Yep I'm back to do these, been busy personally and had to change due to new phone so be a shorter list plus quite the chill season this time. Without futher adou:
Actually I read the manga
From old country Bumpkin to master swordsman: This one was a good manga when I read it but what I liked most were the fight scenes and the main character. In the anime they stuck true to that to the point Shad has made video critiques on it praising it in parts and pointing out room fot improvement. It does have 3D so if that's a no go understand it's in there.
The unaware Atelier meister: this was just light hearted comedy, the mc is a guy who is COMPLETELY useless in combat but all OTHER skills are SSS grade that his porridge can cure and disease, he can build a mansion by himself in a week and his pig feed is so good, dragons fly down to have some.
I'm the Evil Lord of an intergalactic Empire: so imagine a guy REALLY fucked over in life, like he gets ntr'd, his daughter isn't his, framed for fraud, gets cancer and ss he's dying in a shoddy apartment only to be tricked into reincarnating to suffer by an evil entity....only for THAT to go tits up thanks to a certain 'good boy'....
Something to mention with this, it is DIFFERENT from the manga, timelines have been changed, new jokes and scenes added and it WORKS! I like the addition of scenes of the evil guide just fucking with people's everyday lives because he loves negative emotions.
Up to personal tastes
The Brilliant Healer's new life in the shadows: like every bad dnd/raid party, a healer who's exceptional at their job often gets accused of doing nothing at all. MC gets kicked out so starts an underground clinic but doesn't realise how exceptional it is that he can literally amputate then regrow you a new arm. I actually enjoy the deadpan delivery of the MC who asks for minimal pay after he regrows your limbs.
I've been killing slimes for 300 years and now I've maxed out my level season 2: same lighthearted comedy as last time, just nice to clear your head to.
The beginning after the end:I'll be honest, this adaptation felt disappointing. I never read the original work,was on my to read list and never got round to it. But this adaptation felt weak like God of High-school wasted potential. It's getting a season 2 so hopefully tgey improve.
That's it for me, I wanted to see Kowloon Generic Romance and A ninja and assassin under one roof but got too busy. Hopefully others can fill me in on if they're good to catch up on.
something really neat about the show is they actually referenced European swordsmanship for the animation. a lot of anime, even Vinland Saga, are very Eastern in their martial arts movements, even when they do the ridiculous stuff. A few of the techniques bumpkin shows off in training segments are even real longsword techniques.
That's why I linked Shad as he's VERY happy seeing the focus on actual sword play in this series.
I'm hoping there's this much focus on another mawha that I read that has EXCELLENT sword/martial arts combat if it gets an adaptation.
Going through your list, and compiling my own, I realized we didn't get a whole lot of traditional isekai this season. I don't mind them like some people do, but I also certainly wouldn't complain if they stayed less common. Does seem we're getting more novel stuff this time.
Didn't get super far in either, but I'll give my initial impressions:
Kowloon Generic Romance has amazing potential, and I need to get back to it. I only watched one or two episodes but, damn, it just drips style. Very intentionally retro-futuristic nostalgia trip, all wrapped up in psychological weirdness. Art is fucking amazing, like top tier. Also, points for Kowloon Walled City as a setting. What madlads. One concern I had, but didn't get far enough to verify one way or the other is, based on a trailer (I never watch them, but did here because I was looking for one to share), is I'm worried it might turn into a reverse harem, which would suck considering how amazing everything else is. There's a lot of focus on the female MC, and it seems from the trailer that all the men just can't help but be super into her. Due to the psychological elements, there might be a reason, but I hope it doesn't get to 'women's romancey' or whatever. But, yeah, everything else is just ridiculously stunning. Definitely give it a shot.
A Ninja and an Assassin Under One Roof: Personal taste, but I wasn't a fan of the mix of morbid content and goofy tone. It's just jarring. I'd prefer one or the other, and both together feels downright psychopathic. If you like that sort of murder humor, though, I can see it being fun. It definitely does have some humorous moments and good characters, I just wasn't a fan of the overall tone. It gets points for the episode one intro, though, where for one minute it's doing this cool old-school style art, complete with 4:3 aspect ratio.
Ones you didn't mention:
LAZARUS. By the Cowboy Bebop guy, with a fun mix of action, fight choreography, interesting world, cool animation, and excellent use of music. Not super far into it, so I can't speak to lasting quality, but so far it's been pretty impressive.
Sword of the Demon Hunter: Kijin Gentosho. Can't get too into it without giving things away, but pretty interesting. Will be curious to see where it goes.
Catcher in the Ballpark! Interesting format, where it focuses on a bunch of different characters and their lives, in small segments, and then joins some of them together. Just fun, light-hearted anime about some people who love baseball, and love their baseball team.
Food for the Soul. Cute girls doing cute things slice of life anime. In this case college girls creating a food club. Not as good as Yuru Camp...but what is? This is definitely copying the style, but does a good job and pulls it off. Cozy slice of life, for those into that sort of thing.
To respond to the ones you mentioned:
Country Bumpkin is fun but pretty goofy. Enjoyable but not very serious. It sounds like I don't really like it, but I actually do. It's just good times.
I found Unaware Atelier to be one of those ones that gets ruined by the joke getting dragged out too long, and the main character being too clueless. I'd give it another go, but I only have so much time. It wasn't terrible, but it just didn't click for me, and I got bored after a few episodes. Which is a shame, as I do like a lot of the concept. Nowhere near as bad as the I Parry Everything nonsense, but still turned me off for the same reasons.
The Brilliant Healer's New Life in the Shadows. Man, I just love this one. A bit like Country Bumpkin, it's just good fun. Not too much to say, as it's also not that deep, but it's just fun, and the characters are great. Carmilla is hilarious, and the gangster shenanigans are fun.
Love the
retronostalgic art style. I stopped about half-way through when the antagonist character went on his "I was born as male and female, life is hard, whaaa," speech.Gundam GQuuuuuuX: Okay. Interesting premise for an AU Gundam, but middling execution.
Apothecary Diaries S2: Continues to be Japan doing China better than China does China. Very dependable with a good bunch of characters.
Loser Ranger S2: Wastes some time on stuff that doesn't matter and then throws all the shit at the fan at once. Still entertaining.
Your Forma: Had some potential if you like light sci-fi crime stuff, but awful pacing. Not the worst thing ever, but not a recommendation either.
Aharen-san S2: These kids are idiots and I wish them all the best.
What. No. Say it ain't so.
FUCK.
That was my thoughts. Need to catch up on it. But the initial 'school brainwash' nonsense bit was tiresome.
Look on the bright side... I doubt it goes reverse harem later because the two guys besides the MC are in a relationship with each other.
Then again, I also just read that one of the female characters, isn't. So, throws hands up in air
DUDE.
You're ruining my evening ALMOST as much as President Trump is, FUCKING BOMBING IRAN...
Lazarus is complete full blown AIDS from a gay man's anus. You can plainly see that West Coast leftoids made 100% of the story and character choices and it's just rancid.
Unclear. It's certainly got Western gay influence, but even going back decades, Japan thinks the US has a bunch of blacks in all positions and...to be fair...we do.
It's set in America (I think), from a Japanese perspective. I can allow some Diversity™. Unfortunately, that's what we've projected both internally and externally.
It's not the Jap's fault that the international rallying cry of the US is 'Diversity is Our Strength.'
I've enjoyed the few episodes of LAZARUS I've seen.
Shads video made me check out bumpkin, i didn't get very far in. There was stuff that appealed to me, but the bit with all his students loving him was a bit much for me, when the hybrid animal/woman character did too I tapped out. I just don't love this modern style of anime with the harems being so over the top, I remember there being harem animes in the 2000s but it becoming a feature in action/historical animes like this doesn't really do it for me. May give it another go at some point though
A few more you did not mention:
Aharen-san wa Hakarenai 2: The most wholesome rom-com I've ever seen returns for Season 2. Just as good as the first season. The sweetest pure love comedy on TV.
Apocalypse Hotel: Unique idea, post apocalyptic world with only robots and aliens. meh execution.
Please Put Them On, Takamine-san: Hard pass unless you are looking for ecchi on steroids. Trying to combine femdom and a classic rom-com
The Shiunji Family Children: Boy finds out he is not blood related to his 5 sisters. Suddenly all of them are in love with him. Sounds lame but the execution is pretty sweet and innocent.
Can a Boy-Girl Friendship Survive?: Actually wholesome love triangle. I like it!
Thanks for filling in the gaps.
Yeah I looked at the description of Takamine and passed hard, almost as hard as that reincarnated as a dog one years ago lol.
Some animes are just super easy to pass on, aren't they?
Yeah, there's a lot of ecchi coming out this season, for whatever reason. And, although I didn't look into them much, they don't even seem interesting (High School of the Dead, for example, is amazing despite the ecchi), but these just lean way too hard on the ecchi, from the looks of things. None of them interested me in the slightest. Especially Please Put Them On, which looks pretty gross in concept. No thanks.
If you're saying it's actually wholesome, maybe I'll check it out. I passed just based on the framing.
Need to get back to Boy-Girl Friendship, only watched a bit. And I'll check out Aharen-san too; I've heard of it, but never watched.
If you haven't seen Dangers in my Heart, recommend. MC is a an insufferable edgelord for the first ep, but starts to improve quickly.
You didn't like the execution on Apocalypse Hotel? I thought it had some really great animation in it!
And please keep doing these. I don't do many modern animes but I still like these and would like more weeb content on here, it's nice to have stuff to talk about that isn't western culture war shit
I watched From Bureaucrat to Villainess as a lark and it turned out to be kind of interesting. There's been a whole lot of trash isekai where the protagonist reincarnates as the bitchy villain of some shitty dating sim game, but 'subverts' it by being a Mary Sue. This was no exception, but I did like how it was about a dorky old man who is stuck in his daughter's game and is going full dad mode trying to help out the game's true protagonist, but inadvertently becomes the most popular girl in school anyway. The twist to this one is the dad is merely in a coma, while the daughter and mother are playing the game he's in trying to help him beat it under the presumption that he'll wake up when it's over. Also, despite the premise being a 50 year old man in the body of a teenaged girl, it avoids any creepy sexual shenanigans.
Interesting stuff.
I don't watch anime or read manga, so reading through the thread about what's what and what's changed over the years gives some perspective of what's happening in the industry.
Nothing seems too standout; also it seems like a lot of it avoids the more masculine-themed content from the 80s and early 90s. Or do they just not make that kind of stuff anymore?
I'd say it's just this season as last season we had Solo Levelling that was one man getting stronger to body anyone in his way.
There is a lot of masculine characters but one thing I've slowly noticed is there are a few positive male role models now such as in from old country Bumpkin where they not dad's directly but lot's of people look to them for guidance.
It's subtle but happens enough for me to notice.