Have you heard of ‘Ore ga Suki nano wa Imouto dakedo Imouto ja Nai’? The English title is ‘My Sister, My Writer’. I’m not particularly sure why it’s rated 43% on Anilist, 4.90 (out of 10, I’m assuming) on MAL, and 4.37 on aniDB, but at the very least, I enjoyed it. And now that I’m older and more mature (or is it because I’d seen so much anime?), the fun of the show shines through – almost blindingly so!
And so, I’m on my second viewing, and it’s reassuring these eyes that had thought so fondly of this story before hadn’t succumbed to an exaggerated fondness all this time. It makes me wonder what goes into bringing the absurd to life. That, in of itself, is an art I’ve flirted with:
• The MC is your average, normal guy.
• He has to save the world when he’s reincarnated in another world.
• At the end of the story, after he’d saved the world, it is revealed that every single person he’d encountered in the world is a family member who’d reincarnated after dying in his lifetime on Earth.
Or:
• The year is 1995; the future is here.
• A startup company grows into the most beastly industry, taking the world by storm through the sale of original products that serve no purpose nor have any aesthetic value.
Or my grand opus:
• The money stops working.
That final idea has an amount of pen to paper behind it, but… well… anyways…
Here lies the crux of this article: It appears I’ve burnt myself out of anime again. I just don’t feel like watching anything, and we’re coming into Summer, of all the things!
I promise you: I have tried to stay not burnt out too! Like I went and tried starting Arte and Strongest Exorcist again, yet each of these viewings made it only to episode two! See? I’m burnt out! I can’t help it! Over the course of the past week or so, there’d been a sprinkling of other titles like Goburin Sureiya-san (2nd viewing; episode seven—GET THIS MAN A POTION PRONTO!), My Sister, My Writer (2nd viewing; episode three) among others, too.
And so, I am here writing this while listening to POP | CULTURE 2, though it should be noted, this is the third day of putting it together. I’ve, more or less, just been coasting along for this past week, listening to music and wishing for more chances to participate in conversations on Discord. Heck! I even tried starting Edgerunners the other day! Unfortunately, it didn’t look like the kind of anime I’m interested in. And so, I am here trying to figure out how to make this article the least bit interesting…
It is pretty dumb that I want to engage with the user base of this Discord though, honestly. It’s frustrating to want to share the joy I get from anime (and, to a certain extent, manga) with people who have all been swept up by Internet chatroom culture. Like ‘fire and forget’ is a phrase that’d never been more applicable to communications, when it, in fact, is meant to describe a mechanism in games. It’s simple, really: Accept no one gives a fuck about your contributions to conversations, that they don’t share the same principles as you, that there are genuine otaku amongst the bunch, but mostly all have dissimilar tastes to you, and that heavily sprinkled amidst the ‘community’ are snowflakes and retards.
I do want to organize a good community of otaku on—POP | CULTURE 6 is now playing—somewhere. Discord is a waste of time because their ToS/community guidelines are all about inclusivity and compelled speech and, in general, encourages being a retard.
It’s only when I’d sorted through my frustrations that I always come back to the same conclusion: Why don’t I just be happy with the friends I have? The obvious answer is, ‘There is a part of me that still desires something of a wider sampling’. Maybe that… or something. Who knows? I guess they really meant it when they said humans are social creatures. Yet, in the same breath, it appears I’ve gained enough experience (of mainly the disappointment variety) to realize it’s so easy to bark up the wrong tree.
I guess we’re going to see if we can be a bit more honest on Twitter. I must say, it sure is difficult to make progress in this technological world while simultaneously minimizing the broadcasting of my stupidity. It’s like the pipeline of a futuristic online–physical hybrid lifestyle relentlessly tricks you into thinking you’ve reached the end line. It is at the top of the sins: stupidity. I am forgoing the use of cardinal because I don’t actually know what it means.
Anime’s Greatest Hits, pt. V: How to Love Your Antacid
These 3x3s represent me at a time when I, too, was clouded by an unforgiving attachment to false ideals. It is no excuse, but I throw myself at your feet, so that you may reconsider it was I who, despite my honourable intentions, had not a sober thought in my mind! Here, I present to you the new, inspired, and enlightened me:
Personally, it’s hard to believe there is a brief moment in my recent history (07-06-22) stained with such incredulity! Surely, the depths of one’s error can be only so demoralizing! Well, I have seen the light! I am reformed!
R.I.P., Kohaku and S01 of Misfit; you’ll forever be remembered as favourites in a time not so different from days passed.
Anime’s Greatest Hi—
I may be merrily speaking to myself, but wouldn’t it be amazing if 1 x ½ got animated? Additionally, let’s all put our hearts together and let out a resounding hurrah for Slime 300 2, Isekai Ken 2, Arifureta 3, DanMachi 5, 100 Girlfriends 2, Chained Soldier 2, another Quintuplets season (3, I think), and, of course, Maou-sama, Retry! R (because Tron will alone—single-handedly—save the world from despair and corruption before the slime spirit sisters get a chance! Why will this not be up to Fran, you ask? Because Fran is too fucking busy fucking saving the world from pain and destruction!) Looking into the future, there obviously are other anime to get excited about, but I kind of feel like wrapping this up… Oh! That sister harem story—*researches*—’Shiunji-ke no Kodomotachi’! Really, no idea how that one will turn out, but we’ll see; I know it’s the Rent-A-Girlfriend author’s project. Oh!!!!!!!! I just seen it now! Second season of Dress-Up Darling is TBA, too!
Maybe my next piece will have to do with anime we are in dire need of. For now, I’m going to have to tie this one into a neat little bow!