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ONE PIECE fans around the world can finally close the book on Eiichiro Oda's 1155-episode first season, with the Elbaph arc kicking off season 2 in April 2026! Okay, people who actually watch this anime know we're on season 21, but it's a funny meme. Alex once again assembles panelists Ayana, Katy, Lony, and Owen to discuss the episodes that aired in 2025 and bounce ideas around some reasonably important stuff like the Knights of God, Scopper Gaban, Imu using the Domi Reversi, and more. We love to see Luffy succeed via the power of friendship, we must deconstruct the God Valley flashback, and we can't finish a ONE PIECE episode on the couch without a couple of theories to cap off the session. Perhaps Iris, Marcus, and Michael might finally have their chance to join in on the fun with the upcoming The One Piece Remake coming to Netflix at the end of this year. Content warning: SPOILERS, strong language.

The film that heralded the end of Disney's 2D-animated era, 2009's The Princess and the Frog came as a last hurrah after Disney's foray into Chicken Little, then was followed immediately by Tangled...so where does it stand amongst the Disney greats? Its animation and soulful soundtrack certainly elevate it to that illustrious Disney standard, and Marcus can't get through this episode without gassing up Keith David, not to mention that we get a lovely picture of 1920s New Orleans life and culture...which in turn starts to get a little problematic once you remember the kind of social structure that was around in 1920s New Orleans. Indeed, in addition to some minor pacing issues and the weird look for frog Naveen and frog Tiana, it feels like Disney's hard attempt at being colorblind and refusal to address the social rift between Tiana and Lottie actually makes the film's narrative worse, especially for Tiana's character arc through the film. It's another week with another pseudo-Writer's Desk panel in the back half of the episode, so you know it's another certified banger. Content warning: SPOILERS, strong language.

Alex is thoroughly out-weebed on this week's episode of Best Seat on the Couch, as Marcus, hot on the heels of Love, Death & Robots and Transformers One, arises with a multi-month saga planned around the universe of Mobile Suit Gundam, beginning with 2022's The Witch from Mercury. Longtime Gundam fans may find this choice of a beginner's series questionable, but the show is simultaneously a good primer for some of Gundam's most important thematic tenets while also being a fresh take on the formula (a female protagonist!) wrapped up in all of the bells and whistles of high-quality animation, a great soundtrack, and some sick sound design. Join us as we talk about our favorite characters, character arcs, confusing government bodies, and depressing moments, and stick with us as Marcus takes the gang on a genuinely painful Trivia Corner not at all created in retaliation against Alex's Digimon Trivia Corner. Content warning: SPOILERS, strong language.

Happy New Year and welcome back to Best Seat on 2026's Couch! Our first episode of the new year calls back to our 99th episode on Toy Story, as Lightyear takes the mythos of Toy Story's Buzz Lightyear character and creates a whole narrative and backstory to him that, apparently, in-universe inspires Andy to buy the Buzz Lightyear toy — fancy that. The film itself stars Chris Evans as a much more Captain America-esque Buzz Lightyear, plenty of time travel, legitimately gorgeous animation and cinematography, and one (two?) particularly funny cat robots, and yet perhaps the most question asked in this episode is: what are the actual implications of this film existing within the Toy Story universe? Join us as we discuss the nice little character moments Buzz has during his hero's journey, Marcus's favorite character and moment 1 hour into the episode, and the film's THREE mid-/after-credit scenes. Content warning: SPOILERS, strong language.

After a brief holiday hiatus, the gang is back to the recording studio with another anime about high school girls doing...things! Like our episodes on Yuru Camp and Bocchi the Rock! in years past, this slice-of-life series released in 2017 appears often on top anime lists and provides a genuinely sweet and enjoyable story hidden behind its unassuming appearance. We get travel montages! Antarctica! Penguins! Inter-friend-group squabbling! The friends we made along the way! And a pretty baller emotional catharsis scene in the penultimate episode to cap it all off. Plus, stick around for another Trivia Corner hosted by dual-threat weeb and biology aficionado Alex, and learn more about the continent that almost nobody knows anything about. Content warning: SPOILERS, strong language.

'Tis the season for sequel films here on the Couch, and coming off of our discussion of Moana not too long ago, we've got the perfect perspective on its totally-not-planned-to-be-a-TV-series-originally-but-was-then-haphazardly-converted-into-a-feature-film sequel, 2024's Moana 2. It's a tall ask to follow up a film like Moana and while the gang agrees that the story and narrative feel pretty fresh as far as sequels go, there are a few...other issues...with this film that do elicit feelings of "soulless cash grab" in certain moments. A great metric on judging a film's writing quality is how many mini-Writer's Desk segments we can cram into the episode to see just how much more this film could have been compared to what we got. Content warning: SPOILERS, strong language.

Within the Transformers sphere, the last couple of decades have been owned by Michael Bay's live-action series of Transformers films which are certainly...films. But we don't talk about live-action films on this podcast! Instead, we're talking about 2024's Transformers One, a film that harks back to the G1 days from the 80's and soft reboots the franchise on the silver screen. It's got a star-studded voice cast led by Chris Hemsworth and Brian Tyree Henry, absolutely gorgeous animation, some fun sequences that make you go "damn that was cool!", and a genuinely interesting take on the relationship between the bots that eventually become Optimus Prime and Megatron. It is pretty clearly a kids' movie, and there probably is such a thing as too much Keegan-Michael Key, but as far as the emotional notes and story beats go, we think this movie does a pretty bang-up job. Content warning: SPOILERS, strong language.

You'd have to go aaaalllll the way back to Episode 8 of Best Seat on the Couch to catch our thoughts on Disney/Pixar's animated 2004 blockbuster The Incredibles, and after 14 long years of development, the sequel ended up being a commercial and critical success...but did it impress the four of us? Incredibles 2 ends up still being a pretty excellent and entertaining watch, but there are aspects of its story and its villain that feel recycled a bit, and for a film that rides on the success of its predecessor, it fails to iterate much on that success to put out a sequel that's worth the Incredibles name. Tune in to our discussion on The Screenslaver, Evelyn Deavor (heh), Bob being a stay-at-home-dad, and just how crazy the animated hair is in this film. Content warning: SPOILERS, strong language.

Two and a Half Asians returns to the Couch this week to talk about the legend Jackie Chan, the man who brought the Hong Kong action movie to Hollywood while also infusing a level of comedy yet unseen within that genre. This 2000-2005 childhood animated series pays homage to that style of film while adding excellent characters, well-choreographed action scenes, and a unique mystical element to the mythos of this fictional version of Jackie Chan. While it is firmly a Saturday Morning Cartoon™ and does share some of the same issues as Digimon, and while Alex and Marcus are keenly aware of how rose-tinted their glasses are, at some point you have accept that this love letter of a show deserves its flowers. Content warning: strong language, Yu Mo Gui Gwai Fai Di Zao.

Maybe it's surprising that Moana hasn't popped up on the Couch until now, especially considering we've already talked about the more recent Encanto, but the gang agrees that it's a great way to kick off our post-200 slate of episodes with gorgeous and cutting-edge animation, excellent dual protagonists, a penchant for the mythology of the Pacific Islands, and Lin Manuel Miranda's well-crafted post-Hamilton soundtrack. Perhaps the fact that we've already discussed progenitor Frozen and successor Encanto gives us a bit more perspective on this film, letting us compare the songs and the narrative strengths of these "movie-musicals"—and, perhaps, the weakness of two of its primary antagonists. Content warning: SPOILERS, strong language.

Nearly 3 years after recording our milestone 100th episode of Best Seat on the Couch, the gang returns for another round of patting ourselves on the back and laughing at our objectively hilarious jokes with another 100 episodes in the rear-view mirror. This second centennial caps off a much more streamlined podcast than our first, and the four of us agree that we've collectively leveled up our discussions, our analysis, and even our speaking skills as we've fully hit our stride in the podcasting space. Join us as we talk about some of our biggest hits (and maybe a few stinkers) over these past 100 episodes, like our multi-month sagas on JoJo's Bizarre Adventure and Attack on Titan, excellent singletons like Blue Eye Samurai and Scavenger's Reign, and some memorable standout recordings like Robots and the finale of Arcane. To finish off this momentous achievement, Alex reprises the Anniversary Trivia Corner with another set of questions that really test just how much we remember about this journey we've been on together. Content warning: strong language, unabashed self-indulgence. For those of you who are still with us 200 episodes later, thank you thank you THANK YOU for being there with us and pretending that you might find us just a little bit enjoyable to listen to. We hope that you have enjoyed listening to our stupid jokes and hot takes half as much as we've enjoyed recording them, and if it wouldn't be too much to ask, we hope you'll still be here when episode 300 comes around.

At long last, the gang arrives in the current day with 2025's fourth and most recent season of Love, Death & Robots ❤️❌🤖, and y'know, maybe it's gonna be the last one. After Marcus's near transcendent experience with season 3's finale Jibaro, for Tim Miller to immediately follow that up with Can't Stop...let me say this: at the very least, we're able to find 4 separate episodes to talk about as unique favorites in this 10-episode season. And the gang does have some fun picking apart the weaker episodes, pointedly noting that we've got a lot of cats and a healthy serving of Christianity in this season as well. The gang will wait with bated breath to see if a season 5 is on the horizon, and if not, then at least there's Secret Level season 2 to look forward to. Right? Content warning: SPOILERS, strong language.

In this episode, the gang (who collectively doesn't listen to k-pop) attempts to understand the nuances of ~i d o l c u l t u r e~ as we tackle 2025's KPop Demon Hunters, from the same Sony Animation Studios that brought us the Spider-Verse series and The Mitchells vs. the Machines. Perhaps the most notable aspect of this film is the music, which is currently charting over actual albums from actual musicians (not to say that TWICE ain't a real musical group), and with a number of us being music theory nerds we get deep in the nitty-gritty of just how well this film/musical comes together. It's a fun film that isn't perfect but very effectively earworms its way into the audience's heads, and I'm sure we can all agree: this is what cinema sounds like. Content warning: SPOILERS, strong language.

As far as slice-of-life animes go, Frieren completely shatters the mold with a brand new premise in the fantasy-DnD-adjacent genre and a level of quality (in terms of adapting a manga) that really hasn't been matched before or since its 2023 release. With the eponymous main character experiencing the passage of time so differently than the peers of her past and of the present, it's incredible how well this show treats flashback scenes, the passage of time within the world and its evolution, and the effect of the past affecting characters in the present. It's also gorgeously animated, has a charming soundtrack, and presents its narrative at an unusually relaxing pace, even during scenes where magic is flying across the screen. One thing we can all agree on—this is a one of a kind show that cannot be missed. Content warning: SPOILERS, strong language.

Nestled at the tail end of the legendary series of films within the Disney Renaissance, Hercules is both a musical fantasy reimagining and kid-friendly family film that paints the traditional story of Heracles from Greek mythology in a brand new light. It's a bold film that cashes in on some of its bold choices (the Muses are such an excellent edition both tonally and musically) but perhaps encounters missteps on other choices (Zeus is decidedly not a standup dad). And we can't have a discussion about this film without absolutely gassing up James Woods' portrayal of Hades and a couple of excellent songs that have stood the test of time nearly three decades later. Plus, Iris brings a long overdue Trivia Corner that really tests the gang's knowledge (and Marcus' faith in himself) on Greek mythology. Content warning: SPOILERS, strong language.