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Slice-of-life is a difficult genre to pull off effectively, especially realistic slice-of-life, because while most stories are sold on the actions, climaxes, and character decisions, slice-of-life stories rely solely on the strength of having interesting characters alone, as you the viewer have to be intrigued enough to follow the story as it explore the everyday mundane moments of life of these fictious individuals. “Whisper of the Heart” is in my opinion one of the best slice-of-life anime out there, and this review will explore why.

Produced by the famed Studio Ghibli, “Whisper of the Heart” can be at times one of their more overlooked films. ... Nowadays the film is better known more as a meme whose protagonists feature in LoFi music videos on YouTube or that one anime film where the characters constantly sing John Denver’s “Country Road”. Yet this movie deserves to be taken seriously on how it portrays with a great deal of realism the themes of coming of age.

“Whisper of the Heart” is one of the few Studio Ghibli films that was not directed by Hayao Miyazaki or Isao Takahata. Instead it was the directorial debut of Yoshifumi Kondō. Something Kondō does amazingly well in the film is make the mundane moments of life beautiful and captivating. Everyday activities such as taking the train, reading a book, or following a cat are made intriguing by Kondō’s clever directing and use of color, camera angles, tone, and sound. Both Miyazaki or Takahata are great anime directors, but they (especially Miyazaki) tend to rely on more fantastical elements in their story telling, this would have been a much different film if they had directed it. It is a real tragedy that Kondō would die three years after “Whisper of the Heart” was released and this would be the only film he would ever direct.

The coming-of-age theme is one of the best parts of “Whisper of the Heart”. There really isn’t any antagonist or conflict that the main character, Shizuku Tsukishima, has to overcome. Instead, what she faces is far more daunting and relatable, nearing the end of high school and not knowing what will come next, with seemingly everybody else having their life plans set except you. This is a rather relevant theme, as we have all had major transitions in life where we were unsure what is coming next and how the familiar now seems unfamiliar, just as is happening to Shizuku. “Whisper of the Heart” is far from the only anime to tackle these themes, but it does so in a way that is refreshingly free of melodrama that I can appreciate.

Studio Ghibli is famous for its outstanding animation, and “Whisper of the Heart” is no different. In fact this film probably has some of Ghibli’s best animation. While there are no grand battles or dramatic encounters, Kondō and his crew did a great job in their attention to detail, and on rewatch I was struck by many of the simple elements such as the slight scale of rust on the guardrails or the texture of the pavement as Shizuku crosses the road. The animation also does a great job of making 90s Tokyo seem colorful and alive, such as scenes at the train station or school, or even how the sky changes color with the weather. While it may not be as outwardly impressive as some of Ghibli’s other films, for those with an eye for detail “Whisper of the Heart” can be a real treat.

One of the best aspects of “Whisper of the Heart” and something that lends to its sense of realism and its story telling narrative is the fact that all the characters have separate lives, goals, and ambitions independent of the protagonist. This might seem simple, but it is astounding how many anime (or stories in general) mess this up. Shizuku's mother is pursuing a advanced college degree, her sister has a job and is looking to move out, her father is a librarian, Seiji Amasawa is looking to be a violin-making apprentice in Italy and Mr. Nishi runs his antiques shop.

“Whisper of the Heart” isn’t perfect and I do have two minor qualms with the film: the first is that at the beginning the characters are constantly singing the American song “Country Roads”, however this ends up being rather irrelevant towards the end of the movie. I read recently that them singing & rewriting “Country Roads” was never actually in the original manga that serves as the source material, which explains why it sort of oddly peters out towards the end of the film. Secondly, the romance in the film between Seiji and Shizuku is far, far, too rushed. They go from being acquaintances to friends to lovers in what seems like an instant, and the ending of the film struck me as rather abrupt.

All that said “Whisper of the Heart” is still worth watching. While it may not be as good as “Princes Mononoke” or “Spirited Away”, it remains one of my favorite Studio Ghibli and anime films. For fans of more realistic slice-of-life or Ghibli films it well worth your time.

Spring of 2025 wasn’t a good time for me. My laptop broke down and had to be taken to the computer repair shop. A week later my car’s engine broke down and had to be taken to the car repair shop. My phone got glitchy. The only thing that seemed to still work ironically was my DVD player & TV. After dropping off the aforementioned car at the shop I decided to check out the nearby library in hopes of fueling my anime addiction, and the two anime DVDs I ended up checking out were “Bleach” and you guessed it, “Peach Girl”. I bring up ... this convoluted story because 1.) I probably would have never watched this show in any other circumstance, and 2.) that tale of my mishaps is still far more interesting than this anime.

“Peach Girl” (or if you want to use the extra-cringy full length title: “Peach Girl: Super Pop Love Hurricane”) is one of the worst TV series I’ve had the displeasure of seeing. I want to preface this review by saying that even though I’m a guy, I have a soft spot for Shoujo anime. Even though they can be silly, stupid, and problematic in their portrayal of relationships, they tend to have a certain charm and can be more engaging than Shounen series. So while I had heard that “Peach Girl” wasn’t a classic by any means, I went into this anime with at least reasonable hopes that it would be a decent watch to fill that anime void while I cried over my laptop and car (and the money I had to spend fixing them).

The first signs that something was wrong started right as the credits started rolling. Usually the opening for an anime usually showcases the best animation the developers have to offer in order to hook you in. The intro for “Peach Girl” seemed to be missing key frames, characters seemed to be drawn off model, and I remember getting this sinking feeling realizing that art for this whole anime was going to be like this. The animation for this show is frankly embarrassing, “Peach Girl” has some of the most abysmal animation I’ve ever seen in a professionally made tv series. The frame rate is terrible, the animation is stiff and ugly, and the camera has this way of freezing on the character’s faces in dramatic moments that I think is supposed to be dramatic but just makes them seem like an ugly pouting kid. This might sound like hyperbole but even compared to cheap OVAs and hentais the animation of “Peach Girl” is very substandard. I’m not too familiar with Studio Comet, the studio behind this anime, but I’ve seen clips of their other show “School Rumble” on YouTube and it seemed decent, so I’m not sure what went wrong here. I get that at the time of writing this review that this anime is 20 years old, but I don’t buy the excuse that just because something is old the art has to suck. “Eureka Seven” is one of my favorite anime whose artstyle has aged incredibly well, and it came out the same year as this show.

Well okay, the production for this show isn’t great, who cares? While the animation for “Peach Girl” is its most visible problem, it is not its main issue. In fact, two of my favorite shoujo series: “Oniisama e..” and “His and Her Circumstances” both have rather substandard and cheap production, in fact their animation might be even worse than of “Peach Girl”. But through masterful directing, engaging storytelling, interesting dynamic characters, and cleaver editing, I found the aforementioned shows so endearing that I often didn’t notice that they had an animation budget of $10. "Peach Girl" unfortunately has none of that, and that leads me to what else is wrong with this series, which is pretty much everything else.

Starting off with the cast, “Peach Girl” has an extremely infuriating and unlikable roster of characters. The protagonist, Momo, is defined by the fact that she has a crush on her classmate Kazuya, she’s extremely lackadaisical and acts like a doormat for others, and she has tan skin, which for some reason makes everyone else at the school irrationally distrust & hate her and think she’s a slut. She’s not the worst character though, that dishonor goes to Sae, who despite being Momo’s friend (for some reason) pretty much only exists to make Momo’s life miserable. Sae’s sole defining characteristic is that she is jealous of whatever Momo does and she has to do anything to ruin any relationships Momo tries to create. Kazuya is Momo’s love interest, his defining personality trait is that he is dumb as a brick and despite at least partially recognizing that Momo has feelings for him, is too dense and stupid and constantly falls for each and every obvious scheme that Sae hatches to keep them apart. The last important character is Kairi, a lower classman playboy whom Momo accidently points to as her crush and develops feelings for her. Although Kairi is often played up as a silly comic relief, I didn’t find him funny, but he ironically acts to most rationally of all the main cast. He’s also a cheater who has an interest in older women, and his brother Ryou is also a manipulative bastard.

What drove me crazy about the characters in “Peach Girl” is how utterly one dimensional and single focused they all are. The only thing Momo ever cares about is that she has a crush on Kazuya, the only thing Sae cares about is making Momo miserable, the only thing Kairi cares about is teasing girls and doing stupid stunts, and the only thing Kazuya cares about is being a dense idiot who can’t think straight for 5 seconds. The other students at school are never developed aside the fact that they don’t trust Momo because *gasp* she has tan skin. Never is any character characterized by something other than their romantic interests/obsessions. They pretty much only ever talk/think about romance. Trust me I was in highschool at a time, and while yes, we did talk a lot about sex & the opposite gender as our puberty hormones kicked in, we did also talk about sports, homework, from time to time politics and religion, and other things that fill a young person’s mind.

The story of “Peach Girl” is the worst part. Basically, every episode in the first half of the show goes something like this: Momo will try to get close to Kazuya, Sae will do something meanspirited to separate the two, despite the fact that it’s obvious, everyone, including Kazuya, will fall for it. Momo, being a doormat, will often just accept the situation. Kairi will come along and do some goofy stunt that will improve Momo’s situation, but just as it seems things will get better the episode will end on a stupid cliffhanger because of some dumb misunderstanding between Momo and either Kazuya and/or Kairi. Switch Sae with Ryou, add the fact that Kairi is cheating on Momo with an older women, and that’s pretty much the formula for the second half of the show as well. Towards the end of the series Momo has to choose between Kazuya and Kairi, and I’ve personally never felt less invested in a character’s romantic decisions. Basically the message of Peach Girl is “if you’re a girl and your boyfriend is cheating on you and your constantly having fights and misunderstandings, just tough it out and eventually things will work themselves out” which I personally think is an awful message.

Is there anything good about “Peach Girl”? While the opening song was a little annoying and perhaps a bit overly upbeat, I thought the music in the show was passable. In rare instances the characters could be likable, on *occasion* Momo would dress up and have an attractive character design (once every 3 episodes), on *occasion* Momo would stand up for herself (once every 5 episodes or so), on *occasion* Kairi would actually be funny (once every 8 episodes), and on very rare *occasions* someone would satisfyingly put Sae in her place (happens maybe twice in the whole series). Sae’s character may have become slightly bearable in the latter half of the show, although I’m not sure if that was due to actual character development or just that her character didn’t have as much screen.

Overall I strongly un-recommend “Peach Girl” and would discourage fans from watching it. The animation is hideous, the characters are all one-note, irrational, and unlikable, and the story is boring, repetitive, and has a problematic message. There are lots of better anime out there, including shoujo anime, and “Peach Girl” simply isn’t worth it.

Although I don't remember much of my early childhood, growing up in the 90s, there was a distinctive "90s feel" of youthfulness and carefree that has stuck with me my whole life. Together with well-known tragedies such the Columbine High School massacre in 1999 and the September 11th attacks in 2001, the 2000s felt a lot darker and sinister, at least to me as a kid. Of course, there have been good & bad events occurring all the time all over the world, and the 90s were probably not that radically different from the 2000s as I remember it, but I bring that all up ... because "Kodocha" perfectly encapsulates for me that 90s feeling.

On the surface "Kodomo no Omocha" or "Kodocha" (I'll stick with the latter cause that's what it's called in the West) seems like a lot of other generic Shoujo school romances, stubborn girl meets polar opposite boy who becomes her rival, at first they cannot stand each other, but over time they get to know each other and develop as characters, eventually getting romantically involved with each other. It's a plot you've probably seen again & again, "Kare Kano" "Marmalade Boy" "Maid-Sama" "Lovely Complex" "Hana yori Dango" etc. you get the idea. What sets "Kodocha" apart from all those aforementioned Shoujo series is just how wacky and absurd it is in its presentation.

The protagonists Sana Kurata is an elementary student, but also an extremely successful child actress on the TV show "Child's Toy" or "Kodocha" (roll credits) who falsely believes that her adult agent is also her boyfriend and whose adoptive mother is a famous writer who has a chipmunk living in her hat. But that barely scratches the surface, the 4th wall is constantly being broken in the show, visual gags and puns are constantly being thrown around, one only needs to look at the episode titles to get a taste of the craziness ahead, and perhaps best (or worse?) or all at least once per episode Sana breaks out into a rap song describing her feelings.

One of my favorite parts of this show, ironically, is the dub. While the sub is perfectly fine, Laura Bailey's performance as Sana is some of the best voice acting I've heard. She really captures the goofiness & playfulness of the show and character. The only bummer is that because of licensing issues, Funimation only dubbed the first 51 episodes and never got to the last half of the show.

Another strong point of "Kodocha" is that despite how silly it gets, it still manages to tackle a multitude of serious themes. The first arc of the show pits Sana against her masculine rival Akito (later to become her romantic interest) but quickly becomes more about addressing Akito's childhood trauma of losing his mother. Various sensitive topics such as divorce, adoption, unrequited love, unemployment, and death are all handled with a surprisingly gentle touch.

One of my main qualms with the show is that it starts to go downhill after a certain point. The first 20 or so episodes were absolutely fantastic, but after a certain point the show starts falling apart with the serious and comedic moments starting to cause friction in the narrative rather than working in tandem. There's this one arc around the 40 or so episode were one of the characters is dying, but the second ending song "DAIJO-BU" is so overly wacky and goofy it creates this tonally jarring effect. Also there were some bizarre, and I mean BIZARRE filler episodes, such as all the characters turning into cavemen or butterflies for no reason.

Lastly the show can get frustrating, especially in the second half, as the anime seems to be wasting time. It is clear to everyone (even in the show) that Akito and Sana are going to end up together, but the show keeps spinning it's wheeling and going on random detours rather than focusing on the main relationship that the anime started out concentrated on. It felt that Akito and Sana's relationship and development stalled and the anime was simply padding its runtime. I do have one hot take, many fans of "Kodocha" despise Fuuka, a female character who comes in the second half who forms a love triangle with Sana and Akito, as they blame her for halting the story. Personally, Fuuka was actually one of my favorite characters, unlike Sana and most other characters in the show she actually had two brain cells to rub together and plays an important role in furthering the plot in the last few episodes. I did personally find the finale slightly unsatisfying, especially given that you have to watch literally a hundred episodes to get to that point.

Overall though I still highly recommend "Kodocha". It offers something different to the Shoujo romance formula, and even to people who do not like Shoujo anime it still offers laughs and cries in plentiful amounts. It has an outstanding dub (albeit only for the first 51 episodes) as well as a good soundtrack and a goofy yet memorable cast of characters. Most of all for me it captures the youthful and carefree feel of the 90s. It is on the longer side (sitting at a 102 episodes) so I personally recommend skipping the filler episodes, but for those with the patience and perhaps nostalgia from the 90s "Kodocha" could be well worth your time.

It is fairly common in Korean Webtoons and Manhwas to have the story set in a Victorian-inspired fantasy setting were the characters dress, act, and look very European. But instead of having Manhwas that simply imitate European history through fictitious stories, are there any Manhwas that actually depict European history?

The answer is that there is. "The Queen's Realm" is a somewhat obscure Manhwa that came out in 2022, that I started reading in 2023, that I finished in 2024, and for some reason that I am now writting a review for in 2025. The series depicts a part historical part fictitious account of the relationship ... between Sir Francis Drake and Queen Elizabeht of England during the time of the Spanish armada. I think this series has several strengths and weaknesses, and in this review I will go over two of each so that the reader can determine if this series is for them.

To start off something I appreciated was the historical setting. Although there is a disclaimer at the start of every chapter clarifying that the story is fictitious, it is still very evident that the creators did their research when writing "The Queen's Realm." There is a great deal of care that was put into the character designs and personalities. What's more at the end of every chapter there's a historical fun fact that briefly states what how things actually played out, and how the chapter both follows and deviated from the historical events. The first 40 chapters focus on Sir. Francis and Queen Elizabeth, and the last 10 backtrack slightly and examine Queen Mary whose rule preceded Elizabeth. Despite being a history nerd, I feel that even I learned a couple things reading this series, especially in the last ten chapters.

Another things I appreciated about "The Queen's Realm" was the art style. Although Manhwas are very heterogenous and diverse, they do tend to have artistic similarities, most often in how the character's faces are drawn and using CGI to do the background art. Somethings which I liked in this series is how the whole thing is compiled in the fashion that makes it appear that it is hand-drawn. I'm not sure if this series was actually hand drawn, but in a medium where is becoming more and more computer reliant and digital art is being constantly overused, I enjoyed this more rustic artistic aspect. I also liked the varied color pallet, not just in the colorful drawings but also the themes of colors among certain characters.

Something which bugged me about this series were the characters. Sir Francis Drake in particular was petulant, irresponsible, and annoying. His main characteristics seemed that he enjoyed irritating and annoying people, including his own allies, and that he is hopelessly infatuated with Queen Elizabeth. The queen herself was rather stubborn and mean-spirited, and neither her nor Sir Francis really undergo any character development.

Another issue I had was the inconsistent tone. Several times throughout the art style would shift to this goofy chibi style even when the mood was supposed to be serious. This happens quite a bit in manga and manhwas, but for some reason it felt particularly tone-deaf here. There's this one scene where someone gets executed right in front of Sir Francis and we have reason to believe that Sir Francis may be in danger, only for the characters to randomly become chibi babies and start cracking jokes.

Finally, I know I've harped a lot of how "The Queen's Realm" depicts actual historical events, but if you take that aspect away it's really just another generic Manhwa that deals with royal drama, with all the usual stereotypes and clichés. I still think it's a decent series, more for the subject matter than the actual story, and would tentatively recommend it. At 50 chapters it's comparatively short, and although it took me a year to complete it you could probably read the whole thing in one or two sittings.

It’s no secret that anime, and media in general, tend to struggle with originality with most new entries coming out seeming to be a rehashing of the same old tropes. “Hulla Fulla Dance” stood out to me because it tells the story of a girl who’s passionate about hula dancing and it also deals with the aftereffects of the 2011 earthquake, a premise I have literally never seen before in anime or any storytelling genre for that matter. The plot of the film follows Hiwa, a recent high school graduate, who taking after the inspiration of her late sister aspires to be a professional hula ... dancer at a Hawaiian-themed resort. The issue is Hiwa, who is overly ditzy and clumsy, and seems so error prone, doesn’t have the confidence or skill to pull off hula dancing. Can Hiwa and the fellow novice hula dancers learn their craft and inspire the audience?

I think the movie does well in certain aspects; the films performances show I believe that the creators did their research on the hula dance tradition, from the dance movements to the Hawaiian music and language that accompanies it. I also appreciated the character designs, the artists did a good job of giving the characters distinct designs, even minor supporting ones. It is also noteworthy that Hiwa and the other characters often appear in different attire and clothes from scene to scene, which is significantly harder to animate from a production standpoint. The creators should be applauded for never falling back on cheap fanservice during its runtime, something which probably would have been all too easy to do in a film that’s essentially about Polynesian belly dancing. I also think that the anime has strong themes about overcoming adversity and doing what you love, and I also must give the creators credit with taking the risk of making an anime about hula dancing, something that wasn’t done before.

However, my criticisms of the film will be significantly longer. The animation is okay for the most part, but it’s obvious that the producers were relying on CGI and rotoscoping for the dance sequences. It starts off okay-ish but only becomes more and more apparent later in the movie, especially for the final two dances where the characters’ normal hand drawn designs and their CGI designs look rather different.

Something else that I wish was done better in “Hulla Fulla Dance” were the characters. For anyone whose seen idol and/or CGDCT anime, you’ll instantly recognize how cliché most of them are, you have the clumsy protagonist Hiwa, the plumb and cheerful Ranko, the foreign girl with noticeably bigger chest Ohana, the overly serious obvious Kanna, and the shy Shion. To their credit they all develop a little bit during the movie’s runtime, but they're mostly stagnant. There are several scenes that were supposed to be emotional with the characters being sad but it was rendered unintentionally funny due to the melodrama. Also, I must say that the voice of Ohana was utterly unbearable, even the characters in the movie found it annoying.

Lastly, and by far the biggest problem “Hulla Fulla Dance” has, is its pacing. Various elements and characters are brought in only to be dropped, then in the finale of the movie those same things are shoehorned back in. At the beginning of the film Hiwa thinks her plush toy is talking to her, this is then brought up against around the half-hour mark and then left completely forgotten until it’s randomly brought up in this giant plot twist in the finale. There’s one scene where Ohana stops being her cheerful self and starts crying that she misses her family, but after the subsequent scene it's never brought up again. There’s this one relationship Hiwa has with a male co-worker that seems to be building towards something only for him to say “I actually knew your sister, and I’m leaving the company” witch it largely left to that.

Several times in the anime it builds up to a performance that Hiwa and her friends are dancing in, only for the film to skip forward and then we see characters talking and having flash backs to the very event we skipped over. About halfway through Hiwa and her old high school friends go to this concert, where they then sit through a full 3-minute j-pop song of this fake idol group preforming. In the grand performance at the hula competition near the end of the anime, led by Kanna & Hiwa the characters put on a hula dance set to the exact same song, which we then have to hear in full for another 3 minutes. It doesn’t help that the overly autotuned j-pop and hula dancing mix like oil & water, especially since throughout the rest of the film they only dance the hula to traditional Hawaiian music.

In conclusion, while “Hulla Fulla Dance” has a unique premise and several standout features, it is dragged down by the aforementioned issues, especially the pacing. At the time of this writing (December 2024) this anime has an abysmal MAL score of 6.30, and while I think it’s a bit harsh there’s no denying that this isn’t an all-time classic. Despite its unique premise, this is in essence an idol/CGDCT anime, and while the cast of characters have their moments, overall they’re not very unique or endearing. It’s overall a decent but not great film, would rate somewhere between a 5 to 6 out of 10.

A while ago, an anime YouTuber I highly respected said that “Solo Leveling is the best story to ever come out”. More recently, a good friend of mine who knows his anime & manga told me that “solo leveling was the best self-insert fantasy I’ve read”. Lastly a not-so-bright person on some online forums wrote that he thought that “solo leveling was better Dostoevsky”.

Well I’m sorry to spoil the party, but after having recently completed reading Solo Leveling I think those above sentiments are misguided and wrong. Very wrong. Sure, Solo Leveling is by far the most successful Korean webtoon to come out, but ... (in my humble opinion) it is storywise incredibly generic and unoriginal, and I see little reason (aside from the artwork) that it deserves the praise and attention it’s been receiving. Let me explain:

Starting with the plot, Solo Leveling takes place in the not-too-distant future where gates have appeared across the world that have magical beasts, monsters, and items inside of them. Humans with innate magical abilities, called “hunters” get together in guilds and adventure into the gates where they slay beasts and collect magical items to sell. As mentioned above, Hunters have inherent abilities, and are ranked from the lowest (E) to the highest (S). The main character Sung Jin-Woo starts off as an E-ranked as is nicknamed the “World’s weakest hunter”, but because of plot developments he gains the ability to level up, gradually becoming stronger and stronger, to the point in the latter chapters where he is completely invincible.

While that sounds cool, anyone who is even remotely acquainted with anime and/or manga will also realize how generic and overdone this storyline is. Solo Leveling’s storyline is nearly a straight copy of other well-known power fantasies such as “Sword Art Online” and “Danmachi”. Jin-Woo himself is nearly indistinguishable from Tatsuya from “The Irregular at Magic High School” franchise in that they are illogically overpowered, have the same boring expressionless deadpan face, and that they mostly care only about being powerful and protecting their family (especially their sister). And just like in the aforementioned franchises, Solo Leveling is also like them in that there is a steady stream of incompetent guys and large-breasted girls that the protagonist has to rescue.

Most hilariously however is the Jeju Island arc, coming about half way in Solo Leveling, which I shit you not, is utterly, completely, plagiarized from the Chimera ants arc in “Hunter x Hunter”. I mean literally, you have an isolated island full of rapidly evolving giant ants that like to eat humans, with one of them being specifically bred to be the strongest ant of all time, with a team of the world’s strongest hunters being sent out to stop them.

The writing and world-building in Solo Leveling is largely a mixed bag. While there are some nice moments of foreshadowing and a few interesting twists, by and large Solo Leveling is rather predictable, especially in the latter chapters as the protagonist Jin-Woo becomes so overpowered that there is hardly any suspense or tension as you the reader know that he will win anyways. While it was nice to see how the whole concept and economics of hunters and their guilds is expanded not just to Korea but other counties as well, the world building in Solo Leveling is rather weak. There are some notable plot holes, for example why does the world in Solo Leveling resemble the 21st-century world in so many ways, such as for example having hospitals and high schools, when there are humans that through no effort of their own have magical healing powers and can fix fatal wounds with a mere spell. Wouldn’t you think that the healer Hunters would be hired to work at said hospitals instead of aimlessly wandering around gates in search of magical items?

The characters in Solo Leveling are a mixed bag, but as mentioned above are mostly generic. Sung Jin-Woo is very much your typical self-insert protagonist in your power fantasy. The males in Solo Leveling are all arrogant and generally incompetent, the women all have unrealistically large busts. Overall the Chairman was my favorite character. The character designs were also inconsistent, the Japanese Hunters that appear right before the Jeju Island are had some cool designs but some of the others were illogical and generic. There was this one time in the story that Jin-Woo joins this group to raid a gate and I almost burst out laughing, as the Hunters from this guild all looked like they came out of the most generic possible fantasy anime cosplay party. Something annoying the writer keep doing in the story is that they keep introducing new female characters that I guess are supposed to be romantically attracted to Jin-Woo, only for them to disappear after a couple chapters and never to be brought up again. To put it blulntly, aside from Cha Hae-In all the female characters in Solo Leveling are irrelevant. At the very least Solo Leveling does not de-evolve into a harem as most other power fantasies do.

Obviously the most positive aspect of Solo Leveling is the art. It starts off okay, but it gets steadily better after the first 30 chapters. The fight scenes were the best drawn, especially latter in the series, and the panel lay out was competently done. My favorite scenes artistically wise had to be Jin-Woo’s battles with the orcs, with the more varied complex character designs and color pallets.

While Solo Leveling does have a few positive aspects, overall it is far, far too generic to recommend, and the popularity. Not that Manhwas are particularly known for their originality, but with so many aspects of Solo Leveling being identical to other stories, I see little reason why it has achieved such outstanding popularity and critical acclaim. At the very least the popularity of Solo Leveling may have brought the world of Korean webtoons to a wider audience, but even then there are manhwas out there that I feel are better written and have better art than Solo Leveling, but that’s my opinion.

The show Mobile Suit Gundam: The 08th MS Team (here after to be referred to as "The 8th MS Team") has received critical and fan praise and is oftentimes referred to as one of the better if not the best of the Gundam series. At the time of writing this series has a average score on MAL of 8.01 and is bested only by Gundam 00 and Iron-Blooded-Orphans among the Gundam series. But does the 8th MS Team deserve such praise?

Taking place during the universal century timeline, like most other Gundam shows this deals with the conflict between the Earth Federation and their Mobile Suits ... against the Principality of Zeon and their mechs. A key difference from most other Gundam series which tend to be space based is that excluding the first episode, this series takes place exclusively on earth, offering a more grounded (pun intended) take on the beloved mecha series. Another factor is that the 8th MS Team places a higher emphasis on romance than most other mecha anime, with a key part of the plot being the relationship between the Gundam pilot Shiro and the Zeon noble Aina.

Starting with the positives, despite the fact that it was released in 1996 the animation and sound of the 8th MS Team has aged fantastically well. The animation, especially the fights between the mecha, is more the most part fluid and well done, especially the latter episodes. Something I enjoyed was the attention to detail, for example all three of the mobile suit mechs in the 8th MS Team have slight differences reflecting the personalities of their pilots. For example in one episode Karen's mobile suit gets damaged, and for the rest of the series her mech has a slightly different head piece than the rest. The music, including the opening and ending songs, was very good, although perhaps a little too upbeat for a series focusing on the sobering effects of war.

The 8th MS Team also boasts a great and endearing caste of characters. On the Feds/Mobile Suit side we have Shiro, the typical idealist protagonist, Michel the naive mechanic, Terry Sanders, a veteran soldier who feels the guilt of seeing too many of his comrades die, Karen the no-nonsense female member of the crew, Kiki, a villager who often helps them out, and Eledore, the soldier who would rather be a singer. The opposing Zeon side also had some good characters, such as Aina the love interest of Shiro who is also a bit of an idealist, Ginas her mad-scientist brother, and Norris their honorable guardian. I liked how even the more badass characters like Shiro, Terry, and Karen still had moments of weakness when they had to be rescued, and other more wimpy characters such as Michel still had their moments of strength. Compared to a lot of other mecha anime this one was much more character based and driven, and no matter what personality you have you're sure to find a character you can relate to.

Now for the negatives, something I feel the 8th MS Team really struggled with was pacing. Despite being only 12 episodes long, relatively short for a Gundam series, many of the episodes felt like filler because they would always end with the same status quo with which they started. It really only felt that towards the latter part of the series that there was any serious development plot wise. Also, Shiro and Aina's romantic relationship does make much sense; they're literally trying to kill each other and then they make eye contact for a couple seconds and Shiro acts nice towards Aina which results in both of them falling madly in love with one another.

Another issue I had with the show was the constant immature humor and fan-service in the show. For a series that tries to portray the brutality of war it really killed the mood when stupid anime trope of a guy innocently walks into a girl bathing and gets called a pervert, as happens in episode when for a good minuet Kiki gets naked to swim in the water fall as an excuse for her to shove her assets all in the viewer's and Shiro's face. That's the worst example, but their plenty of others, such as Eldore grouping Karen's breast or how despite being in the tundra they still managed to fit in a hot spring episode of Aina and Shiro bathing naked together.

Being a tad pedantic now, but I also felt the fights in the 8th MS Team were a bit inconsistent. There are times in the show when their mechs would take multiple shots from point-blank range and the protagonists would only have a few scratches and bruises, while there were other times just one hit would make the mechs blow up. In one particularly notable example two of the main characters fight for what seems like a long time, with both their mobile suits being severely damaged, but soon after another mech just shots a laser beam at a massive ship for a couple seconds and that's all it takes to make said ship completely explode.

Lastly the worst part of this series is the final episode. Episodes 10 & 11 are very much the climax and conclusion of the show, episode 12 begins with a pointless time-skip and introduction to meaningless side characters and consist of Kiki and Michel going around acting like idiots only to discover at the end what had already been established at the end of episode 11. The whole episode is incredibly boring and disposable in an otherwise action-packed show. This episode was one of the main reasons I dropped my rating for the 8th MS Team from what would've been a 9 or 8/10 to a solid 7/10.

In conclusion I think the 8th MS Team is a good show and a worthy addition to the Gundam franchise, but at the same time I feel the praise it gets is a bit overblown. Viewers of the anime will be treated to great animation and good character development, but personally I was bothered by the less stellar parts of the show, and if you are planning on watching this I highly recommend you skip the twelfth episode.

Puparia is an anime that is difficult to explain because not a lot happens during its 3 minute runtime. Despite having some of the most beautifully detailed and intriguing art you'll ever see, there is no dialogue or story, no real message or plot. It is in a sense just a 3 minute short of nicely drawn art. However, looking deeper, there is a more profound meaning to this short film.

The meaning of Puparia cannot be separated from story of its creator Shingo Tamagawa. In a brief documentary on YouTube Tamagawa explained that after slaving away for a number of years as an animator, he ... felt that he had lost his artistic passion and was fed up with all the bureaucracy and nonsense in the anime industry. Tamagawa ended up taking a lengthy break from working in anime, and it was then that he decided to make his own anime all by himself, something that he could call truly his. He drew, painted, and animated for three years straight (with minimal technology or outside help) until he was satisfied with what he had.

If anyone has seen even a brief clip of Puparia, it will soon become obvious that Puparia has some of the most wonderfully detailed and unique art style and animation among any anime out there. Every second of this short beams with color and character, pretty much any scene of this anime could serve as a wallpaper or background photo. The short film is divided into four sections, each with their own style and characters, but with no real linear or uniting theme or story. The animation is the real selling point of Puparia, and because the art is so amazing yet the story is up to interpretation you will find a plethora of videos and articles online claiming to decipher what the actual message of Puparia is.

While I cannot claim to do anything other than adding another pointless observation of this anime to the already hundreds others, my own personal interpretation of this anime is this: Puparia is at its purest a love letter to creativity and expression. I've had this desire, and I'm sure others have too, of after watching/reading countless anime & manga and a lot of it starting to feel all generic, of wanting to create my own anime/manga and telling the stories I want to be told. I'm probably never going to actually ever make my own anime or manga, but Tamagawa did just that, and the thing most beautiful thing about Puparia I find is not the intricate art but rather the creative desire that it represents.

Puparia is far from the only self-driven avant-garde passion project out there, in anime you have Hiroshi Harada's "Midori", Mamoru Oshii's "Angel Egg", and even to some extent Hideaki Anno's "Neon Genesis Evangelion" and "End of Evangelion". While it is now easier than ever to create your own art with the rapid increase in AI generated images, and I know a fair number of individuals who really enjoy making it, I can't shake off the feeling that it is nothing more than a composite image of other images on the web and not something that really belong to me. While it may be nothing other than a three minute short created by a depressed animator, with no story, plot, or dialogue, Puparia is at it's core a creative and imaginary masterpiece unique to Tamagawa, and that that can never be replicated. Puparia is easy to find online, I highly recommend you see it.

Ergo Proxy is a weird anime to talk about, not just in the strange and cryptic context of the show itself, but also how it is talked about in the anime community. It is both weirdly under and overrated, under because it is a show with a unique style and take on philosophy, over because it seems to be praised by the few who do watch it for those unique traits while ignoring all the flaws that are so blatant in this anime.

Well to start out with the positives, it’s fair to say that Ergo Proxy is definitely a very philosophical and dense anime, and ... certainly one for a viewer who can disseminate symbolism and isn’t afraid to think for themselves. Taking place in a post-apocalyptic world, it follows Re-l Mayer, a female detective, Vincent Law, an immigrant to the city with a mysterious past, and Pino, an AutoReiv or humanoid robot whose been infected causing her to have feelings & emotions. Ergo Proxy deals with a lot of philosophical themes, such as that of Gnosticism (attaining knowledge as a means of personal salvation), Postmodernism (the rejection of universal meanings or truth), the humanity & ethics of sentient beings, as well as xenophobia and how the government uses ideology to subjugate the population.

Sounds pretty great so far, right? Well my issue with Ergo Proxy is not so much the themes, but how the story is paced to handle them. Ergo Proxy begins as a thriller/mystery with Rei-l investigating strange occurrences across the city. I’m not going to lie, at the beginning I was completely hooked. After the first 3 episodes however Ergo Proxy pivots slightly and turns into an adventure show, with the mystery of who the proxy is already made clear if you were paying attention. At this point I was still somewhat invested in the plot, but after a few more episodes the show loses any semblance of a cohesive story and just becomes a bunch of random episodic stories with little semblance.

Don’t get me wrong some of these episodes are pretty good, but there is also some bizarre and dumb stuff, like the out of nowhere gameshow episode 15 where parts of the plot are literally told to the viewer through exposition of the characters playing their version of Jeopardy, and the strange episode 19 where for whatever reason Pino finds herself in looney tune land. My personal favorite is episode 16, where the ship thingy their riding on stops working, and Rei-L starts going insane because she’s too bored, which means that even in the context of the show the characters were getting bored with the story.

Even in terms of the animation, Ergo Proxy is pretty inconsistent. Rei-l has a really unique and beautiful character design, but her animation shifts from incredibly detailed in some scenes to inconsistent and poorly drawn in others, to the point that the shape of her face and eyes seemed to be constantly changing. Also worth mentioning is that often the animation was so dark that it was hard to make out what was happening. I’ve head Ergo Proxy get praise for its music and sound, but while the background noise did do a good job in building up suspense in the show itself, the opening sounded like a bootlegged version of a bad Linkin Park song.

I hope I’m not sounding too negative, in fact there were a lot of concepts and ideas in Ergo Proxy I liked. In fact I wished the show spent more time on the themes of the AutoReivs gaining the ability to feel emotion, which started out as the prominent theme of the show it slowly ignored more and more as the anime went on. Even if you’re not into philosophy or deep thinking, Ergo Proxy does have a few cool fight scenes and boast good character development, not just among the main caste but the supporting characters as well.

Yet the show is too haphazard to fully do its ideas justice. There are a few other dark philosophical animes I’ve seen such as Angel’s Egg, Texhnolyze, Monster, and Serial Experiments Lain, and while I have mixed opinions on some of them, at least they all had a consistent tone and message, something that Ergo Proxy simply does not have. Yes it is very philosophical and deep show, but I also feel that it is grossly over-analyzed by some fans out there, to the point I’m pretty sure that if they made an episode of just Rei-l taking a shit there would still be fans who would write their whole doctoral thesis about it.

In conclusion, for the philosophical and intellectually inclined Ergo Proxy can be a rewarding show, and perhaps I owe it a rewatch, but if that stuff is for you I would personally recommend something else such as Texhnolyze which do similar themes and ideas but better.

“Natsu e no Tunnel, Sayonara no Deguchi” or the English translation “The Tunnel to Summer, the Exit of Goodbyes” was a film I was looking forward to ever since the trailer dropped roughly last year. Having just seen it yesterday, I personally think the wait was worth it, despite some imperfections it still manages to tell a compelling story and have some great emotional moments.

The story involves a mythical tunnel that can grant you any wish if you travel far enough in it, the catch being that every 10 seconds or so inside the tunnel is equal to more than an hour of time passing ... outside. Kaoru Touno is the protagonist who inadvertently caused his sister’s death (similar to Jintan & Menma in “Anohana”) and is seeking to make amends, while he meets a quite & aloof girl named Anzu Hanashiro who is also interested in venturing in the tunnel.

Some things I thought were well done in the film included the animation, which for the most part was fantastic. The tunnel itself was vibrant and well designed, but even the characters and their facial expressions (especially the eyes) were nicely drawn in my opinion. The music, while a little generic, fit the tone perfectly, and I especially enjoyed the songs that played at the climax and the end. Finally I thought the voice acting was expertly done, while the characters did speak a bit monotone there were certain scenes where they were running, yelling, or crying that I think the actors did a great job.

Something I really appreciated about the film was how many small details at the beginning of “Natsu e no Tunnel” that are called back by the midpoint or end of the story. This makes the viewing experience a lot more rewarding for the attentive, and there were certain things like the pair’s interaction at the train stop, or the manga Anzu likes to read, or the umbrella, that proved to be important later. None of that is really a spoiler as they don’t affect the overall plot that much, just that it’s good to pay extra attention to the details of the film.

A few minor flaws I thought existed in the film included the pacing. “Natsu e no Tunnel” seems to be unaware of its short runtime of an hour twenty minutes, and it takes its time fleshing out the environment, but then in the last twenty minutes or so they press the accelerator and speed through the climax. Another common complaint I read online was that apparently the filmmakers cut out a fair amount of content from the source material, sort of similar to what happened in “Koe no Katachi”, leading to some confusing interactions and scenes, especially in the second half. Several of Kaoru’s actions & decisions in the climax seemed completely out-of-character to his personality beforehand, and maybe the film could have benefited from fitting more content from the source material. The characters and plot could also be a bit cliché at times, you’ve got the socially reclusive male protagonist, the aloof but compassionate tsundere which is the female protagonist, the backdrop of a rural Japanese town by the sea, the high school setting etc.

Despite the fact that the story structure could have used some polishing and it’s not the most original, “Natsu e no Tunnel” is still a very good anime in my opinion that boast great animation, music, and voice acting. Even with its inconsistencies the ending did hit me in the feel, I did get a bit emotional at the finale. These relatively lesser-known films by less traditional studios can be hit or miss, but this one was a home run. I know that its release outside of Japan has been a bit slow, but if you can get your hands on it in my opinion “Natsu e no Tunnel” is a worthwhile watch.