Anime - Summer 2015 thread

Cafe Society
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Winter 2015 thread

I know I said I would start a Spring 2015 thread, but being a great lurker/slacker I never got around to it. Anyways, I’ve rolled discussion of the anime spring season into summer as well. When I can find a legitimate link to an anime (Crunchyroll or Funimation), I’ve included it. (Note: I’m only including series that I’ve seen and aired during the Spring or Summer 2015 season)

Excellent series:
While there are many great series over the past two seasons, only one would I classify as excellent and pushing the medium forward.
SHIMONETA - A Boring World Where the Concept of Dirty Jokes Doesn’t Exist: This show is hilarious. That should be enough to recommend it but it actually takes on censorship and human sexuality. In the future, every person in Japan wears a collar that monitors their actions and words to make sure they are morally acceptable. The children raised in this world are ignorant of basic human biology. Both genders are treated as sexually repressed and curious. The protagonist joins a “terrorist” organization that works to educate the public (mostly through porn). Even though sex jokes abound, I don’t feel the creepiness of other fanservice shows. Maybe it’s because they don’t shove boobs into the protagonist’s face every episode and consider it “comedy”. The villain of the first 7 episodes doesn’t recognize what she is doing is immoral or evil because she has no concept of how love, lust, and biology work. She thinks what she is doing is good and just because of “love”.

Great series:
Rokka - Braves of the Six Flowers: If “Mafia” the game were an anime. The first 4 episodes are generic fantasy fare of 6 chosen heroes gathering to defeat the demon lord. The remaining episodes (so far) are an intense game of “Who is the traitor?” when 7 heroes show up in the gathering spot and a magic trap is sprung keeping them from traveling further.
MY love STORY!!: Cuteness overload. Takeo is the MAN. Romance series that starts (instead of ends) with the protagonists getting together.
Snow White with the Red Hair: One of the best female protagonists in several years. A herbalist is chased out of her kingdom and befriends the prince of a neighboring kingdom. Mature, patient storytelling and characters that are more than one note.
The Heroic Legend of Arslan: From the creator of Full Metal Alchemist, an adaptation of a series of fantasy novels. While nothing specifically stands out, it is well done and enjoyable.
My Teen Romantic Comedy SNAFU Too!: the second series of the biting, hilarious, romantic(?) comedy. The only thing keeping this from being an excellent series were the frequent times I became lost with the subtext. This show assumes its audience is smart with many important relationship interactions occurring unspoken. Relying on translations removes some level of my ability to read and follow those hidden meanings.

Good series or Guilty Pleasures:
Gatchaman Crowds insight: A sequel to the highly enjoyable series from last year.
Food Wars! Shokugeki no Soma: Food porn! Kitchen battles! Not to be watched on an empty stomach, this series imagines the world of cooking as if it was a teen action cartoon.
PUNCH LINE: I’ll be honest. I quit this series up a couple of times because of the amount of fanservice before hearing it was good and coming back. I’m glad I did. It is a weird mish-mash of many different genres and tropes to create something unique and satisfying.
GATE: Fantasy world army meets modern Japanese army. It is fun to watch but it feels like there could be a better story with this interesting context. This is an almost great or even an excellent series in someone else’s hands. Still, I’m enjoying it so far.

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I agree with you on Shimoneta – though I feel that as the series progresses, the jokes are getting a bit over the top. Typically for anime, there are no real “heroes” or “villains” – everyone in it has a mixture of innocence and pure lust.

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I’ve been watching Gangsta; an action anime following the story of two “handymen”.

Also, Chu Fen BEE just started and looks really promising. In a world with no war or crime, the first episode starts out with an intense hostage situation.

I’ll have to check out Shimoneta.

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I’ve been told to watch Polar Bear Café. Is it good?

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These are actually older anime that I recently discovered.
Assassination Classroom: A weird creature takes over teaching class “E”. The catch: they’ve got to kill him in 30 days or he’ll destroy the Earth. Turns out he’s a really great teacher as well.

Monster Musume: Harem comedy with monster girls. The hero better not “deflower” them or he’ll start an interstellar war.

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I will add Durarara as one of the excellent ones. It has numerous interesting characters and a little supernatural stuff but it has funny moments, too, and the way they interlink all the characters is pretty smart. Each episode has a different point of view and is narrated by one of the characters. Sometimes a character will appear briefly in one episode and interact with the POV characters for that episode and then in the next episode you see what was happening with that character. The arc/season that is currently running is Durarara X2, I’d definitely recommend starting at the beginning and watch the first season. The music is good, too.

I watch all of these, too. Punch Line definitely surprised me but I stuck with it anyway and really liked it, it’s only 12 or 13 episodes so it’s not a huge commitment.

I am also watching the currently running World Trigger, Fairy Tale and Naruto Shippuden (but that one’s ending soon if they can stop adding more filler).

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[ul]
[li]GANGSTA - I’ve hear good things but I haven’t gotten around to watching it yet.[/li][li]ChuFenBEE - It looks interesting. I’ll have to check it out.[/li][li]Polar Bear’s Cafe - Sorry, I’ve never watched it.[/li][li]Assassination Classroom - This is a great show. I listed it in my Winter 2015 thread.[/li][li]Monster Musume - I’ve watched several episodes. It’s fun, light hearted affair. I have a hard time recommending heavy fanservice shows in threads like this because it is such a specific taste. If you like this, I would recommend “Actually, I am”. It’s about a boy who can’t really lie learns the supernatural truth of several of his classmates including his crush. If anyone finds out the truth, they would have to leave the school.[/li][li]Durarara - haven’t seen it. Everyone always talks highly of it. I’ll have to add it to my must watch list (HunterxHunter and Eccentric Family are also on it).[/li][li]Naruto Shippuden - I started watching Naruto back in the 90s when I was a teenager. I still watch new episodes to see how it ends but I always skip any filler episodes.[/li][/ul]

Some other shows I’m watching include: Overlord, A Seiyuu’s Life

One show I forget to include in my list: Is It Wrong to Try to Pick up Girls in a Dungeon? - This show had the potential to be forgettable but it was fun, funny, and somehow captivating.