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Spice & Wolf (2024) episode 5
Rating: B+ Episode 4 ended with a crisis which demanded quick action. But while this series is many things, it’s definitely not an action series at heart. It…
Spice & Wolf (2024) episode 4
Rating: A- With its fourth episode, the economic scheme that Lawrence has gotten a whiff of expands, with Lawrence wading into deeper water as he arranges a deal…
An Archdemon’s Dilemma: How to Love Your Elf Bride episodes 2-4
Episode 2 Rating: B Episode 3, 4 Rating: B+ In my Preview Guide entry for episode 1, I had mixed feelings about this series and the seemingly-stereotypical path…
Spica & Wolf (2024) episode 3 + English dub
Episode Rating: B+ This week the English simuldub begins, lagging two weeks behind. Brina Palencia and J. Michael Tatum are back reprising their roles from the dub of…
Spice & Wolf (2024) episode 2
Episode Rating: A- Episode 1 may have established the series’ operating premise, but episode 2 is the series’ make-or-break episode, the one which determines whether or not viewers…
Review: Gushing Over Magical Girls
In the world of shy, average teenager Utena Hiiragi, magical girls become celebrities by openly fighting to defend cities from evil organization Enormita. Utena adores and idolizes Tres…
Spice & Wolf: merchant meets wise wolf episode 1
Note: Because I find this title obnoxiously long, I will hereafter be titling these Spice & Wolf (2024). Rating: B+ The base concept here seems simple enough: a…
Spring 2024 Preview Guide
Looks at the first episode of each anime series debuting in the Spring 2024, posted as they debut!
Winter 2024 Wrap-Up
With the last handful of titles for the Winter 2024 season having now aired, let’s take a summative look at what worked well and what didn’t this season.…
The Apothecary Diaries, episode 24 (season finale)
Episode Rating: A Overall Series Rating: A After the dramatic events, revelations, and symbolism of last episode, there was really only one final climax possible for this series,…
8 Lessons From Frieren
With its 28th episode, Frieren: Beyond Journey’s End ends its initial run. By any reasonable metric, it has been a huge hit on both sides of the Pacific,…
The Apothecary Diaries, episode 23
Rating: A The Apothecary Diaries is undeniably Maomao’s series, though Jinshi has increasingly had his viewpoint represented of late. That makes episode 23 a major aberration, since not…
The Apothecary Diaries, episode 22
Rating: A- Though he’s hardly one of the more likable characters in the series, Lakan is still an intriguing one. He’s ferociously smart and a superior judge of…
The Apothecary Diaries, episode 21
Rating: B+ Though The Apothecary Diaries has been set up almost from the beginning to ship Maomao with Jinshi (and Jinshi is clearly starting to see her romantically…
Winter ’24 Mid-Season Round-Up, part 2
In Part 1 last week, I covered series that have not been getting episode reviews at Anime News Network. In this installment, I will be offering my take…
The Apothecary Diaries, episode 20
Rating: A The Incident may be over, but the mysteries surrounding it aren’t, and as this great follow-up shows, they may not be for quite some time. Jinshi…
Winter ’24 Mid-Season Round-Up, part 1
Really, this should have been started last week, when the earliest-starting series were first hitting episode 7s, but sometimes real life intrudes. Anyway, I have plenty of time…
The Apothecary Diaries, episode 19
Rating: A+ This episode represents the biggest dramatic peak in this part of the story. It is the culmination of everything that has happened so far this season…
The Apothecary Diaries, episode 18
Rating: A I was going to skip reviewing this one separately and just combine it with episode 19, rather than post a review this late. However, episode 18…
The Apothecary Diaries, episode 17
Rating: A There have been other strong episodes in this series, but this one is a microcosm of what makes this series stand apart from most other series…
The Apothecary Diaries: Episode 16
Rating: A- Another episode, another mystery for Maomao, but this time it’s a longer one – taking up nearly the whole episode – and doesn’t involve the cause…
The Apothecary Diaries, episode 15
Rating: A- If you’re an anime-only viewer, this episode is one you might want to bookmark to come back and watch again later on, as it drops a…
The Apothecary Diaries, episode 14
Rating: A- Episode 14 contains the sequence that I was probably most looking forward to seeing animated from this part of the story: Maomao’s lessons to the four…
The Apothecary Diaries, episode 13
Rating: B+ After a week off, the second half of the series begins, shifting the adaptation into the territory of the second light novel and the 5th manga…
Winter 2024 Preview Guide
Coverage of the Winter 2024 anime season begins! Check aback regularly for updates through 1/14.
2023 in Review: The Best and Strangest of the Year
As we say good-bye to 2023, it’s time to take a look at the highlights of the year as a whole, rather than just individual seasons. And my,…
Fall ’23 Wrap-Up
Most of the non-continuing series from the Fall season are now in the books, so let’s look at how they wrapped up. As with this article’s predecessor (the…
The Apothecary Diaries episode 12
Rating: B+ The situation at the heart of this episode is one quite familiar to any fan of romances with class-based complications. The higher-ranked man wants to be…
The Eminence in Shadow episode 32 (season finale)
Rating: B+ Ragnarok is upon us! Well, sort of. Really, it’s just an opportunity for Shadow to fight a boss monster-type foe while his Shadow Garden minions do…
Review: Pluto
This ONA series, which debuted on Netflix in late October, has a very interesting pedigree. It adapts a lauded manga by Naoki Urasawa (the manga-ka behind titles like…
The Apothecary Diaries episode 11
Rating: A+ Barring a stunning collapse in the next couple of weeks, Frieren: Beyond Journey’s End is not going to be beat for best series of the season…
The Eminence in Shadow episode 31
Rating: B+ During the last couple of reviews, I wondered why the succession of the Oriana Kingdom bypassed the former queen and went straight to Rose. This episode…
The Apothecary Diaries episode 10
Rating: B+ Last episode began a narrative shift away from individual mysteries and more towards how certain mysteries may be connected into a bigger picture. This episode continues…
Review: The Boy and the Heron
Despite some flaws, this is still a movie well worth seeing.
The Eminence in Shadow, episode 30
Rating: B+ As I watched this week’s episode, I was struck by the thought that I have been overlooking one big inherent irony: Shadow Garden’s behavior is itself…
The Apothecary Diaries, episode 9
Rating: A- One of the major factors which makes this series a top-tier title for both the season and year is its effortless ability to mix its comedic…
The Eminence in Shadow, episode 29
Rating: B The prostitute Marie was shown too prominently back in episode 21 for her to not pop up again later, so it’s little surprise that her reappearance…
The Apothecary Diaries, episode 8
Rating: A- Maomao’s back home, so naturally she’s going to get involved in a brothel-related mystery while there. Actually, two arise, and both are left open-ended, though in…
The Eminence in Shadow, episode 28
Rating: A- What self-respecting anime series with a bevy of sexy ladies in its cast – especially one with a reputation for pointed use of fan service –…
The Apothecary Diaries, episode 7
Rating: B+ If last episode was the big showpiece of the garden party, this episode is the metaphorical side of the clean-up. It covers in efficient fashion a…
The Eminence in Shadow, episode 27
Rating: A- Confirmation bias is a psychological characteristic whereby people tend to search for, interpret, favor, and recall information in ways that align with their pre-existing beliefs or…
Movie Review: The Tunnel to Summer, the Exit of Goodbyes
Posted: 11/13/2023 Note: This review is based on the subtitled version. A dubbed version is apparently also circulating, but that was not shown in my area. The Tunnel…
The Apothecary Diaries, episode 6
Rating: A- More than any other, this particular shot strikes at the essence of how much of an adorable little freak Maomao is. It is the franchise’s signature…
The Eminence in Shadow episode 26
Rating: B+ The series has been cycling through members of the Seven Shades for feature treatment this season, and this episode is Alpha’s turn. What we learn about…
The Apothecary Diaries episode 5
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The Eminence in Shadow episode 25
Rating: A- It’s now official: Gamma is an absolute terror on the battlefield, and not necessarily for any good reason. My sympathies go nearly as much to the…
The Apothecary Diaries episode 4
Rating: B+ Despite the ominous episode title (“The Threat”), this episode focuses almost entirely on dealing with the consequences of a previous mystery rather than initiating a new…
The Eminence in Shadow episode 24
Rating: B+ Any time a new business comes powering into – and dynamically changing – a market to the degree that the Gamma-led Mitsugoshi has, a big backlash…
Debut: The Apothecary Diaries episodes 1-3
Streams: Crunchyroll on Saturdays Rating: A- (overall) Frieren: Beyond Journey’s End and The Eminence in Shadow looked to be the early front-runners for the season’s best series. With…