Manga Mayhem 42 Wizard's Soul ~Holy War of Love~, Seishun Rikon, Anata ni Hana wo Sasagemashou, Bambi no Tegami

Yikes, so I've just quit my first ever real job kinda dealio and so I've had a bit of time on my hands with which to of course indulge in more manga before school starts. I've read these and I don't particularly feel like they've got quite enough substance to them to write separate posts about them so I thought I'd just mash them all into one just because I can.

{Spoilers}

First on the list going chronologically would be Wizard's Soul ~Holy War of Love~. This is a card game manga meant to have a moe moe kind of atmosphere with not a lot going on besides cute girls playing card games. And that's kind of all that goes on. It's got this Chihayafuru vibe to it, only because it has cards tbh, but nonetheless I had to include that thought. They're playing this card game that's apparently based on one that really exists, but as someone not really knowledgable about card games, I'm not sure which one it's based on to be honest. It's set in this alternate world where how good you are at cards determines your place in society. This girl enters one of these card game competitions in order to win money to pay back her father's debt and through playing the game comes to realize that she doesn't actually hate playing the game as much as she thought she did. She originally tried her best at the game with the mindset that if she were to beat her dying mother at one card game she would be able to save her mom from death itself. Ultimately she wasn't able to save her mom which drove her to hating the game. Facing all of these different opponents in the competition, she finally realizes that she likes the game as well. The manga has a good balance of drama, tension, actual card play, and clear narration of what's going on in the game so the reader isn't confused. I wouldn't go so far as to say it was an amazing manga, but it was pretty cute and a bit different from the stuff I usually pick up.

I realized as I was reading that her sister's names together would be ion canon lol which is kinda cute because they're so cute but their names put together would be a weapon

And of course there's a v cute ship

The second manga would be Seishun Rikon. This one was pretty short with 9 chapters and based on the premise of a girl and boy student with the same last name. Their whole class calls them a married couple and the two just accept this, not being too bothered by this. The boy is working on coding a calendar smartphone app to be used by the students at school and involves the girl by enlisting her help to draw a cute mascot for the app. It's a pretty pure manga all around with kind of an open ending hinting that they end up together. Hngh so pure

The third manga was a more supernatural manga with this guy that had nobility but no money and this girl with a lot of money but no status. The two of them are roped into marriage by their families, but really what brings the two together is the curse that the guy is under. There's been a curse on all the male heads of the family for all of them to die young. It's basically the guy and girl and they fall in love and then defeat the curse. It wasn't super special or anything and the characters weren't all that outstanding. I dunno, maybe it was too rushed for 20 chapters or maybe because halfway through it was just about them being in this rushed infatuation stage together. Eh.

The fourth manga was if you just took a manga where the main love interest is that cool edgy bad boy type and the girl has lowkey abandonment issues over a deer and lots of bad luck and put them together and they fall in love. That's all I can say, it was pretty short. LOL I just really like the mangaka and their work in general tbh that's why I read this.

Wow looking at this I'm glad I didn't try to make separate posts on these. Yikes. I guess not every manga can be a gem like Daytime Shooting Star or Blue Spring Ride heh.

Anime ATM 86 Amagi Brilliant Park

Currently I'm sitting in my sister's bed with my dog at my feet after a long day of work. I meant to write this blog right after I got off from work, but I ended up falling asleep due to exhaustion. Manual labor is pretty tiring after all.

I was recommended this anime by V who said, in short, that this was a trip. That day I had tried to watch the gambling anime that's on Netflix, but uhhhhh let's just say it was wild and I probably will never finish that anime.

{Spoilers, but it's more about the comedy than the plot so you kinda already know what's up}

I think something that's really important when watching an anime in terms of how much the story impacts you is how relatable and how much it resonates with you. For V I think this anime really stood out to him. He said the MC was unique because of his narcissistic nature and the way he wouldn't take crap from anyone. Perhaps because V had already pointed it out to me I didn't find these things to be as standout as they maybe would've been had I already not been aware of these unique qualities of his. Then again V also said that he read a comment that said that the MC's name was Kanie because he was actually Kanye or something else ridiculous and nonsensical *smh*.

In general the general plot of banding together people for a greater purpose was well executed. Kanie was enlisted partially against his will and partially through bribery with Latifa's croquettes into becoming Amagi Brilliant Park's new manager. The goal was to get 500,000 guests through those gates, a feat that seemed near impossible at the start of the show. However, with a lot of teamwork, collaboration, sacrifice, and ingenuity, they were able to pull it off and save the park. From this bare bones summary, the show doesn't seem like anything special, but some things that set this show apart are the characters themselves and the fact that most of the cast members of the park are ~magical~. They're from this place called Maple Land that runs on Animus which is like people's fun I guess? It's kinda like the Monsters Inc./University university that runs off children's screams/laughs which is kind of creepy when you think about it...

Anyways, the characters are all really unique. Like V said, Kanie is definitely unique in that he's a narcissist and very pragmatic.

Sento, V's personal favorite, is kind of like if you took Violet from Violet Evergarden and mixed her with the girl from Nichijou that keeps whipping out her gun to shoot that guy she likes. Sometimes it's hard for her to understand people's feelings but she tries her best, even though Macaron and Tiramie are often times waaaay too rated M for mature, and she's very trigger happy. It's hard for her to convey her emotions as well, but she's honestly best girl for wanting the best for the park and for Latifa.

As for Latifa, she was too perfect. Maybe it's just me, but I don't really like the frail, pure ohime-sama characters in general and since Latifa is the cookie cutter of that very description you can see why I don't prefer her character. Moffle, her uncle, on the other hand is great. He's a super cute mouse mascot, which makes me confused as to if he is blood related to Latifa or what, Maple Land lineage is wack, that sacrifices everything for Latifa and for Amagi Brilliant Park. What really got me going though was his backstory about Latifa's mom :(((( his true love. Something that makes Amagi Brilliant Park so iconic in terms of humor oftentimes is because of Tiramie and Macaron. They look like super cute characters like Moffle with their pink cat and sheep exteriors, but inside are perverted old men. This would've been a totally different show if they had super girly voices and acted like fairies like I had expected. Instead they were...very interesting.

I didn't know where to insert this kinda random thought I had, but the ED reminded me of the ED for K with Neko sleeping. In the same way there's kind of a lot of fan service. Heh. You've been warned!

Each of the episodes either showcased methods of how they improved the park to increase visitor count, or they were more filler episodes like when Kanie was too sick to go to school so Sento, Tiramie, Moffle, and Macaron each took turns impersonating him. In the way that Konosuba is a parody of "life in a new world" and Hinamatsuri is a parody of sci fi, Amagi Brilliant Park is a parody of the run of the mill show where people band together to save something (LOL I can't think of a more succinct way of putting it right now). Like the episode of how the fairies of Elementario had to bond in order to pass trials to shut down the castle's defenses through karaoke and DDR.

Or how in the last episode to make a PV, Sento and Tricen consulted everyone around the park on ways to improve the PV and make it more impactful and that PV turned into a viral sensation. That was actually the funniest episode. Kanie's reaction to Sento being so moved by this mish-mash PV was the best.

Overall, I'm glad they were able to save the park. It was a show that was full of a lot of comedic twists and turns that were quite unexpected. You're sure to find a character you relate to and have a lot of fun laughing at everyone's antics and being relieved with them when they find out they've saved the park. It's honestly a pretty moving anime if you let yourself get swept away in this Amaburi world. 

Also I should mention that KyoAni had a part in this and I love KyoAni. KyoAni has the Midas touch I swear.

Manga Match 41 Dreamin' Sun

I've been sitting on the idea of writing a book, well maybe writing a book is a bit too ambitious at this point, but that's the end goal anyways. When I was in this frenzy last week or so I came up with this really interesting idea, but I'm not sure that I could successfully write a coming of age kind of story, if I myself haven't gone through or completed a journey of self-discovery sort of deal. It'd be like writing a romance story without ever having been in love, which can be done, just not well. Trust me, I've really tried. No amount of shoujo manga could ever really replace that personal experience. 

Recently V has brought it to my attention something that I've been avoiding for a while. I've been watching anime for 5+ years now, sure with some of it being on and off, but now it's becoming more of an off thing than an on one. Even blogging is somehow coming more of a chore and a weekly obligation rather than something I'm excited to sit down and discuss with myself in a blog. I'm not exactly sure how much longer this will go on, but I guess we'll just have to wait and see. 

{Spoilers}

Now onto the happy stuff! 

Actually, the creator of this manga also wrote Orange which is one of my all-time favorites. The time travel aspect and the romance and just the raw feelings of everything being out of your control and all of those separate universes ugh. Orange is something I'll never truly forget about.There was nothing left to be desired in that manga. And the creator really did it again! They created another masterpiece. Of course it wasn't as intriguing as Orange because it didn't have that mysterious fantasy thing going for it what with the time traveling letters and all, but it was really just an overall heart-warming manga. I binged the heck out of it and enjoyed each of the characters. I have to say that while the story itself wasn't the most original thing I've ever read, the dynamic in between the characters and the secret relations between the characters due to affairs and all had me shocked at some parts and absolutely melting at others. 

This was the story about Shimana, a girl who couldn't find happiness in her household. She ran away from her house, and found a home with a boarding house situation with three other guys. It was definitely a chronicle of her experience with love, from falling in love with Asahi as the guy who was like the sun to her to chasing after Taiyou/the landlord and her love for him developing beyond admiration and wanting a safe harbor to wanting the very best for him to dealing with Zen and his unrequited love for her. Thank goodness everyone ended up with a happy ending. 

I think something that set this manga apart from the rest, was how holistic the whole story was. I felt as though it did a good job displaying different types of love and how Shimana really matured in how she experienced and dealt with her love. Her love for Asahi was one more of admiration and of generally liking his golden boy aura. There weren't any super deep feelings there, just more of a little girl's crush. With Zen's unrequited love for her, which isn't something that's as focused on in a lot of shoujo, with the emphasis being on the main pair rather than the side characters, just in general though, it was kind of the most beautiful and most attractive thing to me about this manga. Zen's love for Shimana was built on this whimsical crush on this girl that's doing her best and from a place of not wanting things to work out for her so that she would give him a chance to instead just wanting what was best for her. It was a showcase of how pure his love was and how mature he became through supporting Shimana in her love for the landlord. And every time he cried my heart ached for this pure boy that just wanted the best for his unrequited love. On the receiving side of Zen's affections, Shimana was having to deal with someone's feelings who she couldn't reciprocate and a love for someone who didn't seem interested. This dissonance between Zen who could give her everything and the landlord who seemed anything but interested created an interesting internal dialogue of "why do I love this guy who doesn't seem like he will ever reciprocate my love for him instead of this great guy in front of me" which highlights the irrational nature of love as something that definitely isn't logical or even explicable at times. And the Landlord even directly hits on this point when he's realized his feelings for Shimana, but insists that Zen would be a better fit for her. To Shimana this makes her all the more angry because even she can't really explain why exactly she fell for the landlord or why she couldn't fall in love with Zen instead. 

In the end though it all worked out for everyone. They were able to live happily ever after which I am so relieved about, even though they're fictional characters. I know it's irrational to be stressed over things that are make-believe, but I can't help it. I'm glad that Zen was able to turn his feelings for Shimana into an important memory instead of suppressing it or doing something unhealthy and move on to find a new love. Phew

Overall, the expression of love and the way that love grew and developed in this manga was unlike anything else I've experienced. It was definitely unique because of its characters. I would honestly reread it if I had time just to look at Zen's little panda cutely named Zenzen and all of Zen's antics. Can you tell that Zen's my favorite? And it was really nice how the landlord supported all of their dreams. A lot of the time I think we're faced with people that don't support our dreams for one reason or another, out of worry or love or out of some other motivation, but it was encouraging to see Taiyou being there to support other people's dreams even though in his life no one supported his dream. All the boys are very pure. I'll be thinking about this manga for a long time afterwards. 

THEY'RE JUST THE CUTEST, I WANT AN AU WHERE THEY END UP TOGETHER ASDFGHJKL;

Every time this pure boi cried I internally cried T^T

uwu but I'm happy he ended up with such a nice girl

So freaking cute!!!!! They both made each other cream puffs and they have the same taste in food and like cute things hngh

I'm happy that beginning to end this happy household stayed together :')

Anime ATM 85 Flavors of Youth

Coincidentally, about 4 days before the release of this movie onto Netflix I had actually sent the trailer to V. And then after my trip to Hawaii I ended up watching this with my favorite Canadian.

{Spoilers, maybe}

One of the first things that really got me going about this movie was the food. Albeit the food was only really the focal point of the first of the three short films that made up the movie itself, but that one short really made me glad that my favorite Canadian and I had gotten food to eat beforehand. The food shots were Ghibli-tier. You know what I'm talking about, the Ponyo shot of them eating soup that his mom made and all of that.

Beyond the food though, was this sort of quietness about the whole film. It was a reoccurring thing that tied everything together and made it a cohesive trilogy of sorts. In the first short it was about a man that kind of just walked through life and who's life seemed more like a frame through which to view the world rather than the focal piece within the frame if you know what I mean? (I just worked an 8 hour shift so I'm not certain that what I'm saying makes any coherent sense, but I didn't want to lose my motivation to write this post at all so here I am.) There was a sense of melancholy as he was narrating his childhood and his first love all revolving around that bowl of noodles that followed him since his youth. It was also very mysterious in a way because the world around him kept moving in unpredictable ways and we never really got to know what happened to the people he watched.

In a way completely different from how the first short was, the second short was a whirlwind of circumstances that were more dynamic. It was a story of a girl who was thrust into the spotlight and through this became disenchanted with this life that many people idealize. I think that this short would especially resonate with anyone who is a workaholic or who is often blinded by all of the shortcomings in life rather than the blessings.

In the third short, one that S and I both agreed was the best of the three by the end of the movie, it was a romance. I mean who doesn't love a good romance story full of drama and emotions? Sorry, that was kind of the broad summary of every romance story ever hehe. It called back a lot of memories of nostalgia, a sort of archaic and classic feeling that you can't get nowadays what with Spotify and digitalized music. There is a very romanticized feeling about it with the use of recorders, and a reverence for things that haven't changed in the face of progress or technological advancement. It's about a boy and a girl and their unspoken love for one another. The things left unsaid leave room for many unfortunate misunderstandings, however the two of them are able to come together at the very end. This short in particular was a bit of a wake-up call. The main character was almost an echo of myself, not that I study quite that hard, but just the times when I would brush my parents off or ignore them in order to study for a test. It really provoked this self-reflection in me to wonder what exactly I was studying for which was to not burden my parents and to make them proud, and to wonder why I was allowing myself to treat them so roughly because I was stressed. The main character missed out on so much because he was caught up in fulfilling his dream that he hurt the people around him. I guess, before you start to work hard, it's best to think about why you're working hard and not to neglect the present in order to achieve what you want in the future. Good lord I am just a wheel of cheesy feelings aren't I?

Anyways, this sort of vignette style of movie is one that I was not expecting. I was expecting a lot of food and for eating to be the focal point of the movie, but instead I got such a nostalgic and contemplative feeling from the movie. It really made me reflect on myself and it made me quite emotional. It was a good movie to watch with a friend, to laugh together, to discuss together, and to just enjoy hanging out with someone I don't see too often anymore. I'd recommend that you watch the movie if you haven't done so already. Each of the shorts is strong enough to stand alone and I think it's really commendable to be able to tell three successful stories that could each reach out and touch a whole wide range of audiences and for them to be melded together into one beautiful masterpiece.

{No screenshots because Netflix heh}

Manga Match 40 Yukuyuku Futari

When I'm bored I look for shoujo manga to kill time. And that's why there've been so many manga matches coming out.

{There's no spoilers because they're already together and the episodes are more like vignettes or little blurbs of couple stuff lol}

So the story revolves around a high school girl Maru and her high school senpai turned university boyfriend Aoi. The two of them go on cute dates in which Aoi is easily flustered, but still wants to impress his girlfriend, and Maru is forgetful and always stresses about whether or not she's a suitable girlfriend for Aoi. And that's it. Just thirteen chapters of fluff. :) It was a nice little story for sure, just not anything substantial to write about heh.