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Character Analysis: Fushi
Look, there’s a lot to like about Yoshitoki Oima’s work. Don’t just take my word for it. Take a look at her list of awards. They include an…
How to Build a Series: 86
Our old friends Salvati and Simplicito scored BIG on their last series, The Elite Classroom (not to be confused with Classroom of the Elite, which was created by…
The Weakness of Three Plus One: School-Live!
It’s easy to tell what a noob I am when I say that School-Live! was the first manga series I followed from beginning to end as it came…
How to Cook a Series: Rascal Does Not Dream of Bunny Girl Senpai
Why the heck do so many light novels (and the anime adapted from them) have such dumb names? I mean, don’t bother to answer that. I actually know…
Oh, So Trope-ical: The Oaf
I’ve written a bunch of times about one trope, the Soul Woman. You know who she is: She’s a main character who, when you break her down into…
How to Build a Series: Dan Da Dan
Okay, first of all Dan Da Dan falls under the “It’s New” rule. I’ll do my best not to reveal spoilers. Although, SPOILER, it’s a high school romance…
Same Stage, Different Stories: Trigun/Trigun Stampede
The original Trigun was a little messy but ultimately a very powerful story. And let’s be frank: Who doesn’t like Vash the Stampede? The guy’s a total goofball…
For 5 February
February 5th is this blog’s birthday. Yup, been at it since 2018. And look how many of you have gotten bored to death in that period! Every February…
The Power of Three: Samurai Champloo (revisited)
Some time ago I looked at Fuu, Jin, and Mugen and concluded that they were a sort of half-assed Eternal Triangle, where the two guys vie for the…
Oh, So Trope-ical: Pawn Queens
There’s a really great character trope out there if the writers are careful in how they deploy it. You know what it is. The title says it. I…
Character Analysis: Anthy Himemiya
Like Revolutionary Girl Utena generally, there’s a lot going on with Anthy Himemiya. ‘Cuz she’s a symbol, like a lot of things in Revolutionary Girl Utena. I don’t…
The Antagonist: Mysterious Aliens
I started last year (2024) with a lot of posts about antagonists because it was a role I hadn’t thought about a lot yet. Surprise! I thought about…
How to Cook a Series: ZOM 100 Bucket List of the Dead
Sorry, Salviati and Simplicio won’t be making an appearance this week. They are too busy pitching a story that will remind everyone of Rascal Does Not Dream of…
Oh, So Trope-ical: The Superhero Doctor
Regular readers know I bring a few perspectives to these posts. Published writer looking at writing. Award-winning animator looking at animation. And yeah, I can do the critic/critique…
What’s in a Name? Nana
Some of these things are just too easy to write but too much fun not to, kno wut I meen? So this one here is my Christmas present…
Character Analysis: Frieren
There are some things to like about Frieren: Beyond Journey’s End and some things not to like. For instance, after a couple good ideas the plot jumps the…
Oh, So Trope-ical: The Infantilized High School Girl
The Law of Tropes #1: Tropes is tropes because they work. Right? Certain characters/situations/relationships are common because users recognize them and understand them, and because they do somethi…
Triple Plot: Gosick
I watched Gosick because Mari Okada, the writer of O Maidens in Your Savage Season and director of Maboroshi, worked on it. Of course, she was the “Series…
The Power of Three Minus One: Maison Ikkoku
Metastable relationships – where the main characters are in love but can’t or won’t admit it – have been on my mind lately, possibly because for National Novel…
How to Build a Series: Classroom of the Elite
Due to popular demand, we return to our anime-writing friends Salvati and Simplicito. You know, the guys Galileo used to explain how the Earth goes around the Sun.…
How to Start a Series: Dragonball
And I do mean Dragonball, the original series, because it was the start of it all. If the first one doesn’t work, Z and Kai and whatever others…
Oh, So Trope-ical: The Idol Girl
There are a lot of idol girls in anime. It’s almost unavoidable, right? The purpose of anime is to get eyeballs on the screen, and a key way…
Non-random Aside
Boy, it’s been a while since I did one of these, hasn’t it? But here it is, just a few hours after 12:00 AM November 1st, and I’m…
Character Analysis: Kanna Kamui
Look, as cute as it is, there’s a fundamental problem with Miss Kobayashi’s Dragon Maid. Put simply, Tohru and Kobayashi form a complementary pair of characters that’s too…
Oh, So Trope-ical: The Metastable Relationship
I’ve talked about metastable relationships in passing so many times it occurs that there’s something bigger going on there. And sho ‘nuf … The term metastable comes from…
How to Build a Series: Death Note
Death Note is one of those anime stories that tries to be deep by asking deep questions. There are others. Ghost in the Shell asks “What does it…
One-Punch Man, Revolutionary Girl Utena, Death Note, Ghost in the Shell
Oh, So Trope-ical: The Ugly Duckling
Oh, So Trope-ical: The Ugly Duckling Okay, you know the story of the Ugly Duckling and I know the story of the Ugly Duckling. It’s from Hans Christian…
The Power of Three: Ghost in the Shell
Okay, we all know who the most interesting character in Ghost in the Shell is, and it’s the Major, Motoko Kusanagi. She has the choice between her human…
Oh, so Trope-ical: Too Cool for School
One of the things you typically look for in kids’ media … and remember, the target audience for most anime is slightly nerdy Japanese high school boys ……
Character Analysis: Tomo Aizawa
Okay, I’m going to say it right up front: Tomo-chan is a Girl is pretty damned dumb. The hero, Tomo Aizawa, is dumb, the boy she’s hot for,…
Oh, So Trope-ical: The Broken Girl
It sure seems like the number of anime where the kids belong to/come from a complete nuclear family with a mother and a father is pretty small. There…
Killer Ending: Steins;Gate
Okay, the “gimmick” of Steins;Gate is that it’s adapted from a videogame and for the last third of the series – right, the third act in a three-act…
Character Analysis: Ai Hoshino
There are a couple stories where a character who is the real driving force in the plot is behind the scenes for most or all of the series.…
Week Off!
I’m still here. I’m just taking a week off for REASONS. C ya next week.
How to Build a Series: TP Bon
Okay, I write science fiction, so I’m a sucker for stuff like time travel as long as the writers can convincingly deploy handwavium. You know handwavium: “We can…
Blue Eye Anime
Okay, I THINK I’m coining a term here, and if I am I want credit for it. Blue eye anime. Take note. It’s mine. Let me call the…
Killer(?) Ending: Fruits Basket
Fruits Basket is not the sort of story anyone’d expect to talk about when they talk about killer endings, an ending that no one saw coming but makes…
Medium Matters: The Ancient Magus’ Bride
Way back a long time ago, as an experiment I started tracking The Ancient Magus’ Bride manga in real time, picking up the new books as they came…
Oh, So Meta: Excel Saga
I’ve always been interested in things that are self-referential, or meta, if you prefer. This goes back to my college days, where we studied cybernetics. Sure. The Basic…
Oh, So Trope-ical: Raised by Wolves
Well, no, I don’t literally mean raised by actual, you know, wolves, since, you know that doesn’t really happen, the myth of Romulus and Remus aside. But what…
Gender Bender: Alice Murata
Shuzo Oshimi is my favorite mangaka. I may have mentioned that. He’s been working on a new book called Welcome Back, Alice. Hmm … the title of this…
Gender Bender: Neon Genesis Evangelion
All right, I suspect people are going to expect me to talk about Kaworu Nagisa here. Dude is pretty interested in Shinji, isn’t he? (wink wink nudge nudge)…
Gender Bender: Paradise Kiss
If you weren’t watching, Paradise Kiss is an earlier work by Ai Yazawa, the mangaka who gave us Nana. (It has to be an earlier work since she…
Gender Bender: Mizu
There should be a name for American shows that are informed by anime style but American tropes. After watching Blue Eye Samurai, I think they should be called…
Story Drop
Man, I like writing these. I mean, you know what I do here is write about anime and manga from my perspective as a writer, right? Well, lemme…
Gender Bender: Mei Aihara
For reasons I’ve been thinking about Citrus again. Well, actually the reasons are pretty simple. Mei and Yuzu Aihara are simultaneously classmates, step-sisters, roommates, and lovers, and if…
Oh, So Trope-cal: I Can’t Say “I Love You”
Look, if you’re writing a popular romance manga, or an anime made from a popular romance manga, you often have a big problem: How do you keep the…
Killer Ending: Kids on the Slope
You may not remember Kids on the Slope, the series by Shinichiro Watanabe. You know, Cowboy Bebop, Samurai Champloo, Carole and Tuesday … yeah, THAT Shinichiro Watanabe. Not…
Character Analysis: Kaguya Shinomiya
Kaguya-sama Love is War is one of those shows that knows what it is and isn’t any more than that. Dude it’s a rom-com, with emphasis on the…
How to Build a Series: Knights of Sidonia
There are some shows that are constructed so cleverly that I would give anything to be a fly on the wall during their development meetings. In fact, I…