Whew, that was a break if I ever saw one. It is, however, more likely to just be an excuse for me to faff about doing jack shit.
The last few months have gone with following new series, eating more junk food and playing Wizardry Online for ungodly amounts of time. So, in short, just more basement-dwelling shenanigans.
And for all you out there who're also sinking truly Japanese amounts of time into Wizardry, I have something between a shout-out and a prayer.
All of you in Golden Dragon Ruins, I feel for you, man.
So this season, if I might get back on track, is absolutely crammed with shorts. As in the "series below 5 minutes" sense, that is (though Vividred Operation, while not short, does provide plenty of shorts, bloomers and so on and on and on). This is partially good, as it allows space for quirkier series that don't have the pacing or the plot to shine in a 20-minute format, but it is also bad, dreadful, horrible, terrible and lamentable, as many of the series which have been saddled with the short format could've been so much more if they'd gotten the DMC treatment with just 14 minutes.
Take Yama no Susume, for one.
It's a bit gimmicky, sure, but it can plot, knows its shit and at its core is about a cute relationship between two girls who also happen to be nutbladder-bustingly cute (and the relationship itself makes me become happiness), and many, many, many other shows have run that route before. Hidamari Sketch, for example, managed to take a pretty generic concept and stretch it out over four seasons of 20-minute episodes, and I see no reason that Yama no Susume shouldn't be able to do that.
And take Mangirl, for two.
Aside from its unintentionally horrible name (which kind of makes one look for the Men's Beam), it could make it in a 14-minute format, too. The episodes feel a bit rushed, and since they capitalize largely on character quirks, it would be a very good idea to give the characters a bit more time to establish themselves, so we, the cynical and fault-finding audience (wait, what do you mean it's only me?) can get to know them better and find their character gags a bit more entertaining. As it is, it's a bit of a rollercoaster, swinging from the genuinely funny to the downright embarrassing.
But Ishida to Asakura, for Third Impact, is the one short of the season that's the perfect length. Even though there's only really 90 seconds of actual episode per episode, it's just the right length to leave one reeling after the barely comprehensible barrage of non-sequiturs and intentionally disturbing romance, which is eerily reminiscent of a Takeshi Matsu anthology instructed by Ikuni.
