Weekly! Ranma podcast series

 You may not have noticed, but there is a new weekly segment for The Otaku Network Podcast called, Weekly! Ranma.  The first episode is already available on YouTube and Spotify at this point and each episode comes out Friday mornings.

 

    Given my anime fandom started in the early 90's, Ranma is a a vital part of that fandom.  I became aware of the franchise a little before the concept of anime took over my brain though.  It came in the form of an article in some forgotten gaming magazine in 1993.  The article, promoting the newly release Ranma 1/2 Hard Battle release for the SNES, provided and overview of the story its self and then went on to talk about the game.  I don't remember anything about the article other than it highlighting the entire concept of the series...the Jusenkyo curses and Ranma transforming between boy-type and girl-type.  I also remember it talking about one character doing the same but into a panda instead of a girl...Ranma's father.  That novel concept stuck with me and I remember mentioning it to friends at school but it kind of filed its self away.

    Skip ahead to either 1995 or 1996 and the obsession with anime is in full force.  As we scoured the shelves of Blockbuster I noticed tapes for the Ranma TV series immediately recalled the article from earlier in the decade and started the journey with episode 1 of season 3...and the introduction of Ukyo to the story.  Look, don't judge, back in the day we weren't bothered by continuity and just watched whatever was available and figured it out from there!  From that point the series became a core title in frequent anime consumption and as a key piece of bringing new people into the cult.  So...to say I was excited about Ranma getting its own remake treatment like Urusei Yatsurai...I would be understating my joy.

    I wanted to discuss it with David, who had only ever seen the first episode of the original series, as part of a whirlwind I put him through trying to find anime that trigger an interest in him at the beginning of his journey.  After episode two, his reaction was exactly what I was looking for!  Ranma still has it.  I really had no idea what to do with the episodes from the direction aspect.  Of course the dialogue will follow the standard of doing an overview of the plot of the episode followed by a discussion about it.  Thats the easy part, but I sat there as the deadline was staring me down, trying to come up with a way to make it different from the other podcast episodes, which are mostly quite static and uninteresting.  I spent about six hours a day and a half before its publishing date and just started throwing idea's against the wall to see what would stick.  Its a bit messy, but I like the groundwork laid with the first episode, with showcasing the way similar scenes look between both versions.  It became pretty time intensive at first to pull them and try to fit them in with the narration of the episode and then find something to fill in the discussion portion.  With episode two, which was recorded and edited down the night before putting this blog post together, I believe I am satisfied just using the comparison panels showing the progression of the episode to occupy the bulk of the background.  Regardless of where we are in the discussion.

    This may change as the episodes progress in this series, but I am OK with a change in consistency.  Also, the song was slapped together in about an hour in my studio...though maybe I shouldn't admit that!    The original opening theme from the first series is so icon to me I really wanted to play around with it for the podcast.  It took a while to isolate the samples in a way that was fun to program with everything else, but I'm not that embarrassed by the work!  Oh, also if you didn't know...again maybe I shouldn't admit this.  All of the background music for the podcast episodes are done by me...

Closing, I hope that my love of Ranma can come across in the podcast episodes dedicated to it.  I'm also really open to suggestions from you about ideas that can be implemented to enhance the experience.  Thanks for reading and listening and enjoy!!

First Look at the New Titles for the Fall of 2024

 We are into the Fall season, here are my thoughts on the initial episodes of the new shows I had picked to check out.

Tying the Knot with an Amagami Sister

    A struggling high school student ends up boarding in a shrine run by three miko sisters, all with distinct personalities.  He has to juggle the insanity that they present in order to focus on his schooling but they continue to invade his life in unusual ways.

    Two and a half minutes into it we got fan service,  14 year old, 17 year old and a 20 year old in sexy lingerie.  Pilled up for the viewing pleasure..   I could have sworn this was based on a series by Seo Koji, but he's too busy with that Goddess Cafe thing.  I digress.  There is zero redeeming qualities to the tired and played out tropes in this show.  Its so excessive it has to be a joke right?  This has to be making fun of shitty shonen romance stories by mocking them?  No...its really just repeating played out concepts for literally no purpose?  Ugh, yeah pass but I also didn't have any hopes for this one, it was more an off hand inclusion to the list.

If you want to watch it, its available on Crunchyroll.

365 Days to the Wedding

    Two employees at a travel agency are faced with the possibility of a forced transfer to the branch office in Anchorage Alaska.  They concoct a plan to fake an engagement to each other to remove themselves from consideration.  Now they just have to make it believable for the next year to avoid the transfer.

    This was a much needed palette cleaner after the Amagami Sister garbage.  This is a forced romance between two awkward office workers.  Its pretty understood that as they have to spend more time together pretending to be in love they will fall in love for real.  There is a solid chance that the woman in the situation, Honjoji, more than likely had feelings for the man, Ohara, leading her to approach him with the concept in the first place.  This will be fun, even if it probably won't be earth shattering new.  But it so far is really cute and low key.  A nice adult romance between two very socially nervous people.

The series is being simulcast on Crunchyroll.

Dan Da Dan

    A gyaru and an otaku end up becoming linked when they challenge each other into believing the unbelievable.  The otaku becomes cursed due to the gyaru and the gyaru feels responsible and decides to stick with him until the curse is broken...but fate may be at work here for something different as these opposites are forced into extreme situations.

    I'll admit...I was a bit hesitant with this one after the later previews came out and it focused more on Occult-kun's transformations and it appearing to be some battle anime, spurned on by libido.  It hasn't not become that, but there is a lot of charm to the work, some of it has to be through Science Saru's magic.  The first episode was fun, even if the extended moments of Momo mostly naked seemed a bit unnecessary in...the details lets say.  But hey, I guess I'm just a prude.  Anyways, the first episode was fun, sets up an interesting precedence but really made me anxious for the anime adaptation of The Summer Hikaru Died!

The series is being simulcast on Netflix and Crunchyroll. 

Is It Wrong to Pick Up Girls in a Dungeon - Season 5

    We pick up after the dramatic events of the 4th season and Bell along with the rest of the Hestia Familia is safe, rested and powered up.  Bells troubles start once more when one of the women who works at their favorite inn decides to move on her feelings for him, dragging Freya's Familia against our hapless hero.

    Ah this is a bit of a welcomed return.  I really didn't like season 4.  Felling it slid the feel of the world building back to the beginning and took too long to tell what boiled down to one characters background.  This first episode promises a change of pace back to something more in line with what was going on in season 2 were the God's are getting more actively involved in Bells life.  Should be fun!

The series is being simulcast on HiDive.

Blue Box

    High school kid with abnormally developed upper body has feels for older girl who is a star of the basketball team.  He exhibits innocent but stalker like habits in order to be near her...in the hopes she pays attention to him.  He finds out shes moving away and he does a not confession confession about how he feels she should pursue her lost dreams before she leaves.  She then tells him only her fam is leaving and shes staying behind with a family friend.  Skip to later that day and his mom is said family friend.  So now hes living with the girl he likes and the two are going to do sport stuff together.

   Honestly I feel like I'm being unduly harsh to this series.  But the semi-high quality animation pisses me off.  A lot of really nice slice of life stories get shafted when it comes to the animation quality.  Yet when we have a series that falls out of the pages of Shonen Jump it gets a big budget even if its less original of a story.  But...the quality of the animation seems to be a bit of a charade.  The characters themselves, especially their eyes is...soul less.  Their legs are also very disproportionate compared to their upper bodies...and again the MC's torso and neck are super defined and thick...like way too much for someone who plays badminton.  He looks like an Olympic swimmer!!  Half way through i really started to think about how this compares to Suzuka and wrote that of since they don't live in proximity with each other, which was a vital aspect of that series....then the last 2 minutes dropped and I was like...yeah this is Suzuka for a new generation.  I guess I will stick with it for a bit, but the length is not guaranteed.  At least its not leaned into fan service as all...so far.

 The series is being simulcast on Netflix. 

 

How I Attended an all Guys Mixer

    A college student is asked to attend a mixer by a girl in his class.  He wrangles two of his friends into it easily enough but things take an unusual turn when they show up to see 3 handsome men waiting for them instead.  One of the guys reveals to the bewildered men that they are the women they expected.  They all work at a drag king bar and figured they wouldn't have the time to change so came as they are.  The guys are a little unsettled by this but the women ham it up and convince them to party through out the town all night long, attracting more attention than the real men due to their dashing looks.  How much of this was planned by the women to toy with the hapless men and does the woman who orchestrated the entire thing have feelings for her classmate?

    This was a lot of fun and really easy going!  It felt a lot like a grown up version of Ouran Host Club and I look forward to watching this show through out the season.  There seems to be a fun romance plot thread in it but I suspect its largely going to be about the guys getting set up in situations by the women drag that make them uncomfortable.

The series is being simulcast on HiDive.

 

Ranma 1/2

    The reboot of a classic anime, one of the cornerstones 90 fandom in America.  The story of a boy whose zealous father leads him to being cursed to transform into a girl when splashed with cold water, only to revert to a boy with warm water.  He finds himself at a strangers home forced to pick one of the strangers three daughters to be his future bride to carry on the martial arts school his father and the stranger belong to.

    The first episode is a pretty faithful copy of the first episode of the origin season from 1989.  The animation is a little different and there is more going on to enhance the series, especially when Ranma and his father get into a fight in the street and the color palette changes and the line work becomes reminiscent of a manga.  It's going to be great to revisit this classic and to see what changes will take place given how the world has changed in the past 35 years 

 The series is being simulcast on Netflix.

 

Orb: On the Movements of the Earth

    A crafty orphan in a alternate version of Europe in the 15th century has used his intellect and abilities to manipulate those around him to live a comfortable life.  As he is about to enter university to study theology his guardian takes in a renounced heretic who forces the young boy to be an accomplice in his pursuit of forbidden knowledge...studying the heavenly bodies and their movements in the sky.  The heretic tells the boy that the reality of the universe is not one where the Earth exists at its center.

    This is one of the three shows we're reviewing for the Fall season of The Otaku Network Podcast.  So far the intro episode was good.  It set a dark and suspenseful tone.  The main character is a pretty believable 12 year old who is cocky but easily influenced when someone else more crafty than he appears.  It will be interesting to see how this story unfolds and what type of endgame it has in store for us.

 The series is being simulcast on Netflix. 

Tsuma, Shogakusei ni Naru

    After losing his wife ten years ago, time has stopped for salary-man Keisuke.  When a 10 year old girl comes to his house, proclaiming to be the reincarnation of his long lost wife, the world becomes a brighter place but the dramatic age different and genetically different person make things quite complicated and difficult to reconcile.  But hes over the moon that she exists regardless of her age, he loved her for who she was.

    This show is my pick for the Fall season of The Otaku Network Podcast and it delivered way more love and joy than I anticipated.  One episode in and I am already hooked....this may be my favorite show of the season and we just got started.

The series is being simulcast on Crunchyroll. 

Uzumaki

    The long awaited adaptation of Junji It's highly regarded manga.  A girl in a small sea side town begins to struggle with everything around her falling into madness and degeneracy due to a growing influence of spiral formations infecting the town.

    I loved the direction they went in keeping the art black a white, like they animated the pages of the manga.  Looking back into the archives of this blog I never got around to doing a complete review of the manga, just a quick note when I started reading it.  I do remember the lace of the manga being as haphazard and hectic as the anime, where it is difficult to get a feel for the passage of time.  Everything just seems rushed.  Another thing the anime highlights is how difficult it is to be truly creepy in the medium.  Some aspects are more absurdly comical than actually frightening.  Manga and anime have always had a hard time presenting themselves are frightening.  Text only stories have the ability to infect the reader and manipulate their imagination.  Live action has the ability to make things look more real than real.  Manga and anime was just drawings...it's very difficult to make that horrific.  And the amount of time and detail it takes is never going to be financially viable in anime.

The series is being simulcast on Max.

Magilumiere Co, Ltd.

    A fresh graduate finds herself struggling with job interviews.  She does everything she thinks will help her get hired by thuroughly researching each company before hand, but its all for naught as she remains unemployed.  An interview at a finance company is abruptly interrupted when a monsterous being crashes through the ceiling.  The company has been careless in their policies to keep the beasts, known as kaii, at bay and are now being attacked by one.  The only choice they have is to a magical girl company to have them come out and dispatch the menace before it causes too much havoc.  They end up calling a small and low budget company called Magilumiere and they lone magical girl comes immediately.  When the magical girl realizes that the threat is greater than she can handle alone she tries to recruit one of the by-standards for assistance.  The girl struggling to find employment offers to assist and proves to be a valuable asset.

    Its hard to tell what type of story this one is going to settle into.  Its a magical girl story with dramatic action sequences and plenty of magic babble being spewed around.  It also appears to be a workplace dramedy?  Hard to say.  Aspects of it remind me of Read or Die and Soul Eater.  I am on the fence with this one but we will see what a few more episodes deliver as its just barely scratched the surface of the story.

The series is being simulcast on Prime.

Tower of God Season 2 part 2

     We move the story into the Workshop challenge and many ofd the people from Bam's past are going to be intersecting with him as it progresses.  Only Kuhn suspects that he still lives.  When season two was announced, I suspected would get at least as far as the conclusion of this arc and something tells me we that is still the case.  Its hard to say how long it will be until we get more of the manhwa animated.  It feels like there has been a good amount of dissatisfaction with season two, between a change in animation studio and a significantly different and confusing story compared to the first season.  I do hope they keep going in the near future as there is a lot of cool story that still needs to be told but I can't read the future so we will just have to wait.

The series is simulcasting on Crunchyroll.

A Terrified Teacher at Ghoul School

    Abe Haruaki has always wanted to be a teacher.  A year earlier he began a job at a high school only to quite is less and half an hour later after relentless bullying by some students.  He has been offered the chance to teach again bu a family friend.  He finds himself on a friendly and isolated island, and is introduced to his class. However, his situation appears even more dire as the school only teaches yokai from around Japan and hes its sole human staff member.  He has to overcome bis fear of the abnormal teenagers around him as well as develop the tiniest amount of self esteem if hes going to be able to succeed.

    Take Sayonara Zetsubo-seinsei, make the teacher a coward instead of suicidal and turn the kids into yokai and you might be close?  its no where near as stylistically bold as that fantastic satirical comedy but there might be some potential with this one to at least be entertaining.  I will give it a few episodes to generate more interest out of me.  I admit im not very versed in the lore of a lot of traditional and modern yokai and that may hurt the enjoyment of this series.  But we will see...

This is being simulcast on Crunchyroll.

Bananya Around the World

    The third season of the fun and lovable short anime series doesn't start for a few more days.  But I know its going to stick around in my watch list.  The episodes are super short, its low stakes and ive watched the first two seasons as they aired!

This series will be simulcast on Crunchyroll.

    The Fall season is quite a bit leaner for my watch list compared to the Summer season.  Which is fine, I need some space to catch up with my ever growing back log of anime.  Hell, I just noticed Crunchyroll added Minky Momo.

Dungeon People

 Dungeon People (ダンジョンの中のひと) is a 12 episode fantasy series based on the manga of the same name by Futami Sui.  The series originally aired during the Summer of 2024.

    Clay is a young and skilled adventurer having spent most of her childhood being trained as a top class rogue by her father, the legendary adventurer Bran's.  A few years after he was last seen entering their towns local dungeon she has fine tuned her training and is ready to go after him, to find out his fate.  Clay's training has paid off and she easily descends farther than the officially recorded depth by an adventuring party.  While engaging with the boss of the seventh level, the Minotaur suddenly pauses combat after an attack destroyed an interior wall, revealing another space that would be more appropriate on the surface.  Unsure what to do Clay takes the pause in fighting as a chance to reassess the situation and regain some stamina.  To her bewilderment a young girl arrives from a door in the newly revealed room.  The girl talks with the Minotaur in a friendly manner and then directs her attention to the increasingly confused adventurer.  She explains to Clay that she is the manager of the dungeon and she wants to the take the unusual circumstance to explain things to its intruder.

    The girl, Belle, gives Clay a brief tour behind the scenes.  Clay is thoroughly confused and on guard at this point, not understanding whats going on or why.  Belle fully understands the odd situation the other girl finds her self in and does the best she can to ensure her there is nothing weird or dangerous going on, as they pass through the well maintained hallways and antechamber rooms.  Belle is the manager of the dungeon, ensuring the monsters are there for adventurers to face, making sure the chests are filled with loot and keeping the system healthy so that people from the village can continue to explore it.  She wants Clay to join her team, working to ensure the dungeon continues on.  After being defeated in a dual against the unassuming girl, Clay relents and agrees to work as a caretaker.  She see's it as a better way to look for clues to her fathers fate, instead of continuing to risk her own life fighting her way to the bottom floor.  She has doubts that she would have succeeded in the end, given that Belle is the guardian of the dungeons tenth floor and easily defeated the rogue in a friendly dual.  As she shifts her perspective from invader to employee the reality of the machinations of the dungeon reveal themselves to her as part of her on the job training.  Will the dungeons adversary become its champion and will she be able to find out what happened to her father?

    We are in a bit of a fantasy anime renaissance currently, with a series of new and fresh approaches to the traditional sword and sorcery worlds inspired by The Lord of the Rings.  Dungeon People takes a novel but not unique approach to the standard dungeon crawling story by focusing on the dungeon its self and presenting it as an organization whose purpose is to maintain its self as a place for adventuring, instead of a threat to the surface.  Its more like an adventure theme park than anything else.  Belle is a strange girl that has a lot of questions swirling around her, who cares for the continuation and health of her amusement park above all else.  Even though she employs countless beings to help maintain the dungeon, she is lonely and reaches out to Clay as a way to have frequent contact with another human.  Clay, whose entire life has centered around training to conquer the dungeon finds a suddenly very different option in her life.  The story is primarily a workplace 'comedy', with each episode explaining various aspects of the day to day operations and its personnel.  It also serves as a story about the need for connection with others as the two odd girls bond over their situation.

    This was a cute and fun series that had some pretty plain artwork, which goes really well with the story.  Its meant to be cute and a little off putting, distracting you from the grim reality of the world they live in.  At times it dips its toes into the grimness but the artwork keeps it from being as harsh and horrifying as it really is.  But there are two major flaws with the series, two questions that exists from start to finish that never get close to being resolved.  What happened to Clay's father and why was Belle in a position to be the caretaker of the dungeon in the first place?  Both of these were sadly left hanging as the final episode wrapped up, not even hinting at any theories.  Clay is a really fun character though, as she approaches everything with stoic skepticism, constantly analyzing the situation and calmly evaluating the information before her.  While its disappointing that we don't actually have any sort of resolution in the story this was an enjoyable and lovely anime with a lot of low key comedy that built an interesting world for the viewer.  I should probably check out the manga to see what else exists in this world outside of these 12 episodes.  It also makes me want to play Dungeon Keeper.  Why does it feel like her dad may have been the previous manager?

    The series was simulcast on HiDive.

Makeine: Too Many losing Heroines

 Makeine: Too Many losing Heroines! (負けヒロインが多すぎる！) is a 12 episode romantic comedy based on the light novel series of the same name by Amamori Takibi.  The series originally aired during the Summer of 2024.

    Nukumizu Kazuhiko considers himself little more than a background character in the world around him.  He has never really had any friends through out his short life, preferring to be by himself, indulging in reading, especially light novels.  His isolation begins to crumble after attracting the attention of a classmate, Yanami Anna.  He accidentally witnesses a 'break up' between Anna and a childhood friend while at a family restaurant.  Her friend, Sosuke, confides in her that he has feelings for their classmate, Karen.  Anna has never gathered the courage to confess to Sosuke and looses him before she even had a chance to their busty classmate.  As he leaves her alone in the restaurant she notices Nukumizu watching from another table and immediately uses him to vent, joining him.  Unknown to him, Anna orders a few side dishes to help with her depression, leaving him to foot the bill.  At school he confronts he about repaying him for the therapy session.  She agrees to but confides she's going to have to do it by making him lunch.  This forces him to eat lunch with her every day until the 5000 plus yen debt is payed off and the two develop a strange relationship.

    Spending time with one of the more popular girls in class brings other people into his orbit, something hes not exactly comfortable with.  Anna's best friend, Yakishio Lemon, is a peppy member of the track team who lacks a lot of inhibition regarding her body and exposure.  Nukumizu finds himself wrapped up in Lemon's love issues when she finds out her childhood crush is dating another girl who he goes to cram school with.  Forced to be the sounding board of her frustration he does what he can to ease her pain and frustration becoming friends with another popular girl who is too open for her own good.  Before the dust can settle with that bit of drama he is forced to participate in the club he signed up for at the beginning of the year but never bothered to attend, the literature club.  One of the other members and a fellow first year, Komari Chika guilt's him into participating in the club to ensure its continued existence.  Nukumizu's participation ropes both Anna and Lemon into joining the club as well, ensuring its future until the following year.  Chika also struggles with unrequited love and all of the junior members becomes embroiled in it as she confesses to the literature clubs president during a club retreat.  Unfamiliar with love outside of the novels he loves, Nukumizu does what he thinks is best for all of the girls he's suddenly friends with as they continue to suffer heartbreak.  But is basing his advice on fiction really going to help anyone out?

    I'll just say it right from the start.  This is the best anime of the Summer season and is a strong contender for anime of the year in my mind.  Everything about this series is worth every second.  The characters are quirky and unique.  The animation is excellent and carries a sense of life and movement that is rare in anime, even in high end productions.  This was fun from the very beginning and did not fail to deliver through its entire run.  The story effortlessly wove its way across a series rejection arcs, building the characters relationships as it went.  There is little wasted time or dialogue with it.  Even secondary characters take the spot light from time to time and continue to accelerate the story forward.  But what is that end goal you ask?  There really isn't one honestly!  This isn't a series about which girl will Nukumizu pick in the end.  He himself doesn't even consider the idea of dating any of them.  Largely through a combination of his own thoughts on not being a vital part of his own story and believing that none of them would be remotely interested.

    Instead he struggles to offer all of his new found friends some amount of comfort or advice, but typically fails to do a proper job, due to his own inexperience and misconceptions about how people are.  So...don't go in thinking its going to wrap up with him confessing to anyone, Anna being the obvious choice given the patterns school romances typically go with.  No, you just sit back and take in the fun, sometimes emotional plot lines as they unfold, watching as all of the players grow as humans, recognizing their failures and successes.  Did I mention the art is fantastic?  The directing is does a lot of work to make this story as great as it is.  I wouldn't say this is a perfect anime like I said earlier regarding Pseudo Harem but it is absolutely worth your time if you enjoy fun coming of age stories.  I need to re watch this soon....and dive into the light novels.  Also...Nukumizu's younger sister has some serious issues...along with both his homeroom teacher and the school nurse...what the hell!?!?

    The series was simulcast on Crunchyroll.

Senpai is an Otokonoko

 Senpai is an Otokonoko (先輩はおとこのこ) is a 12 episode slice of life romance based on the manga of the same name by Pom.  The series originally aired over the Summer of 2024.

    Aoi Saki has fallen for an upper classman, a beautiful girl named Hanaoka Makoto.  When she gathers up the courage to confess she learns that her senpai is actually a boy who dresses as a girl in school.  Saki falls even more in love with Makoto , entranced by the beautiful boy who looks even more beautiful as a girl.  Makoto's childhood friend, Taiga Ryuji, tries to protect him from the strange younger girl.  Ryuji fears that Saki is only trying to make fun of Makoto.  Saki recognizes that Ryuji harbors deeper feelings for his friend and starts to confront him about them.  Makoto is only able to live the way he wants to in secret from his mother.  He has always been attracted to feminine things but his mother has aggressively tried to force her son to be the way she wants him to be.  His father secretly supports Makoto to be the person he wants to be and helped him get to a school where the faculty at least was accepting of him presenting as a girl.

    Makoto tries and fight his desires when his mother begins to harass him again, only to have his passion restored through Saki's actions.  But she concedes that Makoto will not be able to love her and pushes Ryuji to be more honest with himself about his feelings.  Ryuji himself struggles with the feelings he has had for Makoto since they were young, uncertain if he is really gay or if it is just a deeper love for his best friend.  All three have internal struggles they are trying to fight alone; Makoto with his identity and the resistance from his mother and the world around him.  Ryuji and his conflicted feelings for Makoto.  Saki and her desire to have someone to love and to love her back given her father is absent from her life due to his work and her mother left them when she was little.  Will any of them be able to be honest and open with the other around them who care?

    This show was surprisingly way better than I would have expected.  Just based on the trailers and the first episode, it presented its self as a comedy series, with everything centering around Makoto being a cross dresser and the quirky girl trying to get him to love her.  In reality it is a deep and complex drama about the main characters and their realistic and relatable struggles.  Not just with normal adolescence, but with their very realistic problems with how the world views them and how they view themselves.  There is an amount of comedy which is scattered through out the series in tasteful ways.  All three characters are approachable, relatable and realistic in their portrayal.  Perhaps the most frustrating is Makoto's passive attitude.  Even though he continuously defies the expectations around him he is easily swayed by suggestion.  He does not stand up for himself, relying, if passively, on Ryuji to fight his battles for him.  Ryuji is the most conflicted of the characters, even if he's only open and honest to himself.  Saki's arc is perhaps the most interesting though.

    Saki's background and struggles were an unexpected depth to the story that didn't start to take shape until the second half of the series.  It pushed her from being a generic character who was only there to propel the focus of the story into a different and equally important thread in the tale.  Her arc was not tied to Makoto and Ryuji but their friendship with her tied them to it.  Ryuji himself is the control in this test.  He comes from a loving and supportive family and only struggles with his internal crisis'.  Makoto and Saki struggle with both internal and external issues that allow Ryuji to be a stabilizing force in their dynamics.  I can't speak enough about how lovely and well paced this story was.  The characterization was fantastic and real in a very appreciable way.  Whats better is the story will conclude with a movie set to release in February of 2025.

 

    The series was simulcast on Crunchyroll.

Pseudo Harem

 Pseudo Harem (疑似ハーレム) is a 12 episode comedic romance based on the manga of the same name by Saito Yu.  The series originally aired during the Summer of 2024.

    Nanakura Rin is a first year high school student who dreams of being an actor.  She figured her first step is to join her new schools drama club.  On her way to the club room she runs into a hurried upper class-man.  She asks him if he can help her find the drama club and he tells her that she's in luck.  He introduces himself as Kitahama Eiji, a second year and the president of the drama club.  He laments that he is the sole member and gladly welcomes Rin as a new member and leads her to the room.   He leads her there and opens the door to a room bustling with students.  he sheepishly admits her was lying about being the president and the club struggling for members.  After introducing the potential new member to the real club president she is asked to audition.  Slightly taken aback by the rapid developments and suddenly being put in the spot light she jumps into a monologue, entrancing everyone with her composure and delivery.  The real president eagerly accepts her application and suspects she will be a big draw for the clubs future productions.

    Eiji is a part of the production team for the club, loving the behind the scenes aspect of the stage instead of performing.  He prides himself on his attention to detail and construction prowess.  Rin's audition struck a chord in him and he begins to attend the clubs rehearsals in the gym in order to see her in action more.  As they are taking a break together he bemoans that he will never have a harem.  Rin decides to put her acting chops to the test and begins to craft various alternate personas of her self to toy with her senpai, each representing a common personality type common in dating games.  As they spend more time together, playing their harem game, their mutual feelings begin to blossom as they continue through high school with their future wide open before them.

    I'm pretty sure this anime game me diabetes.  It is sickeningly sweet and innocent and just all around cute and lovable.  The vast majority of the story is little more than Eiji and Rin flirting non stop.  Their flirting is innocent and playful.  At first you're not sure how they really feel about each other but as it continues you begin to understand that they have been interested in the other since they first met and they slowly build a relationship based around pointless banter and one ups-man ship.  the show covers roughly 4 years of their life together as they grow closer with each other, inching towards having the courage to move beyond their friendship and comradery.  The other characters around them barely impact their lives or interactions, the story is almost laser focused on their flirting.  The show lacks all of the hallmark rote story lines and points of friction found in your standard slice of life romance.  There's no awkward, improbable situations, in fact they are sometimes a little too innocent?  There's no love rival or inner monologues about being embarrassed.  Sure there are moments where they aren't willing to go as far with the banter as their heart wants but that is largely due to uncertainty and caution around potentially loosing what they already have.

    I don't know how much I can express how perfect this anime is.  There is no one perfect anime but there can be many perfect anime and this is definitely one of them.  There isn't a bad thing to say about it.  It flows very well, with the passage of time only being casually referenced.  There is essentially no wasted time or distractions with the story.  It delivers what it promises and never strays away from that while also maintaining freshness and originality.  Its a show that gets better with each successive episode, building upon the groundwork laid earlier to deliver a consistently high quality product.  There are only two very minor sticking points for me.  As always I have to pick at the artwork.  The art is simple and the character designs are a little unusual but it grows on you and becomes natural to the characters and their story.  Endearing even as if it wouldn't' be so cute and innocent with a different art style.  The characters are natural in their appearance and body shape.  The clothes are unassuming and realistic, not some crazed over the top design meant for cosplaying.  Beyond the art the only other minor issue I had was with the only conflict that occurred in the story, at the very end, where Rin believes she has to choose between being with Eiji or pursuing an acting career.  I didn't understand why she felt she could only choose one of them and why Eiji was in a similar situation...I mean, she can still choose to be with him and be an actress, regardless of what he ends up doing.  But...its minor and leads to a very nice dramatic resolution to the story as a whole...but I feel like they unnecessarily lost some time together with how they chose to resolve this non-existent conflict.  Either way, its not something strong enough to change my mind that Pseudo Harem is a perfect anime.  it delivers exactly what it needed to and did it in a precise and enjoyable manner.  Now I need to pick up the manga and see if anything was left out and revisit all of the love this story had to offer again.  As a final thought and potentially a bit of a spoiler...for decades at this point the concept of a snowy confession has always been the height of innocent love for me and this scene truly sealed the quality of this story for me.

    The series was simulcast on Crunchyroll.