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Overall: 7.5/10

If you haven't seen the oft-compared LoGH (Legend of the Galactic Heroes) yet but intend to, and aren't sure which to watch first, I'd say Tytania is best to start with. Personally, having seen and loved LoGH beforehand, I came to Tytania in hopes of a similar show that I could enjoy. To that end, Tytania was a letdown. LoGH will make it harder to appreciate Tytania for what it is.

...And what Tytania is is a reasonably solid show, with a few notable shortcomings. I can't laud it with praise, nor can I pick it apart with criticism. It is reasonably well-made when the average quality of anime is kept in mind, even if some of the care and attention to detail we saw in LoGH was completely missing.

The first problem with Tytania is its cast of mannequins. Not only is the character development flimsy and lacking, the manner of the characters often felt cheap and one-dimensional. Nobody was terribly interesting nor seemed to have any deep humanity about them. Ironically, the most well-developed characters seemed to hold either unlikeable or unimportant roles.

There's also the trouble of realism. A lot of the things that happened in Tytania didn't make a whole lot of sense... such as a person dying from spending a couple minutes underwater (When there was no need to be there in the first place), or an unarmed man beating up hordes of men who had large guns (But didn't seem to think it appropriate to try using them). It felt that a lot of times, in terms of plot changes, the ends justified the means, even if the means made no sense at all. This contributed, along with the character problems, to the constant feeling that this story was within the world of anime; it could never transition into the real world, because things wouldn't happen this way in the real world.

My last issue with Tytania is that I feel it was poorly translated into anime form. As the original story comes from a series of novels which is still ongoing, conversion into a stand-alone story is not an altogether straightforward process. It takes some creativity to do it well. Unfortunately, I don't believe it was done well, and Tytania ended up feeling incomplete. There wasn't even a real attempt to wrap up the story. I imagine if there were another season or two to work with, it could become something of a more satisfying story; though I don't think another season is coming judging by the reception of the first.

If you're anything like me, you'll get through this show, and you may even enjoy it here and there if you can avoid being too critical. The story was there, it was just poorly realized. read more

Originally for me, Mouryou no Hako started off somewhat inconspicuous, seeming to be another average, maybe somewhat memorable show. I was certainly wrong for thinking that.

And possibly a quick warning for some out there.. one of the reasons I found this show refreshing was because it was intelligent. It was well-done. You had to use your brain a bit to understand it, even if you had subtitles. If I can put it into words, this series is like Death note, but is actually made for an intelligent audience. You don't actually know what's going to happen next in this show. When I make this comparison, I'm not trying to insult Death Note, but the styles are simply different. Mouryou no Hako is all about substance and less about flare, a refreshing and seemingly rare quality in newer anime.

There was a surprisingly deep amount of character development done in just 13 episodes. The pacing was skillfully done and made the conclusion all the more interesting, and depending on preference, satisfying.

The art was also superb. The sort of soft palette for normal scenes, combined with the brilliantly colorful animations used to portray other, somewhat abstract concepts, was very pleasing on the eyes. Some shows such as ef - A tale of memories are praised for their art, and I would say that Mouryou no Hako tops that standard.

All in all, this show was an interesting, "What will happen next?" sort of experience. It's not for some people, as it can get slightly gory at times, and is certainly a very dialogue-rich anime... but I would definitely recommend Mouryou no Hako as one of the best of 2008. read more

Texhnolyze was an interesting ride. In Lukuss, the underground town that the show mostly focuses on, the utter chaos of the city creates a physically and psychologically challenging environment for the characters.

Firstly, I'd have to say that this show is probably not for younger kids. It has nudity, gore, and all other sorts of fun things, such as homosexual incest (However, I find that in spite of this, it is not filled with service, with maybe one or two occasions at most being able to be defined as such). Some people may find that because of this alone, they prefer to give this show a pass. I would recommend doing so, because it wouldn't be right to judge the show on that count alone. Many of us have come to expect this from Madhouse by now though, and if you don't mind it, I think there are plenty of things that make this show worth watching.

At the beginning of Texhnolyze, one could easily become confused as to what exactly the viewing experience is going to shape up to be like. There is no dialogue for a large portion of the first episode. However, the dark palette and the grungy sounds and music set the environment well, portraying the fact that Lukuss is a town in despair, even if they don't realize it.

The characters are a good example of why this show was enjoyable, and that's because they are imperfect. They are human. There is a broad range of personalities in Texhnolyze, and each one of them truly does feel unique... they act on their desires and follies, and it all melds together to form a truly interesting experience. The sort of melancholy mood that develops by the end of the show is similar to what one might have found themselves feeling while watching the later episodes of Evangelion.

In the end, I think that while this series is not the best out there, it doesn't have to be. For a title that is as of yet not very well known, Texhnolyze delivers an enjoyable and thought-provoking viewing experience comparable to that of any mainstream anime of the same genre.
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Bizarre.. filled with gratuitous nudity (Honestly, how many times do you need to draw a nude 14 year old to tell a 6 chapter story?), creepy people who look creepy, things that just don't make sense, yep... it's a horror manga.

I'm not railing at it from an "ethical" standpoint, but I believe that in such a short retelling of the movie of the same name, the last thing Suicide Circle needs is service or filler.

Not surprisingly, at the end of the manga, we learn that it was created within a month.

The story is just awful and incoherent, in the same grain as some no-name Japanese horror flick that got imported to American DVD and later was played back on the Sci-Fi Channel.

As far as the art goes, it's well done. The art does a good job of portraying the intended morbid tone of the manga, and is probably the only reason I would recommend reading it in the first place.

The characters are relatively boring and stereotypical, with maybe the slight exception of the protagonist.

In short, just go watch the movie. It's hardly a masterpiece, but it's much better than this manga. read more

The Prince of Tennis, or テニスの王子様, is very highly rated here at MAL. It's rated so highly, in fact, that I hope to bring a bit of a fresh perspective in the midst of reviews that seem to be simply singing its praises.

Story: 5
There's really nothing exceptional to be found here. The show follows youngsters of the Japanese tennis world, specifically those of Seishun Gakuen middle school, the "Prince of Tennis" being Echizen Ryoma, a freshmen. Sure, it was a bold move in 2001 to make an anime about tennis, which is not exactly the biggest thing in Japan, but just that fact alone does not guarantee much of a show. The plot is generic, relatively predictable, and most importantly: too long. A normal one or two season show will use a three episode time-frame to put out many new plot developments and possibly character introductions, while The Prince of Tennis would use 3 episodes for a single match. This show, even though it is supposed to be about a sport, suffers from the "power spiral" complex. They label characters as a certain strength and then have them perform completely different come game time. The other real problem I had with this show is the heavily overused surprise comeback. Sure, if a match is one-sided, there's no suspense; but when an unbelievable comeback is happening almost every match, it just gets annoying and tedious. I might have seen the story in a better light if this series was closer to 30-50 episodes (And it easily could have been). At any rate, the pitfalls of this show are typical of a long shounen anime. It's hard to write an excellent story that lasts and stays engaging for almost 200 episodes.. although Prince of Tennis didn't have the change of scenery that tends to help similar shows stay refreshing. It's just 50+ hours of the tennis court. You could watch over 20 movies in that time.

Art: 7
I don't have any real complaints here. The art is far from spectacular, but there's nothing particularly wrong with it.

Sound: 7
The same could be said for the sound as the art. The voice acting was pretty typical, the music was fine.

Character: 7
The characters in Prince of Tennis were many, all of them with their own backgrounds and styles. I felt that there was almost too much character development here, because with every new character came a story that contributed to making this show too long.

Enjoyment: 3
I really don't understand how people could find much of an enjoyment factor in Prince of Tennis. Every ~10 episodes is basically a copy of the last ~10 episodes, but in a new tournament against a new school. It gets extremely repetitive, and I found myself skimming through the matches later in the series, eventually dropping it at episode 162. There are a lot of special moves that are used to spice up the matches; but they're just ridiculously unrealistic and don't really serve the purpose of making things interesting. The use of injury to create drama gets old, as if they're trying to pass tennis off as a contact sport.

In the end, I can't see myself giving this show anything higher than a 5. I recommend watching the first set of matches, and then dropping the show, because there's not really anything new to see after that point. For a show given such a high rating, it really was a disappointment. read more

I watched this series directly following the first series (and assuming the reader of this review has watched the first one as well), so this will be a bit of a comparison between the two.

Firstly, I have to say, that this series was a let down when compared with the original. There are a couple major reasons for this, which are as follows:

1: The story. The story this time around was really unattractive for me. It didn't HAVE to be bad, but I really think it was poorly executed. I should say that the earlier half, story-wise, was going in a good direction. Ken reappeared when everyone thought he was a fallen hero, and Lynn and Bart had grown up and attempted to carry on his legacy. If that had been the major plot piece, I would have liked this series a lot better. However, just as soon as a small climax comes, the story swerves off in a different direction... the island of the Shura, where Ken follows Lynn and discovers the roots of his Hokuto Shinken. The problem with this was not inherently what it was -- but how long it lasted. Traditionally in the first series, you could expect a series of mini-plots that are interconnected to Ken's quest. This Shura plot became the major focus of the series, trading out old characters for new and unacquainted ones. Bart was absent for the bulk of the episodes, only focusing on Lynn and Ken. The new characters on the Shura island bore a striking and boring resemblance to the pre-existing characters of Toki and Raoh.. in fact, you could venture to say that the Kaioh story was just a creative retelling of the Raoh story. There's more I could say but quite simply, the story was a letdown, and at the least, this series could have easily been compacted to 26 episodes without losing any significant detail.

2: Originally, the Hokuto No ken series was about martial arts that actually kind of resembled real-world martial arts. Sure, people blowing up with a touch of the finger is hyperbole, but it's not the same thing as people flying and shooting beams from their hands. Sadly, this second series veered from the martial-arts feel and turned into more of a dragonball-z-style fight setting, with weird energy beams and whatnot often being used to fight. The problem of the "power spiral" was also present, where the strength of the characters begins to make no sense and not logically follow itself. A character who fights evenly with Ken in the earlier episodes has difficulties against a weakling on the Shura island. The Shura island itself was originally made out to be a super-dangerous place full of very powerful fighters.. and yet, the typical Shura fighters ended up predictably pathetic and powerless before the main characters.

All in all, this show was really quite bittersweet.. and it certainly didn't live up to the quality of the first one. The art was wonderful as ever, and there was nothing bad about the sound, but the real problem here was the plot and setting. read more

I'd like to keep my review for this one short and sweet, and summed up -

It just takes itself too seriously. Bleach doesn't need to get into pop psychology, people watch it for fights including shiny balls of reiatsu. This movie suffers, like the series, from the constant, unrealistic emotional problems facing the characters, portraying a very plain and cliche message of "you can count on your friends".

The story was nothing special. The art was, for a movie, quite unimpressive (Not really any better than the normal series). Sound was decent.

All in all this just felt like any average arc in the bleach series. Problem arises, solution comes in the form of Ichigo yelling emotionally and swinging his sword around. If you're into that, then by all means, give this movie a watch. read more