Anime, what are we doing? The first season was only 12 episodes. Why did we need a movie to recap not even the entire season? The mid-credits filler episode didn’t even justify this movie’s existence because it’s the first episode of season two. Filler really starts the season with a bang by the way.
Author: silentfuzzle
Cake Wars (Season 2 Episode 7) – Shrek
“Oh, I love this shade of green. It looks just like shit.”
– Me mishearing a baker comparing her green frosting to Shrek’s coloring.
Kaiju No. 8 (Seasons 1-2)
The first episode of Kaiju No. 8 hooked me first for it uniquely telling its story from the perspective of Kafka, a guy who cleans up the guts of giant, dead monsters. Telling the story through someone on the cleanup crew was refreshingly different. The twist at the end, where Kafka is suddenly transformed into a monster, was also surprising.
From episode 2 onward, however, the series quickly fell into familiar tropes. Kafka’s dream of joining the Japanese Defense Force to fight kaiju felt like well-worn anime territory. The pacing, which felt like five seasons crammed into two, didn’t help. Character development felt rushed, often delivered through flashbacks rather than meaningful character interactions. Each new kaiju appearance felt like another “It’s over 9000!!!” moment. The side characters faced their greatest challenges moments after they explained why it was important to them. Most of the time, they failed and were thoroughly defeated, but because the pacing was so rushed, I didn’t connect with their struggles. I found it difficult to care about anyone.
It’s curious that American bands like OneRepublic were used for many of the opening, closing, and background music tracks, rather than the usual Japanese pop. Why is that? Was this anime targeted at Western audiences?