The Otaku Exhibition

Tag: mecha

  • Evangelion 3.0 + 1.0: You Can (Not) Romance

    I’m going to be spoiling most of the Rebuild films, End of Eva, and NGE here, so just be warned for that. I haven’t talked about Evangelion since I praised the Rebuild series for fixing so many of my problems with the original Neon Genesis Evangelion (and you can read that here). Since writing that…

  • Bokurano Makes Me Uncomfortable, and That’s Okay

    What is the purpose of a story? That’s not a rhetorical question, even if it is a broad one. It doesn’t have a reliable single answer, but if you enjoy any story, it’s worth pondering what its purpose is. Everyone has a different reason why they appreciate art, and if I asked a hundred people…

  • 86 – Eighty-Six Season Two Review: Back to the Battlefield

    Studio: A-1 Pictures Director: Toshimasa Ishi Streaming on: Crunchyroll 2021 has been a bizarre year for anime, and not just because we’re expecting JoJo before long. Winter came in like a lion, with a dozen sequels that were delayed thanks to the world coming down with a bad case of hangnails, a handful of high-profile…

  • 86 – Eighty-Six Will Change How Anime is Made

    86 was the best anime to come out last spring, and considering the caliber of its competition, that’s no easy feat. In a world that’s leaving mecha behind, 86 managed to not completely Darling in the Franxx itself. I say that, but the first season was only eleven episodes, so if I’m being honest, it…

  • Rebuild of Evangelion Has Redefined a Classic

    I have made my dislike of Neon Genesis Evangelion abundantly clear. Across two essays and a flurry of Tweets, I have stood firm that the anime which is widely regarded as an anime, the pinnacle of mecha, or even anime in general, is terrible. There are many reasons for that, but I have to get…

  • The Best Protagonist in Anime

    Code Geass is one of the most popular anime of all time, and more than that, it’s a personal favorite. It reinvigorated my interest in mecha, especially when I had been in a slump of post-Evangelion depressing, but just before finally getting around to watching Gurren Lagann. It is this bizarre cross of a war…

  • The End of Evangelion Deserves to be a Classic

    The first installment in the “Does X Anime Deserve to be a Classic” series was a collection of my thoughts on the original Neon Genesis Evangelion, and how much I hated it. The bulk of the show is tedious, the characters are unlikable across the board, and the story lacks any forward momentum. The ending…

  • 86 – Eight-Six Review: Oh, Great, More Child Soldiers

    Studio: A-1 Pictures Director: Toshimasa Ishii Streaming on: Crunchyroll If you are mourning the end of Attack on Titan Season 4, I think I found an adequate replacement to tide you over until its return later this year. Attack on Titan changed the landscape of anime with its world building and the way its narrative…

  • Darling in the Franxx: A Lesson in Disappointment

    If you haven’t gotten the hint from many of my essays for the last month or so, I have a weakness for mecha anime. It’s just such a weird and wild concept that has a hard time thriving outside of a medium as creatively unrestrained as anime, especially after attempts like Pacific Rim: Uprising and…

  • Does Gurren Lagann Deserve to be a Classic?

    At this point, between the essay on Evangelion that inspired this series, and the initial installment about Code Geass, that this series has only focused on mecha anime. I am fine with that, but it has made me realize how much mecha anime has fallen by the wayside in the modern anime community. Obviously long-running…