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Bang Brave Bang Bravern ep1: I was really bored for the first twenty minutes of this ugly-CG-mecha military dudebro snooze-fest and thought that it was a dreadful waste of a cool name and splash art. And then it got better. Love the charismatic robot, the colours, the action, the classic mecha music! I love how nothing makes any sense and the lead just confusedly complies with the insanity. Definitely giving this a second episode (which is conveniently easy since the first one went up so late).

A Sign of Affection and Blue Exorcist are still in my watchlist after decent second episodes. Metallic Rouge's was good too, and it's easily the show with the best soundtrack so far. I gave up on Tales of Wedding Rings after the second episode because while it wasn't especially bad, it wasn't especially good either and the cheap-looking animation failed to capture my imagination. I'd rather blitz through the original manga if I was going to engage with it again.

In contrast, I adored the ending of Heaven Official's Blessing s2, which maintained its quality throughout and had more character development in momentary stolen glances than some other shows manage across a full season. And I finally finished last season's utterly bonkers 16bit Sensation: Another Layer which had a lot to say about a lot of things for something with such a fluffy premise; a great show which hearkened back to a simpler time in otaku culture. I complain a lot about uninspired adaptations and sketchy pandering which I'd honestly rather not have thrust in my face in the guise of entertainment, but there's still good anime out there. Still, I suspect that my enjoyment of 16bit Sensation: Another Layer would be as alien to some modern fans as my friend's inexplicable (to me) enjoyment of the that Unwanted Undead Adventurer thing. Nostalgia is pretty great. I'm going to go and buy the OP now.

R
 
ActionFaust said:
As the resident CGI enjoyer I gotta ask. Is there any CGI in anime that you actually like? Seems to be a running theme in a lot of your posts lol
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I largely hate it in anime (I play a lot of games and of course, I don't mind it there because I'm interacting and not forced to just... stare at it). I will tolerate it where it's not noticeable (e.g. some background car that doesn't matter is CG while the characters are properly drawn) or when a series is so good that it doesn't matter how ugly it looks, but anime is a visual medium and cheap CG almost universally brings me down. CG people/animals are the absolute worst. Part of what I'm paying for is effectively how good a show looks, after all.

(CG special effects in 2D don't count, they can look pretty great when blended properly.)

I watched all of the infamous second Berserk TV adaptation from start to finish and its CG was atrocious, because the rest of the package was good enough that I could tough it out. I'm not toughing it out for anything average, though! And I can't think of a single example of an anime which was done in full CG and wouldn't have looked better (budget allowing) as a 2D effort, though I'm willing to keep trying in case someone cracks it one day.

(I think the rest of BBBB will be fine since the last part of the episode was visually interesting enough that I didn't care about the medium, but those thinly-disguised CG mecha with thick outlines stood out glaringly for the first chunk of that episode.)

R
 
Shadow Cat said:
I don't think I'm suffering from Anime burnout.. more Seasonal Burnout

Bang Dream Season 1 - Rewatch (Complete)
Bang Dream Season 2 - Rewatch Episodes 1 + 2
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Bang Dream Season 2 - Rewatch [Complete]
Bang Dream Film Live - Complete
Bang Dream Circle Thanks - Complete (Though this should have been watched after S3, I'm not to worried as I've already seen S3)
 
ActionFaust said:
Haha it seems I'm definitely more aligned to a more positive view of CG then. I've never seen it as cheap (especially after being exposed to a lot of industry discussions on budgets) and there's been quite a lot of shows in recent years that I think have benefitted from using CG or see on equal standing with 2D series. Even Berserk, though the execution left A LOT to be desired, is such a project that I think could have been done well in CG. I can hear people grabbing their pitchforks for that last comment.

Studio Orange, Polygon Pictures and Sanzigen are clear forerunners in the CG space and visually I consider some of their projects to be among my favourites in recent years. Other projects like MAPPA's Dorohedoro, Shirogumi's Idolm@ster Million Live and Yaoyorozu's Kemurikusa have also been visually interesting watches. Even my 2023 AOTY was Sanzigen's BanG Dream It's MyGO.

That's not to say I'm totally biased towards CG however. There's been some cases where I agree that they definitely needed more polish. This can also be applied to a lot of 2D series as well. I think either medium has the potential to look bad.

But yeah it's all personal taste in the end. With the big three studios continuing to push the limits for CG animation and Toei now entering the game with their upcoming Girls Band Cry series I think the medium has a bright future. There could well be a series that hits the mark for you.
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I loved Dorohedoro but it was another case of 'I love it in spite of the visuals' for me! The most 'CG' thing I've watched over a longer period is probably Dragon Prince, which while not anime has all of the same problems as the anime done in a similar style. The movements and faces look oddly ghoulish when it's not stylised as full 2D, like puppets rather than people. I don't much like puppets, either, though if they're beautiful enough I'll tolerate them (i.e. Thunderbolt Fantasy).

Part of my resentment is, ironically, one of the things you've singled out as a favourite for you: idol shows. I love idol shows but I can't stand the now-mandatory CG dance scenes, they completely take me out of the moment! The first few seasons of UtaPri were so beautiful and then the specials rolled around and I wanted to close my eyes during the concerts. Hypnosis Mic looks so stylish until they start a rap battle and it all turns into CG, then they teased viewers by inserting a couple of more traditional-looking music 'videos' in the show to tease me with what could have been. Of course the 2D stuff uses plenty of modern CG visual effects, and those are part of the appeal, but as soon as organic people start moving like CG models I go completely cold.

It's been a while since I watched it but I want to say that Promare used CG extremely well, though of course that was a movie by a particularly talented studio of visual tricksters. If there's enough going on stylistically that I'm constantly distracted - and the subjects of the CG are inorganic designs - then the technology works way better for me.

R
 
You guys will be pleased to hear that a sequel to Dorohedoro has been announced (but you may have already known this!)

I don't mind some CG use in anime as long as it's handled well, for background stuff and vehicles like trains/cars it's pretty much mandatory, but it's more about how well they blend it in to me.

"The best CG is the CG you can't notice!" :)

I find it the worst on characters, especially when a character can cut back and forth between CG and 2D depending on the scene in question. Land of the Lustrous was good though and the CG in that was done very well.
 
As a show (or an adaptation) I had very mixed feelings about it, but I think it’s worth mentioning that Studio Orange’s work on the new version of Trigun seemed like a real leap forwards in terms of anime CG. I thought the care put into the characters’ body language and changing facial expressions was remarkable, there was a sense of life to them I’ve rarely seen outside of high budget cinema releases. I just feel it would have been put to better use in something with more emphasis on comedy, rather than that oddly gloomy take on the material.

Lupin III: Voyage to Danger (1993)

TV special number 4 sees Lupin stealing the Red October a legally distinct Soviet nuclear submarine which has never been commanded by Sean Connery, in order to help the recently demoted Zenigata bust a big-time arms smuggler and line his own pockets in the process.

This is a slight improvement on From Siberia With Love, with snappier action and better visuals, but it still suffers with the usual complaints of a padded running time and a frustrating lack of depth to the one-off characters. I know these films were likely produced on a painfully tight schedule, but I would really have appreciated an extra scene or two to develop the difficult relationship between Jigen and a Russian scientist (arguably the most interesting part of the film) or flesh out the main villain, who seems to be just some generic guy.

On the whole, if I’d gone into this one with no particular expectations for it, I’d likely have been pleasantly surprised, but I’d read beforehand about Masaaki Osumi being given the chance to direct this film (apparently as an apology for being sacked from the Lupin TV series some 20 years earlier) and I’d hoped he might have brought some of the strangeness that marked out his work on Part 1, but sadly that‘s not much in evidence here.

It’s a perfectly competent outing for the gang, but not one of their more memorable adventures.

The Witch and the Beast ep1

As a lightweight horror/action series, it’s a little bit boiler-plate, but I did appreciate the look of this show (I can’t imagine the resemblance of its setting to the first Bayonetta game being a coincidence) and the fact that they got the giant rampaging shark monster out within the first couple of minutes. It got straight to the point, and there’s something to be said for that.
 
Chained Soldier episode 3 Eyeful.

Dungeon Meshi episode 3 Living armour.

The Witch and the Beast episode 2 Let it slide.

Lady Georgie episodes 16-28
 
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ActionFaust said:
That's actually something I can understand with idol shows and other performance based series.
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Idol anime aren't on my watch list usually to be honest, at least not the ones that do serious performances and songs, so I'm not sure how hard it would be to 2d animate those types of things (probably very hard).

I've seen the flipping back and forth thing a little in some other shows I have watched, though I don't currently have any examples. It's not usually constant or even consistent, but get the odd scene where a 3d model is used instead of the usual 2d animation.
 
ActionFaust said:
My issue lies more with those that are 2D to begin with but change to CG for performance scenes. Some series like Love Live Nijigasaki can execute this really well but others like Bang Dream's primarily 2D animated first season can be pretty jarring.
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This still annoys me but overall I dont mind CG Anime, last few years I've seen lots of Idol Anime, Bang Dream, Chinese Animation, rewatching Hand Shakers and watching that godawful Crunchyroll show

So got used to seeing CG in anime now

Was weird rewatching Bang Dream S1 as I was sure the show was fully CG. Then S2 started 😇
 
Manyu Scroll (uncensored) Ep 1. Well OK, truth be told, I'm not watching this uncensored ecchi anime to drool over all the women with their big, bare, bouncy boobies - on the contrary, I'll be the one chasing after all those voluptuous girls who got their huge chests sliced with that wondrously amazing breast-slicing sword, which magically shrinks their formerly double-H cup breasts down to that glorious A or B size I am so attracted to... I mean, what more could I possibly even ask for in an anime?!?! My heart is palpatating with anticipation for each new episode! 🤤
 
I have G-cup breasts - I don't have back pain and women get leered at by men regardless of their breast size 😅

Notting Hill (REWATCH) - Such a lovely romantic film 🥰

The Princess and the Frog (REWATCH) - Had this on in the background while putting together a jigsaw puzzle (Cute Snacks, 500 pieces) with a friend, so didn't really pay enough attention but I def wanna rewatch it again soon :)

Flying Witch (English dubbed) - Very pleasantly enjoyable slice of life series, meticulous care evidently put into little details like the cooking class scene, to bring out the nuances and magic of the everyday. Also loved the whales and cats :)
 
Girls with Guns said:
Manyu Scroll (uncensored) Ep 1. Well OK, truth be told, I'm not watching this uncensored ecchi anime to drool over all the women with their big, bare, bouncy boobies - on the contrary, I'll be the one chasing after all those voluptuous girls who got their huge chests sliced with that wondrously amazing breast-slicing sword, which magically shrinks their formerly double-H cup breasts down to that glorious A or B size I am so attracted to... I mean, what more could I possibly even ask for in an anime?!?! My heart is palpatating with anticipation for each new episode! 🤤
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God, I almost panicked when I saw the title of that anime. There was a wrestler whose first name started with M and their last name was similar to the word scroll. After the speaking out movement of 2020, it turned out he was a creep. I don't need to remember that. 😬
 
Frieren: Beyond Journey’s End episode 19 Patience.

The Weakest Tamer Began a Journey to pick up Trash episode 2 Sever.

Undead Unluck episode 15 Laughter.

Lady Georgie episodes 29-45 (Complete. I found the first third or so of this to be a bit dull but the story did pick up when the characters got older and the setting changed.) 3/5

Le Chevalier D'Eon episodes 1-7
 
Delicious in Dungeon ep3

I think it’s much more obvious this week that Trigger are working on the show, the squashy, stretchy movement during the action scenes feels very much like it has their hand on the tiller.

Bang Bravern ep1-2

I clapped like a seal when the music came on in the first episode, but the second is on another level entirely. It’s been quite a while since I’ve seen a show so utterly bananas. This could be something quite special and I’m very glad CR have picked it up, it looked for a moment there as if it might not get an official stream at all.
 
Ancient Magus' Bride Season 2 Part 2 (English Dub) Episode 48 (Complete)

Girlfriend, Girlfriend Season 2 (English Dub) Episode 24 (Complete)

Goblin Slayer II (English Dub) Episode 24 (Complete)

Frieren: Beyond Journey's End Episode 19

The Weakest Tamer Began a Journey to Pick Up Trash Episode 2

The Wrong Way to Use Healing Magic Episode 3
 
Immoral Guild episodes 1-8: How did this only get a 14+ rating? ?The hentai is very strong in this booby-licious show about a monster hunter saddled with a bunch of naive and incompetent (yet very powerful) girls on his quests into the forest to keep the town safe. Most ridiculous line so far is "it's too embarrassing to kiss you, so I'm just going to drool into your mouth". Also, I've spotted a number of minor typos in the subtitles.
 
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