Interstella5555: The 5tory of The 5ecret 5tar 5ystem – 5ecret 5anta Review

This year marks, I believe, the 11th year of the Secret Santa Project and my eighth year participating. Reverse Thieves started the project and continued it for ten years and this year marks the first year that All Geeks Considered hosts this absolutely enjoyable project. I don’t know which part I enjoy more, the picking of anime for someone else to watch or discovering what new anime someone has chosen for me to watch.

My track record in receiving good picks has been very good. Will this year continue the string or did I receive a big lump of coal this year?

Thank You Kyoto Animation

After the horrific tragedy that occurred last July, I knew I needed to write as near a perfect personal tribute to the wonderful people at Kyoto Animation as I am able to before I would even contemplate continuing to write about anime. It seemed like the right and proper thing to do, as well as being the bare minimum I needed to do as so much of the joy that anime has given me in the 15+ years I’ve watched it has been connected to Kyoto Animation.

While the intent as obvious to me, the form of such a tribute alluded me. I almost decided on doing a countdown of my favorite KyoAni works, in part because I’d been thinking of doing one for years now, but realized after further reflection that some clickbaity sounding article was not even close to what Kyoto Animation deserved from me. A better option would have been a long post where I talked about an assorted list of favorites and I almost started blocking such a post out. I realized I still wasn’t happy with this idea since I could really make such a post about any animation studio. As I worked slowly towards the answer, I also realized that I sort of didn’t want to find the answer. Doing so would acknowledge what happened, make it a fact, and remove any space in my brain to retreat to and imagine Schrodinger’s box is still unopened. Incidentally, that’s why I’ve never watched Satoshi Kon’s Perfect Blue; once I do then there are no more movies of his I can look forward to seeing and I have to acknowledge he’s been gone for 9 years now.

To combat my disinclination to post this, I signed up for this year’s Anime Secret Santa that the website all geek’s considered is continuing from the tradition started by Reverse Thieves. To post my review for that, I need to write this first 🙂 .

And I eventually realized why I’m so uniquely thankful for Kyoto Animation. Episode 0 of The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya – The Adventures of Mikuru Asahina.

Carole & Tuesday – First Impressions

There are only a few director/creators in anime that their mere name is enough to make a sizable portion of anime fandom commit to watching their shows. This blue moon of a season happens to have two such director/creators. The first is Shinichirou Watanabe with his work – Carole & Tuesday – and the second is Kunihiko Ikuhara with his work – Sarazanmai. Of the two, I was more curious about Carole & Tuesday because one kinda already knows what one will get with Ikuhara (interesting story wrapped in a bonkers, memorable, animation style) and I wanted to see if Shinichirou Watanabe can channel his inner Shoji Kawamori.

Mix: Meisei Story – First Impressions

With the third season of Chihayafuru being delayed to this autumn, Mix: Meisei Story easily became the anime I was most looking forward to from the new Spring 2019 season which makes it the logical place to start my coverage for the season. And because it’s already got a couple unrelated-to-the-actual-anime strikes against it, I also feel the need to help draw people’s attention to what will hopefully and probably be one of the best titles of the season.

The Winter 2019 Anime Final Report, Part 2

Seeing as I didn’t write anything for three months, I guess I shouldn’t be surprised that I was unable to keep myself brief enough that a part 2 wasn’t warranted. Read on to see what I thought of the Isekai series that started in the fall and continuing through this season as well as see which series I name the best new series and best overall series of the season.

The Winter 2019 Anime Final Report, Part 1

In a shock to almost no one, the long forecasted demise of anime did not occur during the recently completed Winter 2019 season. Instead, we got another solid season of anime made more impressive because the winter season, like the summer season, is considered an off-season for the industry. And I almost missed it because of my shoddy time management skills and because of a certain slime-tastic video game.