Anime Reviews

When I started watching originally I thought the characters were in middle school, but then I realized they were talking about high school and the twin characters turned 17, which is when I realized they were meant to be high schoolers despite how young they look. That sort of sets the tone for some of the jokes in the show (and there's even a couple characters who are entirely based off these jokes), and also dates the show as joking about that type of stuff (at least in the US) has become a bit more controversial. Putting all that aside, the show is actually pretty funny. Especially since I watched it dubbed (as that's what was immediately available to me) I was able to get the tone of the jokes, and it even made me chuckle out loud a bit at some points, which I rarely ever do. My favorite characters were the ones in the ending "Lucky Channel" segment, I loved the dynamic between them and the whole switch-up thing Akira does when she is bullying Shiraishi is hilarious to me. I'll go into more of my favorite characters later on.

Part of me is glad I watched it dubbed bc there is a lot of taking. Now that I think about it, it's 90% talking. I know I wouldn't have enjoyed it as much if I had watched it subbed because of this. Since it was dubbed, that made it way easier to just put it on and have it off to the side as I did other stuff, as well as made it easy to pick up and put down whenever I stopped watching for the day. Plus, it helped me understand the type of vibe it's giving off. Just friends in highschool chatting and vibing. For some reason, the first episode made me think "Oh, I finally understand this genre now" because it's just meant to be no-stakes turn your brain off chilling. Again, if I had watched it subbed, I wouldn't have understood this, and I'd have constantly been waiting for "something" to happen because I'm constantly glued to the screen reading the subtitles anyways. It's a bit hard for me to explain, but basically watching it dubbed makes it a bit more casual feeling for me, rather than subbed where I'm always expecting something to happen because I'm taking it a bit more seriously by constantly looking at the screen? I guess.

And the dub isn't even that bad. Some of the voices can be a bit grating at times, especially in some of the newer characters they had added in the second season, but as someone with a naturally high and childlike voice myself I don't really blame the voice actors so it's fine. Plus I was able to think of it as the VA potentially putting on an intentionally silly sounding voice to help me get through it. But the voice actors did a good job at making the whole thing feel really casual and chill, like actual friends hanging out. I had known the voice actor who does Chirithy from KH was also in the dub, so it was amusing to finally see her character and just think of Chirithy the whole time.

I'd go into the story but there isn't too much of a story to begin with. It's a slice of life anime, so it's essentially as the genre describes, a slice of the lives of this group of friends. They go hang out place and avoid doing schoolwork and talk about stuff like food and other things they enjoy. That's about it. Again, that's part of the appeal though, so the limited story wasn't a bad thing. I guess it's more about the character types and their interactions with each other, which was still fun to see. Also, I thought the running joke of scene-jumping into the middle of a conversation and the topic always being something "stinky" hilarious and always caught me off guard.

In terms of characters, my favorites are probably Akira Kogami (as stated above) and her dynamic with Minoru Shiraishi. (Also the guy who shows up and sings at the end credits in season 2 is supposedly the guy who he is based off of, and those segments were also pretty funny.) For main characters, I think I liked the twins the most. Especially Kagami since I liked her spice and how she barely tolerated Konata when she says anything too otaku for her to understand. I found it amusing. And the contrast between her and her twin Tsukasa, where she was very sweet and innocent compared to her twin sister. Also I just have a soft spot for twins I guess.

Of the newer side characters, I think I liked Tamura the most, since I related to her a bit in terms of being in like middle school and writing fanfiction that I wouldn't dare let anyone read and may or may not be based on real life. And every artist joke segments she had were pretty funny and relatable to me, like turning over while falling to protect her artist hand and having ideas only to forget them instantly. In general though, most of the characters I enjoyed. The only character that I disliked was Konata's dad. I know he's meant to be sort of a joke character and not meant to be taken too seriously, but god did he make me feel uncomfortable. I actually think that's the first time I felt vehemently uncomfortable with a character in anime ever. And the whole episode dedicated to him towards the end of the show which was meant to be wholesome just made me feel eugh. I'm gonna stop talking about him now bc I just don't like even thinking about him. But other than him, everyone else was cool.

Overall the anime was very cozy. It was nice to just put on whenever I had time and tune in and out whenever I wanted. Sometimes it was actually pretty funny, which was nice. (Especially since I had finished watching after our family dog of 10 years passed away recently, so it helped me take my mind off of it for a bit and feel better.) Very fun and chill especially for something I impulsively watched on a whim. The only issue is my curse of mainly enjoying older anime where there is either very little merch or merch that hasn't been sold in decades and is now very expensive. I can only dream of getting those Akira Kogami figs. T^T

I started watching AOT while I was in middle school. The little edgelord I was back then was super into gorey anime, and AOT just so happened to be starting, and somewhat gorey. Totally perfect for my little brain. I really enjoyed the action scenes of the first couple seasons though. I loved seeing the rooftop running, the ziplines and the flips and spins, defeating enemies that were huge. It was very cool.

Then the drama aspect hit, and I enjoyed that as well. The walls are broken and the titans are coming in? Eren's a titan shifter? Female titan? She's one of ours?. Again, very cool at the time. Another thing I enjoyed was the time period that it was "set" in. I use set in quotes because we learn later on that the place they lived was actually just behind in terms of technology I don't normally like anything medieval related at all. I hate the whole "knights and castles and king and dragon" stuff. But this felt different, it felt less fantasy in a way. I have no idea if the time period is even the same (because I suck at history) but basically I enjoyed it too.

So I'm enjoying it so far, and then our crew finally escape the walls and see the ocean. Felt like the end at that point, right? Wrong; WW2 time. As someone who doesn't like history, I didn't enjoy the whole story derailment of it basically being similar to WW2. So I think that was part of what made me stop watching for a bit, and just because I know that would've bored me to death. I'm not sure what I expected to be outside of the walls, but WW2 surely wasn't it. Maybe I was too oblivious to see any of the subtext though, since I was too distracted by all the cool action scenes.

Eventually as I saw that the final season was starting I gave in and caught up. And yeah, it did get a little boring in the middle there. Just the entire time boring political conflicts and gun standoffs. The drama was there, but where was all the action? Where are all the ziplines? The giant swords? I need something here. This is also where they had changed animation studios, so the once unique art style of AOT slowly became more and more generic as the episodes dragged on. Even if there was an action scene, it didn't feel nearly as fluid as it had before. But zero disrespect towards the animators of either studio, the new art style did develop over time and the action scenes did get more uhh action-y as well. I'm just dumb and hate change lol.

Sorry about the lack of details, since again I don't remember as much as I should. As of writing this, I have just finished watching the final episode. I do enjoy that the action and ziplines did eventually return. I don't really have much to say about it. It was just an ending I guess? It's better than what I was thinking of though; I had assumed literally everyone was going to die. But I was almost disappointed at the potential that the whole series was just Mikasa's dream, glad that wasn't the case though. I'm mostly just glad my favorite character, Armin, didn't die lol.

Speaking of characters, I feel like the anime did do a decent job of giving everyone their own stories. Since I essentially grew up with AOT, it almost feels like I knew them as friends. So when some of them died, it hurt. Which is surprising, since I usually don't feel that much when watching anything. Some of my favorites are Armin, Sasha, and Hange, but Levi eventually grew on me as well. The whole cast pretty much I enjoyed, and seeing some of them get along at the end was nice. I did cry a few times: Hange's death, Armin's almost-death (the final season one where he's being suffocated, not the crispy one. This was because that "death" was during the time period when I had stopped watching for a bit, so I knew he was going to live in the end), Levi's entire squad death, and most notably Sasha's death. Hange's death made me sad because she had managed to live for so long, and seeing her happiness as she dove into the rumbling, and not even being killed by a titan either. All while her comrades watched. Again, it felt like an old friend dying. Armin's final season almost-death made me sad mostly just due to seeing him yelling at himself, telling himself he was worthless and useless, and the "I hate you! I always have!" got me good. It just hit too close to home I guess. Levi's squad makes me sad mostly because he's been through so much, every time they showed up it made me feel bad for him. I'll get more into Levi in a bit.

Finally, Sasha's death, the one that hurt me the most. I'm not really sure why honestly. I guess since she was one of my favorite characters from the beginning, always full of nothing but happiness and hope. When she was finally outside of the walls, it was nice to see her be able to try all these new sorts of foods that she loved. Even getting the attention of someone else as well, who's food went seemingly unappreciated until he met her. He would even go against his teachings as a Marleyan to even consider being together with her. But then this rat child named Gabi shows up and shoots her. She doesn't even get to die while fighting. And to make matters worse, Sasha's family unknowingly takes their child's murderer in. And the now-mourning food guy who had a crush on Sasha serves them food. He realizes and chaos ensues. That was a whole thing. But anyways, what I'm trying to say about this is that it's interesting to see the long chain of effects that Sasha's death had on everyone and everything, at least for a little bit. Also I hate Gabi.

Levi was a character that I didn't really understand the appeal to at the time. I mean he was rude, and seemingly overpowered. It wasn't until after I had watched the OVAs about him that I started to enjoy him though. Again, every time they showed his old squad it would make me feel bad for him, he's been through so much and somehow still goes on. The part at the very end of one of the OVAs, where he returns from his expedition without the rest of his squad, and Petra's father is seen holding a letter she had written about thinking about marriage, I assume to Levi, and asking where she was, broke my poor lil heart. I'm not sure if it's because of Levi, or just that my tastes have changed, but I now enjoy the trope of "usually stern and slightly rude character actually has a bunch of trauma". *Squints at Edgeworth from Phoenix Wright* hmmm... Anyways, I enjoyed the OVAs and they made me appreciate Levi's character more.

Going back and listening to some of the music from seasons 1 and 2 made me really miss the old vibe of the anime tho. Even just seeing the old green capes and brown jackets makes me nostalgic. Again, back when it was just ziplining around and fighting giants and doing rad stunts. Before it became mostly just human vs human holding a gun to one another for no reason. Also that whole royal bloodline thing while interesting was also a bit confusing, heck a lot of the stuff in the later seasons was too confusing for my smooth brain. I just feel like it wasn't what I signed up for I guess. I miss the first couple seasons, but that also could probably just be the nostalgia talking, since it did have a huge impact on me due to being one of the first animes I've ever watched and waited for a new episode on tv every week. Felt like the good old days ig.

Overall I think the series was fine. I did get to a point where I was just going through it with the thought process of "I just have to trudge through the rest of this to see the end" since I wasn't gonna let my 10 years of waiting go to waste. I almost caved in and watched the final episode before it was dubbed, and even before that I had almost went and just read the manga, but I managed to be patient and now it's finally over. It was alright.