Show Review: Anime "Beastars" 2019

This is a show review for the animated show "Beastars", released in 2019 on Netflix. I finished watching the second season on July 25, 2021 via Netflix.

Trailer: 

Genre: Action, Crime, Drama, High School, Romance

Plot: In a world of humanoid animals, it is a matter of life and death while trying to live in a full-time school with herbivores and carnivores. A male grey wolf named Legoshi is simply trying to live his life as a teenage boy in high school. However, being a wolf in puberty is difficult. He both feels the desire to eat meat but he also does not want to eat meat. He meets a dwarf rabbit named Haru and finds her to be way more than he could have ever thought an herbivore could be. He finds that he has feelings for her but it is hard for him to understand how to have a relationship with such a small fragile herbivore.

Can herbivores and carnivores live in peace? Is there more to co-habitation than merely being in the same room/class or group? Can carnivores overcome their desire to eat meat? Can a boy and a girl of different species have a relationship more than just friends, especially if one is a carnivore and the other is an herbivore?

Review:

4/5 - *SPOILERS* The problem that a lot of people would have with this show is the fact that it is "furry" (or humanoid animals, personified animals). Once you get past the fact that the characters are animals with human intelligence and behaving/talking/walking like humans, it is a very interesting show. Take your average high school, mix the characters with animals, and see how it goes. Humans have limits for their actions but trying to deal with human-like puberty in high school while being a carnivore has a lot more problems. How does one fight the desire to kill and eat meat (considering carnivores eat herbivores) when eating meat is illegal, since meat means that it was an animal/living being at one point? The struggles of wanting to eat meat, finding a common ground between carnivores and herbivores, fighting natural urges like ravaging others (sex or meat/devouring), and just trying to grow up all come together in this show. It is not a pretty sight to see how bad a being can act when having to fight such urges/struggles, but it could be a way to communicate how humans (not personified animals or furries or humanoid animals, but real human beings) can have animalistic tendencies that we have to fight or deal with.

The average human teenager has to deal with hormones that can drive one crazy or cause him/her to do things that adults wouldn't do [on a spur of a moment or not]. Many teenagers have killed because they think their parent/guardian was out to get them or too harsh. Many teenagers have raped or killed because they thought that they were in love and didn't like what reality was. It is pretty bad to have to see the similarities between humans and animals, but it shouldn't be brushed aside. To confront one's dark instincts or desires is to live. To allow yourself to fall for your baser instincts is bad according to society, so stand up against it. Find a way to acknowledge it and fight it, like Legoshi fights his carnivoristic desire to kill and eat meat.

For those that are squeamish, the talk of such things may be overwhelming. However, I think that this show has qualities that give it value enough to look past the whole "furry"/personified animals thing. Like I said, fighting one's dark desires/instincts, growing up as a teenager, etc are what make this show interesting and valuable.

I do not like that so many people look past this show because of the furry/personified animals thing, though I don't blame them because so many think that it is trying to promote furries and beastiality. I understand their logic, especially considering the fact that the female dwarf rabbit Haru has sex with multiple animals (at different times). They do not show the intimate details of the sexual act but oh man could that ruffle a few people in the wrong way.

On the other hand, this is a tricky subject. There are no non-animal humans, so human on animal is not a thing for your usual definition of "beastiality". Even though they talk about sex and have apparent scenes of sex, no genitalia is shown (not even a bulge of a cock in pants when the males are aroused). All animals are covered by modest clothing at all times, except maybe to show off some cleavage or boobs [modest nipples at that if they are shown]. However, if one is inclined to feel arousal towards the characters, it is a possibility one might try to blame this show for causing thoughts about beastiality. This is also a "slippery slope" for those that think that furries are good (especially cosplaying as these characters). So warning about this show because in different minds, it can gives ideas to some people that most society would say is evil/bad. [To each their own.] If you can find a way to enjoy the show without making it too personal, then go for it. Otherwise, your choice.

There's other things that I could go on about with this show but that's all that I'm going to put down. Even with the furry/beastiality possibility, I would personally suggest this show. It is pretty good. I enjoy it though there are ugly parts in it, but that's what life is about to get you to think about things, right?

That's my show review! I look forward to season 3 whenever it comes out.

Thank you for reading my review. More reviews to come eventually.

~ Gracie Mae DeLunac

Contact me?

Twitter @gracie_delunac

Email graciemaedelunac@yahoo.com

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Skype gracelyn2019@yahoo.com

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Show Review: Anime "King's Game The Animation" 2017

This is a show review for the anime "King's Game The Animation", released in 2017. I watched this around May-June of 2021 via Funimation.

Trailer: 

Genre: Horror, High School, Supernatural

Plot: A regular high school student named Nobuaki Kanazawa has recently moved to a new school. He stays off in the distance when dealing with his classmates but we do not learn about what happened to him until something strange starts happening to him. He and his classmates receive text messages saying that there will be a game played with the classmates all involved. If you do not pay attention to the rules, you will be punished. If you fail your tasks, you will be punished. By "punished", the game obviously means death. (We're talking Final Destination or Saw kind of deaths.) Nobuaki then reveals that he had to go through this game previously with his last class, but that all of his classmates had died. He literally tells them to take the game seriously and they do not believe him until one classmate starts spontaneously bleeding out of all orifices and pores of his body and dies in front of them. How can they survive? Can more than one survive? How far will people go to survive this game? Who is the King?

Review:

3.5/5 - *SPOILERS* This was an interesting anime but the ending was very anti-climatic. This is not an anime for those with weak stomachs or that do not like the look of blood. Many of the deaths are extremely graphic whereas others are implied. Either way, it really does give it a feel of Final Destination ("Did you feel the brutality of it?" and fighting against death's choice/plan). However, many "committing suicide" at the same time is hard to understand when the power behind the King's Game is never shown like Final Destination movies show death working to kill off the survivors. For this, I knock the rating down some. (Give me the supernatural power [or other people] killing off the people!)

Anyways, the ending....was much less than what I was expecting. I was rather disappointed. It was not very fulfilling (good or bad) and could not give a decent understanding. At least with Final Destination, we had the remaining survivor or last few and the knowledge of something isn't quite right. With King's Game (without giving more than moderate spoilers), it seems like there is no reasoning in the supernatural power behind the game. Death is easy enough to understand but to have some strange deaths (like twisting a head around without using anything) is just weird. What is this supernatural power, if not death? At the end, we don't know, honestly. So what does it want or how can it be stopped? Who knows, which is another reason why I knocked the rating down some. It is interesting but the logic behind this supernatural killing force is strange to say the least. *shrugs*

Do I suggest? Kinda yes but that ending really put me off so it is up to you. However, make sure that you are not squeamish nor have a low tolerance for super violence (for example: one character starts cutting off his own leg to make a human doll of body parts). Would I rewatch this show? Probably not but who knows what the future holds. I would love a sequel series or maybe watch the movie (2011).

Anyways, thank you for reading! More reviews to come eventually.

~ Gracie Mae DeLunac

Contact me?

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Email graciemaedelunac@yahoo.com

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Skype gracelyn2019@yahoo.com

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Show Review: Anime "Aquarion" 2005

This is a show review for "Aquarion", released in 2005. I rewatched this in July 2021 via Funimation, English dubbed.

I have been wondering if I should potentially review shows as I watch a lot of shows but the effort that it takes to watch a show and then try to review it afterwards is a lot more than watching a 2.5 hour movie and reviewing it. For one, there are not too many show reviewers (as far as I know). For two, it can be harder to get the basic information about the shows because some shows are very niche. I'm of course talking about animes because you have to deal with the fact that there are original language versions (Japanese, Chinese, French, etc) and there are the English dubbed versions. Talk about trying to get information from anime geeks.... There's so many things that could go wrong with putting out incorrect information about anime shows, aside opinions, that I have just avoided it until now.

The reason that I wanted to say something about this show is that when I first saw this show about 8-12 years ago, I loved it. The show hasn't changed but my understanding of the themes has. I have no set criteria to rate shows yet so I'll try to touch the main points of my usual reviews.

Trailer

Genre: Science Fiction, Mecha, Action, Adventure, Military

Plot: Twelve thousand years ago, there were some warriors that fought against the Shadow Angels (beings that consider themselves to be higher intelligence than humans and are not necessarily humanoid shaped). One warrior was Apollonius and another was Seliane. Apollonius fell in love with Seliane and they stood up against the way the Shadow Angels were treating humans. They defeated the Shadow Angels enough to have the Shadow Angels leave them alone. Present day, however, the Shadow Angels are back to drain the prana (life force) from humans so that they can stay alive and to feed the Tree of Life.

After 12,000 years, reincarnations of Seliane and Apollonius are due to return to the face of the planet. The question is who are they? Could it be this mangy street urchin? Could it be this stuck-up princess? How do the humans, with the help of the mechas (3 vectors that can merge to become Aquarion), stand up against the Shadow Angels? Is there a way to defeat the Shadow Angels forever, so that the humans do not have to worry about being harvested for prana?

Review

3.5/5 - *SPOILERS*

This is a cute anime. It is short series of 26 episodes, running about 25 minutes long.

Reincarnation is obviously one of the main themes of the show because everyone is wondering who is the reincarnation of Apollonius and Seliane. The other themes that I understood better this round were chakras, connections with the earth, spiritualisitic relations to each other, being able to see through vibes and auras (instead of sight), the sexualistic aspects of merging the spirit with each other when they merge the vectors into Aquarion, etc.  For anyone that is willing to open their mind to other thoughts, feel free to watch this. When the three pilots ("Elements") merge their mecha Vectors into Aquarion, though, it really does look like they are have that "O" face/reaction. Talk about....well.... If you're not prepared or if you're a prude, it is awkward. :-P.

From all of these points, I would say this is not necessarily an anime to show a child [or to anyone who is a staunch institutional-religion person] because of the sexual and spiritual aspects.

The way that these points and themes are shown might be odd but they can be very subtle too. The artwork is awesome (except one episode where the prana harvester takes them into a different plane of existence and the art style is changed for half the episode). The music is wonderful, in my opinion.




From a second viewing of this show, I would still have to say that it is worth watching but not necessarily the "greatest anime out there". There are other shows that I would watch over this (Busou Renkin being the first to come to mind atm) but it is kind of a classic considering it is now over 15 years old. Then again, so are InuYasha and Sailor Moon and DBZ and Naruto so what can I say?
 It is interesting and cute.

Oh, but the ending of the show left me with a "wtf, is that it?" feeling. I can see why they came out with a second series a few years later (Genesis of Aquarion OVA) to give more to the story but then again, I have never had much interest in anything more than the 26 episodes. I also hear there are series called Aquarion EVOL and a Aquarion Logos. Looking at Funimation atm on July 25, 2021, they do have Aquarion, Aquarion EVOL, and Aquarion Logos.

Anyways, though the ending left me wanting a "afterwards" bit, this is still an entertaining show in my opinion. Feel free to try it out if you wish. (And yes, I may eventually watch Aquarion EVOL and Aquarion Logos.)

Thank you for reading my review! More reviews to come eventually.

~ Gracie Mae DeLunac

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Email graciemaedelunac@yahoo.com

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Skype gracelyn2019@yahoo.com










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Movie Review: "Escape from L.A." 08/09/96

This is a movie review for "Escape from L.A.", released August 9, 1996. We watched this on June 7, 2020.

Genre: Action, Adventure, Sci-Fi

Run Time: 1 Hour and 41 Minutes

Official MPAA Rating (According to IMDB.com):

G / General Audiences

PG / Parental Guidance Suggested

PG-13 / Parents Strongly Cautioned

R / Restricted

X

Not Rated

Trailer

Notable Cast

 

Kurt Russell     ...     Snake Plissken
A.J. Langer     ...     Utopia
Steve Buscemi     ...     Map to the Stars Eddie

Bruce Campbell     ...     Surgeon General of Beverly Hills

Cliff Robertson     ...     President

Plot

Snake Plissken, after having saved the President from New York, is sent on a mission in Los Angeles to recover a device. This device controls machines in orbit that can wipe out electrical devices in a directed area. Snake is to go recover this device from the daughter of the President of the United States, who has been brainwashed to blindly follow a radical man who is trying his darndest to be like the Cuban revolutionist Che Guevara. Can he get the device in the allotted time frame? Will the world be safe from electro-magnetic pulses destroying what is left of humanity and civilization?

Rating Criteria

0/5 – No value whatsoever. Absolute waste of time.

1/5 – Barely worth any time.

2/5 – Pathetic but has a bit of something to hold the attention a little.

3/5 – Somewhat kept the attention but could definitely have used more.

4/5 – Good, but not awe-strikingly amazing. Could have maybe used a bit more to the movie.

5/5 – Go see it! Wonderful movie all around. – characters, music, theme, story line, etc.

3/5 - *SPOILERS*

This movie could have used a lot to be much better and much more enjoyable. A lot of terrible green screens looked like bad comic book drawings. The characters that had been in the city of L.A. were fairly not too diverse from each other, which made the "we blocked off this place and made it into an internment/prison" idea to seem less real. It was honestly much less interesting than the "Escape from New York" movie. I was waiting the whole movie for something intriguing to happen, but it never really did. By the end of the movie, I was rooting for Snake to become the villain that "saved" the world from technology and the fighting, especially after seeing the President be a yellow-belly as****e and ordering his daughter to be executed via an electric chair. I did, however, like how Snake used the military's logic to fool them and used their technology (hologram projection) to fool them, even if it didn't seem feasible. I also thought it was interesting that he decided it was best to wipe out all technology on the earth and walk away saying "Welcome to the human race" like it was nothing. The ending might leave you wanting but it was something of closure at least.

Honestly, I could watch this movie again but I definitely did not like it as much as I liked "Escape From New York". I would say that "Escape from New York" is a good suggestion but that you could skip "Escape from L.A.". Some movies just don't need a second film, like this one, in my honest opinion. Feel free to watch it if you like!

That's my movie review. Thank you for reading. More reviews to come eventually (if I can get myself to sit down to type them), especially since I am over a year behind on movie reviews. *shrugs* I'll get to them when I can.

Thank you for your support! <3 

~ Gracie Mae DeLunac

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Skype gracelyn2019@yahoo.com

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