Not Your Best Girl

Can we really tell Shinji to get in the robot if we, ourselves, won’t? This week, inspired by Lee Anne watching Neon Genesis Evangelion, we take some time to sit down and talk about what exactly makes a Boring Male Anime Protagonist. What do we mean by that? Listen and find out! Highlights: Kim thinks Emiya Kiritsugu should stop cheating on his wife, Lee Anne finds herself in the Ikari Shinji Defense Squad, and what even is Rainy Cocoa?

* = spoilers

Weekly Check-in: 00:40 - 16:50

Beastars - 00:59 - 4:45

**cw: discussion of slut-shaming

*Fate/Zero - 5:00 - 8:03

Princess Jellyfish - 8:54 - 12:05

**cw: discussion of sexual harassment

*Neon Genesis Evangelion - 12:06 - 16:50

#mamothon: 16:50 - 25:45

Black Butler - 17:22 - 18:36

**cw: mention of sexual assault

Karneval - 18:37 - 20:01

Rainy Cocoa - 20:20 - 22:04

Tokyo Ghoul √A - 22:05 - 24:54

General Discussion - “Generic” Male Protagonists -  25:45 - 58:10

Haikyuu!! -  27:57 - 28:35

Demon Slayer - 28:39 - 29:26

My Hero Academia - 29:30 - 30:10

*Yu-gi-oh! GX - 30:20 - 31:59

*Neon Genesis Evangelion - 33:17 - 39:58

**cw: mention of sexual assault

*Mirai Nikki - 40:00 - 42:30

**cw: mention of sexual assault

Sword Art Online - 42:40 - 44:25

Overlord - 44:37 - 46:15

Nobunaga Concerto - 46:20 - 47:05

*Tower of God - 47:13 - 48:23

*Ajin - 48:45 - 51:30

Domestic Girlfriend - 52:15 - 53:02

Mystic Messenger - 54:20 - 54:37

Hatoful Boyfriend - 54:38 - 55:19

Code;Realize - 55:20 - 55:48

And now… Favorite OPs from Shows We Haven’t Watched - 58:16 - 1:01:59

Seasonal Check-in - 1:02:00 - 1:05:39

God of High School - 1:02:22 - 1:02:50

**cw: mention of racial stereotypes/caricatures

*Deca-Dence - 1:02:52 - 1:05:09

Oregairu - 1:05:10 - 1:05:39

It’s sports week, y’all! What does that mean? Well, it means that when Kim is done being aggressively attracted to Waver Velvet, we take some time to dive (pun intended) into the various ways that our favorite sports anime handle the intersections between character development and athletic development. We promise, we’ve watched shows that aren’t Haikyuu!! - we just really, really love Haikyuu!! Highlights: Kimi ni Todoke and the world’s weirdest OVA, Lee Anne Stans Oikawa Tooru And It Shows, Kim is vaguely coherent about Tsukishima Kei, and #bluehairedanimeladyrights.

* = spoilers

Weekly Check-In: 00:13 - 07:23

Fate/Zero - 00:35 - 03:37

*Bloom Into You: 3:47 - 7:10

#hotmamosummer: 07:27 - 19:45

*Kimi ni Todoke - 7:30 - 11:49

Black Butler - 11:50 - 12:33

*Days - 12:47 -  14:45

Ahiru no Sora - 15:10 - 19:45

General Discussion: Character Dev./Athletic Dev. in Sports Anime: 19:46 - 57:45

*Haikyuu - 21:37 - 43:35

Yuri on Ice - 43:36 - 43:55

*Chihayafuru - 43:56 - 52:00

*March Comes in Like A Lion - 52:24 - 56:05

Ping Pong the Animation - 57:03 - 45

And now...The Best Short Haired Anime Women 57:46 - 1:01:20

Shows mentioned: Gekkan Shoujo Nozaki-kun, Dragon Ball, Ace Attorney, Sound! Euphonium, Sailor Moon, Welcome to the Ballroom, Persona 4, Yurikuma Arashi, My Hero Academia, Skip Beat!, The Promised Neverland, Psycho Pass, Fate/hollow ataraxia, Eureka Seven,

Seasonal Check-In: 1:01:21- 1:05:47

Japan Sinks 2020 - 1:01:44 - 1:02:30

God of High School - 1:02:31 - 1:03:08

Deca-Dence - 1:03:09 - 1:03:50

Oregairu S3 - 1:03:51 - 1:05:47

In this week’s episode, Kim & Lee Anne cover a lot of ground -- from the good cats to the joy of a simple rom-com after a long, hard day of mecha shows. We then get in deep on one of our least favorite media tropes - women in refrigerators. Where does it come from, and where can we see it in anime? What does it even mean to be “fridged” anyway?  Highlights: Lee Anne makes a bold choice, Kim hates Code Geass chest physics, "Will Someone Please Buy Munakata A Segway???" (No), and Akane “ZeroEscape” Kurashiki says #ScrewFridging.

Weekly Check-in 1:20 - 9:03

Shows discussed:

BlendS 1:28 - 4:12

Code Geass 4:22 - 9:03

#hotmamosummer 9:05 - 20:50

Shows discussed:

Days 10:20 - 12:11

Tadakoi/Tada Never Falls in Love -  12:15 - 15:52

Nobunaga Concerto 15:55 - 18:40

Kimi ni Todoke 18:41 - 20:45

General Discussion - Fridging: 21:05 - 1:07:48

**general cw: death, violence against women

Shows discussed:

Code Geass 25:00 - 27:20

Danganronpa 3 and V3 29:58 - 35:55

Psycho Pass 36:10 - 39:57

^**cw: gore mention

Fullmetal Alchemist 40:05 - 44:23, 52:10 - 54:57

Anohana 44:25 - 44:48

Your Name 49:42 - 50:07

Weathering With You 50:08 - 28

I Want to Eat Your Pancreas 50:30 - 51:00

^**cw: terminal illness mention

Your Lie in April 51:15 - 51:53

Yurikuma Arashi 55:53 - 56:10

The Promised Neverland 56:11 - 56:31

Soul Eater 56:44 - 56:58

Zero Escape/999 57:35 - 59:37

Erased 59:40 - 1:01:18

Steins;Gate 1:01:25 - 1:07:48

And Now...Terrible Anime to Recommend to Non-Anime Fans 1:07:49 - end

Wotakoi: Love is Hard for Otaku, Mob Psycho 100, Future Diary/Mirai Nikki, Code Geass, Gekkan Shoujo Nozaki-kun, Love Chuunibyo & Other Delusions, Assassination Classroom, Mahou Shoujo Madoka Magica (and shout out to Mekakucity Actors which got left out)

In our first real episode, Kim & Lee Anne spend a lot of time discussing the what, when, how, and why of our summer challenge, the shows we’ve watched and enjoyed so far, and our personal lists of terrible, horrible, no-good-very-bad anime parents. Highlights include: Kim losing her mind over rakugo, Lee Anne gets into the complicated gender politics of Eureka Seven, and Kim says more than you ever needed to know about Antique Bakery!

Timestamps:

Weekly Check-In 00:31 - 4:04

* = major spoilers

*Code Geass S1 00:39 - 1:30, 15:38 - 17:43, 18:22 - 19:33

Showa Genroku Rakugo Shinju 1:31 - 2:08, 3:00 - 3:38

Revue Starlight 2:17 - 2:58

#hotmamosummer Progress Reports 4:05 - 25:06

The Betrayal Knows My Name/UraBoku 4:40 - 5:44

Nobunaga Concerto 5:45 - 6:40

*Eureka Seven 6:45 - 15:37, 17:44 - 18:22, 19:46 - 22:29

**cw: brief mention of sexual assault

Tada Never Falls in Love/Tadakoi 23:10 - 24:20

Here Comes Miss Modern 24:27 - 24:50

General Discussion - The Road So Far: 25:07 - 40:34

Ajin: Demi-Human 31:10 - 32:04

Bungo Stray Dogs 32:05 - 33:10

**cw: suicide, child abuse

*Antique Bakery 33:11 - 36:21

**cw: kidnapping, mentions of homophobic language/stereotypes

K 36:40 - 39:20

Overlord 39:22 - 40:33

And now…The Worst Parents in Anime 40:35 - 51:30

**cw: discussions of child abuse & neglect (physical, verbal, emotional)

Shows Mentioned: Neon Genesis Evangelion, *Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood, Erased, Noragami, AI: The Somnium Files, Toradora, Stars Align, Fate/Zero & Fate/Stay Night, Durarara, Haikyuu, My Hero Academia, *Hanebado

Spring 2020 Seasonal Check-in 51:31 - 55:50

Shows Mentioned: Kaguya-sama: Love is War, Listeners, Tower of God, Fruits Basket

Hello! Welcome to the very first episode of Not Your Best Girl, an anime podcast with A-tier hosts and D-tier taste. Join your hosts Kim & Lee Anne as we track our progress through any number of horrible anime challenges -- doing our best to learn something along the way -- and then assemble our newfound knowledge into something that’s more than the sum of its terrible, terrible parts. Will we be able to do it? Who knows! But here’s to trying.

In this introductory episode, we offer a sampling of our tastes, so you can get to know us just a bit better! We also dive into our format for standard episodes as well as tell you a bit about how we went from “haha what if we did this” to “Oh God, We’re Actually Doing This.” (Apologies for any audio issues -- we’re working on improving our recording quality for all following episodes.)

We are committed to being as inclusive, intentional, and caring as possible during our discussions. Each future episode will be broken up into sections, and in the text description we will provide applicable content warnings and timestamps for those sections. If you have any additional content warnings you’d like for us to add, please let us know and we will add them immediately and continue to note those in new episodes!

P.S. Lee Anne really wants you to know that she knows Ping Pong and Sarazanmai are 11 eps and not 12. Thank you.