Dr. Stone is an interesting series. At times it is creative anime at its best, at times it is cheesy anime tropes at its worst.

And yet what it results in, is a silly fun series that is perfect to chill out and watch and not take seriously. Part 2 of Season 3 carries on the story, and it continues with the usual vibe.

The second half of the Season kicks off with Senku having made a bunch more of his revival fluid from nitric acid. The problem is, they watch as a bunch of their petrified friends get thrown into the sea. They have a very limited number of underwater breathing devices left, and their creator Kaseki is one of those petrified. So the plan kicks off to go and revive him first.

The two that are trying to uncover him realise it is too hard to dig him out of the sand, so they revive Taiju. When Taiju gets revived he realises he is under water. He takes on massive breath from the breathing device and is then able to pull out the petrified Kaseki. It’s so silly, but so fun and really emphasizes the vibes of Dr . Stone that keep carrying on.

Anyway, the series continues on the strange island they found. The Master is still doing his thing of petrifying outsiders. Ginro is still in the strange village’s community where they all have to keep the Master happy. It turns out that Ibara, who was representing the Master, had actually petrified and hidden the Master so he could take over.

That is where I will stop with the spoilers, because it is a super fun half of the season to enjoy headed into what I believe is the final Season.

As always, the animation is solid. The characters do get some more time to shine, and Ryusui continues to shine. Some of the character quirks like Gen using pig latin and the exaggerated ways Senku talks still annoys me at times. But hey, it’s some unique personality I guess? This set also comes with the Dr. Stone: Ryusui special, which really should have come with Part 1 as it is set between Seasons 2 and 3 and introduces Ryusui as a character.

Still, if you are just checking the Season out now I recommend watching that first.

Dr. Stone continues to be a solid and enjoyable anime. It has its average moments, but for the most part it is still a unique and weird world that makes it worth sitting back and enjoying. It has quickly become a chill out Sunday type of series for me, and I can’t wait to enjoy Season 4 on a Sunday soon.

The post Dr. Stone Season 3 Part 2 (Anime) Review appeared first on Shane the Gamer.

Dr. Stone has been an anime series I have enjoyed since the start.

The weird premise, the strange character quirks, and interesting story has made it an essential watch in my house. Well now Season 3, titled New World, has dropped it’s first half on Bluray, and with one obvious omission, it’s started off strong.

If you haven’t checked out Dr. Stone yet. It’s an interesting show. An event happened which turned everyone into stone. Senku is a boy genius that manages to keep his mind by constantly thinking, and then one day he breaks free. The kicker is that well over 3000 years have passed. He discovers that nitric acid can free people from their stoned ways and kicks off building a little society.

Over the seasons he discovers that he isn’t the only one that was freed, but he is consistently the smartest one. After a pretty epic Stone Wars for Season 2, we come to Season 3… Well kind of.

There is a 1 hour OVA that takes place between season 2 and 3. Generally OVA’s are side stories so there is no panic if you haven’t seen one. In the case of Dr. Stone: Ryusui, it is essential watching as it leads directly into the events of Season 3.

That’s cool though, you can just check it out on disc… Damn it wasn’t included in the Bluray.

In short, this 1 hour special involved the science kingdom getting ready to head off overseas to get to the source of the stoning. They are building a fancy pants new ship and released a sailor Ryusu from stone. Ryusu was from a rich background, so quickly built commerce amongst the kingdom to make himself rich in the process. In the process of making new threads for a hot air balloon, clothing gets a nice boost too. The special ends with them looking for an ability to redraw a map to find an old oil field via their hot air balloon.  So now you are kind of caught up.

Anyway, kicking into Season 3 the team is landing back in their hot air balloon.

The plan is coming together for their ship to be successfully built. One thing they realise is that they will need a whole lot of preserved food to survive a sea journey so far. This kicks off with an interesting short side story as they finish their ship and get underway.

This happens surprisingly fast in the season, and we get some new activity as things don’t go exactly how they want on the ship and encounter some other people.  I don’t want to spoil it more than that but it is a pretty damn solid start to the Season and has me itching to see how Season 3 Part 2 goes.

We get some decent character development, but they still have their quirks. Senku saying 10 billion percent still annoys me. Fortunately Ryusu is an interesting new bit of flavour to the team that certainly belongs in the show with his strange way of acting, but is something different. The voice acting and animation is exceptional as always.

On the whole, Dr. Stone – Season 3 Part 1 is a cracking start to what looks like an exciting season. The OVA missing is a minor annoyance, but hopefully it is included in Part 2 or is released as a separate Bluray.  Either way it is well worth checking out if you enjoyed Season 1 and 2.

The post Dr. Stone Season 3 | Part 1 (Anime) Review appeared first on Shane the Gamer.

I really enjoyed the first season of Dr. Stone, and even with his annoying quirks the first season was an interesting premise with some interesting characters.

Well now the stone world is offering up Stone Wars, well the subtitle for the series is anyway, so this should be an amazing season.

If you haven’t seen it, the first series sees a bizarre wave of energy across the world which freezes a lot of living creatures as stone statues.

Senku is a young genius who loves science, and with his big brain, he realises that he still has consciousness in his stone form and does some counting to try to keep himself sane. One day thanks to some mysterious liquid falling on him he breaks out of his stone prison.

He then proceeds to bring back a couple of people, and one of the first people he brings back is a physically very strong young man called Tsukasa.

Tsukasa then proceeds to realise that instead of bringing everyone back, they should bring back specific people to ensure they don’t just recreate the flaws of the past. Tsukasa gets his statue smashing on, while Senku and his friends try to stop it, and before they know it the few surviving people are at war. Ensue some chaos, and we get to Season 2, Stone Wars.

Now based on that subtitle I was expecting some truly crazy battles as the wars kicked off. If you are expecting that then temper your expectations. The vast majority of the season is what we have come to know from it, Senku inventing stuff with current knowledge of the world and technology but with primitive tools to work with.  Eventually there is a short but relatively big battle.

The first thing Senku kicks off inventing is ramen.

This is framed as the ability to preserve food for the battle ahead against Tsukasa, but ramen becomes a bit of a gag throughout, as people absolutely love it.  The Kingdom of Science continues advancing its technology as the Empire of Might strengthens their brawn.

We get heaps of new characters here, and the variety is much needed. Some get a bit, well anime-ey at times, but I mean it is an anime. With the different characters and personalities, they manage to make some really interesting conflicts which throw the story you expect out a bit at times which is much needed.

In short, if you liked Season 1, then Season 2 is a continuation of that same style.

It improves in many ways, and is about half the length. If you hated things like Senku saying 10 billion percent all the bloody time, well he is just as annoying with that here. The animation and voice acting continues to shine with the series really helping make some of the more annoying moments much more bearable.

The Bluray comes with a special feature where some of the voice cast sample some mystery ramen as they answer some fan questions.

It is silly but fits in with the series, and I enjoyed it.

The Limited Edition comes with a great little Senku phone charm, a periodic table poster, and some tin badges, one for the Empire of Might and one for the Kingdom of Science. So very on theme. It also comes in a tidy box with a very good little art book.

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