Endless 08

From the ill-fated Studio Flag with character design from Fullmetal Alchemists's Hiromu Arakawa, the wuxia inspired action series Hero Tales follows a group of warriors brought into conflict due to a celestial prophecy, with each warrior being an incarnation of one of the stars in the Big Dipper. BJ and Duffo discuss a Chinese empire falling apart due to poverty and corruption, a legendary archer who starts hanging around because h...

Rental Magica is a paranormal action show from Zexcs about a teenager with a cursed eye who inherits his father's wizard-for-hire business with zero qualifications or even knowledge about how magic works. BJ and Duffo watch the first 12 episodes and discuss airing your episodes out of order as an artistic statement, working with a guy named Mr Cathouse who lets four cats live inside his robes, and contaminating your body with magic...

Shaft's romance drama ef: A Tale of Melodies is 2008's most challenging watch yet - the visuals are intense, death hangs over all of the characters, and the narrative is spread across 15 years in two identical cities a whole continent away from each other. BJ and Duffo discuss the Shaft signature style, collecting an alarming number of schoolgirl outfits in your house, and getting an architecture degree for the purpose of challengi...

The second season of Yumeta Company's otome fantasy Neo Angelique Abyss picks up six months after the original, with Angelique waking out of her coma to find that their house has burned down, everyone hates them, and also the pope is doing a coup. BJ and Duffo discuss installing a giant retractable slingshot on your sailing vessel, giving birth to a baby holding a pointy metal leaf, and leaving all your friends behind to become a p...

Charlie and Shamus from Real Fantasy Encounters join us for another bite of Studio Deen's Vampire Knight franchise, where the drama, violence and incest (uh oh) are all ratcheting up. BJ, Duffo and the group discuss Yuki's unfortunate habit of following creepy children into dark alleyways, Kaname bragging about having his DNA inside of Zero in the most homoerotic way possible, and yet another evil pureblood villain whose weakness i...

With the arrival of a new Flame Haze and the villains finally getting into action, Shakugan no Shana II is going to try and pack in all the plot that should have been happening in the first half of this show. BJ and Duffo watch from episode 13 onwards and discuss the Amulet of Kill Yourself, an information network that is too busy getting attacked to do their paperwork properly, and a Christmas Eve villain plot that falls apart bec...

J.C. Staff’s Shakugan no Shana combines supernatural action with slice of life as it follows a group of teenagers drawn into a world of demons and magical hunters fighting a shadowy war. BJ and Duffo watch the first 12 episodes of the second season and discuss the many unexplained proper nouns that make this the most challenging show so far to pick up without pre-2008 context, as well as examining another clear-cut example of our “...

Romantic comedy Haruka Nogizaka's Secret is a Diomedéa production following the relationship between an average teenage boy and his rich heiress classmate who accidentally reveals her anime fangirl side to him. BJ and Duffo discuss the perils of Akihabara, sending out mercenaries in jets to hunt for your runaway daughter, and receiving magical girl doujinshi from the Prime Minister of Japan.

Our theme song is Endless 808 by I.K.