Welcome back to Show Joe, your favorite anime recap podcast where I, Sarah, and my good friend here, Joe, go through Show Joe anime. You know the deal. It's for girly girls and Joe, our manly man, doing his first adventure into the middle school girl genre. Yeah. Try to change it up every time. That's what we're doing. Oh God. Okay. I'm tired. Joe's tired or at least he was. I'm actually not tired. Okay. I'm freaking exhausted. Why are you tired? Oh, I had to imagine this.
I had to go to the office every day of the week. Oh, yeah. That's pretty bad. No, I just, we have some people from, or we have like a guy from the UK and a guy from Australia that worked for us who are in town. So it's like, often that's the opportunity. So I went to the office and there was a lot of like, like yesterday we did a panel for like this UT gaming group. So like stayed late doing that. And I just like have had, and it's been busy. It's been busy, busy, busy.
So I've just been nonstop, get home, pass out. I'm going to have time to do very much at all. Dang. I know. That sounds rough. I know. That's like, it's just a normal work week for people. I mean, that's a lot. My work week is like that necessarily. I just go to sleep late. Yeah. That's also, that's the normal issues. I just go to bed at two. But I mean, one day this week. You went to two? I went to, okay, one day this week. Hold on. Hold on. What do you normally go to sleep and wake up?
Go to bed between one and two and wake up at eight. Dude, that's insane. I know. I, it's, it's a, it's like a struggle to get through the day. I'm over here being like, if I get less than eight hours of sleep, like three days in a row, I'm just like dead that last day. And you're over here getting like six hours average. Yeah. It's self-inflicted. Uh, I just, and then I, oh, I don't know. Sometimes, you know, the, the doom scroll, it's a real thing.
Wow. But I can justify it as being like, ooh, I got it beyond social media. So I know. That's part of my job. I can do it. Oh boy. Oh my God. Yeah. Oh, so I did, I managed to finish Horizon Zero Dawn. So I started for Bid and West, but I just haven't had any time to play it this week. But so far, so good. How about you, Joe? Have you been able to accomplish anything more? I have. Um, yes. I have finished two season twos of anime. Across? That I was watching with my friend.
No, so this is like a different thing that we watch with other friends like week to week. We, I finished, um, High Card season two. Never heard of it. And Faraway Paladin season two. I've never heard of that either. All right. So, uh, I'll start with the one that's more boring. Uh, Faraway Paladin is a, um, story that has a really good like set up, which is there's this kid, you know, it's like an RPG world or whatever there's like power.
It's more of like a, um, D&D world, I guess, because this kid is like raised and he like becomes a Paladin and he's raised by a skeleton and a zombie and they're like his parents. Um, and they teach him how to be like good, like a good adventure boy and like do the right thing and he has this goddess he follows and like all this other stuff and he gets Paladin powers, which means he can like heal people or whatever. Yeah. At first season, it's pretty good.
It's all about like training stuff and like learning to do the right thing and blah, blah, blah. And then, uh, season two is, um, now he has to go on a D&D adventure where he has to clear out a, he has to go fight this dragon that's like taken over the dwarves mountain or something. Uh, and like. It's weird. Well, it's not weird. It's, it's, it's one of these things where like it's 12 episodes, I think of the season.
Yeah. And the first two episodes are good and the last three episodes are good and everything else in between is sucks. It was a waste of time. It's super nothing. It's like, if you've ever played like a D&D or like a tabletop RPG, um, it's like, imagine all of the like world building stuff that's extremely generic that you normally would just gloss over, but in this case they don't gloss over it. They focus on it for like seven episodes or something. Dungeons and Dragon life.
It's incredibly boring. I cannot believe they made that idea. They should have been six episodes. The whole show should have been six episodes. Dwarves and mountains are always under mountains, but they're also digging underground. I feel like that's dangerous. Like the weight of a mountain and then like risking the stability of the ground that it's on. That seems. It's like mining. Crazy. Yeah. It's like a mining thing. Yeah. I mean, it's just like, it's all just the generic fantasy stuff.
It's like, oh yeah, there are these doors. Think that everyone. This mountain. It's exactly what you think it is. Yeah. You already know it. It's like if I just told you. So there's no point going over it. Like me telling you this summary is basically everything.
Nothing of interest happens outside of what I'm saying other than these doors lived in this mountain and then a dragon showed up and they were like, we're gonna, we're gonna, and then they have to like, we're gonna fight and then some of them fight and some of them like leave as refugees and all the ones that fight die the end. It's boring. It's incredibly boring. I can't believe it. Yeah. So that was that one. High card is a show that takes place in like a like a fantasy London, I guess.
In a world called, I think it's called four side or four square or something. Four square. That's the restaurant reviewing app or something that died years ago. Like a kid recess game. So let's see what happens in that.
Yeah. So in that world, there are playing cards that give you magical powers and the people who can use them are called players and you hold the car up and you say play and then it becomes like a like a glove on your hand and then you get whatever power is associated with that card. And like some of them are really goofy. Like the main character, his power is just a gun that shoots straight, which is just a normal gun. He just gets a revolver. It's really stupid.
But like his teammate gets one where like as long as he has enough like sugar in his bloodstream, he can like instantly revive from anything. So he's like Wolverine in that way. And that's pretty cool. Just wait till you watch Karkaptor Sakura. It's it's like that. And then intention purpose. I mean, this has purpose. Like it's it's like goofy. They like work for it's kind of like.
If you've ever seen Kingsman where it's like, oh, yes, we work for the crown and we're trying to recover all the cards because they got stolen and we have a handful. We try to get them back. And it's that kind of thing. That's what season one is basically about. Season two is like batshit insane. The number of like ridiculous things that happen that just like don't make sense.
You're like getting reveals that people are like, oh, this person was secretly my brother or like the prince is conspiring against the other prince. It's like totally batshit. Like things are just going off all the time. It's crazy. Is it like good? It's not that good, but it is wild. So it's just like a crazy time. Different ish. Yeah. It's like, yeah, it's pretty not that good.
Like when I sit there and think about it, but when you're watching it, you're like, damn, that shirt is crazy that this random thing is happening. When you're watching these in your little pal group, is it like everyone takes turns making suggestions or you just agree as a group? Yeah. We like watch like a trailer or something. We're like, yeah, we can try this. Like we tried some other ones. Yeah. We're just going to say outright rejected.
We watched like the first couple episodes of this one anime about like F1 racing, but it was like F5 or something for like amateurs. I mean, we got like three episodes into that and that sucked. Incredibly boring. Cool. Yeah. That's much more exciting. But yeah, let's see. There's also some other stuff that I did, but maybe I'll talk about later. I was reading some manga. I guess. Oh, yeah. Talk about.
Okay. Because you were, I was going to say, we can get, this will be our transition into Angelic Layer. You were talking about getting the manga Angelic Layer. And then like a few days later, I saw on Facebook Marketplace that someone was selling a random collection of manga and they had one of the Angelic Layer. Omnibus. And so I was like, Hey, is this still available? And they're like, No. I was like, Oh, I would have been like $500.
Yeah. So I bought the, I bought the Angelic Layer Omnibus on eBay. So how did you? First off, I realized my eBay account just randomly got suspended. I don't know why they're just like, your account is suspended because you violated our terms. And I'm like, what are you just saying? And I'm like, whatever, I'll just make a new account and cares. And then, yeah, so I bought that, but it won't get here until the end of or like the beginning of May. So, I don't have it.
I've only bought one thing off eBay and that was, well, actually just kidding. I've never bought anything off eBay. I've only bid for one thing. And that was Pikmin two when I was like 13 trying to get for my game cube. Oh man, of which we try to play Pikmin and that was a disappointment last week, the one day. We didn't even try to play it. We just like, we're like, we're like, we're gonna get on. We're like, Oh, we'll play it together because it has, it has co-op and get there.
And it's like, Oh, it's only local co-op because, you know, a re-released game in 2024 can't have online play because Nintendo can't figure out how the internet works. So frustrating. Oops. We'll just have to cram it in when I can visit. Just bid. Just the fact that your company can't have online play for stuff when like indie games have online play is pretty embarrassing. I mean, I don't know. Maybe you should just like pick up a book and learn how the internet works. Maybe.
Yeah. And then Splatoon, which is like their online multiplayer game, like doesn't have basic features. Have I complained about this before? No, no. Okay. Splatoon three. I have Splatoon three because I played the first one and I was like, Oh, it's pretty fun. And then I bought the third one because I was like, I'll try this and it was kind of disappointing. They're always disappointing, but they don't have basic features.
So like there are things in video games that I don't even think of as features. Like if I'm in a lobby, you can back out. You know how you can press B to back out the lobby when you're like, Oh, I don't want to queue up anymore. You literally can't do that in Splatoon. You have to quit the game to exit a queue. Insane behavior. Like this is basic stuff. Yeah. Well, that's what I was saying with Dragon's Dog. And they haven't even implemented it. Yeah. Dragon's Dog was not made by Nintendo.
No, I'm just saying that's another Japanese developer where like they decide to watch a game without like the most, you know, like, like quit to menu. Yeah. Well, like you can't restart the game just straight up. That was so dumb. I'm like, how could you release a game in 2024 without like a undoubtedly. Like a new game button. Yeah. What is happening? You know, like sometimes things are designed like made by design. Like these are design choices. I don't think those are design choices.
I think you just forgot to put a back out of queue button. And never. Because any human being on the earth would recognize that this is a thing you probably need. I don't know. I'm actually played multiplayer. Well soon it's okay. They must have. I don't know. I played a little bit of Splatoon too, but I kind of get into it. Yeah. It's like, it's very much like a gimmick and it's like, it's pretty fun. But then I get tired of it because it's like, okay, all these matches feel exactly the same.
Yeah. Oh boy. But that's me with most online multiplayer games. I get really tired of them really quickly. Yeah. I'm like, yeah, I understand what's happening here. I'm done. Well, I mean, I was going to say my angelic layer transition went out right out the window. But you know what game I wouldn't get tired of if it was real online angelic layer. Yeah. In person. In person. Oh God. That was so cool. It would be good. I mean, I don't know. Like, I can't think of maybe it's good.
Like, well, I don't play fighting games because I'm like, I could go to fighting game tournaments. That's kind of like you do that in person. I feel like it's got to be just like the most like bro-y, like taunting people or something. I mean, God forbid, it's high. It shows up and they just be like, stupid kid, get out of here. Okay. I don't think I just. Our children's game tournament. I do think it's going to be very bro-y. I assume the worst all the time.
Yeah. I think that's a bad way to live. I think you should not assume the worst thing is going to happen every time. Sometimes good things happen. Yeah. I don't want to talk about these episodes. Okay. Let's do it. These episodes are bad. Well, not bad. They're just like, they're just like supremely uninterested into me. Yeah. So like, yeah. So what, what, what, what kind of tournament would you go to in person? What kind of events do you want to go into in person? Me?
Yeah. I mean, you need to keep me from talking about these episodes. No, stop. It's fine. You know, we just got to get, the next ones are going to be a slog for me, but we'll get into that later. Why? I didn't even look at the next ones. God. Well, we're onto the after this. I got it on my Tlex server. Onto the. Basically the next two episodes are just going to be like romance stuff. Which means it's going to be slow and there's going to be no fighting. I mean, at least.
The whole purpose of our. Happening show the girlie romance part. But I'm like, oh yeah, the next two episodes are called summertime at the sea. Someone's in love with someone. And then the next one is suddenly just the two of us secret double days. Yikes. Mm hmm. Yeah. Oh, you know how it's like, I was like, I wonder what they're going to do for the last like eight episodes. Yeah. There's not that many fights left. I guess we're doing this. Yeah. I know after episodes 19 20 here.
I'm on to the final disc of my box set. So we are in the last stretch now. The home stretch. OK, now that we've talked about after these episodes, we should talk about these episodes. Fine. I'll do it. Fine episode 19 of Angelic Layers called System Down Decisive Fight on a Ship in a Storm. What? Not System of a Down. It's not System of a Down. I wish they just played System of a Down over this whole episode. That'd be great. Oh, that should be our AMV for this.
It's just this one like everything's going to shit in this episode. OK, we open on some random woman struggling to put a sock on her angel. Some guy offers to help and then puts the sock on for her. Then he says that he helped her out like he would help out his little sister when she would have problems addressing her doll to, I guess. And then the OP plays. We cut back to this woman and guy. The guy says he comes to the tournament or he came to the tournament to see his little sister compete.
But she left to look for Misaki Suzahara. And then they talk about Misaki and how she's like kind of a big star of this tournament because she's like the big surprise workie. And then the woman gets up to leave and the guy comments that she's really tall and basically the opposite of Misaki in every way, which makes her like very self-conscious because it's not like she chose to be tall or anything. Misaki and Hanoko enter and the guy and his sister go and talk to them.
The woman from earlier gets annoyed and yells at Misaki saying that when you're small, everyone's nice to you. Everyone thinks this is like a weird and out of nowhere thing to say. Hanoko accuses her of using psychological tactics because she's going to be Misaki's opponent. Misaki is mostly just confused by this whole interaction. We cut to Ichon and Shuko grabbing a drink outside.
Ichon says the development of the full-size prosthetics is going pretty well and Shuko says that there's still some testing to do. Then Ichon looks over at a family and starts to float the idea that after all is said and done, maybe he and Shuko or Shuko could be like a couple or something, but he totally chickens out halfway through. Then a thunderstorm starts. Back at the tournament, Shuko and Ojiro are watching Misaki's match or are about to watch the match.
Ojiro says he's hanging out with Shuko because he wants to get away from his fans, but then she's like, no, you're doing it because Ichon told you to watch her and he's like, yeah, right, that's why I'm doing it. Misaki and her opponent gets ready. Sai and Kaede, Mickey, their only appearance in this episode, comments that her opponent is here again and her name is Chita-sei Tanaka. So thank you, Sai and Kaede, for giving us the name of the character.
In the stands, Kataro comments that everyone here is at the level of Sai and Kaede, so all these are going to be tough fights, which is not true at all in this one. Tamayo agrees but says not to worry about it. Then she teases him for only thinking about Misaki, but then she ends up like making herself kind of sad. It's a weird scene. Because she's like, oh, Kataro likes Misaki, dang, I like him. Remember? I just remembered that. That's my plot line. Ah, shoot.
Okay. The arena map is revealed to be a battle on a ship in the middle of the ocean, which is cool. In the control room, the crew says that the Thunder hasn't caused any interference yet, but they're going to keep an eye on it. The announcer says that this match will only consider the ship to be pardoned in play, so if you like fall into the ocean that counts as like layering out. The angels enter, Hikaru's opponent is named Elaine, and he's super tall.
Hikaru's plan is to use the mast of the ship to hit Elaine from above, so like she'll jump on the mast, and then like jump down and hit her. But Elaine uses a move called reversal hexagon, which like traps Hikaru in like this green barrier, and then Elaine punches the barrier and Hikaru falls and like takes a bunch of damage. And then that's the end of the first round. It's extremely bizarre. It's like she just does magic.
In the control room, Ichon explains to Ogata that Elaine made a space resonate with the field sensor's reversed signals, which causes the trapped foe to get attacked by the shock way's diffused reflection. That's an exact quote I wrote down. So this is what we're dealing with in this episode. Right over my head. It really is just like some science nonsense. During the break, Misaki tells Hadoko that she has no idea how she's supposed to counter this, but Hadoko says that she has an idea.
The second round starts, and Hikaru and Elaine exchange blows. The lightning from the storm causes the arena to flicker in and out, and a virtual storm starts in the arena, rocking the ship. Hikaru almost falls off, but catches herself at the last moment. In the control room, the team assesses the damage. It turns out the Matrix Maintenance Module is affected and could shut off, but it's running for now.
Ichon refuses to stop the game because that would ruin the fun, and the deuses in the audience should never see any technical glitches. Which like, they definitely already have Ichon. The fight continues, but both angels are having a hard time keeping their footing. The announcer tries to play this off as an intended part of the match, with the weather hazard. But Shuko, Kataro, and Hadoko are not buying that at all.
The crew tries to fix the layer in between round 2 and 3, and they seem to succeed at doing that. Round 2-3 starts, Chida say, Misaki's opponent tells Misaki that once you've grown taller, you can't go back to being small. And being tall kinda sucks for a girl, because boys think you should be small and cute. And she's made fun of sometimes for being so tall, and that kinda sucks. Back in the control room, Fujimori and Ogata accidentally bump into each other while working on the control panels.
Ogata uses this opportunity to flirt slash sexually harass Fujimori who's not having it. They're interrupted when the machine starts to break down again. It seems that when Elaine uses her weird space attack, it like messes with the layer. Misaki reflects on her ideas of height. She decides that when she said that height and age don't matter, she actually meant that as in it actually doesn't matter if you're tall or short. So they should just play the game like normal.
Eileen is about to use her space trap again, but it causes the layer to disappear beneath her feet and she starts to fall into the void, but then Hikaru grabs her when she's swinging on a rope and they both retreat up to the mast of the ship. Chie-Sé is confused as to why Misaki would save her and Misaki says that she wants to win fair and square. The ship is about to just completely disappear, but Ogata is able to fix the problem before it disappears completely.
The crew is able to restore the layer and the match can continue like normal. Hikaru and Eileen continue to fight until Hikaru is eventually able to kick her off the ship and win the match. Shuko comments that Misaki did a good job and Ojiro is like, yeah, and Ichon also did a good job fixing the problem in the layer. After the match, Chie-Sé and Misaki shake hands and Misaki runs off.
The guy from the beginning of the episode comes up to Chie-Sé and say he's sorry that she lost, but she looked terrific out there, which seems to make her happy and then we cut to credits. Oh my God, that episode. It's like, who the hell are these people? I mean, it continues from, you know, first what we first see and then the opening and then it goes back to these people. We have no idea who they are. I was like, who's the sister? Is the sister someone we know? Oh, God. Yeah, it's not.
She's just some rando. No, it's just like all these people are just random. This is essentially back to like our beginning episodes where each opponent is loving like they're hanging up and then Misaki helps them through it, blah, blah, blah. And hers is just that, which is true. You know that it's typically, or at least here in Western culture, it's like, you know, naturally dudes are supposed to be bigger than girls.
So if a girl's tall, then like it feels like guys aren't going to be interested. And I guess that's something to be upset about. But like, don't this is the angelic layer. It's not a dating show. Calm down. Like, did you ever watch the Netflix movie Tall Girl? Oh, this is like a K-drama or something, right? I feel like this is no. This was a movie.
Okay. Because I remember watching this with my roommate when it came out like a long time ago and I like couldn't take the premise seriously because like, I mean, yes, like does like being tall, like being a tall girl does, you know, I guess. If you're like the kind of dating options, yeah, if you're like dating someone taller. Yeah. If you're like consistent on it, but like that's not an actual, I mean, this isn't a thing you like really get discriminated against. You know what I mean?
Like it's not like an actual. Yeah. I feel, I feel, I don't, I mean, I'm a chick, but I feel, I don't know. Or is it? I mean, maybe it is about it, but it feels like I don't want to date string being because I don't want to feel like a whale next to them, you know, it's like things like that. You want to feel like the dainty lady. So if you have someone where you take on the role of being the more, I don't know.
Yeah. And this is just like one of these things where it's like, yeah, I guess this is a problem, but like only in the realm of dating and like it doesn't really affect your life outside of that at all. Whereas like everything else in this show has been people having specific problems about their life that are more like internal in like how they should interact with the world. And then just having this chick at episode 19 show would be like, I'm tall, so boys don't like me.
It seems like way weaker than anything else we've seen from everybody else. You know what I mean? Like size sister died. Like Jesus. Yeah. That's way bigger than this. And like the way that it's resolved, I also think sucks because it's basically just like, oh, yeah, doesn't it suck to be tall boys don't think you're high. But it's like, but at the end it's like, oh, don't worry, you know, but the resolution isn't like, oh, this is like a hang up about like the way other people perceive you.
You shouldn't think about yourself in terms of like how attractive or appealing you are to other people. You should like think about yourself in the way you like think of who you are as a person and the kind of person you want to be. But instead it just ends with being like, actually there is a guy who likes tall girls, so you're fine. No, she just hangs tight. Short Kings is going to be a whole thing.
And like I feel like we really resolve anything here about like your internality when it's just like, oh, boys don't like me. Just kidding. They do. And he's like, cool. Good. Yeah. I mean, God, yeah. Okay. I mean, it's certainly more understandable on her and the misaki being like, man, it's sucks to be so small. I mean, I definitely can relate to the tall chick more than that. Like for me, I'm too short to get the mug out of the cabinet or something.
Yeah. But like misaki feeling self-conscious about being small is because she wants to be athletic. Like this isn't about her like wanting to be attractive. I mean, this is about her like wanting to do things with a body she can't do those things with. You know what I mean? It feels much more serious and like important than this chicks hang up about like, yeah, I'm tall, but like guys don't like that. It's not even like I'm tall. And so it's like, I can't buy it's hard for to buy clothes.
It's like a lot of things are really annoying. I have to like duck down when I go under, you know, when I get on an airplane or something. Like, I mean, you know, but there are like actual things in your life where like being too tall is a pain. But these are just like the only issue with being tall is that guys don't like me, which is just like, yeah, dude, this is because you were in high school and guys suck. Like, I don't know if this is really a hang up you should have. Oh, goodness.
Okay. Well, I guess they could move on from that. I have notes. Yeah. Okay. So we just walked through the episode. Yeah. Do you think he's hot? Do you think he's short in his tie? His outfit is so unremarkable. I was like, who are these people? Like so unimportant. He's like a poor man's guitar. Yeah. Oh, God. I accidentally started watching it in English. His voice actor sounds like a child. So that made it even worse. It was so bad. Yeah. Okay. So they, what is it? Oh, yes.
When they're watching Misaki about to go on and Ojiro is asking Shuko like, oh, are you cheering her on as her mom and she's like, no, as her rival. I did say, yeah. Of course. You'd rather be the rival than the mother. It's so weird. Anything to not be that. Yeah. Like why did you see yourself? It's so weird. Because like, don't understand. They haven't even thought each other. How could she be your rival? She doesn't even know you. She doesn't even know you're her mom.
Yeah. It's such a bizarre thing to say. It's peculiar. And then her and Ichon at the table, I'm like, maybe they are dating if he's thinking about asking them to move, live together. What is happening? It doesn't, it doesn't sound like, okay. So we haven't really got anything so far to like think that they're dating, right? Like we never see them. Well, it's obvious that he's into her, but she's like too all consumed by angelic layer.
But he's like about to float the idea that they should live together, which feels like a step beyond asking someone out. Like what I said in the summaries is like, oh, maybe we should be a couple because that's how I interpreted it. But what he literally says is like, hey, after all of this living together, hmm. And then he like backs up and he's like, are you going to live with Misaki? And she's like, oh yeah, for sure. And he's like, oh, cool. Yeah. I hate this. This sucks.
Like, like I get the, I get the like being nervous, asking people out thing as like the kids plot line. Yeah. And I'm like, each one in Shoko are like in their thirties, like their mid thirties. Come on. Yeah. I, I, yeah, I do not know. I'm not exactly sure what the hell. I know no Shoko this time. No Shoko. Do you like how each one had a green drink? He has like a lime drink. It's like acid. Look, it's so vibrant. Like what is that? I'm like, yeah, my man. Oh my gosh. Let's see.
And we get to lane the opponent's angel. And I'm like, here we go with more of the boxing stuff because she's wearing like a robe like boxers do before they get on the ring and take it off. She is. Man. She's wearing like a, her angel is cool looking. Elaine's a cool looking angel. I don't get why she just made her angel tall if she thinks being tall is a bad thing.
I mean, I think maybe it's just that she's mad that she doesn't necessarily not like being tall is just how the world perceives women is who are tall is undesirable. I mean, it could be like maybe this will like boost my confidence if I make an angel that's tall and she's successful and people admire her or something like that. I guess that's just kind of weird because like most of the time you make angels that are like things that are aspirational to you. It just depends.
She just makes herself. Yeah. Some people do that. Some people make what they like. Some people make insane looking care. We haven't seen any like, you know, how anytime there's like a character creator and some people just try to make the craziest, ugliest avatars, but we haven't seen that angelic layer. But there's just all sorts of different approaches to do. The parents. The love angst in this episode sucks. I think it's just not that good.
Like you have the each on stuff you have Cheetah say stuff. Tommyo gets in on it a little bit. I was like, yeah. Oh, Katara, you're really you're really focusing on Misaki. Huh? It's all you think about. And he's like, no. And then she's like, dang. I'm sad with that joke. And maybe it is all he doesn't think about me. I'm like, Tommyo, knock it off. Yeah. Oh, God. They kind of get. Okay. Freaking before they even throw their angels in. What's her name? Cheese? It's Cheeto say Cheeto say.
She like can just spot the dude she talked to for five seconds in a crowd. How the hell can you tell the difference of someone you just met and a dude who's in totally unremarkable clothing like the plainest looking dude ever. She just spots him right away. It's funny. And then she throws. Let's see. She throws her angel in and the angel starts moving before it even hips the layer. Like, you know, because normally they get animated. But yeah, like, you know, you're there.
They're not they're supposed to be immobile until you get them in the layer and then they move. But she likes straight. It starts moving her arm before it's a thing. That's, you know, that's not supposed to happen. I mean, it's so minor. But I was just like, oh my gosh, you can't do that. I can't move before you hit the layer. Oh, man. We do learn some fun stuff like Shoo Geonada, who's. Yuko's husband is in charge of making all the environments. So good for him. He gets like a thing to do.
The environment's cool this time. I don't really get what's going on with the subplot of like, oh, everything's falling apart because there's a thunderstorm. Which is like, OK. Yeah, each one's like real intense. Like, guys, everyone knows this is like tech based entertainment and things just happen sometimes. It's OK. Like, it's not the end of the world. It's not like the power is going on.
Someone's on life support or something, you know, it's like just just take a break from the match and resume once it gets fixed. They make it. It's like life or death for each one. Yeah, it's it's very weird because oh God is like, well, maybe we should delay the match because of the thunderstorm. And each one's like, no, we absolutely must not do that. The daisies in the audience must never know. And I'm like, bro, the whole field disappoint like disappeared for a couple seconds. And they know.
Yeah, for real. It's like super bizarre. Oh, I like don't understand. This feels like a filler episode because it feels like something that is completely inconsequential. Like, I don't really know what my takeaway is supposed to be from like the whole dev team works together to solve a tech problem. And it's like, that's cool. We've gone pining for Chuko and Samoyo still pining for Kotaro and Kotaro still pining for Masaki.
See, at least next episodes will actually get the stuff and everyone just thinks about it and then doesn't do anything that annoys me. Oh, dear. Yeah. And we get that. Oh, and we also get that weird moment with Fujimori. You know, God, what the hell is that? Yeah, I was going to say, I've got a shot of that. Oh, the barrier. The freak. I have all caps. What the hell is this? More of the like Athena stuff where Athena can make up powers and do them and so can she traps her in a crystal.
Yeah, it's weird. But then I was like, yeah, I was like, this is a shonen. So of course they got like throwing an ass shot and then Oh, God is he. It's an ass. OK, first off, hold on. What? This is not a shonen thing. OK, you keep saying like, oh, it's a shonen. They do. It's normally they're just like focused on that. So it's the other option of female. This is not a sex. No, but this is not a sexualized male gaze shot. It's mostly Oh, God is but what you're showing me. I know.
But OK, but then he's like, I'll just take this as a chance to kind of like, oh, he's weird. He makes me think of like the stereotypical like as a etchy anime dudes where they're just kind of bumbling and happen to fall into all these like sexual moments. He kind of reminds me of that. Like like show bits or something, which I guess is this guy is and will be a thing. Oh, yeah, but like it doesn't like this is not a sexual moment.
Like you are under a table and you like bump somebody is not sexual at all. You should make the lady in a micro skirt crawling around on the ground. Her knees must hurt. Yeah, this whole thing is dumb because he's like because they bump into each other and then he's like and she's like, dude, watch where you're going. And he is like, oh, sorry, but your butt is so soft or something really weird. And she's like, dude, what? Yeah, she's like.
And like she plays it off as like kind of like she kind of forced with it a little like it doesn't seem like she's totally. I think it's just because like everyone else has somebody so they like need this like implied. Maybe they will maybe it's don't. Yeah, the character itself. I mean, naturally, I would think she just hates it and doesn't want this, but the show is forcing her to possibly consider it. Yeah, like in real life, if you did this, this would be like, yeah, get.
On here to do, yeah, but in this she's like, oh, you're so gross. You're like. Yeah, you're such a bird. Yeah, geez. This is definitely leading to like, I'm sure the last show next to each other and like that's the indication. Jesus, I got a pair off everybody at the end. I don't know. It is. Oh, God, back back to the fight.
We do get to because I know in our earlier episode, I was like, it'd be nice to see kind of the difference of what the biggest and smallest angels next to each other looks like. And I think we kind of get that. I don't know that. I mean, because technically, right, according to your stats, you saw in like episode one or two that she's not the shortest an angel could be, he car, but she's pretty short. And I don't know how much you could be than Elaine is, but it's a pretty big difference.
Yeah. Yeah, she's tall. The thing that sucks about this fight is that like none of the things even come up. Like the fact that she's tall, he car doesn't do anything. She just kind of wins. Well, I mean, kind of even the barriers like she never counters. Reach. She's got reach. Like she, you know, you can't anything. She just grab. Okay. Yeah, I know. But like that doesn't matter. He car just basically ignores it. You know what I mean? Like these things don't matter in the fight that we watch.
Yeah. Like she does the barrier technique and then she doesn't do it a second time and it never comes up again. No, that's because she was doing it and that was somehow taxing the system even further and making the environment faster. Although I still don't understand how that works. This doesn't feel like this just feels like a generic now he car needs to win. Like she doesn't do anything to win. Yes. But I feel a lot of time, you know, like she does one attack and that's it.
This really is like the beginning of the show episode just at the end. I mean, all the other fights, there is something that indicates that like the battle turns in her favor. Yeah. Like, you know, she's able to get one over on Blanche and she's able to like trick. Uh, sure. He made jumping into the ocean. This is just like she uses a barrier. She doesn't use it again. The car just kind of straightforwardly kicks her off the boat and she falls and that's it. It's like, okay, cool.
Yeah, it's wild. Doesn't. And then she doesn't like take advantage of her opponent's height. Nothing. Nothing. She just wins straightforwardly. And it's like, yep, that's the end of the episode. Yeah. Guy comes up and is like, damn, you lost girl, but you were pretty good. Did he get down there? I'm like, surely there's got to be crowd control and security keeping crazed fans from getting down towards the dais and angels. Like some like, ah, how do you get over there? That shouldn't be allowed.
It's just bad. It's it's down. And I'm like, oh, she's resolved because some guy likes her now and that was her problem. Yeah, true. Like everybody else's problem is like something internal about the way they think about themselves. But this one is like, oh, I got validated by a boy. Well, I guess everything's good now. Yeah. I mean, I guess this is filler, but at least it's like filler within the plot.
Like it makes sense that she would have other opponents rather than the ones that we just know she's going to face eventually. So at least it's bad. Yeah. It's not like a totally random. I'm not saying it's filler as in like it's there to buy time for the stuff. Yeah. Because they have like eclipsed the filler. Actually, if you're unaware of this is when a you know, a lot of things are adaptations of like books or manga or like comics or something, right? Still in publication.
The show can often outpace those because, you know, a lot of people work on animation. So there's like a lot more hands on it. So you can make stuff faster than like the other stuff that's usually authored by one person.
And so to fill up time in between like the next release of the full story arc so that you can adapt into an anime, they will just make up some episodes that are like usually very inconsequential and like focus on characters that are just there for like one episode or like that one little made up filler arc. Yeah. And none of those like effects can like linger on the rest of the story because in the canon story, that stuff didn't happen. Right. And that's what filler is.
It's a thing that used to happen a lot. I got it. It's shown in a particular TV. Yeah. But it's like when things were on TV that happened a lot because they have to have an episode out every week, it doesn't happen that much in the streaming area basically at all. That's true. That's what we're talking about here. So I don't think that's this. Like I don't think this was an episode to like create another episode while they waited for the last like volume to come out of the manga or something.
This just feels like some stuff to like add in because we need to make sure that she fights around one match and we don't know what to do. So like, let's just shoehorn this like very flimsy plot in. That's what it feels like. Yeah. Can't just. I don't think this actually is filler. I think it's just like you're just filling time with some stuff. It feels of the same.
Yeah. It feels like inconsequential and like out of step with everything else and like halts all the momentum of everything before it. Yup. Bad. Yeah. That's episode 19. Some filler is good. Sometimes there's filler that's good. I mean, I accidentally watched the bounce season of bleach back when I was still a noob and didn't realize. Oh, really? You just introduced vampires for no reason. That's such a funny filler idea. I just got. Yeah. I know.
It's like you got when watching older sonam from the 2000s, you got find a guide like, OK, these are the episodes you skip because they don't matter. Yeah. But like sometimes that's the only place where you get some characterization for like some minor characters. I know. But that's pretty fun. That can be good. I don't know. I'm like, it doesn't matter. It will never be acknowledged again. Or it'll be weird. Yeah. Bleach kind of does sort of at times reference its filler.
Like it fits because each filler arc for bleach has some kind of like boss enemy. And if he's like reflecting on past challenges, those folks are included in those flashbacks. Yeah. I mean, you can integrate it in. Thank God that doesn't happen anymore. Yeah. They should just make more side content, to be honest. Just make like a side story with some other characters or make movies. That's what they would do as well. They just make movies. I hate it when they make movies. The movie.
I hate the movies. I hate this trend where it's just like we're going to instead of releasing a movie. It's a movie. Oh my God. Why this contributes nothing. Yeah, I mean, a chance to go see anime and theaters and have it feel like it's not just a waste of time because it is part of the plot. I mean, I've only seen the Moog and train arc from Demon Slayer and theaters. Yeah. Yeah. Just sob my eyes. That's why everybody does this because they made up a jillion dollars doing that.
Yeah. But it like just it feels like it was just like you just watched the TV show on a movie theater and I'm like, why did I do this? Yeah. Not satisfying. No. All right. What would you talk about episode 20 now? Yeah, you're super excited about it. I can tell. God. Episode 20 acts as some better stuff. It has some good stuff. Episode 19, the dark, the darkest day of Angelic Layers. It's just a just a real slamming the brakes on this and stuff that was going. All right.
Angelic Layers episode 20 is called is each on the enemy the puzzling second game. We open on the tournament where they are announcing the second round matches. Katara asks how to go where Misaki is, but she is distracted by something and doesn't really answer. They announce on the TV screen that the second round Misaki will play against Shuji and nada from the development department, which is like Yuko's husband, the guy who makes the environments, who's the guy who works for each on.
Yeah. We cut to shuko and each on out in a park. He says that the second round is going to start soon and he really didn't think the dev team was going to play against Misaki because I guess they like match them all up randomly. Then he asks Shuko that if it was him versus Misaki, who'd she cheer for? But before she can answer, they're interrupted by Ogata who's looking for each on back at the tournament. Tomayo is baffled that one of the makers would be allowed to participate in the tournament.
Katara tells her that a guest player from overseas has played in the special slot each year. So that kind of thing can happen. I guess Misaki is a little worried. But Katara reassures her that with Hotoko by her side, she'll be fine. Hotoko, who is like clearly like sick or something, like takes a long time to agree and says the exact thing that Katara says. And he's like, yeah, I just said that. It's pretty funny.
Back at HQ, Shuji and nada reveals that him playing the round is just like a way for them to do a tech demo for the newest model of Angel that they're going to release. Yuko says that even though he's a total amateur, the tech advantage of the new model should give him like a good shot at winning. Shuji comments that he wishes Ogata was doing this instead and we get a cut of Ogata who I guess each on like stripped to his boxers and then left him out in the sun as children laugh at him.
The match is about to start, but Hotoko is spacing out. Misaki asks her what's wrong and Hotoko just like straight up passes out in front of her. The match gets delayed as a doctor checks on Hotoko. And it turns out she's running a fever. Katara joins up with them and tries to take her home, but she's insistent that she stays for Misaki's fight. The gang talks her talks her down as Katara like picks her up and starts to like take her to the hospital. They get checked out during that.
Tomio offers to be Misaki's second, but then Ojiro shows up and says that he can be her second instead. Seeing this Tomio and Katara dramatically exchange glances. Ojiro comes out as Misaki second, which surprises Ichon who spits his pop form out everywhere. Tomio thinks to herself that she's glad Katara isn't here to see his love rival coach his love interest. Misaki thanks Ojiro for being her second and says and he says that they'll do their best.
The announcer announces a last minute change to it, not his team as well, where Shuji is still the dais, but his second is now the founder of Angelic Layer Ichon. Misaki is astounded to learn that Ichon is the founder of Angelic Layer because this is the first time she's ever hearing that. Ichon taunts his little brother and Ojiro says he's being childish.
Misaki is still reeling over the fact that Ichon was the creator the whole time, but she starts the match anyway by throwing a car on the layer. Shuji also throws his angel, which is conveniently named S.I.174 into the layer as well. The layer this time is some kind of like ruins of ancient Greece with like columns and everything. It's pretty good. S.I.174 strikes something that could be called the battle pose, but Hikaru remains totally motionless.
Ojiro tells Misaki that the match started, but she's still too distracted by like Hattako being sick and Ichon being the founder of Angelic Layer, but she's able to snap out of it and tries to land some blows on S.I.174, but can't really seem to get them to collect or connect. In the control room, Yuko and Fujii Morikomite that the new model has really fast response time, which is why Shuji can dodge all of Hikaru's attacks.
While they're talking about this, a shirtless and sunburned Ogata enters and asks what's been going on. Ichon tells Shuji to attack Hikaru, which he does. Hikaru takes a big hit and Ichon is a little worried that the new angel is like too perfect and powerful in this fight. Ojiro notes that ordinary angels are really precise at moving forward and backwards, but not that great at like side to side movements, but it looks like the new model is good in all directions.
S.I.174 starts beating up Hikaru by moving like way more fluidly than she can. Ojiro and Shuko don't seem very happy about this fight, and Yuko just hopes it'll be over soon. We cut to the hospital where Kotaru is waiting for Haruko's results. Turns out she just has a cold and she's gonna be fine. Haruko tells him to go back to the tournament and that she'll call their mom for a ride, but he seems kind of hesitant to do so. Round 1 ends and Misaki doesn't think she stands a chance.
Ojiro gives her some encouragement and says that her love for her angel will be her strength. Round 2 starts and Ojiro tells Misaki to focus on S.I.174's feet. Wait, did I say it wrong? Numbers, man. God, yeah. There's a part where Ichon's like you really couldn't have named it something better, and I agree. The angel's name is S.I.174. Shugi isn't very good at making quick adjustments and Hikaru starts to push her back. Ichon comments that this must be Ojiro's doing.
Kotaru rejoins Tamiyo in the stands and she feels a minimum of what's been happening. Ojiro tells Misaki that they should end this soon and Hikaru rushes up to S.I.174 and gets under her legs and lifts her up in a piggyback so she's on her shoulders. Then she jumps up several columns and at the very top of a column she does a suplex from really high up. Shugi basically does nothing to soften this blow or avoid this attack and just takes all the damage and it knocks out all of S.I.174's health.
Misaki is pleased with her win, but Kotaru is still very stoic that Ojiro helps her wins. Shugi laments that he was too focused on thinking about S.I.174's abilities and he couldn't focus on the actual match. Ichon says it's okay. It'll only affect his evaluation for his summer bonus a bit, meaning his wife will probably make more money than him, which is a very funny thing to say. Yeah, let's start.
Ojiro tells Misaki that the game was a good experience and that he thinks Ichon wanted to show her a bunch of different techniques that she can use later on. I don't think that's true. In the hallway Misaki meets up with Ichon. He congratulates her on winning and she thanks him for the match. We got to outside where Ichon meets up with Ojiro. Ichon asks him why he became her second and Ojiro tells him it's because he wanted Misaki to win.
Ichon insists that he was only her opponent because it's his job and normally he would want her to win too. Ojiro is like, oh, you say you're on her side, but don't you mean he's really on her mom's side? I don't know. Ojiro teases him for a shuko, basically. We cut to the Kobayashi Dojo, which is Ichon and Hadoko's parents' Dojo slash house, where Misaki tells Hadoko that she won.
Tamiyo suggests that they should all go to the sea next week to celebrate and everyone gets excited as we cut to credits. You mean, Hotoko and Kotara's house. Oh, what did I say? Ichon's house. Okay, yeah. Now he doesn't live there. No, that'd be bad. Bad hair. Yeah, their house. All right. That's this episode. So we like it more than the last episode. Listen, the MVP of this episode is Shuji Inada. Yes. Just like the most normal guy. Yeah, I really like him.
Like clearly doesn't want to be here and doesn't really do a very good job. But if we can do this. Yeah. I mean, yeah, if you work with your wife and your wife's tight with your boss, then I can see the power dynamic being a little bizarre. It's the most like this is the guy who designs environments and they're like, oh, we got to do a demo. Hey, you do it. Yeah, yeah. I don't know how to do it. I'm a tenoyo. It shouldn't be an employee shouldn't be allowed to compete.
But I guess technically that means Shuuko shouldn't either. Unless she's just a contract worker. But I yeah. And a new model. That doesn't seem fair either. Yeah, I mean, this feels like this should be like an exhibition map. Yeah, not like the pen or, you know, not like determining if he car continues or not. The stakes are too high.
Yeah, I feel like if I was going to do like a rewrite, this would be like a she gets a buy because like the number of like, I think they said there's like 28 competitors in this, which like doesn't evenly make a tournament. So like some people need to have a buy. So this could be like, oh, like Misaki got selected for the buy and she has to do this exhibition match. That's like inconsequential, but she still wins it anyway. That's I feel like I don't know.
That's how I'm deciding to think about this. Yeah. If I try to think about the tournament, it doesn't make any sense. Yeah, that's right. Shiji's picture is terrible, by the way, or Shiji's like is like when they show the matchup, it's like taking out a weird angle. Like you didn't realize they were taking a picture of him. It's very funny. Oh man. Yeah. We've got Kotaro being a good big brother taking care of a sister. Yeah. Talking her down from insisting on playing or being the second.
Hot OK. Trying to stick it out. Yeah. Trying to be a big kid. I know at first when the episode first started and she was just blushing, I was like, what is happening? Why is she blushing? Did like something happen? But then she said, oh, OK. Oh man. I was I was losing my shit when she when it was announced that Misaki would have to fight Shiji. That was such a funny reveal. Yeah. It's like she's got to fight this random guy in the background. You're like, oh, that guy. So weird.
Yeah. I mean, I guess better this than another random throwaway character. Yeah, it's pretty good. I like how we get more of the dev team. They all get named eventually. That's pretty good. Misaki continuing with her, you know, like I can't comprehend this revelation. I can't, you know, focus on the match. That was a pretty big deal. But this one's a pretty big together, girl. Like this is like the weirdest experience you could ever possibly have. Yeah. Let's see.
Yeah, we get more of each on failing to ask Shuko out or like being weird. Like that was I didn't like this. Why is he like this? You're an adult dude. Don't be like, oh, if I was battling your daughter and Angelica layer, who would you cheer for? Yeah. What are you, an insecure five year old? What's happening? Yeah. I'm just trying to agar on to saying something complimentary to him. Yes. Ridiculous. Like school yard bullshit. Come on, man.
My favorite part of the episode is when he got us or each time is like, hey, do a cool entry phrase. And he's like, come on, go, go. Like super lame. And he like accidentally hit his head on the chair. And so funny. He's totally funny. Like he definitely watched like the old Mecca shows when he was a kid. Then that's just what he's basing action off of. He doesn't even rename it. He just keeps the model name. It's like, dude. Yeah. So good. This freaking.
Yeah, Ojiro gives the tip on going for the feet. Yeah. Well, he knows them. Like he knows. Yeah. So it doesn't seem fair that he competes either because he has all this inside information. I just, I don't know. Yeah. I mean, whatever, you know what I mean? Like it's just how it is. It's just the anime Sarah like calm down. It's just funny to be like, like Ojiro being like, oh, it's Shooji doing this. Yeah. And then he's just go for it. Like she, he didn't give me a little react to that.
He's just going to eat it. Yeah. I kind of like the look of the angel though. She looks like a bug. Yeah. It's just kind of like a armor esque. Yeah. I like the color palette and stuff. Yeah. He car just giving her like a shoulder ride and then that one attack is all it takes to finish her off. She was taking huge blows from Elaine the last episode and had like half of it. To be fair, if you got suplex from the top of a column, that would kill you in real life. She's dead.
A lot of the things that happened was. Yeah, but like just going to like kick or something. Is it like this would for sure kill you. She felt like a story and a half. She's got a helmet on and protects her head. She landed on her back. Like shadow your spine. Yeah, I know that definitely was like. The fact that each one like comes out when he sees Ojiro there, he's like, oh, my, my shitty brother is going to ruin my tech demo. Yeah. Yeah. It's extremely funny. Yes. Oh gosh.
And then after the match went, I got, I just love these two together. Like the just the like totally straightforward, simple, you know, and each on just so funny. Like it'll affect your evaluation and. It'll be easier to control from your wife. Your wife will control you easier. And he's like, no, that's too cruel. And he like runs away crying. It's funny. It's very funny. Yeah. The dev team is good when, when, uh, oh God, isn't harassing his coworkers. They're dead. Yes. Other than that.
Okay. Did you notice that the, the animation is a little off in this episode. Like there's some things that are a little off, like not animate, like characters don't look the same as they normally do. Like I've got like their off. Like, okay. Right. Last you see my screen, right? Yeah. So episode 19, we see normal Masaki and then an episode 20 when she's in the chair in the fight, it looks like a different animation studio doing like, she doesn't look the same. It's weird.
And maybe it was just drawn by a different person. You know how sometimes there's like specific animators that are in charge of like drawing some characters, maybe they just like switched off there. Yeah. I was like, oh, we're in studio Ghibli movie now. Like what? I mean, I do. Yeah. Like the eyes are a little bit smaller. There's not as many, like it's not as like shadowed or like layered or something. I will say that they did.
They did a pretty good job of like animating SI one seven four and like look more flexible. She's animated differently than he car. Yeah. I think it's pretty cool. Yeah. That's a good way to, yeah. The fall through with the idea that she's higher tech and all that. Yeah. She's like more fluid. Like it's like a higher, I don't know, like her movements are less jerky, I guess. I really hate the animation now that is like using 3D effects for action. Like I was thinking about that today.
Like in Demon Slayer when I just, I didn't know it was at first, but I was like, there's something, something's wrong. Like something's weird is happening when he's like running and stuff that was throwing me off. I hate it. Just stick to the 2D please. Like you either, I think you either need to do it all in 2D or you do it all in 3D. I think like the mixing because like. You can't do it like Code Leopold's ghost and it doesn't look that great and chainsaw man.
I don't think like I think it looks weird. There's just throws like Dorohidoro looks good because they do 3D the whole time and it's like stylized 3D and that was pretty good. Yeah. Yeah. It's got pick. Like trying to. Yeah. Like I can definitely tell them like the newer Demon Slayer stuff, like when it's 3D and when it's 2D and it's like, yeah. Yeah. It's weird when you pan the camera around and I can tell something's a 3D object, but something else is. Yeah. Oh man.
And then yeah, just my last notes are like, oh, I love cicada sounds in the summer of anime and Harvest Moon games and and then when they get to Hitoko, she's in bed and she's got little Suzuka in bed with her. She should bring her along with her like Suzuka should be in the second like little area too. Like her assistant. Oh man. So let's see the whole thing with like guitar being like, oh no, Ojiro is helping out. Yeah. It's like dude, like your sister has to go to the hospital.
Yeah, that's more important. Oh yeah. I'm so not into the love eggs. That guy's too old. It's almost predatory for him to be into Misaki. So let's let's not. I don't think he's that old. I don't know. If you're not the same level of school, like if someone's in middle school and you're a high schooler, don't date a middle schooler. Yeah. But this is like a cartoon. You know what I mean?
Like this is like say, I guess, Tuxedo mask and he's like three years older than her or something, which is like a lot when you're in high school, but nothing when you're like an actual adult. Yes. Well, that is the difference. Adolescence versus. Adults. But like Ojiro is not interested in her at all. Like I don't know not the vibe I get from. I think he just like thinks she's a cool opponent that he wants to fight. You know what I mean? Yeah. It's like, oh yeah, this is cool.
And also he knows Shuko. So it's like, oh, this is Shuko's daughter. That's cool. Yeah. It's like I get to hang out with her. You know what I mean? Like I don't think he's into her at all. I think that's a total projection, which is why all of this stuff just feels so pointless to me because he's like, oh, my love rival Ojiro. And I'm like, dude, Ojiro is not interested in Misaki like that at all. They should probably just confirm if Misaki is even remotely interested in. I think, okay, are you?
Yeah, I like her and Kotaro together if they got more time. It's like I like them separately. They're just so awkward when it's just the two of them together. Yeah, they don't have any chemistry together is my problem. Like Kotaro is a nice guy, but like they don't interact in any interesting ways.
Like there's nothing that's like, oh, I can see why these two are together because like every time they hang out, it's like, oh, they like have really good back and forth or like they're both really interested in this topic or like they just have nothing. It's just like, well, he's the guy in the friend group and she's the girl in the friend group. Sometimes that's all it takes. Like he has an actual dynamic with Tamio that he doesn't have with Misaki at all. Yeah, yeah. It's just disappointing.
Maybe it's just they know. I don't know. Maybe he just hasn't had exposure to anyone outside of whoever he started school with. So it's a new, exciting person who he doesn't feel like it's just. They're childhood friends. I'm going to like that. Like all romance in this world is like being portrayed as like, oh, yeah, you get really like shy and fumble way around them. And it's just like, I don't know. We don't we don't all operate as smoothly as you do, Joe. No, I know. But like there are most.
Each on being weird. Yeah. You've been working together for years. Yeah. It's like the way that romance. I feel like liking Shuko is futile. Like she's her head is not. She's the biggest weirdo ever. Yeah. Like, oh God. I mean, how would you approach her and have her be interested in you at all? Oh, she's so just in her own world, doing her own thing. She doesn't want to be anything to anyone except the champion of Angelic Lair.
Yeah. Well, it's just like you've been working together for like five years. You like started a company together. I feel like if she liked you, you would already know by this point. It seems like the opportunities would have arisen for this. I don't like this episode how like we get the big reveal that each on is like the important guy who's found Angelic Lair. But then at the end, like Masaki doesn't ask him about it. They just like she's just like thanks him for the match.
And then we just leave like have the conversation. What are you doing? Yeah, I mean, he, I mean, he wasn't going to bring it up. But like, why not? I don't understand. Direct. I don't know. Because then maybe she would have questions and that would lead to questioning why he hid it and the reason he hid is because he's pining after her mom. He gets to hang out with her mom and she doesn't. Yeah, but it's just like I want them to have the conversation.
I feel like not having the conversation is like a dodge because it's like wouldn't she want it like wouldn't Misaki want to know why does she not ask it? It just feels like plot convenience, but not like like character consistency. Yeah, I don't know. But next time we're getting our for real beach episode. I know I jokingly said we get a beach episode for all the enemies when I cannot believe straight up.
It's going to be Misaki comes out in her little tankini or something and blushes and Kotaro blushes and shit like that. And God, sparklers and let's take just the two of us. Here's what I want. I don't want swimsuit reveals for any of the characters. I want swimsuit reveals for the angels. I want to see a car wearing a different outfit. I want to see. I'm trying to remember. I feel like that might be a thing. Oh, dude, I bet it is. I mean, come on.
It's like the thing that the angels get the cool outfits. Yeah. Oh, man. Yeah. I want to see a car wear a different outfit. Yeah, that's true. We'll see. It's only got the one outfit. We'll sew her own little bathing suit together, too. Yeah. I yeah. We'll see about next episode. Like I usually like the ones where they just hang out. So maybe I'll like those. I didn't like these because it's like, oh, we're just hinting at the fact that people like each other.
And then we're not going to do anything. It's going to be all about indirectness. Like, come on. Next to our romance thing, so they should be more direct if it's back to back romance. A plot heavy things. My thumbnail for the next episode has show a show go in it. So maybe. Yeah. So she's going to be like, oh, Miss hockey, you got to get a cuter bathing suit. That let's go shopping. I can see that being a thing. Okay. Well, that's episode 20 of angelic layer. More episodes. Only six more.
We're going to we have to get the good. So she's going to fight. Oh, Jiro and she's going to fight shuko. And that's it. Right. Like that's basically we're done. Let's left. Yeah. I mean size in the comp is the size still in the competition. So we'll probably see her. Yeah. You know, passing size going to lose to shuko. Oh, maybe. Yeah. She challenged her. Oh, yeah. You got to pay. Oh, that's right. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So I'm looking forward to those episodes.
I think, you know, we got the good stuff. These were just we got to, I guess we had to go up to episode 26. Couldn't have been a 24 episode show. I had to be a 26 episode show. But that's how it was back in 2003 or whenever. Yeah. Now you're lucky if you get more than 12. Yeah. Because everything sucks now. Man. Okay. Miss filler. I mean, I'm going to get an episode where the star gets to be shoo. Gee. And I get to be like, oh yeah, shoo. Gee. He's great. Yeah. Yes. I mean, yeah, he's a hoot.
That one. He's fun. They're fun. And MVP of these of this, of this. Episode. Indeed. Indeed. The best. A delight. All right. So we got three more podcast episodes of this. And then on to the next for reals, for reals show Joe. That's right. It's going to be a real probably big change. We'll probably do a bonus episode of the manga. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. You'll get it by then. Yeah. We'll see. Probably. And then we'll be done with Angelic layer. Yep. Forever.
It'll only live in our dreams of it existing in real life. Maybe one day when AR really takes off. Yeah. God. That'd be good. So cool. Anyway, if you have questions about Angelic layer, you can send them to our email. Show Joe pod at gmail.com. Yeah. So make sure to do that. We'll answer some of those if we'd have them and our final and our ultimate. I was going to say pen ultimate, but it's the ultimate episode. Yeah. All right.
Let's do start with recommendations because I still need to think of one. So another thing I did last week was I watched another movie. I watched the movie in the anime movie. Perfect blue. Oh, I think I've heard of that. Yeah. It's because this movie is incredibly good. So this is a movie from sometime period. It's from 1998. It's a Satoshi Khan movie who's a who's a director who did several things that are like highly praised like millennium actress and paprika and things like that.
It's about a woman who is like who leaves an idol group to pursue a career as an actress kind of at the behest of her agency. That's like very small and like, you know, none of them have very much money.
She tries to like navigate that space of like becoming an actress, which involves her having to do things that she doesn't necessarily want to do like certain types of scenes and has to deal with like being like sexually objectified like all those other stuff, you know, while trying to like navigate this industry. Which causes her to have hallucinations. Causes her some mental distress, which results in hallucinations and being unsure what is and isn't reality.
And also maybe she's being stalked. Oh dear. And so a lot of things happen and it is an incredible movie. It has scenes that were, I think, later referenced in like Black Swan and things like that. So, you know, this influential movie, it's really good. I think it uses animation like exceptionally well where it's able to like blend in, you know, like dream sequences with real life and you can't exactly tell like what is real and what is actually happening. It's really interestingly directed.
And I think about this movie all the time. Basically, anytime. Like if you think about like how our actress is treated in like the world we live in, you look at like Megan Fox and Freddie Spears and like all the like the weird shit that happened to them. And you're like, I think about this movie and this, it's really good. Really good. Kind of horny. So, you know, so it's kind of a thriller. Cool. It's a thriller. It's really good. So you should check it out. Perfect movie.
Recommendations back to back from Joe. And I am going to mix it up with my recommendation. I ain't going to recommend a graphic novel. So I don't know if you've, no, I think we might have discussed this paper girls. I watched the Amazon show and I really liked it. And a few weeks ago, I was half price books and I saw that they had the graphic novels. I decided to pick them up and they're really good.
And yeah, because it's I always like a show that's kind of set in an earlier decade that I never got to experience. So it has like a very distinct kind of setting and apparel and all that. So paper girls is kind of set in the 80s already the little descriptor super short in the early hours after Halloween of 1988 for 12 year old newspaper delivery girls and cover the most important story of all time.
Suburban drama and supernatural mysteries colliding the smash sit smash hit series about nostalgia first jobs in the last days of childhood. Yeah, it's super good. I recommend the show. I haven't finished reading the graphic novels, but I don't really this is I think the first time I bought a graphic novel is normally, you know, they're in the manga section, but I'm like, I'm here for the Japanese stuff. Yeah, I'm reading here that takes place in Cleveland, Ohio. Oh, yeah.
Yeah. Ohio place to be the place to be. Yeah, for sure. Yeah. So that's recommendations and excitingly we have a new Apple podcast review to read. That's right. If you like the show, please rate us five stars on your podcast platform of choice, whether that be Apple podcasts or Spotify or some third thing I'm not aware of. If you leave a comment, I will read it out on Apple podcasts. Apparently this takes a little while.
So like if you post it and don't immediately see it there, it might just be processing. This is one from LWS 537. She says five stars totally hooked. I thought I might listen to an episode or two, but here I am on episode seven and can't wait for more. You guys are so fun. I love the recaps notes and analysis. I can almost play the show in my head, which is a bonus because we can't stream it anywhere. Yeah. And let me just go on record.
I consider myself a pretty deep thinker and I am totally team Sarah. Re Shuko. I hate the name. Re Shuko. Although she found herself in a tragic situation, the choices she made were to mitigate her own pain and flew in the face of any maternal instinct we would hope she would possess. Right there with you, Sarah. Yeah. Keep up the good work. Yeah. Yeah. My mom agrees with you. Congratulations. Yay. I'm so grateful for all I've ever wanted. You know, you're not wrong.
She is totally being kind of selfish about this. I'm not saying you're wrong. I'm still just being sympathetic because, you know. Because you're human with the heart and I like to have a black hole in my chest where the heart should be. Wow. It's mostly because like she's spending her time to be like a researcher and like help people. If she was just sitting around your obligations or to your child first. Yeah. Man. Okay. Yay. Recommendation. So now we've got both our moms having reviewed.
That's right. Yeah. If you would like to join our moms in the Pantheon reviewers, please leave a review. Please. Please. Yeah. Oh, man. If you like the show, you can also tell, you know, word of mouth is really the way people hear things. So, you know, if you want to recommend it to people who like anime or post it about it on your forums, which you're on in 2024, on forums, feel free to do so. Yeah. Because if we do it, then it's self-promotion and people hate it. So you try it.
I mean, I self promote all the time. I'm like, yeah, have you heard about my anime podcast? People love to hear. Have you? Yeah, I talk, I try to slip it in here and there. Oh, man, I got to, I got to turn this around real quick because I'll be out of town for work next week. So I will have to edit this. Man, you are busy. I know. Oh, man. And then I'll be visiting you soon after. Life is wild right now. I'm just go, go, go. Stop being a sloth, Sarah. Like live your life.
You're only 30. Like get it together. Do things. So yeah. Yeah. Oh God, I'm even doing freaking Pilates. It's just a free class. So I'm like, oh, it's free. I'll try it. I'll probably be like, oh God, that was cool for the one time. Never doing that again. But maybe, maybe it'll resonate with me. That's good. Yeah. Look at me. I had to spend class. You do cult Pilates. The muscles go. Stay healthy. Yeah. That's something I need to work on desperately.
Yeah. Yeah. So guys, don't be sad that Angelic Layers is almost over because you've all been waiting for us to actually cover a show joke series and not shown in series. So let's let's. I still don't feel like it feels very shown any this one. Yeah. Thank goodness. All right. I would have just totally blown it for our podcast right off the bat. Okay. You say that, but like it's funny because you seem to like the show and stuff. You're like, I want the fighting. Yeah. I know. Throw some punches.
No, no, no. No, no, no. I know. I know. Why don't we decide on Shojo? Well, first the name just works and it's like. You wanted to show me. Yeah. You wanted to show me this. I'm familiar with it. And I've like seen shown in as well. So it's not like that's something I'm unfamiliar with. You could have made me watch like horrifying horror enemies to like haunt my dreams. I guess that we can work out still pitching. No. I don't want to do that. Shojo reverse where I show you.
Yes, yes, we'll do that eventually. One day. Did you ever watch Elfin Leigh at that show? No, I never did. Gary. I mean, I only watched one episode, but the animation style is upsetting to me. Oh, God. Well, we could. I have never seen it. You think I'd like a cat ear girl, but no, dear. Okay. Okay. Bye. Podcast over. Podcast over. Hey, remember, if you're like a tall girl, don't worry.
Some boy will show up at the end of the episode and be like, you're kind of cute and that'll fix all your problems. Yeah. Angelic layer. There's somebody out there for everyone. If you if if serial killers get love letters in prison, then you can find someone to love you too. I this is not I'm not sending this message. I do not agree with this. What? No, someone can find everyone can find someone that loves them. Yeah, maybe not. What if people are just unlovable?
What if you like live in the middle of nowhere? Where are you going to find someone? I think that's a broad statement. Well, you know, it's not like, yeah, but like being being raised in a ball. So I find it freakishly tall, dude. Just start going hanging out at like the like amateur basketball leagues or something. Yeah. There will always be someone taller. Yeah. Yeah. And then you can be or maybe just don't care.
Maybe you can just be like we can all just move past just like people for who they are. Yeah, maybe you should like care about people's personalities. Show them who you are and not just because you're like conventionally attractive. Look at us just dropping the drop in the deep. I can't. I don't know. I don't know what happened in the world where like I feel like things have taken a step back a bit in terms of like connecting with each other.
Yeah. Connecting with people like the shallowness of like social media being like everybody must be beautiful even though it's like, aren't we doing a whole thing or it's like not about beauty that much? And we were like trying to move past that and then we all just like ratchet it on the brakes because Instagram showed up. Yeah. We'll see. And now everything's reality TV. Hey, I love it. I feel like I'm sounding like an old man. I love love violence.
I used to we used to care about people's personality in my days. Now it's all just. No, it's more like airbrushing. I didn't want my woman to have a personality. So that's like personality didn't matter. Oh, man, OK, well, we can continue on this like trajectory of the futility of love. And but oh, I bet when we watch the next show, I'm going to be talking about this even earlier. No, you're going to be like, oh, my God, they're so cute. Like blushy, blushy, doki doki. You think so? I will be.
I'm going to be like, oh, my God, I love them. I love them. I'm not going to be like, I just don't want people's like internal insecurities to be solved by some guy liking them. I find that to be bleak. That's a bleak way of looking at the world of like, yeah, I have problems with myself, but if I find someone who loves me for me, then it's fine. Even though I never dealt with my own insecurities, I'm like, deal with your insecurities. You don't need this guy to help you.
Yeah, I'm going to be a totally new person. You're going to be like, what happened to the Sarah? I know that like shit's on everything. And I'm just going to be like, oh, my God, he's so cute. Oh, like puppy love. My heart is full. I feel like who what happened to my my co-host Sarah? What happened to the hater? What happened to that? We're the podcast haters. What happened off the magic of shojo and what it has to offer. I can still be valid. Oh man. Okay. All right, folks, just wait.
You thought this was us getting into romance. The next two episodes are going to be super romance. So who knows how this is going to play out? Maybe they'll be good. They'll actually be about romance that are just hinting at it for like an hour. We'll see. Doubtful. But we'll see. We can hope. And on that note, bye bye. Bye everyone.