With Mother’s Day rolling around, it’s interesting to think about the influence of mother’s in anime. While it is typical to not see parents in most anime these days, the ones that do show up usually have a strong influence on our protagonists. With Attack on Titan, while Eren’s mother is only seen for a short period of time in the first episode, it is her untimely fate which gives him the motivation to keep on fighting the titans.
Of course, probably the most influential mother in anime (that I have watched, sorry Dragon Ball fans) is the mother of the Elric Brothers in Fullmetal Alchemist. The main quest of the heroes in FMA is to forge the Philosopher’s Stone, not for greed or any kind of earthly want, but simply because they want their mother back. With many flashbacks in the series, we can understand why they want their mother with them, and they still have a strong influence on how they act throughout the series.
Now onto the reviews!
It’s good to see that Attack on Titan is doing very well in the first half of this season, and hopefully it keeps up that trend. In Night of the Graduation Ceremony: Mankind's Comeback, Part 2, two years half passed since the previous episode. We see how Eren and his friends have grown over the period of time as it is time for them to be selected to join the various corps of the military.
It appears that we are introduced to the various core supporting cast members in Attack on Titan, each one having their own personality, although they feel a bit like stereotypes. It also shows off how well Eren has grown over the past several episodes, but still reminding the audience that he is a young man filled with lots of emotion. This is a strong emotional episode for Eren, especially towards the ends, where it seems like Attack on Titan wants to keep outdoing themselves with.
Attack on Titan - Night of the Graduation Ceremony: Mankind's Comeback, Part 2 gets eight stars out of ten.
My Teenage Romantic Conedy SNAFU is also surprisingly doing pretty well for the kind of show it is. While there are times they play around with the typical tropes of the harem genre, it doesn’t necessarily feel like that was in this particular episode, In Other Words, He Doesn't Have Many Friends. The Service Club is recruited to help out debunk a group of rumors, as well as Harriman trying to figure out where he belongs in the workplace.
This is a very heavy episode involving how we look at Harriman. It seems he is making some progression in becoming a part of the reality that surrounds him, while also thinking about the lives of the people who influence him. While it would have been nice to see more of the supporting cast, as well as have an actual story this episode, it all is still pretty good.
My Teenage Romantic Comedy SNAFU - In Other Words, He Doesn't Have Many Friends gets seven stars out of ten.
Flowers of Evil is doing a good job of really showing the struggles of youth in 4 of 13. After Kasuga defends Nakamura in front of his classmates, it makes the entire class think he is a freak; all except for his crush, Saeki; who is very impressed with him. The two of them start to become friends, which is both a blessing and a curse to Kasuga.
The root of Kasuga’s inner struggle is becoming more brought to the forefront this episode. He likes to hide himself from the world that is around him, but it’s the things in the real world that also strangely intrigues him. While it seems that he does gain some confidence in the episode, Nakamura seems to have a firm grip on him, making for some interesting and nerve-racking scenes.
Flowers of Evil - 4 of 13 gets eight stars out of ten.
For Photo Kano, it is a very mixed bag. In My Feelings Henceforth, Kazuya seems to be enjoying taking advantage of his blackmail over the student body president. He is also becoming much closer to Niimi, who seems to admire him for his love of photography.
Photo Kano doesn’t really feel all that creative in how it’s going around with the story. Kazuya seems to be slowly turning into a character that isn’t all that healthy, becoming a full member of the Photography Club. While it is showing a natural progression of character development, it just leaves a bad taste in my mouth at the end of the episode. Even the girls are becoming boring characters, the only sense of relief for me being the class president.
Photo Kano - My Feelings Henceforth gets five stars out of ten.
