I was tempted to check out Kingdoms of Ruin to hate watch back when it was airing because it just sounds so ridiculous.
Comment on Anime Questions, Recommendations, and Discussion Thread [2025, Week 22]
Ilixtze@lemm.ee 1 week ago
These last two weeks “Listening to bad anime while I work”, turned into watching at “kingdoms of ruin with shocked pikachu face for self harm purposes” I wouldn’t know where to begin:
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Aside from all the grimdork edgyness the thing that stuck out the most is that it appeared to have a thematic thread? The bad guys were humans that wanted to defeat magic through technology and they all had smartphones. They carried out the most cartoonishly evil, poorly motivated witch genocide and just at the end of the season there were hints that these “kingdoms were ruined” by technology and industrialization? There was this side story where this high tech city collapsed because of… Sex bots! They did the “I dated a robot” futurama skit seriously! And i was all like: “Ok this has potential. Give me some magic users fighting mecha! Give me some witches false flag operations! Let the final boss be a super computer! The main character uses writing magic! It is the power of creativity against technology! Just imagine! After a long grueling fight against the automated forces of the evil super computer “totally not Kirito” MC pulls a fast one and says. “You know computer programs are a language as well and THE CAN BE REWRITTEN!” And he uses his writing magic quill to write a virus into the super computer code Fuck yeah!” No, the final baddie of the season was a cyborg guy that spawns hundreds of rocket flying fists, to punch stuff with. That is the level of creativity we are working with. There is a lot more to talk about that makes this Anime terrible: like the editing continuously wanted to make every death as anticlimactic as possible and that is some commitment because this thing has a lot of death on it. There is a building romantic subplot between the cartoonishly psychopath genocidal Main character and a pink haired cartoonishly goody two shoes witch that acts like a 10 year old. she is all like: “I can change him!” There are scenes where my girl is getting the shit kicked out of her for following this idiot on his genocidal crusade and she’s all like: “Thank you for letting me walk beside you genocidal MC; uwu” I was sure this anime was made in 2010! Because all of the Cellphone-bad themes were screaming with this boomer “I am 14 and I’m so deep” subreddit energy; The mc has writing powers for crying out loud!!
I could go on, this thing is endless it is a non Euclidean construct of bad.
Now off I go to watch “Conception” (2018)
On the good side of anime I watched Code Geass and at first I was baffled at the aesthetic until I noticed everything was designed by CLAMP , once I settled down with the medieval knight mecha designs and Shojo sensibilities I enjoyed it quite a bit. As a matter of fact I learned something about myself: I am not inmune to power fantasies. It seems that to my particular neurosis Power fantasies of being an edgy Oc in another world with surrounded by a harem of girls doesn’t cut it. I’m not like other boys, What really floats my boat is the idea of:
spoiler
Being a French coded handsome fem-boy that is secretly royalty, buy he seems pretty chill with his classmates, that acquires the power to force anyone who listens to obey his will! And use overcomplicated 4d chess schemes to orchestrate a revolution that slowly topples the British empire (while getting good grades at school!) And having a group of rag tag rebels by my side that love me and listen to everything I have to say, and some of them could be romantic interests as well. And even my bestfriend/rival is in this weird love hate dynamic! Of fuck yes, I am zero.
Anyway, I can’t criticize this shit, I had a ball with it; It had the silliest political subplots, grandiose high stakes battles, the most convoluted schemes and machinations, load bearing suspensions of disbelief and an ending that had me both hollering at the screen and thinking: “yeah they can’t end it any other way.”
Now off to watch “Mobile suit Gundam” (1979)
wjs018@ani.social 1 week ago
Ilixtze@lemm.ee 1 week ago
I regret not watching it drunk with friends; It’s the kind of show that is fun to riff at
Endmaker@ani.social 1 week ago
Please keep up these negative reviews. From a macro perspective, we (read: people in general) have too many positive reviews, which is natural due to selection bias but now we have an imbalance: we know what to look for but don’t know what to avoid. At a personal level, I found your negative reviews entertaining.
This is only normal; we could all use some junk food to “balance” our diet from time to time.
Get ready for peak.
I don’t know if you have seen Gundam memes. In my case, watching it is like my rewatch of LOTR: I will be trying to spot memes whenever they come up.
Ilixtze@lemm.ee 1 week ago
I felt a Little self conscious reading you there, because on one hand, My drive to reach out for something we might call “bad anime” responds to a need to see something that is rough around the edges, based around the experiences or obsessions of a single author; I feel there is an enjoyment on what I perceive as flaws. I feel so much media feels corporate-made and sanitized these days and Manga , Anime and some literature are the only places I find some unadulterated dirty, fallible, human voice.
On the other hand Kingdoms of ruin is bad in more ways than just the “technical” aspects and I would not recommend it to anyone without an encyclopedia of content warnings.
But yeah, I would not want to come off as excessively negative; I recently rekindled my love for Anime and a big part of it is that I enjoy it’s unapologetic roughness.
As for Gundam; It is really weird for me because until recently I have never been a big mecha fan; Gundam in particular was intimidating for me because it has such a monumental history. So I’m jumping in blind; Aside from a few Charr memes I am very unaware of the meme ecosystem; But I have been enjoying the show 5 episodes in; I am kind of surprised how “modern” the story telling feels for a show from back in the 70’s
mo_lave@reddthat.com 1 week ago
May I suggest Mermaid Forest for your next “listening to bad anime” experience. Gosh, that show left me frustrated over the story and production.