July 2014 Media Thread

ArisKatsaris

This is the monthly thread for posting media of various types that you've found that you enjoy. Post what you're reading, listening to, watching, and your opinion of it. Post recommendations to blogs. Post whatever media you feel like discussing! To see previous recommendations, check out the older threads.

Rules:

Please avoid downvoting recommendations just because you don't personally like the recommended material; remember that liking is a two-place word. If you can point out a specific flaw in a person's recommendation, consider posting a comment to that effect.
If you want to post something that (you know) has been recommended before, but have another recommendation to add, please link to the original, so that the reader has both recommendations.
Please use the comment trees for genres. There is a meta thread for comments about future threads.
If you think there should be a thread for a particular genre of media, please post it to the Other Media thread for now, and add a poll to the Meta thread asking if it should be a thread every month.

Rules:

Please avoid downvoting recommendations just because you don't personally like the recommended material; remember that liking is a two-place word. If you can point out a specific flaw in a person's recommendation, consider posting a comment to that effect.
If you want to post something that (you know) has been recommended before, but have another recommendation to add, please link to the original, so that the reader has both recommendations.
Please use the comment trees for genres. There is a meta thread for comments about future threads.
If you think there should be a thread for a particular genre of media, please post it to the Other Media thread for now, and add a poll to the Meta thread asking if it should be a thread every month.

TV and Movies (Animation) Thread

I've been watching Silicon Valley, a sitcom about a startup in the eponymous, erm, valley. Overall I'd say that it's fairly good. One of the characters, Gilfoyle, is a surprisingly sharp portrayal of a certain contrarian cluster type: polyamorous and satanist (and probably a libertarian, too). Shades of ESR, too, somehow. Worth a look.

(Edit: retracted in order to repost under live action subthread.)

0lmm12y

Macross Zero (4/5 watched): half the length of a regular series, but crams in an engaging romance (with very well-done character revelations), a fun plot and some great action series. The whole thing has visuals that would be impressive in a series half its age. I'll withhold full judgement until the ending, but right now I'd say it's been better than Plus. Recommended. Allison to Lillia: quite a sweet, childish fantasy series, lots of emphasis on the joy of flight. Fun but didn't entirely stand up to a rewatch; I think Patapata Hikousen no Bouken is a more enjoyable example of the genre. Space Battleship Yamato 2199: Not that good; reasonable visuals, but the plot was all over the place; episodes didn't really hang together into a coherent whole, lots of plot elements that came up once and were then never referred to again. Antagonists were unable to present a believable threat after the first half or so; some of the more interesting relationships were left unexplored, whereas the ending romances seemed to come out of nowhere unsupported by the rest of the series. I've seen far worse series, but I wouldn't recommend this. A note on Hunter X Hunter now that I'm up to episode 95 or so: quality really does seem to have picked up in the last 20-or-so episodes, so some of my negativity last month was unwarranted. I still can't really recommend a show that takes this long to get going though.

3gwern12y

Anime: * _Seto no Hanayome_ (review; tldr: don't bother)

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July 2014 Media Thread

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July 2014 Media Thread

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