12.14
Welcome one and all, to the 12 Days of Anime. 2015 was a spastic year for us fans, but we persevered. And we witnessed things you wouldn’t believe…
Hey, remember Is It Wrong to Try to Pick Up Girls in a Dungeon? Because I barely do. On the top of my mind, I can recall an albino boy brushing his teeth, and something about this one girl who carried a giant sack around her. I also remember it taking so many episodes for Hestia to give the damn boy that knife. People who marathon this show will never feel the scorn of waiting week after week for Hestia to just hand over that fucking knife, the chaos that rose into your mind when characters failed to do basic tasks. Even knowing the payoff won’t mean anything passes your head. You just want this to be done and over with, so you don’t want this anime to creep out of the back of your head and rue with your train of thought.
So actually, I do remember this show quite well. Thank you, repressed rage. These images are flooding back to me like a bad break-up or a petty Internet fight. Remember when this anime was everywhere, my friends? Bear in mind when the light novel kept appearing in your local Barnes and Noble? Would you like to consider when all of your anime-loving friends on Twitter shared pictures of Hestia? Because no matter how much you deny, all of that happened. It’s true. All of it. The boob strings. The harems. They’re real. A single sentence will drive you back into the meme, no matter how much you hated hearing about it. You’re clenching your fists and clawing into your palms right now, aren’t you? Even when you focus on issues going on in the real world, you can’t help but imprint some of this Dungeon show onto that thought. You’re imagining that blue ribbon wrapped around Donald Trump’s cleavage. You’re wondering what climate change would look like if wrapped in tight blue string. This is all in your head, and you don’t know how to get it out!
(By the way, what was everyone’s obsession with the string? Were they appealing because they reminded one of bondage, but not too much to turn off the casuals? If I wrapped some blue string around Kenan Thompson’s crusty breasts, would SNL get better ratings? But the moment he takes that off, people just forget and that sensation will only become a ghost deep down the cortex? And now you’re imagining Kenan Thompson wearing a Hestia cosplay. You’re welcome.)