Don't Watch Anime to Learn Japanese | Trash Taste #6
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- Welcome to Trash Taste. I'm your host Connor and I'm tired as fuck. - Great intro. - We all just did a very strong coffee, but again with Joey. - Hi. - And Gon. - Hello. - No nicknames today. I just didn't think to do that. - We're keeping it simple today, are we? - I mean, that's who we are, right? - I'm very tired. - I can't say no. - Every day before we do an episode, I wake up at 7:00 AM to go to a Japanese class for two hours. - How's that going for you? - It's going.

- It's going forward. - Sometimes you're too tired to learn things. And I remember being like this in university, I would be like asleep basically. But then they make you talk. So I kind of- - Yeah, like how's it going for you? 'Cause like me and Connor have gone very different routes in terms of our, how we've approached learning Japanese. 'Cause you've taken classes and I'm like completely like self-taught because I realized in university,

how classes really like slowed me down in terms of my learning process. Just the biggest problem I've encountered is self-discipline. - That's exactly why I wanted lessons.

- 'Cause the way I see it, right? Lessons are like, okay, if I'm keeping up with these lessons, these are like the bare minimum that someone at any mental capacity can learn Japanese, right? So if I'm learning it at this structured course that anyone can do, right? I should learn X amount of Japanese minimum. - Because we know that like everyone who's like homeschooled doesn't actually like do anything. - And also I'm like a liar, dude. I lie to myself a lot.

Like when I say I'm gonna learn Japanese, I will do everything in my power to like think that I'm learning Japanese. - Like during the quarantine, because at this point in the episode, it's pretty much done in Japan. - It's post quarantine. - It's pretty much open. But like during the quarantine, because you know, Connor, you couldn't go to Japanese lessons, right? You had to do like Zoom lessons. - I hated Zoom. - And you were telling me that like most of the time you were just playing "Ark Knight."

- It was just like, yes, I am listening teacher. It's like, ooh, new unit. - Problem was, right, is that I was in a, my class is mainly like,

housewives and like people who are much older than me. - Yeah. - Right. - So a lot of them weren't tech savvy. So they were all spending 10 minutes saying, "Hello, hello, can you hear me? Hello?" Meanwhile, I'm like already set up. I've got my whole YouTube is set up, right? I've got two monitors, three mobile phones. You know what I mean? - You got the green screen in the back. - Yeah, yeah. - The pro streamer set up. - Right, right. And like, you know, it's just like, when I'm at my PC,

Like I'm doing everything but what I'm supposed to be doing. So I got two monitors, right? So I can also put my webcam over the fuck I want. So when they're like, are you looking? And I'm like, damn, like, yeah. I'm doing work on the other monitor. Like, and,

And I know you're like, well, Connor, you're paying for those lessons. Why would you not do it? I don't know. I paid to be in class, you know? - Yeah, exactly. - That's like university in a nutshell though. I mean, you're paying to be here. You're paying to learn. Oh, why do I have to go to classes though? I don't have to. I could just study from home. - I hate going to the class and having to do that and be back in that environment 'cause you know, I want to get out of that. But at the same time, I am learning stuff. Like it is slow.

And I do a lot of study in my own time, mainly Kanji, 'cause they don't teach us Kanji. - They don't teach you Kanji? - It's practical Japanese. So it's all supposed to be for like speaking.

and getting by. 'Cause to reiterate, when I say classes, I think most people will assume like every day. I do classes two times a week for two hours. That's it. So not a lot of time to learn a language really. - Right. - Right. - But it's better than nothing, I guess. - Oh yeah, it's much better than doing nothing, right? - Exactly. 'Cause for me, like I've tried to focus less on the reading and just pure conversational for me. And actually one thing that's really helped with that is,

Not watching anime actually, but watching- - What? - Yeah. - What? - But watching virtual YouTubers. So I've like really gotten into watching virtual YouTubers for the past few months. - Really? - Yeah. - Who are you into? - Asakoko is probably my favorite one.

at the time of right now, she just had her 3D debut. I'm sounding like a total fucking degenerate right now. - Is that the one you like simped over in Super Chat? - Yeah, I saw that all over Twitter was Garnt was simping. - I just did it, what? Okay. - I was very drunk at the time and I saw she was like, she was having like her first 3D debut and I'm like,

"I'll just fucking throw out like 30 bucks, whatever." And then like, as soon as I did, like my Twitter notification just like fucking exploded. - Giggity simping over this VTuber. - Imagine getting caught simping, but over a virtual YouTuber. - No, because like it's actually really helped my Japanese way more than watching anime. Because with watching anime, like I don't know what the anime watching experience has been for you Connor, since you've started learning. But for me,

I found it a lot more difficult to watch anime now that I'm learning Japanese because you know when you like read the subtitles and then you kind of understand what's going on. So you wanna like try to listen in to what's being said, but because you do that, you kind of just miss what's on the subtitles. That's like been my anime watching experience recently.

- I imagine Joey's just on his throne here being like, "Yes, tell me more about your struggles." - What are these subtitles you speak of? - Okay, one thing that I noticed that bugs me is that now that I know, I'd say a very basic amount, very minimal, not enough to watch an episode and be like, "Yep, I understood all of that." But enough to get some sentences, right? Is that when I read the subtitles, and obviously because in Japanese, sometimes the subject at the end of the sentence in English, it's normally the start in Japanese.

So sometimes you'll see a subtitle that comes with the other half of the sentence. So you're hearing the sentence that's gonna come up. - And it's like, you're like Jonathan Joestar. - I know what you're gonna say. - Your next line is gonna be. - Yeah, and it kind of messes with you. And then also like.

Just watching any hentai, it's really frustrating because I'm more like, I realized like two minutes in I'm starting to be like, okay, what are they saying? Oh, yamero, stop. - Kimochi means feels good. - I guess though it makes sense to like watch VTubers though, to like learn Japanese because like, you know, these are real people who are like speaking, right? They just look like anime, but like their mannerisms and their phrasing, even though, you know, they might be playing like a character, right?

it's still like a real person. - 'Cause it feels like they're having an actual conversation. 'Cause you know, like watching an anime and you hear a conversation, you're like, no, I've never actually- - This isn't a real conversation. - This isn't a real conversation that's happening right now. And I'm like zoning most of it out. Whereas when I'm watching a YouTuber, it feels like a genuine, like a Japanese conversation. Like you're actually hearing a story the way,

like any person you talk to Japan would talk like. So it's been like way more useful for me in learning Japanese than it has been watching anime.

- Also because I guess like with VTubers again, they're like real people, right? So like the speed that they talk at as well is very real. And it's like not like overly accentuated. So it actually makes more sense to like get used to that kind of speech speed than like, "Eh, so na no?" Like no one talks like that, right?

- No, 'cause you know, like it's like the anime voice acting voice, you know what I mean? Which is not how real people talk like. And this is true when like, I'd say dub as well, you know? You hear like a dub voice actor or like a dub performance and you're like, this isn't how real people talk. This isn't how people talk. It's very anime, you know? So it's more like watching a live streamer. So it's been like,

I'm not gonna say that's the only reason I've been into VTubers, but it's actually, if you're trying to learn Japanese, I'd say VTubing is much more useful than learning- - It's educational, I swear. - Than watching anime. Because watching anime now for me has become a lot harder. - And you get the joy of finding that one VTuber you can simp. You're like, "Oh yeah, that's my one."

- It is a little bit annoying to watch anime sometimes, but then also now sometimes I can look away just for a second and I can still understand what they said roughly. 'Cause I'll know like three of the five words that they say and off that I can kind of piece together what was being said. - Isn't that such a like a gratifying moment?

- It really is. And I was gonna say as well, like one thing that I found really helpful and I thought I would dread is like learning Kanji. I think learning Kanji is so interesting. I know you love your Kanji. - Yeah. - But learning has been so fun. 'Cause when it slowly starts to make sense, it feels like an RPG where you're unlocking the world where you live.

- Right. - Yeah, yeah. - 'Cause I can slowly start to read stuff and then there's like multiple different like ways to read a kanji. And then when you like know both, it's like, yeah, I'm kind of- - You're like that one isekai protagonist who just like comes in and is like, "What does this say? I don't know." And then like 12 episodes in, it's like, "Yeah, I get it." - Yeah, it's been really helpful for like just learning, like speaking it in general, 'cause a lot of the words have the same pronunciation.

And then obviously Kanji is the way to differentiate. - Yeah, Kanji holds the meaning, right? - Yeah, and sometimes reading a whole sentence in Hiragana is like,

- It is a nightmare. It's weirdly enough, like if for people who'd like have no idea about Japanese, it might be hard to like think about, but a full on like Hiragana or Katakana sentence is so difficult to read sometimes. Whereas Kanji is just like, oh yeah, I know exactly what that means. I know exactly how to read it. - It's the way I see it is that in English is that how we don't need to read the word, we know the shape of the word.

You know what I mean? We can see a word, I know the shape of the word, I can read it. And I think that's how Kanji is to Japanese people where they don't necessarily read it, but they recognize the shape and then they just know what's being said in the sentence. - 'Cause have you seen that video where you can read an entire paragraph where if it's the word is the first letter is the same, the last letter is the same and you swap all the letters in the middle, you can still read what's going on just because of

how your fluency works. - Yeah. - And I feel like it would be the same with Kanji as well. - I think so, yeah. - Yeah. - It is the same, but instead of the first and last letters, it's like, does this have one line in it or two? Like you just have to like, it's that, but just squinting really hard. - Yeah. - Okay, I think- - Yeah, there are some where there's so many lines where I'm like, how the fuck people just like read it this fast? - I mean, the more difficulties when you start to write it.

- True, true. - That's when it starts to get difficult. - Yeah, 'cause I have like an app and then it like vibrates my phone if you do the wrong stroke order. It's like, "No!" It's like, "That's not how you do it!" I mean, it's been good though, 'cause whenever I write a kanji out in my class in like the right stroke order, the teacher's like, "Eh?" Like in the TV shows. - It's like, "What the fuck?"

- Because like you never really think about something like stroke order, you know what I mean? Which stroke order is basically the order you write it in. - Yeah, 'cause like I write my S's the wrong way in English and people freak out. - I've seen you write your S's. - Tell people how you write your S's.

- You're supposed to do it from top to bottom, right? - Yeah, most people do it like that. - I do it from the bottom up and then like swish down with the cursive. I don't know why. - I'm like, how did you learn that? - I was like, dude, I was so bad at English in school. So to clarify, right? Like, okay, I'll just start the story with this. We'll start strong, right? I was so bad at English that they like put me with the kids who,

were not good at anything, you know? - Yeah. - I was in like the English class for one year with like kids with learning disabilities. And I remember being like, dude, what the fuck? 'Cause okay, like I've always been like really good at most subjects in school.

And okay, to clarify the reason why my English was so bad is 'cause the only reading and writing I ever did was in Welsh. 'Cause my school was Welsh. So they, everything I spoke in school and read was in Welsh. But I obviously knew how to spell English, speak English, obviously. And then, yeah, I remember we did like an English spelling test and I got like everything wrong.

- Bear in mind, I was like eight. And I couldn't, I remember they said like, "Oh, can you spell the word said for us?" And I was like, "Yeah, sure." And I just put like- - S-E-D. - S-E-D. - I put like, yeah, or like Z-E-D. And then my parents were like, "Oh no." And bear in mind, like I never read anything in English. I didn't read at all, it was just always video games.

So yeah, and I forgot what was that? Why did the story come up? I forgot why I was saying this. - 'Cause your S is weird. - Yeah, so I think I learned how to write, 'cause in English as well, in school they teach you the stroke order. - Do they? I can't remember this. - I mean, I learned it when we had to, I don't know if this is only in Australia, but like, I think I was in like fourth grade or something. - Yeah, 'cause you have those papers which are half width and full width. - Yeah, yeah, yeah. I learned how to do it when we learned to write cursive.

- Yeah, 'cause I wrote in cursive and it kind of became a thing where for some reason I just started writing some of them weirdly and no one ever stopped me.

- I do what I want. - So I just, I've always done like, I'll go into like the A and then I'll go down and then do the S up and then slash down. - How do you write your, like the number five? Do you go from the bottom or do you go from the top? - It depends, I guess. Like whatever the situation. - What do you mean it depends? - Yeah, I don't know. Like sometimes- - How does that work? - There's only one way to do it. - Most of the time I would do it from the top, but I remember distinctively I was doing it from the bottom for a while and then I stopped that. But I also used to write my fours like,

- The correct way of doing, how do you learn right fours in Australia? - I do it this way. - I do it that way.

- That's the way I learned. But then I remember I was playing brain training and they wouldn't accept that way of writing fours. This is when I was like 11. So then I started having to write fours in the Americanized way, which is doing that way. - Like that? That's the Americanized way? - Well, I think so, yeah. Where you do like, it looks like a kind of like spiky nine, right? - I don't think I've write any letters starting from the bottom. - No. - I'm like always- - How would you do your fours? - Four like this.

- Oh yeah, I do it the opposite way, I think. - So you do it from the bottom? - Yeah, from the bottom and then I go across. - How the fuck do you do that? - I don't know, man. - Yeah, it just feels so weird. - So in school, did you have to learn English literature and language? - What's the difference? - Because they were two different subjects for us in school. - Oh no, we just had English. - Oh shit, 'cause see, I had to learn English literature, English language, Welsh literature and Welsh language

I fucking hated doing that many. - Oh, okay. 'Cause I think for us, like maybe it's just my school, but like it depended on the day of the week. So like on like, it was like on Mondays we go through like a literature for like the term that we have to study. And then on like Wednesdays we like got to like do something else, like watch a movie or like study a different text for like a certain thing or like how to read an essay and write an essay on Fridays.

and shit like that. So yeah, we didn't, I think it's because they'll just, my school was just very small as well. So they probably wasn't enough English teachers in our school to be like, you're the literature one and you're the comprehension one, you know?

- How's it feel like learning a new language as you're older now though, compared to when you were a kid? Because like, I remember we had to learn a lot of other languages when we were in school. We had to learn like Spanish, French. Didn't take any of that shit. - No, no. - But it's been like a really different challenge learning Japanese as like a grown adult, I would say. Because I don't know.

- Has the fact that you were very much into Japanese culture and watching anime helped you at all from your perspective? - Yeah, definitely. I think it's made it easier, but like,

- Easier with an asterisk, right? It's like easier to understand some concepts culturally that might explain some of the language, right? Which is great. But at the end of the day, it doesn't help me like in a crazy amount. I think it just helps me understand why certain things are the way they are in a language. Why is it like, why you can't be direct to someone?

- It's never, and I guess 'cause sometimes when you're learning the language, you're like, why can't I just be like direct? And that's not a thing, you can't do that. That's too aggressive. - Yeah, I think learning Japanese for me, I didn't realize how much

I kind of just zoned out Japanese when I watched anime before. - Oh yeah, you do. You filter it out 'cause you're like, that's nonsense to me. I'm focusing on this. - You're just like absorbing the subtitles and you kind of just mute out the Japanese. And I didn't realize that until I started learning when I actually picked out individual, like how the sentence works and how the language actually works that I realized, oh,

"Oh, this didn't help me a lot at all." - But I find it really hard in my head to recommend learning language to people. 'Cause I feel like if you're not gonna like actually do it, it's kind of a waste of time. - I know, it takes commitment. - Yeah, that's what I've always said to people though about Japanese. - And it's one of those things where like learning Japanese, especially if you're not going to do it full time,

it's like at least a five year thing that you have to commit to. And if you quit two and a half years in, you know. - But that's the problem, right? Is that like so many people, I get fucking emails about it all the goddamn time being like, what's the easiest way to learn Japanese? There is no easy way to learn Japanese. You just have to sit down and just be like, am I about to commit five to 10 years of my life to learn this shit? Yes, go for it. - It's like any like skill chart, right? Where it's like the first like real, getting over the first real difficult like bump is the hardest. And once you get past that,

you've gone through a challenge, you've overcome it. Normally you can keep going. That's the same with any craft, right? Like voice acting as well, like photography, anything, right? - YouTube. - YouTube, right? There's always gonna be that first point where you think you're starting to understand it. And then you'll get to that point where you're like, fuck, I know nothing about what I'm getting into. And it's that point where if you keep going and actually start to really put in the work, you'll probably see some results. But a lot of people quit at that point.

'Cause like I'm always really paranoid and this is true in my life and whenever I'm like doing a playthrough of a game, right? When I'm doing something and it's just sub-optimized. - Yeah. - And sometimes like, sometimes I like paralyze myself 'cause I'm just like, what if I'm not doing this most optimal way? Is this a waste of time? I'm so scared of wasting my time. So when I first started learning Japanese, I spent more time trying to figure out the best way to learn Japanese than actually learning Japanese. - It's really like that.

- Yeah, I guess you're the opposite to me in that sense. Like I do video games, I'm definitely like that. I'll maximize the shit out of video games, but everything else in my life, I'm like, "That's good enough." - I'm kind of the opposite with video games. I'm just like video games- - Yeah, you are, yeah. - Video games are just made to be like fun and time-wasting. - Yeah, 'cause I'll talk to Jerry about video games that we're both playing and I'll be like, "You know this is like 2% more efficient to do this method, right?" And Jerry's like, "Bro, I don't give a fuck."

- And I'm like, I've already put CCDL in this game. I don't care. - That's why if you're learning a language though, I'm like, as long as I'm learning something in the language that I can view as somewhat useful, I'm sure it's not a waste, right? I feel like there's no route to learning a language. Any bit you learn of it is like, it's putting the jigsaw together.

- And it depends on the person, right? At the end of the day. - Yeah, it does. - Some people are crazy. - Like everyone has a different path. Everyone learns differently and you're not gonna discover the best way you learn unless you actually just go out and fail at something. - Right, right, right. - Like I didn't fucking know I would waste like a month on Duolingo. - I wasted a lot of time on Duolingo. - I did. - Don't use, for like other languages, European languages, I'm pretty sure it's pretty good,

- Yeah, for Japanese it was not very useful. - Yeah, yeah, it was very- - Throwing Kanji at you right from the get go, and not explaining why you need to learn it or what this is. - That sounds efficient. - It was like teaching me the Kanji for window. - That's a difficult one too. - Yeah, it was hard. And like seat, Kanji for seat. And I thought like, why are you teaching me this shit? I don't even know the Kanji for Monday. Why would you teach me window? I don't need to know this.

- I think window is in like the top 100 most used kanji. So why are you teaching? - It's pretty uncommon to say. - I feel that the way when Duolingo went about it, we're never gonna get a Duolingo sponsorship by the way. It was not good. - And if we do, you can call us out on that. - It's like Duolingo is a way, it like tricks you into thinking you're learning. - No, no. You know a lot of like,

- Disparate pieces of information that you can never piece together as a whole to use anywhere basically. - And it's a shame 'cause I feel like you don't really realize that you're being marked off by Duolingo until like you actually start learning it properly. And then you're like, I literally have no use for anything I learned on Duolingo 'cause it was such a mess. I remember distinctively, right? Like I didn't even know how to say any sentences but they were teaching me how to read the Kanji of Kyoto and Tokyo. And I'm like, that's cool.

I don't need to know this. I genuinely don't. - If you go to Tokyo and Kyoto, it's written in fucking English. - Yeah, it's like, this is something that I don't need to know. What I would like to know is how do I say like, oh, I recommend this. I think, you know, like I didn't know how to say I think or anything like that, right? - It's like Duolingo, I don't need to know if this is a pen, okay? I know this is a pen.

I know what an apple is. I don't have to ask what an apple is. - There was some good stuff there. I'm not saying it's all bad, but I just felt like the structure was all over the place. - 'Cause I remember when we first moved, before we moved to Japan, me and Connor were on Duolingo for like a good month, month and a half, before moving to Japan. And then we got here and we were like, oh,

"Oh, we don't know shit. "So we need to start off by learning hiragana and katakana." And I remember we just like, I sat down and I Googled like what the best memorization techniques were. And then I found this memorization techniques. Like I can't remember what it's called. - We'll link it in the description. - It's like mnemonics or mnemonics. I can't remember the exact pronunciation of it. And then,

I learned all of Hiragana and Katakana in like one day. And then I told Connor, yo, this shit works. And Connor was like, nah, nah, I don't know about this. And then I linked him the same article and he comes back to me like three, four hours later and like, bruh,

I can read. It was crazy. Like I said earlier, like when you go outside and like you've unlocked the world, 'cause you can start suddenly reading McDonald's menus with no- - Is that the one where it's, is the mnemonics thing where it's like you, it's like shape based? - Yeah, so it would make you assign like, and to be fair, this is how like memory champions memorize stuff. They assign stories and shapes and objects to the memory and that way they can recall them much easier. So it would say like,

which is the one that's like that. They're like, it's a chef's hat. Think of a chef's hat when you see this symbol, but like cooking. - I mean, it's kind of like a very dumb. - It was like, yeah, it was like a sign. 'Cause then you remember that's kind of dumb. But then you remember when you see it, oh, it's that dumb thing.

- You remember the dumb shit. - Yeah, yeah. I mean, it's really stupid, but it made you remember it. - 'Cause it's like counterintuitive, right? Because by remembering more stuff, you remember one stuff better as opposed to just repeating the same thing over and over. - Right, right. - But the best way I've heard an explanation for it is that it's kind of like, your memory is kind of like a filing cabinet, right? So if you just have one random piece of information that you just randomly file, it's very hard to just find that random piece of information, but you have,

If that information is got a bunch of other information that relates that, then it's much easier for you to like find it in your memory. So that's why you can just recall things a lot easier. - I definitely feel like that. Like I find that learning symbols for me is like way easier than learning like

anything else. Like that's why like Kanji has been pretty fun so far. - Yeah, you're definitely like a person who like remembers stuff like visually, right? - Yeah, yeah. When I'm like, like if you give me like a set of numbers, I can normally remember the numbers like decently well. Like so learning Kanji is great. Cause like I love just putting like a hundred symbols

like a program and just making it test me over and over. And I'll do that for like hours until I can remember all 100, right? And that's what I do. And I find that really easy. - At the end of the day, that's what is probably the most effective, right? It's just fucking rote learning. - You literally just need to like force that shit in your head by just like doing it, doing it, doing it. And at least the good thing about doing that here in Japan is that if you then force yourself to learn all those symbols is that you just walk outside and you're like,

- You can like use it like practically, right? - Yeah, yeah, yeah. Like there's somewhere I'm like, I'm never gonna fucking like, why do I need to know this Kanji? And then like two seconds later I'm on the train and that the place has one of the Kanjis in there. - I get it. - Which is like question for you Joey, which is I have always been curious, like how much studying have you done? Because a lot of people assume that Joey's Japanese is like a second language, right?

- It's completely wrong. Joey has a second first language. - Yeah, pretty much. - A lot of people don't know this, but Joey's Japanese is better than most Japanese people.

- I had no idea how good your Japanese was. I just kind of thought that you were like decent at it. But then I came here and then you were teaching Kanji to like 40 year old people. And then they were like, what the fuck? - I was like, it was in this studio. We were like having a party and like, we had like three people from our company, all Japanese. And I was like teaching them about like different Kanji structures and shit. They were like, I'd never heard of this shit before. And I'm like,

I've heard of it before, it's so simple. I did a lot, like a lot, a lot. Like when I say, I've said it in videos, but like when I've said like, I've studied my entire life, like I'm not joking, I've studied my entire life. Just to put it in perspective, when I was like maybe 10 years old, you know what I used to do for fun? - What? - I used to read the Kanji dictionary.

- I would literally, I was that one kid. Like my parents probably thought I was like borderline autistic. 'Cause like, I would like sit in my room as a 10 year old and I'm like, I got nothing better to do. And I would just go to my mom's bookshelf, just take out this massive, like, you know, 2000 page kind of shit and just open up to a random page and just,

for like hours on end. And like, I don't know, maybe I don't know how much that actually helped me in the long run, but definitely it kind of got me like to like familiarize myself with different shapes. And you know, in that sense, I'm definitely a lot like Connor where I'm very good at learning things visually. - Yeah, I need visuals. Learning sentences and stuff doesn't do anything for me. - But like another huge thing for me was probably the fact that like my mom,

we'll have like this, like kind of this unspoken rule where if I spoke to her in English, I would usually get ignored. And that's, that's really cruel. Especially when like a four year old is trying to like talk to their mom about something. And like, but I quickly picked up on it because like I was like four or five years old and I'd like, be like, Hey mom, can I do, you know, blah, blah. She just straight up ignore me. I'm like, all right, she's in a pissed off mood. But then the more times you experience it, I'm like, oh,

I have to ask her in Japanese. And the moment I asked her in Japanese, she's like, yes, son. - That's a genius way to make your kids like that. - My mom was exactly the same actually. And I'm like, thank, I'm like now she's like, you're gonna appreciate this when you're older. Thank you, you're getting this now, mom. I appreciate it now that I'm older. - Mom, I also appreciate it, thank you. - This episode is sponsored by ExpressVPN. Going online without ExpressVPN is like not having a case on your phone.

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- If she didn't do that, then I wouldn't have forced myself to learn Thai or to use Thai in a practical setting, which is very hard when you're not living in the country that you're using it. - Exactly, everybody around me spoke English, right? 'Cause I was living in Australia and I had a few childhood friends who spoke Japanese, but because all of my childhood friends were also halfies like me, sometimes we just spoke in English to one another. So I needed a way, I guess my,

mom was like, all right, I need to find like a consistent way for my son to keep speaking the language, just keep improving. And like, it really helped as well because my mom was like exceedingly good at Japanese and like Kanji and stuff like that especially. So like whenever I had like a question or like I learned a new word, I always went to my mom and I tried to force myself to use that new word in a sentence. And she would either say like, oh, that's not how you use that word.

This is how you use it. - You dumb little shit. Let me tell you how to use this word. - She could immediately know when I was trying to like, where it was like, oh yeah, you just like that word, didn't you? Because she'd be like, okay, that's not quite how you use it. This is how you use it. And then I'd use it again. And she'd be like, okay, perfect. And that's just,

how I learned from practicality. - Do you know one big reason I really wanna learn Japanese? - Why? - Is one specific series I want to experience after having learned Japanese. And that's the Monogatari series. I really, really wanna experience the Monogatari series after learning Japanese. 'Cause like, I love the Monogatari series now, but I feel like I'm getting like maybe half the enjoyment I could be getting and like all the appreciation I could be getting. - There's this video I've been trying to write for the longest time called,

you'll never understand Nishio Isshin where, because as you said, the Monogatari series and everything Nishio Isshin writes is fucking phenomenal. He's an amazing author. A lot of it translates pretty well into English, right? But-

- The thing that makes Nishio Isshin so amazing is the subtleties and the way that he plays around with the Japanese language. And that shit is fucking impossible to translate. And I wanted to make that video because I fucking love Nishio Isshin and the Monogatari series like more than anybody. But it's like, how do I explain to my English speaking audience

about how you'll never understand it if you're an English speaker. - You need to have like a basic understanding of kanji, right? - Not just kanji, he does wordplay in a way that I've never seen any Japanese author do. And I think that's the whole reason why so many people love him. It's because like, wow, I didn't know that you could, like he makes Japanese people's Japanese look dumb.

- That's the only way to describe it. Like a Japanese person will read that and be like, wow, it's like, I don't know this language. - 'Cause like, have you ever seen the Monogatari series? - Yeah. - Yeah. I was learning Kanji the day and I came across the Monogatari Kanji. - Oh yeah. - 'Cause like for, is it like Hanase or Go? Which Kanji is it? The one where you, it's like to speak or to tell a tale is like a- - Oh, Go, yeah. - Yeah, Go is like one of the meanings is to tell a tale. - Is to tell a tale, yeah. - Right, and so it's like a-

- And Monogatari just means like thing tail. - Yeah, yeah, thing tail. - That's essentially what I mean. - And I was like, I saw it and I was like, that's pretty cool. - Yeah. - Monogatari. - 'Cause like that's the thing, right? With the Monogatari series is that even the titles are a play on words. - Right, right. - Because Bakemono and Monogatari is two different words. - Right, yeah. - And it just fucking mashes those two words together to just turn it into one thing. - Oh, okay. - And like, that's like the brilliant subtlety of,

I don't wanna say the whole thing 'cause I wanna save it for a video, but. - Okay, so I was gonna ask, how is it reading the light novel compared to watching the anime? 'Cause that's something I've always been curious about how well the anime has been able to translate his writing into a visual format. - I think with like, that's the one thing I love about

is that they do hold this like really weird appreciation for Nishio Ishin's writing. And that's why, like, you know, Araragi's like monologues are way longer than any anime monologue should be. Like there was so much, that's why it's so dialogue heavy. - Yeah, I remember being like, what the fuck? Like, can we just end?

- Like a standard Monogatari episode is like 95% dialogue, but it needs to be because everything that Nishio-shin writes is so important to the story because it is really convoluted and it does add a lot of character. And like, and you know, like if you've seen Monogatari episodes, you know how like every now and then there were just like these flashing images of text. Yeah, that's all texts ripped straight out of the novels.

- Yeah, I was really confused that would happen. I was confused a lot during every series of the Monogatari. - Yeah, it is confusing. - I'm very surprised how big Monogatari got because I remember when I first watched it and I'm like, this breaks basically every rule of like filmmaking convention that I know. It was like, oh, show don't tell and Monogatari is like, how about we tell everything and show basically nothing.

And you're just gonna enjoy this 20 minute long dialogue and you're gonna fucking, and it turns out amazing. And I'm like, why does this work? I have never seen something work so eloquently as the "Monogatari" series. And what surprised me is that it just became like for the otaku culture back then, it kind of became like a cultural phenomenon. - It did, especially in Japan because it was just,

unlike anything. And I mean, you know, Katanagatari in a sense as well. - I was gonna say like, if I had to, if I was a betting man, I would have put my money on Katanagatari being way bigger than- - Yeah. - Yeah, yeah, yeah. - And it's kind of weird that in the West it was like the other way around. And like people still don't really watch, I think Katanagatari because of, maybe it's like, I don't know where you can watch it.

- Illegally. - Yeah. - I have no idea how- - You have to buy like a $400 Blu-ray, I think. - Such a shame, 'cause it's an absolute banger. - It is fucking great. - It's so good. - It's got nothing to do with the "Morning Guitar Series", just so you know. - It's a good thing, honestly. - But like recently there was an OVA adaptation of the first novel that Nishio Ishii never wrote. I forgot what it was called. It's "Kubikiri Cycle".

That's what it's called. There was like a four episode OVA of it that came out and I was like, okay, it's Nishio Isshin, it's essentially the series that inspired the Monogatari series. So I'm like, this has to be big. Like, you know, of course every Monogatari fan is gonna watch it. No one fucking watched that OVA. And I was really sad because it is screaming Monogatari vibes.

- It's weird 'cause I liked the "Monogatari" series. I've watched, I don't know which part I got up to. I watched a lot of it. - I mean, it's like eight, nine seasons right now. - There's so fucking many, bro. And I'm like a monkey when I watch anime. I'm like, I don't wanna have to like think about like order and shit and like what I'm doing. Just put something on, right? And sometimes it's like, I don't know,

I don't know what happened in between the series sometimes. And because it's so confusing, there was so many times where I would start a season of one of that franchise, I don't know which fucking one. And I was like, am I on the right one or am I just confused because it's this series? - That is like easily the most, like that is the number one question I get possibly the most.

- What order should I watch the Monopoly episode? - It's not even that complicated. - Okay, but even though if you're watching in the right order, it's such a confusing show that normally you can get halfway into the first episode of like season two, right? And you're like, is this season two? I really like don't know what's going on. But then I guess I didn't have any idea what was going on the whole time.

- That's the thing, right? Is that the Monumentary series, like one season is already confusing enough as it is, like in an enclosed story. And when you look at it on the grand scale of things, it's even more confusing because basically Nishioishin pulled a Quentin Tarantino Pulp Fiction. Like everything is out of order, but it's in the same universe. - I mean, I don't think it matters that much, honestly, as long as you just get like the,

- Just fucking Google with the release order. - Yeah. - You can't really go wrong. - It's stressful though, man. I've somehow fucked it up many times. Like when I watched the spoke Rohan Kishbe Oviyes, for some reason,

Araki when he wrote them gave them episode numbers in the thing. So when you're watching the OVAs, they don't do them in order and Araki never did them in order anyway if I remember correctly. So you'll turn on episode one, there'll be like episode six and I'm like,

- What do you mean? - Araki, please stop. - And then you're like, space bar, right? Fucking Google, right? Which episode is episode one? And then they say, yeah, episode one is episode six. Episode two is episode nine. Episode three is like episode four. And then you're like,

- Why? Why would you do this? - He pulled like a George Lucas Star Wars, right? It's like episode four is the first one. - But it's not even that, 'cause at least it goes episode four, five, six, then it goes one, two, it's not even that. It's just like four, nine, two, seven. And it's like, why?

- No, it's like the, not just "Haruhi Suzumiya." Like, did you watch "Haruhi Suzumiya" when it was airing? So "Haruhi Suzumiya" had like this broadcast order and it was for absolutely no reason. It was just broadcasted in this random order, right?

And people were like, I remember when it was airing, people were like, oh, this is like a genius move. Cause it's kind of like you're piecing together the puzzle each episode. And now that it's like all airs now, like I'm pretty fucking sure that they aired it out the order because the fucking last episode chronologically was just the most anticlimactic episode of the entire series. So they're like, oh, the best episode is episode six. Mix it up.

- Just mix up Yorda and people are gonna call that genius movie. It wasn't genius, Tanika Onagura was just on crack. - Wait, wait, was this the original Japanese broadcast? - Yeah. - They had it out of order. - Yeah, yeah. - Why? - 'Cause Tanika Onagura was on crack. - I didn't know that. I see, I only watched it years after and I think we mentioned this before, but I watched the movie first by accident. - Yeah. - Yeah, yeah, yeah.

- Yeah, this guy, I think you mentioned in episode zero. So most people haven't seen it. This person watched the disappearance of Haruhi Suzumiya first, which is like, how do you do that? - I was still less confused watching that movie than I was watching most of the Monogatari series. No, so if you don't know, they made a movie, right? Of like the thing that like tied the whole Haruhi Suzumiya thing up. - It was, yeah. The disappearance of Suzumiya Haruhi, which is the fourth,

- I don't fucking know, right? All I was is like, I just got into anime. I wanted to watch the best rated anime movie. No one told me. - And it still is the best movie. - No one told me that I needed backstory and I went into it and I watched it all and I was like, wow.

- What did you think? Did you think it was a good movie? - I thought it was shit. 'Cause I didn't know what the fuck was going on. How can I think it's a good movie when I don't know anything? I remember being really annoyed with the- - I bet Connor just watched this right after school days and just like, "10 out of 10, 10 out of 10, what the fuck is going on?"

- I might go, I might watch it on crack. - I think the school days was what like, you know, broke the camel's back. It was definitely the "How to Hear Susan Mia" movie watching thing that definitely like made me think like reviews are sus. - So have you gone back to like watch the movie since then or? - No, no, I haven't.

- You haven't. - But you've seen the TV series now, right? - I watched the first season of the TV series. I got like two episodes into the second TV series where they were repeating everything. And I was just like, no, I'm not doing this. - I would say that "Haruhi" still is very much worth watching in this day and age because of "Disappearance". "Disappearance" is still my- - Such a good movie.

- It's probably my favorite anime franchise film of all time. - I agree. - And up there as one of my favorite anime films of all time. And this guy apparently fucking hates it. - I think the whole series is kind of mediocre. I don't know. - Wow. - Really? - The first season was just fine, right? I was watching it and I was like, okay, I know this is a terrible comparison, but I was just like, man, this just feels like "Toradora" but like worse. I don't know why. - What the fuck is this?

- What the fuck are you talking about? There's zero romance in there. - I know, but like, 'cause the whole setting reminded me so much of like "Toradora" and the way that it was set up. - What, that it was set in a school? - Yes. - Like every anime. - I know this is like complete stupid opinion on my part. I recognize this is a garbage opinion, but the whole time I was just like, I guess 'cause it was just, okay, I was very bored a lot of the time watching "How to Choose." The only thing that made me wanna watch it was the fact that Crispin Freeman voiced Keon.

- No, that's the best part of it. - Yeah, he was amazing. And it was a treat watching him. - Yeah, what you said is like saying, oh yeah, Anohana was kind of like another 'cause they have ghosts in there or whatever. - That's a fair comparison, Garnt. - I mean, I don't know, 'cause like, okay, what show could- - And they both start with A in. - What show can you compare Harry and Susamia to? If you had to, the closest comparison.

- Here's the thing, like Haruhi Suzumiya inspired a lot of like- - I came after that huge way, I became an anime fan after that huge thing that had its impact, right? So I think I came into it with like zero attachment to it in any sense. - Yeah, because I think the thing with Haruhi that I find really interesting is the fact that it's one of those anime that is like really weirdly tied to the period that it came out in, much like "Lucky Star" I feel, because like,

- I think that's why I don't give a shit about either. - Right, because like the thing is like, I fucking love both "Lucky Star", especially "Lucky Star". I think it was fucking amazing. But like the problem is that the references in "Lucky Star" and like the whole fact that it really reflected the Otaku culture of the mid 2000s is what made that show really funny in the mid 2000s. But as much as I love "Lucky Star", I can't really recommend it to people

to people today because the scene is just completely changed. - Yeah, but does that mean you can recommend Haruhi Suzumiya today? - Yes, I can. - Really? - Yeah. - I think I ruined it for myself. - Yeah, you basically just watched the climax. You watched the climax before like watching any of the buildups. So now you've just kind of ruined it for yourself. - That's why I kind of don't feel bad for being like, yeah, I think it's not that good because I'm like,

I know I ruined it for myself and it might've been good. - The only way to like top that experience is if you committed to reading all of the light novel. - I'll be dead before I read a light novel. I'm never reading a light novel. - I did that and like the final, final volume of "Haruhi" was like pretty fucking good. So you just have to sit down and read nine volumes. - I have no interest in reading a light novel ever.

'Cause I remember like a lot of the elements in Haruhi have been done in other places now. 'Cause like there's a lot of like self-referential humor in Haruhi. And I remember when that was like an innovative thing. Like I remember when every fucking light novel wasn't trying to parody every other light novel. And now it's just gotten so fucking lazy with its self-referential humor. - Well, again, like that's the whole thing where it comes to like the time period. - You guys sound like anime boomers.

- We had it better back then. You should have shown the anime we had. - In '06 when Haruhi and Lucky Star came out, like as you said, like the whole like self-referential thing. And I think the whole meta aspect of anime was just so new. Like I remember when- - It was such post-modernism.

- It was so post-modern at the time. - No, because I remember at the end of every "Lucky Star" episode, while the credits were rolling, there was no ending song for "Lucky Star." What it was was, it was these scenes of all of the "Lucky Star" characters in a karaoke booth, but you were outside of the karaoke booth, so you could only hear them. But the conversations that they were having in the karaoke booth weren't characters having a conversation with characters, it was voice actresses having a conversation with voice actresses. And people were like,

- Of course they're voiced by voice actresses. These aren't just characters on a screen. They're real people. And that meta was like, that was fucking cool. Cause no other anime did that. You're laughing. - He is laughing. - You're gonna sit down and you're gonna respect this culture. You're gonna respect this corner. - I just don't care.

- It was cool back in the day. - Back in the day, yeah. - Meta anime, I still think meta anime peaked with "Monogatari." - 100%. - In terms of light novel shows, adaptations, it kind of peaked with "Monogatari." And there's been other good light novel shows as well that have been meta, but I'd say "Haruhi" really was the first time I noticed it. It was "Haruhi" and "Lucky Star." And then,

Monogatari was the one that came afterwards. And then it kind of like nothing outdid it. And now you see a lot of lazy fucking attempts at meta humor and meta jokes. Like there was one anime I saw recently

which was like such an eye rolling moment is the MILF Isekai that aired last year. - Everyone's favorite. - Yeah. Okay, because it was, you know, everyone thought, and you know, it kind of marketed itself as like a parody of the Isekai genre, right? 'Cause it's like, oh, it's the Isekai genre, but you know, there's a mom this time, you know, you gotta- - It's different now. - It's different 'cause there's a mom this time. And I remember there was one joke, okay? They were in like, they were in a hot springs.

And there's this one tsundere that's in the hot springs. And then she like stands up and she's naked in front of the main character. And then the main character literally says, "Ah, this is the scene where you're about to hit me." And the tsundere goes, "Ah, but how about if I don't hit you? I bet you weren't expecting that, were you?" And the main character goes, "Ah, you're right. I wasn't expecting that." And the tsundere just goes off crying.

And that was the joke. - Wow. - That was the joke. - I remember we had this exact same conversation that is a kind of this video. You were like fucking like fuming. I'm like, this is not how you write a meta joke. You basically explained the meta before you told the meta. - First of all, I want all my anime scenes acted out by Garnt like that. Second of all, I just like,

whereas you tend to watch the trash Isekai, I could give less of a fuck about the Isekai that's coming out. - Yeah, I'm right there with you. - It's so like, it just iterates on itself and then changes one thing. It's like, I wouldn't be surprised if there's another slime one, except he's like a green slime next, right?

And it's just like, that's gonna be the next big thing. - That's just season two. - Yeah, it's just a green. And it's just like, I just struggle to give a fuck about any of the isekai that come out. Like I wanted to watch the mum one just for the memes. I couldn't even muster up to like type it in. - It wasn't even that good for the memes. Like it was, you saw the title, you're like, "Ha ha, I can make a meme out of this." And then I did. And then I watched two episodes and I'm like, "Now I'm done."

- Because I wanna watch these shows so I can talk about them. But then I realized like, by now maybe, I don't even know, that six months after that show's aired, that meme is long dead. And no one's gonna mention it for six months. - Not even. It's like by the time the next season comes around, in three months time, no one's fucking talking about it. - And then maybe it'll be like a factoid one day. Like, "Did you watch that 'Mommies of Kite'?" Yeah, oh okay.

- You know what I mean? Like you don't need to watch it for any reason. - Right, right. - 'Cause for me watching trash isekai or just trash anime in general, 'cause apparently that's my brand or whatever. It's just the reason I do it is because it's just like, it's just the easy turn your brain off show of the season, right? You know, like I have to be in a certain mood to watch something like Monogatari.

You know what I mean? Like I can't just be like, I can't just like casually sit down having like my lunch or something. And like, I'm gonna like- - Monogatari is like the antithesis of I'm just gonna put something on. - Yeah, exactly. - You don't put Monogatari on. - Whereas with the trash Isakai, like I just sit down for lunch and I just put it on, you know, and I just don't have to think. I watch every week and then I just end,

And those are the shows I end up watching 'cause they're like the easiest watch. 'Cause I know what I'm getting into. I'm not being challenged. I'm just like, okay, this character is gonna do that, whatever. - How much of a brain dead show can we make this season? - Oh, go on, go on, go on. - No, no, which is why I can watch them because they are brain dead. 'Cause I don't have to think. 'Cause you know sometimes where you watch like a good show, right? And sometimes you just really wanna be in that right mood.

to watch something heavy or something good. But with the trash shows, I never have to be in a certain mood to watch it. Which is why I've found that I've watched more trash shows because like sometimes, I don't know, I get anxiety sometimes when if I'm like,

- It's a good show. - If it's a good show, but I'm not in the mood. Do you know what I mean? - I totally had this, right? What was the show? Keep Your Hands Off. - It's okay. - Right, right. Like that was one of those shows where I'm like, I can't just not like, I can't just like watch this. - Yeah, you have to commit to it. - It seemed like such a passionate thing where I was like, I can't just half ass this. So I watched one episode and I liked what I saw. But because of that,

I just never watched episode two. 'Cause I had to be in that mood to watch it and I never was. - Those are the types of shows that are like really hard to like stop and then get back into. - And it sucks 'cause I know that was a good show. I know it was, but I just, I didn't care enough to like find that time to be like, I wanna keep watching this. And I feel bad 'cause like everyone was like,

this is the best show of the season. I'm just sitting there like watching like the 100th documentary on Netflix, you know, like, cause- - I have no time. - I don't know.

I've had that problem a lot more with anime recently. - I feel you though. - This is the reason, this is the fucking reason I still haven't watched Full Metal Alchemist, okay? - Yeah. - 'Cause you know it's good and you just- - I know it's good and I'm like, because here's the thing, I can go years without watching or reading a manga of a series that I know I'm going to love. But I want to be in the right mood and it might take years, it might take a fucking decade. Okay, like last year,

- I finally read 20th Century Boys. - Okay.

It went from like, I know I was gonna read this since I basically started getting into manga to okay, yeah. This is like I thought one of my favorite mangas of all time. And it's fucking incredible. But I had to wait like so many years to experience it because I just wanted to be in that perfect zone to read it. And I'm so glad I did because there are some shows, did you have some shows that you think if you rewatch it, you won't enjoy it as much? - Oh yeah. - Because you're not in the same head space? - Like 90%.

I think. - Yeah, I think so. - Because I feel like that's why I can never get behind watching anime weekly. 'Cause to me- - No, I can. - I can. - I can't. - I can't. - I can't do it anymore. - Because I'm always in a different head space sometimes when I'm watching a show. - There's some shows that transcend that and they're so hype. - Such as?

- I watched Attack on Titan. Watching that weekly was like hype as fuck. Every single week, no matter what, that one day it came out, I was hyped to shit for that show. - 'Cause I binged that whole series. - Right, but like it was such a good episode by episode that like, even though it sucked, it sucked to have to wait a week. It was like so good 'cause that one day in the week, you got like a treat. And it didn't matter how bad your mood was or where your head space is at, for 25 minutes, you can shut your brain off and just have,

- Man, I used to be able to do that so easily when I was in high school and uni. - And as well joining in the discourse online, talking about it. - I feel like that's a different side that I never got growing up with anime, which is the social aspects. Because for me, it was just, I watch a show and I'm like, that was an amazing show and I have no one to talk to about it. - Yeah, same, same. - The social aspect has quickly become one of my favorite parts of watching anime.

And it's why like I caught up to Demon Slayer on episode 19. Like, cause I wanted to get involved with the social discourse. Cause the memes are great. I love memes. - No, the memes are great. And like it's made it so if a show has like a bad ending or something, I still enjoy it because- - Oh, because of the shitstorm on Twitter? - It's just the shitstorm that follows. - I love that shit. - I remember when Darling in the Franks ended and then- - Oh.

there was this shift at like episode 18 or 20, I can't remember the exact episode. And then everyone lost their shit. And like, it's not a good ending, but I had a blast watching it. - I just realized something. I remember that, you know, when Big Ed was a thing, I know, bear with me, this is gonna make sense. Big Ed from 90 Day Fiance was a thing, right? Like it was, you know, great memes, fantastic. I wanna start watching 90 Day Fiance because of that.

it's just like not the same. I was watching it and I was like, oh, it's 'cause I need the YouTube comments for every clip. 'Cause it's like one thing to have a clip is it's funny, but when there's like just the perfect YouTube thread roasting the shit out of it, it's so funny. And also when someone's an asshole on a TV show, you wanna be like, everyone else thinks this guy's an asshole, right? Let me go and check the comments real quick. Because do you get this now where you watch some YouTube videos or clips from shows or YouTube video where they do something in the clip and that's the moment where you open up the comments, you're like,

I hope everyone's talking about this. And that's what I love about watching anime weekly is that you get that kind of like, everyone's gonna be talking about that thing that just happened on Twitter. It's gonna be fun. I love trying to get on that. But then like you said, oh, go on, go on. - Do you ever get personally offended when you go on a YouTube video and then the comments are disabled? Like even if it's something you never wanted to comment on or you never like, if it's just, most of it is like anime trailers or anime opening sometimes, I see the comments are disabled. I'm like, I don't know why, but I feel offended

- I was like you fucking pussies. - I turned like American for like five seconds. I'm like free speech stand, where's my second amendment? - Like going back to what you said earlier with the, if you rewatch the show and not in the right head space, I just, for some reason I was like, I'm pretty sure if I've rewatched "Darker Than Black" I wouldn't think it's that good of a show.

but I remember really liking that show. And I'm happy to leave that memory. - There's a lot of shows like that. Like a lot of shows like that, like "Ergo Proxy" for me is one of those. - Yeah, I've rewatched "Ergo Proxy", I don't think I'd like it. - I don't think I'd like it as much, but when I watched it, I was in that like perfect angsty, like big brain boy mode where I was just like, yep.

- There's a lot of shows that I'm just leaving in that bubble where I'm happy to talk about these shows, but I never wanna rewatch them. - 'Cause like for me, the one big show for me is "Karunokiyokai." I watched it when I was like in a really dark head space. - I watched this one with the blood sword.

- No, that's "Beyond the Boundary." That's a different one. - Oh, okay. I thought we were talking about "Beyond the Boundary." - He said "Beyond the Boundary." It's "Kanano Kyokai." - Yeah. - It's "Kyokai no Kanata" is "Beyond the Boundary." - Oh yeah, that's it. - Yeah, that's it. I was like, "What the fuck's the Japanese title of that?" - Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's the one with the pink haired girl in the glasses with the mask on. - It's about, it's the one with the assassin who has like the death eyes or whatever. But yeah, I was in a really dark head space when I watched that and-

- No, but like it was one of those series that I don't wanna be that guy, but it was like kind of life changing for me. - Okay, now we need to know, please explain. How did that change your life? - Please elaborate. - No, because like I was like, I don't wanna get into too much in detail, but I was like in a head space that I was like kind of like the lowest I've ever been in my life. And then I watched this series and it connected with me on a level that nothing else could at the time.

And it kind of like really changed my perception of the world and everything like that. And because of it, it's like one of my favorite anime of all time. But because I'm not in the same head space that I am now that I was back then, I'm so fucking terrified of rewatching it. 'Cause if I rewatch it and I just don't get that same connection that I'm like, I don't wanna lose that. I don't wanna lose what that series gave to me at that time of my life.

And that's like the one series that I really hold like really close to me. And another series is actually Evangelion because Evangelion, I think is one show that is just infinitely rewatchable, right? 'Cause every time that I've watched Evangelion, I've got a different experience out of it. - I 100% agree with that. - I watched it first time when it came out on Netflix. First time ever watching it. - Oh really? - How'd you find it? - It was good. I mean, I think,

- Because it was the mega hype show that it was. I think you go in expecting too much. I mean, I was happy with what I got. It was just very confusing.

That's under Hideaki for you. - But it was great. And I liked how he built the world is a very, very terrifying one. And I feel like it's a lot of anime struggle to do that. And like a truly terrifying one. - Do you have like that one anime that as Garnt said is like life-changing for you? - Yeah, yeah. I mean, we spoke about it last episode which fucked up the recording by the way. But "Bokurano" is definitely one of those shows that like,

I think definitely changed. - Yeah, yeah. - 'Cause it was again, I think it was a similar thing where I was at a point where I think I was really confused with what I wanted in my life. - Yeah. - And it really helped like ground me a lot and really understand a lot of emotions that I was perhaps feeling. - Can we re-talk about "Boccherano" because I want the audience to know about "Boccherano." - Yeah, yeah, yeah. Not enough people have seen "Boccherano" unfortunately. - It's one of those shows where

- It's not the best show, but it's a very important one that I think people should watch. And I don't know how to describe that eloquently. - It's very disturbing, but not for like the conventional reasons for it being disturbing. - So what "Boccherano" is about is there's this group of kids. - This is gonna sound awesome by the way.

- It sounds like an Evangelion ripoff. - It really does. - Because there's these group of kids and then they're like the, I think they're on their school trip or something. It's been a while since I've seen them. - They're on a school trip. - Yeah, and then they find this, all I remember is they find this cave with a talking head or something like that. - No, so there's a guy in a cave and he's like a middle-aged man working on like a PC in a cave. It's really weird setup. - Yeah.

he basically asked them, "Do you wanna play a game?" - Would you like to play a game? - Which, you know, anyone asking you that ever with a bunch of kids, an immediate no, no, no. And then I think they all get on a scale or something. They all take turns, he measures them and then, you know, whatever happens. And then suddenly they go outside or it happens later on in that evening. 'Cause they're all, we get to know these characters a little bit. There's like, how many kids is there? 12? - It's like 12, 13. - Something like that, around that many kids.

And then they get teleported into this huge mech and there's this scary floating head that's like talking to them. And one of the children has to pilot the mech. And now we're gonna go into spoilers a little bit, but it's episode one. So I'm gonna spoil the premise a little bit to you. So one of the kids pilots the mech and they're fighting another mech and it's to save the world that they're told before this floating head character, very intimidating character.

So they win the battle. Hooray, they all win. They all celebrate and they go outside. They stand on the mech. And then one of the kids just drops dead and falls off the mech. Then they find out that

Each time this mech comes back and they're summoned, one of the kids has to pilot the mech. And when they do, they're going to die immediately after. But it's to save the world. Yeah. And what the real beauty of this show isn't really the mech battles or the mech fights. It's more of the fact that these kids who have to pilot the mech to save the world, like every, it's like, it's basically kind of like a monster of the week kind of show, right? Where every week a new monster comes along and the new kid, another kid from that group has to pilot the mech. But it's,

about the backstory of each of the kids and just having to deal with the fact that they're gonna die. They're just gonna die. - And in like really,

realistic ways as well. Like these characters are very believable. - It makes me like uncomfortable even like thinking back to like the emotions it brought out in me. You know, like I get like very like, you know what I mean? Like it's a really, really brutally honest look into like the human condition and life and especially how,

- It's a lot of these kids from a lot of different backgrounds. Some of them have it easier. I remember there's a one kid who's the stereotypical piece of shit. His dad's spoiled. - Of course. - But there's some of the kids who, I think there's one kid who's like 16 or whatever and he's looking after his two siblings. And it's brutal 'cause he's the one who's raising his two sisters, I think. And it's horrible seeing him have to come to terms with that he's not gonna be able to look after his

It's really brutal. - It's something that just disturbs you on like a level that you can't really describe. - It's so raw, it's so realistic. - Yeah, yeah. - No filters whatsoever. - And like, it's something that really was like, not many people have watched. It's something that was really glossed over. - It's uncomfortable. It's really uncomfortable to have to like sit down and sit through. - I admit, I definitely like did not watch it when it was first came out.

Like I definitely gave it some time. - It's definitely not like, "Yo, did you watch the last episode?" - I think the problem with "Bokurana" and the reason why so many people didn't watch it when it came out is because the way that they marketed it was not that good, not that accurate. A lot of people were like, "Oh, it's a mecha." Must just be an Evangelion rip off. - There's no world where it's like the number one anime 'cause it's just too uncomfortable. - Yeah. - But it also came out in the time period 'cause I think it was like the early to mid 2000s where there was just,

so many Evangelion rip-offs. And they're of varying quality as well. There's another show that I fucking love as well, which is "Rassafon." That's just an Evangelion rip-off. - I have no idea what that is. - It's an Evangelion rip-off, but it's still really good. - It's really good. It totally rips off, but it goes about it in a totally different way from Evangelion. And "Boccherano" also sits in this category of just shows that people have really looked over, 'cause the premise alone sounds like an Evangelion rip-off,

- It does, it does. - But the way they go about it, it's just absolutely harrowing. Just seeing these stories of these kids who have to come to terms with their own mortality, 'cause it's a fucking tragedy. You know what I mean? It's different from Evangelion. Evangelion to me is just Anno's raw cry for help. You know what I mean? That's like, you can't watch...

like everyone's analyzed last two episodes of "Evangelion" and I think it's going back to that meme about the blue curtain. I'm fucking sure that Anno had no fucking clue what he was doing. - Everyone's like, oh, okay. The way that these lines move and the way that it's like very sketchy is like really reflective on Shinji's like mental state. Meanwhile, Anno's just like, we didn't have much of a budget.

- Just wanna put that out there. - Because like, but that's why I love that Evangelion 'cause everyone comes out of Evangelion with something different because his message was so raw and he puts so much of himself into the series that it's impossible not to like come out with it

- I like how with Evangelion especially that, I don't know if it's just unknown, it's just like trolling like crazy, but there were moments where like the Evangelion fan base and like the super hardcore analysts of Evangelion are like just so committed to this idea of like everything in Evangelion, every piece of,

imagery, everything has to have a meaning that I remember when Onno finally came out in an interview about like the meaning behind Evangelion and he just straight up said, there is no meaning. It's just the show I wanted to make. And people are like, but what about like the fact that every time the angels die, it turns into a cross. And he's like, I just thought that looked cool. And all the analysts were like, no, no, he's lying. There has to be a meaning behind it. I'm like,

If the creator says there's no meaning, there's no meaning bro. - What's Occam's razor where the simplest solution. - The simplest solution is the best solution. - Is normally the actual solution. - Yeah, yeah, yeah. - And it's like, Evangelion definitely made me uncomfortable and feel bad for a lot of the characters. Like Bo Carano just went way deeper. - I'd say like Evangelion isn't from like a story structure. - It's not even remotely similar.

remotely similar. Boca Rana, I feel like has more of a structure around his plots where even getting on just ended on this, as I said, raw cry for help from Anna. But Boca Rana was definitely, here's a group of kids dealing with something that's very, very uncomfortable and you're gonna feel fucking awful watching this show. - It's not even the worst part that like kids are gonna die.

It's like sometimes it's their fucking backstories are fucking horrific. And I'm not gonna say it 'cause I don't wanna spoil it 'cause it's a really good one. But there was one episode in particular and it like, after I finished it, it was one of those things where I had to like just sit there for like five minutes and be like, fuck, fuck. Like I don't know if you can remember all the episodes. There was one or two plots that like one of the stories where I was just like, oh Jesus Christ. It was right at the end of the episode. You think that you expected everything, right?

That's what I love though about these like human drama shows is that like sometimes they may just be like the simplest thing of like just a story between two people or one person. But if it's done really fucking well, it can be some of the most powerful fucking storytelling ever. I think it's more relatable than most things. And it's really uncomfortable to think that you could be in a situation where you have to come to terms with your death

- Well, that's why I like, you know, I'll say this till the end of time, but like, that's the whole reason why my favorite manga artist of all time is Inio Asano. - I was gonna say like the one series that, the one manga series that I'm like, that I'm still waiting on to be in the right head space to read is Oyashimi Punpun. - Yeah, I need to read that as well. - Yeah, because like I've read that, I've reread that like two or three times, like all the way through. And every time I'm just like,

- Oh no. Like that's the only way it's just, oh no. Because it's just so like, and it's not just "Poon Poon" as well. Like Inuyasana is just so good at writing these characters that are just so believable. And it's really disturbing when you see these characters, these very believable characters run into these very believable and horrifying situations. And you're just like,

- If this isn't based off a real person's life, then that's just scary in and of itself because this guy can just think of stuff like this and present it in a way that is just so terrifying. - It's like when people are like, "Man, Danganronpa is really like despairful." I'm like, "Please shut the fuck up. It's got pink blood for fuck sake." Real despair is like uncomfortable. Danganronpa is not.

- Sorry, I know that I- - It's on my wife who died. - You probably pissed off so many "Danganronpa" fans with that now. - When you see these characters, like they're about to die in "Danganronpa", it's like, "Who the fuck gives a shit?" - It's 'cause I feel like there are certain levels. 'Cause like everything that, the series that we've talked about is just like, it hits you. I don't wanna say it, but like it hits different.

- It do me different. - Okay, to a reason why you should watch this. If you're like me, I'm a person who avoids these kinds of shows like the play. 'Cause I cry at like anything. I cry at like Deku when he says anything in my hair academia. Remember Deku screams even like a little bit. I'm like, I'm in tears. I don't know why. It's like a human reaction. I'll cry at anything. So I normally just watch shows that I can turn my brain off to. 'Cause I don't wanna have to get into like, oh fuck sake.

- I'm really scared now. I really just like, now that you've said that, I really want you to read like an Inua-san. - No, I will. No, I know it's gonna ruin me. And that's why like, I stay away from it. But like, please watch "Pokerano." You will not regret it. - No, no, if you're in the right head space for that kind of show, 'cause like, you know when you have like social barriers up and you see something that's sad or something, it's like, yeah, you feel sad, you cry, whatever. But there are some shows that you're like,

Like you don't know whether you wanna cry or just lie down and just like disappear. - Yeah, 'cause there's plenty of romance shows that like have really,

left me kind of like very sad, but it's a different feeling. Like golden week made me very sad a lot of the time. Is that what it's called? Golden week, right? - Golden time. - Golden time, whatever, golden time. Sorry, I'm an ape. I like golden time a lot and it made me very sad, very upset a lot of the time, but like, it's just like a, it's not, I don't leave that feeling like, oh man, there's no hope anymore.

- I felt the same way when I watched "Sacrosso" as well, because like there are some, 'cause like that seems like all like, oh yeah, you know, cute, you know, kids in a room, you know, just romance stuff. But some of the backstories of some of these characters, I'm just like,

Fuck man. That's the only way I can describe it. It's like, fuck man. Like that's just sad, dude. But yeah, as you said, it's not like it's sadness and despair are just two totally different emotions, right? - 'Cause it's kind of like those kinds of shows where, you know, I use the, you know, oh, it changed my life kind of, which is really corny when you say it, but it's just one of those shows where you finish and you just sit down and you just like stare at a blank wall and you're like,

- Whoa. - Yeah, it's the big sigh, right? - Yeah, that's the, I can't, yeah, it's the big sigh of just- - You can't even like listen to the ending song 'cause you're like, "I can't listen to this shit. I need to be in silence right now." Like, I remember being very sad and having a similar feeling watching "BoJack Horseman" and it taps in the same areas. I know you're laughing 'cause I do.

- By the way, last time we recorded this, I said an analogy where Bo Carano- - The most amazing analogy. - Bo Carano, right? To sum it up to you, if you're familiar with BoJack Horseman, Bo Carano is imagine if BoJack Horseman had 12 kids and they were all equally as fucked up as BoJack Horseman. And then they all had to get sacrificed and you slowly got to hear the backstory of these fucked up BoJack Horseman children. It's so fucked up and it's...

- It's like different because in BoJack it's his own fault, right? And it's all that and whatever. It's very, you're very sad, okay? Whatever. It hits differently. And I hate it. - This episode of Trash Taste is sponsored by ExpressVPN. - Wow, we've changed shirts, Joey. How amazing. I'm here to tell you today about ExpressVPN. Now I'm sure a lot of you are thinking, Connor, I use incognito mode. The FBI can't see me. And you'd be wrong in thinking that.

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Expressvpn.com/trashtaste to learn more. Links in the description below. - Back to the video. - 'Cause I think one other series that I watched that just hit like really deep is this for like four episode OVA based on this novel called "No Longer Human" which is like a classic Japanese novel. - Yeah, "Dazai Osamu". - Yeah, yeah, yeah. That is like,

- It's probably one of the most harrowing things that I've watched. - Never heard about that. What is it about? - It's written by this guy called Dazai Osamu who is considered like one of the three greats in traditional Japanese literature. He was like a guy from like- - The big three. - He was, he was the big three. - So what's the story about in this one? - It's been a while since I watched it, but I'm not sure if it's his autobiography or if it's based on his life story.

- It's based on his life story. - Okay, so it's just based on this life story about this guy who just keeps taking L's man. Like imagine if you just take L's your entire life and you're just looking for that one win, but no, you just keep taking L's your entire life. - Damn, that sounds like the Joker. - No, but it's this guy just gets more and more depressed as his life goes on because it is based on his life story. So like this character,

it's someone who's like clinically depressed.

And he's so depressed that, you know, he tries taking his life multiple times with, you know, women that he's been with or just people that he finds. And then he just keeps living, which is actually true. Like the author tried committing suicide several times and then he succeeded. He actually succeeded. - He drowned himself. - Yeah. So that's like the head space of the author who wrote this. And like, it's,

- Wait, so he died? - Yeah, yeah, yeah. After finishing this story. - This was the last novel he wrote before he drowned himself. - Yeah, so it's just fucking, it's the most like- - That's like one long suicide note then.

- Yeah, yeah, yeah. 'Cause it's just like a raw peek into the head space of someone. - This is our most depressing episode. I'm sorry. - It's really good though. It's a really good piece of literature. - Yeah, because like, it's just this, it's just based on his life story and just all the shitty things that happens to him. And then it ends with just, you think he's found like this ray of hope, right? You think he's, you feel like,

he's found his ray of hope. And then he just gets shit on once again. Like imagine if someone has stage four leukemia and then you just find out he has AIDS as well. And then he gets kicked on and then you just kick him while he's- - It just keeps going, yeah. - And like how it ends is that he's like so like,

he doesn't even think that like if he commits suicide, that's not even the right way to end it. It's called no longer human because he feels like he's so low that he just doesn't, he's no longer human. Like he no longer is in this human world. And it is the most harrowing thing. I've used harrowing a lot because I don't know,

- I don't know, it's the only way to describe that. - I don't know. - I mean, 'cause you're essentially reading the full, right? - Yeah, yeah, pretty much. - That sounds like a lot. - Yeah, it's brutal is the only way to describe it. - I mean, I like those experiences, but they are, like you said earlier, you have to be in the right head space. 'Cause I feel like, I don't know, if you go into it,

already like pretty fucked up. Like you're not feeling too great. It's not gonna do great for your mental health. - I think the one problem as well with "No Longer Human" and the reason why probably not a lot of people know about it is that not just because of its like subject matter, but just the fact that anime fans today know Dazai Osamu for that one Bungo Stray Dogs character.

- That's true, isn't it? - Yeah. People are like, oh, Dazai, yeah, he was my husbando in "Bungo Stray Dogs," not knowing that the real Dazai was the most depressed fucking author in probably all of Japanese literature. And he wrote some, not just "No Longer Human," but he wrote some amazing pieces of literature. Just because, again, he based it so much on his real life and the fact that he was just

fucking depressed as hell. - 'Cause like, I feel like you have to be in the head space to write something that powerful, just that raw that just hits and just cuts that deeply. - It's like an Edgar Allan Poe situation. You can't write dark poetry like that unless you had a fucked up life growing up.

I feel spoiled. I don't have anything to worry about. - Sorry to bring a downer to this episode. People watch less. - Da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da

- But bottom line is that, you know, regardless of the fact that we did like talk about a lot of like depressing pieces of literature and media, like just because it like puts you down at the end of the day, it doesn't mean it's something that people should skip over. I think that it's equally as important to experience those kinds of anime and literature. - I like to do that so that I'm comfortable with having those emotions prop up sometimes. - Right. - Yeah.

I feel like I have at least some experience dealing with them. Maybe when it's someone else's is a lot easier, but if you do get to that point where you are starting to feel like that, it's like, okay, I can kind of understand where this is coming from. Maybe I know better how to process it. - Yeah, like question to you guys going off this then, but it's a bit less depressing. Has there been any shows or any anime in your history that has like affected you in any way? Not just like in the negative aspects, obviously, or just rethinking life, but just like-

- Butler fucking. - He definitely had to rethink life after that one. - Bro. - I think for me, like the one, as much as I hate to use the word change my life, for me was like, and this is gonna sound cliche as fuck, but Clannad was one of them.

- It was. I know, I know. I totally understand where that laughter comes from. I'm sure there was a handful of people who laughed at the same time, right? Because it's so cliche now to say that Klan had changed your life. But when I watched that, like all the way through it,

straight up 'cause that was the- - After Story fucked me up. - That was the first time that I like, not just in anime but in any piece of media that I just fucking broke down crying. Because especially that second half of "Clanet After Story" it was just the most brutal payoff to the longest buildup, right? And just-

I don't think I'll be able to, that's again, like going back like million topics, that's another show I don't think I'll be able to watch again. Just because again, I'm not in that head space and it's just something, it's not just like the fact that it was just a sad anime, but I think it's just the fact that again, you've been,

kind of following these characters lives all the way through where like, whereas like most, you know, visual novels or like romance stories would end with the couple getting together. - Yeah. - Planet took that one step further and showed you as the title says the after story, right? Of like what happens. And I think just seeing that made these characters even more relatable to me. And that was the first time where I was like, you know what?

family is cool, man. Like family's fucking dope. Like before that family was just like a thing. - Mr. Christian manner. - It was. Because before like, you know, the concept of like family was just very much like everybody else where it was like, yeah, of course family's cool. Like, yeah, everyone wants a family. But like "Clannad" was that one show that really dug into like just how important family is. And I think that like, I mean, as weird as it is to say, after I watched "Clannad", I became way close to my family.

And I think that's like a big aspect. - That's pretty wholesome. - It is wholesome. And that like really changed my life, I feel. - I feel really bad now. 'Cause you're talking about how "Clannad" changed your life. I couldn't fucking finish the first season. - Yeah, I know. - To be fair, I watched "Clannad" and "After Story." And I think the whole time when I was watching "Clannad," I'm like, "When's it gonna get good?"

- Don't fucking sing that dango song one more time bitch. I dare you to sing that song one more time. - 'Cause like I remember watching the first eight episodes and I'm just like, man, this is trying really hard. This is fucking boring. - But that's the problem, right? Is that like the thing with the first season of "Clannad", I never say to people, hey, you should watch the first season of "Clannad" because

I know that on the grand scale of things, the first season is fucking boring. - But you can't appreciate the second season without- - That's the problem. You can't jump into after story without having experienced these characters. - Yeah. - And it is important because a lot of these characters do make a very significant impact in after story. - But I guess,

- It's really hard, I guess, especially now, like maybe back then you could make someone watch 25 episodes of bullshit to get a good payoff. But now you can't do that. I just don't think you can recommend it anymore. - Right, because like the story structure and the joke structures that pop in, it's just so...

- I think it's just so overdone now that like, it just seems like an aged version of everything that you can see today. But back when "Clan Ad" first came out in like 2009, I believe. - Yeah, it was about 2007, 2009. - I think I watched it after I watched "Tarou Hisuzumiya" the first season. And I remember thinking like, this is just like shittier.

Like the school dynamic was just garbage. - Do you just watch every high school anime and just like, yeah, it's in high school. It's the same show. - It must be good, right? - It's the same. - No, I like to compare the high school anime and see what like dynamics they got going on and see what I'm enjoying. - Oh, their uniform is different to the one before. - There was a model in that school? Okay. - Like going off topic, like I remember the first time I watched Seraph: The End.

And I remember it was like a show with a post-apocalyptic show about like how vampires had taken over the world. And then for like four episodes in, there's just a fucking high school. And I'm like, why is there a high school? If there's one show that doesn't need a high school dynamic, it's fucking this show. - I'm like guilty 'cause like, I'm like the only guy I think who has read like all of that manga so far. - Oh, I'm the complete opposite guilty.

never consumed anything about it, which is so weird because for the longest time, I don't know if you guys got these messages.

So many people were asking me to make a video on Zara at the end. - It's got a really big female following. - Yeah, have you noticed? I don't think there's been a single Anituber that's made a video on it. - 'Cause they're all dudes. - Not even like the few females we have in the Anitube community have made it. - The first episode of Zara at the end was like one of like the best first episodes of like, I remember for a while that we had had. It was such a good first episode. - No, no, it was really good. - And then they're like, world ending, wars. And then it, yeah, like you said, high school. And then it's like, ah.

It gets really good again when they leave high school. - Right. - No, it does. - They quickly abandon that. And I'd like to think that's the artist, the author being like, yeah, this is- - This is like shit, go back. - Yeah, yeah. It got really good. And I'd say where, like about two thirds through the manga, 'cause it hasn't finished yet, but about two thirds through the manga where it is right now, it gets amazing. - Yeah. - And then it goes like not so good.

- Yeah, 'cause did the manga deviate from the anime? 'Cause I remember watching all of the anime and it was one of those shows where I had a good time watching it. - If I remember correctly, the manga was really, really similar to the show. - Right, right. - And they build on a lot of the things that I thought were really interesting in the show amazingly in the manga as it goes on. - Yeah.

but then it became really weird and world ending plot kind of like trigger-y. - Right. - It's yeah, I don't really like the main, main, like the final villain that they have as well. Like it's just a fine, it's fine. - It's one of those shows where I'm like, I had a good time watching it. I'm not gonna rewatch it. I'm probably not gonna remember most of the stuff that happened. - Would you recommend people to read it or watch it? Because I haven't done either. - If you, I would say watch it.

and if you like what you've watched, then continue onwards. - Okay. - You'll probably enjoy it, I think. - Yeah. - Up to a certain point, and then you'll start to be like confused and,

- It's good though, it's good. I like how they did a lot of things and like, it sounds like the most Trump sentence ever. I like how they did things. - It means a lot to me. - They did things, I like the things they did. - I totally get it though, 'cause I actually agree with you. Like, it was good, I had a good time. - It's like the most six out of 10 ever.

It's very decent and I have minimal complaints. There's not much to it. And you're just kind of like, I'm happy with what happened. I don't want any more. - It was before I had like five isekai to watch every season. And this just took the space of that. - This came after right after the hyper season one of Attack on Titan. And I remember everyone was hype as fuck for this anime. And then it kind of like fell off.

even though I thought the anime was pretty fucking hype. - Yeah, it just didn't take off and I don't know why. - That's the thing, right? - It's weird as well because the anime had like an amazing fight scene, like an orchestrated fight, like they were hunting down these vampires, really cool episode. And for some reason that wasn't enough hype. - It's one of those shows that weirdly like I hear so much

- People still talk about it. - But I don't really see anything about, you know what I mean? - Yeah, yeah. Because I think people who read it are really, really into it. - Yeah.

It's good. - I think the problem with it is that it just kind of lacked its own identity when it first aired. 'Cause I remember when it first aired, I think like I made a joke that it was like, oh, it's like "Attack on Blue Exorcist" with gay vampires or something. - It very much is like an amalgamation of a lot of different aspects. And the main character is kind of annoying. - Yeah, that's true as well. - That's never a good sign.

It's annoying 'cause it's like, I like all of this, but we're getting a lot of this one thing that I'm just kind of wish would just be a little less like potent, you know? - Yeah. - There's a lot of shows like that though where I've read the manga after it and no one really spoke about it and I was like,

I don't really know why I read this. - Like a certain Black Clover? - Black Clover, I didn't read Black Clover. - Hey man, hey man, Black Clover is good. I'm repping Black Clover, man. - Shit, I shouldn't have said that now. He's gonna go off for like 40 minutes about it. My monkey brain's like taking over now. - Black Clover, Black Clover, Black Clover? - For some reason, I always end up reading the manga that no one fucking talks about or gives a shit about. And I don't know why I end up, I think because I don't know anything, I find it more interesting.

because no one talks about it. - I'm definitely in that phase right now where I'm just like, I just wanna find the weirdest fucking like unknown manga and just like talk about it. - Okay, like I know it's not unknown at all, but I read "Terraformers" just because like no one speaks about it. And I remember liking what I saw of the anime, which is funny 'cause the anime adaptation was garbage. - Horrible. - But I remember enjoying the concept. So I went back and read all of it and I had a fucking great time. - Yeah, "Terraformers" is awesome. - It's amazing. You should definitely read it if you get the chance. Super gory, terrifying cockroaches. Great time.

- Really good. - If you've seen the thumbnail that Connor has made about his cockroach story, that's a terraformer cockroach. - Let me give you like a 30 second pitch, right? On terraformers. So there's an expedition to Mars and there's these cockroaches that are like absolute giga chad cockroaches

like the most, but like Jim bro cockroaches. And then they want to bring them back to earth to see why they're like this. Who made these cockroaches like this? Cause there must be some reason. - Why are they so chad? - And then they, then it turns out that yo, these guys can fight. And then the humans get injected with an,

bug DNA, insect DNA to become super humans, but then they still keep getting destroyed by the Giga Chad cockroaches. And it's just a great war. It's a great time. Lots of politics, lots of Game of Thrones politics-esque things involved. It's fantastic. - Lots of deaths. - Yeah, it's great because you would think that a really straightforward plot where it's about action, big cockroach fight big bug boy. But then it just suddenly, but then it really quickly- - Big bug boy.

- You big bug boy. - You'll never feel as excited for learning one bug. Like, cause I remember, right? I remember thinking when I was in like high school, the mantis shrimp, coolest bug in the world. Do you know what the mantis shrimp is? - Is that a bug? - Is that the one that like punches? - It can punch at like the speed of sound. - Oh yeah. - It punches so hard that it can't be contained in aquariums. - I remember that chapter. - This thing is like,

- Yeah, yeah, yeah. - And then when they made like a human formed with a mantis shrimp, I was like, bro, bro, I know what that is. And then, yeah, then he was, he was, he was OP. He was pretty strong. But I would kind of topic, but because I remember thinking you, you read like 80 chapters of this thing, thinking that it's just going to be like big man punch bug man, like,

And like that's fine, 'cause you're down for it. Then it quickly turns into like, but wait, if Earth was trying to take over Mars and get these samples, there would be a lot of fucked up politics involved with which country is gonna want what. And so it divulges into a lot of that. It's really fucking interesting. - Yeah, the wall building's done really fucking well. - It's super fucking good. I really recommend it. Sorry, that turned from a 30 second pitch into a full discussion, but it's a great manga. And if you like something like Gantz, something like that, you'll probably feel right at home.

- I think I've read it just after I read Gantz, 'cause I was looking for something very- - It's perfect for that kind of demographic. - I was in like that edgy teenager phase. - I was literally living my edgy teenager phase like six months ago. I read Gantz, I read Terraformers, like yeah, I don't know why. - Sometimes the edgy teenager phase, like you never grow out of it.

Sometimes I fucking love going back to my 80 teenager phase 'cause I really wanna reread Gantz as well. Gantz is fucking great. That's like, that defined what I was into as like a late teen. - It's so good.

- It's like aliens, sexy girls, gore? Sign me up, baby. - When he starts just like, okay, there's a scene in Gantz and like, I guess 'cause you're used to the normal dynamics in anime where they're like, oh, a hot girl turns up and he wants to have sex with her. But then he actually just starts fucking her. - Yeah, he just starts fucking her.

"Who is this Chad?" Like I've never seen such a big Chad in anime before. What the fuck? - I was on the train reading this as well. There's a terrible manga to read on the train. 'Cause every time I'd flick the panel, it would be naked tits and stuff. - And that sex scene in the manga is so long. It's so long.

- It's weird that it's like not even remotely like a realistic depiction of sex. It's so weak 'cause then suddenly she's obsessed with him after it's so weird. But the one thing that's amazing about Gantz and I would like to sell people on is one, the monster drawings and the level of detail. - This is why you do not want to watch the anime at all. - Please don't watch it. - 'Cause Gantz is like,

like peak mid 2000 gonzo CG. Like it's like, you think CG today is bad? Watch Gantz and you just see how bad CG was back then. - Yeah, there's so many droids. - I just remember the absolutely just messed up CG of like even the opening.

where it's just like, let's see how many times we can rotate this camera and make everybody sick. - Hopefully we have it on screen right now so you can see. - It was a good song. - The opening was a fucking banger. - Oh, that song was so good. - Rip Slime, man. - Rip Slime, but like every time I watched it, I was like, I'm about to throw up. It's so dizzying. - If you enjoyed the good parts of Darling in the Franxx, like the mystery and not knowing anything about the world and wondering like, oh my God, how does this all function? If you like that aspect of world building, you'll love Gantz.

Yeah. I was really impressed by the world building in Gantz because not, not to spoil how it ends, but like the actual ending of Gantz itself was like very, very anticlimactic. But the actual answers was like that, that kind of was like, that was kind of like that, you know, that big brain like meme that was like, Oh,

- Oh my God. Like it's fucking great. Like it's one of the few series that I've seen that has built up this huge mystery and has delivered on it. You know what I mean? And has delivered on an answer that like, it's satisfying. - The actual ending is not great, but the answers for the main mysteries were very satisfying. So it doesn't end amazingly, but the explanation for all the stuff that was happening is very cool. And I thought it was really interesting, but there's also some stuff in the manga that did not age well.

- Well, like what? - I don't know. - Oh, you don't wanna say? - Everyone who's read it will know what I mean. But there's a part where like a character does blackface and suddenly like turns like- - Oh my God, I completely forgot. - I haven't read it in so long, I genuinely don't remember. - 'Cause I read it like six months ago and there's like a scene where one of the characters

goes to shoot up a thing in public. He goes to do a public shooting. - That's that, oh my God. - Now that- - It's really, really bad. - That is the most yikes. - It is awful. - That's the most yikes moments I've ever thought of. - Please don't cancel "Okuhiro-Ya" please. - Because it's like the, it's a normal Japanese guy and then he wears black face, but then he just is drawn like an actual black, black guy. And it's really, really uncomfortable to read. 'Cause you're like, hmm.

And then that was the moment where I went online to be like, is this, has anyone else realized how fucked up? And then immediately everyone was like, we, you know, it's good, but it's- - We kind of turn a blind eye on it. - It's the one thing that makes it really hard to recommend because it's a very interesting series that does a lot of cool things, but then it's really, really fucked like,

That part is like, you kind of wish that wasn't there. 'Cause then you could recommend it to edge people. It's just too much. - I mean, it's just like a example of something that hasn't aged well. 'Cause when I've read that as a kid, I, you know. - There's a lot of nuance that is lost in Japanese culture about that kind of stuff. But it's still even for Japanese standards is pretty awful.

- It was, yeah. Like when Gantz was like serializing, it was very like lopsided in terms of like, is this okay or is this not okay? - You know if the Japanese audience is concerned with it being racist, it's like,

- It's definitely the one giant stain on like Gantz in general. - I think so. Other than the 3D CG. - That's a pretty damn, I mean, that's just the stain. - That's just like the shit stain on the- - And they had a live action movie, didn't they? - Yeah, but the live action was not as horrible as a lot of people thought it was going to be. 'Cause I watched the live action and I was like, you know what?

- It wasn't amazing, like solid five out of 10, but there was definitely a lot of like questionable CG about it because of course Japanese live action. - Obviously. - Right, but the way that they actually like did the whole Gantz thing and the whole feel of it, the whole like despair of like, oh shit, this world, we don't know what the fuck is happening. They did that really well in the live action. - What do you think is like the best live action anime movie?

'Cause that's hard. - I wanna say, I know which one it is. - Which one is for you? - Gintama. - Oh yeah. - I'm not familiar with Gintama. - The Gintama live action. I've never laughed that hard watching a live action. And like, not even like, I'm not talking about like Dragon Ball Evolution, like ironic laughing. Like it's genuinely, it brings out the Gintama spirit.

so fucking well. And I don't know how the hell they did it because you read a manga like Gintama or watch an anime like Gintama and you're like, there's no way this can be live action. Like no fucking way. Like you can't translate this comedy into live action.

but they somehow did it. - The mad lads did it. - I'm like the casting was perfect, the costumes were perfect. - I'll take your word for it 'cause I have no idea. - Even the action scenes because the second half of it goes into like the first story arc of "Gintama" and concludes it. And I'm like, wow, this is actually like really good CG and really good choreography. And it's like very believable "Gintama" movie. Like I would watch that again. That's how good it is. - I was pleasantly surprised with the JoJo part four movie.

- Really? - I didn't like it. - Really? - It was like fine. - I didn't like it. - I thought some of the scenes they did pretty good. - I mean, that's the thing with live action anime movies, right? The bar is so low that just- - Yeah, like is it good compared to all these other shit or is it just like genuinely good? - Being passable is like the best compliment you can give an anime live action. - Right. - I remember watching the "Ghost in the Shell" live action and I remember how,

- Offensively average it was. - Yeah. - Like it was like, I couldn't form an opinion on it 'cause I'm just like, it's okay. - It's like the ghost in the shell was really weird because it's like, if you watched it as a ghost in the shell live action, it was like a four out of 10. But if you just watched it as like, if you just thought like, okay, this is just a standalone, like sci-fi. - Complex.

- Yeah. - Shut the fuck up, Garnt. - Big brain references. - You know what, I watched "Alita the Battle Angel" was like really good. And you totally forget that's a manga. - Did you think it was good? - I thought it was pretty good. - I thought it was kind of shit. - I think that's one of the best like anime or manga movies we've had. - Really? - Yeah. - I mean, it was-

- The ending was just whack, man. - Yeah, but I mean, everything up until the ending was- - For me, Alita was very much like Ghost in the Shell. Whereas like- - No, I put it higher than Ghost in the Shell. - It was higher than Ghost in the Shell. - Have you read Alita? - No, who the fuck has read Alita? - I have. - That's why I watched the movie. - Joey's read everything, though. - That's why I've watched the movie. - Yeah, I bet if I watched the manga, I'd like it. - Yeah, very much like Ghost in the Shell. - I've watched the manga.

- I bet if I read the manga, I'd appreciate, I'd like the manga more. - It's like Ghost in the Shell, right? Like people who are fans of Ghost in the Shell before there was live action were like, that was a shit adaptation of Ghost in the Shell. - Yeah. - Elite is the exact same. - I guess so. - It's good as a standalone movie, but as an adaptation of Alita, it was pretty weak.

- But at least the Hollywood ones are better than the Japanese adaptation. - Yeah, I mean- - Did you watch the attack on Titan? - Yeah! - Oh my God. - What's with them being like Nazis? What's with that? - I got invited by Madman in Australia to go to the cinemas on the day, like the premiere day. - Oh no! - And they were like, you can bring a plus one. So I brought my best friend, who's like a huge anime fan and we watched it. And we just kind of sat there as the credits were rolling. And I just looked over and I'm like, how was that? My friend's like,

"I know you got me in for free, but I want my money back." That's what he says. I'm like, "You know what? I kind of have to agree with you there, man." - No, because I like, my cousin who I've been trying to get into anime for like ages, biggest normie you can kind of think of. And then I was like- - Breaking bad. - I was like recommending "Attack on Titan" because that's like one of the perfect game. It's "Attack on Titan." And then he fucking ends up watching the "Attack on Titan" live action.

And he was like, "Yeah, that wasn't very good." I'm like, "God damn it." - Why? - You were almost there, you were this close. And now whenever I recommend "Attack on Titan," I'm like, "No, no, no, trust me, the anime is so much better." He's like, "But is it the same story but like,

- You might not know, but there's this character called Levi. He wasn't in the live action because they couldn't pronounce his name. - People? - Yeah, that's the reason why they cut him out, right? - Oh really? - The reason why Levi's not in the live action is because they were like, these are Japanese actors. I don't think they can pronounce the V sound. And I'm like, you do realize this was written by a Japanese person. - Yeah, yeah.

- People like that are the reason why microwaves come with instructions. - They need a hand to hold for everything. - Yeah, yeah. Like, oh my God, you watched the fucking movie? Oh my God. - How'd you fuck up this bad? - How did you clean this up? Like, man.

- I kind of just stay away from the movies though. I stay away from all anime movies. - I think the only one I've enjoyed is Edge of Tomorrow, which I didn't even- - That one was really good. - Tom Hanks? - Tom Hanks. - Tom Cruise. - Tom Cruise. - If it was Tom Cruise, Tom Hanks, I would've done it.

- Yeah, I didn't realize, 'cause I didn't even realize that was based on a manga. - Yeah, it's "All You Need Is Kill." - Which is like the edgiest title ever. - Yeah. - "All You Need Is Kill." - "All You Need Is Kill." - Coming to you next summer. - It's actually based off a novel that was then later adapted into a manga that was written by,

Obata Takeshi, illustrated for Death Note. - Right, right, right. - Which is also very good manga. So when I saw, 'cause like I picked up the novel while I was in Japan, 'cause I was just like, "All you need is kill? Fuck yeah, dude, that sounds awesome." And I read it and the novel was really good. But then like when they were promoting in the bookstore, they were like, "Tom Cruise movie coming out soon." I was just like,

Oh no. Oh, don't do this. Please, please, Tom, don't do this. But of course I had to go watch it because I'm like, all right, this is going to be, this is probably going to be shit. Let's go watch it. I was like, all right, you know what?

- It was good. - I'll give you this one, Hollywood. - It was good. - You did good. - It was one of the few films that I watched it and I was like, oh, I gotta go read the source material now. And it was quite different from the source material. It wasn't exactly the same, but that's how you adapt a live action movie in my opinion. You gotta change some things. - If there is something that is just, if there is a concept in a story that you know will never work in live action, don't put it in. It's so simple and yet there are so many fucking things

- There's so many fucking productions and directors who are like, "No, we can do it. "No, we can definitely, "Assassination Classroom, giant yellow guy. "Fucking man, CG will fix that." - That was a weird adaptation. - I don't know why, but I've slowly started to find myself watching live action anime movies. - Why? - Why would you do this to yourself? - Because it's just like- - You're gonna give me shit for watching trashy sagas. - It's just a guilty pleasure for me. Now, even if it's, because I watched the erased live action as well.

And even though I didn't like Erased. - That was on Netflix, right? - Yeah, but purely just because I was like,

- It's the perfect example of curiosity killed the cat, right? Because it's like, I'm so curious to be like, how could they possibly adapt this? And then I go into it, I'm like, amazing. I just wasted an hour and a half of my life. - That's just some anime adaptions you just know are gonna be shit. There's some you watch for the train wreck, but not all of them. Like Erasure you don't need to watch. The Fullmetal Alchemist live action, I don't need to watch that to know it's gonna be shit. - Yeah, that's the one thing I still haven't watched.

- You know what I'm gonna do? - The Death Note one is- - I'm just gonna watch a live action movie now. - And you'll be like, guys, Fullmetal Alchemist isn't that good. - What the fuck are you talking? It sucks. Fullmetal Alchemist sucks. What are you guys on?

- No, please don't, please don't. You'll actually ruin the story. You'll get a speed run story. It's just awful. I mean, the only reason I watched the Death Note one is 'cause, you know, I- - Oh, the Death Note.

- I wanted to be able to help with the discussion on Twitter. - Oh yeah, I mean, I got a great video out of it. - But if you can't, yeah, exactly, right? You can clown on it. It's great 'cause everyone's gonna be waiting for it. But you can't clown on the erased one 'cause no one gives a fuck. - Well, that's why I didn't make a video on it. - Why watch it? Why waste an hour and a half? Why, why? - I mean, I've done that with more, I think there are more anime live actions that I haven't made a video on than ones that I have made a video on just because,

No one needs to know this is shit. I just need to know this is shit. I don't need to share this because everybody already knows it's shit. Like I didn't have to make a video on the parasite live action because everybody knew it was gonna be shit, but I needed to know that it was gonna be shit.

- Sure enough, I found out that it was absolutely garbage. - You know what blows my mind? That sometimes they only make the anime to promote the garbage movie. Like was Parasite one of those situations? I know Kaiji, the gambler one. That was definitely, that anime was just made to promote the movie. - Was it? - Yeah, it was. - And the movie was,

- The movie was questionable. - I mean, I actually like, I enjoyed the Kaiji movie in this like really campy kind of way. You know what I mean? It's kind of- - But in what world would you choose the movie over the anime? - Oh no, absolutely not. - No, no, no. - Absolutely not. - Right, right. - Because like watching the Kaiji live action was kind of just watching like some, you know, K drama or J drama. - So do you wanna explain what Kaiji is quickly to the audience? - Yeah, so it's a gambling game

Well, it's a gambling story. So this guy racks up this massive, massive debt. I forgot why he racked up this massive debts.

- I can't remember why he did it. - For some reason. - Yeah, so basically he gets an offer from this like mysterious company that can clear his debt that just says, "You need to go on this ship and you're gonna play a bunch of games and if you win these games, then we will clear your debts or you can go into even greater debts." And the basic premise is just Kaiji

on the ship or just like after the ship arcs over, it's just him going through a bunch of different gambling games and just trying to clear his debts. - And he's not OP. So that's like the best part is that you genuinely, he loses a lot. - It's very realistic. - He loses as much as he wins. And it's great because you genuinely don't know if he's gonna lose or win every game. - It's a very quotable show. - A lot of people didn't watch it. I think mainly because for some reason it was only published in 480p.

- Really? - Do you remember that? - Yeah, yeah, yeah. - It was only published in 4DP. - The anime. - Yeah, yeah, yeah. - And it came out in 2007 as well. - And it was only 4DP. And I remember like when I was watching it, I'm like, where's the, where's the HGTV? - What's this ST bullshit? - So just know that when you watch it, it's gonna be like that, but it's definitely worth your time. - I thought the reason why people didn't watch Kaiju was because of the art style. - I think it's that, and I think there's a ton of reasons why people didn't watch it. - 'Cause like it's got like zero female characters in it, I think.

I think. - Yeah. - I can't remember a single female character. - It's got a lot of ugly bastards in it, I know that. - That is the one show that has more ugly bastards than hentai. - That's kaiji, right? Imagine an NTR plot, but instead of sex, it's just watching a guy, it's just gambling. It's just NTR gambling, that's just kaiji, okay? But it's fucking great. - It's so good. It's like going from watching kaiji to, I don't know how you pronounce it, kakigurui? - Kakigurui, yeah.

It was like, how can I watch this shit when this gambling is so fake? It's all just bullshit gambling to serve the plot. Whereas in "Kaiji" it felt like real gambling. - Yeah, "Kakiguri" was just like, they threw it. They were like, okay, how do we make these hot girls orgasm? Gambling. Let's just throw it in. - But like the main character always wins unless it doesn't really matter, then she doesn't win. And it's like, ha ha, you didn't expect that. It's like, yeah, but it didn't matter. - Yeah, exactly.

like there was a one dumb moment. That's the part I dropped the series when the girl with the gun playing Russian roulette. And it's like, it's obvious no one is going to die in this situation. Don't pretend like someone is going to die. Cause I'm not stupid. And then I couldn't watch it further. Cause I'm like, this is just dumb. - Whereas if that was in Kaiji, like. - It's like someone's gonna die. - Someone's gonna die. - Yeah, which is great because, but then it wasn't sure maybe both of them could die. We don't know. That's the best part about Kaiji is that like you just,

- No, the best part of Kaiji is the narrator's voice. - Oh yeah, yeah. - Why is there just that narrator in like every fucking show of that type? - Because it's so epic. - 'Cause I only see it in anime. You're not watching this Netflix show and then this narrator comes out, you know what I mean? - Dude, what's the followup series, the spinoff one with the middle management, whatever, Tonagawa?

- Oh yeah, "20-R" yeah. - I never watched that one. Was there any good? - It's quite funny. If you go in expecting Kaiji, you're gonna be very disappointed. - If you want Kaiji, then you, it's better if you read like the, I don't know the author's name, but like read some of his other works. - Akagi is really good. - Akagi, I really like, Akagi is basically Mahjong Kaiji. And like, here's the thing, I had no fucking interest in Mahjong. I was watching the show. I had no fucking rules of the,

- I had no fucking clue of the rules of mahjong either. But you get drawn in, right? - After I finished "Arcadia" I was like, man, maybe I should learn how to play mahjong. - I had the exact same thing. I don't know which show it was. It was little girls competing in mahjong tournaments. I don't know which, I think it was, might've just been called mahjong.

- No, maybe, I don't know yet. - I don't know what it was, but I remember I was trying my goddamn best to learn Mahjong and I was like, I- - There are a lot of shows like that. I mean like, you know, "Marsh Comes In Like a Lion" made me really invested in shogi. I was like, I don't know what the fuck shogi is. But then after I watched "Marsh Comes In Like a Lion" I was like- - I wanna learn shogi so bad. - I kinda wanna learn shogi.

- I mean, Shogi is just Japanese chess, right? - Yeah, I know, I'm good at chess. I wanna be good at that. - Yeah, exactly. I don't even know how to play chess. And yet I was like, "Shogi looks fun." - How do you know how to play chess, Joey? - Because I just did it. We didn't even own like a chess board in my house.

- You know how to play chess, right? - Yeah, I know the basics. - That's good. - I fucking suck at it. - We need a chess anime, but obviously because- - No, 'cause I actually really want a chess anime. - Chess would be so good in anime. - It would be so fucking hype in anime. - I'm surprised there hasn't been one yet. - It's because like, how big is chess in Japan? It's not very big. - I mean, I guess if you're gonna play chess, you might as well play shogi, right? - No, 'cause I think a lot of the grand masters are from Japan.

- Oh yeah, that's true actually. But like, yeah, I feel like chess, because I remember I got like sucked into this YouTube poll of just like watching a lot of chess. I had no interest in chess. And I'm like, man, this is actually like really interesting 'cause the history and just the entire premise of chess is like really, really interesting. The fact that you'd like- - A lot of history. - It's basically like this massive tournament arc, you know what I mean?

And there's like reading about some of like, some of like the most historical chess games was like, it's like, I have no interest in chess, but this was fucking hype. And I remember thinking, man, this would work so well in an anime or manga setting. So I went out to try and find a single chess anime or manga and there just wasn't one. And I was really, really disappointed. - It's surprising honestly, because like, I think the whole stereotype with chess in anime is like, you know, the fucking like,

transfer student who also happens to be like the daughter of like the giant company is like, let me just do a little bit of chess on the sideline. Basically, the way chess is used in anime is to make someone look smart. Yeah. Like, there's no reason for Lelouch to play chess. Because he's a tactical genius. Yeah, he's a tactical genius. Do you ever lead with the king, Connor? No, you never lead with the king.

- For example. - Do you wanna tell people about your hidden like fucking skill set? - So when I was 13 or 12, I just started high school after I left primary school. I was playing professional chess. And like how I ended up in playing professional chess was weird to begin with. 'Cause I never like played it much. I just liked video games a lot. - Yeah.

it was the only video game that my dad would play with me. - Yeah. - It's chess. - E-Chess. - Yeah, it was just normal chess, right? But like, I remember I was playing at like year three. How old are you in year three in the UK? Like eight, nine? - Nine. - Eight, nine. - And the chess club is only for like the last year, which was like all the 12 year olds. And I remember they wouldn't let me play with them, but one, they let me play with them and this is so anime, right?

'Cause outside of the chess club, I beat their best player in a game of chess. And then they were like, "No, no, you gotta let this guy play with us. "He's good, he's good." And so I beat them all. And then nothing happened for like three years until it was my time to join the chess club. And I was allowed to join the chess club. And then I joined the chess club and our school had lost like every single chess tournament ever.

right? Because it was like a local, I don't even know we had this. There was like a local circuit, right? Between all the schools played each other, like football and every other sport, right? There's one for chess and, uh,

I remember that we started playing in that. And also the guy who was number two in our chess teams, I was number one. We were both like equal, which is also very anime, right? - He had the rival character and everything. His power level was on par with mine. - My whole chess experience is genuinely like an anime. So I'm gonna keep talking and there's more stuff to it. And then we just started like winning every single game, like against every other school. Like it wasn't even close. I remember like these kids were bad.

And I remember every time they were like, wait, they would be like shocked at how quickly we would beat these kids. 'Cause it's very different in professional chess to playing at somebody doesn't, in professional chess, it's a long thing and I'll get more into it later. But, and these were games I could win in 20 minutes. I could see how they fucked up and I would take it. And I, to me, it just made sense, right? I didn't have practice. I was just good at games and it made sense. And then one time there was a school

And these guys have been like number one for like 10 years in a row or something. 'Cause they had a guy who was someone's parent and he's obsessed with chess. He's very, very good at chess. And we beat his team and they were like shocked. They were like, "Nani, you beat like the prodigy team." - This is like a sports anime. This is a fucking sports anime. - You could base a chess manga off of your life, honestly. - No, right, 'cause I remember thinking like it was weird because this guy was making like a whole, bear in mind, I was like 12. I didn't know what the fuck was going on.

And this guy's making like a whole commotion. He was like shocked. And I was sitting there and he was like, walk me through everything you did. And I was like, I don't know. I didn't write it down. 'Cause most you're supposed to write it down. - Yeah. - Professional chess. And he was writing it down. And I thought that was weird. I was like, why would you write down your moves? You just did them. - Yeah. - Why are you not gonna go back? And he was like, which one, which move? Why did you move here? How did you know how to do that and stuff? And I was like, I don't know. I just like did it. - Yeah. - And then he spoke to my mom and was like, you should come to this thing. And it's like a,

it's like, it's weird. It's like 200 kids come to a place. By the way, chess for like kids is a really weird kind of thing. That's it's really, it's just adults pushing a bunch of like Cambridge kids. So I went to a location and there was like two, 300 kids all just playing chess. And then you would get like an opponent. And if you want a lost, you would then play someone who is like one.

And the more you kept winning, the more you would go up. And then eventually people who won all their games would go on to play for like the area. - Yeah, it's like a legit tournament. - Okay, here's the best tournament. I was killing all my games, right? And I'd won like four, so you play seven. I remember I won four in a row. They were really easy. My friend as well, he'd lost like two and then he was already out. And I felt bad.

- I'll avenge you, I'll avenge you. - I'll go on for you. - I'll see you in the finals. - And then like it's weird 'cause I never had any, like a lot of these kids as well, they would be studying it in between games, but I would just whip out like Pokemon and start playing it. And then I'd be like, oh, it's my time to go and save and then play. But I remember, so like my fifth game was against the guy I beat in my school, like the Prodigy team or whatever. And I had to play him again and we drew and it was really like anticlimactic. And I was like, fuck, I beat him last time. I wanna beat him again. Anyway, I got on the team.

And I was okay. I was struggling 'cause this is where it was getting really serious. Like I was decent enough where I could win like 70% of my games, but it was still starting to get like really long 'cause chess games never went more than an hour. And then they started becoming like two hours. And I'm 13 and I'm like, this is kind of taking them.

and this is how it takes. - I just wanna play fucking Pokemon. - But I start winning and then I got contacted and they're like, "Hey, do you wanna play for your country?" And I was like, "Sure, I guess I'll play for my country." They're like, "Why not?" "Yeah, I'm doing good enough." So I turn up, I go to the first tournament. You won't believe, 'cause I was number 10. So there's 10 seats, right? One is the best, 10 is the worst. So I was the worst on the country.

- Guess who was number one? I think I've told you guys this story. It was like the main bully at my school. - You can't make this shit up, man. You can't make this shit up. - I shit you not. It was like the main bully at my school who like no one knew he did this. - This is the point in the manga where like the flashback begins. - Yeah, yeah, yeah. - It's like he used to bully me.

- He was the main rival all along, right? - He literally was the kid that everyone was scared of. And I remember thinking like, man, he was really good at Halo Wars too. That was weird, right? And then suddenly like, he's really fucking good at chess. Like he was amazing. And he was winning a lot against like,

like really, really good players. Bear in mind when it got to this point, it was pretty much me, him and eight kids who are gonna go to Cambridge. You know what I mean? The environment was really weird as well. And I remember just that was when I really started to not enjoy chess anymore is that when I remember

I remember when I lost a game, I got fucking bollocked by the coaches. They were furious at me 'cause they would take your sheet, right? 'Cause this is when you had to start writing it down. They would take your sheet and they would rinse you for your moves in front of you. And then they would watch you the whole game. So there's like always an area above where they can watch you. Like in fucking an hour. And I remember if you made a move that was under five minutes, that was a mistake, you got fucking rinsed for it. 'Cause they were like, you didn't think long enough.

You've got to go through the options. 'Cause it gets to the point where you're like, you know that they're thinking just as many moves ahead as you are. It starts to get really difficult. 'Cause you're like, fuck, I haven't studied enough at this point. 'Cause I never studied chess. But this is where I was getting to the point where I was against people who were naturally pretty good, but also were studying all the fucking time. And it's just a really bad environment. I really didn't like it. It was just like,

Whereas I would finish my games and I play Pokemon. They would wanna talk about, "So why did you move Ruck to F2? "Why did you do that? "It was really impressive when he moved his..." And I was like, "I don't." We are playing chess for eight hours today. I do not wanna talk about chess in between my games. And it was just like a pretty, just...

- Yeah, it was a really weird environment. And I could, I think if I came into chess later in my life, I would have had a more healthy enjoyment of chess. I still like to play it occasionally, but I think I'm just like scarred from the anime experience that I had. - 'Cause that's what I find so fascinating about chess is just like, talking to you and hearing about your chess story and like hearing it, like reading up and watching like Magnus Carlsen's, I think that's his name.

- Yeah, Magnus Carlsen. - His story and how you were just like, you were just born and you just got the game. There are people who just studied the game and then there are just people who just like a genius as it and they don't know why. It's like, it's fucking fascinating. - I was just born to do it. - It's fucking fascinating to me. - It was weird because you kind of like, no matter how good you are at something and like how much raw talent you have at something,

when you start competing at such a high level, you start to realize that like, it doesn't matter as much, but also you meet people who also like, you know, there might be like 10 people in that country who also have that same raw talent. Right. And then it's like,

'Cause then it starts to come to like who can put them. 'Cause I didn't care about chess. I never cared about chess. I was just good at it and I just played it. - Such a thing that a protagonist would say. - Right. - I never cared about chess. - Whereas the protagonist would have got to my point, lost and then been like, I'm gonna dedicate my life to chess. I was like, Pokemon Ranger just came out. So like, I'm gonna start spinning around it. - You took the Hikaru no Go around, right? Where you're just like, I lost, end of the manga. - And it was just kind of like,

- It gets to that point when your life where you're like, I just, I don't need this anymore. And I remember my parents are so sad because I mean, I don't know why my parents were so invested in it. I think that it was a mixture of proud and also they love bragging about it. Why wouldn't you do that? - Yeah, of course. - Your series got canceled from poor sales. - I had a spinoff, right? So what happened is about when I was like 50,

16 or 17, I had like a rejuvenation of my enjoyment. Do you remember a website called MLG Game Battles? Do you remember that? - I remember that. - So it was where you could like compete against Cobb, but they also had Yahoo Chess. And I remember I would compete against like fully grown men and beat them on Yahoo Chess and they would get so pissed off. And then I joined the local pub and that was a weird experience. So I joined the local pub chess team. And I remember, bear in mind, they were all like 80 to 40 year old men, always.

I remember one time I was playing against a guy who looked like Ross Kemp, like the biggest, like a skinhead, terrifying dude. Like he's like this over the table.

- Like a brick shit house. - Yeah, yeah. - Like every bouncer you see at a nightclub or something like that. - I'm like 15, 16 like this with my Coke and he had like a pint and like smoking. And I'm there with my Coke, like occasionally checking my phone. I don't know if that pissed him off, but in between moves, I wouldn't look at what he was doing. I would just check my phone and I was like, 'cause I'm normally thinking in my moves, so I don't really pay much attention when I'm doing it.

And I remember when I beat him and he looked really fucking angry and I was so scared. I was like, is he gonna hit me? 'Cause he looked, he was like this on the table.

- I can't believe you won. - I can't believe you've done this. - People didn't like losing to a 15 year old. That happened a lot. - I mean, yeah, I can understand. - I get it. - I'm just really committed to making this a manga now. - Yeah, please. 'Cause like from a narrative perspective, there's so many interesting ways you could tackle just chess as a concept. - I wanna take like that concept of like, you know, your friend being beaten in the preliminary

And then just cut to the scene where you're like in the final and your friend is like that one guy who narrates all your moves. - He's a speed writer. - He's like, he just did an en passe. He's like, what's an en passe? En passe is when, and then he just goes on with the explanation. - You know what the one move, okay, this is gonna sound so nerdy. There's one move in chess that I always wanted to use. And it was the, I don't know the name of it,

but it was the one where like if someone moves their like pawn two and then like in front of, if you've moved your pawn two and they move it two as well that you can then take it. That's it, I always wanted to do that. Dude, using a rook is, castling is OP. You always castle, that's all I remember. Like, why did he castle there? It's like, I'll tell you why.

- Yeah, I don't know. Because I remember they tried to teach us, they were like, "Why don't you use the Indian Prince opening of 1970?" And I was like, yeah, because when I would do an opening move, I always did the same opening move, 'cause I just liked it. It was nice and symmetrical, I liked it. And they would always say, "Why did you use this person?" Like I said, the Indian Prince move of 1764. And I was like, "What the fuck is that?" I just like how the bishop goes, "Whoop."

Bishop goes. - It just feels nice, you know? It just feels nice. - It's hard to explain it when you're a kid 'cause you're just like, you're just thinking full moods ahead and you're like, if this goes here and this goes here and this goes here, then you go that, you know what I mean? It's just how you see it. It was weird. I just, it's like any sport I imagine where kids are really good at it and adults are really pushy and kind of like almost borderline, some of the kids I'd say they had like a predatory relationship with it. Because a lot of them, again, like I said, they were,

whose kids went to very good private schools and they were destined to go to Cambridge or Oxford no matter what. And they would, you know exactly what I mean, what kind of kids I'm talking about. 'Cause the moment you spoke to them, you're like,

we're from a different world. It's really odd. - Chess is like their entire world to them. - Yeah, it was like something that was forced upon them 'cause it was, you know, it's something that looks good on the resume when you were applying for Cambridge. I mean, to be fair, it got me a few good jobs or it helped a lot. I remember some job interviews where they liked playing chess and they would bring it up and it was like, oh, that's cute, you're good. - That's cute. - I think that's like a really interesting story that you have.

- Yeah, bottom line is we need to turn this into an anime. - Yeah, yeah, yeah. - Most definitely. - If someone was like, I want to like make a chess anime, I would absolutely fund that. - Just like talk to Connor. He has a very interesting story. - If anyone would like a free story, it's right here. - Because like, it's just, it's the perfect chance to like teach people about how to play chess as well. - I think it's a really good game and it's one of my favorite things to like sit down and talk to someone about, just talk and then play chess. I think it's a really good way to,

I don't know, just have fun. - Yeah, exactly. - And it's also fun beating people who think they're good at chess. It's really fun. - The power trip. - 'Cause I'll meet people who have just been like studying chess. I mean, it's getting really big on Twitch right now. - Yeah, exactly. - And you'll meet people who are like, you know, they're like really getting into it and then you just like stomp them. And it's like, oh, well. 'Cause okay, here's the thing, right? Here's the worst part about chess professionally is that you normally know like,

five or six moves in if you've lost or not, but you have to play it for another two and a half hours. And all it is- - Yeah, that sounds crappy. - That's the difference between casual chess and professional chess is that casually you always think you can win if you outsmart them. Professional chess, it's just like, how do I drag this out enough so that maybe they'll make a mistake? - Yeah. - Yeah. - Oh God, it was awful. - Sounds horrible. - It was awful. I hated it. 'Cause it just got to the point where it's like, what's the fucking point in this?

It's like being a troll online. It's just like, I'm literally just being awkward. - Yeah, you're just prolonging the inevitable, right? - Yeah, yeah. And it's like, I fucked up, I fucked up 30 minutes in and now I gotta put up with this for two and a half hours. - It's like loading a game of league and then five minutes in, like your own- - Someone's inting. - Yeah, someone's inting, the jungle is just AFK. And you're like, can I just FF now? Can we just FF? This is like a diamond game right now. No one's gonna make a mistake. - Oh yeah, 'cause I remember this.

- You know, I never got praised for winning games. They would always be like, "Good job." You know when they would praise me? When I made it fucking hell for the other person. I remember when this poor girl, I dragged it out and she made a mistake to her stalemate. This game went on for like three hours and 20 minutes or something ridiculous. It was something fucking long. And I remember I'd lost like an hour in, 100%. And I just made it awkward. I wasn't playing to win anymore. I was playing to make it awkward for her.

And so I did things that you wouldn't normally do to try and win. You would just do it to cock block everything that she did. - Just to annoy them, right? - Yeah. - And I remember she was getting so stressed and I remember being like, this is kind of fun, but also like, I hate this. - This is torture, isn't it? - When I got back, it was like coming back into the football locker room.

"Nice one, let's hit the showers, son. "You really made it hell for that 13 year old girl. "Congratulations, Connor." I was just like, man, that didn't feel good. I got a stalemate. I worked three hours for a stalemate. Are you kidding me? - Absolute cock tease. - Yeah, dude. There's other worse ones there where there was, I remember those people who would constantly, 'cause you can ask for a draw. You'd be like, "Do you want a draw?" And it would fuck my psychology up 'cause I was like, "Does this mean I'm winning?"

I just think he's losing. And one time I remember I regret it to this day. I should have took the draw and I lost and I went fuck. He gave me an out. - That's the learning experience, man. That's the character development when you- - Yeah, I know, yeah, exactly. - I got a little trophy. If you won like three games professionally, you got a thing called a Wendy. I don't know what it was. - Why is it called a Wendy? - I don't know. It just says Wendy on the plaque. - It's just a Wendy's burger. - Yeah, it's like a plaque that just says a Wendy.

And I'm sure there's some chess people who know what this is, but I have no idea. - Please, please educate us. - I was so confused. I was like, why does it not say my name? I won these things. - I'm not Wendy, I'm Connor. - But I think also if you Google my name, I think my chess records come up in the profession. - Really? Oh, wow. - If you dig deep enough, people are gonna find them now. - Yeah, yeah. - You'll see exactly which county and country I was playing for.

- Don't stalk him then. - Well, is there any, I think, is there anything else you guys want to talk about? - That was a huge detour. - I don't think we can top that chess story, man. That was intense. - That was an intense, we just watched an entire anime. - It's a story I love telling, but it's one of those things where it's like, I can't bring it up if they're not gonna be like invested in it, 'cause it's such a long story. - But it's a really interesting story. I remember the first time you told me, I was like, this is,

we need to talk about this publicly. You've never talked. - I bring it up occasionally. - Imagine just being like, yeah, I was a chess pro by accident. I was like, what do you mean?

- What do you mean you are the most- - It's just amazing conversation style, right? - From a young age though, I was just always really, really good at video games as well. Like it always just clicked. Like I'd always just got them. Like to this day, I normally get video games super quickly. - Yeah. - You just have that talent, man. - You're a tensai. - You are a tensai. - If only it was English, eh? And I could learn how to spell. You know, if they gamed English, I'd have been fucking, I'd have been pro at English if they'd have made it like a spelling fucking simulator.

- I think that's a good place to end it. - Thank you guys for watching. We love the memes on the subreddit, keep it up. - Hey, shout out to the Patreons. As always, if you'd like your name on the screen right now, as you can see, or you'd just like to support the show, then make sure to go over to our Patreon 'cause it helps us out a lot. - Yes, and we also have a subreddit, r/TrashTaste and also our Twitter. - Twitter. - Twitter. - Twitter. - Twitter. - Twitter. - No, our Twitter. I think that's just Trash Taste Pod as well. - @TrashTastePod, yes. - @TrashTastePod. - So make sure to follow us on there.

- Keep giving us the memes. - Yeah, we love the memes. - The fucking smash bros meme. - You guys are very creative with your memes and I appreciate them. If I don't comment on all of them, doesn't mean I don't appreciate them. - We go through the subreddit. - We see all of them just for the record.

- Well, I mean, this was a diverse episode of a diverse topic. - Okay, another thing. So this was, this episode wasn't scripted at all. And none of our episodes are scripted, but sometimes we come in with a subject matter in mind or a theme, but this one we were just like, what if we just,

- Let's just sit down. - Let's just talk. - Let's just sit down and start talking and we're not gonna worry about what we're gonna talk about. We'll just talk about whatever. So if you enjoyed that, give us a comment because this is I think our very first one that we just had- - Nothing planned. - We had nothing planned. We could have just sat here and silenced it and just been like, "So what do you guys wanna talk about?"

- I guess what kind of like balance do you guys want of like, 'cause I mean we can do either, we're comfortable with doing that. I think we're really interested to see which one strikes best with you. Do you guys like it when we just throw out anime names, talk about shit and move on or do you like the overall topics basically? - Make sure to smash that motherfucking like button as always and subscribe. - Share the video and go and subscribe to our own channels. - Ring the fucking bell. - Ring the fucking bell. - All right, well, this has been a Trash Taste and I'm with the boys.

We'll see you next time. Bye. Bye. I got to pee real bad.