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This post is by guest writer Liam O’Loghlen.
To be brutally honest I am not very good at keeping up with anime seasons, so this season has taken me out of my comfort zone. The down side is that watching half a dozen new episodes for individual shows splits my enthusiasm and makes it hard to appreciate some shows that I think deserve more from me. Because of this, one show is facing the chopping block this week, and another show narrowly avoided it with an impressive showing. The plus side is that we’re reaching the third week, and third episodes tend to be where we see seminal moments that pave the way for the rest of the series. Lots of teary-eyed anime characters and really great dramatic moments, and even some well-earned hamburg steaks. With that said, it’s time to name my top picks for the week of 7/18 for the summer anime season.
Top Picks
Sweetness And Lightning
Sweetness and Lightning continually does the impossible by matching its unbelievable adorableness with its genuinely heartfelt everyday drama, building the mundane petty quarrel of two kindergarteners over clay into a genuine moment of intimacy between father and daughter, then topping it off on a warm and fuzzy note with Tsumugi finally getting her long-awaited hamburg steak. (STATUS: This remains my top pick because I have nothing but love for this show and it just can’t do any wrong).
Love Live! Sunshine!!
Love Live! Sunshine!! episode three leaned hard into the ridiculous upbeat camp that was the most glowing quality of the original series, and from there it crescendoes into a gloriously huge melodramatic climax that left me physically applauding it. (STATUS: This amazing ridiculousness has truly beat the original series on every front in just three episodes, and it’s become the show that I’m most actively looking forward to each week).
Orange
Orange is slowly but surely building to the poignant underlying truth behind its premise that even when faced with a chance to do it all over Naho will continue to make inevitable mistakes, and it’s the visceral intimacy of its character gestures that truly sells that. (STATUS: Still a must watch that consistently impresses with its dramatic peaks).
JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure: Diamond is Unbreakable
The latest episode leans more into wild unpredictable suspense as Josuke and Jotaro battle a pair of rats with deadly stands, and it nails it with its focused color and line work that really draw out the intensity of this crazy battle. (STATUS: As usual JoJo remains a mainstay in my seasonal picks).
New Game!
New Game! still isn’t everything I want out of a workplace slice of life, but episode three kept me hanging on with a couple unexpected gorgeously expressive animation cuts and a compellingly straightforward focus on the challenges of Aoba’s job. (STATUS: It’s hard to say if I’m going to be keeping up with this show on a weekly basis much longer, but even if I don’t I think it warrants a full watch for a time when I’m in the mood for this type of show).
Dropped
Thunderbolt Fantasy
Thunderbolt Fantasy is a great ridiculous spectacle, but I don’t feel I’m getting as much as I could out of it in the clutter of all my other seasonal picks. (STATUS: Put on hold for now, hope to come back to it some other time).
That was another week in anime. Lots of impressive stuff, especially from Sweetness And Lightning and Love Live! Sunshine!!. Thunderbolt Fantasy and its Urobuchi puppet madness will be missed, while New Game! is in the position of having to offer another satisfying episode to stay in the running. For now I don’t expect to be picking up anything else to take either of their places, but there’s plenty of contenders in the wake if I get the itch. Whatever you’re watching at this point in the season I hope there’s plenty of wonderful anime coming your way.
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