 Hey everybody, welcome back to the channel, Gio here and yes, we finally made it to the end of 2021 and my anime season reviews, this time for the fall season of 2021. So a lot of returning shows from previous seasons, I'm not going to go through most of these because I've already talked about them at length, especially stuff like Dragon Quest Adventures of Die. I've talked about it since 2020. In every single season I've raved about how much I love it. Sure the animation dips here and there, it isn't necessarily the smoothest looking show recently and I get it, Toei Animation has a history of this, especially with long running series and it's hard to animate something week to week for more than a year straight, I totally understand. But I wish those beautiful looking episodes from the start of the series would come back animation wise. So yeah, a wonderful series once again, I love Dragon Quest Adventures of Die. The great Yahisama will not be defeated. It is another great comedic anime, I really did enjoy it. It's a very episodic adventure with Yahisama trying to rebuild the demon kingdom, the demon realm I guess and failing spectacularly through her ego or just random shenanigans that happened throughout the episodes. The cast of characters I really enjoyed, they really made the show what it is. The plot, there's not really much there, it's just her hijinks of trying to restore the demon realm and getting her powers back. It's mostly about the characters and the kooky antics they get themselves involved in. I really enjoyed it, fun great show with awesome voice acting. Shaman King, little trophy here and there but then again, it's an older series and I gotta admit I watched the older show back in the day but I don't remember certain aspects of it and I don't think I ever finished reading the manga either so a lot of the content that I'm watching from Shaman King is actually new stuff which is exciting. It's not that great and at times I think the original still holds up more than this new one to be honest. Certain aspects of the fights and the tournaments I could care less about honestly and it's the heavy drama filled talkative episodes that I enjoy from Shaman King. I don't know, maybe it's because it relies too heavily on the battle show and mechanics and I'm into other type of shows. I don't know for some reason I'm not digging Shaman King reboot as much as I thought I was going to. Kiyo in Kyoto, a warm slice of wholesome pie, a wonderful monthly series I believe were one episode away from finishing it. I can't believe it took a whole year but it's interesting nonetheless you know having the characters in this environment with the geishas in training, the Mako house if I remember correctly and the main character being the cook, the chef and the adventures that the girls get into and learning about that culture and the job of a geisha in training and all that stuff really awesome and the cooking segments are hilarious. I highly recommend just for that a nice slice of life series that you can just relax and enjoy and get rid of all your frustrations as you're watching these girls doing their thing. AquaTope on white sand. Honestly, one of my favorite shows of 2021, a fantastic series, great characters, beautiful animation, the character backgrounds and the setting overall. Being in, I believe it was Okinawa, correct me if I'm wrong, I probably am. But being down south in Japan was a smart move because it's such a visually striking area and it involves fish and sea life and of course it being in aquariums. You really want to be there with all the fishes and how beautiful everything looks and the penguins and seals and all that crazy stuff. Now the actual plot, when I first reviewed on this channel the first 12 episodes, it kind of felt like a definitive end to the story. Usually shows like that will wrap up in 12 episodes and leave you sort of a coda of things to come if they ever make a sequel. In this case, we got another bunch of 12 episodes continuing the story and what really felt like a season 2 instead of a later half of a season, if you will. I'm not complaining though because it was really well done. It jumps forward in time, the characters are a little bit older, they are facing more serious grown up situations as they're working in the aquarium and the new one and getting accustomed to the working life and all that stuff. New people to interact with, new business dealings and marketing and field work and all that stuff that the main characters were not used to because their previous aquarium that they were working on was simpler, more of a mom and pop shop if you will. Now it's sort of this big conglomerate that's built this super duper awesome aquarium. Just an overall fantastic series, I highly recommend it. Again like I mentioned, the animation is probably one of the highest selling points. I love progressive animation, they do fantastic work and this was not the exception. I absolutely loved it and I can't wait to talk about this series at length because I do think everybody should check it out. If you're into some good slice of life drama with wonderful, kooky, wholesome characters and these girls doing amazing work in the field of marine life, I highly recommend Aquatope on Whitesam. Yashahime season 2. Now while I did enjoy the characters in season 1, especially the 3 girls, I complained that it had a lot of episodes that were really pointless and fillerish and there are some here at the start of season 2 because we've already seen 12 episodes of it out of the 24 but for the most part it really picked up on the pacing and explaining things and solving some major issues from the first season and resolving some plot threads and creating new ones of course for the later half of the show. I'm really excited to see where it goes. I'm honestly super excited to see certain reunions take place. Don't worry, I'm not spoiling anything by that. And overall just a really nice upgrade to the first run of Yashahime. Again, probably the biggest selling point are the 3 girls and how great they are as characters and yeah I'm looking forward to more of Yashahime. Demon Slayer. Demon Slayer is interesting. Mugen Train premiered last year. I didn't watch it. I watched it this year when it debuted on Crunchyroll. Fantastic film, a great adaptation of the Mugen Train storyline. Then they announced the weird decision to split it up into a mini arc of I think with 7 or 8 episodes on TV. I just watched it just for, I don't know, just to say that I watched it. I have to admit I'm kinda done with the Mugen Train cause I watched the movie then I jumped over to the TV show and I watched that. It was exactly the same thing so I just skipped a bunch of scenes honestly. And then when I started the Red Light District or the Entertainment District or ARC or whatever, the beginning references stuff from Mugen Train. I'm like guys, guys, no I can't. I watched everything one after the other. I can't deal with the Mugen Train enough. It's a beautifully animated movie and I get the hype but like let's move on. The actual Entertainment District arc or the Red Light District arc, if you will, is really awesome and I think looks even better than the animation on Season 1 and the movie. Obviously you know, UFO Table, they have a track record of excellence and yeah, it's Demon Slayer. It's gonna look gorgeous and I'm super excited about it to get more stuff animated from this fun manga that I love. Mushiko Tensei, Jobless Reincarnation, the second part of the first season, I love this series so much. I talked about the first half back early 2021 and how much I liked it, the progression of characters like Rudeus and to see that yeah, there are a lot of pervy jokes and humors and situations in the series but it's justified in that you have this character that gets a second chance and you get to see his evolution as a character and how he moves forward and of course the amazing world building and all these wonderful characters learning about their histories and the lore and the folklore in this realm and now that they're separated and trying to find each other again after the whole mana disaster thing, I love this series so much. I cannot wait to dig into the light novels. That's something that I'm gonna be hunting down in 2022 and hopefully reading the whole thing. I'm super excited for more Mushiko Tensei. Hopefully season two is around the corner. Comey can't communicate a wonderful romcom. I know some people are not digging certain characters but you gotta understand that these characters, you know, it's more of a satire of romcoms and it's over, it's a little exaggerated with the way that they idolize Comey but it's really endearing and sweet and wholesome to see her progress through the episodes and the story as she gains friends and is able to slowly but surely jump over hurdles of communicating with people and all that stuff. A wonderfully animated series, OLM Studios if I remember correctly, doing a phenomenal job. I really appreciate how similar it is to the manga and yet how different it is in certain aspects, especially the voice acting, phenomenal, really funny on that regard. Platinum End, the anime based on the manga from the same name, the original creators of course of Death Note. I was really excited for it because of the creative team and the original manga. I gotta say, I was a little bit let down and even though I've seen 12 episodes of it so far, I don't know, I find it a little underwhelming. The art really let me down on it. The animation isn't that great and just the plot isn't the most engaging thing, especially when you have that choppy animation, you know, characters just standing idly by, of course with the whole wings and white and red arrows and all that stuff. It was just okay. It's a little bit too complicated for its own good but at the same time it's not really that complicated. It has similar tropes to Death Note so I like the comparisons between the two shows, between the two worlds I should say. The whole fact that it's angels and they're trying to do a battle royale thing to pick out a successor to become God and all that stuff. Interesting premise, just the execution, I don't know, it's not super engaging to me. 86 Part 2. I wish I could tell you it was an amazing season but we're missing two episodes that will air in March of next year 2022. It sucks. I know. What are you gonna do? Last episode that we saw ended on a massive cliffhanger. I can't wait to see how it resolves everything that's going on right now and the themes explored with the characters and how they deal with, you know, war and PTSD and segregation and racism and all those stuff and the dynamics of young soldiers in war and how that affects their mental health and all that stuff plus amazing kick-ass fights and visuals. Just a really solid war mech show that I highly recommend you guys check out. Nieruko Chan, one of my favorite underrated shows of 2021. This was a lot of fun. I'm a big fan of passion studios. I think they are a really underrated animation studio and they did a really good job on this. I love the art style. I think they captured the essence of the manga pretty well especially with the ghoulish monster designs for the apparitions. They looked super frightening and the sound design was really well done on them. The actual human characters, they're all great and what I love is that it doesn't take itself too seriously but at the same time as you progress through the story, more elements start piling up and you get a really interesting story of how is this happening, what is going to happen and how are these characters going to resolve things that are coming down the line. I'm really being as vague as possible but honestly do check it out. I think it's worth your time. There's a little bit of fan service here and there but don't worry about it. It's a show. It's fake characters doing fake things. Don't worry about it guys. Tak OP Destiny. This is a multimedia franchise. It has a video game, a cell phone game I should say. It has a manga in the works and I'm pretty sure it's going to get a second season. I'm pretty sure it's going to get a lot of figures. It reminds me of the Fate series in that regard. I'm not a huge fan of it unfortunately. Just music based shows for some reason are not my thing. Last year was listeners. This year is Tak OP. The story is interesting enough with these monsters killing off people and banning music and all that stuff and it's a very music centric series and the attacks and the terminologies and all that stuff. The maestros have these girls that have abilities and they turn into like super powered warriors and they fight off these monsters and the best thing about Tak OP is obviously the art animated by two awesome studios. You got Madhouse. You got Studio Monoppa doing phenomenal work. Easily one of the best looking shows of 2021. I just thought the plot kind of dragged into nowhere and you get a lot of exposition dump towards the end where I honestly had lost interest and that's not a good thing. The start of the series is interesting and then it just goes on a lengthy road trip where kind of nothing happens. It looks gorgeous but nothing really happens until the very end and we've seen that before in 12 episode series but when you have quality drawings from two major studios working together you expect every single aspect of the show to be A tier or S tier level. Unfortunately for me it wasn't quite there. The far away Paladin. I had heard of this from the light novels, the original novels. They have some amazing illustrations. I was really intrigued by it when I read about it and learned that it was receiving an anime annotation this year. Really solid story about this kid who turns out to be, it turns out to be an isekai story in disguise. They don't really play too much of it at the stage where we're at with the show. Hopefully it does get another season so we continue this world building exercise and fleshing out the characters and all that stuff. But this kid is raised in this necropolis if you will with three ghoulish characters and his upbringing and how he moves forward in life out of that. I will say that the first half of the series is better for me. The second half goes into the world building aspect and meeting a whole bunch of characters. It's just for some reason the animation on this one really let me down. If you look at the visual key, if you look at the original illustrations and then you take a look at the actual animation for it, I don't know. Plus it's an isekai so of course when they do attacks they gotta friggin name them like their JRPG attack names. I'm over that stuff honestly. But it's still a nice show where you get a whole lot of character development and world building political play and magic stuff that you'll want to keep going episode after episode. My senpai is annoying. This is the funniest show of 2021 for me. I love this romcom set in the workspace. You have a character Igarashi who is this pipsqueak who she wants to be this amazing business woman and she looks up to her senpai, Takeda who is this brutish tall ogre looking of a man. He's actually quite the gentle giant and a sweetheart but he's kind of a buffoon if you will. And that dynamic of him being sort of like the annoying older sibling or type parent is where the comedy lies in this show. Also the fact that the side couples in this series get developed pretty well is really awesome. You don't see that a lot in romcoms and stuff like that. Sakugan was labeled as this show that if you like Gunan Lagan and made an abyss you're going to enjoy Sakugan. I was sold on that pitch but I don't think it really delivered at all. It has similar concepts to the two series I mentioned but it's something completely different. You have Memempu and Gagomba which are two of the wackiest names in recent memory and they're living in this underground colony that I don't know how they get sunlight and how the people evolve to not need the sunlight. I guess I missed the explanation on that one but they live down in the underground and the main girl she gets these visions or these dreams of a white pillar in a dark sky and she wants to go to that place of her dreams because it might be of her origin or whatever and Gagomba, her dad is going to accompany her in this giant robot mech thing that sort of functions as a drill machine but also a robot and they fight kaiju and get involved in crazy hijinks as they cross from colony to colony underground. It's more of a road trip kind of anime. It's not until the very end of the series where you get some much needed development and explanation as to where the story's headed and what's happening all the other episodes are just wacky adventures in different settings so I think that's why I didn't dig it as much. Digimon Ghost Game I love Digimon and the fact that you're able to mix yokai type stories with the creepier side of digital monsters and make it sort of a spookier season is phenomenal the art I'm not a fan of whatsoever it kind of let me down there are certain animations like the evolution sequences that look amazing but the show never really replicates that and I'm sort of let down by it there are a couple frames where it just looks bad but the story and the characters in the new Digimon are wholesome and cute and awesome enough that I'm going to keep watching because I'm a huge fan of the franchise regardless. Taishou Otomeg Fairy Tale a wonderful historical fiction a wonderful drama romance story of these two unlikely characters meeting and falling in love now the main character is disabled and he is banished from his household because his whole family they're just a bunch of a-holes so now he's living on the mountain side and in their villa vacation home I guess and the dad buys a wife for him turns out to be a young girl who's like three or four years younger than him but then again that type of thing was sort of common back in the day right in the 1800s or whatever Taishou era Japan so it doesn't surprise me it's still it's a fun little series animations not the biggest thing in the world not the most wow thing but it's more about the romance and the characters and the voice acting and that was top notch where I really enjoyed it and the fact that one of the characters is going to teach the other about moving forward in life and continuing and finding uh enjoyment and love out of living and all that stuff I'm in for that next up is the vampire dies in no time a random comedy series about vampires and a useless vampire at that the main character is this really weak skinny looking guy who is not worth for much and he meets this vampire hunter who's also kind of dumb and the vampire hunter ends up destroying his the vampire's mansion so hijinks ensue and they end up living together in the vampire hunter's apartment in the city and it's this sort of uh classic uh slapstick humor with Japanese bizarre jokes and tropes and there are a lot of crazy kooky characters especially john the armadillo which was my favorite such a wholesome little guy I could just watch a whole short series out of that character vampire designs are interesting each vampire is different with their power sets some are uh kind of perverts others are literal monster technical things that I don't really understand how they function but there they are and the humor goes from lowbrow to just silly slapstick uh if you like that sort of thing you're gonna have a fun time with vampire dies in no time ranking of kings honestly one of the best shows of 2021 a phenomenal series where you're following prince bogey a young wholesome deaf mute kid who is in this um medieval type kingdom that really reminds me of children's books that I would read about these fantasy stories uh with knights and giants and dragons and magic and all that stuff and it's animated by wood studios one of my all-time favorite animation studios this is based off a mug of the same name one you got a really wholesome beautiful kid who you want to root for and he's such a nice character he goes through the ringer there are things that are happening in this series that I'm not going to spoil but really put him to the test and make him evolve and grow uh and and sort of leave that comfort show that protective bubble and realize that there is potential in him he befriends this character called kage this shadowy type monster uh creature that and just forms this really budding beautiful relationship that I I am so excited in each episode I tear up at the wholesome moments and seeing bogey succeeding and hopefully nothing bad happens to him one thing that I do love about the series however is that expect the unexpected and after two episodes in things just get dark and heavy while still retaining that colorful beautiful uh chibi picturesque uh fantasy look to it also the character work on this is insane literally you have characters that subvert expectations left and right go watch the show please finally we got the heike story or heike monogatari based on the famous titan clan and the famous novel uh historical fiction novel of the same name now yes it is based of real people but the original novel uh added a few elements here and there and this anime is based off of that and honestly this is one of the best shows I've ever seen I really enjoyed heike monogatari or the heike story a wonderful piece of art fantastic all-star cast of voice actors a beautiful uh tragic story about the greed rise and fall of the titan clan just a phenomenal series and honestly I think at the end of the day a couple years from now I could see people revisiting this because it got overlooked this year somehow I don't know not a lot of people were watching but I think in a couple years worth of time people are going to look back at the heike monogatari and the anime and list it as one of the essential uh feudal japan samurai media uh things that you consume whether it be a manga a live action movie an anime it belongs in that category of if you want to watch uh you know shows based on feudal japan and all that you gotta watch heike monogatari it's that good that's about it a quick view at all the different shows that I watched on the season a very interesting season like I said earlier a lot of shows had a lot of promise but to me at least they didn't a hundred percent deliver on that whether it be uh voice acting whether it be animation or pacing issues or the story itself sometimes I find myself just skipping through some things because I wanted to watch other stuff like ranking of kings or heike monogatari nonetheless I am super excited that I got through another season hopefully you guys enjoyed this video if you want to see more videos like this subscribe I do content about anime and manga reviewing shows reviewing manga all that fun stuff thank you everybody for a wonderful year thank you for subscribing and being a part of a week in geek them I truly do appreciate it I've got to go stay safe everybody god bless I will catch all of you on our next video