I believe that part of the catalog is still free with ads, but most recent stuff is not. They've changed their policies a few times, and I haven't kept up with the details.

Sony owns both now, but Crunchyroll was purchased from AT&T in 2021. Sony purchased Funimation in 2017. So while it is perhaps not 100% accurate to say that Funimation itself did the purchasing of Crunchyroll, the company that owned Funimation did.

Edit: it is also worth mentioning that after the acquisition there was an immediate decrease in new content added to Funimation, and within a couple seasons there was virtually none, as customers were being pushed to the Crunchyroll app. Many, but not all, Funimation shows were also copied to Crunchyroll, but none the other way.

A clarification that really only makes this worse: Crunchyroll did not acquire Funimation. Funimation acquired Crunchyroll, and decided to use the Crunchyroll name instead. They have had every opportunity since the merger to support people's purchases, but have chosen not to.

A 15 year old, to be precise.

This is an easy one for me, Tales of Berseria. No character gets ignored by the narrative, or peaks in their introductory arc. The characters also build personal relationships with each other that don't depend on the protagonist, and aren't just one-offs or side content. I would recommend it to anyone, doubly so if they're a fan of the "dysfunctional band of misfits" setup.

Due to the nature of how translation works, interpretation will always be inherent to it, especially when we can't ask the original author for clarification. As for the church wanting the faithful to know more about demons, you could argue that is why they borrowed so much demonology from other sources. As for why it wasn't included in the Bible itself, any answer will have to be heavily seasoned with speculation. It is important to remember, however, that the New Testament was not intended as a "how to get to heaven" or "how to avoid hell" guide. It was intended as telling the story of why you get to go to heaven in the first place (the Gospels) and letters discussing how to live faithfully. Plus Revelation.

Off the top of my head, the Bible really says surprisingly little about demons, and various translations will say even less (depending on if the translator thinks an evil spirit=demon or not). Generally, the possessed act either mentally or physically ill, or they get scared of Jesus. Beelzebub is the prince of demons, but that's about all we know from accepted scripture. Most "Christian" demonology stems from writings that didn't make the final cut for the Bible, mythology borrowed from other cultures/religion, bored/crazy monks in a position to write things down, and particularly influential works that never claimed to be anything but fiction (namely Dante's Inferno).

The thing to remember is that there is no "easily" when it comes to building thousands of miles of HSR. Even leaving out the mountains, bridges can be extremely expensive too, and the Midwest has no shortage of waterways. And that's not even accounting for that even by optimistic estimates you'd be spending the same amount as that airport terminal every few miles, or the fact that you'd have to replace the tracks (cheaper than building them the first time, but still not cheap) every ten years. This is not to say that trains wouldn't be a better solution environmentally in the longer term (though it would take decades to get it remotely usable), but you'd have to be king to push it through because few people want to pay that much for something they wouldn't use very often.

Many words could be used to describe Eiko, but the top one to me at this point is "sus".

I also agree, especially as we enter a new season and people are trying to figure out what to watch.

Thank you for the link. To be clear to anyone too lazy to click (which you should do to verify anyway) this is a source that confirms that businesses don't get to claim your donation as their own.

They do not, at least in the US.

That's not how it works, at least in the US. You are donating as yourself, and can use the donation as a tax write off if you would like.

What a great surprise this season, and I'm looking forward to season 2.

I've said it before, but Kana is the ultimate sibling between the harassment, embarrassing herself and her brother both actively and passively, and how she looks out for her little brother, it's just so much fun to watch.

As a side note, if you're reading this OP, thank you for including the episode title in the post. I wish more people would do this.