Wave, Listen to Me! Anime Review: Minare Koda and Taking a Chance

Stability can be a double-edged sword. Having a routine and knowing that by the end of the month, your bank account's gonna have some sweet, sweet moolah to fund your pleasures and vices is pretty great. But at the same time, it can foster contentment. And for some, what is contentment but a state where you're blissfully unaware of how hollow and boring your life has become?

I've written before about how most of us live in obscurity. We look for a decent job and try to tolerate it while cultivating happiness outside of our careers. Most of our dream careers go out the window when the realities of life slap us in the face.

But what if life slaps you with something different? Something that never really entered your radar?

Well, for Minare Koda in Wave, Listen to Me!, that's exactly what happens.

Minare, a quick-witted restaurant server, is suddenly thrusts into the world of radio

A Mangaka's Weirdly Wonderful Workplace Review: Work, Passion & People

"Life changes based on who you cross paths with"

The above line is a direct quote from Episode 12 of A Mangaka's Weirdly Wonderful Workplace  also known as This is a Workplace Where You Can't Help But Smile, or Egao no Taenai Shokuba Desu in Japanese. It may not seem like a groundbreaking statement, but it is something that we working adults rarely stop to think about.

The need for basic necessities drives us to not expect anything more than the tolerable in our professional lives. Of course, this isn't the case for everybody. But for many of us, careers are simply seen as a means to an end.

But what happens when your career is an actual passion? What if you are one of the few who dreamed of and worked hard to reach a profession that is more than just a source of your next vacation, game console, or body pillow?

A Mangaka's Weirdly Wonderful Workplace is an anime that gives us a look at what that world can be like—and how someone can avoid becoming jaded and losing that spark.

Futami, our main heroine, is an emotional wreck who panics at the prospect of submitting her storyboards in the middle of the night

Snack Basue Anime Review: A Comedic Reprieve From Everyday Life

"For those of us who deal with stress at work and in real life, isn't a snack kind of like another world?"

Adulthood is funny, isn't it? As kids, we dream of becoming great individuals admired by others. Our visions of the future are limitless, with the innocence of youth shielding us from the challenges that might get in the way. But as we get older, insurmountable challenges—or just plain bad luck—get in the way. The twinkle in our eyes gets replaced by the cold, bleak cynicism of adulthood.

Well, that is the case for a lot of us, anyway.

Instead of becoming great people whose names are etched in history, we live in anonymity. We get yelled at at work, balance our budgets, and take care of the kids. We are saddled with the responsibilities of life.

It is this burden that causes us to long for some reprieve—a place where we can just hang out and decompress while talking about nothing in particular. For Tatsu, Yamada, Morita, and the rest of its customers, Snack Basue is that place.

Akemi gets the people in Snack Basue hyped as she sings a Thai song... she doesn't speak Thai...

Super Cub Anime Review: How Koguma's World Opens Up

"No parents, no money, no hobbies, no one who I can call friends, or even dreams for the future. That's right, I'm a girl who has nothing."

It's intriguing how, as humans, there is a clear distinction between being alive and actually living. Being alive is biological and can be concretely defined by having a pulse. Actually living life is different. It is the deviation from the simple urges of biology and the pursuit of something that isn't a necessity for our biological functions... or something like that.

At the beginning of Super Cub, Koguma is definitely alive. But that's just about it.

Koguma, the show's nondescript heroine, lives in the rural city of Hokuto in Yamanashi Prefecture. She lives alone, relying on a limited budget to fund her basic needs. She cycles through the mountainous landscape of the area to get to school, and she mainly eats ready-to-eat meals over rice.

The friendless Koguma usually spends her lunch eating alone. She also tends to not heat her lunch as the class microwave usually has a line of users.

Kujima: Why Sing When You Can Warble? Review: A Story About Acceptance

“Acceptance is not about liking, agreeing, or approving. It is about acknowledging that something is what it is.” 

Imagine heading home from work one day. Everything is as usual. It's been a long day: you got stuck in traffic, and you're too tired to cook, so you decide to grab some takeout from a local diner.

As you walk back to your car, food in one hand and your keys in the other, you spot a six-foot-tall Russian bird drooling as it scavenges for coins, desperately hoping to get a taste of the local cuisine.

Yeah, that's not gonna happen in this life.

But for Arata, a first-year junior high school student, that's pretty much how he meets Kujima—the cuter version of Punpun.

Arata meets Kujima in Kujima: Why Sing When You Can Warble

With You and the Rain Anime Review: Finding Magic in a Story With No Goal

"Sometimes, just because you hang out, talk, and have fun, it doesn't necessarily mean you'll become close"

Fuji and her new "dog" enjoy themselves in the bath on their first night together

Slice-of-life is one of the more well-loved genres in anime. Every season, there’s usually one that revolves around a hobby. The formula is familiar: a bubbly, extroverted newbie discovers a new interest and becomes the kohai of an introverted expert. Their shared love for the hobby brings out the best in them as they work toward getting better.

But what if there is no goal? What if the two main characters are an introverted, reclusive writer and a tanuk... I mean, a dog whose only means of communication is through a pen and a notebook?

Well, we get With You and the Rain.

From the first episode, it is clear that With You and the Rain will not present an extraordinary tale of adventure. The atmospheric sounds of the rain, the footsteps wading through small puddles, and the soft piano during the first forty seconds give the show the relaxed first impression it needs as an introduction to our two main characters.

Yowayowa Sensei Anime Review: An Unapologetically Ecchi Story of Self-Improvement

 "To be average is to be free from the burden that you are exceptional" - ChatGPT

Abikura-kun never longed for the cheers of his peers or the benefits of greatness. Entering his second year of high school, he only hoped to go through the motions and get by in the background. For Abikura-kun, mediocrity IS the way of life. By keeping his friendships at a comfortable distance and surrounding himself with ordinary people, illusions of grandeur wouldn't come within a 20-foot pole of our protagonist.

Abikura-kun's new semester begins just as he hoped... until...

Hiyori Hiwamura, the eponymous Yowayowa Sensei, enters Abikura-kun's life

Hiwamura is far from the ordinary sensei Abikura had hoped for. She is an evil demon who chants curses at her students and keeps talismans in her notebook. Dubbed “Kowakowa Sensei,” or “Scary Teacher" by the student body, Hiwamura poses a threat not only to the mediocre high school life Abikura longed for, but also to the safety of the entire school... or so it seemed.