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2020 In Review
Boy, am I happy to see 2020 in the rear-view mirror. Pandemic, protests, political polarization... Millions dead world-wide... It can't end soon enough. Despite that, Orphan Fansubs had…
Nagasaki 1945 ~ The Angelus Bells, Senya Ichiya Monogatari, TONIKAWA: Over The Moon For You, Amatsuki, Great Pretender
Review: Mammoth (2020)
Mammoth 会考试的猛犸象 China, 2020, colour, 2.35:1, 105 mins. Director: Wang Nianyi 王念一. Rating: 6/10. Drama centred on a high-school dreamer and the people in his orbit is strikingly…
Review: Model (2020)
Model 我是监护人 China/US, 2020, colour, 2.35:1, 105 mins. Director: Jing Ran 敬然. Rating: 5/10. Light drama about a Chinese student in New York who’s saddled with her baby…
December 2020 Review
Well, 2020 has been a wild year for all of us. Goodness gracious it will be one for the history books going forward I surmise. Anyway, as I…
Nekopara (2020) Review
A question: I’m pretty sure it’s established somewhere in the VNs that they’re genetically engineered ‘cat girls’, so why call them ‘cats’? Are there actu…
Tapestry (2020) review
“Yes, Zeze delivers a rather straightforward romance narrative with Tapestry, but, in contrast to many other Japanese romance films, he succeeds to genuinely move the spectator.”
Review: Leap (2020)
Leap 夺冠 Hong Kong/China, 2020, colour, 2.35:1, 134 mins. Director: Chen Kexin 陈可辛 [Peter Chan]. Rating: 8/10. Celebration of women’s volleyball in China’s modern development is shaded by…
Review: Damp Season (2020)
Damp Season 回南天 China, 2020, colour, 1.85:1, 107 mins. Director: Gao Ming 高鸣. Rating: 3/10. Typical slice of arty alienation centred on a young couple in sweaty Shenzhen.…
2020 Anime Q3 Review
Previous: 2020 Anime Q1 Review Previous: 2020 Anime Q2 Review [ Standard disclaimer: Spoilers! Lots of spoilers! ] I watched zero full-length new Summer anime. Cool. I did…
November 2020 Review (Gunbuster)
Well, last month we touched upon the debut of Studio Gainax, with The Wings of Honneamise kicking off their first decade of excellent scifi anime, going forward to…
Review: A Leg (2020)
A Leg 腿 Taiwan, 2020, colour, 2.35:1, 115 mins. Director: Zhang Yaosheng 张耀升. Rating: 6/10. Delicious black comedy is weakened by too many flashbacks that lack the main…
Review: Wu Hai (2020)
Wu Hai 乌海 China, 2020, colour, 2.35:1, 102 mins. Director: Zhou Ziyang 周子阳. Rating: 5/10. Drama of a crumbling marriage has two strong leads but is weakened by…
Review: Hot Soup (2020)
Hot Soup 热汤 China, 2020, colour, 2.35:1, 99 mins. Director: Zhang Ming 章明. Rating: 4/10. Arty interweaving of four stories ends up looking precious and rather silly, and…
The Journalist (2020) review
A highly relevant narrative that succeeds in underlining the importance of fighting against a-moral system of media manipulation.
2020 Anime Q2 Review
Previous: 2020 Anime Q1 Review [ Standard disclaimer: Spoilers! Lots of spoilers! ] I was also watching Houkago Teibou Nisshi this season, but it got delayed after only…
2020 Anime Q1 Review
Previous: 2019 Anime Year in Review [ Standard disclaimer: Spoilers! Lots of spoilers! ] While I had fun with these shows, Winter was still a season that lacked…
Year In Review: 2020
With 2020 finally in the rear-view mirror, let’s take a look at some of the highlights in the world of anime, manga and video games. I really slacked…
Review: Being Mortal (2020)
Being Mortal 来处是归途 China, 2020, colour, 1.85:1, 96 mins. Director: Liu Ze 刘泽. Rating: 5/10. Everyday light drama centred on a daughter and her Alzheimer’s-riddled father is well-played…
![Featured image for Citizen Kitano (2020) [Documentary Review]](https://cdn.aniblogtracker.com/live/20211127/1638010957.26027.53071.jpg)
Citizen Kitano (2020) [Documentary Review]
Citizen Kitano; or, A Tribute to the Auteur! I intentionally shoot action to make the audience feel real pain. I have never and I will ...
Summer 2020 Anime in Review
Covid-19 really did a number on airing anime series for a while, but that didn’t lower the quality of this season for me. I didn’t watch a lot…
Spring 2020 Anime In Review
I can’t help but admit this season felt the emptiest in a lot of ways. Not just because of the lack of content provided to us by COVID-19…
Review: Love after Love (2020)
Love after Love 第一炉香 China, 2020, colour/b&w, 1.85:1, 142 mins. Director: Xu Anhua 许鞍华 [Ann Hui]. Rating: 5/10. Story of a Shanghai teenager in Hong Kong’s pre-WW2 socialite…
Fall 2020 Anime in Review
This season is going to be hard to rank things, but it was a very good season to me. Especially regarding a lot of its unique content. Not…
Review: River of Salvation (2020)
River of Salvation 一江春水 China, 2020, colour, 1.33:1, 108 mins. Director: Gao Qisheng 高启盛. Rating: 5/10. Well-played study of a 30-something woman in workaday central China doesn’t really…
A Girl Missing (2020) Review
Introduction Around three years after delivering his award-winning Harmonium (2016), Koji Fukada is finally back with a new filmic product: A Girl Missing (2020). Can Fukada deliver a…
Winter 2020 Anime In Review
The Winter 2020 Quarter of anime has certainly been a wild ride, hasn’t it? I kind of mean in terms of anime, but mostly in terms of world…
Review: The Oldtown Girls (2020)
The Oldtown Girls 兔子暴力 China, 2020, colour, 16:9, 105 mins. Director: Shen Yu 申瑜. Rating: 6/10. Affectingly played daughter-mother drama is weakened by its flashback structure and contrived…
Tokyo Love Story 2020 Review
Tokyo Love Story 2020 might be the best romance Japanese drama of the last 10 years. With great character and captivating storyline this drama is a must watch.
Review: River of Salvation (2020)
River of Salvation 一江春水 China, 2020, colour, 1.33:1, 108 mins. Director: Gao Qisheng 高启盛. Rating: 5/10. Well-played study of a 30-something woman in workaday central China doesn’t really…
Okay! Madam (2020) [Film Review]
Okay! Madam; or, National Lampoon’s Airborne Vacation We have to go on this trip! It has been a while, but I am getting back into Korea...
2020 Manga Q3 in Review
[ Last post: 2020 Manga Q1-Q2 in Review! ] [ Standard disclaimer: Spoilers! Lots of spoilers! ] Only “Completed” is ranked, all others alphabetical. As mentioned last time,…
Spring 2020 Review: Great Pretender.
I can see ‘Great Pretender’ easily become one of my top anime shows for 2020. A major factor may be that it had me reminiscing about one of…
Review: Farewell My Lad (2020)
Farewell My Lad 再见，少年 China, 2020, colour, 2.35:1, 109 mins. Director: Yin Ruoxin 殷若昕. Rating: 5/10. Fairly conventional story of a high-school girl drawn to a bad-boy classmate…
Random Manga Review Post 2020
Ariana here. I have not been able to watch any anime at all due to circumstances, but I was able to read quite a bit of manga thanks…
![Featured image for Tezuka's Barbara (2020) [Film Review]](https://cdn.aniblogtracker.com/live/20210705/1625516605.16630.41930.jpg)
Tezuka's Barbara (2020) [Film Review]
Tezuka’s Barbara; or, Deadly Temptation A woman like the city's excrement from the millions of people that it consumed and digested. Th...
Fall 2020 – Week 13 in Review
This week-numbering system doesn’t really make any sense at this point, huh? Initially, they were supposed to match the “weeks” of each anime season, though of course that…
Spiraken Mini Movie Review: Soul (2020)
As a special Christmas Mini Movie Review, Xan & Gretta talk about a long anticipated Disney/Pixar Film that was finally released on Disney +. Was it worth the…
Review: Striding into the Wind (2020)
Striding into the Wind 野马分鬃 China, 2020, colour, 1.85:1, 128 mins. Director: Wei Shujun 魏书钧. Rating: 3/10. Pointless indie production that’s as aimless as its central character, a…
Winter 2020 – Week 12 in Review
Way to fucking go, Nick. Normally, the loosely defined Week 12s and 13s of a given season are the point where most of my watch schedule has already…
Spring 2020 – Week 10 in Review
Hello everyone, and welcome back to Wrong Every Time. I’ve got plenty more thoughts on a variety of movies for you all today, opening with even more exploration…
Summer 2020 – Week 10 in Review
Pack it on in folks, it’s time for the Week in Review. This week I barreled through a pretty strange selection of feature films; the closest thing to…
Winter 2020 – Week 3 in Review
Well folks, it’s Wednesday again. Normally, this is when I offer some scattered thoughts on the previous week in streaming anime, but for this season, that process seems…
Fall 2020 – Week 10 in Review
Hello everybody, and welcome back to Wrong Every Time. My heart was stolen by a videogame again this week, so expect plenty of rambling about Slay the Spire…
Winter 2020 – Week 4 in Review
Alright folks, settle in for the Week in Review! Once again, the fact that I’m already writing about all the anime I’m watching elsewhere means we’ll be diving…
Winter 2020 – Week 7 in Review
Hello all, and welcome back to Wrong Every Time! I’ve got a fresh pile of films I watched this week, including Masaaki Yuasa’s latest feature, along with another…
Summer 2020 – Week 5 in Review
Hello everyone, and welcome back to Wrong Every Time. I actually didn’t get to any noteworthy films this week, but that’s largely because I’ve been devoting most of…
Summer 2020 – Week 9 in Review
Hello everyone, and welcome back to Wrong Every Time. This week marked the end of an era I commenced several months ago, when I first told my housemate…
![Featured image for Bolt (2020) review [Nippon Connection 2021]](https://cdn.aniblogtracker.com/live/20210611/1623410041.14568.39466.jpg)
Bolt (2020) review [Nippon Connection 2021]
“A great narrative by Kaizo Hayashi that explores, via the structure fiction, the truth of three different affects – responsibility, guilt, and sadness through loss – during and…
2020 Manga Q1-Q2 in Review
[ Last post: 2019 Manga Year in Review! ] [ Standard disclaimer: Spoilers! Lots of spoilers! ] Only “Completed” is ranked, all others alphabetical. (SHIMEJI SIMULATION IS #1…
![Featured image for His (2020) review [Nippon Connection 2021]](https://cdn.aniblogtracker.com/live/20210708/1625703797.16785.42097.jpg)
His (2020) review [Nippon Connection 2021]
A touching and heartwarming romance drama that captivates the spectator not only because it’s driven by romantic feelings feel genuine, but also because the truth of love is…