These three brats

Onto another adventure right after Fire Emblem Sacred Stones (FE8). Time for....the game right before: Blazing Blade (FE7). Curious to finally meet Lyn after all these years.

Bungou Stray Dogs Season One (2016): Atsushi is a remarkably baffled protag, prone to making a slew of Doremi-inspired faces. Bungou is a strange series, and this rewatch reminded me. Sometimes, a little too violent, or too willing to let Dazai make *those* jokes. Excited to finally see more!

Can Intervention Work (2012): As the book asserts, US intervention in Bosnia served as a model of success. Instead, foreign intervention in Afghanistan, drawn from Bosnia, was broadly ineffective. Intervention can work but the ballooning goals and reluctance to trust locals stand in the way.

Kuroko no Basuke Season One (2012): Stories about how Kuroko is an off the wall series are a little misleading. Games get longer and longer, requiring more strategy than a powerful dunk. Surprisingly, I found it fun, especially for tracking dynamic action. Kuroko and Kagami are also a good pair.

Crossing Over (2007): This is a powerful collection of partition literature written from India, Pakistan, and Bangladesh. It powerfully captures the disruption of Partition across multiple generations. Many of the stories are quite sad, but find a way to remind you of humanity's resilience.

Wanpaku Ouji no Orochi Taiji (1963): Oldest feature length anime I have seen-- it is delightfully colorful, trippy with an overt Disney influence. Story's a bit fluid and hard to follow. Also, there is some stunning animation, especially Orochi's 8 heads undulating simultaneously. Ahead of its time.

Tamayura (2010): Being behind the camera can be a liberating force. Fuu (in the salmon shirt and a bandage around her ankle) finds this out again tracing places her late father has visited. I came away with this realization that my photos focus almost too much on perfectly capturing the subject.

Mai-HiME (2004): After 7 years, I came back for this show. Threads converged in surprising ways, reinforcing Mai-HiME's explorations of sexuality and ability. Though some decisions remain puzzling, I especially enjoyed the finale on second watch. Not a perfect show, but a good one!

The Fall of Yugoslavia (1992; 1996): an impressively visceral account from journalist Misha Glenny. A loaded gun shoved at his face often. This book sometimes leans on "Balkans as inherently malicious", but the 1996 epilogue is a truly sobering account. Bet @jaehaerys48.bsky.social read this.

Godzilla Singular Point (2021): It is truly rare when a show is equal parts nerdy and wholesome. Singular Point presses a tremendous global crisis for humanity, from Bengal to Japan, that forces cooperation. Such a lovely Godzilla adventure, matching with my adoration of the first film.

The Balkans A Short History (2000): A remarkably brief and dense primer on the Balkans region, especially on widespread Ottoman influence. Mazower breaks open this idea that the Balkans are inherently prone to violence, more than any other region. Yet, so much of the region is explained here.

Rilakkuma to Kaoru (2019): "Good self care" as @mattdotexe.bsky.social put it. A really charming, adorable stop-motion series. Part of me feels that the Sanrio branding limits the ambition. It's a great pick-me-up though! I would definitely like more anime with this general approach.

Yasuke (2021): LeSean Thomas as director in theory should fit with the excellent Lakeith Stanfield (voice of Yasuke) and the smooth musical stylings of Flying Lotus. However, stylistic clashes and a weak script limit its narrative reach. Surely, we deserve a better show about a black samurai.

Aria the Animation (2005): SatoJun has remarkable range as a director, from silly comedy (positive) Goldfish Warning to Aria, a serene, pleasant experience. Yet there are delightfully cartoony faces, showing a certain Touch. I get the feeling this show has many more splendid secrets ahead to probe.

Bombay Stories (2012): Manto is fascinated with ne'er-do-wells -- sex workers, Bombay's religious plurality, and Partition's eruption. "[L]iterature changes with the times," he responds to accusations of filthy stories. By delving into messy lives, Manto humanizes even the most surreal trife.

Little Witch Academia (2017): At first glance, LWA (TV) seems like a simple expansion of the prior entries. The detours of Akko -- circumventing obstacles untold -- build up into a charming and grand adventure. Remarkably well-produced show with everyone from Ikarashi to recent Trigger stars.

Time for a 2025 Media Thread

The blue birds are migrating to a BlueSky. In that spirit, here's a thread breaking down my year in non-anime media.

Most prominently I:
- Read Umineko in entirety
- Read 18 (!!!) books
- Replayed Ace Attorney 1-3 and completed games 4-6
- Watched all of the Twilight Zone
- Played 3 Ys games