Introduction

Yesterday the Spring 2018 anime season came to an end, and today the Summer 2018 season begins. Since 3 of the 6 series I was watching this season finished last week (not including continuing seasons), we only have Megalo Box, My Hero Academia S3, and Gun Gale Online to talk about today.

Megalo Box

The finale of Megalo Box was both a blessing and a curse. On one hand it was one of the most exciting episodes of the season, but on the other hand the conclusion left me feeling unsatisfied. Regardless, Megalo Box cemented itself as the best new anime of the season.

I have two main complaints about this final episode. The first is that Joe won the fight, although we didn’t actually see it happen, but we were made to believe one or both of the fighters died as a result. I think a death or two during the finale would have sealed the show as the gritty ’90s style anime it tried to be.

However, my other complaint may actually be even more serious. Yūri was still severely injured from the surgery to remove his gear while fighting Joe, and yet Joe only barely defeated him. This means that if Yūri kept his gear, or even just had more time to heal, he would have defeated Joe.

This alone doesn’t really matter, but the fact that Sachio gives water to Yūri so he won’t have anything to complain about if he loses didn’t really matter since Yūri could always just bring up the fact he was still recovering when the fight happened. I felt that it cheapened Joe’s victory.

Sure, Joe won, but he won with a handicap, so does it really count?

My Hero Academia S3

While Megalo Box was the best new anime of the season, My Hero Academia S3 was the best anime of the season out of everything I watched. That said, this week’s episode was mainly just filler.

The UA Class 1-A students have all moved into the on-campus dorm so get ready for some anime boarding school shenanigans! The first order of business after moving into their rooms was to hold a competition to see which room had the best style.

In the end we got to see all of the students’ rooms except Bakugo’s, Tsu’s, and Mineta’s, although it’s probably for the best that Mineta’s room was skipped. I think Bakugo’s and Tsu’s could have been interesting to see though.

In the end, the winner of the competition was the guy with the Sugar Rush quirk whose name I don’t know because he’s not an important character. Also this reminds me, wasn’t there a guy in One Punch Man with the same exact super power? I think he was one of the S-Class Heroes.

Hopefully next episode will have more substance, but I wouldn’t be surprised if next week we get a recap episode or simply no episode at all since we’re moving into the Summer 2018 season.

Gun Gale Online

Gun Gale Online also finished this week and the full review of the series will be coming tomorrow. The ending of this series, however, wasn’t what I was expecting. First of all, LLENN lost Squad Jam 2 which I didn’t see coming.

That said, LLENN did end up killing Pito, but by biting her jugular instead of shooting her or using her knife. I’m not really sure why that was the direction chosen for the climax of the final episode, but it was definitely unexpected if nothing else.

Unfortunately, while the way in which LLENN killed Pito was unexpected, the reveal of Pito’s true identity was about as unimaginative as it gets. Ever since episode two or three when Pito first announced she couldn’t participate in the first Squad Jam, and there was the Elsa Kanzaki concert the same day, I knew Pito’s identity.

Well, guess who was right. Pito being Elsa Kanzaki should have been no surprise to anyone by this point in the series. It was so obvious from early on, in fact, that I hoped I was wrong because I wanted the writer of this series to be better than the writer for the main SAO series (which he still is).

I’m not sure if we’ll ever get a sequel to Gun Gale Online, but I’d be perfectly fine without one. Also, the next season of the main SAO series comes this fall and of course I’ll be watching it because apparently I hate myself.

Conclusion

Next Sunday will be my review of Summer 2018 Week 1, but as of right now I’m not planning to continue writing about My Hero Academia S3 as part of my Summer 2018 series.

For the Spring 2018 series I chose not to include anime which were continuing from the previous season, and I’m strongly considering doing the same for my Summer 2018 series solely due to the number of anime I’ll be watching/writing about.

This season I was watching six anime which started that season, but next season I have 11 anime lined up. Because of this, I may also split each week’s review into two posts to keep them from getting too long.

Love To-LIE-Angle

Love To-LIE-Angle officially ended this week and the finale was actually pretty good which isn’t something I was expecting. As with the previous episode, this one was much less ecchi than the rest of the series, but I thought that actually worked in its favor.

The final episode went for more of an emotional appeal by looking at how the relationship between Hanabi and Iori changed over the course of the series. While Konomi made an appearance near the end of the episode, I liked that Iori seemed to be the one to win over Hanabi in the end.

Also, the final episode being centered around a fireworks show seemed very fitting considering the name of the protagonist is Hanabi, which also means fireworks.

Comic Girls

Comic Girls also ended this week with a final episode about the girls moving out of the dorms. However, after Ruki, Koyume, and Tsubasa moved out for the year, Kaos was left behind alone with the Matron so she could finish the second part of her guest spot manga.

Since this episode focused more on Kaos, but without the addition of the other characters for most of the episode, I didn’t find it as entertaining as most of the rest of the series. Also, where was Fuura? Did she move out already? I don’t remember seeing her at all.

I’m also still conflicted about Kaos partially succeeding at being a manga author. I know she’s the protagonist and needs to grow as a character, but her failure was part of her charm. Hopefully we’ll get another season in the future.

Megalo Box

Megalo Box hasn’t concluded just yet, but next week’s episode will be the last. This week Yūri had his Megalo gear removed so that he can have a real fight against Joe in the finals of Megalonia.

The fact that Yūri had his gear removed like that just goes to show how similar he and Joe actually are. They’re both searching for that one opponent against whom their true strength will be brought out. Because of their similarities, at this point I feel like their match will result in a tie.

However, no matter the ending of the series, I’m sure it’ll be just as good as the rest of the series has been so far, so I’m not worried.

Hinamatsuri

Hinamatsuri came full circle with the final episode by ending with an extended scene from the beginning of the first episode of the series. We learn that Mao, the pink-haired girl stranded on a deserted island, is the same girl as we saw in the opening scene of the anime.

Apparently that opening scene takes place three years after the events of the rest of the series as Mao was traveling in an attempt to find a lead on where Hina and Anzu were living. However, with the exception of this part about Mao, the rest of the episode wasn’t anything special.

I’m hoping that there will be a second season which follows the characters from season one three years later, with the addition of Mao, but at the same time I kind of like how the series ended. I’m not sure if Hina would be the same person after three years of living a “normal” life.

My Hero Academia S3

This week’s episode was both the 12th episode of season three as well as the 50th episode of My Hero Academia overall. The good news is that it wasn’t simply a recap episode like the 50th episode of Boruto, but the bad news is that there wasn’t any action.

Instead, we watched as the police, pro heroes, and UA teachers faced the aftermath of All Might’s battle with All for One, as well as the loss of All Might as the symbol of peace. To deal with the increasing threat from villains on the lives of the students, UA is now going to open a dorm for the students to live in on campus.

All Might and Eraser Head were tasked with personally going to the homes of each of the UA students to get permission from their parents for their students to move into the dorm. It was unclear to me whether living at the dorm is a new requirement for attending UA.

Gun Gale Online

Like Megalo Box, Gun Gale Online also has one remaining episode of the season before it concludes. Because of this, I assumed that LLENN would defeat Pito this episode, leaving the next episode to wrap everything up, however, I was incorrect.

Some of the “highlights” of this episode were Pito’s lightsaber (photon sword) turning out to be double-sided like Darth Mauls, and P-chan once again becoming sentient. While I’m fine with P-chan, I don’t really like the whole photon sword thing.

Fuka and the rhythmic gymnastic girls were eliminated by choice, which was a pretty dumb turn of events if you ask me. They claim it was done to give LLENN back her fighting spirit, but it seemed more like a quick way to dispose of remaining characters since the end of the series is fast approaching.

Next episode we’ll see LLENN defeat Pito and then I assume M will retire from the match. Then, there’s apparently one other all-girl team remaining in a far corner of the map. I have no idea what could happen with them.

Love To-LIE-Angle

This week Hanabi and Iori go to the Summer festival together as Iori’s prize for winning strip ping-pong last week. Although Konomi also wanted to go to the festival with Hanabi, she goes with some other girl from her club instead.

That was basically the whole episode which was surprising because there was a distinct lack of the fan service I’ve come to expect from this series. I don’t think there was any sort of hint about what might happen next week, but it should be the final episode.

Comic Girls

In the first portion of the episode the girls had to fill out forms for school which ask about what careers they want to work towards in the future. Ruki wrote that she wanted to be a preschool teacher if being a manga artist doesn’t work out, and Koyume wrote that she’ll take over her family’s sweets business.

Kaos and Tsubasa had more trouble with coming up with alternative careers. In the end, Tsubasa wrote down “manga artist” for both her primary and secondary choices because she decided she doesn’t want to do anything else.

I believe Kaos did the same thing, but more because she wants to commit to doing something and work towards it. She mentioned that she fails at everything she tries doing, but she wants to work hard so she doesn’t fail as a manga artist.

The second part of the episode follows Kaos as she works to make her dream of becoming a manga artist come true. She submits four storyboards at once for review with the hopes that one of them will be good enough.

The first three of the four storyboards are clearly rip-offs of the manga the other main characters make, but the fourth and final one is a slice of life manga about Kaos’ life at the dorm. Since this is the only manga she’s made based on her own experiences, it’s actually good and gets accepted.

I have mixed feelings about Kaos getting one of her storyboards accepted. On one hand, I want her to succeed, but on the other hand, being a complete failure is part of her charm. We’ll see if she manages to mess it up in the next episode.

Finally, as usual, Fuura was the best character in the episode even though she only played a few small parts. I really wish her character would have gotten a bigger role after she was introduced.

Megalo Box

Every week Megalo Box is better than the last, and this week was no exception. At the beginning of the series I was predicting that Joe was going to win the entire Megalonia, but now I’m more convinced he’ll end up with a tie against Yuri since they’re so similar.

Nanbu was supposed to get Joe to throw the match against Burroughs, but I never expected it would actually happen. What I expected was for Nanbu to sacrifice his life in order to tell Joe to win Megalonia, thus reminding him of why he chose to stop throwing matches in the underground to begin with.

Instead, something similar happens, but Nanbu sacrifices his remaining eye instead of his life. While this may have been less predictable, I’m not sure if it was as impactful. I felt somewhat similar about the choice to have Joe go into the ring with Megalo gear equipped.

I actually really liked this decision at first, but I wanted Nanbu to yell at Joe to win instead of throwing the match, and then Joe would take off his gear and get serious. However, I still liked how over the course of the match Joe’s gear slowly gets broken off until he’s gearless once again.

As a final note, Burroughs’ voice actor reminded me of bad dubbing.

Hinamatsuri

This week’s episode of Hinamatsuri was pretty good as expected. The first half of the episode was about a reporter who was shadowing Nitta in order to film a short documentary about his life as a top Yakuza member. Unfortunately for the reporter, Nitta is just a nice guy.

The second half of the episode was about Nitta babysitting Anzu alone since Hina is at a skiing camp in the mountains. At first Nitta thinks that Anzu is just hiding the fact that she’s a terror like Hina, but then he gets angry when he realizes she’s actually a good kid.

He’s not mad because Anzu is a good kid, however, he’s mad because Hina isn’t a good kid in comparison to Anzu. At the end of the episode Nitta gets a phone call that says Hina has been lost in the mountains during the skiing camp.

I’m hoping this final development isn’t simply glossed over and we get to see Hina wandering around in the wilderness. This might even be a good chance to reintroduce that pink-haired psychic girl we met for one episode.

My Hero Academia S3

This episode was the best episode of the season, not just for My Hero Academia, but across everything I’m watching. We finally got to see All Might defeat All for One by using his ultimate move, United States of Smash.

Along with the fight, we got to see some more of All Might’s back story which I believe a movie is being made about. Due to the stress this fight put on his body, and the way the One for All quirk works, All Might will have to retire as a pro hero after this episode.

Let’s just take a quick second to look at the moves used by both All Might and Deku. The most basic punch is called the Detroit Smash, and the next level up is the Delaware Detroit Smash (I don’t know why; Detroit isn’t in Delaware, it’s in Michigan).

Then, even more powerful than those is All Might’s United States of Smash, which is probably the best name I’ve ever heard for a single punch. I think it’s safe to say that later on in the series we’ll see Deku also use this move, but what comes after that?

It’s implied that each successor of One for All has the potential to be stronger than their predecessor, so this implies Deku may be able to use a move more powerful than the United States of Smash. What do you think this move will (or should) be called?

I’m expecting something either like Global Smash or Worldwide Smash, and maybe he’ll even develop attacks which are even stronger than that.

Gun Gale Online

Team LF teamed up with the rhythmic gymnastic girls this week in order to take down team PM4. The rhythmic gymnastic girls devised a plan beforehand to take down M’s shield by using an anti-tank rifle, and they actually succeeded.

However, Pito was shot in the eye (and through her head) by another sniper who was then taken out by LLENN. Somehow Pito survived this, which would never be the case since this is supposed to be a video game and headshots are typically one-shot kills even when not from a sniper.

Pito was then taken by M into a nearby building which was ambushed by one of the other teams from the first Squad Jam. During this assault, the four mercenaries on team PM4 were defeated and it seemed as though Pito and M were about to be killed.

But that wouldn’t make for a good ending, so of course that was never going to happen. Instead, Pito breaks out a red photon sword (lightsaber) and kills all of the attackers with it because she’s literally female Kirito.

Although I think this series is entertaining while I’m watching it, I don’t really have high hopes for the finale. Also, I wonder if there’s going to be a second season or if this is just a one-off.

Love To-LIE-Angle

This week the girls took a trip to the hot springs which would normally signify an obligatory fan service episode, but since this whole series is just fan service, it was a standard episode for the series. I don’t think we’ve had a beach episode yet, but we’ll probably get one soon.

At the hot springs, the girls split into two teams and played strip ping-pong. The prize for the winning team is bathing with Hanabi (which she never agreed to). However, after winning, Iori says that she’ll also accept a prize of going to a festival with Hanabi instead (if I’m remembering correctly).

Since the festival should be the next episode, that would mean there will only be one episode left for the beach. Will we get it? Place your bets now!

Comic Girls

Episode 10 of Comic Girls aired on June 7th, so you know what that means! That’s right, a Christmas/New Year’s episode! I’m not entirely sure why there needed to be what’s essentially a “holiday special” in June, but I’ll look past that for now.

I don’t remember what she did this episode, but in my notes I have written “Fuura is still my favorite character,” so she must have done something fairly entertaining. However, most of the episode focused around Tsubasa, Kaos, and Ruki.

These three went to Tsubasa’s house (mansion) for the holidays. Well, really it was only Tsubasa and Kaos, but then Ruki showed up because she knew everything was going to be a mess if Kaos was left alone with Tsubasa’s family.

Speaking of Tsubasa’s family, they apparently don’t know she’s a manga artist or a tomboy. It appears that Ruki has been helping her keep up this facade over the past few years. Overall, it was a much better episode than I expected when I first saw it was a “holiday special.”

Megalo Box

Comic Girls was followed up by an equally good (if not better) episode of Megalo Box. This week we got to see the semifinal match between the champion, Yuri, and the number two ranked fighter, Pepe “The Spider” Iglesias.

While I enjoyed watching the match this week, there were also a lot of other important developments. First, Team Nowhere has disbanded (probably temporarily) due to Nanbu telling Joe to throw his match against Burroughs (his next opponent).

Later on, Nanbu took Sachio to Shirato’s house and asked her to protect him from Fujimaki who has threatened to kill the entire Team Nowhere if Joe doesn’t throw the match. Apparently Sachio’s father was killed after his work was stolen by Shirato’s corporation.

As I previously mentioned, this episode, much like the one for Comic Girls this week, was very entertaining.

Hinamatsuri

Unfortunately Hinamatsuri wasn’t as good as Comic Girls or Megalo Box this week. The episode focused on Hitomi and Anzu, and we only got to see Hina asleep in the background of a few scenes. Any episode without Hina simply isn’t as good.

The first thing I noticed about this episode was that the new pink-haired girl from last week didn’t make an appearance. Maybe she’s not going to end up as a new character and she was just a one-off instead, but there’s still time for her to make a comeback.

The first part of the episode was about Hitomi moving out because her mother didn’t believe that she had a real job and instead thought she was getting into trouble. The second half was about Anzu wanting to get a present for her adoptive parents, but gambling it all away on horse races instead.

My Hero Academia S3

As usual, My Hero Academia season 3 was good. As I expected, we got to see how All for One was able to wipe out some of the top pro heroes including Best Jeanist in an instant. We also got to see the start of the fight between All Might and All for One which should continue next week.

Unfortunately, All Might wasn’t able to go all out against All for One because Bakugo was too close by. This was remedied by the other UA students who were nearby rescuing Bakugo in what was one of my favorite scenes of the series so far (other than All Might getting angry).

Now that the UA students are away to safety, and All for One transported the League of Villains to an unknown location, there should be nothing in the way of his fight with All Might. I also liked seeing Himeko Toga used as a magnet to pull the other villains to safety.

Gun Gale Online

The most surprisingly good episode of the week came from Sword Art Online Alternative: Gun Gale Online. I had pretty much given up on this series giving me anything really entertaining, but I won’t complain about this week’s episode being a good surprise.

First we saw Pito and M’s team wipe out the seven teams who joined forces to take them down. Unlike when M was teamed up with LLENN, M was the bait this time and Pito defeated most of the enemies.

After that we joined back up with LLENN and Fuka as they made their way through the giant dome. It turns out that there was a savanna environment inside and the three teams located there were working together to take down the girls.

This could have been a boring encounter, or no encounter if LLENN and Fuka had snuck past the enemies, but instead it was possibly my favorite part of the episode. Fuka became surrounded by enemies and then fired off pink smoke grenades all around herself.

Normally you’d think that smoke grenades would be used to cover a getaway, but since the smoke was pink, LLENN was able to blend in and take out all the nearby enemies. Not only did I enjoy the strategy the girls used, but I liked how it referenced the first episode or two when LLENN would ambush players in the pink desert.

Hopefully the final two episodes of GGO continue to be as good as this recent one was.

Love To-LIE-Angle

This week we’ll skip the introduction and get right into the action with episode nine of Love To-LIE-Angle (I still don’t understand the title). As usual, not much happened in this series since the episodes are only about three minutes long.

Hanabi caught a cold and stayed home from school with Sonoa (who either doesn’t go to school or is already out of school?). I’m assuming she’s already out of school, but I thought Sonoa was the one the blonde girl (I don’t remember her name) brought home one night.

This episode was less about ecchi fan service and slightly more heartwarming. Hanabi tells Sonoa that she sees her as a dependable older sister and the rest of the girls living in the house are like her family.

Comic Girls

Tsubasa and Koyume took the spotlight this week in Comic Girls. Unlike how episodes are generally split into two halves, this week it was split into three parts.

The first part of the episode followed Tsubasa as she struggles to come up with a “girly” chapter for her manga to fill the gap after just finishing an action-packed arc. She originally uses Koyume as the basis for her princess character, but Koyume then teaches Tsubasa how to be more girly herself.

Part two followed the same pair, but this time focused on Koyume who discovered that she gained some weight. Unfortunately, the stress of dieting was negatively impacting her manga and so in the end she chose her manga over her weight.

However, it seems everything ended up working out since she lost weight simply by focusing more on her manga work.

The third and final part of this episode followed Tsubasa once again as she lost her manga manuscript somewhere in the school. Instead of finding Tsubasa’s manuscript, Kaos ended up finding one made by their teacher from back when she was a student, but the teacher quickly took it before anyone could look inside.

At the end of the day, it was Fuura senpai who ended up finding and returning Tsubasa’s manuscript. However, with her hair done properly and her glasses on, the rest of the girls didn’t recognize her at first.

Megalo Box

This week’s episode of Megalo Box may have been the best episode of the series so far. Not only did we get to see the fight between Joe and Mikio, but we also got to see the back story of Mikio and Yuri’s relationship.

The fight alone wouldn’t have made this episode one of the best because we generally know by now that Joe will always be behind at the start of a fight, but end up winning in the end. The part that made the episode really good was the back story for the fight.

Mikio developed his Megalo gear specifically for the purpose of taking down Yuri, who we learn used to work for him, not his sister. We also learned that Yuri’s cybernetic Megalo gear functions much like a “gearless” human body instead of like standard exoskeleton Megalo gear.

Because of this, Mikio’s latest version of his A.I. infused gear, ACE, works against Joe despite him not using any Megalo gear. I thought this was a great background explanation to make the fight more interesting. If Mikio was using his old ACE gear, Joe would have easily won.

With the conclusion of this fight, Joe is officially the fourth and final competitor of Megalonia. He was also recognized as the superior fighter by Mikio after the match which was a nice touch. It made Mikio’s character feel a lot more relatable.

Hinamatsuri

At the beginning of this week’s Hinamatsuri episode we were introduced to a new psychic girl (whose name I forget, but I’ll be sure to write down next week if she returns). This girl was summoned by the organization to bring an extra transportation orb with her, but it, along with her own, got washed out to sea.

This left the new girl stranded on a deserted island for weeks where she made dolls out of coconuts to represent both Hina and Anzu. In the end, this girl never actually joined the rest of the main cast, but I expect her to show up as a real character next week.

The rest of the episode followed Nitta and the Yakuza. Nitta was tasked with getting one of the lieutenants selected to be the next boss of the Yakuza, but in the end his plans somewhat backfired. The lieutenant who wanted to become the boss find out that Nitta was selected instead.

Because of this, Nitta wakes up to find himself stuck in a barrel full of cement and about to be thrown into the ocean. However, at the last second, the current boss appears and confirms Nitta’s story that it was all a misunderstanding and that the lieutenant will be the new boss after all.

Due to this misunderstanding, the lieutenant promises Nitta a promotion, which then brings us to the final part of the episode. After learning of his promotion, Hina decides to throw a party for Nitta, but as expected, she does everything wrong.

She even made him a cake entirely out of salt.

My Hero Academia S3

My Hero Academia is really getting intense this season with the major fight between All Might and All for One fast approaching. This week the pro heroes split into two teams to attack two different League of Villains hideouts simultaneously.

One of the hideouts is the bar where the League of Villains brought Bakugo after kidnapping him, while the other is a Nomu warehouse where All for One is currently hiding out unknown to the pro heroes.

The first team which goes to rescue Bakugo is made up of All Might, Gran Torino, Kamui Woods, Endeavor, and a few other heroes including the paper ninja guy whose name I don’t know. While the heroes managed to capture all of the villains at this hideout, Bakugo was lost once again.

I’m assuming that the portals which opened up to release Nomu and also take Bakugo away were the creation of All for One since the teleportation villain was incapacitated at the time. When Bakugo was kidnapped once again, we see All Might get angry for the first time in the series (pictured below).

His anger is most likely directed at himself for not being quick enough to save Bakugo. Midoriya mentioned an episode or two ago that All Might once said that he’ll save anyone within his reach, and for Bakugo to slip between his fingers like that must have really hurt his pride.

The second pro hero team, which attacked the Nomu warehouse, was made up of Best Jeanist, Mt. Lady, Gang Orca, and Tiger from the Wild, Wild Pussycats. After destroying the warehouse, they rescued Tiger’s teammate, but her quirk was apparently stolen by All for One.

Speaking of All for One, he officially makes his appearance by wiping out the pro heroes and the rest of the warehouse in a split second. I assume this will be shown in more detail next episode and we’ll see what became of the heroes.

Gun Gale Online

The second Squad Jam is now underway in Gun Gale Online and appears to be much more interesting than the first one. This time around, we’re following four different squads as they make their way through the competition instead of just LLENN’s team.

LLENN and Fuka are still the main team we follow, but we also get to see things from the perspective of Pito and M’s team, the rythmic gymnastic girls’ team, and the third place team from the first squad jam. Each of these teams spawned in the four corners of the map.

Since the team Pito and M are on has been holed up in a mountain range, seven of the other teams have grouped up in order to take them down together. Next episode we should see Pito and her team launch an ambush attack on this large group.

Meanwhile, LLENN and Fuka have already taken down at least two teams and are making their way to a large stadium on the map. LLENN took out the first group with her P-chan, and Fuka rained grenades down on another team from long-range.

Fuka is continuing to show that she’s the best character of the season (other than P-chan of course).