This season had a rough start. The visuals were absolutely fantastic. There’s no doubt about that. But of all the 150 episodes I’ve watched. The first ten episodes of this were the worst. They honestly felt disappointing. It feels even weird to tell that. I mean, we’re talking about Gintama here. How CAN it be bad? They were wayy too fast-paced for my liking. It was as if the story didn’t know what to do, so it just ran as fast as it could. Most of the jokes went right over my head.
The main issue was that they sucked at buildup. Because the buildup sucked, the payoffs didn’t work either. The payoffs themselves weren’t bad. They were as Gintama as ever. But everything leading up to them was so so bad.
There were even a couple of episodes where it felt as if Gintama’s charm had been broken. But it didn’t take long for the show to pick itself back up. In the end, it took around 20 eps for the show to grow on me.
Sometimes you just gotta appreciate how much work has been put into Gintama. In Gintoki’s scandal arc, the staff literally remade a whole scene in the OP to reflect a single 2ep arc. That’s so much work for just two freaking episodes. The changes weren’t even obvious. Anyone who didn’t pay attention would easily miss it. I’m referring to Hasegawa’s appearance on the OP because he’s one of Gintoki’s supposed partners on his night out drinking. Small details like this just make me love the show even more.
There are certainly some things different from the first season but they didn’t veer too much off of the essence of Gintama. I’m more than three months in and I still love everything about this show.
Oh, and how could I forget… Jugem Jugem Shit-Tossing of Shin-chan’s Two-Day-Old Underwear of Shinpachi’s Life Balmung Fezalion Issac Schneider 1/3 Pure Love 2/3 Hangnail Anxiety Betrayal Knows My Name Or Does It Really Ignore Calls Squid Dogfish Halibut Trout-Cod Dogfish… This Is A Different Dogfish, I’m Talking About The Dogfish Shark Kaluga Angler Ray Yuuteimiyaoukimukou Pepepepepepepepepepepepe Runny Diarrhea.