Their format has never really changed
since then; each week, they go through the new chapters of all the
regular Shonen Jump releases, reading through them and lending their
own unique takes and voices to the story and dialogue, and discussing
their reactions and thoughts to each one. Occasionally, they start
an episode by taking a deep dive at an entire series they either
selected beforehand or took from readers as a recommendation. And
that's about it- they have the occasional guest, and as of a few
years ago they've started to do monthly Q&A sessions that are
also fun, but the meat and potatoes of the series has remained
really, really basic.
Why, then, is the show so addicting
and fun to listen to? What makes it so compulsively enjoyable?
In short, that which forms the core of
any good podcast; ridiculously good chemistry between the hosts.
Chris and Nick have the sort of indescribable, relentlessly funny
rapport that can only be generated between two really good friends
who know, inside and out, how the other ticks and how they can best
respond to them. They regularly go off on wide tangents that have
nothing to do with the chapter they are talking about at a given
moment, if indeed they have anything to do with manga at all, but
still never miss a beat, making every minute of their banter one of
the most consistent joys of my life since I started following them.
Their bizarro sense of humor reached
its zenith over the course of the tottering, absurdly terrible final
arc of Bleach, where Kudo's story, dialogue, and even character names
almost made it seem like he was daring these two to go all out in
making their dissections of each chapter as comic as possible. It
was, in fact, an episode entitled “Bleach Sucks!” that first drew
my attention to the podcast.
Given how so much of my love for this
show centers around just the experience of hearing these two nutters
bounce off each other- plus the fact that whole episodes can easily
run up to and over two hours, so this is hardly easy listening- it's
often hard to pinpoint specific episodes that stand out particularly
more than others. Nonetheless, I have give it my best effort; here,
in no specific order, are a few special favorites of mine.
This episode, a deep look
at the manga of the title, got me to pick up and read into a series
about teenage angst and romance that I otherwise would never have
even thought of giving the time of day to. Thank God I did, because
this series was way better than it had any right to be, taking a
romance genre usually too filled with cliches to make an impression
and telling a surprisingly compelling story.
Here, too, if I hadn't
taken the time to listen to Nick and Chris examine a bizarre
classroom comedy-drama centered around a powerful octopus-like being
raising a room of grade-school kids to be assassins, it never would
have occurred to me to get into this fantastically funny story that,
much like Good Ending, has no business being as excellent as it is.
May
28th, 2016: Pokemon Adventures Red & Blue
My life has been so much
more fulfilling since I started getting back into the many Pokemon
games, but it took awhile before I learned of the existence of the
Pokemon Adventure series, which at its best moments matches and even
exceeds the best parts of the original show and movies. Starting
with Red & Blue, Chris and Nick have been slowly working through
each major arc of the series, with the most recent episode (as of
this writing) looking at the Diamond/Pearl/Platinum arc. All of them
are worth listening to for anyone who is a Pokefreak like me.
Bakuman, the follow-up
series to Death Note from Tsugumi Oba, was the first major Shonen
series to end after Chris and Nick had made it a regular part of WMR,
making their final retrospective after the conclusion of the series a
great sendoff to a special series.
As special as the ending of
Bakuman was, things got real when Naruto, first of the Shonen Big
Three that had dominated the manga world for nearly two decades,
became the first of the three to wrap up. For all its flaws, Naruto
retains a particularly special place in my heart, so of course, I
couldn't wait to hear the WMR take on the conclusion of this massive
journey.
The
Bleach Chronicles
Each chapter review of
Bleach was a shot of pure joy into my veins right up until its end in
2016, so picking out the BEST moments of that is hard, though Nick's
take on Juha Bach as voiced by Foghorn J. Leghorn easily stands out
as one of the most inspired comedic bits of the decade. Here are
just a few major episodes that provide a solid highlight of their
takes on the series over the years.
Just as the title suggests:
Nick and Chris take a stab at fixing Bleach after the series had
already started to noticeably decline (although, tragically, the
worst was still well off in the future).
In my opinion, this remains
one of the best moments of the entire podcast so far; after the
“truth about Ichigo's sword, Zangetsu, is revealed, Nick takes a
long, but necessary, chunk of the episode to go over, in explicit
detail, how this whole, game-changing twist doesn't make a lick of
sense.
August
25th, 2016: Bleach's Final Chapter
A whole episode devoted to
the very final chapter of Bleach, after Kudo was forced to end the
series way sooner than he wanted to. What more could you want?
September
2nd, 2016: Bleach Retrospective
For all its flaws, I still
think back on the early, glory days of Bleach with an intense
fondness. As such, it was not so easy for me to see the series end
to poorly, but getting the full thoughts of Chris and Nick on the
story as a whole helped me process the strange journey the world of
Bleach ended up taking.
Previously on
Producers in Focus:
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