ablackenedrose

For me, it's characters - above all else, you have to make me care about your characters, and that goes for every single genre of anime. They can be wonderful people, they can be terrible people, they can be laser-focused on a single objective or just living their day-to-day lives, but an anime absolutely must get me to want to watch those characters do their thing, whatever that "thing" is. You can have all the grand conflicts you want going on, all the wild powers you can imagine or the most incredible animation ever put to screen, but if I don't care about the characters caught up in those conflicts or wielding those powers or who are so lovingly animated, I'm not going to stick around.

I cannot wait to be emotionally built up and then destroyed all over again

Mostly spent the first half of today reading the last couple hundred pages of a novel I've been reading through on-and-off for the last couple of weeks (Sons of Darkness by Gourav Mohanty, if you're curious). Quite enjoyable, though I've no idea when I'll find time for the sequel.

Right, looks like I'll need to pencil in a theater visit sometime in 2027...

I'd probably pick Armored Trooper VOTOMS. Easily one of the grittiest mecha shows ever made and also one of the best. Excellent plot and compelling central mystery and well-written characters, in a setting that's "grimy futuristic", if you will. Yeah, the tech is obviously absurdly advanced, but every frame brings across that the Atragius galaxy is a fairly awful place to live, being in the aftermath of a galaxy ravaged by a century-long war that's left deep scars. I also find VOTOMS' presentation of its mecha (called "Armored Troopers" or ATs) quite interesting and fairly unique. You know how in many/most mecha shows, the mecha (or at least the one the protagonist pilots) is some terrifying engine of death, a mighty god-machine that strides/flies through the battlefield, unchallenged by anything except a fellow near-peerless machine? Yeah, that's averted completely in this show. The ATs are mass-produced weapons of war built on the cheap and there is never any pretense otherwise. The protagonist changes machines quite a few times as they get damaged, disabled and/or blown up.

Just started up the second volume of Witch Hat Atelier, which yes, was motivated by the anime's first season conclusion (on a massive cliffhanger, no less!). Coco is somehow even more endearing on-page than she is on-screen.

I particularly appreciate the English dub's inclusion of in-universe slang into the dialogue - adds a nice extra level of authenticity and really makes it feel like Night City.

Just finished up Fractale, which I thought was all right. I enjoyed it well enough, but the chance I'll ever watch it again is extremely low. Picked up Last Exile to replace it, and I'm having a great time. Hopefully this continues throughout the entire show.

Just started up Bloom Into You and Insomniacs After School, the latter as part of my ongoing effort to actually make use of that HiDive subscription I'm paying for. Bloom Into You clicked right away and unless it goes completely off the rails, I'll be happy to finish it. Insomniacs After School hasn't quite gotten there after the first episode, but I'll give it the standard three.

A big bowl of rice.

Currently partway through A Place Further Than The Universe and have been keeping up weekly with Witch Hat Atelier. (The latter is one of the few times I've ever watched something week-to-week as it came out.)

Mostly use Crunchyroll - sure, plenty of ports exist for sailors of the high seas, but I don't keep my computer hooked up to a television in my living room with a comfy couch. Watching anime on a couch on a decent-size TV is a vastly, vastly more pleasant experience for me than watching anime hunched over my laptop, and my smart TV (gotten for free from a previous roommate who was looking to downsize) let me have that experience with ease.

I do read one or two manga series, but I watch far more anime, in large part because I don't need to store streamed anime physically. I don't live in the most spacious of accommodations and don't have that much room to store manga volumes, and trying to read manga on an E-reader generally results in a dramatically worse reading experience for me.

Probably Thunder and Lightning by ToddTownsend40K, though my view is heavily biased on that point by it having been performed as an audio play on Youtube (which was apparently the entire reason it was written in the first place).

Listened to a few hours of an audiobook while batch painting several miniatures for my Warhammer 40,000 army while desperately hoping work doesn't call me in on my day off. (No calls so far.)

There's no news of such, to my knowledge. Given that the anime finished airing a decade ago, I would not be especially hopeful for a new season. The manga is ongoing.

Currently making my way through The Summer Hikaru Died. Quite a good pick if you're into Lovecraftian and psychological horror (these are not spoilers, by far the most "present" Lovecraftian element of the narrative is revealed as such in the first five minutes and much of the psychological horror flows out from that overt element).

"No more runnin' for me, dawg. Reaper's finally callin' my name." - Maine, Cyberpunk: Edgerunners, Episode 6 Still gets me even after multiple re-watches.

Was a three-volume original English-language manga called The Dreaming. I was unfamiliar with manga at the time (I was maybe twelve when I read it), but I read this particular story several times through and loved it. Ended up being a gateway into the medium for me.