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What I've Seen Recently: Late December - Early May, 2022-2023
wow hello! it's been quite a while! i prefer not to use these entries to talk about my personal life but ah, yeah, it's been a time. however i want to talk about stuff, so here i am again. this time i also edited the post a little for readability between entries, does it help?
manga and anime
all i ever talk about here is horror anthologies... here's another one! egao no sekai came out of nowhere and it was a really pleasant surprise for me! this is one of my favorite sub-sub-subgenres of horror in manga -- horror that looks like a very late 2000s/early 2010s shoujo manga. kind of like screaming lessons, an anthology series i hold to the gold standard and really need to reread sometime. even though this manga was published EXTREMELY recently (it's made apparent in the 2nd chapter LMAO) it still has that kind of dated look i really like, and the author doesn't really skimp on the horror scenes. this is most clearly illustrated in the chapter bagworm. it's so abrupt it almost feels like a different manga, but i like it when artists show their chops like that.
my favorites were chapter 3 (magical faucet), chapter 6 (i'm going to borrow that), and chapter 7 (hell's trap). in 3 i enjoyed how there were basically two twists to the story. i think the parents hunting humans was pretty obvious from the get go, but the fact that they also had a supernatural element on their side is one i didn't particularly expect. 6 is just a straight up ghost story that's well put together, i don't really have much to comment on there. and in 7 combined a seriously gross and creepy looking monster for this type of manga with a fairly biting commentary about how the schooling system in japan can work. our ruthless little protagonist is going to go places.
i disliked chapter 2 (the slit-mouth woman) and chapter 8 (confinement ground). for 2, while i enjoyed the flip on its head that a normal mouth can be a slit mouth woman in a society where no one has an open mouth, the disease/ItsCovidButWeCantSayItsCovidButItIsCovid angle was just kinda dumb lmao. you are not immune to mask scaremongering apparently. 8 i think was a cultural difference at play here? i just didn't find it interesting and didn't really understand why the evil spirit faces spread to the rest of the town all of a sudden, because their place of rest was disturbed? this might be my american ignorance here, it didn't click for me too much.
content warnings for this one: bugs, bullying and dehumanization, general horror spoopy themes, kinda covid denialism but not rly i guess i'm not really sure how to warn for that.
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i read the web serialization of a new kouhai who's skilled at "reading the mood" and an unfriendly senpai and i really, really liked it! this is not my usual bag at all... but the relationship between the kouhai and the senpai is just super adorable. and i really like the design of the "emotions" she can read and how they hold up little signs, it's so cute.
this one is quite short as it's not nearly as edgy or complex as other series i might stumble upon. i have yet to read the magazine serialization so i don't know how it differs. it's in my mangadex reading column though, i'll get around to it sometime. either way i recommend it for short and fluffy het that's decent.
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speaking of edgy. i read the manga version of nisioisin's new series new alternative magical girl risuka and it's... uh... a nisioisin series. what that means to you depends on your experience with his previous series. (if you've forgotten over the years you've known me: love medaka box, fond of zaregoto, like shounen shoujo and juuni taisen and katanagatari, meaning to try okitegami kyouko, bounced off monogatari although i want to go back to it again for the 40th time to see if it sticks then, holy shit pretty boy detective club was by him? i'm interested now)
i honestly don't know what to say about this one. lmao. it's slightly less full of fetishes then bakemonogatari i guess. (ie no toothbrushing scene yet...) but. yeah it's still there. definitely on the hornier spectrum. the main character is such an asshole but a fascinating one... they do a bait and switch that actually got me when he killed the class president, i really wasn't expecting him to?! looking back on it i'm not sure why considering what a trainwreck the future risuka is but i genuinely thought she would become the 3rd party member.
however i find the magic system fascinating. it's so overcomplicated and Very nisioisn, the level of detail in it definitely plays to my brain. i like risuka a lot as a character, i feel quite bad for her. basically everyone is trying to use her for some reason or another, which makes her incredibly sympathetic. and tsurugi is a fun ball of nonsense, i really liked her intro although the way her character is going seems kinda meh. time will tell on that front though.
and the art is quite nice. i enjoy emoto nao's paneling especially, she has a very distinct style and is quite good at building tension. she also drew the critically acclaimed o maidens in your savage season which i haven't seen personally but heard very good things about... and also explains the air of horny that pervades the whole thing even without nisoisin's Nisioisining. it's very appropriate for the manga and i like it a lot.
content warnings: gore, age gap relationship sorta kinda lol time travel, it is just. SO horny...
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youtubers??
short enough section that i don't feel the need to cut it but i would like to point your attention to zuldim, a youtube video essayist who i quite liked. he's where i learned about fear and hunger long before i saw supereyepatchwolf's (excellent) video about it and he highlights things that genuinely wouldn't have crossed my radar and popular stuff. i recommend him. also he has a three hour video about FFXIV and i know some of you would be into that so
--
i've also read quite a lot of books since i've been laid up but this entry is long enough, so maybe i'll snowball them into another entry or make one just dedicated to books and light novels i dunno. that's it for now, thanks for reading!
manga and anime
all i ever talk about here is horror anthologies... here's another one! egao no sekai came out of nowhere and it was a really pleasant surprise for me! this is one of my favorite sub-sub-subgenres of horror in manga -- horror that looks like a very late 2000s/early 2010s shoujo manga. kind of like screaming lessons, an anthology series i hold to the gold standard and really need to reread sometime. even though this manga was published EXTREMELY recently (it's made apparent in the 2nd chapter LMAO) it still has that kind of dated look i really like, and the author doesn't really skimp on the horror scenes. this is most clearly illustrated in the chapter bagworm. it's so abrupt it almost feels like a different manga, but i like it when artists show their chops like that.
my favorites were chapter 3 (magical faucet), chapter 6 (i'm going to borrow that), and chapter 7 (hell's trap). in 3 i enjoyed how there were basically two twists to the story. i think the parents hunting humans was pretty obvious from the get go, but the fact that they also had a supernatural element on their side is one i didn't particularly expect. 6 is just a straight up ghost story that's well put together, i don't really have much to comment on there. and in 7 combined a seriously gross and creepy looking monster for this type of manga with a fairly biting commentary about how the schooling system in japan can work. our ruthless little protagonist is going to go places.
i disliked chapter 2 (the slit-mouth woman) and chapter 8 (confinement ground). for 2, while i enjoyed the flip on its head that a normal mouth can be a slit mouth woman in a society where no one has an open mouth, the disease/ItsCovidButWeCantSayItsCovidButItIsCovid angle was just kinda dumb lmao. you are not immune to mask scaremongering apparently. 8 i think was a cultural difference at play here? i just didn't find it interesting and didn't really understand why the evil spirit faces spread to the rest of the town all of a sudden, because their place of rest was disturbed? this might be my american ignorance here, it didn't click for me too much.
content warnings for this one: bugs, bullying and dehumanization, general horror spoopy themes, kinda covid denialism but not rly i guess i'm not really sure how to warn for that.
--
i read the web serialization of a new kouhai who's skilled at "reading the mood" and an unfriendly senpai and i really, really liked it! this is not my usual bag at all... but the relationship between the kouhai and the senpai is just super adorable. and i really like the design of the "emotions" she can read and how they hold up little signs, it's so cute.
this one is quite short as it's not nearly as edgy or complex as other series i might stumble upon. i have yet to read the magazine serialization so i don't know how it differs. it's in my mangadex reading column though, i'll get around to it sometime. either way i recommend it for short and fluffy het that's decent.
--
speaking of edgy. i read the manga version of nisioisin's new series new alternative magical girl risuka and it's... uh... a nisioisin series. what that means to you depends on your experience with his previous series. (if you've forgotten over the years you've known me: love medaka box, fond of zaregoto, like shounen shoujo and juuni taisen and katanagatari, meaning to try okitegami kyouko, bounced off monogatari although i want to go back to it again for the 40th time to see if it sticks then, holy shit pretty boy detective club was by him? i'm interested now)
i honestly don't know what to say about this one. lmao. it's slightly less full of fetishes then bakemonogatari i guess. (ie no toothbrushing scene yet...) but. yeah it's still there. definitely on the hornier spectrum. the main character is such an asshole but a fascinating one... they do a bait and switch that actually got me when he killed the class president, i really wasn't expecting him to?! looking back on it i'm not sure why considering what a trainwreck the future risuka is but i genuinely thought she would become the 3rd party member.
however i find the magic system fascinating. it's so overcomplicated and Very nisioisn, the level of detail in it definitely plays to my brain. i like risuka a lot as a character, i feel quite bad for her. basically everyone is trying to use her for some reason or another, which makes her incredibly sympathetic. and tsurugi is a fun ball of nonsense, i really liked her intro although the way her character is going seems kinda meh. time will tell on that front though.
and the art is quite nice. i enjoy emoto nao's paneling especially, she has a very distinct style and is quite good at building tension. she also drew the critically acclaimed o maidens in your savage season which i haven't seen personally but heard very good things about... and also explains the air of horny that pervades the whole thing even without nisoisin's Nisioisining. it's very appropriate for the manga and i like it a lot.
content warnings: gore, age gap relationship sorta kinda lol time travel, it is just. SO horny...
--
youtubers??
short enough section that i don't feel the need to cut it but i would like to point your attention to zuldim, a youtube video essayist who i quite liked. he's where i learned about fear and hunger long before i saw supereyepatchwolf's (excellent) video about it and he highlights things that genuinely wouldn't have crossed my radar and popular stuff. i recommend him. also he has a three hour video about FFXIV and i know some of you would be into that so
--
i've also read quite a lot of books since i've been laid up but this entry is long enough, so maybe i'll snowball them into another entry or make one just dedicated to books and light novels i dunno. that's it for now, thanks for reading!