Welcome to Show Joe, the podcast where I, Sarah, introduce my good friend Joe to the show Joe anime genre about girls and romance, typically. Although for our first series, we've decided with intention, of course, to cover Angelic Layer so that Joe can have some time to transition into the genre of show Joe, since it's technically categorized as shown in, but we decided to re-categorize. We decided to pick not to show Joe, so. In my mind, that's how it was categorized and we're too far in, but.
We're too far in. Well, I mean, it's a good starting point. I mean, it's going to be good juxtaposition of like, hey, what's different about this as opposed to stuff that's like actually in the genre? I mean, even watching. Because it basically is in the genre. We've been, I was going to say, as we're watching it, comparing it to other shown in, it certainly is different.
I mean, you see like the aspects where they're trying to be more shown in, but I think in general, it's still more like a female audience kind of show. Well, it's mostly just the context, right? It's just because like it's about these dolls fighting. But I mean, listen, women like shows when people fight. That's right. Everybody loves to watch a fight. Okay. Fighting is in the soul of all of us. That's right. Like at the Ant, the crunchy was it the crunchy roll awards? What is it?
Megan, the stallion was what she say? She was like, oh yeah, she's dressed up like Gojo. She likes JJK. You know what? It may be basic, but at least it's a big, giant public figure promoting anime. Are you saying it's bad? Wait, hold on. Are you saying JJK is basic? Yeah. Did you see Kaisen? Yeah. You think it's basic? It's popular. I think those are two different things. Both? I don't know. I mean, I haven't seen season two, so apparently it goes down.
But just based off the first season, it didn't, I personally did not feel like it brought anything new. Now the characters are all that remarkable to me. So to me, it's a pretty just like basic. Yeah. I mean, that's like Europe. That's not like the consensus. No, it's not. No, people freaking love that show. The ending song is really catchy for season one. I will say that. We should have a conversation at some point about anime opinions because I also don't like JJK for different reasons.
Oh, really? I was because I read the manga and like, oh man, you want to watch something spiral out of control forever in a way that makes no sense. Oh, okay. I have not read the manga, but okay, Sunday on a bonus episode. Sunday. We'll tear it to pieces. Sunday, I'll talk about my unpopular shonen opinions, like how I don't like this and how maybe Hunter Hunter isn't that good. But you know. Okay. Hunter Hunter. I can't get into this. I was going to say, I do like that.
It just feels more lighthearted at least in the earlier seasons. Like it feels pure somehow. Yeah. So I've only watched the earlier seasons and yeah, okay. Sure. I mean, let's just say it can't be that good because at some point I got to what I thought was a filler arc and I was like, ew, what is this? And apparently that's canon. We can't talk about this now. No. Okay. But yes, I'm Sarah. Obviously Joe. Should we start with news? Oh yeah. I mean, McDonald's.
That's who you're going to start with? The like shitty McDonald's ad campaign. Yeah. Have you seen any of this? What is this? I don't know what this is. People keep leaving like, oh, Joe, you'd like this and I'm like, I don't. Honestly, I haven't really seen much. I've seen like mention of it in news stuff, but I mean, it's just cool. I mean, along the vein of, you know, Megan the stallion promoting anime and stuff. McDonald's getting on the anime bandwagon.
I guess because I mean, anime is mainstream. But like for it's nice to see that a corporation is acknowledging that it can be profitable and hopefully now McDonald's can go to hell. What? The sausage I can cheese Mcmuffin. No. It's so good. I'm sorry. Your crimes against humanity are not forgiven McDonald's. Oh, okay. Could have fooled me. No, no, no cutesy anime ad campaign is going to fix is going to resolve you of your crime, or many numerous crimes. Okay, nevermind.
Nevermind. No, I'm kidding. It's another big anime news. The creator of Dragon Ball unfortunately passed a curatoriyama. I've only watched the first season of Dragon Ball, but that series is like a huge milestone in anime and so many people of our age. That's the gateway anime that got them into it. So we appreciate that contribution. Probably the first thing I ever saw was like Dragon Ball. You're like Dragon Ball Z. Dragon Ball, Speed Racer or Sailor Moon. Those were like the three in the 90s.
You saw Speed Racer? Yeah, I had cousins who had like Sailor Moon and Speed Racer like on VHS, the whole series. Oh. So I've seen a little bit of that. Okay, I guess that's a sports anime. I vaguely remember it. I don't know. It's racing. I don't know, but is it actually about racing? I thought it was about some wacky adventures that got you to racing. I don't know. I so vaguely remember watching it. Okay, what news were you going to mention? Oh, that was the news I was going to mention.
The curatoriyama news. It's been really nice at least seeing a lot of people on Twitter like share stuff that was inspirational for them. I learned a lot of stuff. I learned about Dr. Slump and I learned about, I guess he made the slime from Dragon Quest. Just like extremely iconic and did a lot of the designs for that. Yeah, the same art style. I find a smage of a dragon quest game. Yeah. So, you know, he was 68. It's pretty young. Yeah, I know.
Although like the working conditions for Monaco are really bad. And like a lot of them have a lot of health problems because of these are bad industries. These are bad industries to work in is my understanding. I mean, I don't think that was necessarily related to the curatoriyama. I think, you know, he had like a blood clot or something. But never other notable Monaco have died very young for things that seem preventable industry bad. One other. I mean, this isn't tech.
Well, I guess technically it could be tied into anime, but Rooster Teeth is closing. Oh, yeah, I did see that. And because they made Ruby, which is I guess anime kind of an anime inspired anime adjacent. Yeah, something notable. How do you feel about it? Because I know that you like because I stopped, you know, I stopped watching Rooster Teeth like 10 years ago and like a lot of people that I was familiar with, they're kind of left.
And now it's just like a honestly, I'd watch a few seasons of Red vs. Blue probably in high school. And then I think once I got out of college, I listened to their podcast and that was pretty entertaining. Eventually I fell off that. But my hairdresser, I mean, she's married to Jeff Ramsey. So like I've met him a few times and Millie and I told you I went to like their wedding thing, so I saw Gavin and Barbara and Michael and stuff.
I haven't like consumed, I guess I watched a little bit of Ruby as well. I haven't been like an active consumer of their stuff much. Yeah, I, from my understanding, like I haven't really been keeping up with any of it, like something about like the production setup. It was a very troubled company. Yeah, there was like years ago, there's a huge layoff wave. And also they're owned by Warner Brothers, which means everything's going to hell because Warner Brothers is continuing there.
Did you see that they announced that they're going to take, they're going to list a bunch of like games off of steam? I can't believe that like they're able to do, like they're already able to shelve movies that were completed to like write them off as a tax loss, right? And they just have like gotten away with this. Like it's bizarre to me that nobody has been able to like regulatorally or anything. This is a bad trend.
This is why you should get Blu-rays of everything and get physical media copies of stuff. Thank God I have Angelic Layer on box set and dynotopia on DVD. Dynotopia? Oh God. Yeah. Okay. What is dynotopia? It was this mini series that I freaking love and no one else seems to love it because it was, you know, anything with dinosaurs on TV that doesn't have the budget of a movie like the effects. Yikes. I love it.
My sister rolls her eyes every time I mention it because it's a mini series, but I would watch it in its entirety, which is four hours. Like that's something they should do a reboot of this thing that only I love. Dynotopia? It's, I love it so much. I mean, it's probably better than these Jurassic Park remakes. They should just make one where you hang out on an island with the dinosaurs. We'll like to see it.
Yeah. I mean, cause all these, I mean, Jurassic Park, I guess all like big movie dinosaurs have been in aggressive, like attacking us way, not in a like, oh, what would it be like to live together with dinosaurs? It would be a different take. Jurassic World Dominion atrocity. Like no one died in front of my eyes. That's everyone should die. That's why you're mad at it because they'll be died on screen. Yeah. Or are you just saying you want the everybody hangs out with dinosaurs show?
I'm just saying that would be a different, I'm not saying that I don't like. I think my, was it nihilistic tendencies come from probably like listening to Ian Malcolm as a small child all the time. Humidity, getting what's coming to it for messing with mother nature. I love that. I love it so much. So dinosaurs should be eating people in a world in which they've been. Just say the unjust world separated us from the dinosaurs so they can't eat the people I don't like. Well, just anyone.
You know, we haven't really had any. Oh yeah. Like there's a little dinosaur consumption. Yeah. Like, you know, you know, it's the popular thing for shows that kill off characters you don't expect. I mean, I had that really happen in Jurassic Park. When you watch apocalypse movie, are you cheering for the apocalypse? Yeah. Are you like, yeah, let's go. Hit that hit that. Day after tomorrow. Like get it. Get everything. God. We're going to have to, we're going to have to explore this.
This will be like the through line of the podcast as we check in with your nihilistic views on how you want humanity to be destroyed every week. Yeah. And I don't know, I'm just like team earth, not humans and you don't consider humans a part of earth. The bad part. That's why it's like maybe a zombie apocalypse wouldn't be that bad because then as long as they don't eat the animals and it's just people and then the planet can restore itself. How is that better?
How is that possibly better because we're not like defiling the planet anymore with our you're just going to like become like, I don't know, poison ivy is a certain thing. That's why I'm like, yeah, Thanos, I can see your point, my dude. No, here's the thing. Poison Ivy actually correct. She can't be a villain anymore because she's just like right about everything. She's like Magneto where it's just like you look back and you're like, you know, Magneto kind of right about everything.
Like I wouldn't just go around indiscriminately killing people, but like overall the overall plan pretty good plan. Yes, I know they just they don't do it. They do it in a way that makes them look crazy. That's the problem. Anyway, what have you been watching? Let's see. Okay. Well, it's been a very international women's day. Actually, hold on. Okay, let's do that. So this last week, international women's day. Yes. It's international women's week. And then I think a specific day. It's a week.
Yeah, it's a week long thing. No, sorry, women. I figured why not acknowledge it by each of us kind of mentioning our favorite female anime character. And I guess I'll start off since I already have one in mind. Well, I have two in mind, but I'm trying to think. So I'm going to do obviously I love Car Captor Sakura. And it's not very often that a protagonist is my favorite character, but Sakura Kinamoto, who's like 10 or 11, I think, in the beginning of the series.
She's like a normal kind of peppy girl, but she's not in excess, annoyingly happy and also, you know, she's not just boring. Like her brother will pick on her and she'll retaliate and kind of bicker with him. It's not like she's just sweet and easygoing in all aspects. So I guess deaf and she's super cute. So that doesn't hurt either. And then my other pick is Kyoko Mogami from or Mogumi, maybe from Skip Beat, which read the manga and I did not do justice.
It's like the longest running Shoujo manga I own. I have like 48 volumes. It's so long. Because that is a lot more humorous. Like it's really funny. And I like her because the plot of it is that she's getting revenge because she was wronged by a childhood friend and I like love the pettiness of that. Like, bitch, I'm a come for you.
So and she's just so funny because she before she was betrayed, she was super like, you know, la la la rosy eyed thing so that part of her will still kind of show up every once in a while and then it gets like destroyed by something else. It's really funny. But yeah, those are my picks. How about you, Joe? So I got this assignment like 10 minutes ago.
So I just first off, I want to say it's really hard to find like lists of cool women anime characters because you just got like a waifu list in that. So I have I am picking also picked to because I don't know, I got two tabs open. First one is Utena Tenjo from Revolutionary Girl, Utena. She owns we love lesbians here. We love people who can sort of fight. She is I don't know. She's like really cool. I mean, she's like the main character of that show.
She does a lot of stuff that's very fun and actiony, but also like it's a little bit more internality. It's I'm pretty sure I'm not 100 percent, but I'm pretty sure that Revolutionary Girl Utena was made by a lot of the people that made Sailor Moon. I think our was the season that was kind of dark. And then they were told basically like, no, you have to lighten it back up. So they all left and made this show. So it carries on a lot of that stuff with like a lot of interesting ideas.
And Utena gets to be the express or a lot of those ideas about gender dynamics and how you dress and how you act and all this other stuff. And it's great. She's great. Yeah, that's an older one, right? So back then that was quite distinct. Yeah, yeah. So that was a revolutionary. You could say trailblazer. Yeah, I mean, you know, it's like definitely like one of the first in that space that was doing that kind of thing. And then for my second one, because I don't know what else to pick.
And I feel like I should pick more than just one. I also like Maka Alwan from Soul Eater because she wheels a scythe and is cool. Yeah, I have a poster. The scythe thing where she spins it. Yeah, because she owns dude. It's cool. Yeah. I mean, seriously, so funny. I love Death the Kid and it's unique. That one. Maka's great. She's just like a big nerd. It's really good and a lot of different stuff. And she's like the hope character and is like able to ground everything. Yeah, she's cool.
And she's voiced by Laura Bailey and the English dub. I love Laura Bailey. There are probably better other picks that I will have later if I think about it more. I was gonna say, because there's like, I named one of my, I'm down to one ferret now, but I did my last ferret, her name was Revy from Black Lagoon, which I didn't even finish. But I was like, ferrets are crazy and she's a psycho bitch. So I'm gonna name my ferret after her. She's cool. Like a cool looking character.
The show, I can't believe I watched it. I was probably like 16 when I watched it too. But so not my cup of tea, but she was cool. Also Claymore. Claymore is just full of badass chicks. I don't know if you've watched or read it. I have known nothing about Claymore. I always, I'm always like, is this really a to berserk? I don't know. It looks the same to me. It is intense. Like it's a very harsh art style. It's really cool though. I need to get the manga.
I feel like I saw the box set, but I was like, nope, that's expensive to buy the whole manga series and I got to have some self control. It's cool though, because it's just like chicks are the badasses in that show because dudes are weak-willed and turn into monsters more quickly than Claymores, which are the female females, which basically are these warriors that were human, get injected with like yokai blood and become hybrids.
And eventually you like succumb to the madness and become a full blown yokai. And they just found that women can hold out longer before becoming one than men that they tried with. So it's cool. So they're using them all as tools? Yeah. Okay. I mean, it's like a monster riddled world. Yeah. The characters are beautiful. I objectify my women differently. I turn them into super weapons. No, I mean, you know, you still look bad. No, I don't. It's like I think it happens in real life.
I mean, that's just like what every actual person in the military is. And then, okay, so as far as what I personally have been doing, it's been a busy work week. We had a new DLC launch Ice Lair, which in the vein of Women's Week or whatever, it's based off the layer of a female villainess that has little puff and flunkies and it's cool. Totally check it out if you like walking about me golf.
And then also we yesterday we had an event and we announced that we're partnering with Wallace and Gromit to make a wall. It's a themed course. Yeah. Yeah. So yeah, I had to I hadn't really I knew of it. I've seen chicken run by hadn't watched Wallace and Gromit. You've been watching Wallace and Gromit. No, so I need to. You should watch Wallace and Gromit. Oh, yeah. On talker. All right. Maybe I'll buy a VR headset. Hell yeah, man. All right. So what have you been watching? Oh, sorry.
Oh, sorry. No, okay. I was going to say watching Traders, which is a live reality TV, so I won't go into it and then playing Horizon Zero Dawn because I need to cram that in. So it's so I remember everything for the 21st one for Ben and Wes comes to steam. But that's what I mean. It's been busy. I don't have as much time to do stuff. How about you, Joe? What have you been up to? I finished two series. I finished Gundam Stardust Memory. Not that I there's not that much to say about that.
It's not that good. It looks really nice though. Cool, cool Gundam fights bad. Everything else. Actually, no, the Xeon stuff is pretty good. It just does the thing where it's like this is going to be about like a romance story. Piloting the Gundam is like being a man. And it's like, I don't think that's I don't think you should I don't think you should say that. It's good. I don't think it makes a lot of sense. You kind of just dies pointlessly when you do that.
Like it's a lot of bad ideas surrounding it. But the thing that does have good ideas surrounding it is the other thing I watched, which is I watched the 12 episode OVA series, Armor Hunter, Mellow Link, which takes place in the bottoms universe. I'm still on bottoms. But it's unrelated.
So basically that that show is about a guy named Mellow Link who was in a squad, like a military squad that was sacrificed intentionally so that his higher ups could steal a bunch of they were sabotaged by like they were set up by their superiors to go like hold off a bunch of mechs with basically like anti tank guns. So like just as big, this is enormous gun. It was like 30 guys fighting 50 tanks.
So it's like they were absolutely going to lose the whole time and they do like to completely get wrecked. But Mellow Link survives. And what he's doing is he is going and getting revenge on all of the higher ups that got him killed because they were like using it as a cover to steal some like military resource for some other thing that happens in like the bottom show.
And so every episode is just like a set piece where Mellow Link is there and there's the guy he's going to kill and the guy who's going to die is like, ah, yes, here I am at my extravagant French villa in the Riviera or whatever. Oh, yes, Mellow Link is around. Hmm, sure, hope nothing bad happens and every episode ends with Mellow Link totally killing that guy. And it's just like a revenge story in 12 parts and it's very good. I have a question. It gets in and it gets out. What is?
Yeah, I feel like I've looked this up in the past. What's OVA stand for? Original video animation. Okay. Yeah, I feel like I don't see it for newer content. I feel like this is more popular maybe in the early 2000s. Like the attack on Titan endings would be like a thing that would normally be an OVA in my opinion, but like it just aired on TV because it's like a super popular thing. Also, like with the whole streaming airing on TV is not that important. It's bad.
Attack on Titan is not a good show. I just, I like the first season and then not the rest. I just, when there's, I don't know, when it's like mystery and like, oh, we don't know why, but then it gets into like all this world politics shit I hate. Okay, yeah. We need to have that. We need to have a separate conversation about unpopular shown in opinions because, yeah, Attack on Titan is like pretty fun until it gets to like weird Imperial Japan apology and it is bad.
I just want to see people devastated by giant monster things, not like, oh, the king and royal family and blah, blah, blah. Yeah. I love to make the divine right to rule a literal thing in my universe as much as I like, I like politics and stuff. Unless your politics are bad in which case, I think you're an idiot. So, okay. But that's all I've got if you want to get into Angelic Lay. We'll get to the, yeah, we'll start talking about the thing. Dude, I have so much to say. So long.
Okay, this is gonna be a long one. Angelic Lay, Episode 9 is called Sing Masaki, the deus is an idol. We open on Masaki watching TV. She sees an ad for Ringo's new album and freaks out because that's the girl she been in the bathroom last episode. Even though she went to her concert last episode, so I like, I don't know. I guess she just didn't get very good seats so she couldn't actually sit here.
Open. Okay. Um, we cut to Ringo at her, at her home eating milk and cookies like Santa Claus and watching footage of Angelic Lay or matches from the tournament where she's doing her little study hour for herself. The next morning, Masaki, Tamio and Kataru are riding on the train to the Kanto qualifying games. Kataru lets Masaki listen to Ringo's new album on a CD player and Masaki reflects on Ringo's advice to shine on stage from last episode.
At the Kanto games, we see the girls from the peanut gallery. That's what I'm calling them by the way, the floor. At the Tokyo tournament in the opening ceremony and also Hotaco and Masaki are there. So we're going to be playing against each other at this arc. The announcer tells us that the best 24 players from the region are gathered here and it's a single elimination tournament, which means if you lose once you're out.
They also announced that the first match will be between Masaki and Ringo and Masaki is surprised to see Ringo there. After the opening ceremony, Ringo catches up with a flustered Masaki. That Shoko shows up and Masaki asks if she's here for her, but she's not. Ringo tells her that she's here to interview her because she... Wait, Ringo tells us that Shoko is here to interview her because she is quote, a weird idol, which is how she self describes.
Then they walk off, but Shoko rushes back to tell Masaki that yeah, she's here for work, but she is going to watch her match because Aunt Shoko is very nice. Unlike another adult who's going to watch the match and not say anything. In the cafeteria, Tamayo speculates as to why Ringo plays Angelic Layer. Masaki asks to listen to her album again so she can learn about her opponent.
While listening to the song, Masaki wonders why she plays Angelic Layer on top of all the other things she has going on, with, you know, being an idol and stuff. A few tables over, Shoko asks Ringo why she's playing Angelic Layer on top of all the other stuff she's doing, like being an idol and stuff. Ringo says management doesn't like it, but she does it anyway. Masaki gets thirsty and goes to order some juice but is surprised when she is served by none other than Ichan in disguise.
Ichan asks her why she's so nervous, and Masaki tells him that she's intimidated about playing against an idol. Ichan tells Masaki that the idol of Angelic Layer is the one that shines brightest in the layer, and then he's dragged off by Ogata. In the control room, Ogata's coworker, the woman whose tag I couldn't read last time, I looked it up. Her name is Fujimori, and it's spelled with some kanji I'd never seen before, so that was like a huge pain to do.
Fujimori tells him that Shoko is on leave but is probably here at the tournament. Ichan freaks out and tells Ogata to find her, and if he doesn't, he'll name a weird-looking doll Ogata-chi and sleep with it every night. The first match is about to begin and everybody is watching, including Ryo and the bullies from last episode, the Pina Gallery Girls, Ojiro, Shoko, and lastly Shuko. Shoko gets her cameraman to film Masaki's walk on because she's cool.
The match starts, and Masaki throws Ikaro into the layer, Ringo throws her, Angel Ranga in the layer as well. Ranga is dressed like some kind of vaguely Middle Eastern or Indian dancer. It's kind of weird. Ranga starts doing some weird dance and starts to chip away at Hikaru's hit points because she's combining the dance with fighting. Ringo is hyped that Masaki isn't going to lose too quickly and starts to pump up the crowd.
Ranga starts dancing more intensely and then starts sending out shock waves from her body in a move called the Dance of Death. Masaki is confused as to how Hikaru is getting hit at a distance by invisible moves, and she starts to doubt herself in the face of Ringo who's better than her at everything.
Also, I didn't mention this, but the entire episode Kataro's been quietly cheering for Ringo because it's his favorite idol, but now he decides to loudly cheer for Masaki by yelling, and Masaki hears it and gets all blushy and starts to pull together. Masaki recognizes that Ranga's attacks are actually her sending out wind at her opponent, like condensed wind blasts, but it can only go on a straight line and she's able to use that to get Hikaru to start dodging them.
Masaki asserts that even though she's a normal girl, she can shine in the layer and we cut to Shoko watching footage of her interview with Ringo where Ringo says that she's just a girl who loves Angelic Layer. Masaki then starts singing the song that Ringo sang to her in the bathroom from last episode and Hikaru starts moving along with the rhythm of the Dance of Death because they are the same rhythm. Some of the people in the crowd start cheering for Masaki as Hikaru and Ranga brawl.
Eventually Hikaru is able to knock Ranga out of the ring using the same type of kick that Suzuka uses for rolling thunder. Everyone cheers for Hikaru as Shoko comments that Masaki was shining brightly and then she just leaves. The peanut gallery comment that Masaki must have good fighting sense if she's able to copy rolling thunder so easily after seeing it only one time and Ojiro comes and tells him that he agrees.
Also the youngest member of the peanut gallery has a crush on Ojiro and asks for his autograph. After the match Masaki apologizes to Ringo for hurting her Angel. Ringo thinks that's funny and she drags Masaki over to Shoko so she can get an camera shot of the two of them doing a peace sign together as we cut to credits. Boy oh boy do I have a lot to say in this episode. Okay we'll say stuff because that was really long. I feel like that was, there's so much stuff.
The problem with this episode is that they cut, they do a lot of cuts to different things which is cool in the episode. It's really hard to describe that in a paragraph. To make it make sense. Yeah. We last episode she saw her in the bathroom and then she saw her on the stage like probably maybe an hour or less between the two encounters and then it's not until she sees on TV that she connects the dots. Dumb. She's a dummy.
And then I said Ringo has the same diet as me just garbage like just eating cookies instead of a real meal. Also I just hate that. I mean I don't know that this has made any improvements in anime today but just when they have characters for the same outfit every day I mean if it's your school uniform it makes sense. Ringo and Idol you would think she'd have a bunch of cute outfits because she wears the same outfit.
Yeah. I think it's, so the part where Ringo goes and eats milk and cookies it's 8pm. I have a note. Ringo Seto 8pm milk and cookies watching Angelic Lair. Also okay did she, what's the, does everyone have access? Did she have her manager film? Are they even allowed to film Angelic Lair? Did they like air it on the news later or something? Probably I don't know.
Yeah. And because she's watching, I don't know if she just watched all of 24 contestants footage knowing who made it or if she somehow already knew who she was going to face off against which Misaki did and so does Ringo have like these inside connections that she uses to her advantage to like prepare beforehand knowing who she's going to fight already? Yeah those, those I thought I had. It's like, does Misaki like guitar now?
Like there's something weird thing going on where it's like everybody's cheering for Ringo and I can't tell if this is like a, just like a general like sense of feeling inferior because the person you're playing is more popular than you or if it's like actually specifically Katara. Yeah, because up to this point, I mean she, she doesn't seem interested in him at all and then also Katara didn't even see that into her last episode and now he does. Yeah, it's a little weird.
I mean like this is a thing, it's one of these things where like, Tomiho constantly makes jokes about them. Yeah, I mean like being love rivals and all that stuff but like neither Katara or Misaki seemed to take that seriously. But then I guess maybe it is. I mean only when it's convenient for the sake of plot I guess.
Yeah. I mean I guess this goes into our, what we talked about earlier, I don't remember if this is before we start recording but that shonen romance just sucks and this is technically a shonen so of course the hinted romance is going to be fine. I think you're confusing cause and effect here. It's not like it's going to be bad because it's a shonen like it's just the genre is not very good at it. I don't know if this will be a specific example of that. I just can't tell which one's which.
Like I can't, I can't, because we don't ever get any time for like characters to talk about their feelings toward each other. It's just like this vague thing of like is Katara just like a stand in for your friends cheering for you or like people that are important for you cheering for you. It's like again, I mean this kind of ties in with the whole like all of her mentor figures watch her from the sidelines where they don't like cheer for her like loudly or actively or like overtly right?
Like Shuko's there watching this match but she's never going to talk to Masaki about it. Ichan watches from the control room, Hadoko watches but like they're not being loud and cheering and like standing up and clapping you know. Yeah. But it's nice to see, I mean I think Ranga is the first not white doll we've seen. So that was a nice, nice to see some diversity in the angels. Yeah, I mean not controlled by a, but I mean it's not like Ringo is not a, no she's like Middle Eastern Japanese girl.
Yeah. I mean, because maybe it's the same in video games, you don't necessarily have to me. I mean a lot of people do I think replicate their characters after themselves, but that's the nice thing about games is that you can play as something that you aren't in real life. So I guess that can be applied to Angelic Layers as well. Yeah, it would have been nicer if like they just made the actual day is that's true. There's some diversity amongst the day is as opposed to just the angels.
Or if there was some like, I don't know, like, oh, I do dance lessons and so I really admire this culture that the dance I'm doing for my stuff is I based my angel off those performers or something like that maybe could be more interesting. Yeah. I don't know. I would have just liked them more if we get more diversity amongst the day is as themselves as people instead of the dolls.
So in the opening ceremony, like it shows all the peanut gallery and they're all holding their angels, except for Alice, who's just standing there. I mean, we get I guess I should ask us next step like about next episode because we get more about her. But like, is she in the tournament? Why is she standing up there? She's just like tagging along with her sister, who's the actual day is OK. Let's see. So I've complained about how like, oh, God, she let she go and oh, Christ. Oh, no. And who?
Let's see because day is me again. Hot to go. Hot to go. Both of them are so obsessed with Angelic layer, right? Like it's their life and nothing else that even Misaki, he's slowly becoming that she could have possibly fathom someone who has other interests like being an idol, having more than one interest like multifaceted, you know, all are nothing. Are you talking about the scene where she's like listening to the music and she's wondering why Ringo plays?
Yeah. OK, so this is the note I have for that, which is like she's sitting there listening to the song wondering why Ringo plays Angelic layer because she has so much other stuff going on because she's like already popular and she already has friends. But that's because Misaki sees Angelic layer as like the vector for her to be popular and have friends, right?
Like that's how she views the utility of this game is like, oh, this is like my chance to interact with people like as equals and we can like hang out and stuff. Whereas for Ringo, when she gives the interview with Shoko, she's basically saying that like, oh, I'm just like a when I'm playing Angelic layer, I'm just like a regular girl playing this game. So this is like Ringo's opportunity to be normal for a while.
So it's more of like they're using the game for different ends, like they get different things out of it. Yeah, you're so deep thinking. I think that works a bit. Now I will say yes, Hotoko and Shuko both like base their entire lives around this, but it makes more sense for Hotoko, who's five as opposed to Shuko, who's a whole ass adult with a child to be like actually the only thing in my life that matters is Angelic layer.
Although the way they describe like the way that Fujimori describes how like Shuko is there is really weird because she shows up and she's like, oh, it's about the champion and each one's like, OK, yeah, like what about her? Yeah, it's her day off. And she's like, oh, well, Shuko got permission to go out. Why does she have to get permission to go out? No, no, is she being a hostage? I think is my not like what's going on. Yeah. Like why is she like institutionalized? She seems completely normal.
Like I don't understand. Yeah, it is weird, right? Because she's under such strict observation and what she has to get permission to go out and like yeah, people want to control where she's going and not going. It is bizarre. It is bizarre. I mean, we get kind of a parallel because Ringo also kind of has that where it's like, oh, she has her manager, but like she can still just like ditch and go do stuff. Maybe the reason Shuko is a terrible mom is that she's not allowed to be with a kid.
Also Shuko's an adult. Like what is she going to get in trouble? She could get yelled at. Oh my God. Yeah, that's weird. I don't understand what's going on there, but hopefully we'll get more of that. Okay, I said I don't really like Ringo. Like when they're in the match and she's like talking to the crowd like, oh, let's see how much more popular I am. Like, hey, everyone, cheer for me and intimidate my opponent. Like focus on the match. That's not what she's doing. Oh my God. I hate it.
That line is funny because like because like Hikaru is putting up, you know, she's like dodging and stuff. This is before Ringo or Ranga starts shooting wave beams at her. So she's like, you know, she's dodged the stuff. They're like having a pretty good brawl and Ringo's like, yeah, nice. You aren't losing instantly. Like everybody else I fight. So I guess Ringo is also like a hot oak or she just is like wrecking everybody and like the first 10 seconds.
So then she hypes them up because she's like, yeah, we're like having a bout. Isn't this great? I don't think she's trying to intimidate Misaki. I think she's just like doing that because she's like, whoa, we're having a hype game. Let's go. I guess she's an idol, but it just feels very like about, I don't know. It's like about her and not even her doll, her angel. She's this is no, she's throwing her hands up. She's hyping up the crowd. She's pumping everybody up for like the next.
That's the MC's job. The leg of the fight. Missy. Well, the MC doesn't do it. The MC just like introduce everybody and sits there. She's got to do it. It's great. Ringo's great. We love this. No, we love the show. We love us. Ringo knows how to put on a match, you know? That's how Maria was the heel and this time Ringo is like a crowd favorite, like hyping everybody up. It's good.
During this fight, I was like, does Hikaru just have more health points than others because she's taking so many hits and not dying because it seems like in other fights, people's health points go down so quickly just by like one punch. How she's just, you know, like not losing. Like I noticed this.
It seems to me like my interpretation of this is like when Hikaru gets hit, she's getting hit on like the arms or like the side or like things that wouldn't necessarily even score a point in like boxing or MMA or something. She's able to mitigate most of these things. Whereas when she wins her fights, like she usually wins on like one big attack, but that usually attack is like to your chin or like to your like something that would knock you out instantly in real life.
So it seems like she's just getting like a critical hit. Whereas everybody else is just doing like chip damage because Karu's not getting hit full on in the way that she is hitting people when she wins her matches. Speaking of that finish, that's my interpretation. Get your own moves. Stop coughing. Hotoko bitch. Like, I hate it. But that's okay. You're not cool. Rolling Thunder's only school by Suzukat, not Hikaru. But this is where we get like this is the thing that Misaki's good at, right?
She's very good at on the fly. Yeah, she's dead from Pokemon. Just copy everyone else because she can see it once and master it immediately. Blah, blah, blah. A copying what? Yeah. Well, because like she's been doing this, right? Like in the first couple of rounds, she's been winning by using like things that Tamayo and Katara did in real life. And now she's borrowing moves from other people she's played before in matches. So like this is the thing.
Like the Pino Galaga, I mean, this is like when they talk about her and it always comes up. It's always like, oh, she's like really observant. She like knows how to like she understands what's going on and that's how she wins. And I mean, like just as like a fighter, that's what she does, right? Like her entire play style is you get attacked by somebody, you figure out how they move and then you're able to counter it. That's always what she does. She's like a counter.
She's like an Uchiha with the shoring on to do, you know, like copy whatever your opponent's doing. Yeah, I like it. I don't. It's goofy to me that they're asserting that angels don't use weapons, but then Frong is able to shoot wind beams. Yeah. And then the whole like Athena with the wings, like what are the laws of physics? I'm like, what do you mean? There's no there's no weapons. Athena shot a giant spirit bomb. What is that? What?
Yeah, you think this is like martial arts, but it's confusing the the restrictions of what angels are capable of doing. And speaking of Athena, her mom, I'm like, she's only proud if Misaki wins. Like what would have happened if she had lost or she'd been like, no one knows. You describe this as malice of everybody. You think everybody is so evil in this show. Everybody's pretty nice in this show. I don't know. It's wrong with me. I have a couple more notes about Ringo's interview.
That's pretty funny. There's one part where she says that like, oh yeah, people speculate that I use angelic layer to de-stress, but that's not true. I'm always stressed basically because she's like, I mean, what she actually says is like, no, I'm just always the same whether I'm playing angelic layer or whether I'm being an idol. But to me, it's like, yeah, I'm always stressed. This does not help me at all. That's like, I don't find video games relaxing. Some people do that. I don't.
I'm relaxing. Just have had this conversation with all of like, I have this conversation all the time where it's like, I don't like relax in the way that like people normally talk about relaxing, you know, like sitting on a beach or like, you know, getting a massage, like none of that stuff relaxes me. I'm always just like, I want to be doing something. Yeah. You just want to be productive with your time.
Although I used to be like that or I, you know, as a kid would wake up at five in the morning naturally on weekends because I didn't want my weekend sleeping. Oh my God. But now I don't know if it's my terrible diet, but now I like nap so much. Like I just nap my problems away. I just, I feel like waking up at five, I feel like waking up at five a.m. just isn't the normal thing to do.
That's what I did as a kid because it's like, oh, you know, I wasn't allowed to play video games during the week at my mom's house. That was my time to play video games. I see. Don't waste your time sleeping. I mean, I guess like farming sins are relaxing like Coral Island or my time at Sandrock, but not intense triple A games. What I'm saying is that I would play Angelic Lair. It was real to not de-stress because I can't de-stress. It's so cool. People wouldn't. That all for episode nine.
Angelic Lair episode 10 is called The Mean Sisters and the Targeted Hikaru. We open on the third match of the first round, which is Hotoko and Suzuka versus Unnamed Deus and her angel Natasha. That's a pretty cool angel. Suzuka starts the match. Sorry. Natasha looks cool. I haven't known that. Yeah. Suzuka starts the match by disappearing and then reappearing upon Natasha and kicking her so hard she's knocked out in one hit.
The peanut gallery is annoyed that she keeps winning and vows to defeat her. Unfortunately, the two most adamant members will have to face Misaki before Hotoko and the rest of the gallery isn't all that confident that they'll win that matchup. We cut to a match between Hikaru and some angel with spiked knuckles and they appear to be boxing.
Hikaru lands a knockout hit qualifying Misaki for the top eight and then after the match, Hotoko is waiting for Misaki and she is pumped that Misaki is still in the tournament. They still have a shot at facing each other again. Hotoko starts talking again about how age and height don't matter in Angelic Layer and then re-ups her promise with Misaki to make it to another match in the tournament. The two most spiteful members of the peanut gallery are annoyed that Hotoko is so hyped.
At this point, we get their names, or we get one of their names, but I just looked them both up. The two of them are sisters. The younger one is named Alice and the older one is named Motoko. Motoko, who is the deus who actually has to play, affirms that they can't lose to Misaki and Alice produces what looks like a tiny dart. Because clearly they're scheming something. We cut to outside where Misaki, Tamio, and Kataru are all eating lunch.
Often the distance, Ogata is still looking for Shuko from last episode. Kataru compliments Misaki's cooking and Tamio tackles him saying that he's following her dating advice, which I don't think he's actually doing. In the background, Ringo sneaks around in her terrible disguise. Misaki spots her instantly and invites her over. Ringo is astounded that Misaki recognizes her and she and Tamio do a comedy bit together.
Ringo tells her that she was escaping from her manager and decides that they should all be friends. They start watching a match where a speed type angel, the same type as Akaru, named Blanche, defeats her opponent. We see that her deus is one of the peanut gallery members and her name is Kaede. In the next match, we see the other peanut member, Sai, and her angel, Shira Hime. We learn that she was last year's runner up.
She wins her match very easily and Misaki is excited that she might get to place against some good opponents. Then Ojiro shows up. Both Ringo and Kataru are surprised that Misaki and Ojiro know each other and Ringo tells Misaki that Ojiro was the runner up in Nationals two years ago. Or two years in a row, sorry. Ojiro reminds Misaki that her match is starting soon and she should probably get back to the arena.
As she leaves, he cryptically comments that she is so alike to her mother but only Ringo notices this. Ben Ringo has to run away from her manager, but not before rounding back to get one of Misaki's sandwiches because she's like a cartoon character now. Kataru looks over at Ojiro and Tamiyoteezes him that his love rile has arrived as she starts to grapple him. Shukou sees Misaki running to the arena but says nothing. Shukou shows up and asks why Shukou didn't say anything to Misaki.
Shukou says that she can't face her yet, and Shukou teases that she could just like force them together in the same room she wanted to, but Shukou says that she wouldn't do it. By pushing her wheelchair. By pushing her wheelchair. Misaki enters the lobby and sees Alice and Madoka waiting for her. Madoka introduces herself as Misaki's next opponent. Alice poses as a fan of cool angels and asks as she can see Hikaru. Misaki is excited to meet a fellow fan of cool angels and lets Alice hold Hikaru.
Alice plants the pin on her. The match is about to begin and Misaki has some new fans. The announcer introduces Madoka and her angel Mao and we learn that she is steady in kung fu. Hotoko is being interviewed by Shukou, or no I'm sorry. Hotoko is being interviewed by Shoko, god I hate that their names are like that. But gets distracted by the match. The match starts and we learn that Mao is totally a cat girl with a tail and everything. Mao rushes in and her and Hikaru start trading blows.
Mao is winning and Madoka comments that maybe she doesn't even need a cheat, she can just win this game normally. In the control room Ichan explains that Fuji Mori, or explains to Fuji Mori that Alice, the younger sister, is a genius angel builder and she makes the angels for her sister. Misaki starts figuring out Madoka's fighting pattern and Hikaru starts beating Mao. Feeling cornered Alice activates her device which lags Hikaru causing her to trip.
Mao is able to land a hit on her while she's tripping. Hotoko, Ojiro and Ichan immediately clock that there's some foul play going on as Misaki wonders why Hikaru is responding so slowly. We see a worried Shukou as it looks like Hikaru is going to lose as we cut to correct. This is an intense episode, yeah. The peanut gallery at the beginning when Madoka is trash talking Misaki. Kaede, the glasses chick, gives her the coldest ice glare I've ever seen.
Because we see that she's kind of known for her healing smile. She's so cheery looking but then she's so stone cold looking at Madoka. It's cool. Yeah, I mean she seems like a mom kind of character or something. Like mother. Isn't her... Blanche is like a nurse outfit. Blanche is like a nurse, yeah. But maybe her personality doesn't match. Or she just takes this very seriously and doesn't like that these people are doubting someone. Or she knows that Madoka sucks and is going to totally lose.
Yes, or that. Okay, so in this fight between Mao and Hikaru, Hikaru lands a rolling thunder. But that's not... Because that's been like a KO hit up to this point but that didn't do the trick for this fight enough with the stealing of rolling thunder. Good God. No, that's good. She should just steal everybody's moves. At the end she should blast Athena with a giant energy ball. That would be funny.
I did like Ringo more with the terrible animated like little 2D running away in her manager following. Oh yeah. This is our comedy bit character for a little bit. First off, Suzuka stays winning. But her opponent Natasha actually looks pretty cool. She has like a futuristic looking jumpsuit on. I do like her design. It's pretty good. It's better than some of the other designs. The angels are so much better animated than the rest of the people in the series.
On the layer, I feel like a lot more effort was put in there. Yes, because that's what the people came to see. I guess, I guess. But it's like, oh, what could have been if the whole show had this level of effort? Yeah, Hikaru in her fight that she's having, the one where she's like boxing, she's copying her opponent's fighting style. So this is like further evidence for me that this is what she does, right?
Like because she starts boxing, she's like doing, she's like pulled in, she's ducking down under punches and stuff like that. Like she fights nothing the way that she fought the last Matt chickens Ringo. Good stuff. I like copycat Misaki. I think that's fun. I like that her whole thing is being very observant and being able to figure out what other people are doing. She basically just downloads her enemies every time it's great.
When they're having lunch, Misaki and Kotaro just kind of looking at each other with a little blushy blush. I just wrote to Maya is the biggest cock block ever. Like as soon as she senses any kind of connecting, she's ruins the moment. So after after Misaki's match, Hadoka was like waiting for her outside and she's doing like the cool guy pose. Yeah, Lee gets the wall. Where she's like her back's against the wall and one of her legs is up like against it and she's just like waiting for it.
Oh, I didn't see you there. It's really good. Hadoka's great. I know. She's really excited that Misaki is like still winning and they probably will get to see each other like in the finals, I guess. When Alice and Madoka are like doing their little scheme and they're like going to go up to Misaki right then, but then Tomahyou just runs up and like picks Misaki up and holds her up like she's an airplane. Like she's a tiny child. It's very funny. Back to Ringo with the I feel bad for.
Okay. This is like a common thing in anime, right? Like somebody's a manga artist or somebody's an idol and their poor manager is always like lagging behind trying to, you know, get them to follow schedule and stuff. But then there are like bad managers too. Like the guy who made NSYNC in the back street boys. So then I'm like, I don't know. Are we team poor managers or not?
Yeah. It's in this, in this case, it feels better to me because Ringo specifically says she's like, oh yeah, I had all these days blocked off because I was expecting to like stay in the tournament and not get eliminated round one. But now that I don't, my manager scheduled all this other stuff for me to do that I don't care about. So that makes sense to me because it's like, oh, this is just like stuff that was scheduled at the last second. Of course she doesn't care about this.
I do think it's very funny when Misaki sees Ringo and Ringo is like, how did you know it was me? And Misaki's like, you're wearing the same outfit as yesterday. Yeah. Yeah. And then Tomahyou's like, call her Misaki. She's like pushing the nickname so hard. The campaign of hers. She knows it. She does branding. She's doing the branding. We do see the footage of Blanche and Shirahime and Blanche is so cute and Shirahime is freaking bad ass.
I think I have a preference because Suzuka and Shirahime are both like heavier weight dolls, I think, like larger billed dolls and they're both so cool. Yeah. Shirahime is like wearing, you want to describe the outfit? Shirahime is basically, it's kind of got Japanese kimono-esque. Basically she's wearing like a bodysuit and then she has sleeves that are like a kimono. And she's, it's like all white because they call the day a sigh. Like, who the color personified ice?
Some weird, basically ice queen like is her moniker because she's so stone cold and her angel is too. Because in the fight we see she's just like, enemy angel comes in attacks her and she just grabs her and like chucks her to the ground and that's that. Like she barely had them moved to dominate. So cool. Well, Shirahime, I mean, Shirahime is white and Hime is princess. So she's the ice queen. Screaming in the crowds too. Like I'd be size fan. She's so cool. Yeah. It's okay.
It's very funny though. The opponent, Shirahime's fighting. It's like a weird harlequin. Oh yeah. Yeah. With like the pointy hat, like the little two, two points coming out of the hat. It's like the juxtaposition here. Yeah. The things the random, like unimportant angels that they design are funny. She's like the coolest, most stoic angel and she's fighting an actual clown. And then Ocho comes up to them while they're eating ice and I'm like, is he hitting on what he's got to be like 16 right?
Almost like flirting with a 12 year old. I'm like, that's concerning. And then later when Misaki goes up and there's like people screaming her name and some adult ass man is saying like, I love you Misaki. I'm like, ooh, creepy. Oh my God. These are people just cheering for stuff. Okay. I can twist anything to be negative. I can make everything bad if I'm in my mind. I can't believe Ojiro shows up and doesn't say, doesn't mention that he knows your mom. He knows your mom.
He calls your mom by her first name. What? That's confusing. He's an insane man. I can all believe he just doesn't say anything. It's not a love triangle. Stop saying that. It is. Misaki, her mom and Ojiro love triangle. Although now I'm confused because she seems like she likes Kotara now. This episode is some contradicting things in these episodes. There's some stuff happening. It's tough, you know. I have some comments about Ranga.
First off, apparently Ranga is like a derogatory term for residents in Australia. Is it? Or not? I mean, it's four red heads. It's not like it's not like a slur. I think it's just like a negative term. Okay. Like a blonde, maybe equivalent? I guess. But it's supposed to be, I guess it's a playoff of like a orangutan and they're like orange. Oh. And so it's like you're calling them like a monkey guy. Okay. Good to know.
But the reason I bring that up, I looked that up at this point because I'm like, you know, it's kind of a weird name. I wonder if that's anything it is. But Ringo says like, one point Misaki is like, Oh, is Ranga okay? And Ringo is like, Oh yeah, she just needed her outer skin changed. What? They have outer skins? You can change their outer skin? The angels? Yeah. That's what she says. She's like, Oh yeah, her outer skin just had to be changed. And I'm like, that's gross.
Are you like peeling off the skin? Yeah, that is gross. What's going on? How do you assemble these things? It looks like they just come out pre-made, but like, are you actually putting on skin? Well, I guess if they're like little androids where it's all machinery and then just like a soft, soft skin off like it's like Terminator. Ex Machina. Is it like, I don't know. Oh, and she, okay. She's embarrassed at one point. And even then she's like, yeah, she does the cat sound even then.
She does the cat sound. Yeah. That's such that's her surprise noise. Okay. So I'm confused. I'm confused about how all of this works. So, okay. And in Hot Oco's match, she makes it to the semi-finals. So that's the top four. And then Sai clearly also makes it and Kaiyé they make it. So I guess it's Madoka and Misaki for the fourth spot. Right. Even though it kind of comes out of order. Also, if you have 24 in combatants that doesn't, that doesn't, that doesn't lead to like a tournament.
Like it needs to be a multiple of two for that to, but also, okay. So if Ojiro won the Kansai games two years in a row, that means he beat Hot Oco, which means Hot Oco must lose to Sai. Yeah. Oh, cause well, they were saying Sai was the runner. That's what they said. Did she say she's the second runner up or just the runner up? Well, I don't know. Cause they say this is the Kansai games, but they're at Kanto right now. Right.
And then they talk about Nationals and he's the runner up in Nationals cause Shuko is the champion, but I don't understand. Cause is there another tournament after this? I feel like there isn't. I don't know. Or maybe there is. I don't know. You know what, if in this world of Angelic Layer, is it only in Japan you would think that maybe this would be popular everywhere and then there'd be like a World Series or something. Also I, okay.
So in the vein of like how this is run, does the winner like get anything like money, a prize? Apparently you get held hostage and you have to ask permission to leave. That's true. Oh, where you think it's a good thing, but it's bad when you win. Let's see. My next note, all caps. Shuko, talk to your daughter. She does not.
Nope. Madoka has the most dynamic Angel call yet cause she like does all these like kung fu punches when she's like saying her little entry call cause everyone else has just like said it and chucked it, but she like is making actions as she does it. Like her, she just makes a cat girl.
Like Mao is just a cat girl with like say an armor from Dragon Ball V. Cause that seems to be the theme cause we see, I don't remember if it shows this or if it's the next episode, but I know that this is like not their first angel. Like apparently if the angel loses, like it did to Suzuka, they just scrap it and start a new. And so I think this Mao is similarly designed. So that seems to be the thing. The sisters have the kung fu kind of asks aesthetic with the ears and tail.
But it is weird that it's like one makes the doll and one plays the dais. Yeah. Yeah, each on comments on this is saying that like, oh yeah, last year Alice made this. Yeah. And like, yeah, because Madoka doesn't make her own doll. She doesn't have the connection with it. She's like not as good as using it because she doesn't like understand how it's made. Also Madoka is such a Japanese name and Alice is so Western. It's like a Western name.
Yeah. Cause it's like, it's like the Japanese Katakana version of Alice. So it's like Adi-su. So it's just like, it's not, it's who are your parents? How are they named when they're kids? What's going on? Well, I'm sure they suck. Like all the other parents in Angelica. They also have terrible, just like Maria's parents. They have terrible tastes and names. Yes. I love the name Madoka. Madoka. Listen to manga. Although I feel like it's always like a villain or it's like the main girl name.
It's always a mean girl that I've seen that name used. I just know it from Madoka Magica where that's the name character's name and she's very nice. Oh, I haven't watched that because apparently it's very sad and I don't want that. Yeah. It is sad. Is that technically Shoujo? Are we going to cover that? That's like horror or something. No, it's not. It's magic girls. But it's like definitely like, what if magic girls were dark? Yeah. But it actually is good. I like that one.
I don't like the other dark magic girls stuff. I think it's bad. It's scary. It seems scary. Ugh. Like I'm settling. Yeah, I think you'd like, you're so doom and gloom about all of this. You're like giving everybody the worst, like the least charitable reads you can. I'm a very, I'm a negative Nancy. I just, yeah. I think. I know. We already got past the Sarah Nile is an hour about how you want humanity to be destroyed this week. Maybe as we consume more fluff, it will, it'll purify my soul.
Oh, okay. Sure. Okay. When the, when I was dawn on all the folks that something is a rye, like cheating is happening, Oduro in the crowd says something along the lines of like, oh, looks like some kind of naughty trick is happening. Like, oh God, you saying naughty is like kind of pervy. Like I don't like you using that terminology. Okay. Why are you reading into this? Like, oh, it's like a weird creep. He's not. It's because I know something about him that you don't. Oh, cool.
Can't wait to learn this. Yeah, I had to, I had to mention, I had to go back and mention all of the times when Alice had a crush on Oduro because I watched the like, um, next time. Oh yeah. And like, there's a part where he goes and talks to her and I'm like, oh, shit. Like I have to include this retroactively in the summer. What, what somebody, Ringo, she seemed to know a lot about the contestants. So she was telling Misaki and that he's called the young nobleman of the layer or something.
So he's, I guess, just like the male fixation of the Angela Glare scene. It's like, I'm starting to be creepy. I don't like this. I don't like, like you've been joking about it being a weird, it's nice. It's just there's a small and I was just assuming that was a joke. I don't know what they were saying. I would be so bummed. It's not like you're particularly attached to him. No, but like, I don't want the show to be weird. It's been nice so far. Yeah. I got like goosebumps.
I was kind of like excited. Yeah. I guess the cliffhanger, but I was like, yeah, it was a good ending and I'm excited for the next episode. Uh, I'm worried for Hotoko though. Why? It's she's made ass. She's in the semi finals, right? But it's like, if Misaki is going to fight the other ones, then she's going to lose. Oh, you mean if Misaki, okay, you're assuming Misaki is just going to beat everyone.
So yeah, because we foreshadowed Kiety and Sai so much that it's like, well, she's probably going to have to fight both of them. But that means Hanako is going to lose and they're not going to get their rematch. You're so perceptive, Joe. I mean, there's also like a million. I mean, how many episodes left are there? 16? We're not even halfway. Next episode will be halfway through the series. It's good. It's good so far. The show's good. Yeah. Yeah, it's heating up. It's getting more intense.
I'm excited because yeah, this is where it's more skilled. Like everyone's better at this level. So it's going to be more about the fight itself and not external factors like the insecurity about an idol or like having fun playing. Like it'll be more intense. Like everyone's in it to win it at this point. So it's yeah, it'll be more focused on the fighting, which will be super cool. We do the recommendations first. What do you recommend, Sarah?
What do you have to recommend the people when they're not watching the newest episodes of Angelic Layer? I'm going to recommend something near and dear to my heart. I'm going to recommend Persona 3 Portable, not reload or not reloaded because it can't play as the female protagonist, which is a fan favorite and is stupid and I hate it and I refuse to play it because of that.
But Persona 3 Portable was re-released on like all the things last year and it's a more visual novel style of the Persona 3 game in it. Yeah, it's how you got I got into Persona. You got into Persona. I let you my Persona 3 Portable PSP copy. You played that and then now we've been Persona fans ever since, but it's got killer. Like the music is so good. It's so good. Yeah, it's just so fun. It's a long game. So long game. It's really good. It's an RPG. I immensely enjoy it and recommend it.
So I am recommending an anime this time on our anime podcast. I've been watching FreeRen beyond Journey's End. Oh, that's a lot of the elf chick, right? She's cute. Yes. So this is a series that is about an elf named FreeRen who is like, you know, has like, it's like a high fantasy world, so elves have like a century long lifespan or something. And she was part of the like party of heroes that like defeated the demon king or whatever 80 years ago.
And then she just kind of wandered around after that. And then she kind of like went back and realized that like, oh, all of my like former compatriots got old and died while I was off doing other stuff. And it's kind of like a nice, it's a very nice like series.
So basically like about how you should spend the time actually befriending your friends and like how to spend time with people and how to make things that like actually matter to you and to like invest in relationships and not just being aloof all the time. And so is it kind of like slice of life that just happens to be in a fantasy setting? Like is it combat heavy or is it mostly just relationships? There is.
I mean, like they're the kind of inciting incident of like what FreeRen's doing and a plot at them. And like right now is about, um, she like regrets that she didn't spend more time with like the main party hero guy Himmel. And she learns about a place where you can go and talk with the dead. Um, that's super far more dear like the demon territory. Um, I mean, he definitely did for her, whether she did or not kind of up in the air. She's like pretty aloof about the whole thing.
And so like she wants to go and like talk with some of like her old dead comrades essentially. So she's traveling up there with like one of her new companions. Oh, never mind. Old members like apprentice. So in connective to adoptive daughter. So she's traveling with her and like another one that's like the other guys protege. So it's kind of like she's hanging out with the like the next generation of some of those.
Yeah. Um, except, you know, she's like the mentor and she's like, eh, being a mentor is kind of weird. And so there's just like a lot of stuff going on there.
So there is like, you know, they do, there is like some fighting, like they fight some demons and they do some stuff, but it is also just kind of like about hanging out and what it's like to be in a party traveling with people, like in a little adventuring squad and like taking the time to get to know everybody and not just like going through the motions. Like she kind of did last time. So that's, that's pretty fun. I think it's really good.
It's really well thought out, much more character depth that I think you normally would expect in this kind of thing. So it's good. Yeah. So I've been seeing early crunchy roles seems to be promoting it a lot on their socials. Now we can get into our new Apple podcasts review. If you enjoyed this podcast, please rate it on whatever podcast platform you are listening to this on that allows ratings, which I'm pretty sure is all of them. Um, please rate us five stars.
If you rate us five stars and leave a comment on Apple podcasts, I will read it most likely unless you're saying some stuff. I'm not going to read on the podcast at this and during this section. So a recent review we got is from Caitlin BB1234. Caitlin says, Carming and funny podcasts love this podcast. It's rare to find a good anime podcast. Sarah and Joe have great chemistry and really bounce off, really bounce off each other. I feel like I'm listening to a conversation with my friends.
I look forward to hearing all about other show Joe anime as they cover. Highly recommend listening five stars. Thank you. Caitlin BB1234. Oh, can that be? Yeah, you know who knows? Could be anybody. Could be me. That's the first one. I already left a comment. I left a comment that just says love to see it because I don't think it matters what you write down. And also I'm not going to read that. Okay, but no, it's not. It's my sister.
And she's essentially, she's been telling me on the side like, hey, you should cover KamiSamaKiss as your next series. Because I think she just wants to, because she, she watched Angelic Layer, but I don't think it's one of the ones she likes as much. I know she's just selfishly is trying to get me to pick where her next is going to be. I think I'll do a poll on our Instagram or something about what series we should cover next. I think we should really try to do an actual show Joe.
That'd be, that'd be advisable. Become pop. Yeah. I think we should do a real show Joe show. I think we should live up to the expectations of the show. I think we should pick one that like people like, but we also like, I like to keep the depth of it. I don't like to just like, Yes. Well, you're very good at actually, I'm just sitting on everything, but you are actually like doing deep thoughts and I'm just like, what if the worst case scenario was happening?
That's my contribution to our discussions. Yeah. So we'll finally be at the halfway mark next episode. Halfway. Hopefully you guys are enjoying the ride. If you have any questions. Yeah. You can email us at show Joe pod at gmail.com, spelled the same way as the series or podcast title. Yeah. If you're like, mmm, Sarah, you're really bombing me out with all your stuff. People may not know. We record over over distance.
I know it just feels like we're riffing so well as if we're in the same room, but no, we're very, when you've been friends for so long, it just appears that way. Yeah. I think I commented on the pot low like podcast subreddit, but there's a subreddit. Yeah. I tried network here. Okay. I try to make this a success. Oh, okay. I think you made a subreddit. Oh, no, no. What? Podcasting subreddit, not us specifically. Yeah. I'm so glad you're like a social media manager.
I would never be able to do this stuff. I'm on it. If you need any like natural language processing AI, that's where I can be of use using my profession. How is that? What I do? Good time. Oh, dear. Okay. I was streaming, you were there and I, you know, we were saying, oh, we really got to do something. Cause we haven't, you know, we can't physically hang out anymore. Um, and we hadn't gained in a while. Yeah. Because I lost my body in the war 10,000 years ago.
And I am an evil spirit that isn't happening. You're living my dream of leaving this hellhole that I live in. What? Texas is not that hard to leave Texas. It's so hot. I know this week I had a moment where I was like, I like wrote down a bunch of things about what it's like living in Indianapolis cause like that's not far from you. And the rent is so cheap. Uh, and apparently the winters are only like in the mid 20s to 30, uh, degree Fahrenheit, which seems lovely to me.
Do you want to know what the temperature is right now? Yes. 49 degrees. Oh, see that's lovely. It was freaking like 87 degrees this week in March. Yeah. Sorry you live in an oven. I hate it. Just. Are you living a hot place? I just, oh, it makes me mad. Like, yeah, I got out here someday. My dream of leaving Texas will come true. But yeah, we start the podcast just as a way for us to keep in touch.
And I, you know, this is something that I've had a lot of fun working on and I've like put a lot of time into. This has been fun. And we're going to keep doing this forever until we watch every show Joe. And they ever not many are coming out. So there is an end at the point. We're going to die. We're going to be on our death bed and I'm going to be like, oh, I got to record the last episode of. I can't let down our top listeners, me and you. I need to listen to. I need this. It's true.
I'm tired of listening to other people. I need to listen to me more. That's right. I need to remember that I have fun sometimes. We're so charming. How could you not be devastating if we ever ended? Well, anyway. Until until next time. Don't hand your doll over to some weird girl, even if she wants to hold it before you're about to have a big match. Don't just hand over Hikaru. It's Hikaru. What are you doing? Trust no one. Trust no one. That's right. Show Joe. Expect the worst out of humanity.
Learn how we want humanity to die next week by tuning in. Yes. If dinosaurs want to do it, we'll have to find something else. I'm going to say biblical flood. All right. See you guys later.