Tag: action

Divorce me, Husband – Mediocre so far (Korean romance webtoon)

Divorce me, Husband is one of those series that are worth reading if you can binge them, but once you get caught up, there’s no point continuing. Actually I rather like romance series with arranged marriages where they later fall in love, like in The Evil Lady will Change that I reviewed last time. But plenty of other fans like the trope as well, which is why there are dozens of series with the same premise. Divorce Me, Husband is on the mediocre side both in terms of story and in terms of art, so it’s not something I’m going to stick with now I’ve caught up (chapter 20 as of writing).

Summary

She possessed the body of a supporting character who was swept away by her husband’s treason and was killed.

I’m trying to divorce my husband, Claude, to survive, but this guy won’t let me go. In the original novel, it was said that he was clearly a man with no interest in his wife, so why is he refusing the divorce?

Even if you give me the most expensive diamond in the Empire, I refuse to live in such a marriage. Because I want to live!

So please, please… divorce me, husband!

The heroine Ayla has good reason to divorce “her” husband after transmigrating into the world of a novel where she gets killed because of a husband who doesn’t love her.

The series has got all the usual cliches, like dumb servants who actually mistreat a duchess because her husband ignores her, petty nobles who actually talk down to a duchess in public for the same reason, the usual tea party full of snark, scheming royals and of course, the grand daddy of all cliches: “I’M MAKING ALL THESE CHANGES TO THE STORY, BUT WHY ISN’T EVERYTHING THE SAME AS THE BOOK?”

To Ayla’s credit, she realizes very quickly that some of the things she read in the novel are different from what she’s encountering. The original female lead is petty and jealous, the original male lead is a lazy, crazy and rude and her husband is actually a sweet and affectionate gentleman who was only avoiding her because he mistakenly (?) thought she was scared of him.

Claude is one of the brightest spots of “Divorce Me, Husband” because he is so open about his feelings for Ayla and his desire to be closer to her. The majority of these romance series have a male lead who is either super dense about his own feelings or super tsundere so he’ll never say his feelings out loud.

Claude on the other hand comes clean not just once but repeatedly and makes a sincere but cute and clumsy effort to win her heart by doing things she likes. He’s even man enough to apologize when he oversteps his boundaries by interfering in her social relationships. Honestly, he’s a complete sweetheart, so if you’ve had enough of neglectful male leads in Korean series or the abusive/rapey CEOs and princes in Chinese series, he’s a breath of fresh air. If I continue reading this, it will be largely for him.

BUT! There’s a problem with his relationship with Ayla. The problem is the original Ayla. If new Ayla hadn’t transmigrated and asked for a divorce, Claude would have ignored the original forever until dragging her to a messy end.

That’s one thing I really don’t like about transmigrated arranged marriage series. The implication is always that the bullied or ignored person deserved it somehow, and if only she would change herself, everyone would also change and start treating her better. Sure it’s not good to be entirely passive in life, but sometimes people treat you badly because they’re bad people, not because you deserved it by being quiet or scared. And sometimes it’s not possible to safely stand up for yourself, especially when those in authority are turning a blind eye to the bullying or even engaging in it themselves.

So yeah, poor original Ayla. Hope she found happiness somewhere else and not with a husband who completely ignores her for a year because of some pre-wedding jitters. Then says “I like this version of you better” when an imposter steals your body, so sad.

But the series doesn’t dwell on the unfortunate implications of this trope for long, so neither shall we. The long and short of it is that Divorce Me, Husband has a cliched story and a dense female lead who is resisting the advances of our sweetheart Claude because she remains convinced he is a traitor even though she has plenty of evidence that things in the novel are not what they seem. So whether you enjoy it or not depends on your tolerance for stubborn leads balanced with your love for puppy dog love interests.

For my part, I was going to firmly drop it, but the latest chapter (20) ended with Claude in a pinch, so I have to read at least one more just to make sure my boy is okay. Plus, even better, Ayla is finally using her knowledge from the novel to change Claude’s fate, though she hasn’t admitted it to herself yet.

I think the next five chapters will be the key to whether this series is worth continuing or not. Since the raws seem to be caught up with now, I’ll have to check back in about 6 weeks, but the next developments will be important. If Ayla successfully shakes off that pesky “It’s just a novel” mindset and commits herself to staying with Claude and saving his life, all well and good. Otherwise Divorce Me, Husband will just be another mediocre entry in the rapidly saturating field of Korean webtoons. Remind me in 6 weeks to check back again and see.

Tian Jiang Xian Shu Nan manga review (spoilers)

Tian Jiang Xian Shu Nan (天降贤淑男) is a manhua title I randomly picked up to read when I was looking for completed series to read. I haven’t read too many manhua (and TBH if it’s a Chinese comic then I would rather read a wuxia title) but it was complete and I was bored so I gave it a try. The title Tian Jiang Xian Shu Nan literally means “Goddess of Mercy” according to Google Translate. Yeah… that doesn’t help but thanks anyway.

Story: It’s the story of a love triangle between tomboy martial artist Su Jia Ao, her ultra-submissive fiance Ji Chun Qing and wild guy Xiao Yao Jing. You see, Su Jia Ao is from a tribe where women are expected to be rough and tough while the men passively obey. Having been brought up in the city, Su prefers macho bad boys like Xiao Yao Jing. And yet there’s something about that Ji Chun Qing…

…and that something is an almost-stalkerish level of persistence. Talk about Dogged Nice Guys. From start to finish it’s never clear what he sees in Su Jia Ao besides tradition demanding that he marry her, but that doesn’t stop him from hanging in there anyway. In the real world the police would have to get involved, but in Tian Jiang Xian Shu Nan it’s almost funny after a while. 

This could have been a good, funny love triangle series. Could have been, and almost was. I read up to chapter 95 out of 129, skipped to 120 and read to the end. Even that required me to force myself at several points.

The problem? Su Jia Ao herself. A love triangle series only works as long as the feelings of the key players are clear to the audience but not clear to the persons concerned. There should be room for doubt if not wholesale denseness. If Girl likes Boy A but isn’t sure how he feels about her and Boy B likes her but isn’t sure how she feels, that can work. But when the feelings of all parties are clear and Girl likes A but keeps stringing B along and pulling him back whenever he tries to pull away… Su Jia Ao, die in a fire.

What happens is that Su has a huge and obvious crush on Xiao – and he likes her back – and she knows it – and they’ve even dated and almost kissed. But Ji Chun Qing and her family keep putting pressure on her. That’s hard for a teen to deal with, so I was sympathetic up to that point.

Then Su got the chance to break the engagement with Ji off cleanly, no hard feelings. But noooo, for the sake of her pride she decided to fight for Chun Qing’s hand. And she won. That means she likes him, right? Nnnnot quite. When Xiao’s parents arrange a fiancee for him, Su goes crazy and does everything in her power to interrupt that deal as well. Then right after that Chun Qing gets kidnapped. And of course she runs after him again. I’d had enough of her fickleness by then and skipped to the end to find out which guy she ends up with… But I won’t tell you to avoid spoilers.

The good thing about Tian Jiang Xian Shu Nan is that it’s short, colorful and action-packed with pretty nice character designs and a likeable cast. Yes, even Su when she’s not being a horrible two-timer. The bad side is how frustrating it is to see a main character cruelly toying with people’s emotions. She’s a prime dog in a manger – doesn’t want him, but doesn’t want to see him date someone else. What do you want? Luckily the situation doesn’t drag on too long before the series ends so it’s worth the read if you’re looking for something short, light and romantic – for a given definition of romantic.

Knights of Sidonia quick anime and manga review

Still easing myself back into watching and blogging about anime regularly. Gundam 00 really did a number on me. From now on I will know better than to marathon a drama-heavy show, and if the fandom says to stay away from a movie I will consider their responses more carefully. Today, let’s talk about Knights of Sidonia. I watched both seasons of the anime and finished up by reading the manga, which was only 78 chapters long and thus a quick affair. The ending was… umm… Well, we’ll talk about that in a bit. First the summary:

Knights of Sidonia (シドニアの騎士) is a mecha manga series by Tsutomu Nihei. After destroying Earth many years ago, the alien race Gauna has been pursuing the remnants of humanity—which, having narrowly escaped, fled across the galaxy in a number of giant seed ships. In the year 3394, Nagate Tanikaze surfaces from his lifelong seclusion deep beneath the seed ship Sidonia in search of food on the upper levels, only to find himself dragged into events unfolding without his knowledge.
When the Gauna begin their assault on Sidonia, it’s up to Tanikaze to defend humanity’s last hope for survival, and defeat their alien foes.

What I liked about Knights of Sidonia
  • It’s short. You can marathon both seasons of the anime.
  • The enemies are truly threatening. Although Tanikaze starts out overpowered, he can’t keep up with the Gauna’s speed of adaptation so he’s almost always in danger. This isn’t one of those “Boring Invincible Hero” shows.
  • That said, Tanikaze is a pretty boring typical shonen hero who tries to save everyone all the time. But he’s a nice, earnest guy and easy to root for, which is more than I can say for many protagonists.
  • There’s plenty of action in every episode. Sometimes it gets a bit much.
  • The ending is happier than I would have expected, given the overwhelming odds they face.
  • It seems to be a love-hate kind of thing, but I rather like the CG art style. It’s different from the other stuff I’ve been watching.
  • She takes some getting used to, but Tsumugi-chan is kind of cute. Best girl ftw!
What I didn’t like about Knights of Sidonia
  • Some of the gauna are kind of gross.
  • Some of the scenes are kind of gross, like the living catheter (ick) and the romantic piss-drinking (double ick).
  • A little too much time is wasted on romantic hijinks halfway through the show/manga. It brings everything to a screeching halt to have girls fighting over the hero when the world is collapsing around them.
  • I don’t approve of certain relationships in the ending (to explain would be to spoil, but it is an abomination).
  • Some of the characters look a little too similar, which makes it hard to tell people apart at first.
  • Certain characters get away with murder, literally, and are quickly and easily forgiven. Like it’s not even an issue.
To watch or not to watch?

It’s probably faster to read the Knights of Sidonia manga, since it’s only 78 chapters. But the anime isn’t bad at all, plenty of action and tense moments and the body count of a small civil war. There are many unanswered questions at the end concerning the origins and intentions of the gauna and the history of the world, so this probably isn’t for anyone who likes complete closure. For anybody else, y

Watched Gundam 00 Season 2 + the movie

Yes, I said I would watch it and I did… and it almost killed this blog. Was it bad? No, honestly I enjoyed most of  Gundam 00 Season 2 more than the first season. The ending was highly implausible and a little overly optimistic given the nature of human beings, but it was… serviceable. Acceptable, even. The movie, I shouldn’t have watched. It was exhausting, pointless, aliens? in my Gundam? It’s more likely than you think! And by the end I was all Gundammed out. Not just Gundammed out but anime-d out, it took me two weeks to touch any episode of any other show.

Final thoughts: I marathoned both seasons so fast that they’re a blur now. I want to forget I ever watched any of this stuff. It was such a cheerless, joyless, tedious show. At least I did learn that I prefer the Gundam Seed/Wing-type BOOM POW KAPOW overpowered Gundams to these useless weaklings with their ridiculous ideas and incompetent leadership. So from an anime watcher’s point of view it’s good to know what you like and what you don’t like.

Apart from that, I’ve got nothing left to say about Gundam 00. It’s good to get it off my backlog. It doesn’t mean I won’t watch any more Gundam. And it got me pretty involved when I was watching. But… now that it’s all over… what did I watch it for? It was so crappy, so unsatisfying, such a waste of time… *sigh* I want those 2000 minutes of my life back… <— That’s how I felt when I finished the whole show + the movie.

Oh. I supposed I’d better comment on my wishlist from last time:

The overall story needs to make sense – It did, more or less. I won’t spoil. I don’t care enough to spoil

Better planning, strategy and reconnaissance from all parties but especially the Gundams – NOPE. There were flashes of brilliance here and there, but everything always fizzled to naught. Nobody ever had a backup plan in case the first one didn’t work, it was just ridiculous. And I lost count of the number of battles that turned into skirmishes – you hit me, I hit you, we kill a few grunt pilots, everyone retreat!

More Tieria back story – This we got. Pretty straightforward stuff, and Tieria becomes much less of a jerk and much more of a useful, sympathetic character as the show progresses. This part I enjoyed.

Less Saji and Louise – Ha. No.

Less Setsuna, less Mari-whatshername – Ha. Of course not, Setsuna is the main character. But there was less focus on Marina and she didn’t turn into the second coming of Lacus Clyne, so we should be grateful for that much.

Enough talking about Gundam 00. It wasn’t bad but it made me feel bad. It’s that kind of show. Now if you’ll excuse me, I have to hunt for something light and fluffy and actually interesting to clean the bad taste from my mouth.

Gundam 00 first season impressions

Gundam 00 is the first Gundam series I’ve watched seriously since Gundam Seed Destiny ended. I loved the first two-thirds of of Seed Destiny, btw. How did it fall apart so horribly? But that’s a story for another day.

After Destiny ended, I watched the movies of the original Gundam 0079. Interesting stuff, especially for the similarities and differences between it and Seed. And watching Amuro getting Bright-slapped is probably the most satisfying thing in all anime. So that was fun, but not a full series. I followed it up with Zeta Gundam, but I’d downloaded only 5 episodes. Once I ran out I couldn’t decide whether to continue it or not, so I put it on hold… about 7 years ago. I’ll make it my next mecha project after 00. It had potential and I liked Camille.

After Zeta I tried Turn A. Watched at least 10 episodes but it was slow. Really slow. Too much drama, too many cross-dressing shenanigans, nothing I wanted to watch was happening. I skipped to the last episode but obviously it didn’t make much sense. That was it for me and Turn A. Most recently I watched an episode of Victory Gundam… or was it Gundam X? The one with the little boy. Didn’t catch me but I did mean to try a little more.

What’s the point of this long lead in? Nothing! I just like to write. And it does show that I’m not a Gundam hater, no matter how critical I am of it in this and subsequent posts. I watched Gundam 00 because I wanted to enjoy it, and for the most part I did. It had a lot of flaws (dumb protagonists being number one) but I’m only halfway through. That’s why I’ll save judgment until I finish the whole show. A few impressions plus wishlist for season two.

Impressions of Gundam 00 season one
  • gundam 00 animefangirlThe slow build up was a bit frustrating, but the upside is that it helps to keep all the parties and characters distinct in my mind. You’re never left guessing who is who or who is working for who, it’s very easy to follow.
  • The story, such as it is, is easy to understand. More questions have been raised than have been answered so far, but the timeline is clear, the general aims and objectives of the different parties are clear as well. It’s very straightforward.
  • The Gundams aren’t quite as cool as I’d been hoping for. They look decent enough but outside of a few early scenes they don’t act very cool. They get beaten up a lot, which any wrestling fan can tell you reduces your cool factor by 0.1% for every blow. Their weapons are either not interesting (yawn beam saber) or are rarely used even when they should be (Dynames’s long-distance rifle, Kyrios’s pincers).
  • The Gundams need more strategy. The enemies seem to do a lot of planning and thinking about how to take the Gundams down. The Gundams just rely on luck and their superior firepower and armor. That makes some of the battles hair-rippingly frustrating (episode 15!!).
  • setsuna is such a weaklingI can’t decide whether I like the relative weakness of the Gundams or not. On one hand it’s a nice change from the KIRA STOMPS nature of Seed/Destiny and the AIEEEE IT’S A GUNDAAAM nature of Wing. On the other hand, I watch Gundams to see stuff getting blown up, pink explosions everywhere, so 00 is a little dull so far. Ask me again at the end of the show.
  • It’s great how the enemy combat leaders are seasoned and competent and give the Gundams (a.k.a. Gundumbs) a run for their money. TBH I often found myself rooting for them, especially for Sergei of the Human Reform League. Smart, compassionate, skilled… why couldn’t he be the main character?
  • Seeing the tables turned on the Gundams in the last few episodes of the season was GLORIOUS. Smarts + firepower trump simple firepower every time. QED.
  • The last episodes of the season were a huge disappointment. Enemies coming out of nowhere and attacking with very little motivation, unimpressive final boss, ugly mecha, wasted buildups etc etc. But to explain would involve spoiling so I will refrain.
Wishlist for season two
  • The overall story needs to make sense. They’re doing well keeping things logical so far and I’d like them to keep doing so. That’s my main wish.
  • Second biggest wish: better planning, strategy and reconnaissance from all parties but especially the Gundams. They approach battle like they’re in Gundam Wing but they have all the might of an light novel protagonist in front of a truck. Their piloting skills are only so-so so they need to compensate with brains. That goes double for you, Ms. “tactical forecaster” Sumeragi.
  • More Tieria back story. Horrible fashion sense aside, he had the most professional attitude out of all the Gundam pilots. Everyone else got their flashback, now it’s Tieria’s turn.
  • Less Saji and Louise. Please.
  • Less Setsuna, less Mari-whatshername. A forlorn wish, I know.
  • Cooler mecha. I can forgive it in Knight’s & Magic and Aldnoah Zero, but Gundam is the mech show. If the lead mecha don’t make me go “I want all of them!” something is wrong.

That’s it. A very short wishlist because there wasn’t that much wrong with the show apart from the lack of strategy in the battles. Trying to shoot your way out of everything against enemies that are more experienced and better prepared than you doesn’t work very long, which the show illustrates well. And now that they’ve illustrated it, I’d like them to do something about it. Let’s see if they do.