Bakacast

Hey, folks, this episode is releasing…really late. Even by my standards. We get into what’s going on with Bakacast in the episode itself, but the short version is: I’m totally burned out. I tried various ways to keep the show going, but ultimately after 398 episodes (or more than that, if you include the episodes I lost to my hard drive crashing), it was getting harder and harder for me to watch the shows and actually provide a decent analysis. Even the shows I really liked felt like a chore to watch. Ultimately, the problem was that Bakacast became a thing I felt like I had to do instead of something I wanted to do.So we’re taking a break. I don’t know for how long, and I’m not sure what Bakacast will even look like, format-wise, if I decide to start recording episodes again. But before we went on hiatus, we decided to record an episode looking back at the last decade of anime—which coincidentally happens to be almost exactly as long as we’ve been doing Bakacast—and giving accolades to some of our favorite shows of each year.Oh, and also we review the final episodes of some winter season shows. Did I mention I got this edited very late?Time Stamps04:46 - Beastars 11 - 1210:51 - My Hero Academy S4 10 - 1320:39 - Chihayafuru 12 - 1327:20 - Anime of the Decade Awards

In a way, having belated season previews is almost better, because it’s much easier to see how very confidently wrong our predictions were, which is much more entertaining than being correct all the time.

sees original recording date of audio files is December 6th, 2019“That’s not a real date. Pretty sure December never happened.”checks computer time clock, which shows current date as February 4th, 2020“January is fake, too.”

Hey, it’s the first episode we recorded after my hard drive died! Are we gonna cover the anime episodes that we talked about on those lost episodes? Absolutely not. I’m certain that would take a good year off my life if I attempted it. So yeah, we’re just gonna start our Fall 2019 reviews smack dab in the middle of the season.

Hey, folks. It’s, uh, been a while. As you may notice, this episode about the end of the summer season was recorded several weeks ago. I go into more detail on the next podcast, but the basics of what happened is this: I had been editing this podcast when my hard drive suddenly stopped working. I have three drives: one SSD and two HDDs. The one the failed happened to be the one I do all my projects on, which also means I lost the audio for three other episodes I recorded. I managed to save my audio for this episode before the drive completely died, but the first few reviews of the fall 2019 season are gone forever.So yeah. Fun times!

On this episode of Bakacast, I finally get fed up with Fire Force, my internet again tries to prevent me from talking about more dumb Fate universe stuff, and also I guess it was my birthday? Whatever, it’s probably not important.

On this episode of Bakacast, Fruits Basket has a shaky couple of episodes, Carole & Tuesday starts getting political, Fire Force slowly burns away its goodwill, and Lord El-Melloi is…maybe the best Fate show that’s ever been made?01:26 - Fruits Basket 18 - 1908:01 - Carole & Tuesday 13 - 1722:59 - Dumbbell 5 - 731:35 - Dr. Stone 5 - 638:11 - Fire Force 4 - 546:14 - Granbelm 4 - 653:41 - Lord El-Melloi II’s Case Files {Rail Zeppelin} Grace note 5 - 601:02:46 - Cop Craft 4 - 601:18:52 - Listener questions

On this episode of Bakacast, editing became a nightmare, because my WiFi constantly cut out and I could never tell whether or not my cohosts were hearing me (or if they were even responding). However, I was able to find moments where I could talk about a few of the shows that we stuck with, thankfully.Before we start our reviews, though, we take a moment to offer our thoughts about the KyoAni attack. We don’t go over the actual event in detail, because that’s already been covered extensively by proper news organizations and would feel far too morbid for a silly podcast like ours to delve into anyway. Instead, we talk briefly about what the studio meant to us and what made it unique. If you’re looking for the link to the Crunchyroll article about different ways you can donate, you can find it below:https://www.crunchyroll.com/anime-news/2019/07/24-1/kyoto-animation-officially-starts-accepting-donations-through-bank-transfer

On this episode of Bakacast, we give our impressions of the first couple episodes of…a lot of shows. Too many shows, honestly. Between us all, we covered a lot. Ben even subjected himself to Arifureta, and somehow managed to trick Larry into watching it, too. One day, I’m sure, Larry will have his revenge.01:52 - Dumbbell Nan Kilo Moteru?08:40 - Kanata no Astra15:28 - Dr. Stone28:36 - Maidens in Your Savage Season34:40 - Fire Force48:01 - Granbelm51:21 - Lord El-Melloi II’s Case Files {Rail Zeppelin} Grace note1:02:29 - Arifureta1:15:29 - Cop Craft1:20:15 - Vinland Saga1:31:49 - Sounan Desu Ka1:37:00 - Mou-sama Retry

This time on Gacha Journalism, we find a game we actually like again? Yes, we escaped the doldrums that were our last two episodes and landed into gay rhythm game paradise with Bang Dream, which is basically Love Live for band nerds. Are you prepared for positivity and also arguing about which band is objectively the best? The answer is Roselia, by the way, and Sierra can’t argue that it’s Afterglow here because she’s not writing the blog posts.

Hey, so, what’s more unsettling than a dude who turns your blood into razor blades? Turns out it’s a dude who can dismember himself with a scalpel as a combat tactic and his sidekick/gimp who eats mud. Yeah.

One this episode of Bakacast, One Punch Man continues to be Slow Pacing Show, Fairy Gone finally starts to break my resolve, Carole & Tuesday plays it safe (and generic), and Fruits Basket is our only solace in these trying times.

On this episode of JJBR, Doppio discovers the magic of incredibly sharp metal, and the hosts have a very difficult time dealing with all the visuals of scissors bursting out of a neck. At least we got rid of the cop.

On this episode of Bakacast, One Punch Man finally gets to the point, Fairy Gone (maybe?) reveals where it actually wants to take this arc, Carole & Tuesday lets Ben show off his TV idol contest knowledge, and Fruits Basket gets sad.

On this very-belated episode of JJBR, Narancia attempts to fend off an enemy Stand all on his own, and I attempt to pronounce Italian words. Only one of us succeeds in our mission. Also, Trish finally gets her own Stand and then immediately has to fight an unbeatable enemy. Good luck!

On this episode, Sierra and I ostensibly talk about the SMT mobile game, but spend most of our runtime bantering about literally anything else. Our issues with Persona and how the Arena games are amazing? Yep. Our hopes for the Granblue fighting game’s roster? Yeah, we cover that too. Welcome to this tangent-filled episode where we try desperately to not discuss this thoroughly mediocre gacha game.

On this episode of Bakacast, Fairy Gone has some more fight scenes and then faffs around for a bit, One Punch Man refuses to get to the good part, Carole & Tuesday feels bafflingly outdated, and Fruits Basket starts ramping up the drama. Also, we actually went outside and saw some movies!

On this episode of Bakacast, we review the narrowed-down list we have for the Spring 2019 season. One Punch Man slows down a bit too much, Fairy Gone continues to be enjoyable (if somewhat baffling), Carole & Tuesday gets a bit goofy, Fruits Basket reminds us that it does have parts that don’t age well, and Sarazanmai slowly charms me.01:26 - One Punch Man S2 3 - 409:49 - Fairy Gone 3 - 423:43 - Carole & Tuesday 3 - 441:11 - Fruits Basket 3 - 457:03 - Sarazanmai 3 - 4

On this episode of Bakacast, we go back to reviewing current anime for the Spring 2019 season, largely because we all really want to talk about Fruits Basket and One Punch Man. Also, Ikuhara and Watanabe are both directing new shows this season? Talk about an embarrassment of riches.

On this episode of Bakacast, we finish up our review of “Banana Fish”, and then we finally get around to handing out accolades to the 2018 anime season. If you’ve been paying attention to our reviews, the choices probably won’t be very surprising, but it’s nice to make it “official.”

On this episode of Bakacast, Ben, Larry and I talk about a short and sweet comedy show called “Skull-face Bookseller Honda-san”. There aren’t a whole lot of anime out there that use retail jobs as anything more than a backdrop, so it was nice to see one that actually examined the joy and despair of working a customer-facing job. Also, we cover the second third of “Banana Fish”, a show I’m still not entirely sure I like.

For our first randomly-chosen gacha game, the dice roller saw fit to give us DanMachi, a game based on an anime neither of us has seen (but Dustin has seen plenty of tweets and fanart of). Does it elevate its source material? And more importantly, was it at all worth the short amount of time we spent on it? The answer will…probably not surprise you. Join us as we try to find a character we like that doesn’t also make us feel bad for liking them.

On this episode of Bakacast, we talk about the critically acclaimed crime drama “Banana Fish”. This one…ended up being a little rougher than I expected. Ben and I have a rousing debate about the representation of gay men in the show and the story’s use of rape. I think we ended up having a very good discussion, but be warned that this episode is more serious than most Bakacasts tend to be due to the subject matter.

On this episode of JJBR, Luke explains to us how King Crimson actually works, and then we spend a few minutes considering the implications such a power has on the rest of the world. Also, we learn some neat facts about Araki’s motivations regarding the GangStars, and we yell at the boys for being way too mean to Narancia.

Hello and welcome to the first episode of Gacha Journalism, a podcast about free-to-play “gacha” games. On our introductory episode, Sierra and I give a brief overview of what gacha games are and some of the common terminology we’re going to be throwing around. Then we dive right into Granblue Fantasy, one of the most influential (and profitable) gacha games. We talk about what makes it so appealing, if its friendly to those who don’t want to spend a dime, and the impact it’s had on legislation. Most importantly, though, we answer the question: how gay is it?If you’d like to learn more about the game, here are some links that were mentioned on the episode (hopefully I didn’t forget any):The Granblue WikiGuide on how to start playing GranblueWeapon Grid Guide (not necessary for brand new players, but if you decide to keep playing it gives you an idea of what to aim for)

On this episode of JJBR, Mista and Giorno enter the final stage of their fight against White Album, where Gionro reveals he never actually had a plan and Mista’s strategy is to nearly die again. Also, we are finally introduced to King Crimson and his infamous time shenanigans.

On this episode of Bakacast, we review the short but frantic (and highly self-indulgent) newish show from Trigger: Space Patrol Luluco. Is it a fun-filled celebration of Triggers’ best qualities, or an exhausting reminder of all their worst tendencies? Opinions are…mixed. We really wanted an excuse to say “Lu” some more, though, so we also reviewed Lu Over the Wall, another wildly entertaining and imaginative film from director Masaaki Yuasa.

On this episode of JJBR, we cover the profoundly problematic Baby Face: a Stand with a really cool power and design, but a shockingly awful, uh, “creation” sequence. On the bright side, Giorno figures out a body-horror way to heal people, which is really what we were all waiting for. Also: ice powers are terrifying.

On this episode of Bakacast, we our minds boggle over the final episodes of Geneshaft. What was the point of all the DNA backstory? Isn’t it weird that there was basically no direct commentary on the weird gender dynamics? Did anyone actually know how they wanted the story to wrap up before the final episode? We may never know. Also, we watch the final Netflix Godzilla movie: The Planet Eater. Hey, Gen Urobuchi? Please stop.

On this episode of JJBR, Bucciarati faces the Grateful Dead and Beach Boy in a life-or-death team train battle. Can his zipper powers defeat an aging virus and a fish hook what can dive under your skin and tear your heart up? Yes, he definitely can. Of course he can. But not before Mista totally dies. it sure is a shame we’ll never see Mista ever again.

On this episode of Bakacast, we review the first 7 episode of Geneshaft, a very weird show about DNA, buggy mecha, and using one song over and over again because it’s the only memorable one you have. We also talk about Fireworks, the latest movie produced by Shaft and directed by Akiyuki Simbo. So it should be great, right? We’ve loved a lot of their stuff, yeah? Well, things a little more tricky this time.

On this episode of Bakacast, we review Night is Short, Walk on Girl, the absolutely delightful and visually arresting movie directed by Masaaki Yuasa, who is probably most famous for his work on Tatami Galaxy, Ping Pong, and (more recently) Devilman Crybaby. We also finish the second half of Planet With, giving our thoughts on how well the two story arcs fit together and dissecting the interesting things it has to say about conflict, justice, and forgiveness.

On this episode of the rewatch, Giorno, Fugo, and Abbacchio have a fun field trip to the ruins of Pomepeii, where absolutely nothing could possibly go wrong. We discuss: the ambiguous physics of Mirror Worlds, Abbacchio being a lame edgelord, the evolution of Fugo’s fashion choices, and whether or not all this weirdness is starting to get to our good boy Giorno.

On this episode of Bakacast, we gush about the delightfully goofy (and surprisingly sincere) Planet With. In order to balance out the fun, though, we also dissect “In This Corner of the World”, a movie by Sunao Katabuchi that focuses on World War II’s effects on the daily lives of a family in Hiroshima.

On this episode of JJBR, we find out that you can definitely make a shrinking episode that Luke will not care about. The trick is to make your antagonist very lame and include EXTREMELY problematic gay representation.

On this episode of Bakacast, we cover the second part of Cartoon Network’s FLCL sequel—FLCL Alternative—and determine whether or not it’s better than Progressive (and if it adds anything to FLCL in general). We also take a look at “A Silent Voice,” one of many movies recommended to us by long-time listener FathomlessBlue.

On this episode JJBR, we finish up Soft Machine with a reveal I never could have predicted, a very trippy torture sequence, and adorable bullet gremlins. Turns out that even in a world of weird-ass superpowers, having a gun is still pretty useful.

On this episode of Bakacast, we follow up our Cowboy Bebop series review by talking about the movie. We also stretch the definition of anime a bit to cover the second season of Castlevania, which you should watch immediately.

On this episode of Bakacast, Ben and I take the opportunity to finish talking about Garo: Vanishing Line and Lupin III Part V: two shows we started a while ago and liked but never actually did full reviews for. Turns out they were both pretty good!

On this episode of JJBR, Luke, Ty, Ben and I spend a whole lot of time talkin’ ‘bout urine. Also: we prove that every plot element of JJBA is internally consistent and ruminate on the viability of a banana gun.

On this episode of Bakacast, we finally finish up Katanagatari and Cowboy Bebop. Find out if we felt Bebop still lives up to all the hype, and hear me struggle to decide whether to judge Katangatari’s ending with my heart or with my head.

On this episode of JJBR, I bring in another cohost: my good friend Ty, who some of you may remember from Roll For Your Lives, the tabletop RPG podcast I did for a spell. We Bruno’s varied and unsettling use of zippers, extremely detailed face-punching, and falling in love with your enemy.

On this episode of Bakacast, we encounter the tonally-diverse middle section of Cowboy Bebop and go into detail about the beautiful tragedies at play in Katanagatari.

Just because Bakacast has switched to a different format doesn’t mean we’re abandoning JoJo’s reviews. We will never abandon JoJo’s reviews. Instead of putting it on the main show, though, I’m bringing JoJo’s Bizarre Rewatch back from hiatus, with Luke and Ben joining me as my cohosts. Please ignore all the episodes in between that we never covered on JJBR.

On this episode of Bakacast, we review the delightfully entertaining absurdity of Batman Ninja; delve into Nisio Isin’s tale of swords and souls, Katanagatari; and I finally get around to watching the biggest shame in my series backlog: Cowboy Bebop.

On this episode of Bakacast, we immerse ourselves in cyberspace and ask the important question: what is Lain, like, even about, man? Also: Mob Psycho 100 finale gets surprisingly philosophical about the nature of conflict and supervillains.

On this episode of Bakacast, we cover the very weird (in a good way) second CGI Godzilla movie, revisit the TechTV classic Serial Experiments Lain, analyse the not-quite-as-popular-as-One-Punch-Man-but-still-extremely-good Mob Psycho 100, and say goodbye to everyone’s favorite emperor with the last 3 episodes of Fate/Extra Last Encore.

On this episode of Bakacast, we gush about the first part of the new CGI Godzilla movie trilogy and revisit Hinamatsuri to talk about the show as a whole.

On this episode of Bakacast, we finish up FLCL Progressive, talk a whole lot about the Nasu-verse, and try to figure out why everyone seems to hate Fate/Extra.

On this episode of Bakacast, we say goodbye to our weekly review format by finishing off (most) of the spring 2018.

I was hoping--deep in my heart--that someday anime would give me more female character designs that looked like the ones in 80's/90's sci-fi, like Bubblegum Crisis, Dirty Pair and Outlaw Star. I just never expected an FLCL sequel to give me what I wanted. Her name is Julia Jinyu, and I love her so much.