The Legend of Zelda: Link’s Awakening, for the Nintendo Switch, is an incredibly faithful remake of a decades-old game, with all the charm of the original, plus gorgeous art and sound, and a variety of quality of life improvements. I confess I came to this game highly biased. Link’s Awakening, the old black and white… Read More Legend of Zelda: Link’s Awakening (Switch) Review
Is It Wrong to Try to Pick Up Girls in a Dungeon? is, as the absurd title implies, generally a fairly lighthearted show. So I was quite surprised when it abruptly featured an arc dealing with sex trafficking. I appreciated the unambiguously evil portrayal ofthe goddess Ishtar and her chief pimp Phryne. The show clearly… Read More Bell’s Heroic Love (in a Dungeon?)
Rascal Does Not Dream of a Dreaming Girl is a sequel / follow-up to last year’s delightful Rascal Does Not Dream of Bunny Girl Senpai. It’s very much more of the same, and that’s a good thing. The series ended without resolving the curious case of Makinohara Shoko, and now the film delves into that… Read More Review: Rascal Does Not Dream of a Dreaming Girl
Is It Wrong to Try to Pick Up Girls in a Dungeon? takes place in Orario, a setting populated by gods drawn from a variety of ancient mythologies. These beings form followings known as familia. Early in the second season of the series, the god Apollo attempts to poach protagonist Bell Cranel from his goddess,… Read More Making Gods in Our Image (in a Dungeon)