For sure, I’d take this style of storytelling over the handholding we get in many other shows any day. I just typically look for a show to exemplify its own strengths early on, which includes its ability to pay off things it’s built up.

The best case for me is when a story weaves a smaller version of its larger arc within the first episode, giving us a taste of what the show is aiming for, be that twists and turns of intrigue, cathartic payoff of some tension it’s built up, or the solution to a mystery. Obviously it won’t hit as hard as later events will, but it proves that a show is capable of following through on its promises. (which helps spot shows like Lost, who keep promising and never deliver)

And it can be fun to watch characters and try to figure out what their motivations are, but it would be nice to get a bit of something for any of our characters, even if it’s incomplete or even false, because as it is I feel a bit adrift in the story without anything to hold onto.

But I’m still hopefully my issues with the show get resolved soon. I do want to trust Bones on this one, even though the premiere didn’t wow me.

Impeccable vibes on this one, but the story felt a bit jumbled and hard to follow. I’m all for show-don’t-tell, but I think it could have benefited from trimming down the number of unfamiliar elements to throw around, at least to start with. I couldn’t really get a read on any of the characters’ motivations or goals, either. It feels like the selling point is supposed to be “tokusatsu, but make it cyberpunk”, but I’ve got no personal attachment to either of those genres, so it didn’t do much for me.

But it’s always good to see original anime, so I’ll give Bones some time to cook before I give up completely. Judging just from the premiere, though, I give it a 3/5

CGDCT is not my genre and mahjong is not a game i understand, and the extremely predictable result was that this anime flopped for me hard. It doesn’t seem like it’s doing anything particularly special or interesting other than those reference-humor faces the girls make. For CGDCT-enjoyers it’ll probably be a comfy and familiar ride, but without an affinity for the genre all I can give this premiere is a 1/5.

Wow this show is doing a lot of things at once, lol. At first I was pretty confused about the hour-long premiere, but they had a lot of twists to pack in. The lore is definitely interesting (like ram said, having two conflicting magic systems is definitely cool), but I just couldn’t get myself invested in the characters. I’m sure the people this vibes with will have a good time, but for me the premiere was an underwhelming 3/5.

Very cute and very comfy. I’m a sucker for characters who do mundane things with an air of villainy and this nailed that for me. It remains to be seen if it can maintain itself after the gimmick of its premise wears out, but I’m hopeful. This premiere gets a 4/5.

As a gay dude, this anime had a bit of an uphill battle for me, but wow did it actually impress. The writing, pacing, and animation were all top-notch and I found myself pretty invested in our main character despite my misgivings. It also helped that i couldn’t help but crack up every time the evil mascot’s dumb face was on screen, lol. In the end, though, there was predictably just too much time spent being horny at girls for me to want to continue watching. It’s not for me, but I still feel i have to give the premiere a solid 4/5.

I’m already not really an isekai power-fantasy kinda guy, but this seemed like bottom of the barrel even for the genre. I really liked the opening scene and was intrigued by the mystery of the main character’s origins, but the isekai part seemed aggressively generic. I’ve heard it’s supposed to be a comedy/parody type of vibe, but I couldn’t even really identify when it was trying to make jokes. This premiere gets a 1/5 from me.

I found this one very dull, with the typical-of-the-genre problem that it felt like watching someone else play the boring parts of a video game. Then again, this isn’t really my genre in the first place, so maybe its charm is just fully missed on me. A 2/5 premiere for me.

Normally I hate long premieres, but I think this absolutely would have benefited from a double-length episode; the pacing was solid, but the ending just felt very abrupt.

So far the plot seems pretty generic, the twists are predictable, and our hero seems like a bit of an idiot (if you’re not paid well and not good at hunting and it’s not your dream or anything, why not just get a normal job where you probably won’t die??). On the other hand, the animation was really good and I loved the fight scenes.

Ultimately I give the premiere a 3/5. I’ll give it another episode or two to get to its hook and see if I want to continue from there.

Not really invested in the plot so far, but I really liked our main three characters, so I’ll give the show a couple more episodes to see if it can hook me. I give the premiere a 3/5

Went in without any real expectations and ended up really enjoying it. I just hope they manage to get around to saving the sister while it still makes sense for her to not be fully digested…

i give the premiere a 4/5 and look forward to being hungry every week