Spring 2018 First Impressions

It’s the first impressions roundup you’ve all been waiting for!

…that is, unless you’ve been waiting for one that enthusiastically covers all the reboots, spinoffs, and mega-franchise hits airing this season, because this roundup includes almost none of them. Not to worry, though—a couple of them are on our marathon backlogs, which just means we weren’t going to cover them weekly anyway, and there’s too little time to check the pilots of shows where a “hold” outcome is inevitable. Instead, Yata and Haru mostly had a field day with spring’s brand new offerings and wound up with one of their most selective weekly schedules yet, but not for a lack of trying. What’s sticking around? What’s out early? And why do these fucking horsegirls not overthrow humanity and become Earth’s dominant species? Answers to two of those questions lie below. Read on!

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Winter 2018 Final Thoughts

Spring is just around the corner (if not already here), but the Megalo Boxes and Special Weeks and Tri Hero Academias can wait just a while longer: first things first, winter has ended, and what a winter this season was. This seasonal transition period was a bit tight, though: Yata and Haru both watched more than what they had time to cover here, but hopefully the quality will outweigh the quantity. The outcomes probably won’t surprise you either, but find out below what For Great Justice loved and simply put up with as this noteworthy winter anime season came to a close!

Darling For You: FranXX, Pinkerton, & “Bad” Media

Author Note: This article was published shortly following the release of episode 10 of Darling in the FranXX. Future developments within the show may age the stances and topics discussed here, though hopefully it will still hold value as a snapshot in time and address larger concerns within society and approaches to media in general.

It’s been a while, fellas. I normally don’t write up mid-season thoughts for the blog outside our regularly-scheduled articles, in part because I rarely have the extra time, and also because I can cover most of my feelings on individual shows in those. But in a season stacked with more anime-of-the-year contenders than I think I’ve encountered from any one season in years, I want to discuss a title that isn’t working out as well as many people, myself included, thought it would. You know the one: Darling in the FranXX. Pre-season hype for it quickly faded to skeptical optimism and, more recently, persistent doubt. It’s a divisive show and my opinions are pretty divided on it as well. Virtually all the criticism I’ve seen of it is deserved.

But today, I’m not solely going to echo that. I’m going to defend its existence as well.

This will all make sense, I swear.

Winter 2018 Mid-Season Thoughts

Hello, everybody, and welcome back for this mid-season update on For Great Justice! First things first, sorry for the one-week delay: Yata got the flu a short while ago and had to catch up academically, and Haru got bogged down at work and had to catch up on anime itself (some of which he just dropped, and frankly, that’s probably a good call). But better late than never! This season’s still managing to impress overall, and we’re excited to finally check in on how everything’s faring. What are our favorites? What’s falling short? And is Citrus good, actually? There aren’t too many hot takes this time, but there are a few down there, and now’s as good a time as any to check them out before we reach our final thoughts next month. Read on!

Winter 2018 First Impressions

It’s a new year, but here at For Great Justice, we’re the same old us. For our first post on the subject of 2018, Yata and Haru did the usual, watching a ton of this new winter season’s premieres and whipping together some initial thoughts on them. In a season defined by popcorn shows, how did the ambitious hypetrains fare? Which said popcorn shows are the best? And will we ever stop cringewatching the problematic content of the season? The answers to all those questions and more below! Let’s kick off the new year right!

Yata’s 2017 Anime Year in Review / Top 10

Another year’s here, another year’s in the rear-view mirror. Even though my 2017 personally ended up less stressful than the previous few years, I still wouldn’t argue the notion that this past year was overwhelming, pessimistic, and frustrating.

…well, except for anime. I ended up watching more anime this year than I had in long time, and a lot of it was fantastic! From airing titles alone, I completed roughly 40 series and attempted around 30 more. Add to that a handful of superb movies and for me this year was anime’s best in recent memory in terms of both quantity and quality.

Whether you have a casual interest in anime or you breathe this stuff like oxygen, someone seasoned in ani-culture or someone completely oblivious to it, my goal with this spoiler-free 2017 Anime Year in Review is to give you a concise guide to everything I checked out from the past year and supply you with just enough background for you to determine whether or not you might dig each title. Obviously my opinions are subjective to my own personal preferences, and keep in mind that this is the one time each year where I really double down on the stuff I loved and hated. If you liked something I despised or vice versa, do not view any of what follows as a personal attack. It’s just my quick, probably oversimplified thoughts.

So here’s how we’ll do this. Instead of ranking every single show, half of which I didn’t even finish, we’ll leave the detailed, numerical spots to the top 10 and sort everything else by tiers of similar quality. Starting with shows I dropped after just an episode or two, we’ll work our way up from the most atrocious offerings to the most tolerable. After that comes the completed titles, using the same “worst to best” approach. I’ll also highlight some anime films that came out/I saw this year before rounding this off with more in-depth thoughts for my top 10.

Sound like a plan? I’m ready if you are. It’s not everything under the sun, but here’s what my 2017 in anime was like. Enjoy the walk down memory lane.

Fall 2017 Final Thoughts

Oh, quit yer cryin’! Yeah, 2017 was great, and this fall was stacked in particular, but all good things must come to an end. With the new year practically on our doorstep, we can’t wait forever to wrap up our final thoughts on this season’s offerings. Which shows stuck the landing? Which ones did we awkwardly watch faceplant over and over? And – could it be? Is there a 10/10 lurking below? We’re sure you’re looking ahead to 2018 by now, but the fall needs closure, and Yata and Haru are here to give it to ya.

Yata’s Top 25 OPs of 2017

Happy holidays, everybody! Yata here, with what seems to be an annual tradition at this point. That’s right – it just wouldn’t feel like the end of the year if I didn’t frantically write up a bajillion blurbs about anime openings, and I don’t intend to break the streak now. If you’ve been around FGJ for a while, you probably know the drill by now. If not, allow me to quickly summarize my criteria for you:

• The OP must have debuted in 2017. It can be from a show that premiered before 2017 or will continue airing after 2017, but the OP in question has to be from this year.
• I don’t need to have seen a show in order for its OP to be eligible on the list, but I recognize I’m inherently biased towards those I have seen since I’m able to understand additional context from them. OPs of long-running shounen adaptations tend to be absent here for that reason, and though they fare a bit better this year, if you’re eagerly awaiting entries from say, One Piece or Gintama, you’ll probably be disappointed. Don’t say I didn’t warn you.
• My ratings are arbitrarily based on music composition, audio production, lyrics, visual production, audiovisual sync, visual prowess…and pretty much any other metric you could think of. And despite all that, the pros and cons still fall second to my personal enjoyment. After all, objectivity is bullshit and these ratings are ultimately just my personal opinion. You are certainly entitled to disagree and/or think I’m a maniac.
• And last but not least, I’ve always considered an entry field of 25 large enough to not think twice about including multiple OPs from the same show, but this year, the competition was abundant and I wanted to highlight a maximum number of different productions, so I’ll be limiting each show to one OP.

Fall 2017 Mid-Season Thoughts

The holiday season is imminent and we’re trudging through the end-of-the-year work rush, but it’ll take a little more than that to stop Yata & Haru from scribbling together some updated thoughts on (most of) this fall season’s hit series. Which ones are exceeding our expectations? How are the numerous sequels of the season faring? And most importantly, which shows are we letting go of now that we’ve given them a fair chance? The answers may surprise you – read on!

Yata’s Top 10 EDs of 2017

There’s just never enough time to go around, is there? The end of the year is slowly approaching, and I’ve already got loads of finals, holiday commitments, and other writing to juggle. Another list on top of all that seemed unthinkable. Hell, those annual Top 25 OPs lists I do take about two months of listening, writing, reshuffling, and editing before I even come close to a finished product, and that’s usually on top of all those other matters. Before now, though I’ve always been curious about doing an ED list too, I felt there was neither the demand nor the supply for one, since let’s face it, ending themes always get the short end of the stick. While a deserving OP is easy to rewatch, even during one-sitting marathons, EDs are usually less memorable, less addictive, and ultimately less talked about than their introductory counterparts.

But as I sat down in mid-October to run through my preliminary list of 2017 openings, I came to a surprising realization; this year has been uncharacteristically fantastic for ending themes. I could name several shows whose closing montages were just as well-regarded as their OPs, if not more so, and I didn’t want to waste the opportunity to do some of them great justice. After floating the idea and getting some warm feedback, I decided that if I were to ever do an endings list, this would be the year to try it out, and if I had any chance of completing it, I’d have to crank it out early. And thus, here we are.