sturgeonspyramid

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Memory Hole.

Ebitani?  Never heard of ‘im.

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Boys in the girl’s room.  Girls in the men’s room.

I’m not very familiar with MMOs, so I must assume this situation is very common.

I would kill for abs like those, man.

That is not the word I would use to describe this action.

Fish -> Ichthys -> Jesus -> Christmas.  Obvious when you think about it.

Winner for best out-of-context line, episode 1.

We’re coming for ya, Elsa!  For Arendelle!

Tough situation, right?  Things get complicated, and-

ಠ_ಠ 

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All that needs be said about Keijo!!!!!!!!:

Word.

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Troll Level: Master

Natsuki x Yuuko, everybody.

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Dude, really?  Really?  REALLY?

Asuka is conducting!  THIS IS MY EVERYTHING.

Oh, it’s only a song from another anime: DRRR!

Man, this show.  I need to post more from this and Haikyuu.

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Lesson learned?

The thing that I really like about My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic is the way that characters learn from their mistakes.  Season 6, Episode 6:

"And I guess my first instinct shouldn't be to magically command ponies to act the way I want them to?"  Good job, Starlight.  Now that you’ve learned that lesson, we don’t need to retread-

God...damn it.

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The natural order of things.

Maybe I’m just hate-watching Rewrite?  Anyway, thoughts on episode 6:

Both of them should really ask if all this effort was really worth it.  I mean, I guess Lucia probably got some catharsis out of knocking Kotarou unconscious and tying him up.  And Kotarou seems like the kind of guy who’ll endure a lot to feed his perversions.  This doesn’t seem like a healthy relationship, though.

I hate this animation shortcut to get a pattern on characters’ clothes.  It looks really cheap and out of place, especially when characters are in motion.  It happens so often nowadays.  It’s a bad use of CG.

And now we know why Lucia had no response to the hot sauce parfait.  Actually glad to see that loose thread tied up.

That is a winning face from Lucia.

Sure, why not.  Might as well do something useful in addition to inducing amnesia in people.

“Oh, that’s easy.  Any time I feel the urge to strike him, I want him within arms reach.”

She is literally apologizing for not being able to bury his arm in her cleavage like Lucia is doing on the opposite side of him.  Seriously, this show.

And then Occult Club activities happened.  Still waiting on a Harlem Globetrotters cameo, though.

If I had any standards, I’d turn my computer off right here.

I don’t want to hear that from someone who casually falls asleep in the forest.

Seriously.  I don’t trust her to know what a dog looks like.

Yeah, well, you’re cheating.

It’s true.  That’s why humans have never lived in forests or any kind of wilderness throughout their entire history.

Things started to get a little too real in a discussion about man’s relationship to nature, so Shizuru reminded everyone what really matters.

That’s some unsettling juxtaposition, all right.

I have no idea why she’s so angry, but I feel like she’s entirely justified in her actions.

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That girl is poison.

Okay, I’ll try and be a little more positive about Rewrite. Thoughts on episode 5:

FORGET I SAID ANYTHING.  THE BLACK DEATH COMETH.

Those “ALL EMPLOYEES MUST WASH HANDS BEFORE RETURNING TO WORK” signs aren’t joking around, people.

Seriously, what kind of sociopath eats potato chips with chopsticks? Chihaya is worst girl.

I hope I’m not the only one finding this conversation odd.  Either Shizuru knows that Kotarou and Lucia are friends (in which case, why is she asking), or she doesn’t (in which case, why would you leave confirmation of the fact to someone who isn’t the vulnerable one in this situation). Shizuru, you are a bad friend to Lucia.

Okay, maybe these kids just don’t know what the word “friend” means.  Couple hints to get you started: talk every so often, and don’t tell their secrets to others.

We’ve all had that life experience, right?  Going to a fourth-grade reunion?  I’m pretty sure it’s universal.

Yep, typical fourth-grade reunion occurrence.

She has the worst superpower: the ability to induce blackface in others.

Ooh, are we gonna get another cool fence-hopping sequence?  This one’s got barbed wire, though.  Good luck, man.

What?!  That’s all we get?  I feel gypped.

We haven’t seen real limits to this power yet, I think.  How often can he do this?  Under what conditions?  How long do the effects last?  Is there an aspect of himself he can’t rewrite?

What?  You didn’t fix her problem.  You just created a situation where she can touch you without killing you.  Absolutely no one else is affected by this.

Yeah, uh, chapels aren’t really known for their miracles.  Weddings, on the other hand...

Hey, maybe this story is a prequel to Charlotte.  Or an alternate timeline to it.

Serious show, serious issues.

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All in the family.

 Thoughts on episode 4 of Rewrite:

Isn’t Kazamatsuri an eco-conscious, planned city?  How the hell is there a “wrong side of the tracks” neighborhood?

Yoshino seems to be in the mold of “high school student who rules over a gang,” kinda like Tomoyo Sakagami, from another Key work.

This Wolf Pack looks pretty legitimate.  They even appear to have a gang accountant hanging out in the back.

“Also, whenever I get a phone call when someone else is around, they tend to run off screaming.  I can’t figure out why, so I thought this’d be easier.”

Have I mentioned before that all the adults in this show are disturbing?  Law enforcement needs to step up their game.

Only in anime or an anime-related work could this sentence be said without batting an eye.

Did she just score a bunch of bread crusts?  Is Shizuru actually homeless?  What the hell is going on here?  What other dark secrets does this town hold?

“Not bad.  I see you had waffles for breakfast.  I can taste the syrup in your veins.”

“Maybe that’s why people like this work, because I made them forget how bad it was.”

Getting a little heavy-handed with the metaphors, aren’t we?

PRIORITIES.

Surprisingly, wealth accumulation is a theme of this show.  Kotori was dreaming about clinking coins in the first episode, Shizuru and Chiyaha are wealthy, and Inoue all but accused Kotarou of buying his way into matriculating at their high school.

“Leave her alone.  She probably throws like a girl, anyway.”

“I do want to touch what I do want to touch, though.  Let’s go on a date!”

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Unconventional Love.

Thoughts on Rewrite episode 3:

“I guess I’ll have to go back to the club room where I can receive the undivided attention of five high school girls.  Yep, life is pretty hard.”

Hey, maybe Kotarou will get lucky after all! You don’t need Haruhiko, man.  He’s a drag.

Maybe Kotarou is just bad with first impressions.

This reasoning is too stupid.  I’m not buying it.  I prefer my theory, about the scarcity and skyrocketing price of ribbon.  Much more sensible.

Poor Sakuya, coming down with a temporary bout of macrocephaly.

“I hear it’s because she works a shift at Starbucks before she attends class.  Supposedly, her Flat Whites are to die for.”

Oh, so Haruhiko just can’t come to terms with the feelings he has for Kotarou.  Maybe the middle of class isn’t the best time to have this conversation.

Lucia’s expression indicates that this occurrence is pretty common.  Also, for those of you wondering, those math problems on the board were done correctly.

“It includes your favorite, ghost pepper hot sauce, Miss Lucia.”

Truthfully, I seriously can’t believe that this is what’s driving the plot of this show.  Was the visual novel also this banal?

Pretty much every adult I’ve seen on this show is disturbing in one way or another. Trying to grope children, trying to fish for children...that guy smoking a pipe in the intro was pretty baller, but I feel he’s the exception.

Heterochromia.  Apparently, Simon Pegg has it, though I’ve never noticed. David Bowie technically didn’t: he had a dilated pupil, not a differently colored eye.

Hold on, he dropped that can in the aluminum bin.  You’re telling me that companies still put soft drinks in steel cans?

How about, instead of rewriting your DNA, you rewrite a better plot to this show?

A villain with ethics!  Always unusual to see in a protagonist.

Seriously, this town has a high percentage of pedophiles.  It’s kind of unsettling.

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Time to go clubbing.

Thoughts on episode 2 of Rewrite:

“My, is it Thursday already?  The week goes by so fast.”

“Are you kidding?  Why do you think they call it the Dark Web?”

Wait, she’s not playing Hexen?  Wasted opportunity for some synergy, Rewrite.

Come on, UFOs?  Let’s stay grounded in reality, please.

“On an unrelated note, I’ve got some unopened letters I could use your help with.”

Wait, Venus is the goddess of, among other things, fertility.  Is...is she giving him a handful of Viagra?

“Hi, I’m Clippy!  It looks like you’re being haunted by a succubus.  Have you tried repenting for your sins?”

“I charge per hour.  Two hour minimum.  Bring your own couch.  And your own Viagra.”

“I don’t always appear in the opening sequence of an anime, but when I do, I prefer adaptations of visual novels.”

“Failing that, we’ll just have a three-way with the succubus.  It’s a fine backup plan.”

“Sure thing.  That’ll be the first thing I do after I drop my origami swan off at the vet.”

I THOUGHT THIS WAS A PG-RATED SHOW.

Come on.  If you’re going to sneak into someone’s house and get into bed with him, at least have the decency to close the balcony door.  Kazamatsuri is a eco-conscious town; don’t waste energy like that.

This is seriously what happened: she got into bed, examined his hand, made that face, and got the hell out of there.  I think it’s pretty obvious where his hand was when he was talking to the dream wraith.

“It was a fantastical world full of dancing brooms, mops, buckets, and bottles of cleaning liquid.” “You mixed bleach and ammonia in a confined space again, didn’t you?”

“Just keep repressing them and have some nightmares.  It’s the socially responsible thing to do.”

Can we take a moment to wonder about a school cafeteria that makes strawberry parfaits that look like that?  Okay, good.  Next scene.

Surprise twist: Lucia also enjoys hot sauce on her strawberry parfaits.  The joke’s on Kotarou.  Your bromance with Haruhiko was always ill-fated.

You know what, no sympathy.  If she can’t smell the hot sauce prior to tasting it, she either deserves what happens or it shouldn’t affect her much if at all.

This is a little much, though.  Please swerve.  Please, for the love of God.

If it was as innocuous as “there was no hot sauce at the top of the parfait,” I’m going to be hugely disappointed.

Looking forward to seeing the gif of this later.

Where’d the other parfait go?  Please tell me that Haruhiko ate it.

The school is also a dangerous place during the day.  It’s just more mundane, like teachers trying to creep on their students.

Wow, the animation budget fell off a cliff in this scene.  Closer things look bigger.  Not a hard concept.

“Thus solving the problem once and for all.” “But...” “ONCE AND FOR ALL.”

"Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic." - Arthur C. Clarke

Boom.  Mic drop.

“How else to explain that sweet vault over the school fence last night?”

Not a superpower, Kotarou.

Okay, I was only kidding about a rape whistle in the first episode.  But Akane legitimately has a rape deterring audio device.  And then Kotarou goes and destroys it.  I’m seriously concerned, everyone.

Well, screw it.  Carte blanche for Kotarou.

You know, the first time this happened, I actually thought, “Wouldn’t it be weird if Kotarou Dutch-ovenned her?”  And then Kotarou in this scene Dutch-ovens her.  I can’t even.

We are all this girl.  #RibbonLivesMatter

“She said something about videotaping our session for her collection, whatever that means.”

Does it really matter that I left out how they got from A to Z?  Kotori’s totally down to see Kotarou get lucky.

Chihaya’s a transfer student.  Was she supposed to show up at club at a school she didn’t go to at the time?  Let’s be reasonable about this.  Also, Kotarou now has two girls to help in his quest to get to second base with Akari.

TH͟E͠ ̡PA̶C͏T IS ҉S͏EA͢LE̴D.͏

Special Forces Colonel Sanders looks on with interest...and approval.

“I figure, what the hell, my efforts to grope Akane can’t be left to random chance.”

“Exactly right, Akane-senpai!  Want to join, Lucia?  I need all the help I can get.”

Honestly, I’m shocked.  Usually the flat-chested girls are really self-conscious about this sort of thing and will get angry at any insinuation that they are not well-endowed.  Shizuru, to the contrary, has a very clear understanding of her assets.

No, seriously, Shizuru knows the score.  Does she have some amazing life experience that makes her wise beyond her years?

Only in a visual novel based on an anime would this happen.

<music plays>

First order of business: find a magical artifact to increase Shizuru’s cup size.

So, we already that anime.  It was called Haganai: I Don’t Have Many Friends.  It was also a harem show.  Seriously, is there any anime that Rewrite isn’t?

Ribbon Girl needs to understand that just because Kotarou is making friends and wants to grope other girls doesn’t mean that he won’t want to be her friend and grope her.  I mean, he’s already accomplished 50% of those tasks.

I’m glad that Akane has hobbies that aren’t playing first-person shooters.  Model building can be very rewarding, too.  It’s probably a Gundam, though.  How cliche.

“Someday, Kotarou will get to know the real me, and not just know my body.”

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This Wendy’s Restaurant is G-Rated.

Welcome to part 2 of my thoughts on episode 1 of Rewrite (part 1 can be found here):

"But you’re making an X with your arms.  Does that mean this is X-rated?  I’m so confused.”

PG-rating is in serious jeopardy, folks.

Kotarou, seen here doing his best Keiichi Maebara impression.  Well, maybe not as crazy-eyed.

“She’s the reason for the ribbon shortage and skyrocketing prices!  I have to get out of here and tell the school board!”

Wait, what’s he...

Whoa.  Holy sh-

Jesus Christ.

Man, that puts so many other anime protagonists to shame right there.  Where’s my parkour anime, dammit?

If you’re haunting someone night after night, you need to find ways to keep your energy up.  Canned coffee is a pretty good one.

Okay, if this kid does have superpowers, maybe I’m not as impressed at his earlier fence jumping.  Still a little impressed.

“But if you’ve been eating a lot of candy lately, well, we won’t say no to a few drops.”

No, seriously, what was that I said about growing flora in places it wasn’t mean to be grown in?  These creatures are an affront to God.

“In his nest under the school, dead Cthulhu waits dreaming.”

...said every viewer since the beginning of the episode.

OH SHIT IT’S SPECIAL FORCES COLONEL HARLAN SANDERS WE’RE ALL DOOMED

...to receive a coupon for $1.50 off a Three-Piece Chicken Big Box Meal!  (Limited time promotion.  One coupon per customer per visit.  May not be combined with any other offers.)

Thanks for reading, everyone.  Look forward to the rest!

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Reference Material.

Good news!  Rewrite is here, and I’m doing commentary on episodes.  We’ll regret this, you and I, when all this is said and done, but that’s a problem for our future selves.  Screw those guys.  Let’s get to my thoughts on episode 1.  (Also, this is a double-length episode, so I’ll be splitting it up.)

Not true!  You’ve got both sub- and supertitles!  And not everyone can say that.  Also, #SMOD2016.

Okay, I don’t know how long this story is, but if we’re showing the creation of the earth and the evolutionary process, humans haven’t been here that long.  This is going to be an incredibly short show.  Better slow it down a tad, guys.

Suddenly, HUMANS.

Did you know this show is based on a dating sim?  </sarcasm>

“Unfamiliar ceiling...” “Get in the goddamn robot.”

“My planet needs me.”  Uh, actually I don’t know if that’s a joke.  I haven’t played this game, but I think there’s an excellent chance that this guy isn’t from Earth.  (Don’t spoil the magic for me.)

Awesome, it’s an anime version of I Am Legend.

What, is this the first night of his AirBnB in a deserted city?  Probably got a great rate, though.

Kodachi Kuno only wishes she had such ribbon control.  I’m really showing my age right now, aren’t I?

This is serious xenophobia.  You want to attract tourism and business back to the deserted city, you’re going to have to stop cutting people to ribbons.  With ribbons.

Let me remind you of those famous song lyrics: “Shot through the heart and you're to blame/Darlin' you give love a bad name”.

I see we’ve got this anime’s version of Botan.  Seriously, what the hell is this?  At least I recognized Botan as some form of swine.  This is some Pokemon nonsense right here.

I don’t know if this makes me feel better or worse.

The spirit of Scrooge McDuck lives on in a Japanese schoolgirl.

“I was swimming in a huge money vault.  It had a diving board.  A large ‘K’ was emblazoned on the exterior of the building.  And for some reason, I was the guardian to three identical triplet brothers who were my great-nephews.  Such a strange dream.”

He compared an earlier girl to a zombie.  This girl is definitely a vampire.  Is this show secretly Monster Musume?  If so, I’m gonna be really pissed off.

Let’s put flora in a place where it’s never grown before!  I’m sure that will have no repercussions!  It surely won’t take over a city and cause it to become uninhabitable!

“Oh, you’re a fan of ZHIEND too?  I know this girl in a different Key property who’s a huge fan!  I’ll have to introduce you two.”

Haha, seriously, how long does it take to put that outfit together in the morning?  Those bows on the arms do...what, exactly?

Maybe if she stopped telling people to hook, shack, and lube up, she’d do a lot better in that area.  Also, I guess this show is also turning into Haganai: I Don’t Have Many Friends.  All these harem shows start to bleed together after a while, I guess.

“Amazon Prime promises delivery within two days, guaranteed.  We didn’t say we’d deliver to your domicile, however.”

The entire purpose of this screenshot is to relay the translation of the lettering.

I thought this guy knew he was in a visual novel?  Ah well, dramatic irony.

“The price of ribbon has skyrocketed recently due to a shortage for some reason, so it’ll be a few weeks while we generate the funding to purchase it.”

Why would you want to blow that?  He hasn’t made advances toward you or anyone else.  #sorrynotsorry

Sensible.  Print media is dead, after all.

I’d say this is the true spirit of “yellow journalism,” but this is Japan and that would be racist.

This school has a Bribery Club?  Awesome!

That puts us at about the halfway point.  Expect Part 2 of this episode tomorrow!

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Three of the four reviewers have the correct reaction to this show.  And then there’s Rebecca Silverman, who is today’s Worst Person.

Sorry, but giving this show an actual rating makes you a bad person.

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Climb the mountain.

Nice work, Sawamura.

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Bonds.

Aww, this is heart-warming.

Very magnanimous, Oikawa.

LOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOL

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Out of hand.

Trying to meet new people can be a challenge.  That being said...

Come on, man.  Don’t do this.

Oh, geez.

Oh, GEEZ.

Uh...

Uh-oh.

UH-OH.

OH GOD.

Wha...?

YES.

This is everything I wanted.