BashZeStampeedo

The word you're looking for is more along the lines of "asshole", not "pretentious". Yes, I am an asshole. No, I'm not doing this because I'm trying to impress anyone with my pointless opinions about our silly cartoons. Edit: Frankly my posts *should* annoy you if you want a more detailed analysis or full-blown review or something, because they're only intended to be my basic impressions. They're far too short for anything more than a shallow criticism. But if people want something more rigorous, I'm open to it.

Well yeah, you don't need to be "smart" to know when your inner bullshit detector is going off, do you? That's one of the clearest signs to me whether a show is actually trying to entertain you, or is just trying to distract you enough to let you entertain yourself. If the show knows its limits and tries to not set off your BS detector, or at least revels in the BS for the sake of entertaining you, then I'm a lot kinder to it. When my BS detector is going off and it feels unearned (or worse: like I'm being asked to make my own entertainment) then I get harsh.

This. People just wouldn't shut up about how original, creative and thought-provoking it is when it's really not; it's just a decent repackaging of classic junk into a fairly solid popcorn anime. The way some people talk about the thing made me feel sad. It was like listening to people who had never sought anything stimulating in their preferred medium of entertainment before. Basically the same thing as with those people who saw the Matrix and thought it was deep.

Nah. Less experienced viewers consider it amazing, because it's full of Shaft-isms, children in dramatic situations, and the kind of faux-depth that most viewers like. Just don't fall for all the hype about it, and you'll be fine. It's not bad, it's just a bit weird, with stuff that evokes Pink Floyd's The Wall, and those fat-faced anime characters that not everyone likes. Don't expect to like the movies if you like the series, and vice-versa - most people who enjoy one a lot dislike the other, for some reason.

I'd say watch the first one, then skim through and watch just the bits that interest you until the episode where the OP changes (ep13?)

The *initial* episodes are similar. Not 50 of them. If it bothers you that much, skip ahead until you see stuff you don't recognize.

Well I *did* say that the two anime were similar at the start, but that they differ after that initial run of episodes

To be fair, it may be tough to classify us as "adults"

That's just it. You have to keep your eyes open for the good stuff, not just roll with the popular opinion. And you have to find what joy you can in the rest, be it being critical, or trying your best to get back into a younger mentality. For instance, who here even knows about the Rakugo anime, or The Great Passage? They're fine anime for adults, but they go unnoticed because we're too busy ignoring them in favor of trying to focus on the popular stuff for whatever reason.

That's kind of like asking if adults watch or read stuff based on comic books The answer is "yes". There are anime for kids, teens, and adults (though not as many for adults as the former). Adults tend to be more critical of anime, though, because they've seen it all before.

You might also get a kick out of Chi's Sweet Home (and its sequels), Poyopoyo Kansatsu Nikki, Kanojo to Kanojo no Neko, and Kuroneko (if you can find it).

The older FMA and newer one have a slightly different tone, but share a similar start because the older series was made before there was enough manga to finish adapting. Because of that the older series' story is kind of a mess, but some people prefer the tone, feeling the newer series isn't as mature in some way. I don't really agree, as I think the older series is only superficially more mature, and both are basically glorified shounen anime (just probably the best shounen anime yet made, and don't really just aim for that demographic alone). It's likely worth watching both if you enjoyed one of them, as they're effectively alternate takes on the same premise.

Hey, we've all got our Game Grumps or whatever to cheer us up. Lord knows the latest few seasons of anime struggle to entertain as much

I'd say "Psycho Pass season 2", but I'm not in the trolling mood (everyone seems to hate 2 compared to 1). So maybe watch the PP movie instead (I'm not sure if it comes after season 2, though). Or if you're still in an introspective mood after PP, try Mushishi?

Well well. I didn't expect Konosuba to have two relatively decent episodes in a row. Or for Kobayashi to feel so lifeless. Kobayashi's Dragon Maid (4). disappointing. So... do I praise them for being able to at least remain thematically relevant with their extreme filler, or blast them for reducing this to a glacial sludge? In the end I don't think I have the energy to do either: this episode just sucked all the life out of me like some moe vampire. By the time the all-Kanna-all-the-time segment ended I couldn't tell where the pandering ended and the manga material began. Even for a slice-of-nothing fan like me that segment was really pushing it, stretching 2 minutes of manga into 15 minutes of borderline tedium. Then they chose a segment that felt clumsily chosen to liven up the proceedings, but didn't impress. Not only was the pacing choppy (rather than snappy), but they also ruined Saikawa's character by having her be so confrontational that I actually wanted to see her learn her lesson. They even skimped on the animation for the dodgeball fight. Lame. The one thing I liked over the manga was that Kanna forced a catchphrase, but I don't think the translation was consistent enough for the joke to come across (not that I hold that against the anime itself). Konosuba S2 (4). mild pulse. Man, I really have to hand it to the folks who can take this crappy writing and actually turn it into something resembling a comedy. It's base, repetitive, predictable as all hell, and frankly just shy of atrocious, but when they aren't also phoning it in, these guys can really pull off a miracle: the return of Darkness was actually pretty amusing (also pretty awful, but I'm willing to look past that after Dragon Maid's fumble). As with the last episode they were just shy of nailing some hilarious material, this time with Kazuma. I can only imagine what they could have pulled off if they weren't haphazardly cobbling together a lot of little ideas into something that almost worked. And so I salute you, unsung heros that can make crap like this viably entertaining in spite of itself. Your dedication to salvaging this trainwreck will not go unremarked (even if it's still a trainwreck).