Since everything else here requires spoiler warnings, I’ll start with the one item I can place before the jump and go from there!
I just wanted to make brief mention of an anime series we’ve been enjoying, not just for its terrific story and animation, but also for its method of delivery! Eve no Jikan (Time of Eve) from writer/director Yasuhiro Yoshiura (whose Pale Cocoon we also enjoyed), is being provided with English subtitles as free streaming video at Crunchyroll, shortly after each episode’s release in Japan. Episodes can also be downloaded for a small fee.
Eve no Jikan‘s premise is nothing extremely new. We’ve seen plenty of fiction involving the ethics and complications of a world in which human-like androids are employed to serve humans, and what it really means to be human, etc. What I’m enjoying about this series especially, is that the story revolves around an underground cafe where discrimination between human and android is prohibited. The cafe setting, with its set of fixed characters, helps make the story feel more intimate than what I’m used to in fiction with these themes, assisted also by the youthful POV of its protagonist. I’m impressed, too, with its effectiveness, considering that it is being fed to us only in 15-minute increments.
This is probably old news to most people who read here, but just in case I’m not the last person to talk about this, I wanted to pass it along! :) Watch the first episode here!
Now on to the rest. SPOILERS for new chapters of Bakuman, xxxHolic, and NANA, as well as recent episodes of Ef: A Tale of Melodies after the jump! …