The time has come: CountVonNumenor is talking about Touhou Memories of Phantasm

[CountVonNumenor]

"I was thinking about covering that series at one point. I have not personally watched it, but my best friend did, and told me a little bit what it is about long ago. The series I would have gone into next was rather going to be Memories of Phantasm. I have foreshadowed a summary + review for each episode since back in May when I wrote the multi-thread collection, yet still have to go through it. I have watched the first 7 episodes in the winter break at the end of 2020, yet never went further. Perhaps with the review, I may be able to finish the series and refresh on what I have already watched." - CountVonNumenor, in The time has come: CountVonNumenor is talking about KKHTA... (3rd November 2022)

 

Merry Christmas everyone!

The time has finally come. Just as I promised, I am no here to write the tread on Touhou Gensou Mangekyou, better known as The Memories of Phantasm or Fantasy Kaleidoscope (both names seem to be used interchangeably on the internet and in YouTube uploads of the series). Take this a my Christmas gift for the community. Since I was finally in the winter break, I have decided to give a watch again to the series. It's been 2 years since my previous attempt at going through the fan-made anime, and it stopped at Episode 7. Back then, I simply could not get forward after seeing all the negativity the series was getting as I was advancing through the episodes (I was watching one of those version you can find on YouTube, so the voice-over was quite far from good at times). 

One of the things that really made me get back to this idea was the recent review of the series made by Megafrog (video will be linked at the end). He nailed down excellently a lot of the main points when it comes to the strong and weak points of MoP. Therefore, my review will be instead a brief breakdown of each episode, followed by the raw, unfiltered opinions on the episode itself accompanied by screenshots and further comments. Unfortunately, I only have the raw thoughts and screenshots registered beginning with Episode 5,therefore I will have to find a different formula for everything before that. I have searched for a streaming platform (I really wanted to find a better voiceover version from that on YouTube, and actually found so on anime streaming websites), then got myself a couple free days to go through all the 17 episodes. I was planning to write this thread since yesterday and only have it published today, on the 25th December, but it seems like it took me longer than planned.

I would like to thank @Isaac, @sodaodaoda and @Gou the frog in accompanying me while watching the episodes. It was extremely fun to discuss with them live as the things were unfolding in front of my eyes. I will probably try that again at some point in the future. 

Without any further ado, let's get into the content you have all come here for, shall we?

 

 

Episode 1 - The Spring Snow Incident

This is the beginning of the series. After a brief prologue scene giving us the origin of the never-coming spring incident from Perfect Cherry Blossom, we are introduced to probably one of the most recognizable intros for a fan-made Touhou project, on the music of Yuuhei Satellite (seriously, that song is so memorable). From here, we have a retelling of the events from Touhou 7, as seen in the vision of the show creators (and apparently the fandom itself), and not necessarily that of ZUN and game itself. So this is what I thought about it:

• from the first minutes, we basically establish Marisa as the main character; Reimu can still be considered a protagonist, but most of the focus seems to go towards Marisa
• at the Hakurei Shrine, we have a few things established: 1) Reimu is lazy, and as long as she is not bothered, she will not go out to solve the incident and 2) the brief Cirno representation was probably supposed to be the mid-stage boss in Stage 1
• Marisa decides to go by herself solve the cause of the prolonged winter
• the fight against Letty is basically 2 shots, one of them being Letty falling defeated to the ground (this will be a common occurrence through the series with lesser bosses and budget restrains to animate battles)
• Stage 2: pretty much a cat-chase at what I guess is supposed to be Mayohiga?
• Stage 3: brief meeting at Alice's house, again made out of a few shots, or batter said snapshots (oh, I forgot to mention, Aya is already around, taking photos of wherever Marisa is going)
• Stage 4: we are literally bypassing Lily White and the Prismriver sisters without any bit of interaction
• Stage 5: finally at the stairs leading up to Hakugyokurou; the duel against Youmu begins after she insults us in a very generic "ah, a human is too weak to defeat us" kind of speech; we have a brief fight, after which Youmu is curb-stomped by Marisa after the latter used what looks to me like Blazing Star, ramming the half-human-half-phantom into a wall and knocking her out
• Stage 6: Ara Ara, we have a smug, big booba Yuyuko; we are finally at the first serious confrontation of the episode; and like any villain of the week, Yuyuko also has her own monologue
• meanwhile, Reimu is still chilling at her Shrine; it is only due to a timely arrival of Sakuya (in her PCB outfit, albeit with a skirt that slowly getting shorter with each shot she is in) that Reimu is convinced to go help Marisa (we don't see Sakya afterwards through the plot except for a cameo at the end)
• Reimu finally joins the battle at Hakugyokurou; the Yuuhei Satellite song starts again, and it is time for the final showdown; in her arrogance, Yuyuko falls into a trap set by Reimu, and is defeated via Fantasy Seal
• end scene: party at the Hakurei Shrine; everyone is happy, we have a friendly banter between Reimu and Marisa, then end credits
• ...except for the fact we have a post-credits scene; it seems to be in the brief aftermath of PCB, with Youmu and Yuyuko looking at the youkai cherry tree; we do get a surprise though - at Hakugyokurou, out of nowhere, Sanae shows up, the context and scenery implying that she just as arrived to Gensokyo (it would make sense, given tat just before Youmu arrived, the whole Yakumo family was there - we get there when we get there)

Conclusion: this could be longer. I really wish more characters had some proper screen time, but I guess you cannot ask too much from a fan project after all, especially when the final goal is to make some money from your product (and even at that, MoP seems to have failed in some measure)

 

Episode 2 - The Scarlet Mist Incident (Part 1)

Interestingly enough, this episode has an alternative title in the title sequence: An interview without the Vampire, which is a clear reference to the film Interview with the Vampire from 1994. Anyway, time to make the timeline more confusing. Are you with me? Alright, let's go:

• the episode starts with a large banquet at the Moriya Shrine, in what looks to be the aftermath of Subterranean Animism
• after a few minutes of introduction, there comes the intro; we have a new intro from previous episode
• everything starts nicely - it is an intro that makes reference to the events of SA; at this point, you may be forgiven if you assumed it would be SA that will be covered in this episode... anyway, we have the formation of the gheizer and HOLY MOTHER OF MONKE, SOMEONE IS ABOUT TO CALL THE FBI - the fanservice scene with everyone naked at the hot springs comes out of nowhere, and can be very questionable; at least there is more about this intro to go
• a few more nice battle sequences, mostly Reimu vs Yuugi and a team battle between Reimu & Marisa vs Okuu and Orin at the Blazing Hell, then Reimu and Marisa chilling at another hot spring, this time dressed - good thing for Marisa that she wears bloomers, since we get quite a copious amount of Reimu thighs there
• anyway, about the episode itself
• oh yeah, those two are here, along with everyone from SA 

• poor Nitori, she got blasted Team Rocket style by Kanako for an inappropriate comment

• we get more of the Moriya Shrine party, and after some curiosity on the side of Sanae (we will get there when we get there), Marisa takes the role of story-teller and decides to tell us the story of the Scarlet Mist Incident (of course, with some support from Sakuya, to "fill some of the gaps" - again, we get there when we get there...)

Storytime with Marisa

• we just start with some chill atmosphere at the Misty Lake; Cirno does her famous "Icicle Fall Easy", Aya shows up, and points Marisa towards the newly arrived wester style mansion (proved to be the Scarlet Devil Mansion later)
• Aya points out that she tried getting in numerous times, only to be stopped by the vicious gatekeeper (we are getting some setting for Meiling to be a tough opponent)
• Marisa breaks in the mansion, goes downstairs and finds Flandre's room
• now for the Flandre encounter: this is 2013, so the psycho child version of her is still up; the show did go for a soft version of that fan interpretation, but also for someone not realizing hor fragile things like humans actually are (more on that and her personality next time)
• Flan chases Marisa through the Mansion, and the two end up in the library of Patchouli; Flan is caught in a trap, and Patchy decided to take the fight on her own
• here comes the most annoying side-character, miss exposition herself, Koakuma
• Patchouli goes on a similar rand to that of Youmu last episode, directs a spell towards Marisa, and we get a cliffhanger ending of the episode
• Patchouli starts the Scarlet Mist and spreads it over Gensokyo
• cute intermission I forgot to talk about: I really like the waiting screens for each of the arcs (I will post them as we progress through the story)

 

Episode 3 - The Scarlet Mist Incident (Part 2)

• first episode where we are getting a recap of the events, narrated by Marisa; together with the intro sequence (same one as past episode), we are at about 4 minutes into the episode already
• the party is till going 

 

• since we have not met yet the Yakumo clan proper in the PCB episode, welcome to Yukari, Ran and Chen; what was the best way to introduce them? HOLY MOTHER OF MONKE x2, another hot springs scene, and kind of a long one (2 minutes of the whole screen time of the episode); the righting itself is... alright, but you just can't focus on it when you have two naked ladies in front of you only conveniently censored by mild steam and water reflections Touhou visual learner moment at its finest
• but to quote our friend Megafrog on the issue:

• we are back to the Marisa vs Patchouli battle; after a short, mostly off-screen battle (this will become another common occurrence through the series), Patchouli is defeated, and now both Marisa and Flandre are heading towards Remilia
• meanwhile, Reimu finally woke up and is heading towards the Scarlet Devil Mansion; Rumia gets her few seconds of screen time in this arc (about 17 seconds), coming in ball of darkness, missing Reimu and bumping into a tree, Meiling, previously established as a fierce gatekeeper, is defeated in on fell "sword vs gun" swoop, and now is time for Reimu to fight the real enemy, Sakuya
• hold up a second; this Meiling design was established to be the one not wearing pants; and even more so, some of the shots imply the fact she might not even have any underwear down there; does this mean that when she was laid down defeated, we got a small glimpse at her crotch? given the fact her clothes were torn in that area (more about torn clothes in the following episodes)
• the Sakuya fight respects the formula established until now: villain/villain's servant(s) keep a lengthy speech about the fact they cannot be stopped, the two characters start fighting, and Reimu wins; how does Reimu win this time? does she use a clever trick like in the Yuyuko fight? not really - we get her basically faking a death (perhaps a game reference?), spawns behind Sakuya, locks her in place with seals and giver the maid the final blow
• Marisa and Flandre finally reach Remilia; we get a bit more backstory about Flandre and how she was locked in her room, with the implication that the lack of contact and interaction with the rest of the SDM crew made her have problems, and then we end up with a fight between the two sisters

 

Episode 4 - The Scarlet Mist Incident (Part 3)

• Remilia and Flandre keep fighting each other, while Reimu and Marisa finally meet
• the two sisters reconcile, then decid to fight together against the protagonists
• the beginning of an actual battle; again, the Yuuhei Satellite music plays, and we get some scenes pretty much shot-for-shot from the intro used in the PCB episode; the battle is concluded when Reimu dropped a huge Ying-Yang orb on the Scarlet sisters, blowing the Scarlet Devil Mansion (it can't be a Touhou doujin if the SDM doesn't explode...)

YING YANG ORB TO THE FACE!

• and now we are back to the part; Flandre appears and starts another fight with Remilia over pudding
• end credits, and wait a second, another post-credits scene (after 4 episodes, none of them had the same outro; at least they had the money to create new end sequences for each episode); this time, we have a teaser... for UFO? we have Nitori walking through the woods, only to accidentally witness Shou and Nazrin discovering the place where Byakuren was sealed (and a glimpse of Byakuren as well); a teaser that will most likely lead to nothing in the future

Conclusion: boobs, boobs everywhere. Ahem, I mean a fine trilogy; a bit long at some points, some fanservice that could be shortened, and probably what Megafrog is calling "the best worst fight of the show" (Reimu vs Sakuya)

 

Episode 5 - The Flower Incident (Part 1)

New arc, this time we have shifted focus to PoFV out of all games. Are we going to keep jumping around games like that for the rest of the episodes as well? Anyway, this is the filler/breather arc, but this is also the place from where my thoughts will become shorter and less organized. This is also where I started directly talking to Isaac as I was watching (though I may have actually done it since the EoSD arc, given i still have screenshots from that one as well). Anyway, on with the ideas:

• we have a new intro, with some cute arrangement of Fate of Sixty Years - it is actually quite an adorable intro, and it gives a lot of awesome shots of the characters we are going to meet (...or maybe not) through the arc - PoFV after all had quite a large and diverse cast 

I have never seen a happier Medicine than here

• since she was so present in Episode 5, I will call this one the Aya episode
• Aya goes to the Hakurei Shrine, asking Reimu to exterminate a youkai just so that she would have anything to write about in her newspaper; naturally, Reimu refuses, and Aya leaves disappointed
• Aya then heads to the Garden of the Sun; Cirno is already there, and gets the scare of her life (I am sorry, I mean her strongest senses detected something as very hazardous)
• now we meet Yuuka for the first and only time, and man, do I really love this voice-over for her; she really sounds like a woman in this fandub, compared to the fandub available on YouTube

(I love this version of her so much...) I will also leave a sample showing what I mean in regards to the voice option for her:

 

• ahem, back to the topic; Yuuka ends up putting a flower on Cirno, and Aya leaves disappointed (again) that there was no action
• (I will actually start posting the random, unorganized thoughts from now on)
• quick visit at the Scarlet devil Mansion; Flandre grabs a screaming plant, Meiling is a running joke again, Patchouli faints and Sakuya pulls a ZA WARUDO on Aya, turning her into a pincushion (scream into the night)
• Poor Aya, she's becoming increasingly disappointed
• First Reimu refused going out to exterminate youkai, and now Yuuka proved to be harmless
• Hey, Kaguya and Eirin! Also Medicine! Miss Lily is so tiny here
• Oh yeah, time for the Tewi prank; can't wait to see her again getting forced to chug that bottle of poison...

She fell for it

• oh, poor bunny, forced to get a taste of her own medicine; at least Reisen got her revenge
• meanwhile, Mokou is just shrugging it as just another day at Eintei
• I guess now Aya finally got something to write about?
• and now for another cute commercial break sequence

• ok, now to Mystia's Izakaya moment
• funny detail I have noticed: Mystia's theme is briefly playing in the background, be it in-universe through some sort of speaker at the bar or just from the overall OST of the episode
• it's just a few notes, but it's already recognizable
• and now Eiki is here, angrier than usual...
• outro

 

Episode 6 - The Flower Incident (Part 2)

• Aya is narrating this episode's recap section; I love how she embellished the truth despite the fact we could very clearly see what was going on in the scenes she was talking about (many times pretty much the opposite from her claims)
• interesting voice choices for Mokou and Keine (both are very good); very lady-like (something I really appreciate, if not have a soft spot for)
• and now for the famous Youmu-Komachi dialogue
• oh no, the Yama is here now
• Eiki is furious, Komachi is scared, and Youmu is hammered:

• (incoming Donald Duck voice lecture - that was THE ACTUAL AUDIO from the episode
• not before Eiki getting pushed back from the bounce of Komachi's boobs (because their size had to be somehow emphasized)
• poor Mystia, Komachi did not pay...
• and now time to lecture Youmu
• nice how she (Youmu )suddenly woke up to be sober when realizing Lady Enma from Hell was right next to her
• holding the Myon like a plushy is adorable though
• interesting how Youmu turned from the serious minion in Episode 1 to this goofball in Episode 6
• now we are dragged again into a title screen that has an alternative title for the episode, more precisely being called Judgement Day (Part 2) in the sequence
• oh poor Youmu, she is now slowly dying inside next to the Yama as she gets lectured
• Myon is down in a faint...
• ...and so is she:

• my oh my, Aya is here now, and with torn clothes too
• wait a minute, is it just me, or her boobs increased in size since last episode?!

Nice cut, Aya

• oh no, it's time for Aya to be lectured too
• famous last words: "I'm off duty today"
• and so, the Donald Duck lecture begins...
• yay, at least Mystia is back
• ok, Aya getting slapped with the Rod of Remorse sure was random and unexpected
• at least she got a good pillow for the night; I am sure Komachi will not be bothered:

• that must have been a rough night for Youmu - get drunk, be lectured by the Yama and threatened you will go to hell, suffer an emotional breakdown, then continue getting lectured for the rest of the night
• and now for the intermission with Sanae and the Yakumo clan; welcome to Gensokyo, Sanae
• Chen does cat things in the background and is adorable
• hey, we finally get the Prismriver sisters do something as we are back at the Hakurei Shrine
• since we are getting to the end, and everyone is trying to run from the Yama
• seems like Lyrica was the most vocal out of the three sisters in their scene; our few precious seconds of the Prismriver sisters in a speaking role
• and now Suika joins the scene, scared by Eiki

• and Reimu is just as scary

• now for the ending; normally, I would not say anything since one images makes as much as a million words, but here it is

So much for Marisa...

• I like the outro song, it's a nice remix for Higan Retour
• and of course, since the arc is over, we are getting another teaser; this time, it is for the Mountain of Faith arc, which actually does happen (finally)

Conclusion: a bit of an unnecessary arc. It was nice to get a breath after the battles of the previous arc, but I think it could have been executed better. Also god, this little version of Eiki... I know, I know, they wanted to go with her fanon/"Danzai Yamaxanadu" version, but I guess it is not my cup of tea.

 

Episode 7 - The Mysterious Giant Youkai 

Now, all of a sudden, the creators of the show have decided to randomly jump forward in time, presenting us the Cirno route in Touhou Hisoutensoku.

• ok, we are back to the Yuuhei Satellite intro from first episode; well, just am excuse to listen again to that magnificent song
• oh, I love the Godzilla reference from the title of this episode "Daidarabocchi, King of the Monsters!"
• Meiling is sleeping again on duty...
• nice introduction of Alice; I have the feeling she will be much better in this show than her usual fanon (which is quite a surprise)
• looks like Cirno still has to train in using Perfect Freeze

• oh, it's cute that Daiyousei still cares about the wellbeing of Cirno even they had an argument
• now at the Hakurei Shrine; Sanae is here, which just confuses the heck out of me (mostly due to the random order of the story arcs and rewritings done by Manpukujinja to make their plot work)
• hey, a maneki-neko in the background

No, Reimu, I was talking about a little cat

• and now Sanae is geeking out over the idea the Daidarabocchi could be a robot, and that they could be real in Gensokyo
• she is all so fired up about the idea

• also this

• on to the next scene
• hmm, I see the market scene is filled with static background characters
• literally everyone is frozen there as they have not been animated; it starts becoming visible that the production/animation team is starting to cut corners with the animation process and effort put into things)
• the Myoren Temple group is back
• and this time, Shou has her beloved pagoda

• I really like this version of Alice; amazing how out of all pieces of fanon, MoP was the one to come up with an awesome version of Alice - calm, a helpful person, and just lacking any ill intentions

• new commercial break transition screen:

• Okuu Time!
• again, nice voice pick for Utsuho - she really does sound like an imposing woman in this version of the fan voice-over
• time for the battle of the bird-brains - the literal birdbrain vs the ⑨ 

Yes you are, dummy

[...] meanwhile, in Okuu's (bird)brain:

(Nuclear Fusion starts playing)

• meanwhile, at Chireiden - there we have our 10 seconds of shared screen-time for Satori and Koishi in this episode 
• holy shit, I really love this new voice-over, especially that for Okuu; quite a progress from the version I have seen in YouTube - she sounded so bored and monotone there

Yeah, she is scary (and hot - both literally and metaphorically)

• Daiyousei to the rescue!
• ...and if course, Cirno failed AGAIN at Perfect Freeze
• poor Dai-Chan, she can't catch a break from getting frozen...
• (WARNING: Count is about to geek out over this depiction of Okuu)

I just love the combination of good character design and woman voice Okuu was given in this episode. Oh god, she's hot, not gonna lie (both literally and metaphorically). Alright, where was I? Ah, yeah, Daiyousei is not here to help Cirno, and she ended up frozen in another failed attempt at Perfect Freeze...

Reminds me of a saying we have here in Romania: "Mare e grădina Domnului" (basically meaning there is room for anything possible; or just like Okuu said)

• Also sudden Suwako hat smash - oh, poor her (birb gonna cry)

• anyway...
• even now, at the end of the story, Meiling is still sleeping; never mind, she just woke up. How was the dream about fighting the giant catfish, Meiling?
• awww, Cirno and Daiyousei finally came to terms
• nice reveal about the Goliath Doll at the end
• also do I hear an arrangement for The Grimoire of Alice in the background?

• alright, this time the outro is just a compilation of Cirno scenes from the previous episodes - literally EVERY Cirno scene (even some from the following story arc)
• and I think the song is the one related to Hisoutensoku? I don't really know the songs from the early fighter games

Conclusion: surprisingly, an overall very good episode. I really like the Alice-Daiyousei dynamic, and gave us probably one of my favorite fanon versions of our beloved puppeteer. Okuu might just just as much of a birdbrain as fans depicted her, but she is still my beloved birdbrain. I see a lot of people online hate this episode (after all, this is where I stopped at my first watch, seing all the comments), but I think it was actually good. And i see that I have backing when it comes to that (more on that at end). 

 

Episode 8 - The Eternal Night Incident (Part 1)

We are going back in time, to the era of Imperishable Night. From here on, the plots start becoming a little annoying, scenes frustrating and sometimes either unnecessary or just extremely convenient. Get ready for 5 episodes that could have been so much shorter...

• prologue: alright, is what Eirin did to the Moon in the opening sequence basically an eclipse before bringing in the fake moon?
• new arc intro sequence; this time, it actually fits with what is going on

Awww, this Keine is so pretty! 

• is the theme used for the intro a version of Rise for the Moon, Immortal Smoke? or whatever the name of the Mokou theme was
• nice to see the teams forming though 
• so the Tewi scene from previous intro happened in the larger context of this scene...; now it's even more weird that we had PoFV before IN

• Reimu wtf

• ...and now Sanae is part of Team Hakugyokurou?
• chronologically, Sanae was last seen at Hakugyokurou, at the end of the PCB episode since she just as arrived to Gensokyo (so in Episode 1)
• again, have I told you how much I like this version of Alice? quite a pleasant surprise ("Alice is great here" counter should be a thing)
• I am confused, which one is the actual name of the episode and arc? I see both The Night the Earth Stood Still and The Eternal Moon Incident; really like those title screens though

• poor Wriggle and Mystia, already defeated off-screen... we only see them knocked out
• more of Keine though
• anyway, great dynamic between Marisa and Alice- one as the bold one and the other as the calm, calculated and methodical side

Fascinating

• and now for Reimu fighting Marisa
• I can't remember the details from IN, but I am sure it was not Yukari who messed with everything, right?
• given that she calls herself the culprit here in the anime, which creates some (artificial) tension between Reimu and Marisa and therefore leads to them fighting because I guess Stage 4 has to happen somehow; I need to check the game script again...
• the whole lead-up to the battle feels a little forced, even if it has to happen
• but again, I still need to remember what happened in the game
• Yukari is just smug and cocky like usual
• and now this arc's break screen:

• until now, there is some pattern I may have noticed in the show- Yukari is messing a lot with Reimu, and not treating her very well; however, when it comes to Sanae, Yukari is all friendly and "welcome to Gensokyo and all"
• is she actually planning something?
• yay, we got the famous Marisad

• finally they figured out the culprit is at Eintei
• quite a fiery entrance for Udon-chan - literally

 

Episode 9 - The Eternal Night Incident (Part 2)

• BRUH - "Fantasy Kaleidoscope Episode 9 The Eternal Night Incident (Last part)" (hahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha) - if only...
• new narration by Marisa, retelling the actions of previous episode; this recap, together with the intro, last for about 4 minutes of of the total 12 minutes of screen-time; the outro and hype-building for the following episode also take about 2-3 minutes, so we can see how much actual content there really is 
• as a reminder that we had 2 seconds of Wriggle and Mystia combined; Wriggle gets an extra couple seconds of screen-time in the arc intro, and so does Mystia

• until now, Team Hakugyokurou had 1 minute, and Team Scarlet did not even show up yet
• huh, only now I noticed; Marisa using Master Spark in the fight against Reimu turned into a very convenient way of finding Eintei and creating a path to it

So convenient...

• oh wait, now I think Yukari would make sense to have a role in the events - did she make the night longer or something, so to give time to find out who created the fake Moon and replace it with the real one?
• I am still confused if I put it with the game, as I forgot critical information from the game
• and now for the subtle Lunatic Eyes music; Yukari and Alice are about to fight Reisen, while Reimu and Marisa continue on their way to find the real culprit
• never mind... oh damn it, a good chunk of the fight against Reisen happened off screen, or better said behind the walls of Eintei now we only get the dialogue between bnnuy, Alice and Yukari
• the visuals for the hallway are beautiful though; the infinite hallway is quite a fascinating place, and looks cool in the game too from what I have seen (probably some of my favorite visuals from this show)

• suddenly Tewi... so much for Tewi
• 2 seconds of off-screen combat and she surrendered

• at least she is still the troll we all know and love so much

• and now time to introduce Kaguya...
• yeah, they really went for a lengthy scene there while talking about Kaguya's backstory
• I did not even know what to focus on - the story, or having the princess naked in front of us
• yeah, Tewi is a troll:

• oooooh, time to fight Eirin; Tewi is still smug as heck 
• second chatty side-kick character that gets blown away (first was Koakuma):

Still a better side-kick than Koakuma

• oh boy, Voyage 1969?
• back to Reisen now
• I like the thing with her splitting into duplicates (Naruto-style); an effect of the lunatic eyes?
• and now time for Yukari to use her trump card -  bring in the Hakugyokurou crew
• this looks like it will become a cool fight between Youmu and Reisen...

• "That's all, folks!" - it was literally... 5 seconds? So much build-up for nothing
• it took more seconds for Reisen to fall to the ground than the fight itself
• ...and now Youmu and Yuyuko are gone; they really felt like a Deus Ex Machina moment
• good thing we got the random Sane insertion to the scene:

• we are finally back to the battle between Eirin, Reimu and Marisa: visuals really are epic for the Eirin fight though

• and now cliffhanger until next episode; imagine buying this as a CD, as each episode came on its own separate CD/DVD/BlueRay 
• damn it, I really need a counter for how many times they have said the following episode will be the conclusion; they did it about Ep 9, now they advertised Ep. 10 as the same (Ending, Part 1)
• at least that was specified

 

Episode 10 - The Eternal Night Incident (Part 3)

• yet another recap
• I don't really know how muc they really planned ahead this series, or it was done on the go
• which may explain the random order of the arcs, unless they wanted t build their own narrative, independent from the games
• I mean more about how we got the arcs and order of games- PCB, the EoSD, PoFV, Hisoutensoku, IN and finally MoF
• or how the more this series goes, the longer and more bloated arcs become 
• (cute, but rather unnecessary) tiny Marisa flashback:

• how many trump cards does Yukari have?!
• now it looks like she summoned Sakuya as another Deus Ex moment to save Marisa
• does this show imply that the sole reason team Scarlet exists is due to the fact Yukari summoned them?

• hmmm, this Remilia seems very confident; she clearly did not get that Charisma Break yet
• out of 12:26 minutes of screentime as of Episode 10, 3:38 minutes are the recap and intro, and the final 2:26 minutes are taken by the outro and announcement for the following episode
• so we are left with just under 6 and a half minutes of actual episode
• oof, the battle turned 180 degrees with the appearance of the Team Scarlet
• and now, Eirin got both Fantasy Seal and Master Spark to the face
• yay, the real Moon is back
• at least Reisen is still alive despite taking a ful-on sword blow (and with no major injuries either, just scratched clothes)
• some more Reimu-Yukari banter
• and we still did not get a proper meeting with Kaguya; did they go the Eirin fight route?
• never mind, there she is

• end screen

 

Episode 11 - The Eternal Night Incident (Part 4)

• Episode 11 recap really wanted to give us the full nude shot of Kaguya in there; that came out of nowhere, but I should no longer be amazed with the tone of this series

(Take instead a fully-clothed Kaguya; she look pretty in the animation style of MoP)

• wait, we are going to have a full episode dedicated to the Extra stage?
• I guess more screen-time for Mokou (spoiler: only from next time)
• awww, they (Kaguya and Eirin) are having such a pretty, totally-not-yuri moment, it's cute

[visibly confused Marisa]

• and in the spirit of Gensokyo, this cannot end without a danmaku battle; at least they got the word right (stil looking at you, LostWord and "battle of bullets")

• ...and Yukari left
• at least Kaguya seems to be having the fun of her life
• (meanwhile, in another scene) so this is where was Mokou... giving piggy rides to Cirno
• and again, I really love the voiceover for Mokou

• hey, a bit more screen time for Mystia and Wriggle; now I think we are at like... 6 seconds through the arc

• Ara, Kaguya is done as well (and with some slight fanservice to keep people watching)

She still looks happy; must have been a fun night, filled with danmaku battles

• hey, I was not expecting to see Hatate in here

• ...the fuck happened here?

• Chen being adorable again

• what is the world is Yukari doing now at the top of the Youkai Maintain? Don't tell me this is her moving in the Moriya Shrine to Gensokyo
• yeah, there is, the Moriya Shrine, gods included

• new outro; does this mean there is one more episode in the arc? we did not have the Mokou fight yet and the test of courage

 

Episode 12 - The Courage Test (Part 1)

I was wrong; it looks like Imperishable Night Extra stage is getting not only a dedicated episode, but a dedicated sub-arc that I tend to merge together with the IN one.

• and now it is time for Mokou to be the next big baddie, even if until now she has shown no sign or reason for becoming one
• all she did was give piggy rides to Cirno through the arc
• again, two alternative names:

 

Personally, I prefer The Only NEET Thing to Do

• and Aya is providing the comment to the trial of guts? looks like she really is used as a sports commentator in fan-made stuff (first time I saw it in LW, and now here)
• also a few more seconds of Wriggle and finally some more Rumia

• oh, I see it is actually Reisen doing the commentary/introduction to the trial, while Aya is also talking for some reason from another scene
• more Wriggle and Rumia

• ...and Mystia is alive (quite a surprise at the end of IN if you ask fanon; "Even in death, I still serve" ~ WH40K Venerable Dreadnought Mystia, probably); she still has to tend her Izakaya and ultimately become the God-Emperor of Hell's Kitchen

• Cirno is a true fighter at heart:

• more points for Eirin being cute

• and new transition screen 

• time for Remilia to fight Mokou

Oh God she's hot (literally and metaphorically) (we need an "oh god she's hot" moment counter)

• and we got our fight for now, just as quickly as it began
• time to interrupt for another scene
• we stil got a few second of it while Reimu and Kaguya were discussing about the whole trial and nature of Mokou
• ...and just as we were talking, Sakuya stopped time and brought Tewi tied to the roof

• and the episode is over... looks like this will be dragged into yet another episode
• new outro
• it feels as if Trial of Guts became its own two episodes mini-arc
• 6th episode already in this arc? this really extended quite a long
• maybe a little longer than it was welcome

 

Episode 13 - The Test of Courage (Part 2)

• one more episode with Mokou though
• Marisa was about the joint the Remilia-Mokou fight, but then Keine happened
• boy oh boy oh boy, Hakutaku form Keine... and now for another scene, as quickly as we built this
• take a derpy Kaguya:

• and now finally, we are back to the duel begun in the previous episode
• oh shit...

She will be fine, don't worry...

• poor Tewi, she is still tied up
• we need a compilation of "Kaguya being cute moments"

• and it looks like Keine did her famous headbutt (again, an off-screen battle, unless all she needed to do was headbutt Marisa to defeat her)

• or at least we get to see its aftermath...
• finally the arc is over
• time to see how much of a grind MoF shall be 

Conclusion: the arc started with a bit of a bang, and now it ended with a fuss. I really believe this story has dragged for a little too long, or at least longer than it was welcome. At least I hope the following arc will be better.

• 4 more episodes to go...

 

Episode 14 - The Youkai Mountain Battle Incident (Part 1)

Finally, time for Mountain of Faith to be put on screen. So much build-up for this arc through the series, it sure has to be worth, right... RIGHT? 

• I am slowly starting to lose the meaning of even reviewing this series, since the arcs are slowly starting to give me less and less to talk about
• now to watch how Sanae destroys Reimu's donation box
• and now goodbye donation box... as well as a chunk of the Shrine itself

• so we have this new, hot-headed, self-proclaimed Shrine Maiden of the newly established Moriya Shrine; and now, she is asking the only other shrine in the land to accept becoming a subject of the newcomers or else perish
• we are basically in a "join Moriya Shrine or be destroyed"
• also the Yuuhei Satellite intro from first episode is back... again
• Reimu is ready to go to war, she won't accept the embarrassment from earlier:

• yeah, Reimu is ready to kick butt and chew bubblegum, and she is all out of bubblegum 

There you go, Reimu!

• stage 1: the Aki sisters...

• ...so much for the Aki sisters; they have lasted... about 1 shot and 5 seconds each?
• at least Minoriko still has the time and mood to talk about sweet potatoes
• stage 2: Hina time...
• ...so much for Hina (maybe 3 seconds?)
• Reimu sure is in full Terminator Mode now

This line gives me Dark Souls vibe. "The Hakurei Miko invaded"

• at least Momiji gets more screen time and characterization than she actually got in MoF
• hey, the Tengu have phones - 19th century phones, but phones nonetheless; they do look classy. Wait, aren't they... a little outdated? Given that Tengu like Hatate have stuff like flip-phones, to just makes things funny. Or just the Tengu society is so excentric they managed to create modern phones, but dressed them in the aesthetic of 19th century (or pre-encapsulation of Gensokyo - since that happened less than 2 decades into the Meiji Restoration) devices for familiarity 

• ladies and gentlemen, this arc;s waiting screen:

• and now back to Yukari in her shadow realm
• yeah, Yukari just wants this battle to happen
• Momiji is defeated during an off-screen battle:

• and now it is time for Aya; let's see how long it will be for her
• oooh, nice rock arrangement of Wind God Girl
• also Pokemon reference?

(She's a Wind type)

• ah, just as the battle was about to start, and the episode is over
• I really like the style of the new outro and art for it

 

Episode 15 - The Youkai Mountain Battle Incident (Part 2)

• time to see what actually happened in the battle against Aya
• she is all smug and cocky now (nothing new from bosses through the series)

• oh, so now Aya is willing to bargain the passing of Reimu towards the Moriya Shrine, I see

• and now, it is time for Reimu to defeat her effortlessly:

(Don't worry, she will be back soon)

• wait, was a part of the Fantasy Seal animation recycled from another episode? it looks very similar to the same animation used in the fight against Eirin
• there goes Aya... another short, rather anticlimactic battle
• at least we get to see more of Marisa and Nitori
• speaking of which...

Optical camouflage failed

• kappa ballistic missile! this scene is precious

• the missile failed failed, resulting in explosion
• great, now we have a kappa-induced tsunami at the Genbu Ravine I guess? (if I got the location correctly)
• did Nitori go full-on flirting, just after Marisa threatened to exterminate her?

Another one to the fanon-made Marisa harem

• and now we finally arrived at the Moriya Shrine
• ok, we got a little bit of introduction to Kanako and Sanae through Ran, still in Yukari's shadow realm at their HQ - who Kanako is and where she came from , as well as a bit about Sanae being able to fulfill miracles
• now I really have the feeling Yukari is more favorable towards the newly established Moriya Shrine, since she gave them so much help in settling to Gensokyo, as well as the build-up towards this arc
• Kanako talking about how the MS will become the ultimate Shrine in Gensokyo - a speech full of ham, rather bombastic, and probably not too different from what Yuyuko, Remilia and Eirin have also said until now in their own final battles
• and now suddenly Hatate scene, spying the unfolding events from a bush

 

• EXCUSE ME WHAT THE FUCK!? 
• so this was the whole plan of Yukari?! KILL/GET RID OF REIMU?!

These are not the words of Kanako, they came from the gap...

• and now a 2 vs 1 battle
• and now we also had a brief introduction scene of Suwako
• Yukari, Ran, who are you supporting here?
• end of the episode, see you next time
• I did not notice this Kosuzu image in the outro

 

Episode 16 - The Youkai Mountain Battle Incident (Part 3)

• looks like Suwako wants to see what is going on with the battle; none of her business, time to chill
• and now Aya joined next to Hatate

Nice cut, Aya! Quite a bit of side-boob, I see...

• kappa drill machine out of nowhere... so much for it, we crashed into a rock
• Marisa has joined the fight

• and now back to the battle, this time Reimu & Marisa vs Kanako & Sanae
• ...and Sanae is down, in one fell swoop (or better said 1 Master Spark) - this was again, 5-10 seconds since Marisa appeared? 
• and with Manpukujinja, you you will always end up wondering how torn off will the defeated character's clothes be

Answer: quite a lot (don't worry, it gets worse for Sanae as she lays down defeated)

• and now to mirror a scene from the EoSD arc:

• Sanae doesn't want to give up, but I guess she is too exhausted and weakened... and that kids, was Stage 5 in Mountain of Faith
• time to see Suwako take her place in combat

Yeah Sanae, we know... You are exhausted, so better go to sleep, and pray your clothes don't get even more torn off in next scene you get a close-up

• oh yeah, those two are still here:

• so now we are merging Stage 6 and Extra in one battle
• and now the giant mountain hands are here:

• end of the episode
• also yet another new outro, this time with Hina's theme

 

Episode 17 - The Youkai Mountain Battle Incident (Part 4)

• we are finally at the conclusion episode for this arc, and the final episode overall
• even if not in combat, the clothes of Sanae have become even more torn off

Just a little more, and we are going to witness the bare shrine maiden boobies if we keep the pace...

• everyone, from all realms, is witnessing this final battle for domination between shrines
• ok, now I see the thing with Yukari: as she was not introduced in the PBC episode, the authors took the liberty to rewrite her as the overarching antagonist of the series
• so I guess now it makes more sense why she would want Reimu dead? (just wanna rewatch the Yukari section from Megafrog's video, then I can get back to the episode)
• (personal intermission)
• and now back to the actual episode...
• yay, Reimu saved Marisa
• ...and now with the choreography, music and pure idea, we are doing a carbon copy of the Reimu & Marisa vs Remilia & Flandre battle, except with Kanako & Suwako; we even have the same Yuuhei Satellite song playing
• did we just suddenly go MoF Marisa B and turned her into a jet (I mean mini Hakkero propelled) projectile?
• ...and Kanako is gone
• now Reimu uses Fantasy Nature against Suwako - and game over; the two goddesses have been defeated 
• Marisa loves posing:

• and now we keep on having a competition of torn clothes in the most fanservice areas of a woman's body

Sanae already provided in the previous image(s). Aya is providing the under-boob missing piece of clothing, as well as some (only now noticed) skirt bits missing all the way up to the crotch and... that feminine part... (bonus for the fact Marisa really loves having pictures of her being taken)

...Kanako goes for something similar, but with an extra on both boobs (though if combined with some other shots, she also has a lot of her thighs exposed as the skirt got torn off as well); Suwako is lucky though, with only just some cuts on the sleeves.

• ok, and now I see we got the origin of the banquet from first episode (actually not really, it is a different banquet held months before SA); things have come full circle
• drinking competition between gods and Tengu

• oh, this is a different banquet
• the one from the EoSD arc was during winter, this one is... whenever MoF took place
• so I was right - Episodes 2-4 take place at the end of SA, with s tory placed much earlier in history
• oh, Yukari decided to show up (look who is here after all the mess she has caused; as it is implied she was the grand mastermind behind every incident up to that point in Gensokyo)
• and holy cow, it really was Yukari who stirred up all incidents until now in the series
• ...and now she is gone, just as soon as she arrived
• Suika to the rescue - she has called the entire EoSD, PCB, IN and PoFV characters to the banquet

Welcome to that part of the cast that merely existed

• and this is how we ended the story:

• now we have yet another new outro
• this episode could have worked nicely as a tie-up to the series... if only the did not tease a lot of other stuff, with this episode's post-credits screen teasing yet another arc (most likely Scarlet Weather Rhapsody)

Conclusion: PLEASE, END THIS ALREADY! I don't know if it is from the fact I have watched 2 full arcs in one day, the fact the show has problems or that I have lost enjoyment the further I was going, but I am honestly happy it is over. This arc could have been a very good point to end the show, given it has been running since 2011 and the fact we have been building for over a decade just to get to this final showdown between the Hakurei and Moriya Shrine, but I guess they really want to keep producing it. I am done, at least for a while.

 

AND THIS IS IT...

• the end of my less-than-24-hours-long marathon on watching Memories of Phantasm (well, 48 hours if also counting the writing of this review)
• this was... something
• 17 episodes, yet it could have very easily have fit into at most 12 episodes
• we had 4 arcs (EoSD, PoFV, IN and MoF), and 2 individual episodes (PCB and Hisoutensoku), unevenly distributed (it became extremely bloated towards the end; it became very tiring to go through both IN and MoF in one go)

 

Conclusion

Despite all my frustration with some of the moments, I would say that overall, the show has not been that much of an awful experience as some depict it. There is however one big problems about Memories of Phantasm. Not so big about the show itself, as much as about the way it was received and how people perceive it. Ever since its release, a lot of people have pushed MoP as basically the "ambassador" of Touhou anime. Even if this is a fan-made, unofficial product. For some, it might be the first contact with Touhou, which often strikes the "wHaT aNiMe iS tOuHoU?" question among groups of unaware people. 

It is a fan-made series, projecting the views of the fans on the series up to that point. Therefore, not the most accurate depiction of the game. And it really did not seek out to be that. Just like any other Touhou fanwork, it was looking to envision the way its authors perceived the wonderful and fascinating universe of Gensokyo. Even if their vision includes a lot of fanservice and big sized boobs... However, compared to any other fanworks, MoP has become a punching bag for the fandom when it comes to "everything wrong about the Touhou fans" (just like Touhou LostWord has become nowadays). But hey, let's look at the bright side of things. Maybe this series actually made at least one person actually become curious about what Touhou is, and from there we may have earned a dedicated fan. For every misguided, "filthy casual" bunch, there should be at least that one gem that stays with us and helps in building a better community. Or maybe am I being too optimistic?

Basically, in the lack of an official anime adaptation (and not that we will ever get one), Memories of Phantasm has been forced into becoming the figurehead for Touhou animations. And it is hard to blame, especially when the overall visual quality of a product that was not created by a professional studio can actually pass as the product of a big company (seriously, I really love the art style of MoP).

(bonus section, put into spoilers just to make things shorter in case this is already too long of a read)
 

Spoiler

There have actually been some very good comments about the perception of the show as a result of Megafrog's video, and I would love to quote some of them:

Quote

"In a way MoP is the working example of why ZUN has never pursued an official Touhou anime: The risk of losing control over the universe and how it's presented. I still enjoy the series because it's an unofficial fan series, i.e. an interpretation of the mythos. If it was an officially licensed work with a corporate production committee pulling the strings, it would be utterly infuriating. Even if hypothetical official anime was non-canonical, the very fact that it has corporate sponsors would lead a ton of people to just assume it's canonical and definitive. Look at how many people already struggle with the official-but-not-canonical distinction with Inaba of the Earth & Inaba of the Moon and Lost Word."

 

(a comment from the rising star and guy I absolutely respect in terms of quality content, GensouChronicle himself)

Quote

"I'm glad you spent a bit of extra time just explaining Authorial Intention for the viewers. As much as it would be nice to just not do it for the sake of slimming the video down, I think your point would have been lost on more people. Nice call there. While I considering myself someone who isn't a fan of what this series does, both the animators and musical artists both deserve a lot of credit for what they've managed to accomplish over the years. The scene direction, effects, and even a lot of the choreography is great. Especially for a fan work. But that's probably where my praise ends. If only to go back to your point of authorial intention, I think I can sum up my thoughts like this. While the author's intention is immutable, that should in no way exclude it from any criticism that a viewer can place upon it. Especially when the intention is more or less, "Our goal is to flanderize the entire series inside of a fan anime." Which, while sounding harsh, only feels accurate. I think your 'bottom line' to this video nicely explains the problem while tying into the title. It's main problem is identity.

On the topic of the fanservice, I don't think it's so uncertain as being 'unknown' why people didn't like it. Previews and the opening, which were many people's first impression, gave off a specific vibe, and not one that would have that sort of content(Something you bring up later in the video). The scenes come out of nowhere- and in my opinion just look silly(Wearing hats and holding umbrellas in the bath). I don't mind these sorts of scenes- when they are done well. Basically, it's not the eroticism factor- just the fact that it looks so corny/weird while feeling completely out of place with everything else. You pretty much nailed the story and characterization issues. Even if the Flandre-Remilia characterization is meant to be a touching moment, it makes no sense and just hopes the audience is too dumb to notice. That isn't to ignore the parts that are perfectly fine like with Dai and Cirno, of course. 'The rest of the episodes in the series aren't worth mentioning' lol. The non-professional use of an official twitter account should say plenty about the leadership of the project though. There's a reason why art/gimmick twitters lose followers when they start tweeting about these sorts of things/complain instead of posting what people follow for. (Obviously, people can use their accounts how they like, but they shouldn't be surprised when people aren't as open-minded.) As you correctly put, these are 'escapes', and to have those tainted turns people away.

tl;dr I blame the people in charge of the project. All of that talent would have been better utilized under different people. Anyways, great work. This was a nicely put together video considering its length. For as much as I dislike a lot of things about it, MoP impressed upon new and old fans alike just how absolutely dedicated Touhou fans are."

 

User "Just some simple Nuclear Birbs" wanted to add the following:

Quote

 

"Memories of Phantasma definitely had an interesting concept. A retelling of Gensokyo's most well known and famous/infamous incidents but from the eyes of the fanbase. But that's where the problems start, it's through the eyes of the fanbase which is massive and wildly inconsistent. It tries to blend three completely different genres into one fan anime by making some moments fun, action packed, slice of life or fanservice-y and failing because of the sudden tonal whiplash.

Like mentioned in the video, each episode is literally a copy-pasted plotline but with the cast from whatever game is being retold. It's like watching an anime show based off of Mario with how bland and uninspired each episode becomes. Someone causes trouble, one of the protagonists go to stop it, several fights happen off-screen and there are pointless side events happening, eventually the big bad's right-hand woman shows up and gloats about how superior they are while also trying stop the protagonist only to get defeated in an anticlimactic way, the big bad finally appears and repeats what their right-hand woman literally just said mere minutes ago and fights the protagonist only for the other protagonist to show up after the other protagonist gets caught in a bind, team up with the other protagonist and then kick major ass which results in an anticlimactic defeat just like with their right-hand woman.

Even as a fan work retelling the events of Touhou's various games, it falls flat. It tried to start with a bang, but instead it started with a whimper, a loud whimper, but a whimper nonetheless and it's going to end the same way if it keeps going down this route. It tries to make the events that happens in the games look as amazing as possible, yet goes all over the place with its pacing by randomly cutting to something that barely holds anything significant to the original plot and even more so when characters that weren't introduced until later show up.

And that sucks because Touhou fanworks tend to be some of the main reasons why folks become Touhou fans in the first place. Not everyone is into bullethell shoot-em-ups or fighting games, so fanworks tend to fill that gap of not wanting to miss out. But 9 times out of 10, they tend to hyper fixate on one specific aspect of the series that was made by the fans.

The fanservice for Touhou fanworks is one such aspect that often gets over exaggerated, usually putting the characters in skimpy clothing and often making them as big and plump as possible with no concern of the person playing the game, watching the animation or viewing the fanart. It's especially bad in the various fangames that have artwork where the characters have tits and asses bigger than their head but the other content in-game is pretty basic. Here's a challenge, open up a word document and make list of all the Touhou fangames and fanworks that have hentai levels of character design. If the number of fangames and fanworks in general both enter or exceed the double digits then we've got a problem.

Edit: To the folks responding about the "challenge" I gave and the comment on if the fan content was in the double digits, it's a joke. I've been well aware about Touhou's existence and how massive the community is ever since I found out about Touhou in the early 2010s, I was making a joke and if I have to explain the joke then it loses its value."

 

This is what user "Taka" wanted to add:

Quote

 

"I think the Koakuma exposition helps to establish her personality as a giddy fangirl of Patchouli and helps to accentuates the latter as somewhat of a threat to Marisa without confirming it; the closest I can think of would be Gary Oak from the first season of the Pokemon animated series and the group of cheerleaders that follow him. That said, I agree having Flan showcase this instead of just Koakuma dumping exposition would have helped both in terms of showing why this was a smart tactic and using Koakuma as a fangirl to gush over Patchouli and make her seem more of a threat than she actually is.

For the humans are weak thing, I feel it should be expressed moreso through action rather than dialogue; I mean, it seems to be somewhat of an overarching thread throughout this series and even the original material--the spell card system was implemented to give humans a chance to help humans resolve the incidents with stronger youkai so that they can coexist peacefully within Gensokyo like was shown at the end of the 1st episode.

I like how the Cirno filler was done and it opened a lot of potential for alternative story telling, but I feel like the 'humans are inferior/cant we just get along?' thing would still apply to Utsuho if she was facing a human--as weak as Cirno is compared to both Reimu and Utsuho, she is still a youkai. Given how other incidents after the Moriya Shrine were hinted at or even explictly referenced (SA and UFO specifically), I feel a fight between Reimu/Marisa and Utsuho (as hinted at in one of the openings) could have helped accentuate this bias youkai have towards humans, especially since prior to this both of them would have beaten Cirno fairly easily. ... Ok this was my third thing I wanted to mention, but this does seem like a major let down because so much could have been done in addition to this "filler" that would have helped the overall thing so much.

And finally: Yukari's moyivation makes me want to brick my head into a wall; like ... why would she bother instigating the IN incident and then help Reimu by not only accompanying her, but also enlisting the aid of previous antagonists like Remillia and Yuyuko. I mean from what has been shown in this series and the theme of coexistence, you coulf have Yukari still instigating things, but in a way thay controls the pacing that allows Reimu to handle them individually instead of all at once; she could still be seen as manipulative, cunning, and somewhat antagonistic, but not completely villainous and certainly not incompetent."

 

Waluigi wanted to add the following:

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"While I get the “authorial intent” with the work trying to be its own thing and not be an adaptation, at the end of the day it is basically taking the plot of the games and rewriting them. The characters are the same, the basic premise is the same, but the details are different. The problem is that the differences are for the worse in many people’s eyes. Character traits are exaggerated, the plots become more similar to each other, etc. 

This is a bit of an issue, since the anachronic order make the series confusing to people unfamiliar with the games plots, but those who are familiar may be disappointed that the plots are so different, and not necessarily in a good way.

I feel this mean that the series is primarily for Touhou fans who only look at fanworks. Which, admittedly is most fans, but the whole inconsistent tone means many fans only like some of the series, and find the rest jarring or boring.

What the author intends is not always what the audience sees. And while this can be partially to blame on the audience not bothering to think about what the author intended, or even fundamentally misunderstand the thing they like, the author should also make sure their intent is clear enough most of the audience understands without having to be told what they intended, without feeling like it’s forced and unsubtle. 

Which is a difficult thing to do, especially on a meta level with being an adaptation or not. 

Personally, I think MoP is kinda an adaptation, since it is taking the plots for the games, modifying them, and then making it into an anime. Although I guess this depends on what one defines adaptation, and how similar a work needs to be to the original in order to be called an adaptation."

 

Meanwhile, Arch has brought this to the table:

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"One thing that western fans often don't understand is the difference between the fanon depictions and canon depictions. In Japan it is taken as a given that fans will re-imagine their own versions of characters and events, demonstrated by the mountains and mountains of parodies, be it anything from jokes to porn. Western fans and the more prudent and extremist Japanese fans often don't understand this at all and view any deviations from the original depiction to be an insult to the work."

 

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"A very good video and really good amount of research in reporting on what is still a very niche work of fiction. Despite feeling like a really mediocre shounen-like anime fanwork, I've acknowledged and respected the amount of resources and passion it manages to gather despite being a fully indie project. 

My main complaint is how this anime series misleads so many newcomers on what Touhou is. Many think of the anime like it's an anime adaptation because it is the natural trend for all popular Japanese media. Newcomers tend to miss out on the more unique aspects and storytelling the games and written works provide because they think the games and written works tell the stories the same way as this anime. Since it follows the chronological events of Touhou, it is easy to confuse it as an official adaptation compared to the other animated Touhou animated fanworks that follow the spirit of standard doujins fanworks by telling their own unique stories. 

Memories of Phantasm has turned into an unwilling unofficial anime adaptation despite the disclaimer at the beginning of each episode that many people miss or forget about. I just wished Memories of Phantasm was at least better at retelling the main events of the series." 

 

Quote

"Honestly, this is a great analysis from a perspective of someone who watched Memories of Phantasm as a standalone work, as my experiences were in some points quite similar. 

But before that, to the argument at 20:17. While the argument absolutely sound, it is also ignoring the long history of Touhou from a complete outsiders perspective. While digging deeper into things, you quickly find out that the Anime indeed wasn't meant as a representation of the series, but what it sadly is, is that it is the first representation for some people wanting to know about the series.

In a world with so much Touhou media that it's daunting to join this fandom, people inside of it tend to forget that there is a reason why so many people, even up to this day, go and ask "what Anime is this from" and stumble upon the name of Touhou. So, the first instinctive reaction would be of course to Google "Touhou Anime", quickly stumbling about Memory of Phantasm and while the criticism towards the fans is justified, pointing out that Memories of Phantasm was never made to accurately represent the lore, I have the feeling, that at least partly, people do not allow this series to be all that fanservicey, because that this series has a high chance to be the first piece of media someone will consume of Touhou Project and having first time watcher experience the series that way and turning it away because of that, I think that's a reason why a huge majority of people are upset about the unnecessary fanservice.

Well, as about myself who experienced first Touhou that way..., I honestly didn't care all that much, but that might be because I turn my brain off while watching Anime. Which comes to my second criticism of the series, which was mostly all said in the video already, so I won't rant too much about it. The first episode was honestly great and made me excited to watch the rest of the series, that feeling quickly fading off around the PoFV arc, as was said in the video all the hype they built off, lead to nowhere, giving me the feeling that it's not worth watching, especially after I learned that Touhou was a Shoot-and-Up series with a lot of girls. Some scenes felt pointless, and some characters gave me the feeling that they were disrupting the story. My confusion amplifying when the Filler-ish episodes of PoFV hit and I got the feeling that this series wasn't for someone like me at that time. A complete noob at Touhou who knew nothing about it.

So, half a year later and speed consuming all the Touhou games from 1 to 18, playing all the Spin-off games, reading the official canon manga’s and reading the official, but uncanon licensed works and deep diving into Dynasties Doujin collection from the years 2006 to 2010 later, I felt ready to give the series another chance and find myself...
...mildly underwhelmed. The result was, I enjoyed the parts I already liked a bit better and felt insulted about the parts that I disliked and realizing that knowing my stuff, doesn't make the part them any better. Especially after realizing that my favorite character as of that point, Eiki was replaced by a brat that could only scold.

What does this say about the series? Well, similar as this video already pointed out, it more felt like a collection of interesting, cool and good ideas, which were just thrown against the wall in the hopes that something good would come out of it. Like this comment of mine that is just a guys comment about an indie anime production and his opinion on it and while it's okay for someone like me to do it, because the likelihood of someone seriously going through this thought mess is unlikely, it's not okay for a series whose livelihood depends on the public perception on how good it is."

 

Quote

"I only have gone through half of this so far real well made video, but I think I can already give out my renewed thoughts on the anime. I always had issues with the series, but that was always done with the assumption, the anime being official or not nonwithstanding, that the creators actually intended for the anime to, you know, represent the actual series and stuff (especially since they actually go through the main games' events), so all my, and I assume most other people's, complains have always derived from the canon divergence, and tbh not even regarding lore or anything, since any changes due to time limit are understandable, but mostly as how the anime actually gives newcomers an animated example of how the series actually is like. This is the reason why the fanservice bit always always annoyed me, because touhou is so unique among popular girl-filled Japanese indie series of being basically devoid of sexual and for the most part also romance, so that aspect in the anime is a very bad wrong impression to have for what touhou is like. But that absolutely changes with the fact the creators actually spoke out about their intentions! Now I feel much much better about it, and everyone should really know about it and stop suggesting the anime as a way to present the series to newcomers, as it's just a fun (very impressive!) silly fanmade fanon based thing.

Just a nitpick on the sakuya battle rant, I think it actually works very well because reimu is purposefully acting like she is struggling while in the meantime she is setting up her trap which is both clever so she outsmarted sakuya by not revealing what she could do on the get go, so she took advantage of her flaws too, and the fact sakuya was defeated the same way she was defeated by the watatsuki sister with the same powers as reimu in the manga, by neutralizing her by making her unable to move out of the way, is very fitting. But all your complains are still very valid, especially with the newcomers in mind."

 

Quote

"Didn't know there was so much backlash against MoP. I've just entered Touhou fandom during the last four years, and my jaw was on the floor when I discovered you guys had this awesome full-scale fan-made anime. Heck, I didn't even know an anime could be fan-made.

I really appreciate MoP for what it is. Your point still stands, and I agree with some of your criticism. In general, the anime feels like a fan-made project with a shoestring budget made for fans. Hence, a lot of cameos and characters appearing out of turn. Aya, for example, needs to appear early on; otherwise, we might have never seen her at all. Who knew back then whether this anime would get to the Mountain of Faith?

This also explains why the villains all have the same recurring theme. Since this series span over a long period of time. When they got to Kaguya, they might forget they gave her this exact same motive as they did Remilia. Despite for average human and youkai as the superior being are such a common theme for villains in shonen anime.
All in all, the people behind MoP earn from me so much respect. I could really see how wonderful the series would turn out if they had more budget and worked on a regular, tight schedule."

 

(and here is another comment comment from one of the lore channels, this time from Delta Pie - these kind of people are a great contribution towards the overall community; Delta Pie's opinion is also a little bit of the cause that influenced a little bit of my conclusion in regards to the Memories of Phantasm)

Quote

"I think a large portion of why the fandom gives such undue judgment with the lore deviations is because it assigned it a role that it was never trying to fill - the whole misunderstanding you discussed. MoP is the introductory Touhou media for a vast portion of fans, and people who are already fans know this as well. Hence, they hold MoP to a higher standard because they have placed MoP in that higher position of being the “unofficial official” Touhou anime, when in reality it is simply another doujin work in a sea of many. In other words, Touhou fans have appointed MoP as an ambassador of the Touhou games as an anime adaptation, then tear it down for failing the job that they assigned it to do.

In a way, I don’t really blame people for placing MoP in this position. The “Is this an anime?” crowd has to be answered in some way, and while some could respond with a 10-page rant on the intricacies of Patchouli’s spellcard design, others respond with “…yeah, sure.” They then point to MoP simply because it is more popular. Years of this have led to MoP being assigned the role of an adaptation of the games when it was never intended to fulfill that (hence the misunderstood part). Fans of MoP misunderstand it, at least on the Western side of things, since the whole “adaptation of fanon” aspect is not communicated at all across the language barrier. So fans point to MoP as a cute anime adaptation of the games that newcomers can watch. Critics of MoP see fans of MoP giving these directions and assume the same thing the fans did - that MoP was intended to be an adaptation of the games, leading to things such as the lore deviations list.

Summer Day’s Dream and Hifuu Activity Record escape criticism by not being MoP and (from what I’ve seen, and I may be wrong) remaining fairly niche, even amongst the actual Touhou community. Hence, they don’t escape the Touhou fandom as much and aren’t subjected to the ambassador scrutiny. The nuance of MoP also isn’t very easily explained to the many newcomers whose first exposure is MoP. You wouldn’t respond to “what anime is this?” with “uhhh well it’s an adaption of a video game series, but it isn’t actually an adaptation of the actual games but the fanworks of it. What’s a fanwork you say? Well-”. MoP was forced into the role of being an adaptation of the games by the fans, critics, and poor clueless newcomers. 

But what about other fanworks that breach containment? Why aren’t they subject to the same ambassador scrutiny by the fandom? Now that I think of it, they kind of are. The old memes have their critics for overuse, and I think that’s in part because they view these memes as ambassadors of the canon rather than fandom-specific flandreized memes that spread like wildfire outside the Touhou community. I think we can also see this with people who dislike the popularity of fumos, again with people assigning something the ambassador role to it when it’s really just a funny plushie. We see a similar phenomenon with LostWord, with people criticizing it’s inaccuracies in terms of characterization and fanservice, though in this case it’s a product rather than exclusively a creative work so the context is different - that’s a discussion for another time. 

So obviously MoP is a bad ambassador for the games since it wasn’t intended to be one, but what about being an ambassador for the entire Touhou Project (including fanworks)? I think that the quality issues still drag it down, but the fact that there is a fan ANIME for Touhou is a good testament to and representation of the creative talent of the fanbase. In my opinion MoP’s most impressive feat is existing. Perhaps it does in some way fulfill the role enforced on it by the fans and the algorithm, but not in the way that Touhou fans think it should."

 

And a little bit of a potentially concerning situation about Sealed Esoteric History:

Quote

'1:06:44 I'm kind of happy to see you about talking about Hifuu Club Activity Record (the Sealed Esoteric History), since i like that fanime... but...

1:06:56 but i'm kinda get worried about the relationship between the members of the kyoto fantasy troupe, since the whole "firing" of ori/antares due to... how to treat the story they're making (and about creatibity within it's characters), it's makes me think that sooner or latter, most of the troupe would disband and cease production of the fanime...

As well, thanks to 1:07:01, i also know that the troupe was doing good with the help of a billonaire who was also a big fan of touhou, but knowing how the investment where and that he needs the fans's money to still be a float, i'm very much having complex feelings about this...

Add to that (mostly the first), the troupe hasn't updated their web page in like... 1 year or so, since the last news was about the first teaser of the Destiny episode of the SEH (sealed esoteric history), and hasn't do much else, as well their Niconico page hasn't been updated too...

However, they do also have a weibo page and a billibilli one too, which also post stuff related to the fanime as well... however, trying to join in is hard since (due for me being mexican) it doesn't have the specific phone number to join in, they have both in English and Spanish but from Spain, but mexican? Sorry but not...

As well, there's also some pieces of merch they also sell (or sold) in the previous Reitaisai too, mostly doujins that do continue the story of the Hifuu Club Activity Record (as well artbooks too), but, for the ones that are from some last years (2016-15 to be specific) it's kind of hard to find (and Mostly i do want a single DVD of just the OPENING of the series, as well with small pieces of merch they also did too, like a fake ID of Renko, a pen, a fan and a bookmark set... and also the first CD of music of the first episode too...) and since i don't live in japan, i used eBay to buy them from, i know it doesn't help, but at least i can get them to see them...

But hearing about all what's happening from behind of the scenes is just makes me have some problems with my faith onto the series, since: i do really like them and have a lot of potential for more episodes (mostly the ones based on the characters from the opening: we already got yukkuri, Kanako/Suwako, and Remilia/Sakuya; but we're still missing Byakuren/Murasa, Yuyuko and Reisen/Mokou... and in just in case, Sumireko and Renko/Maribel centered plot of backstory... and Reimu too, i guess?) But knowing that the creators are having problems with the staff and some are quitting, i'm kind of scared to see the series going to end, maybe after the second half of episode 3 destiny... i'm afraid for it to happen...

But even then, hearing of 1:09:09 (and 1:09:53), i do kind of want to try to at least create something that could fit with the whole SEH story, even if it isn't official for it (or for the Touhou canon in general), and trying to at least create a story based on the whole Murasa/Byakuren bit from the op, albeit, based in what you said in 1:07:56, my story would rely more into the "slice of life" aspect than the mystery/action aspect from what the series tries to be... on the sealing club part, on the Murasa part, i feel the whole mystery would still fit in (even though i still don't know a lot of her, but i'm trying to read and understands about her backstory and how it would be implemented, the same with Byakuren too)... i also am thinking of doing the same but with Rumia too, but i'm trying to distance it from works like Osana Reimu and more into trying to play with her key ability of the darkness.

I'm a fan of the series and i'm trying to support the troupe through thick and thin, even if the series (or the staff) may have problems within itself, i just wanna have fun seeing the story and how it would end too, it is kind of one of my favorites ssc works yet, and i kind of want to see it being continue, even if the worse happens or gets cancelled, i just wanna see how it will end, and inspire other people to create works too... (maybe also reading the canon material too, but that's another thing, i can't force people to read the canon or to just see the wiki and tv troupes too, that's something the fans would do by themselves, i guess?) Sorry for the long ramble, but i really had a lot of things to say about this series though."

Megafrog (I swear, I will link his video in just a moment) has pointed out very well 3 ways in which nobody really managed to understand the anime:

Yes, this series is a mess. Yes, it has a lot of unnecessary and awkward fanservice used only just to patch and take attention from bad writing. Yes, a lot of things may not really make sense, and could be better executed. But does it deserve all the hate it tends to get from the seasoned Touhou veterans? At least for the first 7 episodes, it really tries to make its own thing with all it gets. And sometimes, we even get some good episodes, or at least pieces of an episode going well in a sea of dumpster fire. 

If we are to give credit to Memories of Phantasm for something, that would be how long it lasted. Many, if not most Touhou fan-made anime projects died out as soon as they appeared. Every now and often, you will see that sporadic PV for a "soon to come" series, only for you to find out the PV was from 10 years ago and nothing actually came besides that PV. The only other two (maybe three, if you also count the 3D animations released every few years by minusT) competitors when it comes to a fan-made Touhou anime that went for more than a PV: Summer Day's Dream and Sealed Esoteric History. Those two got a few episodes, but they are even more of a niche product, only known by their own specific public. To me, MoP is just a proof that there is possible to make a Touhou animated series, and actually have it survive for more than a decade, or at least long enough until it becomes a long-lasting name in the community - "you either die early as a hero, or live long enough to become the villain" as some would say. 

As to why I have not done this a proper review: this has already been done, and much better than I ever could by Megafrog. His video, released mere weeks ago, was my main drive to finally give a shot at writing this thread. Without him, it would have probably taken me even more to come up with it, quite likely leaving the project for the next year or so. He has covered the series very well in a 1 hour long review, with a specific focus on episodes 1-7 (as the rest afterwards copy the EoSD arc formula to some various degree). As a bonus, he even went further and actually made some research into the media posts of the doujin group, uncovering some rather interesting things about Manpukujinja and the people behind all this project. It is definitely a video i would recommend watching if you have 1 hour to spare, or just want to have something to listen to in the background when busy. 
 

This is probably the longest thread I have written this year. I was not expecting to come up with this kind of a monster all of a sudden, but I guess here we are now. 

 

Th video I promised so much I will link:

This has been CountVonNumenor, and see you until the end of this year with at least one more thread, then an important one on the New Year Eve. 

See you, space cowboy

[buskerdog]

Thank you CVN for this post, I haven't looked at MoP for a pretty long time and this was a really good recap/review of the series! I watched up to the end of Imperishable Night arc, as that's where the series finished at the time, and found the overall experience to be just "alright" in a similar way to what you concluded, which would explain why I never bothered to catch up with the new episodes after that.

11 hours ago, CountVonNumenor said:

I would like to thank @Isaac, @sodaodaoda and @Gou the frog in accompanying me while watching the episodes. It was extremely fun to discuss with them live as the things were unfolding in front of my eyes. I will probably try that again at some point in the future. 

Huh, that sounds really cool! I'm sure you all had interesting things to say about it!

 

And now, for some additional canon information I can provide to fill in a few holes:

11 hours ago, CountVonNumenor said:

• oh wait, now I think Yukari would make sense to have a role in the events - did she make the night longer or something, so to give time to find out who created the fake Moon and replace it with the real one?
• I am still confused if I put it with the game, as I forgot critical information from the game

Eirin places a magical seal on the moon so that the Lunarians cannot pursue Kaguya on earth. Since the real moon becomes sealed away, she also creates a replacement fake moon. Unfortunately, this is having adverse effects on Youkai. Eirin's spell takes time to complete however, so the protagonists use magic to extend the duration of the night to find the culprit before the damage becomes irreversible. This is why there's an actual "time" resource in the game that the characters collect for playing well, and without enough of it, the game ends early. In Reimu's route it is of course Yukari manipulating the border of night and day to extend the night time, and since this explanation fits very soundly, along with being part of Reimu's story, it's generally the one fans accept as the "most canon", but all the teams have a method for extending the night. The Forbidden Magic team are using a spell from a grimoire (probably Alice's grimoire, but I'm not actually sure), the Scarlet team are using Sakuya's innate time manipulation powers, and the Netherworld team are... uh... Yuyuko just has powers, I guess? (actually, due to Yuyuko's closeness with Yukari, it could possibly be her again that's manipulating time behind the scenes.)

12 hours ago, CountVonNumenor said:

how does Reimu win this time? does she use a clever trick like in the Yuyuko fight? not really - we get her basically faking a death (perhaps a game reference?), spawns behind Sakuya, locks her in place with seals and giver the maid the final blow

This technique is "Instant Dimensional Rift", a skill card in Scarlet Weather Rhapsody and Hisoutensoku. The special move works like a counter - if Reimu is hit when she activates it, she teleports away to safety and a burst of ofuda appear in her place, assuming that same star-shaped formation you see in the anime before flying towards the attacker.

[Isaac]

It's nice to finally see a thread dedicate to Fantasy Kaleidoscope and I'm glad you've caught up with all the episodes now! I haven't seen the show in a while just like Buskerdog, so this recap helps me remember the cool moments and saves me time.

17 hours ago, CountVonNumenor said:

 I would like to thank @Isaac, @sodaodaoda and @Gou the frog in accompanying me while watching the episodes. It was extremely fun to discuss with them live as the things were unfolding in front of my eyes. I will probably try that again at some point in the future. 

Despite my feelings on the show, I'll admit it was really fun to see your live reaction to these episodes and then talking about them after! We should definitely plan more stuff like this in the future. Since Fantasy Kaleidoscope opened the gateway to anime sites for you, Maybe you'll decide to watch other anime shows that we like one day : )

I think now would also be a good time to mention that we created a discord group recently! It's mainly for the people we genuinely trust, but I'd love to see more people from MS to join there. Please feel free to message either one of us about it anytime!

17 hours ago, CountVonNumenor said:

This episode could have worked nicely as a tie-up to the series... if only the did not tease a lot of other stuff, with this episode's post-credits screen teasing yet another arc (most likely Scarlet Weather Rhapsody)

Conclusion: PLEASE, END THIS ALREADY! I don't know if it is from the fact I have watched 2 full arcs in one day, the fact the show has problems or that I have lost enjoyment the further I was going, but I am honestly happy it is over. This arc could have been a very good point to end the show, given it has been running since 2011 and the fact we have been building for over a decade just to get to this final showdown between the Hakurei and Moriya Shrine, but I guess they really want to keep producing it. I am done, at least for a while.

 

AND THIS IS IT...

• the end of my less-than-24-hours-long marathon on watching Memories of Phantasm (well, 48 hours if also counting the writing of this review)
• this was... something
• 17 episodes, yet it could have very easily have fit into at most 12 episodes
• we had 4 arcs (EoSD, PoFV, IN and MoF), and 2 individual episodes (PCB and Hisoutensoku), unevenly distributed (it became extremely bloated towards the end; it became very tiring to go through both IN and MoF in one go)

Episode 17 really felt like the end of the story they were trying to tell and I would've liked to see them wrap up everything here as well. Even with the Tenshi teaser at the end, I can't imagine them working on full arcs like IN and MoF anymore. A special episode for Scarlet Weather Rhapsody would be nice though. Manpukujinja have been producing this show for over 12 years now, so maybe it's the right time to take a break. 

[CountVonNumenor]

On 12/26/2022 at 3:27 PM, buskerdog said:

Eirin places a magical seal on the moon so that the Lunarians cannot pursue Kaguya on earth. Since the real moon becomes sealed away, she also creates a replacement fake moon. Unfortunately, this is having adverse effects on Youkai. Eirin's spell takes time to complete however, so the protagonists use magic to extend the duration of the night to find the culprit before the damage becomes irreversible. This is why there's an actual "time" resource in the game that the characters collect for playing well, and without enough of it, the game ends early. In Reimu's route it is of course Yukari manipulating the border of night and day to extend the night time, and since this explanation fits very soundly, along with being part of Reimu's story, it's generally the one fans accept as the "most canon", but all the teams have a method for extending the night. The Forbidden Magic team are using a spell from a grimoire (probably Alice's grimoire, but I'm not actually sure), the Scarlet team are using Sakuya's innate time manipulation powers, and the Netherworld team are... uh... Yuyuko just has powers, I guess? (actually, due to Yuyuko's closeness with Yukari, it could possibly be her again that's manipulating time behind the scenes.)

First of all, thank you for the reply! Watching the series in one go has been a very interesting experience. As for the lore explanations, it is finally more clear. So thank you again. There are quite a few things I tend to forget, given how vast Touhou can be at times. 

 

On 12/26/2022 at 3:27 PM, buskerdog said:

This technique is "Instant Dimensional Rift", a skill card in Scarlet Weather Rhapsody and Hisoutensoku. The special move works like a counter - if Reimu is hit when she activates it, she teleports away to safety and a burst of ofuda appear in her place, assuming that same star-shaped formation you see in the anime before flying towards the attacker.

Again, even more lore explanations . I really did not know about the mechanic from SWR and Hisoutensoku, so that is quite new info for me. 

 

On 12/26/2022 at 10:20 PM, Isaac said:

Episode 17 really felt like the end of the story they were trying to tell and I would've liked to see them wrap up everything here as well. Even with the Tenshi teaser at the end, I can't imagine them working on full arcs like IN and MoF anymore. A special episode for Scarlet Weather Rhapsody would be nice though. Manpukujinja have been producing this show for over 12 years now, so maybe it's the right time to take a break. 

We should not forget that besides Scarlet Weather Rhapsody, we have had both Subterranean Animism and UFO teased for almost a decade now (without any sign those plotlines would actually come to be realized). Especially with SA, where we already had like at least an entire minute of solid battle animation. Again, it is the weird order in which the episodes have been created, as well as possibly a lack of general direction that ended up with us having the teasers for 3 arcs, while the creation team is not even sure what are they going to do next. 

In some cases, it looks as if they already had something planned, but suddenly changed their mind and did something else. Again, case in point with all the footage for SA. I wonder how things will actually develop in the following years, and in what direction will the series go. Until now, we had Touhou 7, 6, 9, 12.3, 8 and 10 (in this order), with some decent gaps in between. As a bonus, perhaps I should work on a timeline based on all the materials from the show as of yet just to see "the journey of Sanae", from her getting dropped into the setting to the resolution of the MoF incident (use the actual order of the games and put the data together), as depicted in the Manpukujinja-verse. 

[buskerdog]

52 minutes ago, CountVonNumenor said:

Again, even more lore explanations . I really did not know about the mechanic from SWR and Hisoutensoku, so that is quite new info for me. 

I don't blame you for not knowing, it's certainly from the more obscure side of things, being a move in a spinoff that didn't become a mainstay in any way. I remember the first time watching that fight scene, I lit up with glee to see something so niche get represented 

[SoundOfRayne]

Holy shit @CountVonNumenor, you really like putting us through the wringer on these posts, huh?
Not just satisfied having us go through your episode-by-episode reactions, but MegaFrog's hour-long video AND a compilation of comments too? Absolute sadist.

I'm kidding. I love that any thread you start up is gonna get my brain-gears turning. Though I'm not as happy to say that thanks to MegaFrog's due diligence, there isn't much of anything I can think of to research for this thread. But getting to revisit my time with MoP again leaves me with a lot of questions and thoughts on it, and I feel like sharing them.

Girls are now calculating...

So, trying to put a pin in my feelings for Memories of Phantasm turned out to be really difficult because I don't really have strong feelings for it. My feelings are largely similar to the kind of reception MegaFrog covered in his video: I remember the show pretty fondly, I can recall a good number of moments that I enjoyed, and some I enjoyed a lot, but when I try to think about the kind of impact it left on me, I can't really muster up anything more than "It's the Touhou anime," and end up defaulting to a lot of the criticisms for stuff about it that I didn't like. Which is a shame. No other singular project in the Touhou fandom that I've seen reaches the kind of scale MoP does, and despite it being so full of stuff that I really liked, my feelings about it overall are just lukewarm...

One of the pieces of MegaFrog's video that stuck out to me was his opening argument over authorial intent and the claim that MoP was never made to be an adaptation of Touhou Project. Maybe it was recency bias, the well-formed argument MegaFrog made around this, or that smooth voice of his, but I ended up following along with it throughout the entirety of his video, but when I spent literal hours yesterday trying to write out a response to this thread, I ended up feeling frustrated because despite agreeing with his position at the time, most of my stances and feelings on MoP contradicted it. I decided to sleep on the matter. When I woke up, I realized that there were a few points MegaFrog made that I don't actually agree with; this being one of them.

• MoP adds very little "new" to the stories of the games. Sure, it takes creative liberties with the way characters are portrayed and how the events are structured, but that was going to happen anyways. All adaptations take creative liberties. Claiming that MoP isn't one just highlights how little deviation there is from the events it's recreating, and how reductive the deviations it does take are. People mistaking MoP as a failed adaptation of Touhou's canon isn't the result of fans misunderstanding the project; it's the result of MoP failing to forge it's own unique identity separate from the source material.
• Alright, let's talk about the tiddies because ho' boy, there are sure a lot of them in MoP. Look, I watched MegaFrog's entire video. I see the image. The fanservicing was done because the creators wanted it; not necessarily to make the show more marketable. I get it. But on the other hand, what does it matter why the fanservice was put in? When I hear people complain that the fanservice is excessive, they don't care about whether it was an executive decision for money or the passion work of a particularly horny animator; they care that it's detracting from a story that's already cutting out characters and potential content to make a tight run time and negatively impacts their ability to enjoy the show. "Why" is completely irrelevant in this. It's not people are gonna say "Well, I used to hate Chen's ass, but now that I know the artist is into it, I guess it is pretty cool."
• And since I guess this has become the "This is the part where SoundOfRayne disagrees with MegaFrog's analysis of MoP's criticisms" part of the post, I may as well comment on the final thing I don't agree with him on: the closing image of the three ways in which MoP is misinterpreted by the creators, its critics, and its fans. Mind, not because of what's actually put on-screen. I do believe that different people have different conclusions on what Memories of Phantasm is trying to be. No, what I disagree with is the implication that MoP's mixed reception comes from a shared responsibility (or lack thereof) from all three parties to properly identify and understand the show. I do not agree with this implication in the slightest. As GensouChronicle put it, "I blame the people in charge of the project." As a creator, it is your responsibility to properly establish what your work is and what it's about. If people are misunderstanding MoP, that's its creators' fault, not theirs.

Okay, now that I've covered the Frog in the room, I guess I talk about my specific feelings on Memories of Phantasm now. I do wanna start with positives since, as I said before, MoP does so many things well, and those positives often get overshadowed by its criticisms.

• I don't think this needs much elaboration, but damn, MoP looks so darn pretty. All of the art is crisp and clean, and pretty much any frame of the show could be a valid wallpaper choice. Personally, I'm a bigger fan of good smear-framing to sell that extra bit of oomph to movements, but I'd be stupid not to recognize the talent that went into MoP's visual production. Even as the show carried on and the team downsized, the art for the show continues to look polished and professional.
• One of the things that MoP does that most other non-game fanworks don't is portraying actual danmaku battles. Danmaku are such visual clutter; it works well in the context of the games, but for things like doujin manga or animations, it distracts viewers from what the artist wants them to focus on. So, most examples of battles in fanworks tend to be simpler; more direct attacks with basic patterns to give fights a better sense of direction and flow. But MoP opts to animate danmaku in all of their glory, giving us gorgeous scenes of colorful bullet patterns, and they're just as captivating and terrifying as they are in the games. Admittedly, though, this does come with the downside of being less visually impressive once things zoom in and we watch the characters just... not get hit by anything. I'm convinced that Touhou bosses all just have Stormtrooper aim, but also have like 1000 blasters to even it out. Something's bound to hit, right?
• This one might be a bit contentious depending on which character you happen to be a fan of, but on the whole, I do like the way most of the characters are written. Cirno is the favorite in my book. She's not too stupid, but she's also clearly not all there. She's arrogant and scrappy, but also gets her moments to be sweet for Daiyousei. MegaFrog was spot on. I never really considered having a favorite episode for the show, but if I had to choose, I would give it to The Mysterious Giant Youkai. I kinda forgot how favorably I remembered that episode until I heard MegaFrog talking about it.
  Also, can we talk about Nitori being an adorkable little butterbean? She just wants to play with her science toys, and Marisa joins in as her hypeman just because it "sounds like it'd be cool." Sure, Nitori getting flirty with her wasn't really my thing, but everything else was so cute and wholesome and I loved it. I wish the actual MoF story wasn't going on and I coulda just gotten an episode of them just playing around, being doofuses.
  Okay, so Meiling got absolutely shafted in the EoSD arc. Everyone agrees on this. But like, Meiling being Flandre's mom in pretty much every other scene they're in is the most precious and wholesome thing ever, and no one talks about it. It's all just "haha, lazy gatekeeper gets her ass handed to her." Meiling fans, just... take the L on that fight, okay? You're still eating pretty good.
  Alright, I know this one is hated by a lot of people, but... I actually really like Eiki in MoP. Not necessarily because I like her flanderized personality (smol, judgemental, obnoxiously self-righteous, talks shit about everyone to their face literally the whole night) but because despite being shown as annoying and non-threatening, she strikes the most visceral fear into the hearts of everyone the moment she's mentioned. I find the idea that listening to her lectures is more terrifying that the literal death-matches these characters have with each other absolutely hilarious, canon be damned.
  Sure, MoP doesn't bat 1000. There are definitely characters who got the short end of the stick when it came to representation. If you're a fan of any character who shows up before stage 4, you just get to eat whole shit. Except Alice. Alice fans get to eat good. ...Fuck you, Alice fans...

I would say that the big main issue I take with MoP is, as MegaFrog elaborated on, its lack of identity. MoP does do something very fascinating, though. I would say it's a perfect reflection of the inconsistency within the Touhou fandom. MoP wants to be a high-intensity action show that replicates the spectacle of danmaku battles from the games, but it also wants to be a cute, silly little slice-of-life-y show that focuses on these adorable little beans we call characters, but it also also wants to coat the whole thing in raw sex appeal because the fandom sure does like their yuri-bait and tiddies, huh? It's like it's trying to be everyone's Touhou and, well... In all fairness, it did bring everyone together to collectively say, "Not my Touhou." That's really what it boils down to. It's trying to be for everyone; to encompass as much about Touhou's canon and fandom as possible to give everyone something. And as the old saying goes, if you try to please everyone, you'll end up pleasing no one. That's why I think that MoP is so heavily panned compared to its contemporaries. A Summer's Day Dream and Hifuu Club Activity Record knew exactly what they wanted to be; what story they wanted to tell, how they wanted to tell it, and who they wanted to tell it for. So people who watched them can know exactly why they like them, or maybe don't like them. They can judge them fairly because they understand what they're watching. MoP didn't have this. Even though it was incredibly popular, not many people seem to consider themselves fans of it, and I totally get that.

And that's where I find myself with Memories of Phantasm. There are all these moments which captured my heart, but that's all they were; moments. It's like taking a bunch of really tasty ingredients and putting them in a pot to cook, except the pot is rusted and hadn't been cleaned in a while, the heat isn't at the right setting, and oh yeah, you don't know how to cook. Those ingredients- those moments- might be good on their own; maybe even the best. But unless they can be properly tied together, your soup is gonna end up nasty. MoP is so odd to talk about because it's a whole that's somehow less than the sum of its parts. It's easy to punch down to because people from all stages in the Touhou fandom can find the cracks in it pretty easily.

But it's hard to hate. Despite how much flak it gets for the sloppy execution, people still see Memories of Phantasm for what it truly is: A labor of love at an unprecedented level. Seriously, how many other fandoms can get a whole, independently funded, professionally animated series? Touhou fans really are an entirely different breed. I think that's why people give all this conflicting reception to it. It's a genuinely special endeavor for the Touhou fandom, and that kind of passion shouldn't go unappreciated. But, uhh... It was kinda hard watching the end of MegaFrog's video, hearing about just how bad MoP's finances are. It's heartbreaking knowing that this massive passion project, given to one of the most ravenous fanbases around, isn't making back any of its money. Like, this is the same fandom that will shell out hundreds of dollars for a fucking felt plushie based off an ages-old fan manga (Seriously, fuck Fumos), but this is where they draw the line? I'm genuinely shocked. I hope for the sake of the people who really believe in Memories of Phantasm that no one ends up breaking themselves over it.

[CountVonNumenor]

On 12/28/2022 at 3:35 AM, SoundOfRayne said:

Holy shit @CountVonNumenor, you really like putting us through the wringer on these posts, huh?
Not just satisfied having us go through your episode-by-episode reactions, but MegaFrog's hour-long video AND a compilation of comments too? Absolute sadist.

You are welcome . On a serious note, I am glad you have enjoyed the whole project I have put together. It took me about 8 hours to compile all this information, and I wanted to make sure all the effort was worth it.

 

On 12/28/2022 at 3:35 AM, SoundOfRayne said:

So, trying to put a pin in my feelings for Memories of Phantasm turned out to be really difficult because I don't really have strong feelings for it. My feelings are largely similar to the kind of reception MegaFrog covered in his video: I remember the show pretty fondly, I can recall a good number of moments that I enjoyed, and some I enjoyed a lot, but when I try to think about the kind of impact it left on me, I can't really muster up anything more than "It's the Touhou anime," and end up defaulting to a lot of the criticisms for stuff about it that I didn't like. Which is a shame. No other singular project in the Touhou fandom that I've seen reaches the kind of scale MoP does, and despite it being so full of stuff that I really liked, my feelings about it overall are just lukewarm...

Honestly, my reaction towards Memories of Phantasm is very similar, even now after rewatching the series and watching Megafrog's review. When I first watched MoP, back in December 2020, I was still new to the Touhou fandom (about 2 months "old"). At the time, I was interested as I was seeing the new series I got into put into motion (despite alright having got the taste of MVs and some short animations), this one being pretty much the biggest fan project I was aware of (interesting enough, even but that early point I was aware of the concept of "what is canon" and "what is fanon"). Yet halfway through (it really was the halfway at the time), I stopped, and left the animation aside for almost 2 years. Now, I still can remember a little more warmly of some episodes (especially from the first seven), then it started getting a little colder the more I got into the never-ending IN arc MoF. To me, it is also "the Touhou anime", even if I still have to watch A Summer Day's Dream and Hifuu Club Activity Record. 

 

On 12/28/2022 at 3:35 AM, SoundOfRayne said:

One of the pieces of MegaFrog's video that stuck out to me was his opening argument over authorial intent and the claim that MoP was never made to be an adaptation of Touhou Project. Maybe it was recency bias, the well-formed argument MegaFrog made around this, or that smooth voice of his, but I ended up following along with it throughout the entirety of his video, but when I spent literal hours yesterday trying to write out a response to this thread, I ended up feeling frustrated because despite agreeing with his position at the time, most of my stances and feelings on MoP contradicted it. I decided to sleep on the matter. When I woke up, I realized that there were a few points MegaFrog made that I don't actually agree with; this being one of them.

Honestly, up to the moment Megafrog brought it up, I have never really been aware of what "authorial intent" is, and I am still in a much better shape now either. Now I am honestly very curious about the points you were initially going to bring up, in case they are any different to the ones we have ended up with in your answer. (sorry that I am answering this late, I am honestly in the shape where I really want to solve some unsolved business in regards to threads I wanted to answer to or create). 

 

On 12/28/2022 at 3:35 AM, SoundOfRayne said:

MoP adds very little "new" to the stories of the games. Sure, it takes creative liberties with the way characters are portrayed and how the events are structured, but that was going to happen anyways. All adaptations take creative liberties. Claiming that MoP isn't one just highlights how little deviation there is from the events it's recreating, and how reductive the deviations it does take are. People mistaking MoP as a failed adaptation of Touhou's canon isn't the result of fans misunderstanding the project; it's the result of MoP failing to forge it's own unique identity separate from the source material.

I have to agree on this one. In a way, MoP is trying to be its own thing, but at the same time it ends up still retelling the story of the games, even if in a more confusing order, and with included confusions, unconnected plots and gratuitious fanservice. Therefore,  am not sure either what they were looking for. Did they want a faithful recreation of the game events? Did they want to tell a new story/"reinvent the wheel"? Were they actually looking for a middle way? I am still a little confused about the "tells the story of the games from the perspective of fandom" statement to be honest. 

 

On 12/28/2022 at 3:35 AM, SoundOfRayne said:

One of the things that MoP does that most other non-game fanworks don't is portraying actual danmaku battles. Danmaku are such visual clutter; it works well in the context of the games, but for things like doujin manga or animations, it distracts viewers from what the artist wants them to focus on. So, most examples of battles in fanworks tend to be simpler; more direct attacks with basic patterns to give fights a better sense of direction and flow. But MoP opts to animate danmaku in all of their glory, giving us gorgeous scenes of colorful bullet patterns, and they're just as captivating and terrifying as they are in the games. Admittedly, though, this does come with the downside of being less visually impressive once things zoom in and we watch the characters just... not get hit by anything. I'm convinced that Touhou bosses all just have Stormtrooper aim, but also have like 1000 blasters to even it out. Something's bound to hit, right?

Another point I honestly agree on. Aside from Memories of Phantasm and the animations of minusT, seeing a danmaku battle on screen is extremely rare, if not absent. Which is probably one of the better points this anime can get. I was going to say that besides "Stormtrooper aim", it might also be the small hitbox of the characters, but I guess you also do have a point in here. 

 

On 12/28/2022 at 3:35 AM, SoundOfRayne said:

This one might be a bit contentious depending on which character you happen to be a fan of, but on the whole, I do like the way most of the characters are written. Cirno is the favorite in my book. She's not too stupid, but she's also clearly not all there. She's arrogant and scrappy, but also gets her moments to be sweet for Daiyousei. MegaFrog was spot on. I never really considered having a favorite episode for the show, but if I had to choose, I would give it to The Mysterious Giant Youkai.

Again, I really enjoyed that episode, and I did not really realize it until Megafrog came up with his review. Until then, I only knew The Mysterious Giant Youkai as "that episode everyone and their guts hated on YouTube when I was watching that version of MoP". I can still remember one of comments regarding the final scene with Cirno and Daiyousei, in which the person was saying "JUST KISS ALREADY!", making it as if the scene itself was building up for a yuri moment. 

 

On 12/28/2022 at 3:35 AM, SoundOfRayne said:

Also, can we talk about Nitori being an adorkable little butterbean? She just wants to play with her science toys, and Marisa joins in as her hypeman just because it "sounds like it'd be cool." Sure, Nitori getting flirty with her wasn't really my thing, but everything else was so cute and wholesome and I loved it. I wish the actual MoF story wasn't going on and I coulda just gotten an episode of them just playing around, being doofuses.

I loved that moments as well. That is why I wanted to point out the precious smile moment shared by the two waiting for the missile to lift off. 

 

On 12/28/2022 at 3:35 AM, SoundOfRayne said:

Okay, so Meiling got absolutely shafted in the EoSD arc. Everyone agrees on this. But like, Meiling being Flandre's mom in pretty much every other scene they're in is the most precious and wholesome thing ever, and no one talks about it. It's all just "haha, lazy gatekeeper gets her ass handed to her." Meiling fans, just... take the L on that fight, okay? You're still eating pretty good.

I guess you got a point. Despite being treated like I joke, I guess it was cute to see Meiling acting as if she were Flan's mom. 

 

On 12/28/2022 at 3:35 AM, SoundOfRayne said:

Alright, let's talk about the tiddies because ho' boy, there are sure a lot of them in MoP. Look, I watched MegaFrog's entire video. I see the image. The fanservicing was done because the creators wanted it; not necessarily to make the show more marketable. I get it. But on the other hand, what does it matter why the fanservice was put in? When I hear people complain that the fanservice is excessive, they don't care about whether it was an executive decision for money or the passion work of a particularly horny animator; they care that it's detracting from a story that's already cutting out characters and potential content to make a tight run time and negatively impacts their ability to enjoy the show. "Why" is completely irrelevant in this. It's not people are gonna say "Well, I used to hate Chen's ass, but now that I know the artist is into it, I guess it is pretty cool."

About the artist being into it.... It was funny in Megafrog's video to find out that tweets from the Manpukujija team taking so much about boobs (like that situation of basically "1 in 20 words" of a tweet referring to breasts. I can see the dissonance though with the official materials. Normally, official Touhou materials (with some slight moments of fanservice) are devoid of any lewd content. However, fandom has made sure, and went beyond the call of duty to lewd everything to hell (which "hell"? I am not sure, given how many there are in Gensokyo) and back. And of this show really was supposed to be a reflection of the fandom, I guess they got that aspect right. Again, in my opinion, it just felt a little out of place, and rather distracting from what was normally supposed to be going on that scene. Like how the naked Yakumo clan and Chen's ass were distracting from pretty much the scene that properly introduced these three characters and their motivations, to Kaguya and her backstory being told in the middle of a bathing scene. 

 

On 12/28/2022 at 3:35 AM, SoundOfRayne said:

As GensouChronicle put it, "I blame the people in charge of the project." As a creator, it is your responsibility to properly establish what your work is and what it's about. If people are misunderstanding MoP, that's its creators' fault, not theirs.

I think GensouChronicle really got a good point in there. 

 

On 12/28/2022 at 3:35 AM, SoundOfRayne said:

I don't think this needs much elaboration, but damn, MoP looks so darn pretty. All of the art is crisp and clean, and pretty much any frame of the show could be a valid wallpaper choice. Personally, I'm a bigger fan of good smear-framing to sell that extra bit of oomph to movements, but I'd be stupid not to recognize the talent that went into MoP's visual production. Even as the show carried on and the team downsized, the art for the show continues to look polished and professional.

At my first watch, I was amazed about the sheer quality coming from what was basically a group of fans doing a small project for their fandom, without the backing of a big studio. Even now, I still hold to that opinion. Besides, MoP has such a recognizable style, that you could recognize it anywhere you go. 

 

On 12/28/2022 at 3:35 AM, SoundOfRayne said:

Alright, I know this one is hated by a lot of people, but... I actually really like Eiki in MoP. Not necessarily because I like her flanderized personality (smol, judgemental, obnoxiously self-righteous, talks shit about everyone to their face literally the whole night) but because despite being shown as annoying and non-threatening, she strikes the most visceral fear into the hearts of everyone the moment she's mentioned.

Initially, I was quite repulsed by any of these disrespectful fanon depictions of Eiki. In some measure, I still am, even if I paradoxically believe that Danzai Yamaxanadu really slaps as a song. As for her being able to strike fear, I think that one is quite spot on. Normally, this is what the wiki has to say about Eiki and her canon personality:

"As the Yama who judges people after they die, Eiki is impartial to anyone when lecturing them, whenever they are human or youkai. Since she is very preachy and is never mistaken about anything, this makes her hard to approach. Despite her stern attitude and seriousness at her job, Eiki has a teasing side, smiling even when revealing the shortcomings of the people she's lecturing. She's described as being polite and patient when lecturing."

Meanwhile, this bit comes as a comparison written in her fanon section for PofV:

"A lot of fanworks portray Eiki as a bit of a short-tempered grouch who will sentence people to hell for any arbitrary reason, but this conflicts with her personality in Phantasmagoria of Flower View where she's stern, but patient and is constantly smiling even when having to reveal someone's shortcomings. In fact, she spends a lot of time lecturing people on their shortcomings and sins for the sole purpose of getting them to repent before they have to be judged. In her opinion, "Hell does not exist to punish sinners. Hell exists to ensure that no-one sins."

(I am sorry for being a little biased, but I really am a little biased due to the fact she is one of my favorite characters in the series)

 

On 12/28/2022 at 3:35 AM, SoundOfRayne said:

Sure, MoP doesn't bat 1000. There are definitely characters who got the short end of the stick when it came to representation. If you're a fan of any character who shows up before stage 4, you just get to eat whole shit. Except Alice. Alice fans get to eat good. ...Fuck you, Alice fans...

Yeah, the absence of focus on any character below Stage 4 (sans Alice) is quite sad. I wish they distributed better some of the lengthier arcs so that we could actually get some screen-time for these characters instead of just rushing towards the Stage 5 boss most of the time. Instead of bloating the final two stages (and still have pretty much nothing happening on screen), why not distribute the acting a little bit? One of the unique (or maybe not) and strong points of Touhou is the huge and varied cast it has. But I could imagine shows like this one, given the strong impact on fandom, could also negatively help in keeping those early stage characters low in the popularity lists...

 

On 12/28/2022 at 3:35 AM, SoundOfRayne said:

I would say that the big main issue I take with MoP is, as MegaFrog elaborated on, its lack of identity. MoP does do something very fascinating, though. I would say it's a perfect reflection of the inconsistency within the Touhou fandom. MoP wants to be a high-intensity action show that replicates the spectacle of danmaku battles from the games, but it also wants to be a cute, silly little slice-of-life-y show that focuses on these adorable little beans we call characters, but it also also wants to coat the whole thing in raw sex appeal because the fandom sure does like their yuri-bait and tiddies, huh? It's like it's trying to be everyone's Touhou and, well... In all fairness, it did bring everyone together to collectively say, "Not my Touhou."

I am sorry to keep the answer short for this one, but I agree that the lack of a clear direction and overall tone set for a series can end up making the series unappealing to everyone. You just can't make everyone happy, it never works in real life (I know it from personal experience). Trying to appeal to absolutely every splinter opinion group of the Touhou fandom can only end up with everyone not feeling satisfied as they did not get enough of what they really wanted to see? I guess that is why we should have more fan-made anime, to satisfy all the needs. Make a show for a specific target public: a series/animation focusing on the 2hus being adorable little beans, an action series focused on danmaku battles (already covered by minusT), a series coated in raw sex appeal to appease the fandom's need for yuri and tiddies. Or maybe not, that might be a bad idea?

 

On 12/28/2022 at 3:35 AM, SoundOfRayne said:

And as the old saying goes, if you try to please everyone, you'll end up pleasing no one.

Oh, you just perfectly said what I was looking for. Darn... 

 

On 12/28/2022 at 3:35 AM, SoundOfRayne said:

It was kinda hard watching the end of MegaFrog's video, hearing about just how bad MoP's finances are. It's heartbreaking knowing that this massive passion project, given to one of the most ravenous fanbases around, isn't making back any of its money. Like, this is the same fandom that will shell out hundreds of dollars for a fucking felt plushie based off an ages-old fan manga (Seriously, fuck Fumos), but this is where they draw the line? I'm genuinely shocked. I hope for the sake of the people who really believe in Memories of Phantasm that no one ends up breaking themselves over it.

Oh, don't worry, I will cover the topic of Fumo (and overall Fumo craze as I witnessed it since autumn 2021) somewhere early next year, in case I do ont get into any complications with college. It was another thing I was planning to write about since spring, but I guess I just ended up not doing it. But indeed, it is quite heath-throbbing to see the situation of Memories of Phantasm. And the situation I have heard of from China (the problems regarding the circle who made Hifuu Activity Club Record, the Chinese Playboy dude who pumped money into the Chinese Touhou community until the moment he lost all due to "2020 just being 2020" and so on), despite still being confused and not really sure what it was all about leaves me a little bit worried as well.

 

As an end note, I hope you have enjoyed some of the funnier notes I tried to insert into the review, just so it would not be dry. A few jokes here and there, some memes, maybe a light-hearted tone in presenting some of the stuff, the jokes about how the defeated characters' clothes started to resemble a contest who who can become more fanservice-y the longer we advanced through the final couple episodes of the MoF arc (kind of a close competition between Aya, Sanae and Kanako) and a few links here and there (probably one of my favorite inserts was the Komeiji Records song for the moment Okuu was confused about what she had to do - it took her quite a bit to process, to be fair).

Edited December 29, 2022 by CountVonNumenor

[CountVonNumenor]

I would like to thank everyone who has contribute to the thread as of yet. This is still open for discussion, so anyone is welcome to join the talk...

[CountVonNumenor]

Episode has been announced

Again, it has been presented as the series finale. And in a way, I would feel extremely glad if it just ended here. The series has been going for ove a decade now, it was becoming a bloated mess the more it went on. To me, the series felt quite rushed towards the end. Especially when out of 12 minutes of screen time, almost half, if not half of the video is the intro & outro segments, the episode recap and the teaser for "next time". Which leaves you with a bare 6 minutes aft actual show, in which they both need to rush the story and bloat a lot of time on a single boss if they are a Stage 5 character or higher. Also we shall not speak about Mokou's extra story. That was basically an arc within another arc at how long it was (3 episodes).  

But I will let you take a look at the video itself first, then we can come back and debate it. 

[Gri]

Thanks for posting. Here's hoping the finale's decent (my expectation are low for this one)

[Gri]

Just watched it.

I didn't understand the subtitles, but it seems like the finale it going to be a bit bloated. Main plot seems to be that Marisa is going to investigate who did this to Reimu (Remillia seemed to only have provoked Marisa for fun, and Reimu is clearly not dead). During the investigation, the SA and UFO cast is going to be there. 

I am afraid the SA and UFO cast won't get much time to shine, and at this point it would be better to just no include them in the plot at all. Including them will rush the plot, which ain't a good thing.

This is based on the fact this is going to last only 1 episode. If it's a whole "arc", the it may be feasible. Like I said though, not expecting much.

Oh yeah, and let's not forget memories-of-phantasm's signature: hot spring fanservice
 

[CountVonNumenor]

On 4/17/2023 at 3:54 PM, Gri said:

Just watched it.

I didn't understand the subtitles, but it seems like the finale it going to be a bit bloated. Main plot seems to be that Marisa is going to investigate who did this to Reimu (Remillia seemed to only have provoked Marisa for fun, and Reimu is clearly not dead). During the investigation, the SA and UFO cast is going to be there. 

I am afraid the SA and UFO cast won't get much time to shine, and at this point it would be better to just no include them in the plot at all. Including them will rush the plot, which ain't a good thing.

This is based on the fact this is going to last only 1 episode. If it's a whole "arc", the it may be feasible. Like I said though, not expecting much.

Oh yeah, and let's not forget memories-of-phantasm's signature: hot spring fanservice
 

Alright, so just as I watched the promo video. It is 4 minutes long, has no subtitles (thank you, Manpukujinja), first half is just a nostalgia trip through the previous episodes, and HOLY MOTHER OF ALL TITS! ("I swear, the hot springs scene is essential to the plot"). Looking at the comments for the video on YouTube, all I have seen is written in Japanese. But at a quick Google translation (the mobile phone version of YouTube allows for translating comments), it seems like everyone was praising the video. Meanwhile, if word of mouth is true, when the same trailer was uploaded on the official Twitter page of the group, reactions have been a little more mixed, going from the seemingly rushed idea for the plot, to the unnecessary hot springs scene. 

[CountVonNumenor]

An interesting development - not only has Surnist returned to YouTube, but he also blessed us with his own take on a review for Memories of Phantasms:

OH BOY ITS OVER 1 HOUR LONG
Well, this is gonna be an interesting watch for sure, given the video mark points...