This post is by guest writer Liam O’Loghlen.
Welcome to another week of the latest animated goodness from the east! As usual time flies by, and perhaps before any of us knew it we found ourselves right here a third of the way through the summer anime season. This was a fairly modest week across the board, with most shows meeting my base expectations without any disappointments. The exceptions here were JoJo and Orange, which both swung for the fences in ways that were uniquely them and had plenty of success doing so. Now let’s go one by one and break down my top picks for the week of 7/25.
Sweetness and Lightning
Sweetness and Lightning continues to make warmth and sheer adorableness look incredibly easy, consistently being tonally in sync on every level and offering an endless flowing array of ridiculous Tsumugi facial gestures while it’s at it. (STATUS: This has become one series on a fairly short list of shows with enough good will that it could hold me over for 25 minutes a week on goofy faces).
Orange
This week’s episode reached a grand climax as a flurry of adolescent jealousy and regret and misunderstanding and frustration came to a head, pulled together with a slow but graceful build-up that hits hard every step of the way. (STATUS: This series might be better suited to an individual focused watch but it’s still a continually impressive and intimate adolescent drama).
Love Live! Sunshine!!
Love Live! Sunshine!! stays in top form with a solid light drama piece this week, which also ties itself more into the amusingly camp idea of the original series’ µ’s (Muse) being a sort of monolithic inspiration to Aquors. (STATUS: This continues to be a pleasure to watch week after week, topping its predecessor every step along the way).
JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure: Diamond is Unbreakable
JoJo finally reached the main sub-plot of its fourth part this week, offering a blisteringly intense horror-fueled mystery elevated by the series’ enduring ridiculous stylishness. (STATUS: Now that we’re getting into the meat of Part IV things are going to get exciting in the next few weeks, so I’m definitely tuned in to see it in adaptation).
New Game!
It’s very difficult to recommend New Game! unless you’re into a very specific kind of slice of life, and it runs on some fanservice loaded recurring gags that are straight-up bad, but I’m still here because it still manages to be a pleasant distraction. (STATUS: This one has been hanging on a thread since week two and at this point I could toss it to the side at any given time, but I’m just going to hang on to it for now).
And that was the week in anime. So far this hasn’t been the most thrilling season, but you could hardly call it a disappointment. It’s a solid lineup that offers plenty of different things to different tastes. I hope this has been another good week of anime for everyone.