Apr 5, 2024
Library display: Staff Anti-Recommendations
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Library display: Staff Anti-Recommendations
The worst book I’ve ever read was the Vorrh by Brian Catling. Not only is the plot pretty much nonsense, but the writing style is like the author had a goal of using every word in the English language in as few paragraphs as possible. It was SO overdone that the concept of a character walking from one side of a room to another was almost impossible to understand based on how it was written, and I have to assume that if it had been written in any coherent way, the book could half been 80% shorter. The whole thing was so clearly an ego massage for the author, to such an extent that he should be the only person who actually likes it; to my surprise, it has a lot of positive reviews, which I have to believe are from people who think that “something with this many clunky and unreadable sentences and a plot that makes no actual sense MUST be very high brow, and that means it’s good!”
that made me laugh! So sorry that you had to read something like that. But I’ll make sure to stay away from Mr. Catling!!
send anti-recommendations. sick of seeing which books i should read. please send books that i should not read at any cost. lengthy explanations necessary and appreciated
Dan Brown's Inferno sucked so bad it gave me reader's block for 2 years. Though the title is apt, as the book itself should be tossed into an inferno for the sin of its wasted paper and ink.
Uuuh I've never read anything Dan Brown and tbh I'm glad I didn't ajhdjddn
Hopefully you found better books to read <3
I hate to ask this, but I got to know. What are considered to be the worst Magical Girl shows? The hypocritical, the bland, the poorly-animated, the rip-offs, the most pandering shows? But the new Sailor Moon doesn't count; too recent and too easy to list.
Ohoho. Actually I think I’ve already done a list like this, but I’ll elaborate some more because ragging on crap anime is fun. By the way, these are my personal picks, because I don’t know what the general consensus on this stuff is. Here are the worst three, in order:
Ultimate Girls. This is what happens when moe metastasizes. This show displays a dedication to creative sexism that I don’t often see even in the most craven titty-fests. Aside from the mortifying plot, it’s just trashy and poorly made.
Moetan. It feels unfair to rag on a lolicon show for having lolicon in it, so I’ll rag on it for some other reasons: it’s a boring, meandering, limp-wristed “parody” with annoying characters and condescendingly stupid comedy.
CosPrayers: This is one of those that’s so forgettably mediocre that it feels wrong to put it on a “worst” list. Surely a “worst” list is for things that are memorably, impressively, iconically awful, right? But as a wise pop song reviewer once said, “Bad is the absence of good,” and there’s nothing good about CosPrayers. It’s half-assed from beginning to end. At least Ultimate Girls and Moetan seemed to put some effort and passion into being offensively terrible.
Those are the biggies, but here are some dishonorable mentions, in no particular order:
Most Shameless Bandwagoning: A three-way tie between Wedding Peach, Day Break Illusion, and Angel’s Friends. I hesitate to use the term “rip-off,” because all of these shows do plenty of things different from the shows they’re emulating (Sailor Moon, PMMM, and Winx Club respectively). However, all three of these series were clearly made not because someone had a cool idea that they wanted to share with us, but because someone wanted to make a huge pile of money by half-assed-ly imitating something popular.
Most Functionally Incompetent: Mink (manga) and Mermaid Melody (manga). These series are bad in the same way that a house built by a construction crew that never studied basic architecture is bad. The builders might be passionate and have the best intentions, but at the end of the day, the house will fall down.
Worst Clean Adaptation of a Porn: Papillon Rose New Season. The original Papillon Rose was a porn parody of Sailor Moon. “New Season” decided the best way to spruce it up for broadcast television was to cut out not just the porn, but all the sexual content and pervy humor. It’s bizarre because there was no need for them to go that far — I’ve seen plenty of way filthier stuff on late-night anime.
Most Migraine-Inducing: Twin Angel Twinkle Farts. The poster-child for loud, shrill, obnoxious, unfunny, vapid, pandering moe garbage. Probably the hardest show to watch on this list.
Biggest Waste of Potential: Uta Kata. Okay, it didn’t have that much potential, but even so. Gggggggggh.
Most Depressing in Context: Aikatsu and Pretty Rhythm. I’m still undecided on whether these even count as MG shows, but I’ll give them a few bitchslaps anyway. Their slobbering glorification of vapid consumerism and the exploitative pop industry is cringe-inducing, made worse by how these shows a) are made for very little girls and b) are insanely popular. To make matters worse, these franchises have basically replaced the Magic Warrior and Cute Witch genres in girls’ media — those genres are almost exclusively the domain of seinen and shonen now. Apparently the little girls of Japan don’t want to save the world or be wizards anymore — they want to get worked to death by their managers, blow their pauper’s wage on buying overpriced sweatshop clothing, develop an eating disorder, OD on cocaine, and then get tossed out on the curb like a used tissue once they get too old/fat/assertive. Add in the larger context of a) Japan’s collective self-esteem problem and fatalistic outlook, this attitude of “Well, things are never going to get better, so may as well buy meaningless shit to fill the void in my soul” (see also: the plummeting birthrate, hikikomori men, parasite single women) and b) Japan’s excruciatingly slow progress in the area of women’s liberation (they lag behind Tajikistan, Indonesia, Uganda, Bangladesh, South Africa, Russia, and 107 others), and these two dumb little shows start to look like a cry for help.
Whoa, that got really long. I guess I have a lot of feelings about Aikatsu and PR.
do you have any thoughts on Uta-Kata? I felt like it was one of those shows that had real potential, but beyond awful delivery, but maybe I'm not the best judge :/
HA HA HA oh god Uta Kata. UTA KATA. What even is there to say.
Okay, so I actually liked most aspects of Uta Kata: the characters, the friendships, the les-yay, the henshins, the soundtrack, the mood, the overall artistry and design work. It’s a show of style over substance, which I can dig. It even did some interesting things with the genre, shaking up the traditional formula. It did so many things right.
And then it got to the final episode and just… WHAT.
It’s hard to describe, because Uta Kata’s plot sucks in a way you don’t often see. It didn’t suck because it was incompetent or confusing or incoherent. I can’t say it was poorly written, because that would imply that someone actually wrote something. Uta Kata’s plot sucks because it DOESN’T EXIST.
It’s like they set up all this build-up and foreshadowing and loose ends that they were going to pay off later, and instead of tying up the loose ends hastily or nonsensically or stupidly, they just DIDN’T TIE ANY OF THEM UP AT ALL. You can’t call it a “plot hole” when it’s ALL HOLE AND NO PLOT!1! It’s so extreme that I can’t even have an opinion on the ending or the plot because I still don’t know WTF happened! In fact, I’m just going to paraphrase my Livejournal rant from when I first watched it, with the spoilers cut out:
Who are the djinn [think Clow Cards]? Where did they come from? What do they do when they’re not lending fourteen-year-olds their powers? Whom do they serve? Is the villain in charge of them? If so, are they her allies or her pawns? Why do their powers affect the heroine in wildly different ways?
And what is the purpose of the villain’s actions? Why is she so interested in humans, to the point where she meddles with their lives? Why does her method of achieving her goals make NO SENSE WHATSOVER on multiple levels? And where did she get the power to make good on her threats? Does she even have the power to make good on her threats?
And why did the villain do X, even though basic human nature guaranteed that X would blow up in her face? Why didn’t she figure that out after the first time it blew up in her face? And at the end, why were the heroes able to save each other by doing Y? And why didn’t the villain just go ahead and kill the heroine when she had the chance?
And who the fuck was that person in the last scene? And what exactly did the heroine’s friend do in Ep 11 that saved the day?
Sorry it’s just– it’s been four years since I watched that show, and it still blows my mind whenever I think about it, because I hardly ever see this in fiction. This isn’t half-assed writing — it’s no-assed writing. This isn’t lazy plotting — it’s nonexistent plotting.
Any personal guilty pleasures in the genre?
OH THERE ARE PLENTY.
Ranked from least embarrassing to most embarrassing:
PSG: This one barely makes it on here because it’s SO CLEARLY AWESOME, but there’s still a lot of anime fans who don’t just dislike PSG — they think it’s one of the worst pieces of shit to come out, like, ever. So a bit of embarrassment there.
Uta Kata: Less embarrassing because no one’s seen this one, but if they had, they’d be like “It’s moe, it’s fanservicey, and the plot is as well-constructed as a tissue-paper suspension bridge.” The plot is the main source of embarrassment, I mean what the hell.
Getsumen to Heiki Miina: Also less embarrassing due to obscurity, but it’s quite fanservicey (holy transformation Batman) and has a “WTF Japan” premise. The OP alone would be enough to make most people go “Why in God’s name do you like this?” I fucking adore this show, omg.
Mao-chan: It’s really not good at all, and the comedy’s pretty dumb, but it’s cute, and I’m programmed to love everything Ken Akamatsu does. I HAVE NO IDEA WHY. He just has magical powers.
Vividred Operation: ASS ASS ASS ASS ASS. It’s clichéd and devoid of substance, but goddamn is it stylish and entertaining.
Onegai My Melody: It’s based on a toy by Sanrio, the Hello Kitty people. It is waaaaay better than it has any right to be.
Sailor Moon TOS: Despite my many posts about how crappy it is, I still like it. It’s cheesey and hokey and that’s what makes it charming.
Any Precure besides Heartcatch: They’re cheapish, formulaic, filleriffic, design-by-committee kids’ TV. And I love themmmm.
PMMM: Actually anime fans would be way more likely to shun me if I didn’t like this one, but I’m still very much in the camp of “IT’S OVERRATED AND FLAWED AND KIND OF ICKY. But I like it. BUT IT’S REALLY NOT THAT GREAT. Buuuuuut I like it.” Whoa, wait, is PMMM really my guiltiest pleasure!? Actually I think it’s the most embarrassing because so many people worship it, and some of those people are really annoying, and I don’t want to be lumped in with them. If it were only moderately popular, I doubt it’d be on this list.
No, wait! I thought of one that’s way more embarrassing than PMMM!
Winx Club: HAAAAAAA. Yeah. I was hooked on this one in high school. AND IT WAS THE 4KIDS DUB TOO. It’s cheaply animated, sparkly, revoltingly girly, overly focused on teen romance, and the girls’ anatomy makes them look like Bratz dolls. AND THOSE ARE ALL REASONS WHY I LIKE IT. I EVEN LIKE THE SHITTY 4KIDS DUB AND THE CHEESEY THEME SONG. It’s the epitome of a guilty pleasure.
Tantei Opera Milky Holmes: Episodes 1-4
The Plot: Milky Holmes are a quartet of airheaded moeblobs attending a school for superpowered detectives. They’re the stars of the school until they randomly lose their powers during a fight with stripperiffic arch-rival Arsene. The girls’ depowered state gives them a perfect excuse to blow off all that tedious crime-fighting and mystery-solving, instead opting to fart around and do moe shit all day. Seriously, if you are a fan of any of the famous detectives name-dropped in this series, this is absolutely the last show you’ll want to watch.
Is This A Magical Girl Show?: Nope. I’m booting it out of the project.
There’s no secrecy, no transformations, and no dual identities, except for the villains. Plus, while the heroines have magical powers, they lose them in the first episode and spend the series as muggles, which sort of kills the whole point of a Magical Girl show, i.e. a show about girls who use magic.
On the flip side, Arsene is a personality-switching rival in the same mold as Pixy Misa, and her minions all do the Clark Kenting thing, working at the detective school without disguising themselves at all, but that’s about it.
Is It Any Good?: Oh dear god, it’s complete dreck on toast. Let’s try to count all the ways this thing sucks:
What we all expect from B-grade four-girl moe comedies: flat, clichéd, annoying characters, a near-nonexistent plot that revels in the inane, and a saccharine edgeless tone that makes Pretty Cure look like Berserk.
Some of the laziest, most painful “comedy” I’ve seen in an anime in quite a while. Most of the jokes boil down to “reaction faces!” or “someone fell over!” or “flamboyant homo villain with pointy nipples!” (Relatedly: MAKE IT STOP.)
A shrieky baby-talking opening theme that makes me want to punch everyone within reach.
Cheap-ass animation.
But the worst thing about this show is how it takes an interesting premise — great male detectives reincarnated as teenage girls attending a detective school — and wastes it on aimless moe garbage.
Do you know any magical girl mangas that don't have animes
Ooh, yes I do:
Stuff I’ve read:
Codename Sailor V: Prototype of Sailor Moon. Great on its own merits and as a historical piece.
ION: Pseudo-magical-girl sciency stuff. Arina Tanemura’s early work.
Mink: Sciency magic idol singer. By the author of Saint Tail. Bad. Not offensive, just incompetent.
Carat: Cross-dressing parody AWESOMENESS. I NEED TO DO A PROPER REVIEW OF THIS ONE.
Mistress Fortune: Co-ed esper duo fighting aliens. Arina Tanemura again. I found the main characters too annoying to read beyond the first few chapters.
Stuff I haven’t read:
Shadow Lady: Kaitou girl with a slinky black leather outfit.
Hyper Rune: By a CLAMP member.
Zodiac PI: Detective with astrology powers.
Pixie Pop: Age-enhancing soda.
Miracle Dieter Miyuki: A parody, obvs.
Gaba Kawa: Demon girl comes to the human world.