Category: Anime Reviews

Bocchi the Rock! teems with experimental animation that captures the social anxiety and catastrophizing the anime’s namesake character experiences. It’s a fun ride. Bocchi the Rock! follows the members of Kessoku Band: Hitari Goto (better known by her nickname Bocchi), Nijika Ijichi, Ryo Yamada, and Ikuyo Kita. Each of the girls fall into different psychological…

Raven of the Inner Palace wowed me on many levels when I gave it a watch. While the animation is stiff, especially compared to the experimental animation of Bocchi the Rock! and the lovely fluid animation of Do it Yourself!!, it is beautiful. The detailed stiffness works well with the guarded feel of the characters…

Anime often does character studies and coming-of-age stories well. Hanasaku Iroha centers on Ohana Matsumae who is sent from Tokyo to live with a grandmother she had never met. Her grandmother runs a hot spring inn called Kissuiso. Her grandmother, at first, comes off as stern, uncaring, and harsh. She slaps the faces of the…

Parallel World Pharmacy takes a different direction from the usual isekai. When medical researcher Kanji Yakutani dies from karoshi, he wakes up to find himself reborn in a medieval fantasy culture with all his medical knowledge intact. Fortunately, he was also reborn to a pharmacist family and, in isekai fashion, born to power. In his…

Shikimori’s Not Just a Cutie addresses interesting themes. Let’s get to them! But first, the summary for those who haven’t seen the anime yet. Not Just a Cutie follows the high school relationship between a boy named Izumi Yuu, who is cursed with bad luck–as in things-fall-and-try-to-kill-him bad luck, and Shikimori, who is an assertive…