Welcome. My thoughts on these episodes of seasonal anime will be brief today as I seem to be entering a writer’s block and some mood shifts. Hopefully, I’ll be back up to speed by next week. Anyway, here goes– let’s rant!

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Higurashi no Naku Koro ni GOU

Episode 5: Watadamashi-hen part 1

Just as in the original Higurashi, after the Rena arc comes the one about Mion and Shion. Everything seems to be going well so far. Rika’s intervention caused Keiichi to give the doll from the toy shop to Mion and not Rena. However, I expect that tragedy will still happen despite Rika’s early intervention. The rules in this continued Higurashi world have changed. We don’t know why things are do different, nor why Rika was sent to relive the worlds again in the first place.

As usual, Mion and Shion are both beautiful and wonderful characters. I never liked all the implied sexism in this arc about Mion being boyish just because she is confident and leaderly. But if you think about it, this attitude (“girls must like dolls, boys must be leaders”) was what most people thought in the 80s in Japan. Anyway, one thing I noticed was that reactions from the characters are more pronounced in this Higurashi than in the old one. The embarrassed reactions are really cute. I look forward to what happens next.

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Majo no Tabitabi (The Journey of Elaina)

Episode 5: Royal Celesteria

In this episode, Elaina recalls a time when she visited the land of mages, Royal Celesteria. She was temporarily reunited with her teacher, Fran, at the country’s magic academy. While she stayed, Elaina helped teach some of Fran’s students at the school. Fran talked about how she wrote a manuscript of a book about her travels but accidentally sold the bag it was in. 6 months after that meeting, a book was published called “The Journeys of Fran.”

There wasn’t much of interest to me in this episode, besides my continuing amusement with the frank, logical, and self-interested personality of Elaina. It was nice to see Fran again, though. I love hearing her seiyuu, Kana Hanazawa, doing such a mature voice. In the end, Fran and her students sent Elaina off with a shower of flower petals.

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Kamisama ni Natte Hi (The Day I Became A God)

Episode 4

Thanks to Hina (Odin!), Yota won a mahjong tournament and got to meet a celebrity he loves, Miss Tengan. She was so impressed with his unique style — complete bullshittery style– that she started coming on to him. Yota was tempted but he decided that he wouldn’t go with Tengan because he still likes Izanami. By the way, I finally recognized Izanami’s seiyuu, thanks to some lines in this episode. It’s Yui Ishikawa, voice of Mikasa Ackerman and Violet Evergarden. No wonder she sounded familiar.

On another note, the research into the mysterious physicist Dr. Korogi continued, and it was discovered that he had a family. I wonder if Hina is related to him. It was a funny episode overall, with very little plot progression but plenty of comedy. I know next to nothing about mahjong, but the episode made it easy to tell that Yota was doing everything wrong. XD

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Ikebukuro West Gate Park

Episode 4

Quite frankly, this episode bored me so much that watching it was an ordeal. I think I’m just not quite “clicking” with IWGP. The story was about a random old man and the mystery of his deceased son. I fail to see how this episode contributes to the story, or why audiences should care about characters we don’t know. Maybe next week will be better.

Thanks for reading! Sayonara until next time!

PATREON