First Impressions – Page 9

Banana Fish — First Impressions

Published on July 7, 2018Leave a comment

Okumura Eiji, a naive Japanese photographer’s assistant comes to New York, meets a gang leader in a bar and immediately gets to touch his gun.

Banana Fish: hold my gun

Which is not exactly subtle, but does symbolise what Banana Fish is all about. This is a classic eighties shoujo romance manga, slightly updated for modern times, an adaptation a lot of fans of the manga have been waiting on. I only know of it by reputation myself, so if you want a review from a proper fan, try Anime Feminist. As for me, judging on the first episode only, this is going to be one of the best series this season. Just seeing those eighties character designs with real noses is a win for me. It makes it stand out from every other anime this season, just like Megalo Box did last season.

Banana Fish: witnessing a murder

Most of the focus in this episode is on Ash, the blonde gang leader, who stumbles across a murder done by his own men. Just before he dies, their victim hands Ash something and mumbles two words: Banana Fish. Which are the last words Ash’s older brother said when he seemingly went mad and attacked his squad in Iraq. It’s this that drives the plot of the series and this first episode is mostly setup, getting all the pieces in place for the story to start in earnest. There’s a lot happening this episode but it never felt rushed. Similarly, though about a dozen new characters are introduced, it was easy enough to keep track of who was who and what their role in the story was. It makes such a difference to have a good team working on this

Banana Fish: unhealthy relationship

There are some nasty undercurrents in this episode, revolving around the relationship between Ash and mafia boss “Papa” Dino Golzine, here doing his best to come across as a paedophile. Combine that with his henchman being a “fan” of the videos of Ash used to make and some very nasty things are insinuated here. How these insinuations, as well as Ash and Eiji’s relationship will be treated is what’ll make or break Banana Fish. The original manga is very much a product of its time and the way we talk about queerness, about being gay, about child abuse, has changed. Banana Fish can be a bit problematic and the anime has to be careful in how it deals with these elements, finding that balance of being true to the original and not causing harm by doing so.

Banana Fish: using slurs were none were used is disappointing

The same duty falls on Amazon’s translators and they already failed, by translating a non-homophobic insult with a gay slur. The first hurdle and the translation failed. Disappointing. Hopefully this will improve with later episodes and corrected in this one.

Isekai Maou — First Impressions

Published on July 5, 2018Leave a comment

Isekai Maou to Shoukan Shoujo no Dorei Majutsu‘s appeal is not exactly hidden:

Isekai Maou: boobies

So, shut-in edgelord gets transported to the world of his favourite game as the demon lord he’s playing as, summoned by a cat girl and an elf, who were trying to summon a familair ala Zero no Tsukaima, but instead became enslaved to him. This is, as @LossThief said on Twitter, an anime that says the quiet part loud about isekai fantasy. As such it’s less hypocritical than something like last year’s Death March, not trying to be better than it is, a slavery fetish power fantasy. There’s no deeper meaning to be found here, you know exactly what you’re in for from the start.

Isekai Maou: sexual assault

Having read the manga version of this until it got too boring, I know it’ll stick to the template all those isekai fantasies have: our overpowered protagonist will, join the adventurers guild, then faff around, though there may be some nominal plot about going on a quest or whatever. In the end, it’s all about the waifus, our hero getting to play with flesh and blood girls rather than plastic figurines. Of course he’s the kind of otaku who has never ever talked to a girl, so of course he hides behind his Devil Lord persona. And since the girls here have been enslaved –accidently! through no fault of his own!– they’re safe. So the series can flirt with all that sexy, sexy pretend rape while still have its hero be a good guy. He only wants to help that cat girl after all, so that’s why he has to rub her ears to get her to spill her secret. See? She’s grateful he did.

If there’s anything where Isekai Maou stands out it’s in the quality of the animation: it’s all a bit better than it needs to be. Normally garbage tier isekais get garbage tier effort put into them, but this is all just that little bit smoother than usual. Most of it to better show off the elf girl’s chest or the cat girl’s arousal, true. So it’s still trash, just slightly better looking trash. I think this actually has a chance of being popular, having just that extra bit of quality that anime like Death March and Smart Phone lacked. f you’re fourteen and horny, this may be the anime for you, if you can get past the slavery.

Senjuushi — First Impressions

Published on July 3, 2018Leave a comment

I’ve tried giving this a chance, but I doozed off halfway through the episode watching it on the couch.

Senjuushi: bland pretty boys

Remember the sword boy animes from a few seasons ago? Well, Senjuushi is the same, only with antique guns. Some of which are special guns, owned by people like Napoleon, while others are more generic incarnations of a certain type of gun, like Springfield or Brown Bess. Anyway, they’re all pretty boys, with some dressing in a non gender conforming way, serving a master who in some way has called them to live and who the subtitles keep addressing in a gender neutral way. Which is about the most interesting thing about this episode. Apart from that, the setting could be interesting: World War III happened and the centralised world state that took over all weaponry after it has slid into tyranny, with our gun boys being part of the resistance. But there are far too many characters introduced to care about and most of them seem to have no personality other than their hair colour. Too much talking, not enough action, with the animation nothing special either and it all looks like every other pretty boy series. Not for me I’m afraid.

Hanebado! — First Impressions

Published on July 1, 2018Leave a comment

We usually played volleyball or basketball in high school, but occasionally we had to try badminton as well. I was never good at it, unlike these girls:

Hanebado!: badmintoning intensifies

This is in the establishing flashback with which the episode starts. Aragaki Nagisa, the intense girl in the background will lose this match 21-0 to the badminton monster that is Hanesaki Ayano, the girl in the blue shirt, driving the former to ‘git gud’, in the process driving her club mates to despair, while the latter leaves badminton altogether. That is, until she enrolls in the same high school as the first girl and is challenged to a match with her. This takes the whole episode to set up, but that wasn’t a problem for me.

Hanebado!: a coach with grabby hands. Original

What was a problem was coach grabby over here, who actually climbs over a fence onto the tennis court to fondle her hands when he sees Ayano protect her friend from a stray ball hit by the tennis club’s ace player. Which is supposed to show he’s a badminton savant but which comes across as creepy, as it always does. The second problem is that there was little badminton on offer here after the flashback, but that can be excused by the need for character establishment. Less excusable is that the point of the whole episode is to force Ayano into a match when it’s clear she doesn’t want to play badminton anymore. It’s an old, tired trope to have an ace player fed up with their sport being forced to return to it only to rediscover their love for it.

Hanebado!: Nagisa finds out her rival goes to her school now

Much can be excused for intense faces like this though, Nagisa after she finds out that the rival she’s determined to beat is at her own school, playing tennis instead of badminton. In general the animation and design quality of this first episode is quite high, especially in that badminton match and I like that none of the characters look particularly ‘anime’ but a bit more realistic. This has good potential. I like a good sports series, as long as it doesn’t faff about too much.

Island — First Impressions

Published on July 1, 2018Leave a comment

Twin tailed heroine stumbles and faceplants straight into our very naked protagonist’s crotch. Even without knowing anything else about it, you know this is going to be based on a visual novel. It’s as if the early 2000s have never left.

Island: Face full of alien wing wong

Naked boy here lost his memory but knows he was sent back from the future to save the past and keeps having little flashbacks/forwards about the girls he interacts with. Said girls so far include the blonde sporty twintailed tsundere above, the silver haired weirdo who can only leave her house at night and the flat chested priestess who looks significantly younger than the other two. Lots of buildup and mysterious allusions so far, not much plot and a little bit of the usual smexy comedic antics any self respecting visual novel adaptation has to has. Enjoyable, but I’m under no illusion this may turn out to be good. As long as it doesn’t turn out to be actively obnoxious I’ll keep watching.