Reviews From Anime to Board Games, and More!
Charlotte, the anime that promised to be the next big thing from Jun Maeda, the mastermind behind many popular anime series, such as Clannad and Angel Beats! While some fans were skeptical about whether the show could live up to the hype, others were excited to see what Maeda had in store for them.
Continue reading “Confessions of a Charlotte Fan”
Here we are at the end of the mainline Fate reviews. I thought about breaking each film out into its own review, but let’s be realistic, you aren’t going to watch just one of these randomly as that would make no sense. Instead, we are talking about the Heaven’s Feel films as a set. By the title, I hope you could guess that these are well worth watching. If all you wanted was a quick recommendation, well there you go! For those of you who want a little bit more though (and if you have read my Fate retrospective up until now, let’s not kid ourselves, you do), join me as we talk about why I enjoyed these films. Continue reading “Fate/stay night Movie: Heaven’s Feel (1-3) Route 2 – The Best Mainline Fate Since Zero”
For this huge undertaking that has been the Fate franchise retrospective, I’ll admit that Illya was added to the review roster mostly for myself. I don’t actually expect anyone to rush out and see this, regardless of what I have to say, but there was some fun to be had in this Cardcaptor Sakura clone spun Fate. That’s actually a bit reductive. Illya manages to settle into its own thing by the end of the first 10 episodes, but if you aren’t already a Fate fan, there’s not much here for you that other (better) shows of the magical girl genre can offer. Even still, I’m hopeful for what’s yet to come with this one. Want to know more? You’ll just have to read on to find out! Continue reading “Fate/Kaleid Liner Prisma Illya Extra Route 2 – Time to Collect the Clo-, I mean Class Cards!”
To understand why I’m so disappointed with Stone Ocean you have to go back to the beginning. This isn’t my first look at the JoJo franchise, in fact I’ve done a deep dive you should read before this one as it should help to explain why I just didn’t enjoy this latest installment. One of the reasons I caught up on the entire franchise was in preparation for Stone Ocean, which has had considerable hype from the community well before it ever existed in anime form. Now that it has come to an end, I’m sorry to report that it may not be worth your time. Continue reading “Jon’s Bizarre Adventure – Disappointed in Stone Ocean”
When it comes to what I choose to cover here on this website it’s easy to see that there are a few patterns for what I’m partial for. Among these are big retrospective pieces on large franchises, making today’s topic of conversation in the Index, Railgun and Accelerator series long overdue. In fact, I’ve wanted to cover this franchise for several years but always found excuses in watching other programs. Since my Funimation subscription was about to end, this made for an ideal last hurrah for that platform as Crunchyroll didn’t have the full series dubbed (for some reason). With this all out of the way, let’s get on with the main event: is this franchise worth watching? Continue reading “Project Raildex – Worth a Watch for Modern Fans?”
If you read my previous article on Love Live! School Idol Project, then you may be expecting another overly long love letter to its follow up series, Love Live! Sunshine!! If you were, unfortunately, I must disappoint. While Sunshine is fine in a vacuum, unfortunately I have something to compare it to, and as a result, there’s not much to say. Ironically, Sunshine is a cautionary tale about the importance of being yourself. Just too bad it didn’t seem to learn that lesson itself nearly fast enough. A shadow of greatness is still just that, a shadow. Continue reading “Love Live! Sunshine!! – Chasing the Past”
Over the past three years I’ve run a group watch called AniTwitWatches over on Twitter. In that time we watched 20 different shows, had wonderful discussions, and had a pretty good time (well, mostly) along the way too! Today’s article, however, marks the end of this program after season 20, Big Order. I’d like to take this time to explain why we stopped, how Big Order represented the spirit of the program (even if it might seem like a strange note to end on), and whatever related thoughts I may have along the way. This isn’t a typical review, but I will talk about my thoughts on Big Order here so if you want that I’ll section it in a way so you can easily find it. With that, let’s get right to it. Continue reading “Big Finale! – Saying Goodbye to #AnitTwitWatches (Featuring Big Order)”
While author Tsukasa Fushimi has done other, smaller works, he’s mostly known for Oreimo and Eromanga Sensei. I’d go as far as to say that, at least in Oreimo’s case, that the series carries the same kind of cultural weight to the medium that other titles such as Cowboy Bebop or Code Geass have, albeit for those deeper into the medium. This is a bold claim, but the notoriety that his works have is the whole reason I’ve threatened to watch these two titles for some time now. It’s not like Tsukasa Fushimi’s work was positively received in the same way that those other titles were, much less so today, but it would also be completely incorrect to say that they didn’t leave a lasting impact. Now having watched both his flagship works, I couldn’t help but wonder just what’s wrong with onii-chan? Continue reading “What’s Wrong with Onii-chan? – A Look at Tsukasa Fushimi’s Work”
While Season 19’s Sound of the Sky has been a nice little revisit, I fell like we really need to shake things up with this watch. So when you voted for my “mystery pick”, I knew exactly what we were going to do! For me, this will be a two for one as I am getting around to a previous recommendation from one of my followers all while getting you to watch it with me. Enough build up, here’s the reveal: Big Order!
This is not considered a good show. It is a descent into madness. However, there are no doubts in my mind that every single person will have an excellent time with the discussion whether they love or loath the show alike. That’s what you get for voting for me though!
This is a weekly community event meant to bring folks together to revisit old favorites and discover new shows. It’s meant to be something you can get as involved in as you want, there is no pressure to participate every week or every watch, but we’d love to have you to share in the experience and discuss the shows we are watching all the same!
I was inspired to do this after seeing the “rewatches” that people do over at Reddit in the r/anime sub. Since I interact with a lot of you guys on Twitter, I thought it would be the perfect place to do something similar! That said, even if you do not have a Twitter you can still join in by posting any content via WordPress, YouTube, or whatever suits your fancy. If you do, be sure to send me an email at jonspencerreviews@gmail.com so I can share your wonderful creations!
For everyone else, simply watch the episodes for the week based on the schedule below. Make sure to use the hashtag, #anitwitwatches when you do, and that’s it! Discuss with the other folks participating, create content, and generally just have a fun time!
This next show was chosen based on YOUR votes, so let’s get to the watch schedule.
As always, we have a short break before returning. The main reason for this is to give everybody a little time off between watches. If you have not done so, you can see where you can watch Sound of the Sky for free, and legally, by using justwatch.com. Unfortunately, I cannot realistically check all regions but I aimed to make this as accessible as possible. That said, I won’t stop you from doing what you need to in order to participate. The more the merrier!
Here are the dates (all Mondays) and the episodes for each, please keep in mind that Monday’s are the main days for discussion but you basically have the whole week to watch (if you need to miss a week or whatever, that’s all good too). Be sure to save a copy of the schedule for your use:
I wanted this watch to be on the shorter side so this will only be 6 weeks long. I isolated the first and last episode because I think that will make for an interesting “where we started, where we ended up” kind of deal. Looking forward to all the discussion and hope to see you there!
As with any larger franchise, this question always seems to come up: where should I start? It’s a seemingly simple question without an equally straightforward answer. If you have been following my Fate journey thus far you’d notice that each has a “route” in the article’s title and wondered why I bothered putting it there. In part this is to help you, the reader, navigate the articles in a sensible way as to have my thoughts presented more cohesively, but even more so it acts as a general watch order suggestion. That brings us back to this article which you may have noticed is labeled “route 1 alternative” much like the review of the 2006 and 2010 Deen adaptations, so what gives?
Continue reading “Fate/Stay Night: Unlimited Bladeworks (2014) Route 1 Alternative – Should You Start Here?”
Jon Spencer Reviews 