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Nov 9, 2023
Hetalia is a bit like Wikipedia. There's lots of fun rabbit holes to go down, and plenty of cool information, but if you start believing without verifying and stop checking citations, you end up with a head full of rubbish. Also, you should probably make sure you're reading it in your native language.
Hetalia: Axis Powers is a short anime adapted from a (mostly) 4-koma comedy manga. It is worth noting that 4-koma comedy manga are notably lacking from many historical textbooks - thus, I'm going to treat Hetalia as a comedy rather than as an educational or historical series, and given how frequently it flubs
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its history, I think you should too.
The biggest reason I say this is to get you to look at Hetalia as fiction (which it is), spinning jokes based on history and culture, as opposed to a funny anime retelling of the history books. But the next biggest reason is the language. The Japanese dub places its emphasis on character interactions, the type of interactions we get all the time from anime characters that aren't countries. This builds chemistry (read: yaoi ships) with its cast, but it takes the appeal of the premise off the plate. The English dub on the other hand is much more aggressive in making jokes, especially ones that specifically reference culture or historical events. And where the Japanese voice cast takes little to no liberty with accents, Funimation goes all out. It's hit or miss, but it lends Hetalia a desperately needed facelift; it's way easier to read which character is Italy and which is Spain when they're not both Japanese guys! As a result, there is a lot more stereotype humor in the English than in the Japanese. To me, it never stoops to demean anyone, mostly stays tasteful and always operates in good faith. I know not everyone will feel this way.
Hetalia: Axis Powers' biggest flaw is its story structure. This season is preoccupied with three things: the main story (WWII), Chibitalia, and spamming historical/cultural jokes. (And it's all out of main story and Chibitalia.) But even within the main story and Chibitalia it jumps around quite a lot, throwing chronology to the wind and killing the momentum of each. Most jokes are disconnected from both their own story and their episode, lending the whole series a rather anthological feel. I think this is what makes the Japanese dub so hard for me to watch: its humor is rooted in its characters, but you're rarely given more than a minute or two at a time to spend with a character before moving onto the next joke. The English dub on the other hand relies more on its performances than its characters, and packs so many jokes in that it doesn't matter if you don't get attached to the characters (and considering a lot of them are war criminals, you really shouldn't!).
If you're looking for an anime sporting a thoughtful, researched comedic treatment of world history, you should keep looking. (and hit me up if you find one!) If you're looking for 100 Years of Solitude? Yeah, uh, this ain't it. But if you have a basic understanding of world history and just want some dumb shit to laugh at that you won't have completely forgotten in three years? Hetalia can do that. A bunch of jokes don't land, and trying to follow the story is like trying to put shredded documents back together. But Funimation get to a few jokes in the dub that I would never see from any other anime. That alone to me is worth the four-hour cost of admission.
Reviewer’s Rating: 6
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Jan 29, 2019
(Full disclosure: I did watch Maquia on an in-flight entertainment system. I strongly believe it had no impact on my overall impression of the movie, but who knows, maybe if I had gotten to see it in theaters I would feel differently about it than I do.)
Maquia is a disappointment. If you enjoyed the movie, by all means go ahead and enjoy it - but to me it lacks the space to really drive its narrative and themes home, and as a result characters who should be interesting and compelling come off one dimensional and occasionally annoying as the thematic resolution falls flat. First things
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foremost, though: I have absolutely nothing against Mari Okada or her work on this project. She has her fair share of haters and her style is not always my thing, but she does a fantastic job with what she is given here. Thanks to P.A. Works, Maquia sports a visual flavor and pace that the shows she wrote just never had, and it allows Okada to try her hand at a larger scope than she's ever dealt with.
My first, second, and third problems with this movie can be boiled down to a single word: time. There's just not enough. I'm sorry, you cannot spin this huge generation-spanning epic starring an ageless lead, dissecting her relationship with the humans around her who age and die before her eyes, and then cram it into barely 100 minutes. When Maquia visits Ariel in the film's epilogue, a moment that should feel poignant and heavy with the weight of almost a century of events leaves little to no impact. This needed likely a full cour to really get the meat out of the story - and get this! If this had been in the form of a 1 or 2-cour TV anime, I probably would have loved it. Drum up the art and animation quality a bit more, sink your teeth in more to Maquia's narrative, and tell the whole story so you can actually feel the time pass. That way the audience can actually invest in the characters, most of all Maquia herself, and you can pursue some semblance of a resolution. Without time, you have nothing with which to hammer home your main themes, and everything you've built falls apart. If you can use your imagination to fill the years-long gaps in the narrative, power to ya, but the film simply does not do enough on its own to convince me of its thematic or character resolutions.
Again: there are legitimate moments of pure inspiration here. 15 year old Maquia sobbing trying to figure out breastfeeding was probably the most moving moment of the whole film, and the final scene was something else (though should the climax of a movie this big have been better? who knows). Okada plays with her motifs in a refreshingly powerful way, and there is clearly thought behind the development of theme ideas as the movie progresses. Maquia just doesn’t have the space to take them all the way.
P.A. Works, or Mari Okada herself, or whoever, made the (wrong) decision that this story was best told in movie format and attempted to recount over ninety years in under two hours. Yes, a large chunk of that time is tacked on in the epilogue, but the main plot covers over two decades of time - still not enough in my opinion, but way too much to be squished into the total runtime of an eight minute short.
Reviewer’s Rating: 4
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Sep 5, 2018
I feel 3D Kanojo gets a lot of bad rep just from the fact that it is getting a second season while many popular franchises remain in limbo. If you can put aside resentment or comparison, what you will find is a pretty decent little romance with enough heartfelt moments to carry an otherwise banal production.
EYES - F
Visually the show looks just plain bad. The character designs range from great (Iroha) to barely tolerable (basically the rest of the cast except Ishino), the art is generic and blah, and the animation is comically awful. The direction is there but it adds little to the tone
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or the story that the manga didn't already have. If you can laugh at the animation and get sucked into the main romance at the same time, you will enjoy this show.
EARS - C
Nothing of note to report here. The sound effects are generic but not overbearing, and the OP and ED are catchy but nothing special. The voice acting stands out, with solid performances from Serizawa Yuu as Iroha and Tsuda Minami as Ishino. The soundtrack does what most soundtracks do nowadays - blend in - and it for the most part makes no impact. Every now and then you'll notice a catchy riff in there somewhere, but it almost never adds much to the experience of watching the show.
HEART - B-
This is what carries 3D Kanojo. The writing isn't anything spectacular or groundbreaking, but the romance between Tsutsui and Iroha is incredibly real and solidly carried out. The finale is as heartwarming as the whole romance is throughout, and watching the two grow together through is charming to say the least. Tsutsui is fairly generic conceptually, but his psyche is explored in a surprisingly interesting way, and while he comes out slightly above average he does enough work as a character to make the romance what it is. Igarashi Iroha is a real joy to watch, and she's the most interesting character in the whole show with her promiscuous backstory and emotional arc. While 3D Kanojo explores more of the supporting cast and side characters than I would like, it's more that I wish the side characters were better and less that I disliked their episodes. Ishino - my spirit animal - is an absolute revelation, but Takanashi, Ito, Ayado, Anzu, Kaoru, ototo, and the rest of the cast are all pretty mediocre. Except for the mom, she's a ballerr.
There aren't any big overarching themes to speak of - which is probably my favorite part about the show. It delves into specific, real situations and emotions the main couple feels, and just kind of explores whatever it wants to. But it does so pretty damn well, and it was an especially thought-provoking experience given some recent stuff in my personal life.
OVERALL - C+
3D Kanojo is not going to knock your socks off or blow you out of the water. In the romance category it doesn't even stand up to the likes of Kare Kano, or Doukyuusei, or Tsurezure Children, or Cardcaptor Sakura - but it doesn't need to. Those are all great shows in their own right, but while what 3D Kanojo brings to the table is not dissimilar to what other titles offer, it is indeed a unique flavor in its own way. Again, if you can laugh at the atrocious animation and get hooked by the main couple and/or Ishino, you will enjoy this show as I did. Just don't go in comparing it to the classics.
Reviewer’s Rating: 5
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Sep 28, 2017
Allow me to start by clearing up the first of what will be many misunderstandings: Gamers! is not about games or gaming. It's an anime about the people who play games - a loner who loves video games to death but is awful at most of them, an honors student who hides her gaming to maintain her image, a game designer with a fetish for fish, a casual who needs the aforementioned loner's recommendations to really get into gaming, and the casual's girlfriend, who looks at all of them like members of an alien species. Every character has clear and particular tastes and relationships with
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gaming, making them infinitely more relatable and distinct. Oh yeah, and all five form a love pentagon of epic proportions.
Just because Gamers! is about the gamers doesn't mean it can't show off their shared titular hobby, and Pine Jam packs GOBS of gaming references both specific and not. Even disregarding the OP and EDs - which are fantastic - the show itself incorporates plenty of references and behaviors that are instantly familiar to anyone familiar with gaming culture (the scene where Amano gets critted is particularly memorable). The staff are obviously passionate about gaming, and it shows through in every moment of the show, though the story leans on it less heavily in later episodes.
Speaking of the story, it seems like a pretty standard romcom laden with misunderstandings. Upon closer inspection however, the misunderstandings are impressively self-aware and carefully orchestrated for maximum effect. And with characters that feel as alive as this cast does, the misunderstandings and love pentagons become infectiously fun to watch. Seriously, having misunderstandings DOES NOT ruin this show. Clichés can work if executed well, and they are very very well executed here.
The soundtrack is pretty good, if a little unremarkable at times. The animation suffers pretty visibly as the show goes on, likely from deadline issues or the like (episode 10 was delayed like 12 hours), but it's never awful, and if you've already bought in to everything Gamers! is trying to do, it's easy to ignore. Plus, the more glaring stuff will likely get fixed on BDs.
Overall, Gamers! is a diamond in the rough. It's the rare hobby-focused slice of life that actually understands said hobby. The characters are likeable and well-rounded, and the romcom side turns out to be a blast. There's an inexplicable charm to this show - this is the most fun I've had watching anime in years - and even if it doesn't sound like your cup of tea, give it a shot and let it surprise you.
Reviewer’s Rating: 10
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