Angelic Layer Ep 3-4: What If Esports Were Good? - podcast episode cover

Angelic Layer Ep 3-4: What If Esports Were Good?

Feb 18, 20241 hr 5 minSeason 1Ep. 2
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Episode description

We’re back this week to discuss Angelic Layer episodes 3 & 4. Sarah reveals that she’s in an anime slump, oh no! Meanwhile, Joe is raking in the cash from an apparent class action settlement against HiDive. And you thought being an anime watcher wasn’t profitable. In Angelic Layer, having just won her first match, Misaki’s next challenge is to learn some cool dance moves. And a new mysterious and talented boy enters the picture, Ooo la la. We then move immediately into a tournament arc and find out that Hatoko is the coolest kindergartener ever, who’da thought? We double down on how this show really is Shoujo and we imagine a world where Esports are actually good.

We cap off with some recommendations:

Transcript

Welcome to Show Joe, a podcast where me and my friend Joe go through show Joe anime, the genre of anime targeting young girls, which Joe has not seen, and hence the name Show Joe. I'm your host Sarah and with me is the man. The myth, the legend, Joe. I don't think I've warranted anything to have that kind of introduction, but thank you. Sure you do. It's me. I'm in the name. Anytime I talk about you to someone, I'm like, he's the most interesting person I've ever met in my entire life.

That's really sad. I don't think I'm interesting. Please! You had a freaking unicycle at one point. Oh my god, don't. That doesn't make me cool. That makes me look cool. I do cooler things now. Book clubs. Like book clubs, that's right. I read books now. I'm different.

Yeah. Okay, so I'm hoping that by doing this podcast, it'll kind of reignite my anime watching, because I'll watch something periodically, but I typically like to think that I'm either in a reading phase, an anime phase, or a gaming phase, and I've just been in the gaming phase for quite some time. That counts. That counts. I think it's like, what have you been doing? Okay. What have you been gaming? What have I been gaming? I've been playing through Monster Hunter World.

Hopefully I can play Rise, which I own. Just suck or someone into buying it so that I can be held accountable by playing co-op. And then, I don't know, Monster Hunter Wildt is like the next one coming out that hopefully will be good, and then I need to play Horizon Zero Dawn so that it's fresh on my mind for when Forbidden West is finally released on PC.

And Love Island's coming to an end, so, and the challenge is coming to an end, so there's gonna be a huge void in my life where my reality TV was. For anime, a huge void for anime. Yeah, that's right. Be able to watch everything that's come out in the last, I don't know, five years. No, that's not true. I just can't, I cannot deal with all these crazy name animes. It just turns me off of, just reading the title alone. Oh. How high can you lift your dumbbells? Just not. Yeah, okay. Draw me in.

Why do you explain that for people who don't, who don't are not like... You tell me, why is this happening? It all started with how to pick up girls in a dungeon, I feel like. That is not... No. Okay, that's the first one I can remember. That's, yeah. So, okay. So, the way that anime gets adapted, usually like, okay, so, you know, it's like a TV show, so sometimes it's like original stuff that people come up with, but a lot of the times is adapted from a source material.

And a lot of these shows are adapted from light novels, which are just kind of like... Short stories. Paperback kind of novels. Yeah, they're like, well, not short stories. They're like short, like you publish a, I don't know, they're probably like 200 pages or something, and then like they do another one, like a serial kind of like novelization of a story, right?

And because they make so many of those, or they have so many of those, and I think a lot of them are also grabbed from like websites and stuff that people will just like write kind of like their own things. People have given them really long titles to describe what the story is about, because that's the only part that a reader will read. So like you can't just give it a title because no one's going to read the description.

So they end up naming all of these stories, these incredibly long things that are like bizarre and weird, and then they get adapted into an anime with the exact same title. I hate all it so much. Super bizarre. Oh my God. Yeah. I'm trying to think of some that are like especially egregious. I guess the most, I feel like one of the more popular ones is, what was it? I was reincarnated into a slime or something. I was reincarnated. Okay, here's one. I have a list of upcoming anime.

Oh dear God. Okay. As a reincarnated aristocrat, Tama, I'll use my appraisal skill to rise in the world. That's the entire title. Jesus Christ. It's just a sentence. They just give a sentence. Oh God. See, that's like ill. Why? I hate it. I was reincarnated as the seventh prince so I can take my time perfecting my magical ability. This is what I'm saying. This can't be the title. Also Isakai, which is what? Where you get either brought into a book or reincarnated.

So Isakai's genre in which a character gets killed in the real world and then they get reincarnated into a, or they get transported sometimes into a fantasy world. It's usually because, most of these are basically just male power fantasy stuff where it's like, oh my life sucks, but I'm good at video games. What if I got teleported to a video game world? Wow. Now I'm super cool and everybody likes me. This has become extremely popular, I guess. It's because of Sword Art Online.

This existed for a while. I know that DotHack did this and some other stuff, but Sword Art Online is the one that got super popular and everybody just kept doing this forever until the end of time.

I guess that's the anime version of it because I read a lot of web comics online and so a lot of, it's like Villaness is the whole subsection of Isakai where you are reading a book and then you get turned into the villain of the book and you know you're going to get killed by the end of it so you try to change how your characters perceive so you don't get murdered and that is so, it's kind of hard to not find those if you're looking at web comics. It's so dominant as a topic.

It feels unoriginal. It's like a really popular, this is like, I'm going to equate this to like back in the olden days the cinema used to make a western every five minutes and that is my equivalent of this. It's this, except being reincarnated into a video game. Incredibly oversaturated. Yeah. Yeah, I haven't watched any. I like like two of them. Not a one, none whatsoever. You don't like any of them? Okay. No, well I'm never going to try them because the names are so ridiculous.

Well, how can you say they're bad? I think you have to watch every single one of them and then rate them out of ten. That's not this podcast. That's the only way. That's for the Patreon. Oh, this crap we hate. We're going to watch things we can steal so we have no paper. Make me watch the steady stuff. That's right. So I have a funny story. Yeah, tell us all about you, Joe. So I've been watching Armored Trooper Bottoms. I just finished that.

I mentioned it on the pilot episode, but I guess that hasn't been released to everybody. So can I ask what Bottoms is? I just straight go to Bottoms. It's like V-O-T-O-M-S. It stands for something I don't know. I think it's like the whole premise is like there's this big forever war against these like two like galactic space powers. I think it's Balleron and Gilgamesh, maybe. And they have been in a war for like a thousand years or something.

And they fight with these mechs that are like just kind of like these big armored suits that you like get in the top of like in the head of and stuff like that. And you follow a guy named Kierko who is like on a mission that he like doesn't understand because he got transferred to this unit and they end up like attacking their own ship on the same side. And he's really confused about that.

And he runs and he like meets this woman who's like a weird genetic experiment and then a bunch of crazy stuff happens. It's 52 episodes, which is way too long, but each like arc is just a different set piece for like, here's Kierko, a really cool soldier guy. He's going to kill a bajillion dudes and we're going to get a lot of like war is hell, gritty stuff. And then the end is like insane.

When you like the last 10 episodes, what it reveals what the actual A plot about is like totally out of left field. It is like completely bizarre, but it's also pretty cool. For the older anime like that, do they have filler then or did filler? I wonder if they waited until a manga or the source material was finished running before they adapted. This I think was an original. So I don't think there's anything that's filler. But yeah, that I don't think there's any filler in it.

It's just a long show that is like they keep doing more things and I'm like, you didn't have to do this thing. Okay. Yeah. Anyway, the reason why this is funny is that I watched it. This is exclusively on high dive, which I know we mentioned last time when we were talking about where people can watch angelic layer, which by the way, you can watch it on YouTube. The English dub is on YouTube, you can watch it there.

I signed up for high dive like two months ago and then two days ago, I got an email that's like, according to our records, you qualify for this settlement of this class action lawsuit against high dives. I guess they were like sharing people's information. Snap. It shouldn't have been or something. So like, oops. Isn't that what also didn't crunchy roll have that too? Or just everything. Everything has had that issue. They probably have it. I don't know.

I think they've got a breach or something that's like, well, they should have caught this. So here's $5. Oh, that's it? I don't know what she's going to be. It's not going to be very much. So you're proceeding with this? Oh, I did. Yeah. I filled up that little form. I want that $5. You're going to make bank. Listen, if you're ever part of a class action lawsuit like settlement, you should take it. You should take the money. Take the money. Dojo podcast colon, take the money.

See, I just, my mind immediately goes to clash that action park that documentary about that New Jersey water park that was just sheer mayhem in the 80s, which if you haven't watched, you should. It's on HBO. Highly recommend. Okay. I've never heard of this. Well, because you don't consume super morbid content like I do where I just like listening to disasters and true crime and animal attacks and all that. So this is on my radar big time. Yeah. I got my fill of that.

I got my fill of that in like high school when I was on a watch, watch, watch, watch awful things happen. I'm like, actually, I'm good on watching awful things happen. It's tough. Like I follow. I think it's you don't have to write it of public outbreak or outrage or whatever. Public freak out. Yeah. Like Karen's. I have gone through very long rabbit holes of just watching Karen's and being totally outraged. Like how can anyone act? Yeah, I think this is a bad way to spend your time.

I don't do too much. I don't think you should be watching like disaster porn or whatever. I think it's bad. Well, not. I mean, it's like retellings of firsthand accounts. I'm trying to think of any other ones I've watched, but no, like freaking.

Did I tell you that my animal attack podcast, here's the plug for it, tooth and claw turns out they play walk about me golf and they just organically mentioned it and then I was like, oh, my big googly eyes like, oh, my God, they play the game that my company makes. This is my end to talk to these podcasts. This is my end. Yeah. Like your podcast about dogs attacking people. That dog is like mini golf. It's a lot of bears. Let's see. Yeah. I can how much drop so many facts.

I guess we'll just have to listen to this because like I don't understand how much you could talk about bears attacking people. Kind of seems strange for one of them is a wildlife biologist. So there's some credibility to what he's saying. Like I made my sister listen. You know, if I'm the one driving the long road trip, I get to pick what we're listening to. So we listen to like this early 1900s shark attack series of attacks and I think Jersey that maybe partially inspired jaws.

I was like, look now. And then I was quizzing here. I was like, look now, you know something about bull sharks and yeah. Yeah. Okay. Okay. Yeah. Love animals. Okay. Love animal attacks here. Well, yeah. I hate HB of documentaries, but we love animals. Get them. Get them critters. Don't watch disaster porn. Learn about animal attacks. Like wait, are you cheering for the animals and the animal attacks?

Well, they're just being animals, you know, like I like how in national parks, if the if the behavior is within normal expected behavior of a bear or something, they won't kill them. You know, they won't just bear's got a grind XP somehow.

Well, because if, you know, if they're guarding a carcass or if there's young nearby, if it's the problem is when it's like some kind of bear that's been habituated by people feeding it and then it just, you know, the fear of humans are gone or they associate people with food, that's when or if they eat the body, because normally they won't eat a person if they attack them is normally to like remove a threat. But if they consume the body, then they get euthanized typically.

Okay. This is so dark and off topic from the content of this podcast. I mean, this could happen in an angelic layer. I'm waiting to be able to attack. There was a huge like Asian black bear attack in Japan. And it just like demolished a whole household and stuff. So it happens. They have bears there. Oh, all right. Well, we'll be on the bear lookout. Probably not Tokyo. Inside of the metropolitan Tokyo area. Yeah. Okay. I think that's enough about us. We can get into the episode.

Yeah. Watch these on YouTube. So if you want to watch these, if you haven't watched them yet and you've been wanting to, you can pause us now and go do that and then make sure to come back. Time for summaries. Yes. Take it away. This summary is basically the same length. I was hoping it was going to be shorter. It is not. I mean, you can do more broad strokes. Nope. Okay. All in. This is the only way we talked about it last time.

This is the only way some people will ever be able to experience this. That's true. Because it doesn't exist anywhere except I just bought it on Blu-ray. So I'll have it. Angelic layer episode three is called Why Are You? What? Okay. Hold on. It's called Why Are You? I didn't read this. I just copied. What's it called? Misaki's Nervous Lesson. Who are you? I talked to why. Why are you? All right. Angelic layer episode three. Who are you? Misaki's Nervous Lesson.

We open on an Angelic Layer match in Kobe. The match is between a male doll named Wizard against an unnamed female opponent. Wizard pushes his opponent out of the layer and wins. We learn that this player is named Ojiro Mihara and he has won 10 consecutive matches which qualifies him to the Kansai games. We then cut to school where Tamayo explains to Misaki that she's learning like 10 different types of martial arts.

Katara complains that she learns these by practicing on him since they were four. And Tamayo rebuts by saying that Katara knows karate so he could prevent himself from like dying or anything actually damaging when she attacks him. Then she reveals that she also dresses him up in girl clothes sometimes and his classmates all laugh at him. Katara taking huge L's this episode. We transition to a conversation between Ogata and Ichon.

Ichon is demanding that Ogata gets an Angel card from Misaki which will get her into the upcoming tournament. Ogata wants to know why this or who this card is going to be for and Ichon makes some guess. He guesses wrong and his punishment is to eat spaghetti through his nose which he does for some reason. Or at least he starts to do. We don't see him actually do the whole thing thank god.

On the way home Katara and Tamayo ask Misaki if she's going to enter the Angelic Layer tournament but this is the first time she's hearing about it. This might have been said before but this is the part where it kind of clicks to me that the dolls are called angels and the players are called dais. Daises like god it's like god and angel. So I'm going to use that term from now on if I remember.

Katara reveals that Hadako will be at the tournament but doesn't say in what capacity although it's going to be pretty obvious. Tamayo and Katara leave and Tamayo chastises Katara for not calling Misaki by her nickname and for being shy. Misaki runs into Ichon who congratulates her for winning her first match but tells her that she needs to actually train if she wants to win. He takes her to a practice area and explains how to make her angel move more agilely.

Misaki wonders if by sending Hikaru commands through her mind Hikaru can understand what she's thinking but Ichon reminds her that she's just a doll. Then he produces a boombox and starts dancing. He tells Misaki to have Hikaru dance along with the song and she does but she's not really sure if this counts as practicing. The scene then transitions to a facility where Athena and Misaki's mom are practicing by dancing to the same song.

Two assistants explain to the audience that dancing is a good way for agile type angels to learn how to react quickly. Misaki's song ends and she notices that Ichon is left. She goes to restart the song but she stops when Ojiro and Wizard randomly show up. There's a scene where Wizard just dramatically descends onto the layer table and approaches Hikaru and it's very weird. Very menacing music. Yeah, it seems like he's gonna just start fighting.

Misaki's very confused by the interaction until Ojiro turns on the music and Wizard starts dancing. Misaki and Hikaru join in and they all dance together. When the song ends, Ojiro asks if he can practice with her since all the other tables are occupied and Misaki agrees. They practice together and Ojiro compliments Misaki on her improved dancing and they introduce themselves to each other and then Ojiro leaves.

As he leaves, three high school girls come in and try to take Misaki's table by beating her to match. Misaki agrees thinking that they just want to practice with her but then she's surprised when they start a fight or they try to start a match with her. They tell her that the term to do it means to fight and she's like, okay, well, I didn't know that. Everybody knows that. They bully her. Everybody knows that. They bully her into fighting and she finally agrees.

Hikaru and her opponent Queen face off. Queen takes out two electrified whips and starts attacking Hikaru. The bully's internal monologue reveals that electric whips are actually banned in Angelic Layer but they're banking on the fact that beginners like Misaki are not going to know the rules and so they can win easy matches to boost her win ratio even though later on Ishan says this is an unofficial match so I don't really know who's win ratio this is supposed to be.

Hikaru struggles to find an opening and gets caught in a whip attack. Ishan shows back up and is annoyed that her opponent is using electric whips but doesn't say anything when he sees Misaki concentrating. Misaki starts to make Hikaru dance. Using the beats of the song, she's able to quickly get inside of Queen's defenses and push her out of the layer winning the match. Her opponent gets angry and leaves.

Ishan congratulates Misaki for winning her match and gives her an Angel card and then he tells her that he's entered her into the tournament as we cut two credits. Okay, so a more like casual paced episode in comparison because the last two were pretty like packed with a bunch of stuff like the one lol before next episode where it like goes right back up to intense happening. Well, this is I think this is kind of the reveal that like this is a sports anime kind of.

I mean not really but kind of right where it's like this is the training episode because this is a sport and like we need to show our character getting better at the sport. Yeah. That won't make sense which starts doing better later on right. Well, yeah, I made a note that see this is why it feels different than shown in it because we're not spending like freaking 20 episodes on training and we just get straight to it but somehow it doesn't feel rushed.

I mean they don't explicitly say what the time differences between this episode and the next but yeah most shown in it's like a week. I think they say it's a week until the tournament most shown and take forever. I mean part of it is because like Angelic layer as a game is more about like concentrating and visualizing and stuff like the thing that makes.

So if you've watched a lot of shown in anime, you know that like the thing they usually do is they introduce some kind of like magic system or like some magic equivalent system and then they have to like explain the rules of like how superpowers can happen and Jellic layer doesn't do that. They're just like yeah you have a doll you can visualize it. That's basically it. Like it's really just about are you able to concentrate? Are you able to react? That kind of thing.

So there's not the explanation part that I think a long time and shown in stuff because there's not that much to explain here because this is a very like use your imagination kind of thing. Okay. I my first two notes the first being the fight music is so good. I don't remember the fight music. Yeah, I made like four different notes saying how much I like the music. Like the music is really good. Okay, okay. I remember being good. I just don't remember the fight music.

You're looking at my screen right? My second note. It is so old like all the NPCs. And Jellic layer and Kobe. Stationary. Nobody moves. It's like a huge arena. They're playing in like a huge arena. Yeah. Okay. Look at that. Okay. My second note is that dog's face is locked up. Okay. So in the beginning of the episode it like doesn't cut to like the arena and it like zooms in and then it cuts to like two kids sitting on a fountain and the guy with his dog and this dog is looking like droopy.

It looks like he's melting. Yeah. That kind of dog looks like that. I don't know what it's called. Like a quad hound kind of or pass a hound or something. It's good. Oh my God. Yeah. Look at that little dog. That drew my attention for like a two second pan. Oh dear. Okay. And then my third note was wizard's pretty cool looking because this is our first introduction to a male. Okay. That's so weird. Why is this he doesn't look like a wizard at all. I'm mad about this. I don't know.

He has like basic like what's he wearing like a big trench coat kind of thing with like really extended shoulder pads that go out to like the left and right by like a foot. A foot relative to him. Not like a foot in real life. And like he's just wearing. Yeah. She's like this big coat and he's got gloves and that's it. He's called wizard. I don't know. Why is he called wizard. If he has a cast of spell. We see one character named Colossus so you just name doll whatever you want.

I feel like you should be a little bit on theme though. I feel like you should try to be on theme a little bit. So what do you think of Ojiro? This is our introduction to him. Yeah. He seems fine. Like he seems nice. Like we meet him. Like he's really good. His introduction is really weird when he just like shows up and like stops her from turning on the music and then puts his doll in the thing and then turns it on without saying anything. It's like a very bizarre thing to do.

I know is he's going to be like a romantic interest or something because like he is tall and he is good and angelic layer. Yes. When okay so on the opening fight words him and he wins he stands up and like waves the crowd. It's such typical like anime girl swooning voices like oh my Ojiro. Yeah. My favorite. Yeah. So he's obviously being introduced as like the pretty boy that all the girls love. Yeah. I'll have to wait and see what I think about him later.

Okay. I'm going to talk about Hunter Hunter later in this episode. So I'm going to do that. Freaking love Hunter Hunter. Because a lot of I'm watching it for the first time and I'm like up to I don't know the part where they had that auction. Oh yeah.

Yeah. And like the stuff I watched before where they're in like this big battle tower a lot of that same stuff is happening in angelic layer right now which I think is very odd because like the whole pushing someone out of the ring just like like physically pushing them is like a thing that happens in Hunter Hunter a lot and that's the way wizard wins his fight. I mean it's kind of like boxing. I do have a note.

I do have a note about Ojiro that says he takes off his helmet or he takes off his headset to reveal the most normal looking anime guy. Yeah. He's just a guy. I mean in this series is the dolls that are all cool looking so I guess it makes sense that all the like humans are pretty just typical normal looking people. Wizards should have a beard. He should have a big beard. What? That's a wizard. He should be casting some spells. I don't understand.

A lot of these like even wizard has and it's interesting because it does seem like they're maybe trying to pair them romantically because both their dolls are very similar aesthetics with the kind of big thick boots and the you know white and blue and white and red and the like the little visor the like head piece the ear piece that sticks out who Karo has to and wizard just has one but they have various and then the freaking weird tassel like long tassel rope thing.

He Karo has two but I'm like you guys that's like just asking you to be grabbed by those things and chucked out of the ring. Like I wouldn't want any dangly loose anything on my doll that someone else's doll could just grab. I guess but I mean listen this is this is a sport about fighting but it's also a sport about fashion. Some people are not getting the memo on that because this chicken this fight looks stupid. Oh queen she's a dominatrix.

Not that one the one that wizards fighting it looks like she's a transformer that's going to turn into a plane because she's got like this. Oh my god she turned into a car that would be so good. Yeah but yeah queen looks I don't know just badly made like cheap materials. She's like a dominatrix she's got like the she's got like the corset she's got like the mask like doesn't match. I do like the little leather strap with a buckle thing that's nice.

He uses two electric whips as a guy they find Hunter Hunter also uses two electric whips. That was funny. Okay so I'm going to talk like I'd like to about a thing later on but this is kind of the first time it's marked it's like when Tommy was talking about how she does all these martial arts and Misaki is like I'm not athletic like I don't do athletic stuff. Yeah like she's not an athlete but she clearly wants to be I'm going to come back to that.

The other thing that happens put a pen in it the other thing that happens is Misaki starts calling Katara Katara Chan. I made that note too I was like I guess you just went with whatever to my othkling it was yeah I was like poor guy. Dude just takes L's.

Yes. Okay so I made a note that the gym shorts in some animes are insane but then I went into deep dive reading about them so I guess they called them bloomers and they first got introduced to Japan I think through the Olympics because their volleyball team won but then everyone was saying how the other team looked cooler because they had the tight little shorts and I guess bloomers in Japan were originally kind of puffy and then that just kind of bled into school athletic wear.

They actually wear these. So what we're describing is they're wearing their athletic clothes because they're in gym and they were long sleeve shirts but then the girls wear shorts that are like a one inch in the same. It's actually underwear cut. It's really like a leotard almost and then the guys just wear normal like basketball shorts.

In the 90s I guess in a Japanese school in Singapore there's a student protest to these because they were tired of getting unwanted attention from having to wear these. And so and then yes but since the 90s it's gone out of style but it's lived on in infamy through anime. Right love that. Love to give the women unwanted attention by making them wear these stupid shorts.

Yes well because I guess it was like a lot of people had issues with the you know because you're trying to wear underwear under that and freaking underwear probably covers more than the damn shorts. So if I had to deal with them peeking out I would be pissed. This is a bad plan.

Yes I mean I understand that it's like minimal friction with clothing but I mean they had like I guess well I don't know I guess like athletic clothes got better over time so yeah I think as sandex stuff material yeah it became more affordable. Like bike shorts exist now. Yeah. That was weird. Oh and then I mean okay so is it deuce or daeus? Daeus. Okay well I was like okay. So I'm not very cultured in the religious stuff.

You said that's in reference to like God and angel and then I was like okay so maybe it's like Amadeus like rock Amadeus you know that rock me Amadeus song you know. What is that? Oh the song? I don't know what this is. What is this song? Amadeus. I don't I don't sing sorry. I don't know what the song is. You can look it up later rock me Amadeus. It's like an 80s song or 90s or something but I was like okay so maybe that I was like I'm assuming that's some kind of God reference.

So deus is Latin for God and then angel is the English word for angel and you know the relationship between gods and angels is that they're like your little agents more or less. They carry out your will etc etc which is what's I guess happening in angelic layer. My next note is about the spaghetti punishment. Oh yeah I have that. Like don't do it dude. I just have why is he doing that. Why is he doing it? He's just like Tilly Lee's and say he did it. Are you technically quick and?

Yeah I'm doing it. Eat spaghetti up your nose because it like is thin enough to go through your like nasal cavity but like there were meatballs on that plate. That was not going to work. You couldn't do that. So gross. I hate it. My next note is it's hard. It doesn't call her by her nickname and how many hoes like a Rizzi. You can't be like oh why are you so shy. Why are you so shy. Yeah. I'm helping you out so much. I'm like pointing out how much of a huge loser you are like.

Worse wing man ever. You got it man. Yeah it's so funny. Okay so. He's just like a generically nice guy I don't know. Yeah he's not very remarkable. Although he is a good commentator for the sideline for viewers I guess. I like him. He's not bad.

Yeah so this is when they're walking home that they were doing that but also it keeps happening where they cut off Kotaro talking about his sister Hotoko doing angelic layer and I made a note that they always do this in Shonen where like there's a character that we get it's like implied that they do cool stuff but it like keeps being put off that we get to see it. Normally it's like some old man character I feel like but this is the five year old girl who's you know a beast.

Yeah I mean next episode it's the new girl but she's like a heavyweight. And then. I mean she's very good at fighting. I made a note that now I'm hearing her say yeah all the time. She does. Every time she's like confused instead of saying like what because like what in Japanese is Nani and she's like yeah. I also made a note because I went back and looked because you commented on Shoko's wall art and you're right. It's bad. It's so bad. Two year old finger painted them. Why'd she buy it?

We don't see Shoko this episode. My next thing is about Ichan and how Ichan is basically just her dad. He plays the coach character. He is like her coach. The mentor kind of. He's the only person who he's the only adult who spends time with her. So sad. It's so sad. I know I was talking to my mom last night and she's like this girl sounds way too young to be traveling on train by herself because she's slowly trying to process what Shoujo is and yeah she doesn't know anything about Japan.

But I was like yeah there's like a whole freaking Netflix show about kids going and running errands at the age of like five by themselves. But Ichan is playing this role of like hey I'm going to allow you or I'm going to be your mentor through this thing that you want to do that's going to be very important to your development. And that's basically like a dad character. Yeah. Because he's got. For sure. Only parental figure she has right now. So sad.

I know I feel like her aunt is not a great option. She's more responsible than her aunt. Well and like the way he talks about it's also pretty good. Like you know when they're talking about the doll and she's like oh I wonder if Ikara will hear me and she's like well you know she's a doll. But like the whole point of this is to have fun. I was going to say yeah she mentions that like oh if I like put her on the layer can I like make her smile at me. And he's like yeah it's only on the layer.

Can't just do it outside there. Think bigger kid. Okay. But like this is a kid that's clearly this is what I'm saying. Like she's so starred of attention that she's like bonding with this doll. So sad. And this random man. Yeah he's like the coolest adult to her. In her world this is the coolest adult. He's like the only one taking an interest in stuff that she's interested in. But he's also only at his convenience because he keeps disappearing and leaving her alone.

He does keep disappearing which is pretty funny. So I have a note for when it's Athena doing the practice to the dancing as well. That like because clearly one of the ladies commenting has been there a while and then we have the new one who's there to ask the dumb questions for the sake of the audience.

They make a comment saying how okay so this is how a lightweight like Athena is able to be successful kind of making the implication that before her only heavyweight dolls were able to kind of be on top which I thought was an interesting thing to note. Yeah we see Athena doing the dance but her version of it is like way more complicated and it involves like jumping around and stuff whereas like Ikari's dance is just like pivoting and spinning and stuff. Dance training.

Gotta be really good at rhythm games to be good at angelic layer. God it's all my beat sabers been in practice for and dance central. Oh god I want angelic layer to be real. I want to make my own doll. Be so sick. When I get to my bigger point I will also talk about how I want this to be real.

So in the fight with queen I'm like how long are these cables because some of them are standing so far away from the layer but they have like a cable dangling and I feel like with these technologies should be wireless you know like. Yeah you connect the wire to the table. I think I mean they sit in the chair like you have to sit in the chair to like play so I think it makes sense. You don't want that delay it's your mind brain waves you gotta react quickly. Oh that's true that's true.

With a wired connection there'd be so much delay. Right right right. Queens fight is the first appearance of weapons. First time a weapon shows up. Dude high schoolers are so mean in this world. It's very funny. I was gonna say yeah that girl is clearly a high schooler and this is just some 12 year old that's just like wow I'm gonna freaking demolish this child. Okara wins by doing like a dance and then like running in between strikes and then jumping and then pushing her out.

Yeah I feel like she keeps having these fights where it's one move is doing it which doesn't seem practical. She does one explosive move that usually involves jumping at the last second and getting inside of someone's defenses and then pushing them out. That's her deal. Yeah. Which like that's a strategy.

I mean I think there is I'm not a big like fighting games kind of person but I know that there are like strategies that are basically like if you can just get an opponent into a combo that can do like 60% of their health two times you win. So like this is a type of I mean not like a one hit kill but there is you know this is a style that you see in some games. But you like high risk high rewards. So you'd be all about that slow beat down of them.

Oh yeah I'm like I want this match to last approximately two hours. I want this to be a miserable experience for both of us. I want you to regret ever challenging me to a fight. You know I don't know I don't play fighting games like that. So we have the first kind of more in depth thought of what the entry call is going to be and for the you know in this fight she just says go Hikaru. That's what she throws her in. Yeah. I mean another note this music is so good.

And then I said is there a black market for angelic layer accessories. Is that where this chick got these freaking electric whips. I mean I guess if they're banned and they had to have not been banned at one point right. I guess so. The final note I had was maybe she didn't want to do the tournament dude like she's just getting started. Oh she's so dead. Come on. I'd be peeing my pants like oh my god. Yeah well he's like pushing her out of her comfort zone. Yeah this is what I'm saying.

He's like the coach figure for her. Freaking episode four which we're about to go into. We're already into a tournament that's so fast. Next episode is a tournament. Every shonen has a tournament arc. I guess I can get into it. Episode four is called the day an angel flew down. We open on the tournament. It's here. It's a huge event for all the players in Tokyo. In the control room Ichon instructs Ogata to record all of Misaki's matches.

Ogata is confused as to why Ichon would want to do this and guesses that it's because Misaki is his estranged child. Which good guess Ogata because that's basically true. As punishment for being wrong Ichan puts clothes pins all over his face. Misaki Tamio and Kataru take their seats and Misaki shows them her battle phrases that she's supposed to say when the match starts and she throws her doll into the arena. The tournament begins with its opening ceremony. Then the first match starts.

Misaki goes backstage to prep for her match. Tamio asks Kataru if he thinks Hadaka will be okay but he's not worried since she's like a tournament vet. She's been here a lot. Tamio jokes that he's more worried about his crush than his sister and then they get in a little comedy fight. Misaki gets a registration and sees a lot of really stressed out and kind of hostile players as they wait for their matches. Eventually she runs into Hadaka who's hanging out in the waiting room.

Hadaka tells her that Misaki's match is right after hers and gives her some advice about not being nervous. We cut to two girls watching a match complaining that it's so bad and two other girls come by and say that Suzuka's match is next. Which is the name of a doll. Hadaka goes to her match and it's revealed that her angel's name is Lightspeed Suzuka because she's so quick.

Suzuka is dressed like a ninja kinda and wins her match by kicking her opponent in the face immediately like within seconds of the match starting. Those girls that were watching approve of her performance. Back in the waiting room Misaki congratulates Hadaka on winning and Hadaka tells her that she could be great too because size or age doesn't matter for Angelic Lair. Misaki's battle starts as she throws Hikaru in the ring with her new entry phase. Wings of an Angel please guide me in Hikaru.

Which is bad grammar in the English translation. It should be Hikaru in me. Thank you. Her opponent's angel's name is Katarina. Am I saying that right? Katrina? Katarina. Katarina. Okay. So, in the middle of the layer, listen to the wind's voice Katarina which I feel like is kind of cooler. Katarina is an ice skater with skates on and she kinda skates around the arena and stuff. She starts skating around the ring and Misaki has a hard time following it.

In the control room, each hand comments that Katarina is a speed type fighter but she takes time to accelerate. Oh god, I comments that Hikaru has already lost the chance to attack early. Katarina at full speed starts spinning with a leg up so that her skate is exposed and she grazes Hikaru's hair by kicking. Then Kanarita kicks the shit out of Hikaru and takes off half of her health meter. Kataru comments that all her power is coming from spinning which increases her like force.

As long as she's spinning she's a threat. Misaki tries to think of a plan while Hikaru dodges. Misaki settles on a risky plan and sends Hikaru running directly at Katarina. She dodges the kick, jumps in the air and strikes her from above, kicking her in the face and pushing her out of the layer.

The girls who watched Haruko comment that Misaki also seems like an interesting player and then back in the waiting room, Haruko congratulates Misaki on her win and asks her if she loves Angelic Layer as much as she does. Misaki says she really loves Angelic Layer and they shake hands as we cut to credits. Another one hit win dude, she kicks her so good. There's two one hit wins because when Haruko wins her match it's incredible. Yes, freaking badass.

She just like runs, like she runs forward, hurt. Okay, so I want to talk about Suzuka. Freaking awesome. Cool doll, a very cool doll. She's very sexy for a five year old's doll. Yeah, she's like a female ninja, like the hot female kind of thing. She's got like the under chain mesh and height. Yeah, she's got mesh, she's got little body skirts. She has like these huge like shoulder pads and she has like little things dangling off that are bells. Yes, she has a big bow and yes, I love the bells.

It's so cool. And she's wearing like all black. It's cool. Yeah, she's awesome because this is one of the angels that we saw in episode two that they were reviewing footage of. I don't know. Oh, yeah, she was one of those. I do remember that. Okay, okay. Yeah, she's so freaking cool. When did when did Hotoko start doing this? She's five, but she's a veteran like was doing this in three. What is there should be age restrictions. No, but this is the whole thing.

The whole thing is that like age doesn't matter. I know, but I feel like like this is an important part. This is I'm going to talk about this. I know, but get to that point. Violence. It's love violence. I guess so. Okay, I was going to say I have one more note. So I watched the fight in English as well and then that the entry call is I think it sounds better and the English translated says angel wings please guide me in Hikaru, which sounds better than wings of an angel.

But I hate this because you know who uses angel wings her mom's doll Athena has angel wings and her mommy guiding her to shit. Mom sucks. That's true. Anyway, my first note is Misaki might as well be each hands a strange child because he's the only one who pays attention to her. That's no joke. That's no joke.

Like we see like when she's in the tournament like she's like walking through like the registration zone or whatever and she sees like I know there's one like damps mom but Angelic layer dad. Yeah, yeah. Like there's people with their kids and there's like people with their friends and like Misaki just by herself like she does not have anybody with her in the waiting room. I mean, Tom and Gitaro are like watching but they're also watching Hanako. So they're not going with her.

That seems very lonely. Yeah. When she gets in that waiting room, I put freaking all these chicks have RBF big time. Oh my God. Resting bitch face. They all look so angry, aggressive, you know, no nervous like concerned look all scowling. They are intimidating. They're getting in the zone. This is what sports is like. This is why I don't like sports. I guess I was just a casual participant of sports. Yeah. Yeah, I'm not big into like contests. My next note is that this arena is cool as hell.

Like the big arena where they fight is like a like there's like a big ring. They have the layer which is like this big table. The announcer is like in a chair that's like connected by an arm that like articulates all over the place around and the chairs at the the day assistant also is like a big chair that is like on an arm that can be like raised up and down. It's cool. I know the budget of this thing is yeah. I wonder if you have to pay to go. Surely you do.

Yeah. Yeah. You have to pay to get in for sure. You always think about the economics of this. I you're always asking about the money. I'm just probably struck in disbelief all the time in Jell-O-Clay or Colin get that money. The first fight like the first fight that starts but we don't see because she goes backstage. Those are mixed gender deus angel compares both of them. Like I think the guy has a girl doll and the high schooler has like a guy doll.

I think I mean it's like in video games or dudes always plays chicks because you're always staring at a girl's ass and it dudes for a 60 hour game. Okay. No. Okay. Never mind then. Or the smaller hit or the smaller like target or something. The smaller hit box. I don't think that actually happens. Sometimes people just have cooler designs. I guess so.

Um, I have Katara's worry about hot echo and like the girls that are watching seem to imply that hot echo they like say a line that I don't know if it's like I don't know if this is translated perfectly or like whatever. But one of them says we'll make her runner up this time which makes it sound like hot echo one last time. That's not the that is what it sounded like. I mean it could be just like a smaller competition that they got second place to her or something.

Maybe like not like it's very funny. I mean this is qualifiers right so obviously wizard was at a different regional qualifier and this is just the Tokyo version and then we'll move to where all the different places come together. But it's just interesting because like earlier in the episode Tom and Yo was like making fun of Katara from not being worried about hot echo but it kind of seems like he doesn't have to be kind of just owns everybody and everybody else sucks.

I put to my oh is such a troll and I love when she's like beating the shit out of Katara just like what I had another note of music is on points if I had an angel. Okay one the little because they essentially have ring girls that are angels or like hold up the cards saying round whatever.

I feel like they could have made them cuter like they're pretty plain looking and then also if I had an angel I would just make sure the clothes covered all the joints because they look so realistic except when you see like the little knee knee cut out on some of them where you're like oh yeah these are little toys. I'd have all this covered up. But I mean I don't know. A hot echo is opponent like a battle nurse.

I mean she gets owned immediately so we don't see anything she does but she doesn't have like a nurses outfit on which is pretty funny. Yes I know it's like I guess you're just gonna embrace I mean it makes sense if you want to be more marketable to have a very distinct look but yeah she got wrecked by a five year old.

And I also said I could see like the styles that people put on their angels that are successful and have more exposure affecting like real life fashion trends like I could see people wanting to kind of wear clothes inspired by more popular and jug layer dolls. Oh sure yeah I bet that's like or I would make it a big part of this if I was making this. So it looks like here in this competition at least it's a 10 minute time limit to each round.

Yeah because Misaki almost runs out of time in her match because like basically her opponent like the ice skater just like beats her up a bunch and her score is really low and the commentator is like well if the round ends it's whoever has like the most like the higher health bar basically wins. If she would lose if she didn't do anything. And again jumps and then kicks. She kicks this time instead of pushes. Okay yeah like I got her changing it up slightly.

Do you have any more notes or can I get to my main? Yes let's hear it. Let's give it to us. So the last note I have is that Angelic Layer is a show that imagines a world where esports weren't so misogynistic. What if you had esports that didn't suck and you were cool actually. Because like the whole premise of like anything that's been going on like the last episode like in the first episode we see Yukaro and she is like concerned or she feels bad for being small. Misaki.

You know we commented like or Misaki sorry. And we commented like that seemed a little kind of out of nowhere. But then in like the last episode where she talks about how she's like not athletic. It's the thing where she clearly wants to do sports but she just doesn't have the body for it right. It isn't going to be able to compete in sports in a way that's fun for her because those games are not designed for someone of her build right.

Yeah. And then the thing that Hanako sends at the end about like oh Angelic Layer doesn't like discriminate in terms of like size or age or any of that stuff. Is like why she likes it so much because this is actually a sport that she can engage with. Equalizer. Yes. Which really is what the promise of esports should be. You don't need to worry about like your physicality so much in esports.

I mean I'm like you know there are some cases where like you know accessibility is kind of an issue sometimes. But like the barrier to entry to esports is much lower in terms of like how tall you are doesn't really matter. How much muscle mass you have doesn't really matter. How old you are not that important. It should be. Esports should be a venue where people are equalized. But it's not because we live in a garbage culture. And it's just like run by like the worst most misogynistic dudes.

It's like imagine all the worst guys who are the most annoying. Those are all the people that are in esports. Yeah. I don't know. I've never attended because it's never remotely interested in me watching a bunch of dudes play at first person shooters. Yeah. Well I mean there's like a lot of different kinds like there's a lot of different types of games that have esports. But there's two problems. One is like they're all corporate right. So it's like they like run how things are going.

And the second part is like it's so dude heavy. Like they're all guys. It's toxic game culture. You know. Yeah. It's it's like the worst guys too. It's like all of the really annoying ones. It's super sexist. I mean like you can read like I've read some like testimonials by like women that are in esports that like prefer women only.

Yeah. Like events which is clearly like a cultural thing because there's nothing there's no reason why like being a guy or a chick would like make a difference in terms of like how good you are at pressing buttons. Right. Yeah. It's all like the culture. Like do you want to play against a bunch of people who are like huge assholes to you or do you want to play against people who are going to be like cool and normal which just sucks.

I am much more a single player kind of gamer but during that phase where I was in the Halo reach and back when game chat was more of a thing either people hit on you or I mean I luckily well I don't know about luckily it was more of that for me but also people just being like yeah I hear dumb girl. Yeah. Which I feel like is probably the worst.

Well I don't know because then they like leave you a DM afterwards like was it and then these faces really attract the worst kind of guy and don't police them or like don't try to do anything to compensate them at all. It sucks. When I was in college and I did competitive paintball I was the only girl at our school competing.

There's barely any other girls competing as far as like pro leagues and like all female teams from what I saw like one of their freaking YouTube channels was just them mud wrestling and I was like dear god this is just catering to the male fantasy and this isn't like a true like all girls team.

Yeah. It's a game where yeah it doesn't as much matter what your size or gender is I mean possibly per what position you play in because there's like if you kind of bigger you probably just want to not have to move as much and stay behind bigger bunkers but it's not as big of an element in paintball. Right. But there's still not that much female.

I mean that's more IRL aggression that you had to muster I guess like one time I had these girls come up to me be like oh my god you're so brave and blah blah blah. I guess we don't all have a deep seated like beast waiting to be released and you know they they ring the buzzer to say the game's over but you have extra padding in your head and your face and ask that you can't hear so you're still shooting people after the point story ended and they're like stop stop. That's the most mean.

That's how I always think of you. The inner beast violating the rules. Yeah that's me. But yeah so I like this I mean this should be this is a show and this should be a show show show I mean it really is just about like what if what if you could like experience the sports in a way that isn't irritating and kind of annoying and like dealing with like a bunch of the worst guys. What if eSports were fun? And I think this should be reality. They should make this for real.

Yeah well this podcast once it makes it big it's going to have people thinking about that and then it's going to change. Yeah but like you just know that like this is why like E-chan actually rules because he's like oh yeah anybody can play this this would be great like imagine like I can imagine this if Netflix was going to make a live action garbage remake of the show like E-chan would be like a shitty crypto dude or something like you'd just be like the biggest fucking loser of all time.

Yeah like in real life he'd be like an Elon Musk adjacent asshole because that's what we have in the real world. Yeah anyone who makes a tech company is in it for themselves and not for the sake of you know people can just do it no matter who they are. I mean well later in the show kind of discover the motivation of starting Angelic Layer and that'll give each and more depth of the character. I was the only episode four.

Wouldn't this be cool though if we had like if we had like these sports for like somebody who's playing against a kindergartner and it was just like everybody was just cool about it that would own but we don't have that because everything's stupid. You're right. And I hate that. Listen I used to I used to pay attention to the competitive Smash Brothers tournament and then it turns out all those guys are like weird sex pests who suck and it's like of course.

Yeah I don't like Smash but I might be going to a tournament for one actually for the sake of research and work. So I'll get to first hand witness how that looks. Listen if your sport attracts too many like two online guys that are like predators and forchanners it's gonna be bad. You're just gonna have a bad time. Yeah. You're just gonna have this is just a loser convention. Maybe one day. One day we can have good eSports. Not now. Definitely not right now.

Let's walk about mini golf has its own thing then it'll be the pure hearted joy. Is this what you want? Competitive? I mean we do have intense players they're like oh I know an angle for every hole blah blah blah. It's like you know it's because I feel like first-person shooters are it's really competitive like there's no other way to enjoy it but trying to be the best whereas something like mini golf which does have competitive capabilities but it's more so just for the fun of it.

So I think we need more fun. More fun. Yeah more fun games where it's more about that than winning I guess but there is a winning element. Yeah I'm asked what Echan says he's like you know she's a doll the point is to have fun playing with her. The point of Angelic Layer is to have fun. A beautifully simple concept. Too bad. Too bad. Nobody in Funnest banned. This show's good. Yeah you would you want it to be real.

I want to maybe for the end we should eat straw our own Angel and name them stuff. Oh how we would design an Angel. Yeah that'd be fine. That'd be good I can't draw so it's gonna be a little bit more. Sure you can. Yeah okay. But yeah this show's good. I'm glad we're watching it first. I do think this should count as a show show. Yeah okay good that makes me feel better. Oh yeah.

If you want to learn more about sexism in video games there's an episode that just came out of Game Study Study Buddies which is a podcast where they read stuff called Gaming Sexism. You should listen to that. Yeah. If you want to know more because Jesus Christ I hate gamers. Gamers are so bad. I mean honestly because I mean you work for the video game company. I well okay here's the thing it's very different because this is the second video game company I've worked for right.

The first one was much more what you would imagine but this one I'm at Mighty Coconut. I originated it as an animation studio first so maybe something with that because it's like a lot of the people who work there are not gamers or super dedicated intense gamers. So I don't know if that lends itself to the culture being non-toxic but like there's never been anything like that at my current place. So I'm very fortunate.

It's also just a small VR indie dev and I'm assuming gigantic things like Capcom or you know obviously Blizzard has had its own scandals. It definitely gets worse with scale it seems like. Yeah. So yeah.

Lucky but as a gamer I mean because I stream now so luckily I have for the most part avoided you know people being coming to my channel for the wrong reasons because typically the games I'm playing are not currently popular or you know I'm not I don't have little tongue emotes in my descriptor for my episode. Yeah. I mean you stream you also show your face. Yes. Yeah. I mean yeah some people do the V2 being which you know very intentional. I did that. It can be hyper sexual.

Well yours is cute but even for me being a chick who plays games even just friendship and stuff can be it's kind of frustrating or just because you're a chick who plays games that people I don't know just you just want to be friends with everyone and they don't have those same intentions. So I mean normal interactions. Yeah. Oh yeah it's just always different like not proceed the way if you were playing with another dude. My rant. But yeah so that's our recap of episodes three and four.

We appreciate we've gotten a few reviews. Yeah. Totally all unsolicited not by us or my mom. There's nothing wrong with asking for reviews. Even you all know the gig economy you all understand that reviewing you know always you always rate your reviews for like your drivers and stuff five stars because you know that anything less than that is bad because we live in a stupid world run by stupid losers who don't understand how rating works because these companies are trash.

Yeah. I just have a tear. I just have terrible time asking for things from people. I don't. So please rate us five stars on your thing on your podcast. Right on the thing. Spotify. Apple podcast. Amazon music. We did get a comment on Apple podcast that I can read out. By the way if you this is a maneuver I stole from range touch so if you like more podcasts range touch thank you for letting me steal this. This is from Bev's five stars. Look at that.

What an awesome conversation in introduction to anime. Such fun and knowledgeable hosts can't wait to hear more. Thank you Bev. Yeah. If you want me to read something then leave a five star review. Do you know who that is? I don't know who that is. It's my mom. If you want me to read things from your mom please. Make your mom listen. And a comment. I don't know. Does Spotify have comments? Do you just have.

No it's well okay so you can rate with the stars and then I can either I don't know if we want to I did a custom question but you can add a question for people to reply to on Spotify like my first episode I said is each time creepy or not. That was the question so I was going to try and think of one specific to each episode recovering but the default is just like what are your thoughts on this episode. So listen we're trying to game the algorithm right.

I'm sure that participating in polls like boosts our rankings in the algorithm so if you listen on Spotify please participate in the polls. That probably does something. If you're on Apple podcast leave a comment because I think that does something. It doesn't even have to be it doesn't even have just type button mash I don't care. Just leave a comment I think that's what matters. If you're on something else then let me know what that is because I don't know what the other ones are.

There's probably some way. If you think you can manipulate the algorithm in our advantage I would do that. Let's say that the goal of our podcast as an intro to Shoujo anime is to get people like my mom and grandma to comprehend what Shoujo is. We have to do more explainers about like yeah.

I mean honestly I feel like most people who would organically find the show are going to be more into anime and already know these things but we don't want to exclude anyone who maybe is not one of those people. I know other podcasts that recap things that the people listening don't actually consume the thing they're discussing. I mean I tried listening to some of the other like Shoujo in the name podcasts and some of them only cover like manga and stuff so I'm just thinking what the ones are.

A lot of them are very positive. Yes they're all very upbeat and cutesy and I think we're going to bring them more like we're going to be a little bit more critical. We're going to talk about misogyny in eSports. Yeah. I don't think they're doing that. Maybe they are I don't know. Yeah I think we're just we're I don't know maybe we're just not as serious or we're just having fun.

So we have a trailer now that I just clipped together from our last episode and our little demo episode for those of you who did not have the pleasure of listening to that in whole. So send that to people if you want to try and get them into Shoujo. I think we should do maybe for each episode we have something we recommend. Oh okay sure. Like it could be a show or a book or another podcast whatever. That's a nice way to kind of call out at the creators of things. Yeah okay.

You know people might be looking for other content to consume. Yeah I wouldn't have to do it like mid in the middle of my discussions of a thing if we have it out here. Yeah. I guess I could go ahead and do mine. Okay. Game study study buddies is a podcast where they read academic book about game studies which sounds like it might be kind of boring but that includes things like gaming sexism which they just did. It's very good. This is like a like it's the podcast network called Range Touch.

They do a lot of really interesting stuff. This one is like what if we took academic studies and made them accessible to people that are mostly about video games but also have range into other stuff. It's very good. If you listen to that you'll notice a lot of the things I say that feel like salesmanship comes from them. I'm just I'm just creeping it from them basically word for word. I'm sure it's fine. But yeah it's really good.

You should give it a listen because if you want to try something new it's a really good way of trying something new. Nice. Okay. I'm going to recommend a game. I recently played a game called Witch Spring R which I guess is a series of games that used to be mobile and this is the first kind of full blown dedicated game that's on Steam and it's really freaking cute. It's about this young witch.

She lives in a forest that you know it's apparent that it's kind of a different dimension from the human world and she kind of raised herself and she named herself Pie Berry because she loves pies and strawberries and she just kind of eventually leaves that little space she grew up knowing and there's like a grand adventure and friends and growth and it's really really freaking cute and I love it. Let me double check that name. Yeah. We can.

Yeah. Which which which spring are yeah yeah that's true. Okay. That sounds fun. It's really good. I highly highly recommend it. It just came out I think in September of 2023. It's just very endearing and if you like Shojo you would definitely or if you just like kind of cute see it almost has similar vibes to was it at Lear series. It's like an Alcanine. This is cute. I'm looking at it. Yeah. It was a mech. Hold on. Is there a mech? It's like a Gala thing. My seeing this right?

It's got huge shoulder cannons. It's yeah. I just I love it so much. It was just like a delightful game. I only took me about 25 hours to complete and I didn't do everything. I might be checking this out later. Like if you could hug a game I just want to hug that game. Just a cozy but combat potion crafting character. There's a mech and she fights a dragon. Yeah. Fantastic elements. But yeah that's my recommendation.

I will link these in the episode description and thanks for listening to our second episode of Shojo. We never came up with an outro. Did we need an official one? I mean I think we have a thing slowly. We could just say like a little funny thing. Such as. Imagine if eSports were good. What? Outro specific to each episode. Yeah. Just say it for you. Word for thought. Word for thought. Let's see. If only the world didn't suck. Imagine how great things would be.

You know we're really not going to be the upper Shojo podcast. Hey we're bringing you something different. Yeah. Being sad. We're bringing pessimism to the Shojo space for too long. These people have been happy. And we're like really? About this? Come on. Yeah that's right. That's right. Bringing the negativity. Bringing the tired energy to Shojo. Join us next time where we see Misaki and Hikaru and their next Angelic Lair fight or whatever.

I'm not going to reveal what the next episode is about because you guys stay tuned to Shojo to learn. Episode five and six next time. Yep. On Shojo. Don't miss out. Oh. Our sign off should be like we should come up with our own fake thing to throw our doll in. Oh my god that's so good. Like a little like a little like a little layer. Yeah. Our entry phrase. What do we have like a collective doll or each have our own doll we're throwing in? I think the doll should be called Shojo. Here we go.

Here's mine. Okay let's hear it. I'm going to torch the skies Shojo. Rain down misery upon them. How's that? That's great. Mine was probably going to be a very like spell scouting like he was hoping we can win Shojo. Go. I would say that and then the doll would be like the tiniest like pinkest like least threatening looking thing. Yeah. It would just like have bad posture and look at the ground. It's just a person who pulls it all nighter is like hunched over a cup of coffee.

Yes. Okay. Till next week. Hopefully the world gets a little better. It's our new sign off. If you say till next week you're saying the sign off. Okay. I can edit this out. Till next week we'll edit this out. All right. Bye everyone. Bye everyone.

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