Anime World Order Show # 236 – It’s Shark Time, Baby

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Although we’re posting this on Halloween, there’s not much especially spooky about this episode since after having seen Uzumaki, Daryl has instead elected to review the theatrical film adaptation of Look Back by Tatsuki Fujimoto. Be forewarned that we do spoil it all in the event you didn’t already read or watch it first.

Introduction (0:00 – 54:24)
We were fortunate that the two recent hurricanes did not do significant damage to where any of us were, but it was lucky breaks on both occasions. We go over what we’re watching in the current anime season, and Daryl finally receives his Macross Plus Blu-Ray set. Not mentioned in the recording is the fact that due to inadequate packaging during transportation–this despite shipping from the old Right Stuf warehouse, which has clearly been mandated some changes to their procedures and policies by the new Sony ownership–a corner of his Blu-Ray set box was slightly crushed despite no damage to the exterior packaging box; an extremely common thing which Crunchyroll Store’s service reps say they can do absolutely nothing to remedy. This is not even close to the worst news coming out about Crunchyroll as we touch upon the then-breaking David Wald situation and contrast that with some recent financial publication coverage of Crunchyroll strategically rolled out to coincide with the broadcast start of the new Dragon Ball Daima series. Toho’s acquisition of GKIDS has us wondering if a similar fate will befall them, for the number of independent anime publishers in the US is basically down to about two or three guys at this point. Oh yeah, and we also talk about the anime adaptation of Uzumaki, which was originally going to be the subject of this episode until well, we saw the rest of it. Not stated in this recording: we’re 99.5% sure that the infamous quality drop coincides with the concurrent-with-production merger of Warner Brothers and Discovery to form WBD and the appointment of then-new CEO David Zaslav. We’re placing our chips on the roulette wheel as far as that, since it’d also neatly explain why Jason DeMarco couldn’t name names when talking about who was responsible (before locking/disabling his social media accounts).

Review: Look Back (54:24 – 1:47:03)
Originally released in US theaters in a very limited engagement, 2024’s Look Back vastly exceeded expectations and got additional showtimes, which on a per capita basis is better than the singing clown movie everybody who saw it hated. Adapted from a one-shot released in 2021 by Chainsaw Man creator Tatsuki Fujimoto, this film by Kiyotaka Oshiyama (whom we’d previously talked about in our review of Flip Flappers) is absolutely worth seeing by everyone. It’ll stream on Prime Video starting November 7, 2024. You can also read the original manga courtesy of Viz, who have released it both in print as well as digitally. If you pay the $3 a month for Shonen Jump, it is available to read as part of that. Daryl recommends you either watch the film or read the manga before listening to this, since we basically summarize what happens scene by scene from start to finish in order to give our thoughts on it.

Anime World Order Show # 235 – We Can Think of Numerous Things Griffith Did Wrong, Actually

Despite a grievous tech failure, we’re back to discuss the upcoming Fall 2024 anime season before Daryl reviews the 1997 anime adaptation of Berserk, recently back in print in the US due to a Blu-Ray release.

Introduction (0:00 – 59:42)
The actual on-topic anime discussion doesn’t begin until about 23 minutes in, so feel free to skip ahead if you don’t want to hear about Daryl’s ineptitude that resulted in him shelling out for a new PC as an unplanned emergency expense, which somehow segues into us making fun of the PS5 Pro. A new anime season is underway, and while Patrons who tuned into our Discord live event saw our reactions in real time, we’re recounting those to the best of our ability here. There are 68 new titles this season alone, and that’s not counting continuations of previous shows, stuff for young children, or 18+ material. As such, there was no possible way we could talk about everything here, so if there’s something noteworthy or enjoyable that you’re checking out, let us know about it! PS: It’s In My Desk is a song commonly sung by elementary school chorus kids. Or at least, it was something done back in the 1980s. If YouTube is anything to go by, it seems to have endured into this century as well.

Review: Berserk (59:42 – 2:40:50)
Daryl’s PC death means he lost all of his notes, but perhaps that doesn’t matter since Berserk by Kentaro Miura is one of the single most popular manga and anime series among American fans, as it has been for decades now. With the release of the new Blu-Ray set from Discotek Media (available from the Crunchyroll Store or Amazon — note those are affiliate links), we figured now would be a good time to review the original 1997 anime series, now that everybody has a legal way to watch it again. We understand that there are entire podcasts and entire websites devoted to covering Berserk in detail, so this review is mostly centered on how each of us have engaged with it over the decades. For example, Gerald has only ever seen this anime version, and has yet to read any of the manga. Daryl by contrast has seen and read everything (but is bad at remembering things), while Clarissa has seen this series and read much of the manga but has not dared to watch…the 2016 series. Hmm. Perhaps Daryl should make Gerald and Clarissa watch the 2016 Berserk TV series–which he watched as it simulcast and then purchased the Blu-Rays of–and then record a future episode about that…

This was posted in our Discord and will hopefully be a relic of a forgotten meme in the near future, but it’s a sign of this moment we live in now.