Thus ends the beginning of the year. Three months ago, when the season started, I was
worried about the year as a whole. I was worried because, for me, 2018 was one of the best
years we’ve had in a long time, so 2019 had a lot to live up to. But now, with a quarter
of the year done and a bunch of awesome shows on the horizon, I’m a little less worried.
It’s still far too early to see how the year as a whole is going to stack up compared
to last year, but this was an amazing start. Winter of 2019 had some amazing anime from
a variety of genres to keep us interested, amused, and frightened for the lives of characters
we've only just met.
and today on Glass Reflection we are going to be giving a brief look into
the best that this past season had to offer. This is for those who may not yet have dived
into the season, or for those who, perhaps quite rightly, decided to wait until the end
and just marathon the best shows in fantastic fashion (rather than deal with the numerous
cliff-hangers that us weekly watchers had to contend with these past few months).
YOU GUYS ARE LUCKY
And so without any further ado, ladies, gentlemen, and others, my name is Arkada and today on
Glass Reflection we are taking a look at the Top 5 anime from winter 2019. Let’s jam.
We are going to start off with a semi-blind mention. What do I mean by that? Well I’m
about to recommend an anime that I didn’t finish watching, however that isn’t necessary
to make this recommendation. Because I don’t need to watch the remainder of Dororo to let
you know that it’s one of the better shows from the season. I already know that it started
off strong and it’s also a remake of the original Dororo which I own.
You can buy this old version, orrrrrrr you can watch the new remake. If
you have access to it, that is.
THIS IS BECAUSE, this season of Dororo has only been available for streaming over on Amazon.
While historically Amazon Prime video and the briefly-lived and more quickly forgotten
Anime Strike service were available for awesome Canadian peoples like myself, this particular
series is not available in my region. So I instead had to watch it during the couple
of times I was briefly in the US over the past few months. I saw enough for me to recommend
it, just not enough to see how it continued.
Dororo is a historical action adventure anime set in Japan’s Sen-go-ku period. It’s
not a story that’s revolutionary or anything – again, it’s a remake of an anime that
came out back in the 60’s – but the modern update to the story’s pacing and my god
the animation make it well worth the recommendation. You might have actually seen this scene comparison
on social media back at the start of the season. It really does show off just how far anime
has come in the last 50 years. With luck, the series will be available on another service
before long so that we non-American folks can watch it, but until then just know that
it will be worth our time…whenever we can actually watch it.
Next up on the list is a continuing series from last season: That Time I was Reincarnated
as a Slime! This is a prime example of ending off a 2 cour series in a way that feels semi-natural
and not disappointing. Slime did this quite well. It’s still very obvious that this
season is not the end of the story by a long shot and we are only on a bit of a break,
but if you want a bit of a breather from your bog standard Isekai series, then Slime has
continually proved to be a breath of fresh air.
It’s got good action and political dealings between a newly developing nation made up
of monsters and the rest of the world. There are demon lords with both mysterious objectives
and outright simple ones. It’s a series that’s not really all that complicated,
while at the same time is detailed enough to showcase a fairly elaborate fantasy world
in which our protagonist Rimiru handles all the various things thrown at him.
I’ll admit that there are some hints at potential plotline complication brought up
in the final episodes that have me worried for when the series eventually starts back
up again, but I will try to remain confident that any issue that may arise will be dealt
with in the same clever style as every one that has come before it. With luck, I’ll
be proven right on that.
Next on my list is Mob Psycho II, demonstrating
exactly how you play off a sequel to such a weirdly fantastic series as the original.
Obviously Mob Psycho I is required watching in order to enjoy this second season, but
come on! If you haven’t watched the original Mob, then you’ve done a disservice to your
life, and should rectify this problem at your earliest convenience.
There are a number of reasons why Mob Psycho is one of the best shows of this season, and
hell, maybe even the best of the past couple of years. It’s not just the production values
that have come out of BONES (which, holy crap, they do not let up with this series), but
also just the writing and characterizations of everyone involved is strangely compelling.
The development that this series has for Reigen, going from the sleazy con artist to….well,
he never really lets go of being a sleazy con artist, it’s kind of his shtick, but
the amount of humanizing that he goes through in the mid part of the season were some of
my favourite episodes.
And then there’s the development of Mob! The story could have been so basic, leaving
Mob as nothing more than a fairly ticking-time-bomb dunce of a boy with so much power and little
actual focus in how to use it. But this second season takes him far beyond that, and so quickly
too. He goes from being this naive student, who can’t really decide for himself how
to do nearly anything despite his near limitless psychic powers, to becoming honestly one of
the most kind and understanding individuals that BONES has ever animated. Plus the show’s
OP is one of the best of the season, which surprises me as it now gets added to a shortlist
of mine for series with amazing season 1 OPs that have even better OPs for season two.
For best ED though? That goes to our next entry.
Kaguya-sama: Love is War is almost the series I most enjoyed this season, but there are
reasons why I wouldn’t say it’s the absolute best. It’s an absurdist comedy about two
very intelligent individuals who are deeply in love but who both absolutely refuse to
make the first move in the relationship. Because of this, the length they go to in order to
force a situation where the other must make the first move is stupidly entertaining. In
the same sort of crazy style as Gintama and FMP: Fumofuu, Kaguya-sama is a series that
is not complicated, and has no narrative twists that grip you, nor any real stakes. Because
hey, when your whole narrative relies on the two main characters attempting and failing
to get the other to indicate the nature of their relationship, the chances of them ACTUALLY
starting a relationship is next to 0 until the series decides that it’s time to end
it all. I really can’t speak much more on this series
without either spoiling what little overarching plot the series has, or just outright repeating
myself from my First Reaction video from last month. But suffice it to say that if you want
a series that is funny, carefree, and a guaranteed good time for 25 minutes an episode, then
few other shows this season can offer what Kaguya-sama can. It is without a doubt the
best comedy of the year so far and is also contender for one of my favourite shows. But
of course, I left the best for last.
The Promised Neverland is far and away the
series I have sitting in my slot for best anime of the year, unless some newer series
comes to claim that title as we continue on through 2019. I know that this statement will
probably send a bunch of the show’s manga readers to promptly tell me how poor of an
adaptation it was, but hell, I don’t care. There are many parts to Neverland’s story
that are…very spoiler heavy. It’s not a series you can describe to someone in much
detail without accidently saying things you shouldn’t. Half the joy and entertainment
I took out of this series was from the narrative twists and turns that the story took, and
I found the presentation of it all to be extremely well done. It’s the perfect example of why
I love watching the anime for a story before reading its manga, because I can almost guarantee
that I would not enjoy this series anywhere near as much if I knew beforehand which twists
were about to be revealed. Are there things missing? Probably. That happens with every
adaptation. But hey, now the manga is something amazing that I can to look forward to later,
preferably with the soundtrack playing in the background while I read.
Best part of the whole show to me though? The series ends on an extremely solid narrative
beat. Now thankfully that’s somewhat unnecessary, considering we already have confirmation of
a second season in the works for 2020. And since there’s still plenty of manga to go,
that’s nothing but good news. There’s plenty hinted at in the story’s first season
that hasn’t yet been explained. Objects found, relationships formed, character outcomes
not yet set in stone. Because “If it didn’t happen on screen, then it didn’t happen,”
is a mantra I’m going to stand by with this series. Plus, the atmosphere that the show
sets is stunning. I’ve made complaints against the use of 3D animation in other anime from
this season, but Neverland is one that utilizes CG animation to great effect. And the soundtrack?
My god, it’s one of the better ones from this year so far. The opening especially is
one of my favourites, sitting right next to both Kaguya-sama and of course Mob Psycho.
The OP did and incredible job at getting me pumped
up each week. This is the only series from this season that I’ve watched multiple times,
mostly to make sure that other people I know have seen it because I knew they would love
it. So I can’t do anything BUT recommend it highly as one of my favourite shows from
this season. And it’s the one, out of all the available options so far, that I desperately
want to see more of.
So that’s the list! Thank you for taking the time to watch this video, I hope if there
is any show I’ve talked about today that you haven’t seen, that you get on that.
They should all be complete by the time this video goes live unless I miscalculated episode
counts so get your marathon comfy clothes on and just sit back and enjoy. This video
was lovingly sponsored by the wonderful folks over at Crunchyroll, who happen to stream
most but not all the entries on today’s list. They also recently made some fan-centric
documentaries. Check them out on their YouTube page using the link in the description.
Now with the winter season out of the way it’s time to dive straight first into spring!
Not...not today though. Soon! Yes Soon!
#PleaseLookForwardToIt
But not today.
Lastly, a very special thank you to my patrons, who not only support my work in general, but
who also allow me to do what I do. I love and appreciate you all. Specifically though,
as I like to do, I want to give particular shout-outs to patrons Joshua Garcia, Calhoonboy,
Siri Yamiko, Ryefan Boneapart, and Rune Jachobson for being especially awesome. You guys are
great! And until next time – ladies, gentlemen, and others – watch more anime...
and stay frosty.