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Peach Boy Riverside (TV).




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Stark700



Joined: 30 Jan 2012
Posts: 11762
Location: Earth
PostPosted: Thu Jul 01, 2021 8:11 am Reply with quote


Peach Boy Riverside (TV)

Genres: fantasy
Themes: shounen

Plot Summary: Once upon a time, there was an old man and an old woman in a certain land. The old man went to the mountains to cut the grass, and the old woman went to the river to wash clothes, when she came across a giant peach with a baby floating by. And the long story short, the Japanese demon-fighting folk-tale hero Momotarō was born. But there's more to the story. There were many such peaches besides the one that floated to Japan. Much later, Momotarō did eventually vanquish the demons threatening his home, but still more demons are said to roam in foreign lands, so Momotarō set off across the sea.
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Blood-
Bargain Hunter



Joined: 07 Mar 2009
Posts: 24136
PostPosted: Fri Jul 16, 2021 10:00 am Reply with quote
Episode 3

I don't know if anybody else is watching this but I just finished watching episode 3 and I am thoroughly confused. Episode 2 ended with an entire city getting wiped out by a Masked High Ogre named Somenki (or Blue by his creator). We don't find out it was Somenki until episode 3. So the weirdness starts with the beginning of episode 3. Remember the city that got wiped out at the end of episode 2? As witnessed by Sally, Frau and Hawthorn (who now is the sole survivor of the destroyed city).

You'd kind of think episode 3 might start in the immediate aftermath of that, right? Nope, it starts with Hawthorn participating in a tournament where the prize is 300 gold coins. No mention of the wiped out city at all. Also there's a girl dressed as a nun who is travelling with Mikoto whom we have never met before. (I don't think - I scanned the first two espies and didn't see her.). She's also participating in the tournament and seems to be strong. And eats a lot.

So there's a high ogre named Sumeragi who we saw briefly in episode 2. He plays a large part in episode 3. We see him talk with a mid-level ogre. And this is where things get weird. We find out through Sumeragi that the midlevel had an encounter with Mikoto which he ran away from. We also find out that it was Somenki who destroyed the city... but now Somenki is just a head. We have no idea what happened to the rest of his body.

In other words, it feels like this episode 3 is actually episode 4 and an episode 3 we've not seen has happened that would have filled these blanks in. Or is this a deliberate thing where we've jumped forward in time and a future episode will show what happened?

If anybody can explain this weirdness to me, I'd be much obliged.

eta: okay, did a bit of internet research and this episode is DEFINITELY outside of the normal chronological order. I haven't found the reason for that, but it sounds like they ran into production difficulties with episode 3 and since it is too soon to do an infamous "recap" episode, they decided to broadcast an episode out of order? I dunno. I'm just glad I'm not actually going insane.
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DuskyPredator



Joined: 10 Mar 2009
Posts: 15573
Location: Brisbane, Australia
PostPosted: Fri Jul 16, 2021 11:21 am Reply with quote
So there is an explanation? I had been thinking that it felt like there was a weird jump between the episodes. Episode 3 also felt like it was on weird fast forward for parts, where we have its that feel like they were meant to be a twist or something, but we just met those characters this episode anyway.
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Chiibi



Joined: 19 Dec 2011
Posts: 4829
PostPosted: Fri Jul 16, 2021 11:27 am Reply with quote
Just watched episode 01 last night.

Too busy fangirling over how cute Frau is to think about much else. xD

https://64.media.tumblr.com/abfcd8352f46db293dfb56c218261934/9b0b376fece579b7-ef/s400x600/7d236576c0207a02e2e576c1a34df4c12bc86719.gif

LOOK. AT. THAT. FACE.

Also...I was watching this with a Discord group...and the admin pointed out how the Hawthorn's horse's body was "too long for a horse" so then we all started calling it "wiener horse" (like a wiener dog) and that was all we focused on for fifteen minutes because it was 1:30 am and we are mature adults. Laughing Razz
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Blood-
Bargain Hunter



Joined: 07 Mar 2009
Posts: 24136
PostPosted: Fri Jul 16, 2021 12:34 pm Reply with quote
Yes, Frau is super cute. Definitely one of the elements that attracts me to this show.
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Yttrbio



Joined: 09 Jun 2011
Posts: 3670
PostPosted: Fri Jul 16, 2021 12:38 pm Reply with quote
animenewsnetwork.com/interest/2021-07-01/peach-boy-riverside-anime-airing-out-of-chronological-order/.174683

May be of interest. Looks planned, not a budget problem. Though I don't see much reason for it.
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Chiibi



Joined: 19 Dec 2011
Posts: 4829
PostPosted: Fri Jul 16, 2021 12:44 pm Reply with quote
Blood- wrote:
Yes, Frau is super cute. Definitely one of the elements that attracts me to this show.


Right!?

I can deal with the tired "racism is bad" themes as long as the characters are so charming ^^ (actually that goes for a lot of 'flaws' anime may have in general; just give me good characters to love)

As a rodent observer, when Frau eats, it's so incredibly rodent-like...you know the animators must have studied the way a real rabbit's cheeks move (or a hamster). I appreciate fine details such as this.♥
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DuskyPredator



Joined: 10 Mar 2009
Posts: 15573
Location: Brisbane, Australia
PostPosted: Fri Jul 30, 2021 4:55 am Reply with quote
Episode 5

Frau is in heaven and being revived after talking to an angel: "Oh, cool, that must mean that Frau is a god."
Frau has red eyes and starts to have shadows appear on her body with black wings: "Or she is a demon, yeah probably demon."

This show is really bad at feeling like we have a cohesive through line from episode to episode. Such as first episodes showed city being destroyed, before picking up around a tournament. To an episode ending with looking like conflict between an oni that looks like for peace but might be up to something, to going prequel story when Sally was a princess before the first episode, and this episode not at all picking up where episode 3 ended.

They really should have put episode 4 as the first episode, and done something a bit more to not have episodes feel so randomly connected.
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poltroon



Joined: 26 Sep 2018
Posts: 105
PostPosted: Fri Aug 13, 2021 1:35 am Reply with quote
This series has moments that feel like it's going to work, but I really have no idea what the heck is going on even after 5 episodes. I vaguely know the story of Momotaro but I have no idea how Sally has Peach Power or what she's supposed to do with it and the relationships between the characters make no sense either.

Not to mention, Oh, my whole city was destroyed, oh well, guess we'll just go adventuring then, sounds fun!
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DuskyPredator



Joined: 10 Mar 2009
Posts: 15573
Location: Brisbane, Australia
PostPosted: Fri Aug 13, 2021 4:30 am Reply with quote
poltroon wrote:
Not to mention, Oh, my whole city was destroyed, oh well, guess we'll just go adventuring then, sounds fun!


I think he was super in shock, with episode 7 showing that it was so sudden that he didn't really have time to process it, and is not sure what will happen to him after really processing so many people under his care and a part of his life suddenly being gone.

I do kind of have thoughts going both ways after episode 7, such as that the out of order story has made some character growth kind of needlessly confusing. What the name "Carrot" meant rather than suddenly being used in an earlier episode means more now. And to be honest, I kind of think some parts maybe even have worked in ways they wouldn't have, like seeing now what orders were given to the guy who destroyed the city, after an earlier episode showed us that little girl who apparently created him, interacting with the man who's city she is responsible for removing from the map.

And also the part the nun has played, where we are now seeing her as more of a part of the priest guy's machinations that I don't think we got a clear look of when he put a question to Sally if she will work with him or with Mikoto. And we saw in this episode more hints that Mikoto could be entirely deranged as the type of person who if he had a grudge against demi-humans he would try to wipe them all out. We are also learning now that Sally decided that her goal would be against discrimination, which Mikoto seemed to realise is a type of iealogy he might struggle from because it could temp him away from his crusade. These are all pieces that were in effect of some earlier episodes, but we are only learning them now, after we might have been shown them in action.
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Blood-
Bargain Hunter



Joined: 07 Mar 2009
Posts: 24136
PostPosted: Fri Aug 13, 2021 8:36 am Reply with quote
As I continue to watch this show, it becomes clearer and clearer that the decision to mix up the episode order was a terrible one. I'm enjoying this but my enjoyment would have been so much more if things had been doled out in the proper order. That's an opinion thing, of course, I know others groove on slice and dice, but I ain't one of them.
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DuskyPredator



Joined: 10 Mar 2009
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Location: Brisbane, Australia
PostPosted: Fri Aug 13, 2021 8:51 am Reply with quote
It feels very much like a half baked gimmick.
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DuskyPredator



Joined: 10 Mar 2009
Posts: 15573
Location: Brisbane, Australia
PostPosted: Fri Sep 17, 2021 6:27 am Reply with quote
Episode 12 (season? finale)

Well, it was a rather odd place to finish, seeing this episode kind of works as the middle of the timeline of episodes shown so far, I think. That following Sally and Frau leaving the first town in the first episode, they then left the city that was destroyed by the Oni and went to Winny's place with Carrot and Hawthorn where this episode was them then deciding to leave Winny's place. I think that the majority of their travel with Carrot, along with her development, happened in the timeline after where this episode was, which does make keeping track where each character is in their characterisation kind of hard.

Granted, some of it worked, where I think we the audience might be confused over some development, before we get it more in context by another episode going back in time, it didn't always fail. But it really makes me think that the main thing I am going to talk about it was how the show's episodes were out of chronological order, which is just going to make me think it is just trying to be like Haruhi, and not actual confidence in its own story. Even if it might not be the case. But with the single watch by the order of episodes released, it just feels overly confusing, like it was afraid it might be boring otherwise. That it had me keep trying to guess what the motives of characters were, what their convictions were, but only after I had already seen them follow up on those things.

The show is not a total loss, I actually thought it was going to be totally trashy by needing to focus on things like boobs to keep the audience paying attention, but it did other things and I would like to say didn't abuse things like fanservice too much. It maybe did pay up shocking imagery a bit much, like a town wiped off the map while leaving a single hand after its owner was just chatting, which feels a bit odd when Sally seems so set on an all be friends story. Also, maybe repeated certain jokes a bit much, such as Mikoto looking like a girl, so everyone thinks he is a girl, and then repeated also with Berrett. The thing is that I can like some androgynous characters, but I can have some mixed feelings on how characters can fit into the Japanese otokonoko character trope.

My rating is going to be Good (7/10), which is kind of my standard rating for alright that it have some enjoyable bits, not harmed enough by its down sides to not be so. Where it has some interesting elements, such as marrying its ultra violence with a hero who doesn't want to revel in it, while characters try to actually fight that sort of nature, but it is also kind of confusing by its out of order episodes, which makes me wonder a bit if it would be improved if it was watched in a chronological order.
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