Monthly Log - August 2025

As usual, some of the stuff I watched or read in the month of August.

Watched

• Finished Shinzō Ningen Casshan. The show's highly episodic nature can lead to each individual episode to do interesting things on their own. But it also means there are few major changes in the overarching status quo of the central characters. Perhaps the most notable is just the reveal to the Andro Force and to the public that Casshan is a synthetic man. Otherwise, the relations remain the same until the final two episodes, which are like a two-part finale (both with Nunokawa's enshutsu). The story is simple enough to easily predict what things will be at stake for the heroes in the finale, but it's still sufficiently exciting to see which stakes they would be able to secure and what sacrifices might still need to be made.
• Watched April Showers Bring May Flowers episodes 5-9. Whatever combination of character interaction the show presents, they are always delightful to see.

Manga grade school boys are precious#ブスに花束を pic.twitter.com/XaIX72aDcA

— Hal @ 嘘つき達の国 (@HalimunM91) August 24, 2025

• Watched Secrets of the Silent Witch episodes 5-9. The conflicts, climax, and conclusion in this story arc are exquisite. There's some biting nobles' politics, a startling reveal, thrilling race against time, and Monica's growing determination to become someone who can do things she feels important is poignant.
• Watched Princess-Session Orchestra episodes 16-19. So, it has come to the point where the Band Snatch are confirmed to be Alicepians, though the main characters still don't know that yet. Looking forward to see that one happens.
• Watched CITY The Animation episodes 5-8. Episode 5 really feels like it's the best show of the spirit of CITY so far, to see everybody going about in the town and gathering together. But it also makes me think, if they already pull up such a thing in episode 5, what would they pull for the finale later?

• Watched Dealing with Mikadono Sisters is a Breeze episodes 5-8. Yuu and Kazuki's date is very enjoyable to see. This may not be an actual fan lingo, but I want to say that Yuu has so much otouto energy. On the other hand, maybe Yuu is a genius in something after all; charming girls when it's not expected, lol.

• Started the anime adaptation of Miracle Girls. I had expected the anime to be different from the manga, but I didn't expect that it would practically skip the early story arcs. Anno's (not that one) directing is pretty interesting. But with the show starting at a later stage in the story could make it confusing without having the context. After establishing some stuff for the long-term plot for a couple of the first episodes, though, it eventually starts getting into cozier everyday life scenarios for the sisters, and the directing may work better in this stage since there's more emphasis on emotions instead.
• Watched the stop motion animation anthology The House on Netflix. Making use of the same house setting and characters having unhealthy attachment to the strange house, the three works in it still give different experiences, from horror to weird to healing.
• Watched the Chaplin short Making a Living. In 1914, buying a car to throw it off a hill for filming a car crash scene was astonishing. But, unfortunately, a car crash scene in itself maybe doesn't feel that special anymore from a modern viewpoint. Like, despite knowing that fact, when the scene comes, I forgot about it and just see it like I would have seen a car crash scene from other films.
• Watched the 1954 film 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea. I ended up reading fascinating details about the origins of Captain Nemo's character in Verne's books and how early English language translations of Jules Verne's works butchered them.
• Watched the Doraemon film Mugen Sankenshi. The plot is essentially the same as the manga version, but other details like creature designs can be so different it makes me curious to learn the details of the production pipeline of these films. I know the manga and the films were produced concurrently, but how much materials were shared or discussed in the process?
• Watched Hello WeGo!. is a pretty nice casual SF. The machines being used by the kids like bicycles for IRL kids feels so fresh. They race in those in the climax even. It can give various ideas for possible ways to do mecha story outside of war settings.

Readings

• Reread Kobato. volumes 4-6, When I think about ehoba's observation that 'angel on Earth' is an early archetype of magical girl, I think there could be a strong basis to say that Kobato is, indeed, a magical girl.
• Read Soul Eater NOT volumes 1-4. It's a rather eclectic mix of everyday life situations and some tense plot about Shaula the witch infiltrating Death City and the hunt for her. My favorite part of this series is how it covers the backstory of Kim and Jacqualine team, though.
• Read Danshi Kōkōsei wo Yashinaitai Onēsan no Hanashi volumes 2-5. The comedy of this manga works because the main character has a reasonable balance of desire and common sense that provides for funny internal conflicts. If he only had unrestrained desires, he would be annoying as his friend Ryōsuke; and if he were too commonsensical, he would be bland. I didn't expect a turn of events that threatens the status quo to appear among these volumes, though. Even if the status quo is upheld in the end, I'm not sure how I feel about the way the situation gets resolved.
• Read the first volume of Midorikawa Yuki's older manga series Akaku Saku Koe. has a pretty interesting premise and some elements that you'd find in her future works like Natsume's Book of Friends. I still don't quite get the use of the crime-busting element, though. Still, it's a good experience to see Midorikawa-sensei at an earler point in her career.
• Read I am Their Silence: A Barcelona Murder Mystery. I like Jordi Lafebre's art style in general. And while it does so in a different way from and not as ambitious as another one of his work Always Never, it still makes good use of non-linear narrative order to take readers through the mysteryies of the murder and the characters until every piece of the puzzle comes together neatly.
• Rereading Dune. Haven't read it again in a long time, so some of my memories of it were out of place and I had been piecing them together in good order as I went through the rereading. One point that particularly intrigued me was revisiting what Paul and Reverend Mother Mohiam actually discussed about the thinking machines. As few the details might be, read carefully, they implied that the consequences of those machines were not so much the machines turned against humans a la The Terminator or The Matrix, but rather, they hinder the development of humans' own potentials through dependence and allow some humans to use those machines to oppress other humans. Since this conversation appears while Paul was inquiring Mohiam about the purpose of the gom jabbar test, I believe one also needs to read this conversation in the context of how the Bene Gesserit conceptualizes the distinction between 'human' and 'animals' (I believe their view is that the thinking machines had never really achieve 'humanity' the way they understand what makes someone a 'human' and not an 'animal').