As soon as I think Wano fatigue has finally set in, they pull me right back from the brink.
The big rumble with Queen is one of the things in Wano that I struggle to get invested in. I understand the function of it, mind you. It's important to remind the audience that Onigashima is not simply just a few skirmishes between big personalities, but a sprawling battle waged by thousands of warriors for the fate of the new era. It just feels like we cut back to Queen laughing and people turning into ice oni one too many times at this point, and it is starting to wear on me.
That said, boy did we get a big mixup this week.
The battle with Kaido on the roof is expectedly great. I think what really sticks out to me is that even in the face of Kaido's wrath, the source of the Akazaya Nine's fear is not Kaido as much as it is seeing Oden in the afterlife with their duty unfulfilled. They are truly his retainers eternal, and it's heart-wrenching to see them give it all they've got and still come up short. Having no music during the fade to the eye-catch – and making Kaido's booming approaching footsteps the last thing viewers hear before the commercial break – was a brilliant touch.
Then of course it's Zoro time baby. Our favorite green-haired swordsman always gets the jaw-dropping visuals, and Wano has been particularly kind to him. What can I even say about the sequence where he takes down Apoo? How many times can I compliment the team at Toei for their incredible work? We're like three years into Wano at this point, and it's basically been an unbroken run of gorgeous episodes. They pulled out all the stops so many times that they had to have new stops installed just to pull them out again. The cracked shade POV shot from Apoo is somewhat reminiscent of the sequence with Trunks and Frieza, and the glass effect is another nice touch that gave it new texture.
Crystal Kay previously sang themes for 2004's Fullmetal Alchemist and Nodame Cantabile― Recently, Anime News Network was able to sit down with singer-songwriter Crystal Kay and talk about not only her involvement with anime over the years but also what it was like to grow up in Japan as the child of a Korean-Japanese mother and an African-American father. Anime fans likely know of Crystal Kay throug...
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The Code Geass creator discusses his new project with Web3 company Azuki, Enter the Garden, and his hope that this new path could help the medium evolve.― Los Angeles-based Web3 anime-styled brand Azuki and advertising conglomerate Dentsu debuted the first nine-minute episode of their joint anime endeavor, Enter the Garden, on April 30. The episode, which has already racked up a quarter of a million...