User blog:Miskos3/Fairy Tail Wiki in Anime: Summer 2016

Hello! Welcome to the next edition of the blogs discussing the seasonal anime.

In spite of me saying that... right in the beginning, let me mention something that many probably wouldn't expect me to do. Naruto.

FT Wiki:



Nnnnoooo, wait, don't leave yet. Let me just very briefly say that I highly disliked the way that the Naruto series has developed in the last year or two of its run and the nail to the coffin was was the final battle between Naruto and Sasuke, which was more of a forced fanservice with Sasuke changing his mind for the n-th time, rather than something we needed. However. However. After like a year of fillers, the anime is finally reaching the end of the manga adaption and it looks like Studio Pierrot has directed all of its resources towards the final battle, even taking two weeks off and then releasing a double episode last Thursday.. and o boy, did it look fucking awesome. Holy Jesus, I haven't been this hyped watching a Naruto episode in years. It was so good. The animation. The anime-only expansions. The soundtrack. Naruto was what got me into the world of anime and even though I stopped enjoying it some time before it ended, these two episodes were, in a way, a really big throwback to those early days. So if you ever liked Naruto, I definitely recommend checking those two episodes out.



Moving on, there were a few more anime I got to watch this season, so let's go over those.

Re: Zero

Even though this is a series that started airing last season, as it is 2 cours long, I can still talk about it here, I suppose. And of course, I can't praise it enough. While cliche in many aspects, the series takes an overused concept and tranforms it into something that just amazes me every week. Episode 15, ladies and gentlemen. The studio behind this anime, White Fox, has certainly put a lot of work into it, I mean, seeing an opening or an ending was about as rare as a vegan not telling you that they're a vegan. They made sure to use all the time available. Anyways, as I already talked about this anime last season, I'm just gonna recommend it yet again, as it is a competitor for the anime of year as far as I'm concerned.



Orange

This anime is such a contrast to Re: Zero in one way: production. As I've praised White Fox for how they managed to deal with Re: Zero's creation, from what I've been reading, it took them 2 years of production. While it may be unfair to compare it to Orange as the latter is simply a different genre and everything, it clearly didn't have the time, budget and perhaps a dedicated staff to make things look good all the time. Sure, the backgrounds are more than often absolutely beautiful, however, as far as character art goes... Yuck. The middle parts of the anime suffered so much from the art drop that I just couldn't focus on the story. Which is a great shame, because imo the story had quite a lot of emotion in it. It tackles topics like suicide, so especially for those, who know what it's about, it touches a lot of strings. However, it was a little too hard to feel anything when the close up of a character looked like it was drawn by me. As a btw, I can't draw. At all.



Tales of Zestiria the X

Ufotable? I'm in! This was basically what I thought, when I found out that the anime staff behind Fate/Zero was making an anime advert adaption of a game. There's not much to talk about, the story isn't all that original or shocking, however, it is still an interesting watch and Ufotable's touch makes it all the better. As is the tradition with their series by now, it is a split cour, therefore, the second part starts airing in 2017.



Fate/kaleid liner Prisma☆Illya 3rei!!

We all know how many spin-offs has Fairy Tail spawned. Some of them good, some of them not. I guess that's how it goes with popular franchises and Fate isn't an exception. Now imagine that one of the spin-offs receives an adaption.. And not just one season. Not two. Not three. But f-o-u-r madafakin' seasons of anime. Yup, that's an Illya spin-off, airing a cour every summer for 4 years now. And it's not over yet! The adaption continues with a movie. As far as the contents of the spin-off go, magical girls, loli fanservice, Fate fanservice and some seriousness here and there. Especially in the most recent arc, which was rather consistent with its intention to tell a story.



Dragon Ball Super

Aaaaaand the cow is being milked... However, finally in a good way! Many complained, perhaps rightfully so, that Dragon Ball Super has dropped the ball with the seriousness of the story, and even the animation sometimes, however, as far as I'm concerned, I've really enjoyed the lighthearted parts. The comedy just hits me in a good way. But! Enter Future Trunks arc and we finally get some of the serious stuff back. I have no real expectations, however, I feel the arc has been pretty good so far. If you're a DB fan, go for it~



And that's it. There were more anime I wanted to check out, but somehow, I never managed to do so. However, as it looks like the upcoming Fall Season is gonna be bland, (Haikyuu and Ajin only welp), so it's a good chance to get rid of some backlog.

What did everyone else watch? And what were your thoughts? Do share.