zetsubou_panda's Blog

Well, it's that strange time of year again, where time, which had previously felt like it was moving just as fast as an uninspired and very lazy cow, suddenly avalanches with breathtaking speed after Halloween. Little by little, my friends stop talking to me as much, and my days are becoming more and more lonely. You know what that means, right? Time to convert to anti-social mode, where I sit like a true hikikomori in front of the computer all day.

Given my own resources, this would probably not last very long. After finishing ZSZS and K-ON, I would have probably have lost interest of computer-sitting very quickly, and this would have been a short venture indeed.

However, due to an awesome friend, I now have enough anime to last me at least several weeks thin-slicing and marathoning anime. It's probably rather late to catch up on series that originally aired about... oh, 10 seasons ago, but hey, better late than never, right?

Oh, my, Japan... what are you thinking?

http://www.reuters.com/article/lifestyleMolt/idUSTRE52B4JC20090312?pageNumber=1&virtualBrandChannel=0

"Japan picks 'schoolgirl' among cute ambassadors" By Isabel Reynolds

"... In a bid to raise its international profile, Tokyo has appointed three young women as cultural envoys because they represent Japan's long-running craze for all things cute. "

Check out this entertaining comic that someone from deviantArt has drawn in response to this news: http://chancake.deviantart.com/art/APH-Japan-s-SOFT-POWER-115948935

yes, I have a depressing backlog list of manga that I want to read the latest volumes of (and in some cases, not so recently released volumes)... and as per usual, I am broke.

Manga that I want to read the next volumes of:

Honey and Clover
D.Gray-man
Fruits Basket
Gentleman's Alliance
DN angel
Chobits (lol)
Yotsubato
xxxHolic
The Wallflower

Then there's manga volumes that I want to buy because they were so awesome! T^T

Honey and Clover #2 & 3
D.Grayman #2-4
Yotsubato #2 &3
Azumanga #1
Pita ten #1-3, 5
Crimson hero #3-??

...and probably more that I can't remember at the moment >_<;

Compiling my lists of anime and manga made me think more than ever about awesome manga series that just fail as anime (IMHO). Among the biggest disappointments have been, in no particular order:

~D.Gray-man (that had HUGE potential! T_T)
~Honey and Clover (the theme song is a big turn-off and doesn't help anything)
~The Wallflower (anime=".. no, just no.")
~Magic Knight Rayearth (anime=ick)
~Kare Kano (the series ended at such an odd place...)
~Fruits Basket (...where's season 2??)
~Ouran High School Host Club (same reason as Fruits Basket... where's season 2???)
~Chobits (multiple flashback episodes=epic phail)

So, that being said, I'd also like to take this chance to voice my hopes for several manga series that I would like to be seen as awesome anime series:

~Yotsubato
~Kobato (coming out soon!)
~Crimson Hero (it doesn't exist yet... right?..)