| Finished only one anime series and one manga series. Working'!! - A continuation of the original Working!! franchise. Or as Souta-kun stated in the very first episode, the craziness of the woman are in direct proportion to their height. Suugaku Girl - This is the first of a series of mathematics themed mangas. The main audience of this series is suppose to be girls. Why? The main character is a female that loves math and is quite adept at it. In fact, all three of the main characters are connected to each other because of this. It's done very well without getting all mathy for the ready. Since I have a degree in math, I actually learned something. Sadly the second series hasn't been scanlated yet and the third was started. The LN have been done up to the 5th novel. I would recommend this for anyone, well anyone, especially with girls with a stronger lead female. |
| What if the Hokey Pokey is what it is all about? |
| I've been watching a few interesting oldies: Firebird 2772: Cosmos Zone of Love – This 1980 movie is from Osamu Tezuka, creator of Astro Boy and considered the "Godfather of Anime" In the distant future, children are born in test tubes and are raised by computers and robots. The child Godo learns the skills that will make him into a great pilot. Along with his robot companion Olga, he is commanded to capture the powerful space creature, Phoenix 2772, to be used by the Earth Government to create unlimited energy. An Anime Classic. One-Million Year Trip: Bander Book – This 1978 movie is another Anime Classic by the "Godfather of Anime", Osamu Tezuka. This is a wild and creative one with lots of amazing creatures that look like they were created by Dr. Suess. The Star of Cottonland – This 1984 G rated movie is for children and adults who love cats. After two-month-old kitten Chibi-neko is abandoned by her former owners, she is found,near death, by 18-year-old Tokio. Although his mother is allergic to cats and has a great fear of them, she agrees to let him keep the kitten because she fears he is becoming too withdrawn after failing his university entrance exams. Chibi-neko believes Humans were born as cats and change into humans and she desperately wants to become human also. One of the things that make this anime special is that Chibi-neko is portrayed as a cute little girl even though the humans see her as a cat. An elegant stray cat tells Chibi-neko of a paradise called Cottonland, where dreams can come true and she leaves home to find this land. As childish as this may sound, The Star of Cottonland is a heartwarming and beautiful movie for young and old. A Tree of Palme – This 2003 movie is a surreal revisioning of Pinocchio. Palme is a puppet created by a man to care for his sickly wife. After her death Palme becomes paralyzed with sorrow, that is, until a woman being pursed happens to cross paths with Palme and his creator and ask them to deliver something precious to a sacred place called Tama. Palme goes on a fantastic journey where he hopes to become human. This beautiful movie was either loved or hated for it’s complicated and confusing plot and surreal imagery, but I enjoyed it very much. I watched a poor quality version online but ordered a used copy from Amazon for my collection. |
JymSep 21, 2015 7:57 AM
| Lots to catch up on since my last post, so I'll have to do this in two or three parts, I think: Air The plot in one sentence: A man comes to a coastal town and befriends three girls, one of whom is involved in a mystery that goes back a thousand years. My thoughts: Air has some major problems with its story structure. The three main girls’ stories aren’t woven together well at all, and the pacing is terrible - after strolling leisurely through most of the series it suddenly tries to pack way too much plot in at the very end. I’m sure a lot of that comes from cramming a 30-hour VN into a 12-episode series. Yet despite its significant problems, Air still works, because it succeeds in making you care about its characters, and because once you strip away the chaff, the core story is a very good one. Oh, and the opening song is still just as fabulous as ever. Score: 5/10. If you're a KyoAni fan or a Jun Maeda fan looking for another series to watch, and you haven't already seen Air yet, then by all means go ahead - it's good enough to be worth seeing once. For everyone else, there are much better options out there if you're just looking for a sad anime - starting with KyoAni and Maeda's other two collaborations (Kanon and Clannad). Love Live Season 2 The plot in one sentence: μ's takes another crack at entering the Love Live idol competition, while also trying to reconcile the fact that three of their members are graduating soon. My thoughts: I thought season 2 was slightly stronger than season 1, only because forced drama was season 1's biggest weakness, and I thought the drama flowed much more naturally from the story in this season. Comedy and music are still the show's main strengths, though, and LL fans won't be disappointed with either of those. Score: 7/10. Basically, if you liked season 1, then you'll like season 2. Love Live Movie The plot in one sentence: The original cast of the series takes its final bow with one last adventure. My thoughts: And I enjoyed the movie even more than both seasons of the TV series. Score: 8/10. Despite some odd decisions with regards to the story (I still don't get why they had to go to New York to promote a Japanese concert event), the movie is a ton of fun and most Love Live fans should be happy with it. It's fanservice, but in the best way possible. Sakura Wars (TV) The plot in one sentence: A group of young women perform in a musical theater troupe by day, and work as mech pilots protecting Tokyo from a demon invasion by night. My thoughts: A solid mid-tier series from the year 2000. It's adapted from a series of video games (though only the fifth one was ever released outside Japan), and while being familiar with the games isn't 100% necessary to get what's going on, it does help quite a lot. I think most of the appeal of this show is going to be to people like me who've played one or more of the games before, but if you're into mecha, alternate history, or steampunk, you may find something to like here too, as the show is set in a steampunk version of 1920s Tokyo. It's no masterpiece, but it definitely entertained me, which was all I wanted from it. Score: 6/10. I'd say stream it if you're going to watch it, but AFAIK the only site streaming it legally right now is the Anime Network, and they only have the English dub, which is frankly one of the worst dubs I've heard in a very long time. |
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| Kämpfer I decided to watch it based on short clip from youtube (as I learned later the clip was from sequel :-)). Senou Natsuru is a high-school boy who one day wake ups in female form. If it wasn't weird enough, a stuffed animal tells him, that now he is a Kämpfer and have to fight other Kämpfers. Animation and art style has mixed quality. There are some really good parts but there are other not so good (and sometimes bad). Surprisingly the soundtrack is a good one. Too bad the characters and the story are mostly quite weak. If it wasn't for the later episodes, where the story kicks in, I would gave it only 5. Score: 6/10 Recommendation level: Only if you liked "Ore, Twintails ni Narimasu." and would like to see something similar, otherwise don't bother. Kämpfer für die Liebe The last two episodes, where the first one is direct continuation of the main story, and the second is typical special. The only good thing was that the second episode was really funny. I laughed a lot while watching it. Score: 6/10 Recommendation level: Only if you watched the original story. Angel Beats! Specials Actually only the second special "Hell's Kitchen". It wasn't as good as I expected it would be, but it wasn't bad either. I enjoyed watching this new special for Angel Beats!. I think I would like it more if I watched it right after the main story. Score: 7/10 Recommendation level: If you liked main story, you should watch it. Akagami no Shirayuki-hime Another one from last season. But I don't know why I picked it :D The story follows Shirayuki, a red-haired herbalist, who is forced to leave her home town after local prince tried to force her a his concubine. On her way out of the town she meets Zen, 2nd prince of the Kingdom of Clarines, and, after learning that not all princes are bad persons, decided to move to his Kingdom. There she can work as herbalist and learn more about Clarines and Zen :-) Visuals in this anime are amazing, especialy when portraying gardens, herbs or water. This is accompanied by very good and sometimes even great soundtrack, with opening being one of the best in the last season :-) Characters are also very good. And not only the main ones (Shirayuki and Zen) but also the supporting ones. It's obvious that a lot of efforts were put into making them that way (in story, development and voice acting). Too bad that the story is not a very good one. It has some great parts, but not enough to balance the weaker parts. Score: 8/10 Recommendation level: A very good Shoujo anime. Danchigai Yet another one from last season. This one I picked after reading synopsis on Crunchyroll. Haruki is a highschooler that lives with his four sisters: Mutsuki, Yayoi, Uzuki, and Satsuki. Watch as those sisters turn his life into living hell :-) As for really short anime (only 3 minutes per episode) this one is really well made. In most short ones I watched, the pacing of the story is really fast or even crazy fast. But not in this one. Each episode present a simple story with pacing as in normal length anime. And it's due to this that many people (including me) would like to see a normal length series made out of it. Score: 8/10 Recommendation level: Definitely worth the time you need to watch it. Danchigai Special A special episode for the Danchigai and a quite good one too :-) Score: 7/10 Recommendation level: Worst case scenario: You wasted 3 minutes of your life :-) Ginga Ojousama Densetsu Yuna: Kanashimi no Siren The story how I found it is a bit longer so I put it into spoiler tag :-) The first episode was a bit too fast for me. Liked they tried to pack too many things into the first episode. The second one was better in that aspect. As for the animation it could be used as example of how anime looked in the '90s. And the best part of this anime were the characters. Very cheerful and kind Yuna, always hungry and straightforward Yuri and a bunch of supporting magical girls (and there is a lot of them :-)). I think that one would like it more if one played one of the games it's based on. Score: 7/10 Recommendation level: If you want to see how mix of Machou Shoujo and Mecha looks like. Ginga Ojousama Densetsu Yuna: Shin'en no Fairy Continuation of the previous OVA :-) And this one is a much better one. Especially the last episode with some unexpected events :-) Score: 8/10 Recommendation level: If you watched the prequel it's a must. If you haven't you might gave it a chance and then go back to this one. On-deck: Yuuki Yuuna wa Yuusha de Aru. |
mozgowSep 26, 2015 11:53 PM
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| Did a double episode to get it completed. I completed... Charlotte It's a Key written story about teen getting unique powers as part of puberty. It then clears up as they get older and become adults. In a way, it's a nice concept. But with anyone with unique powers there are those, either governments or criminal organizations, that would want to harness that power for their own good. This story wasn't about that part, it was about a group of kids and how they went about to protect those with these powers. The first half was basically the "the power of the week" story. Nothing outstanding except we learn about the main characters. The middle part is about the breakdown of the MC, how he reacted and how it was resolved. I found this the best part because it showed the MC growing up. Sadly the last couple episodes left me in with mixed feelings. Most Key stories will you with a lump in your throat or some form of sadness because of something MC does or what happens to them. The ending was pretty much finding a way to "end" the disease by having the MC collect them all before the disease leaves him...and he does. (sorry for the spoiler). In the process he loses his identity and everyone around him. Score: I have to give it a 6.5/10. Recommendation: It was good, artwork was very good, characters were very good, it was that lack of the emotional hit that as missing from an usual Key work. |
| What if the Hokey Pokey is what it is all about? |
| Just finished the last 4 episodes of Charlotte. I agree with sbyrstall up until the last 4 episodes. I did get a "lump in my throat" and I felt that it was a very fitting and emotional end. Of course that is just my opinion. The reviews were mostly negative but a lot were written before the last episode, Overall almost 67% of the viewers gave it a rating of 8/10 or above. I gave it an 8/10 myself. Check it out and see. |
| Yūki Yūna wa Yūsha de Aru I watched it only because it had Yuna in the title :D (After watching Ginga Ojousama Densetsu Yuna I remembered the other Yuna I had on my PTW list) Yūki Yūna is a member of "Hero Club" in which she and her friend helps other clubs and/or community. One day her smartphone rings during the lesson, but before she cloud do something about it, she notices that time has frozen. Along with other members of "Hero club" she has to fight mysterious Vertexes in order to protect Shinju-sama, a god-like being protecting humanity. When I read the synopsis I didn't knew what to expect from it. I knew it was mahō-shōjo, but that was all. After first episode I thought that it would be a good slice of life/mahō-shōjo mix. But with each subsequent episode I had a feeling that something is really wrong with this world. Episode 6, which supposedly is a nice, relaxing SoL type, was not relaxing at all! I can't say more to not spoil it, but it's not what it seems at first glance. Moving to the "technical aspects", everything is very good or great. Starting from the animation and artstyle, it's simply amazing. It might not look very impressive but there are many tiny details, that make it so (like the wind made by truck passing by, or the hairs bouncing while walking). Battle sequences are in 3D, but it doesn't look bad. Moreover, IMO it looks great that way :-) And finally the last thing that makes it really impressive - there are at least 4 different animation sequences for opening and ending (openings differs mostly only by petals of the flowers). Soundtrack, sound-effects and voice acting are also great. Opening and ending songs are very good and in the mood of the series. Soundtrack during the show is top-notch and sound-effects are amazing (they made the proper sound of the sink! who would ever thought about it?). The voice acting has some really minor flaws, but it doesn't change my opinion about the whole sound aspects :-) Finally characters and the story. There are only five main characters and some really minor ones (there is no supporting cast so to say). Not every girl gets the same amount of development and progress but it doesn't change the fact that every single one is likeable and memorable. The story is also very good and unique (and I don't think that anyone would dare to say that it's just Madoka rip-off) and even the ending is not what it seems. Score: 9/10 Recommendation level: Yūki Yūna wa yūsha de aru is probably the first post-Madoka mahō-shōjo anime which managed to withstand the comparison against it. Ai Mai! Moe Can Change! A short OVA based on some mobile app. I can say it was enjoyable to watch. Nothing more, nothing less. Score: 6/10 Recommendation level: Only if you have 24 minutes of spare time :-) Bokura no Live Kimi to no Life and Snow Halation Two promotional videos for Love Live! School Idol Project. Love Live! is on my PTW list, and after watching those two videos I would gave it a try in the nearest future :-) Score: 7/10 (both) Recommendation level: Worth the time you need to watch it. Monsutā Musume no Iru Nichijō I actually planed to watch it right after Ginga Ojousama Densetsu Yuna, but the other Yuna distracted me :D Monsters—they're real, and they want to date us! Three years ago, the world learned that harpies, centaurs, catgirls, and all manners of fabulous creatures are not merely fiction; they are flesh and blood—not to mention scale, feather, horn, and fang. Thanks to the "Cultural Exchange Between Species Act," these once-mythical creatures have assimilated into society, or at least, they're trying... I think that I might be too old for ecchi now :D I liked it but not as much as I think I would. The good parts were animation, art style and gags. I laughed a lot while watching it but it wasn't enough to balance the bad parts. There were no story (or I'm too dump to notice it) nor character development. I personally think that Nagasarete Airantō is a better ecchi/comedy anime. Score: 7/10 Recommendation level: Only for true ecchi fans. On-deck: Gokukoku no Brynhildr. P.S. I just noticed that with Ginga Ojousama Densetsu Yuna I completed 250 anime :D |
mozgowOct 12, 2015 9:57 AM
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| It's been a while and I've completed a few series/OVAs/one-shots Gatchaman Crowds Insight I really enjoy a good story that reflects on the human condition and what could separate man from regular animals. This was a great stepping stone. It is the continuation of the first season of Gatchman when CROWDS were introduced to the general public as extension and tools of humans. Sadly, these become substitutes, much like today's social media has become a substitute. There is a group who are against the use of CROWDS. In fact, the leader of this anti-CROWD group has stated that humans are still no better than apes. That's the first third of the series. The second third has the introduction of an alien who wants nothing but the best for human but with all good intention it get's screwed up. The combination of the genius of Hajime Ichinose and Berg Katz (possibly from the very first Gatchaman series) they were able to resolve the problem. This also put Hajime in my top tier of favorite characters. It's just to complex of a storyline to give it justice. Just watch the series. Score: 9/10 (yes, I found it that good) Recommendation: For those who want to thinking person's anime Million Doll These were 4 minute episodes about a female hikikomori who's reviews can make or break upcoming idols through her blogs and social media. The current story has her favoring the group Itorio while a dark horse solo idol Mariko is being pushed by another fan. The singing is done strictly through CGI and it looks blocky at times. Not as good or fluid as the Love Live series. It was left with a cliffhanger to allow a season 2 at some time. Score: 5/10 Recommendation: A fluffy idol series, it will hold us idol group fans for a short time Now the much anticipated review of Bishoujo Senshi Sailor Moon Crystal I'll start off by saying this isn't your father's Sailor Moon. If you don't know by now it is remake keeping true to the manga, unlike the original which had a lot of fillers while the mangaka was busy writing the series (think Fullmetal Alchemist vs. Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood). Saying that, yes, there have been a lot of comparisons between the original series and the remake. As a whole, people did not like this remake. They felt that character development was missing or some of the stories resolved to fast. Some were even put off by the artwork. Let me say this, if these were what made it bad, then you might as well say the manga was bad. No need to go into the details since the only covered the first two stories: the Dark Kingdom and the Dark Moon arcs. I've only read the Dark Kingdom in the manga and thought it was done very well. I only complained about the series mostly because of how it was released - an ONA released every two weeks. This time spacing made it hard to get into a rhythm. I'm also not a big fan of marathoning series. This is why I complained about taking so long to watch it. Score: 8/10. Yes, I did enjoy it. Yes, there were plot holes. Yes, it will be looked upon fondly after a few years. Recommendation: Nostalgia of when we were younger, and stupid. Couple one shots. I'll keep it as short as they are. Miss Monochrome: The Animation - Manager Miss M is asked to be manager of her rival Kikuko while Kikuko's current manager is sick. Score: 6/10 Recommendation: Just a good natured series. Yayoi (I'm not linking this just to protect all of you) Kidnapped female cop...oh hell, I have yet to say anything good about hentai. Score: 4/10 (art was only redeeming quality, very 90s) Recommendation: I don't recommend this AT ALL On-deck: Senki Zesshou Symphogear GX: Believe in Justice and Hold a Determination to Fist. and Shimoneta to Iu Gainen ga Sonzai Shinai Taikutsu na Sekai (should finish both by next week) |
Dodecahedron-O24Oct 7, 2015 7:01 AM
| What if the Hokey Pokey is what it is all about? |
| I just finished the latest Ghibli masterpiece When Marnie Was There. Directed and scripted by Hiromasa Yonebayashi, I felt that he did a great job maintaining the Miyazaki magic. Beautifully animated, it’s the story of a young girl who has asthma, is sullen and doesn’t get along with her classmates and foster parents so she is sent to a small town near the ocean to live with some relatives. There she meets a mysterious girl named Marnie who she instantly becomes friends with and shares a special bond. This movie is slow paced, beautiful with a touch of mystery and because there are no fight scenes, demons, witches etc, I would recommend this one for adults, kids would get bored. Highly recommended 10/10. It was just released in the US on DVD or Blu Ray |
| It's been a while since I've done one of these. So this one might go a bit long(er than usual). Aria the Origination It's simply Aria. That's all that ever needs to be said. The most peace-inducing title known to humanity, and it is glorious. This is a perfect example of a show taking a winning formula and slowly refining it over time, until the final episode is the unquestionable capstone that could never be improved on. Rating: 10/10 Recommendation Level: Ara ara. After that piece of amazement, I needed to slow it down a bit and clear some of the lesser titles from my bookmarks until the PADS faded away. Steins;Gate: Soumei Eichi no Cognitive Computing Hm. A series of long-ish commercials for IBM? Not really much there, but I'm certain it was welcomed by all of the S;G fanboys. Of which, I am not one. Just sayin'. Score: 5/10 Recommendation Level: Okabe fanbois Ai Mai Mi: Mousou Catastrophe Mildly more forgettable than the first season. Which is an accomplishment in and of itself, as Ai Mai Mi is one of my most forgettable titles ever. I can't think of a single positive about it, and all I can remember is a vague sense of headache-creation as I violently facepalmed repeatedly. Score: 4/10 Recommendation Level: I wouldn't. Hyakko OVA Just as mildly humorous as the main series, but only mildly so. So if you were a fan of Torako and Touma from the main series, you'll enjoy this. (Though Minato was best girl...) Score: 6/10 Recommendation Level: Only if you've seen he main series. Toaru Kagaku no Railgun: Entenka no Satsuei Model mo Raku Ja Arimasen wa ne. It's just a plain fanservice episode for your favorite cast members. Move along, citizen. Score: 5/10 Recommendation Level: Not even for Biribiri fans, to be honest. Okay. So maybe I went too far down the rabbit hole. But I needed a broad swath of low-level shows. At least I know how to pick it back up again. Tiger & Bunny The Movie: The Beginning At it's face, it's just a retelling of the first two episodes. Sure, it's got a couple of extra scenes tacked on to it to flesh it out some, but it's just the start of the series all over again. On the other hand, it's yet more evidence that anime can do a good buddy show if it wants to. The interplay between Barnaby and Kotetsu is one of the best available, and this was only out of a brief taste of the whole series. Score: 8/10 Recommendation Level: Anyone who loved superheroes as a kid. Koitabi: True Tours Nanto Six short episodes featuring three well-written romance stories, this was an absolutely beautiful advertisement for the small city of Nanto. With little details about the town and couples that you want to cheer for, this is a must for lovers of romance anime. Score: 8/10 Recommendation Level: Everyone who was horribly disappointed in Urawa no Usagi-chan. K I needed something more to watch this season, so I figured I'd check this out. And it was at least moderately entertaining. It could have been a bit more clear as to where it was going, but it was fine enough as it was to make me interested enough to continue. Score: 6/10 Recommendation Level: Fans of the overpowered anime. 'Cause these guys are damn well OP. K:Missing Kings This, on the other hand, made me want to find something else to watch this season. While the action and the plot was continued well, the direction the rest of it took just made me want to walk away. Unnecessary panty shots were all over the place, and it seemed that every skirt in the show but one was reduced by twenty percent. Not in price, but in length. Add to that the issues with the CGI use, and this was definitely a step backwards in the series. And it has made my pick-up of K: Return of Kings questionable rather than probable. Score: 5/10 Recommendation Level: I wouldn't. It may be required to understand the second season, but it's still not worth the effort. |
on sbyrstall said: On-deck: Senki Zesshou Symphogear GX: Believe in Justice and Hold a Determination to Fist. and Shimoneta to Iu Gainen ga Sonzai Shinai Taikutsu na Sekai (should finish both by next week) I will not be giving any reviews on these two because I never got around to watching them. I blame life for getting in my way. Life sucks. :( I was only able to get Tsukimonogatari watched. The focus on this 4 episode series was on the doll/shikigami Yotsugi Ononoki and her interaction with Koyomi Araragi as his vampirism starts to reemerge. It is suppose to connect the second season of Bakemonogatri and Owarimonogatari. I found this the enjoyable as I have with the other Monogatari series. Yes, I do like the banter of the characters very much. Guess I'm a strange one. I know series like this would never do well in the US because it's all talk and very little action. Also many of references, jokes and play on words would go over the heads of the general public. Score: 8/10 (some scenes go to fast to catch it all) Recommendation: If you are into this kind of anime I would highly recommend it. If not, go watch your Dragon Ball Super. :p OffColfax said: K:Missing Kings This, on the other hand, made me want to find something else to watch this season. While the action and the plot was continued well, the direction the rest of it took just made me want to walk away. Unnecessary panty shots were all over the place, and it seemed that every skirt in the show but one was reduced by twenty percent. Not in price, but in length. Add to that the issues with the CGI use, and this was definitely a step backwards in the series. And it has made my pick-up of K: Return of Kings questionable rather than probable. Score: 5/10 Recommendation Level: I wouldn't. It may be required to understand the second season, but it's still not worth the effort. I agree with this review. There is a heck of a lot of background information that is never explored nor explain to any great detail. I felt detached from most of the storyline. The Return of the King sequel starts off in the same way. The Blues fight the Red with the old Red king but then halfway through the first episode it we meet the "new" Red king. They introduce the Green king with no information whatsoever. Since this is just 12 episodes I'll slug it through. It's not a horrible series. I've seen worse. I just feel I already invested one season into it that I want to see this through, especially when the Silver king reappears and the Colorless king making some kind of appearance. |
Dodecahedron-O24Oct 17, 2015 5:41 AM
| What if the Hokey Pokey is what it is all about? |
| Didn't had much time in the past week to watch something other than seasonal anime, so the list is short :-) Gokukoku no Brynhildr Found this via Youtube in one of the top 10s. Murakami Ryouta is obsessed with proving that aliens exists. It is so since the tragic death of his childhood friend - Kuroneko. One day a new transfer student appears, who looks exactly as Kuroneko. Even the name is similar - Kuroha Neko. Is she really his childhood friend? If so, why she doesn't remember him? If not, why she looks like Kuroneko? Watch Murakami as she tries to find out the truth. Yet another anime I have a mixed feelings about. Animation and art style was overall good. The hand-drawn parts where much better than the CGI ones (it's from last year but I can say with 100% certainty that it will age pretty badly). Soundtrack were also overall good. The first opening was great (very similar in the mood to that from Higurashi no Naku Koro ni) but the second one was totally not in the mood of the series. It wasn't bad per se, but it was a bad choice for this series. Characters and the story are the things I have the most mixed feelings about. Based on the opening I expected something similar to Higurashi - comedy / slice of life mixed with darker themes. Although it wasn't actually very similar, it had a good mix of comedy and darker themes. Everything was going smoothly up until episode 10 or 11, when story started to go very fast. New characters (first seen in the opening) didn't get proper introduction and it was hard to find a reason behind their actions. It's a real shame it was so rushed, because if it were a longer series it could be a great one. Score: 8/10 Recommendation level: If you want to see a comedy mixed with darker themes. Gokukoku no Brynhildr Special 100% fan-service episode. Nothing more, nothing less. Score: 6/10 Recommendation level: Only if you are in need for fan-service episode. On-deck: Akatsuki no Yona |
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| Finished the series of Senki Zesshou Symphogear GX: Believe in Justice and Hold a Determination to Fist. It's the third season of the Symphogear franchise. Yes, I call it a franchise. Unlike other animes, this doesn't have a source manga, it is original. Okay, original as one can be about magical/mecha girls in hooker heels, who sing, that power up as DBZ, and to save the world. Standard cliche' fare. I only like it because I claimed Chris (the white haired, twin tail) as my waifu. It's up to you if you like a series like this. Me, I like this one so I rated it high (7/10). |
| What if the Hokey Pokey is what it is all about? |
| Akatsuki no Yona I don't remember how I added it to my PTW list, but I picked it after seeing that it's available on Crunchyroll :-) Yona is a princes of Kouka Kingdom and the only daughter of King Il. On the night after her sixteen birthday, he wanders to king's chambers to convince father to her marriage with Su-Won. But instead of convincing him, he sees as Su-Won kills him. Now, with the help of Son Hak (her bodyguard and friend) she has to escape the castle, survive, find more friends and allies, and hopefully reclaim the throne. Although it starts as typical Shoujo, with damsel in distress, it's far from being typical Shoujo anime. First, the main character, Yona, who admits that she's week, works very hard to became stronger, both physically and mentally (albeit it's unknown to her, she has hidden strength that shows itself when she's determined to do something - when it happens, her enemies tremble in fear). Second, her friend and allies, who are not what you expect to see in Shoujo anime (it's more like they're taken from some battle Shounen :-)). Each of them is unique, have own quirks and feels like a real person. Third, the setting, which seems to be a mix of Chinese and Korean legends and myths - a theme that's quite unique even for anime (I have a feeling that it's not the first anime with such theme I've seen, but it's the first where it works really well). And finally the battle scenes. There is a lot of fighting it this supposedly Shoujo anime, and the fights are made pretty well. Animation and art style are very good with some parts being great (especially reflections - in sword, floor, mirror or water - those were the most amazing things I saw in this anime). This fits really great with the thing this anime stand outs the most - the soundtrack. First opening and second ending are truly amazing (when I first heard the opening I thought that it's mediocre, lol :D). But not only openings/endings are great, the music throughout the whole series is also great. Every important scene has it music, which really strengthen the feels :-) I hope that there will be a second season... Score: 9/10 Recommendation level: The best Shoujo anime I've seen so far. Akatsuki no Yona: Sono Se niwa It's tagged as side-story, but I think it's more like a direct sequel to first season. This time our group visits onsen in some remote part of the country. Overall good episode, with nothing I didn't expect from onsen episode :-) Score: 7/10 Recommendation: If you liked the main series you should watch this. Animation Seisaku Shinkou Kuromi-chan Kuromi (full name Oguro Mikiko) graduates from animation university and joins Studio Petit. There, to her surprise, she is put in charge of producing anime "Time Journey". It was highly pleasant to watch the insides of anime industry. There were nothing I already didn't know, but nonetheless it was nice to see it animated (with great dose of humour). Art style is really odd at times, but animation is not, moreover it's really good. Same goes to the soundtrack. Nothing really outstanding, but it's there and it does its job. Characters and story are the best part of this OVA. And there is even some character development for Kuromi :-) Score: 8/10 Recommendation level: Inner working of anime industry with really good gags. Animation Seisaku Shinkou Kuromi-chan 2 Continuation of the previous OVA. "Time Journey" was a great success for Studio Petit. Now they have to work on three anime simultaneously. The only thing that changes was the animation, which is better than in the first OVA. The story might not be as good, but nonetheless it was enjoyable. Score: 8/10 Recommendation level: If you liked the prequel, you would like this one too. Aozora Shōjotai Found this one via some Youtube comment. Isurugi Takuya, an aviation mechanic (and anime fanboy), joins the 801st Tactical Training Squadron - an all-female aerial acrobatic team. The rest of JASDF thinks of them as junkyard for people who failed during their carer in the air-force, and would like to disband it altogether. The "Airbats" have to show them that they are capable air-force squadron... First the good things. Animation and art style are '90s top quality. Camera changing focus isn't something one see often, even in feature films. The flight scenes are also well made, as so are some of the backgrounds. Same goes for the soundtrack, which is being used properly throughout the whole series, with the opening song being really great (with a nostalgic feeling). Now the not so good things. From the three main characters (Isurugi, Haneda, Mitaka) only the girls are really good or even great. The male protagonist is archetypal, indecisive MC from every harem anime. Even the supporting cast is better than him (and that's something the creators should be ashamed of). Also the story is not so great as it could be. But it's probably mostly due to the fact that the series was never finished. Maybe if it was, it would be better. Score: 8/10 Recommendation level: Not for everyone. Some might dislike the MC and the unfinished story. On-deck: Aria The Natural: Sono Futatabi Deaeru Kiseki ni... (I thought that I've already watched everything in the Aria franchise :-P), Mangaka-san to Assistant-san to The Animation Specials and Ookami to Koushinryou. |
mozgowOct 18, 2015 8:02 AM
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| Red Garden Four students at an exclusive school on Roosevelt Island in New York City wake up in their own beds, and remember absolutely nothing about the night before. Not exactly an awful set-up, but then things get really weird as we find that a fifth student was found dead from an apparent suicide. This is... not the best anime on the planet. The fights are weird, the girls spend too much time with other things instead of figuring out what's going on, and there's a lot of useless side plots that don't really matter and don't get a lot of resolution. The sideplot about Grace was particularly headshaking, as it seemed like they were just trying to introduce a Mean Girls element for absolutely no reason. But when it actually wanted to go somewhere, it really moved quickly and with some decent energy. And that's what saved it in the end. Score: 6/10 Recommendation level: Someone who wants to watch an obscure anime set in New York City. Red Garden: Dead Girls Set after the events of the main series. A lot after the events of the main series. I could talk about this, but it wouldn't make any sense unless you saw Red Garden itself. Come to think of it, it doesn't exactly make much sense even after watching the main series. Score: 5/10 Recommendation level: Completionists Ah! My Goddess: Tatakau Tsubasa Ah, yes. The 20th Anniversary special was a lovely addition to one of my favorite series of all time. More fun with Belldandy and K1, more silliness from Urd and Skuld, and a new goddess to join the herd? Sign me up all the way. And it never disappoints. Ever. Score: 9/10 Recommendation level: Send me an angel. Je T'aime A lonely basset hound wanders an empty city looking for someone. Anyone. This short by Production I.G is absolutely beautifully animated, and does a lot with its limited running time. After all, you can't do much character building with only 10 minutes and no voice acting. But what it has, it does well. The background music and main song, while beautifully done, are actually a point against it, as they get remarkably repetitive really quickly. Score: 7/10 Recommendation level: Fans of shorts should be all over this one. Koukou Butouden Crows Sometimes you just need to hit the Random button until something interesting comes up. And this time, I got a weird old-school GAR OVA from 1994. Complete with VHS artifacts, it was a real blast from the past to how anime really used to be watched. With typical tough guy characters, a typical setting, and a typical setup, Crows isn't precisely a standout in the history of anime. But in it, you can also see the same roots as some of the standout titles of the genre. It's not great, mind you. But it's still an interesting addition to the watch list. Score: 5/10 Recommendation level: Old-school. |
| So a month ago I posted that I needed to catch up on my completions here, and now I'm even further behind. Oh well. Summer Season Completions: Wakako-zake Enjoyable little short following a woman who likes to go to restaurants for a drink and a nice meal after work (something I’m sure all of us older folks can relate to). Especially good for foodies, but don’t watch before dinner, because this show will make you hungry – I really want to try some of those dishes for myself. Score: 6/10 Bikini Warriors There are two audiences for this show. One audience are fans of ecchi shows that go about as far as they can without crossing over into any actual nudity. The other audience are fans of Japanese RPGs, especially Final Fantasy and Dragon Quest, because when the show isn’t sexually harassing its characters, it’s lampshading and parodying common JRPG tropes to the hilt. I don’t watch a lot of ecchi; I only loaded the first episode to test out Daisuki’s streaming, which I hadn’t used before, and the first episode turned out to be funny enough with the RPG jokes that I just kept going. While it’s not a good show by any means, it stayed pretty funny throughout, so I had no problems finishing it. Score: 4/10 Food Wars Another show I watched in spite of the ecchi, but a much, much better series all the way around. I started watching Food Wars for the food, and I kept watching it for the characters; I really liked the cast of this show. The writing overall was pretty good too, with some amusing variations on the typical Shonen Jump formula. I’d definitely watch a second season if it ever gets one. Score: 8/10 Also, I started a weekly feature in another MAL club reviewing anime shorts. I won't repeat everything I wrote there over here - if you want to read my complete thoughts you can find them in this forum. Thus far I have covered: Pale Cocoon Deep, thoughtful science fiction short with some beautiful visuals. Score: 9/10 Ai Mai! Moe Can Change! Adapted from a Japanese cell phone game, just a cute little comedy romp with moe girls. Score: 5/10 Iblard Jikan A very mellow, Ghibli short that's a series of fantasy paintings animated and set to music. No story to it, but visually beautiful and the perfect kind of thing to relax with. Score: 7/10 Bokura no Live Kimi to no Life First-ever Love Live music video from 2010. Catchy song and interesting to watch how the franchise was developing in its early stages. Score: 6/10 Snow Halation Second Love Live music video, technically a bit more complex than the first one and I like the song better too. Score: 7/10 Tenshi no Tamago An early Mamoru Oshii fantasy drama from 1985. On the surface this is a simple story of two people, a soldier and a young girl who carries a large egg with her wherever she goes, who encounter each other in an otherwise seemingly deserted city. Beneath the surface this is actually quite a multi-layered film, heavily atmospheric, rife with symbolism, and very much open to interpretation. The visuals are still striking even 30 years later, and I loved the soundtrack. Score: 8/10 |
WingKingOct 19, 2015 9:41 AM
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| Aria The Natural: Sono Futatabi Deaeru Kiseki ni... It was really nice and very nostalgic to be back at Aqua :-) Man, I didn't know how much I missed Aria until I watched this short, introductory episode. And now I can't wait to see Avvenire :-) Score: 7/10 Recommendation level: Aria! :-) Mangaka-san to Assistant-san to The Animation Specials Tagged as specials but it feels more like a direct sequel to the original series. Animation-wise it's nothing really impressive, but it's not bad either. It's what good animation should look like. There is some soundtrack during the series, but what is the best in the sound department, it's the ending song. It has the best ending for all the shorts I've seen so far. Characters are the same as in prequel/main series and there is no character development at all. But it matters not as the story and gags are really good. First four episodes might not be very good, but the fifth one is simply great and the last one not much worse :-) I had a good time watching it. Score: 7/10 Recommendation level: If you need something short to cheer you up. Ōkami to kōshinryō Recommended to me by fellow MAL member few months ago. Finally decided to watch it :-) While visiting Pasloe Kraft Lawrence, a local merchant, discovers in his cart a naked girl with wolf ears and a tail. She introduces herself as Holo, the "Wise Wolf of Yoitsu" and ask for a ride to her northern home of Yoitsu. At first he is reluctant, but later agrees if she helps him earn money during the journey. They start travelling together and this is only the beginning of unusual chain of events... Animation and art style are simply beautiful. Some of the backgrounds looks like taken directly from some paintings, and characters animation is really good. But I dare to say that animation is the weakest part of this anime. The best part, and amazing is not good enough to express how good it is, is the soundtrack. No songs, just music, and one might say a simple one too, but it fits this show so perfectly that it's inseparable from the anime and the story. Characters might not be as amazing as the soundtrack, but they are really great. The main couple (it's obvious almost right from the start that they feel something to each other) is great. The chemistry between them, their interactions and dialogues - it's almost perfect. The supportive cast might not be so great, but it does its jobs - adds a sense of reality to this fictional world. And finally the story. At first it might seems as very predictable, but there are few really unexpected and really good plot twists on the way. With the open ending I look forward to the next season. Score: 9/10 Recommendation level: One of the best SoL anime I've seen. Tenshi no Tamago This one was on my PTW list from the time I joined MAL. Finally decided to watch it thanks to WingKing's Short Anime Spotlight :-) A mysterious girl takes care of some big egg. While visiting some deserted town, she meets not less mysterious boy. Discover more about this strange world as the two discuss about it. Amazing and confusing as hell. Those are the two words that describe this anime the most. Animation and art style is very unique and really great too. There are very little colours but it's not black and white. When it is needed there are intense colours. But the art style wouldn't be so great if it wasn't accompanied by this amazing soundtrack. I don't know how but it feels like the music is part of the animation and the usage of it in this anime is a form of an art on its own. There are only two voiced characters and very few dialogues. But each single one is very important and reveals some of the mysteries this fictional world has. And there are a lot of them. Don't expect to find all the answers at the end of the movie. If you watch it carefully you will find some, but not all (as some questions are unanswered). Score: 9/10 Recommendation level: If you want to think a lot while watching anime. One Off Another short one recommended by WingKing :-) This one was sponsored by Honda and product placement is all over the place. But it's not a bad anime, moreover IMO it's very good on its own. Animation and soundtrack are nothing really special, but neither are they bad. But characters and the story are on completely different level :-) While there is very little character development (maybe Haruno gets more of it), characters are well made and really enjoyable to watch. Some of the quirks will made you laugh very hard :-) Score: 8/10 Recommendation level: If you need a good dose of laugh. On-deck: Ookami to Koushinryou II: Ookami to Kohakuiro no Yuuutsu and Ookami to Koushinryou II. |
mozgowOct 25, 2015 9:25 AM
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| Ergo Proxy At first, I thought I was going to love this show. Amazingly wonderful art and animation combined with a shoot-'em-up style suspense/mystery? Absolutely my cup of tea. Plus Re-l is pretty much one of my fetishes. And then it changed into a weird journey-style anime that completely changed its tone from where it started in the first half. Combine the change of theme with the inclusion of random episodes that made absolutely no sense (the game show episode and the theme park episode, for specific examples), and you come out with a very confused anime that tried to do far too much. It tried to be everything at the same time: a psychological thriller, a philosophical conundrum, an action thriller, and an adventure of discovery. Unfortunately, it needed to be another six or seven episodes longer in order to be able to properly give all of those elements a thorough explanation. As it is, it still went 7 episodes too long as most of the waste was at the approach to the finale. This is one of those things where you can always point and say "See? This is why you just do one thing and do it well." It shows very clearly how you can take an amazing anime at the beginning and turn it into something that's just merely entertaining on average across the rest of the running time. Score: 7/10 Recommendation level: Pretty much only people that would like this kind of thing. On-deck: Halloween Week with GYO and and my hand-picked selection for Anime 666: the Ghost Stories dub! |
| Another very busy week at work, so not many new things here :-) Ōkami to Kōshinryō II: Ōkami to Kohakuiro no Yūutsu OVA or episode 00 for Spice and Wolf second season. The story is told from the perspective of Holo, as she falls ill and has to stay in the inn. It was very nice to the see how Holo thinks and what is she doing when Lawrence isn't around :-) Score: 8/10 Recommendation level: Holo at her finest. Ōkami to Kōshinryō II Second season for Spice and Wolf. The story continues where it ended in the first season. It's really hard to write something new, that I haven't already wrote for the first season. Everything is still true, with some minor improvements :-) The thing that changed the most are the characters, that are even better than in first season. The dialogues, interactions and chemistry between the two is just brilliant :-) Lawrence even learned some new tricks to tease with Holo. The story is again split into two arcs, with the first one being really great. The second one is not bad but it looks weak compared to the first one. Two bad that there will be no season three. Score: 9/10 Recommendation level: Spice and Wolf! On-deck: Something from my on-hold list. Most likely Nagi no Asukara. |
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| Gyo: Tokyo Fish Attack This was... weird. A fair attempt at a modern anime B-movie classic, Gyo had a few things going for it. Creepy scenario? Check. Unstoppable foes? Check. Disgusting ends for characters? Check. Showing the strength of human determination in the face of the impossible? Check. It feels to me like a cross between an old H.P. Lovecraft story and a George Romero zombie film. And that's not a bad comparison for me at all. It did, however, have a number of negatives. Most of the characters were simply empty tropes: the one-dimensional protagonist trying to get home, the bland photojournalist looking for truth, the cheap slut that just wants to get laid, the mad scientist tinkering with things best left alone, et cetera et cetera. The circus tent scene was completely unnecessary, and only served as a massive distraction away from the rest of the action. (Plus I never again want to type the words "quad-mounted shit cannon" again. I have the feeling that it will happen a few more times in the future, unfortunately.) And, of course, it wouldn't be a fish horror movie set in Japan without a conveniently placed octopus with conveniently placed tentacles. I would still recommend it, as it's an interesting switch from the standard fare. Score: 7/10 Recommendation level: Fun for the whole family! Bring grandma along! Free all-you-can-eat sushi bar with proof of purchase. Ghost Stories Ah yes: the infamous Ghost Stories dub. Frequently referenced yet rarely watched, and never again to be duplicated in any form. This iconic show has been whispered about in chat rooms and forums for a decade, and I felt it most appropriate to use as my personal Anime Number 666. While it was clearly an improvement over the original (You really didn't need to listen to the Japanese soundtrack to figure that bit out.), it frequently fell flat. With an over-reliance on repetitive jokes and shock value, there just wasn't enough variety in the banter to keep it going for the entire run. So while it was frequently funny as hell at the beginning, it tailed off dramatically for the last few episodes to the point where I was starting to predict with alarming accuracy which of the old gags was going to come up at certain points. Is it worth the watch? Absolutely. If only for the historical value of seeing an anime so bad that even the original studio said "Fuck it, just do whatever.", it's worth the watch. Score: 666/1000 Recommendation level: People who hate dubs, people without a sense of humor, and people who think Christian Slater still has a career. On-deck: I think it's finally time for me to start Fate/Zero. So why not. |
| Fate/Zero and Fate/Zero Second Season It's not for nothing that the common wisdom about this series is that you should read through the VN before watching F/Z. The beginning of the series felt more like a second season rather than the start of the run, with allusions to prior events all over the place. It's not that this is inherently a bad thing, but the overall feel after it was all said and done was that there were many things left unsaid and unexplained. That is the bad thing, and the series suffered as a whole because of it. Another definite minus was that it still felt like a game. One thing I look for in game adaptations is a complete move from the original format, and Fate/Zero failed that mark at the very beginning. When characters openly talk about "stats" and "ranks" like they were chatting back and forth in an OOC channel, it completely ruins my immersion into the anime. This is an inherent problem with adaptations such as this, and it needs to be very carefully written in order to avoid falling into the trap. F/Z, on the other hand, blithely walked straight into it and was never able to recover in the first season. The characters themselves mostly felt like cardboard cutouts. The vast majority of them failed to show any form of development whatsoever. While it may have been acceptable for the Servants to remain static throughout, I expected more out of the assembled suite of Masters. Yet the only one that really showed development was Waver, with the help of a major assist from Rider being the epitome of a bro. And of the Servants, I'd say the most interesting one of the entire group was actually Caster as his mistaken identity of Saber was probably the most interesting set of interactions out of the group. And finally, the backstory episodes for Kiritsugu felt... out of place in the main series. They did some interesting exploration of how he came to be the character we see at the start of the show, but it was rather senseless to include those episodes right before the final sequence of conflicts. I feel that it would have been much better served to have these episodes split off into a special, remove the later allusions to those events, and save the running time for more applicable things. As an anime-only viewer, it was still fairly entertaining. Unfortunately, it had far too many faults for me to be able to hold it in high esteem. Score: 6/10 for the first season, 7/10 for the second season. Recommendation level: mongrels. Mou Hitotsu no Mirai wo. I'm thinking that this could have been a decent idea for a full-length series run by the creative team behind last season's Classroom Crisis and turned into something amazing. All the pieces are already there: a new invention that allows for direct communication with a point in the future, industrial espionage, and the resolution thereof. It might even have been the next Steins;Gate, particularly with the application of a sufficient backstory. As it is, it's mostly forgettable. Rushed to the point of almost nonsense, it tried far too hard to fit everything into just fifteen minutes and suffered measurably for it. And if that wasn't bad enough, they wasted a lot of running time with a random cute narrator standing there at the beginning and end of each episode to give monologue after monologue. This might have seemed like a good idea to the marketing department of its sponsor KDDI Telecommunications, but in the end it was a major disconnect from the more serious nature of the actual content. Score: 5/10 Recommendation level: Pass. On-deck: Simoun. And maybe a movie or two if I have time. |
| Simoun Overpowered planes powered by cute girls kissing each other? In the middle of a war for the existence of their country? Tell me why this shouldn't have been the Anime Of The Millennium. Go on. I dare you. Yet alas that it wasn't. And even worse, many of the issues I had with Simoun could have easily been made less serious. Most serious were the multiple failures in the writing department. First off, don't make your viewers want to access a wiki just to make sense of the terminology. Bugger all naught was actually explained except for in the most obtuse way possible. While excessive exposition is a sign of bad writing, obscuring your exposition and have it explain very little is an even worse problem. Not only that, but if you're going to make one character's motivations revolve around one significant event, then it might just be a good idea to give us some time to get to know the other side of that equation first before you go and drop them in the pot. And the character writing issues go deeper than that. Many characters were simply not understandable by normal means. Side plots that went nowhere walked side-by-side with discussions that flew far beyond the bounds of comprehension. The finale was headshakingly underemphasized and left me wondering if the entire sequence of events was actually worth it. And finally, if you're going to make the big viewership hook something like "cute girls kissing", you could at least make it a bit more... more, if you catch my drift. For the most part, they were about as interesting as watching someone kiss their great-aunt before Christmas dinner. All of this dragged down what could have been an amazing anime. The concept was fascinating. The worldbuilding was amazing all the way across the board with more interesting quirks to the setting in one episode than many anime can manage in an entire season. And when they let it simply happen, the anime as a whole was excellent. Unfortunately, they got far too fancy for their own good. Score: 6/10 Recommendation level: People bored by Sakura Trick Nyoro-n Churuta-san I noticed that there was a single part of the Haruhi series that I hadn't seen. This little short OVA features all the characters we have come to know and love... and then proceeds to shit all over them. With bad artwork and worse animation, it has only a passing resemblance to the original series. And worse, the jokes were awful even for a half-assed 4-koma OVA. Score: 3/10 Recommendation level: "Kyon-kun, denwa..." Download: Namu Amida Butsu wa Ai no Uta This obscure 1992 cyberpunk OVA from Madhouse is practically unheard-of. I actually don't even remember how I twigged onto its existence or even how I decided to watch it. And part of me wishes that I hadn't. Nonsensical situations, awful dialogue, and inane characters make it something that was better off forgotten in the dustbin of history. The only positive thing that I could come up with was that it was a definite flash from the past. With blocky yellow subtitles and massive VHS artifacts all over the place, the only reason to watch this is to see what anime fans from the early-90s had to put up with in order to find new things to watch. Score: 4/10 Recommendation level: Get off my damn lawn. Golden Boy Yet another old OVA for the list, this one was from '95 and was a little bit better than the rest of what I've mentioned so far. But not by much. After dropping out of law school because he had already mastered the entire curriculum, a wandering genius goes through Japan's cities, works various odd jobs, and makes a not-insignificant percentage of the attractive female population fall madly in love with him. Filled with bouncing breasts, implausible situations, and unlikely experiences, Golden Boy is just... okay. I can see why the kids like it so much, because boobs are always a good way to grab a guy's attention. The only actually good episodes were the third one set in a noodle shop and the final one about a struggling animation studio. The rest were simply various degrees of mundane insert fantasy fuel. Score: 6/10 Recommendation level: Hormonal teenage males. In-Progress: Serial Experiments Lain - 5/13 |
| Am I taking over this section again? It looks like I'm taking over this section again... Serial Experiments Lain That was... really damn good, actually. A philosophically heavy title that was surprisingly light on the cyberpunk, Lain did almost everything right. From an almost complete lack of explanation that made people keep guessing to a protagonist who was exceptionally easy to connect with, Lain kept my attention well in hand all the way through. Even its half-episode worth of recap at the start of Layer:10 didn't feel out of place, as they were capable of making it seem almost normal... Well, at least normal for SEL, that is. I did, however, have two problems with it. First, Deus was an awkward BBEG from his first appearance to his last. He wasn't just an awful person but also a really bad character as a whole, and he was much more of a distraction than he was a benefit. Second was the one major infodump. While some points were actually applicable to the plot, many others were not. While throwing in tidbits like the MJ-12 document and the Roswell incident may have seemed like a good idea at the time (I remember that The X-Files was also quite popular in Japan when SEL came out.), they felt way out of place and served as a distraction away from the actual plot points they were trying to reveal in the midst of that massive information aneurysm. I'm just glad that I already had a decent base for all of those references due to my wasted year combing through the archives of The Black Vault when I was in college so I could understand what was being said without having to wind my way through reference after reference for hours. For people without that base, it was probably one of the most mindblowing experiences they've ever had while watching anime. Yet even with those two massive faults, the remainder of SEL was still worth the watch. Score: 8/10 Recommendation level: Old-school mindfuckery Patema Inverted As an interesting movie with an interesting concept, I expected to fully love Patema. The worldbuilding was excellent with one of the more unique premises around. The characters were (mostly) well-written and (mostly) believable. Art and animation were of typical movie standards that it's not exactly notable how excellent it was. Now, one of the problems was that it was fairly predictable. When I can pick out the big reveal at the end from 40 minutes out, that's a sign that the mystery was far too obvious. The other major issue was that there were two very weak characters, and both of them the two grownups that got the most screentime. From Elder with his "We don't tell the children about this huge dangerous thing that could lead to their messy demise in order to protect them!" spiel to Izamura being a boringly stereotypical Evil Bastard straight out of central casting, both of them cast a huge shadow on what could easily have been a better movie. It's still an entertaining way to spend 99 minutes, though. Score: 8/10 Recommendation level: An extra-large tub of buttered popcorn and a big cup of soda. Diabolik Lovers Vampire-filled reverse harems? They suck. While not visually awful, it still suffered from an overload of awful writing. From male protagonists more dense than granite to a female self-insert love interest, this was too inane to even pretend to enjoy. It was almost like the writers took the most generic harem tropes, switched the genders, and thought that simply adding in stunningly attractive undead would be enough to pretend that they did a decent job. And the dialogue was even worse, as hard as that is to imagine. With every male doing the "Grr. Argh. I'm a scary vampire." shtick at every given opportunity and half of the lead female's lines consisting of screams of terror and cries for help, it was a constant repetition of mundane blather... at least until an actual plot staggered out of the crypt and fell flat on its face. While I may have hated absolutely everything else about this one, there was a single bright point in the music. While what was on the screen was meaningless drivel, the soundtrack was very much on-point and disturbingly well-done. That's not nearly enough to make me want to recommend this to anyone, mind you. But it was still prominent enough to mention. Score: 4/10 Recommendation level: Twilight is a better love story. |
| OffCo, Carry on! You are an inspiration to us all. Everyone else just talks about the weather :-) |
| Sorry that I left you here alone, OffColfax :-) I was sick last week and couldn't post here. But I'm much better now and will post my recently watched list sometime during this week. |
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| It's been a while since I posted here, but it won't be a very long one :-P Nagi no Asukara It was on my On Hold list for more than a year. Decided to watch it again thanks to elkensteyin GIF :-) The story follows a life of four middle-school students from underwater city of Shioshishio. After their school has been closed they have to attend to a school on the surface. There they will have to deal with hatred and discrimination... I don't remember why I stopped watching it (most likely some other anime distracted me), but I'm ashamed that I did so. This anime is one the best I've seen so far. Art-style is just mind-blowing with gorgeous backgrounds and so many details, that it's obvious that a lot of efforts were put into making it. And the atmosphere of a world which is pass its golden age, but at the same time looks fairly modern. Animation might not be as great, but neither it is bad and no noticeable drawbacks can be seen (or I didn't noticed any). One might think that with budged constraints they put everything into animation, but it is not true. The soundtrack in this anime is amazing too. Every piece of music is chosen very carefully to strengthen the feels of what is seen. Even the opening and ending are amazing (especially the second opening :-)). This story is split into two parts. The first starts as Slice of Life/School/RomCom mix and gradually changes into drama. The second one is a mix of drama and mystery. It might not be the best/most unique story ever made, but it brings so many emotions that it's unforgettable. And finally the characters, which again might not be the best one I've ever seen, but they are really well-thought, gets enough screen time and development, that one might think they're based on a real-life persons (and maybe they are, who knows). Score: 9/10 Recommendation level: A train to feeladelphia. Gunnm I was looking for some recommendations and this was one of them. As a really short OVA this one is fairly good. The art style at first looks very similar to "Trigun" and might be a bit peculiar, but it fits this anime very well. The soundtrack is not very noticeable, but when it is, it's very good :-) They did a fairly good job with establishing characters and the setting of the world in just two episodes. I'm not the only one who thinks that it will adapt pretty well into full TV series. Score: 8/10 Recommendation level: Definitely worth trying. A Kite A hentai with actual plot and not just "plot". Found it via Youtube channel that I'm following. Animation and art-style are quire good and there is some soundtrack (but not much). The best part are characters and the story. Sawa is a girl you wouldn't want to mess with. And if you would then... well, you are as good as dead. Score: 7/10 Recommendation level: Lots of action, sex and gore. Kite Liberator A sequel to the previous one, this time without hentai (but it's ecchi heavy). It has much better animation, art-style and soundtrack. Too bad that the story and characters are not on the same level. As I read, it was planned to be only the first episode in the series. But it seems unlikely we will ever get continuation... Score: 7/10 Recommendation level: Only if you liked the prequel. Break Blade (TV) Another one recommended by MAL users. In the land of Cruzon people are able to use quartz for whatever purpose they desire. But there is one person, Rygart Arrow, who can't use them. He is a rare case of "un-sorcerer", born one in a million. One day he is summoned to the capital, where he learn that he is the only one who can pilot ancient Golem - a mecha powerful enough to stand against the invading army of Athens. In many aspects this is very typical mecha anime. Main protagonist, who seems powerless, suddenly gains an overpowered mecha (called Golem in this anime) and kicks the ass of the enemies. There is also a main female character, that seems to be in love with our protagonist, but is with another man. No matter how bad the situation might look, the main character always finds a way to win the fight. But not everything is so typical. The conflict is shown from the both sides (something I've seen for the first time, but heard about before). Both sides have a good case to fight for and there is no clear evil side (even though Athens is the invalid force, it's hard to say they are evil). The so called "technical" aspects of this anime are overall good. There are some really impressive animation sequences as well as some backgrounds music, but there are too few of them to give it a higher score. The best part of this anime are the characters, with both sides having unique and believable heroes. Too bad that the story is not as good. If it delved more into politics, the world or characters back-story, it could be a very good anime. Score: 7/10 Recommendation level: Not only for mecha fans. On-deck: Kurokami The Animation. |
mozgowDec 6, 2015 1:36 PM
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Jym said: OffCo, Carry on! You are an inspiration to us all. Everyone else just talks about the weather :-) Well, of course we do. That's what happens when a bunch of old people get together! It's just like a coffee shop. At least ours is staffed with cute bunny girls and pretty boys. Now, for this week's array... Kyou no Asuka Show When I watch shorts, I look for two things. First, that they just pick one or two things and do them well. Second, that they be consistent and carry those all the way through. The good ones manage both; the bad ones can't manage either. Today's Asuka Show at least met my expectations halfway, but only just. Asuka, a beautiful teenage girl, goes around and creates questionable and awkward situations for random people. From tucking her skirt into her underwear to watching couples make out in a park at night, it's a long parade of mildly lewd scenarios and mildly humorous reactions that are occasionally followed by a poignant philosophical comment. Unfortunately, the inconsistency came in the humor. Many episodes, particularly in the beginning, just fell flat. And for a show that relies on its light comedy to carry it, this is a major problem. Score: 6/10 Recommendation level: Lewdness Appreciation Day. And if that's not an official thing, it should be. Nisemonogatari After a gap of a few months, I figured it's time to continue on with the next installment of the Monogatari series. And I quickly realized that it would have been much better if I had cut that timespan down to a few weeks instead, as I had forgotten many of the plot points. But I'm used to being confused when it comes to Monogatari, so I continued on as normal. Karen Bee was kind of a blah arc, to be honest. The pacing was awkward, and the situations made even less sense than normal. Well... at least normal for this series, that is. Going through the harem leads in a breakneck speed didn't help matters much, either. It felt flat, almost like it only existed to set things up for the next arc. And that's no way to run a railroad. Tsubasa Phoenix, on the other hand, was just about right. From the infamous infamous toothbrush scene to the final encounter, it hit its spots and kept on delivering. This arc is exactly where I see why so many people constantly beat the drum of Araaragi and his harem. Score: Karen Bee - 6/10, Tsubasa Phoenix - 9/10, total 8/10. Recommendation level: You already know what you're getting into by this point. Dominion Ah, yes. Time to duck back into the broad selection of cheesy 80s OVAs. This trip down in the annals of mostly-forgotten titles takes us to Dominion Tank Police. Set in a city filled with what is now absurd-looking buildings and absurd stereotypical characters, it's pretty much what we thought the future would look like in the throes of the cyberpunk movement. Dark, dank, and with so much violence that they had to arm the cops with actual tanks, Dominion is one of the most purely 80s anime I can think of. Top it off with a rather poignant commentary on the nature of humanity, and you pretty much have what we all expected out of things back in this era. Unfortunately, the plot blew chunks. It was just absurdity after absurdity layered over senseless violence and inane proclamations for two straight hours, burying whatever positives it may have developed under a pile of steaming rubble. And then driving a tank over it, because that's just how this anime does things. Score: 6/10, but only just barely. Recommendation level: Sure. If you like this kind of thing. On-deck: Seitokai no Ichizon and Battle Angel Alita. |
| Kurokami The Animation I don't remember why I picked this one to watch :-P Ibuki Keita is a high-school student who thinks that he brings misfortune to people close to him. That's why he chose to not get close with anyone. One night he meets a strange girl named Kuro. She tells him about Doppeliner System and Mototsumitama that balances Terra on Earth. Before he could ask more questions the girl is attacked by even more strange man. She defeats the attacker and leaves in a hurry. The next day Keita sees for himself how Doppeliner System works, when neighbour's daughter is killed in car accident. The mysterious girl appears again to explain that this is how the System works and then disappears almost instantly. Thinking that he would never see her again Keita returns home only to find her there... This anime is an almost perfect example how wasted potential looks like. It started really good, with intriguing story, quite good characters, very good animation sequences and very good (or even great) soundtrack. But unfortunately it failed to deliver what it promised. But lets start with good parts. Animation and art-style is good, with some very good (or even great) moments during fighting sequences. Maybe it was too expensive, but it's a shame that such impressive animation was not used more often. But they did a great job changing every ending's animation, something that is not seen very often (openings are also changing, but less often). This is mixed with great soundtrack (especially during fighting) that is the best part of this anime. The overall setting of the story is also good. The Doppeliner System that's based on Doppelgänger myth, Mototsumitama working to balance Terra on Earth, that is a really good mix of real-life and imaginary concepts. And now the bad parts. While the concept might be very good, the execution is not. There are times when pacing of the story is too fast, and others when it is too slow. And it could transfer from "too fast" to "too slow" in just few minutes. Characters, that had much potential at the beginning, are not developed enough. Some other, good characters are almost totally forgotten, to only appear in the last few episodes. And the plot twist that changed the bad guy into the good guy. Such twist is not a bad thing per se, but it should be hinted from the start that the bad guy might not be "bad". Based on the above, the final score shouldn't be too high. But there is one more thing they did right - the ending. Quite unexpected and bitter-sweet too, especially with last few minutes of the final episode. Score: 8/10 (only for great soundtrack and the ending) Recommendation level: If you want to know how wasted potential looks like. Steins;Gate: Kyoukaimenjou no Missing Link - Divide By Zero It was very nostalgic to be back in Steins;Gate world :-) This can be considered as episode 0 for upcoming Steins;Gate 0. And it seems it would show how Okarin came up with the idea for Operation Skuld. Score: 8/10 Recommendation level: El Psy Congroo. Yamada-kun to 7-nin no Majo (OVA) I decided to watch it when I learned that there will be continuation to this short ONA. But I waited way too long to start watching it :-) The story centres itself around cultural festival and the grand price for the first place in performance competition. Supernatural Studies Club has to come up with the idea what to do to win this competition... I enjoyed watching this short OVA. There were some scenes where I laughed out loud, but there were also other that I found to be very cliché. Animation was good and so was soundtrack (yes, there is soundtrack in this short OVA :-)). It's too short to say much about characters, but they seemed to be well-thought. The story was quite good (with the exception of some cliché moments). Overall a good, enjoyable, short OVA. Score: 7/10 Recommendation level: Worth the time you need to watch it. On-deck: Yamada-kun to 7-nin no Majo (TV) |
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| No long spiel this week, as I've got a hole in my jaw and a killer headache. Gunnm Good enough to be interesting, but not nearly long enough to be satisfying. This would have been well served with a full series instead of just a two-episode OVA. Score: 7/10 Recommendation level: Old-school awesomeness. Haruwo What could almost have been an interesting short got dragged into an alley and beat to death by bad art and worse animation. Score: 3/10 Recommendation level: I wouldn't. Seitokai no Ichizon Think GJ-bu with cruder humor, and you won't be that far off. Kinda trailed off at the end, presumably in expectation of a second season. (And, for a change, the second season actually came.) It wasn't anything that special, though. Score: 7/10 Recommendation level: Fans of perverted MCs. On-deck: Lucky Star. Moe is a perfect prescription for dental surgery. |
| Wall of text incoming. You have been warned :-) Yamada-kun to 7-nin no Majo (TV) This is another version of Yamada-kun to 7-nin no Majo adaptation :-) When I started watching it I expected that it would be better than two episode OVA. And first few episodes gave hope that it would be so. But later the story was rushed a bit too much and the charm was gone. Each new character got only one episode and no further development. Even the very good ending doesn't change my opinion that the pacing of the story was way too fast. If it wasn't, it could easily be an anime with a score of 8 (or even more). But it is not a bad anime. Animation and art-style is quite good, with few very impressive animation sequences. Soundtrack is not bad either, with the opening being quite catchy. Because story is so rushed only the main cast gets enough screen time and some development. The story is not bad, but had potential to be much better. The only good part about it is that gags are overall funny with few of them being really hilarious. Score: 7/10 Recommendation level: Enjoyable to watch. Nothing more, nothing less. 1+2=Paradise I was looking for something short to watch and this was first entry on my PTW list :-) Yuusuke is afraid of women. To such point he has nightmares about them. To make everything even worse, he is supposed to succeed his father as renowned gynaecologist. To overcome his irrational fear of women his father invites twin sisters Yuka and Rika... This anime is ecchi heavy and I wouldn't be surprised if it was tagged as hentai. Animation and art-style is not what the best quality of the '90s can offer. It's not bad but it's noticeable that it aged a lot. Soundtrack is minimal to say the least. Characters are well introduced and there is some development, but how many things can you put into two episodes? The only good part of the story are the gags. The rest is just too absurd to make a real story out of it. Score: 6/10 Recommendation level: A grey zone between ecchi and hentai. Subete ga F ni Naru: The Perfect Insider First anime from fall 2015 that finished airing. Magata Shiki is a genius that has been living in isolation at a research facility since she was a girl. Nagono University professor Saikawa Sōhei and Nishinosono Moe wish to meet Shiki in person. They visit the facility but instead of meeting her they get caught up in a murderous game. Animation and art-style in this anime are something that some will like and others will not (especially the art-style :-)) and it uses one of the best 3D-animation I've seen in anime (one can distinguish between 2D and 3D, but the 3D parts are well blended with 2D). And I should make a separate mention for opening and ending animations, which are very good and really unique. And they match the opening and ending songs pretty well. But songs are not the only good part in the "sound department" :-) Soundtrack is also very good, as are sound effects and voice acting (with the exception of some engrish part). The thing that this anime shine the most are characters and the story. Nishinosono and Saikawa-sensei are the two main characters that have the most screen time and development. They have some "complicated" relationship and the chemistry between them, which is really good and unique, is something one would like to see more often in any anime. The third main character, Magata Shiki, is one of the most unique character I've seen in a long time. From common sense point of view she could be seen as both genius and insane person. But the show presents her inner thoughts and reasoning, so it's not so obvious if she's an insane person or not. And finally the story. An impossible murder case - something that based on available information should never happen. But when bits and pieces of information are gathered together, mystery will be slowly solved. And one more thing I should mention. This is the first anime I've seen that talks about IT stuff without typical bullshit seen in other anime or TV shows. Score: 9/10 Recommendation level: For those in need of intellectual game. Dragon Ball GT: Goku Gaiden! Yuuki no Akashi wa Suushinchuu Once again I was looking for something short on my PTW list :-) The story is set 100 years after the end of DB GT. The story follows Goku Jr., a great-great-grandson of Son Goku. At first it seems that he has nothing in common with Goku, but when his grandma gets sick, he embark on a quest to find mythical dragon ball... There was nothing really good or really bad in this GT special. Probably I would like it more if it showed what happened to the original heroes of DB in the last 100 years. Score: 6/10 Recommendation level: Only for die-hard fans of Dragon Ball. Tamayura Yet another short from my PTW list. As for really short anime (four episodes of 18 minutes each) this one is really good. Animation and soundtrack is very good, each of the four main girls gets proper introduction and the story is not bad either (could be better but I can't complain). And the best part is that it's relaxing as hell :-) I wasn't so relaxed while watching anime since Aria. Score: 8/10 Recommendation level: Just watch and relax. Gakusen Toshi Asterisk Ayato arrived at Rikka at the invitation of the Student Council President of the Seidoukan Academy, Claudia, and right after that he incurred the wrath of the "Petalblaze Witch" Julis, and ended up having to duel her. It starts very typical for Action/Comedy/Harem/Ecchi/Supernatural genre mix. But every now and then there are hints that the presented world is not so perfect as it seems. Other academies have some dark secrets and/or use some dirty tricks to achieve their goals. And there seems to be a dire cost for the use of supernatural powers. Animation and art-style is overall very good. There are some very impressive animation sequences, but not many enough to give it a higher score. Soundtrack is also good, with opening and ending songs being very good. The weakest part of this anime are characters and partially story. The two main characters are good. Their feelings and thoughts are well explained and they get some development. Too bad that the MC is the stereotypical, indecisive type. The supportive cast is also good but they would be much better if they could get more screen time. And finally the story. When I noticed that there is something hidden beneath the surface, I expected it would delve more into it. Well, it didn't, but I hope it will in the second season. Score: 7/10 Recommendation level: If you looking for good Action/Comedy/Harem/Ecchi/Supernatural mix. Rakudai Kishi no Cavalry Kurogane Ikki goes to a school for Magic Knights, a modern magic-users, who fight with magical weapons born from their souls. But he is the "Failed Knight" or "Worst One", because he has no magical skills. However, one day, he is challenged to a duel by Stella, a foreign princess and the "Number One" student. In this duel, "the loser must be obedient for life.". One could say that this is a doppelgänger for "Gakusen Toshi Asterisk". It might be so but only on a first glance. It has the same concept of students fighting with magic/superpowers, with Action/Comedy/Harem/Ecchi mix, but it is all that there is in common. The main character is not the indecisive archetype from every harem anime and there is actual romance with development. And the main girl isn't a weak, fragile one, that need to be protected. The supportive cast is really good with almost every single character being unique and well presented. Animation is very good and art-style is overall good, with the exception of the last two episodes, where it is IMO great. Soundtrack is nothing really special, but opening and ending songs are great (along with OP and ED animation sequences). And finally the best part IMO - the story. It might be not the most unique one, but it's presented in a very good way. There are action packed moments and there are some almost SoL type ones. Based on the OP animation I expected it to be a bit dark. And it did so in the last two episodes. Prior to that point it was really enjoyable RomCom/Harem/Ecchi mix. Score: 8/10 Recommendation level: How Harem/Ecchi anime should look like. On-deck: Tamayura: Hitotose. |
mozgowDec 19, 2015 1:11 PM
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| This one will be a short one :-) Komori-san wa Kotowarenai! Picked this from fall season based only on PV :-) Komori Shuri is a girl who can't decline if someone ask her for help... This was an enjoyable short anime to watch. Good animation, some soundtrack, nice characters and quite good story. I could be better but I wouldn't say I'm disappointed :-) Score: 6/10 Recommendation level: You need only 30 minutes to watch all episodes. Majokko Shimai no Yoyo to Nene I don't remember why or when I added it to my PTW list. I picked it to watch because my family in southern Poland still has too slow internet to watch HD streams. Yoyo and Nene are working as "noroiya" to lift curses in fantasy world. One day a big tree with buildings, that looks like from our world, appear near their house. Yoyo goes to explore the tree and suddenly is transported to our world... Animation and art-style in this anime are simply great, with good use of 3D animation (that looks really impressive). And the art-style is a bit different between fantasy world and our world. The soundtrack is not bad either with some really impressive parts in the finale. Too bad that those are only great parts of this anime. Characters and story are good at best. I would say that from the main cast only Yoyo is a very good character, with enough screen time and some character development. I can't say the rest are bad, but they do not have screen time they should have. Score: 8/10 Recommendation level: Great movie for kids. Adults will also enjoy watching it. Momo e no Tegami Yet another one I don't know how I added it to my PTW list. Momo is a young girl who grew up in a big city. However, following the premature loss of her father, she has to move with her mother to the old family house on a remote island. There she will encounter some unusual phenomena... Comparing it to "Magical Sisters Yoyo & Nene"" animation and art-style are a bit weaker. But this is still a very good animation. Soundtrack is not very noticeable but it is there and it is a good one. And the best part of this anime are characters and the story. The main character, Momo, is the only one with real development but it is not a bad thing. The story centres around her so it's a good thing to see her more often than any other character. Score: 8/10 Recommendation level: Another great movie for kids that adults will also enjoy. On-deck: Tamayura: Hitotose. |
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| Am I taking over this thread? Miyori no Mori Yet another movie on my completed list :-) Mashima Miyori is an 11-year-old girl that has to move to her grandma's house in the countryside. She doesn't like the idea of living in the old, uncivilized village. But everything starts to change when she enters old, mysterious forest... Animation and art-style are very good and at some parts even great. It might not be the best animation ever, but it's obvious a lot of effort were put into making it (different hair styles of main character are really impressive). The soundtrack and voice acting is also great, with some parts bringing memories of old Ghibli movies. There is only one main character and a bunch of supporting ones. The supportive cast might not have a lot of screen time, but most of them are well-presented and feels like a real people. The best if of course the main heroine with real development and realistic change. Too bad that the story is not as great (but it's not bad) and would work better IMO if it was a bit longer or started later in the story. Score: 8/10 Recommendation level: A hidden gem. Hana to Alice: Satsujin Jiken Arisugawa Tetsuko moves to new house and new school. There she soon learns about mysterious local urban legend. She decides to learn the truth behind it and tries to find the ones involved in the original story. Animation and art-style is unique and a bit peculiar, that some will not like (I personally love it :-)). At first glance it might not seem anything special, but the more you watch the better it is. And it fits the concept of urban legend mystery almost perfectly. Same goes for soundtrack - it might seems that there is none, while actually there is one and a very good one too. And finally the best part - characters and the story. All the characters (and not only two main) behaves as real people. Teenagers, teachers, parents - everyone acts as one would think they would act (I was impressed the most by how well they presented the character of teenage girls). And the story shows us how and why urban legends are born. Score: 9/10 Recommendation level: How urban legends are born. On-deck: Tamayura: Hitotose (I hope to finish it next week :-)). |
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| It's been a while, but there's a good reason for that. I put most of my backlog clearing on-hold until I had gotten done with the currently airing shows. After all, it would have been embarrassing for me to admit in the future that Miss Monochrome 3 was one of my milestone completions. Right? Right. So with that being said... Lovely Complex 700th Completed MAL Entry We all know what it's like by now. We see a bog-standard romance anime that features a bog-standard male main character that is approximately as dense as a neutron star. And we all sit there and shake our head at his idiocy, and wonder why Best Girl bothers to still be interested in such a moron. Yet LoveCom is different, as it gives us this view from the other side of the equation. We get to see exactly why the girl is being so stubborn about a guy, and the things she's willing to go through in order to follow through with her desires. And this is why I like shoujo romance anime. They don't need a lot of frills in order to spice up the story, so one can avoid the whole "ecchi-harem-combat-tournament" scenario entirely. The relationships feel more like two actual people getting together and less like the usual MC-wins-day-and-wins-life-sheerly-by-accident like the boys' anime will give you, with dramas and trials more fitting of an actual set of teenagers and less an escapist fantasy. The first few episodes were fairly hard to get through and it felt more like they were struggling to get going as a production, though I understand that to be a limitation of the source material as well. While the art and animation weren't all that special, they really didn't need to be such. For what was there, it did a great job at conveying everything in a simple and understandable manner. And for an almost-9 year old title, it held up fairly well on a HD display. The main characters and the major supporting cast were amazingly relatable, with only a couple of side characters being notably obnoxious. (Which, of course, they were meant to be.) While it doesn't place on the top of my shoujo romance charts, I do consider it in the same general area as Ore Monogatari!!: not the greatest but still in the lead pack. And for me, that's a damn nice place to put an anime. Score: 9/10 Recommendation level: People who love to fall in love. Lucky☆Star All throughout Lucky☆Star, I had a constant thought in the back of my mind; that, of all the 4-koma adaptations I've seen, this has to be the least remarkable of the list. It felt more like a poor-man's Azumanga Daioh than it did a normal KyoAni production. The humor was always off by a little bit, the jokes always fell just a bit flat, the personalities were always just a bit muted, and the situations just a bit more unnecessarily awkward. I think part of the problem is that I've seen some great 4-koma adaptations already. Titles like Azumanga Daioh, K-ON!, Gekkan Shoujo Nozaki-kun, and SYD are among my favorites. So I know what to expect from this type of adaptation. Yet Lucky☆Star kept on not delivering time and time again to the point where it felt more like I was watching an episode of Saturday Night Live than something that is supposed to be funny. And just like SNL, the only part of Lucky☆Star that was consistently funny was the Lucky Channel bit when two characters sat at a desk and talked to the camera. Everything else was hit-or-miss. Though I will say... That opening? It's taken the prize for What The Hell Are Those Lyrics Again away from the former title-holder of Excel Saga. 'Cause that song made absolutely zero sense. And the EDs are just as awkwardly weird, particularly in the second half. Score: barely 7/10 Recommendation level: Eat your heart out, Lorne Michaels! On-deck: Heroic Age |
| My last post in this thread was October 19? Geez, what happened to me? Well, this isn't comprehensive, but here are some highlights from what I've finished in the last couple of months, at least: Girls und Panzer Bought this blind because the RightStuf Holiday Sale had it for a good price, and I enjoyed the hell out of it. It's cute girls, it's tanks, it moves at a good pace and it's a whole lot of fun. Not a show that needs a ton of analysis, but for pure entertainment value it's as good as anything I've seen lately. 3 stars out of 4 Magical Witch Punie-chan I reviewed this for my Short Anime Spotlight column a while back, and enjoyed it so much that I also bought it during the RSHS. Also written and directed by the director of Girls und Panzer - and Prison School - Punie-chan is both a savagely funny black comedy and a great parody of magical princess anime. If you enjoy any kind of anime comedies along the lines of Bludgeoning Angel Dokuro-chan, Excel Saga, or the next one below this, then do yourself a favor and don't miss this OVA. It's only four episodes, so it's a nice quick watch. 3 1/2 stars out of 4 Hacka Doll This was my favorite fall series out of the ones I've finished so far (note: I have not finished OPM yet, so put your pitchforks away). Since the series is supposed to be promoting a mobile app, I was expecting the usual bland product tie-in anime. Instead it turned out to be a really sharp and energetic parody series. It sends up one otaku subculture after another, from doujin artists to MMORPG gamers to idol fans, while riffing on a ton of anime both classic and recent along the way. This is another series that was a lot of fun, and with episodes that are only 8 minutes long it moves at a really brisk pace. 3 stars out of 4 Non Non Biyori When I needed a recommendation from someone to complete one of the 2015 MAL Anime Watching Challenge categories, the person I asked gave me this. I sent him a thank you note afterward. NNB is very well made, and while it's not my favorite "relaxing" series that I've seen, I did enjoy it, and will probably watch Repeat eventually too. My favorite character was definitely Renge - I loved her unique way of looking at the world, and every scene with her and Candy Store together was priceless. 3 stars out of 4 Hyouka My personal top tier of favorite anime went from a Top Ten to an Elite Eleven earlier this year. Now that I've seen Hyouka I may have to expand that again to a Dandy Dozen. It's a show that's hard to do justice in a blurb, because it has so much in it to unpack. It's a slice of life, it's a mystery series, it's a light drama, it's all of those genres. It's about life: growing up, finding a place in the world, accepting obligations, and dealing with the expectations of others. It's about learning to take responsibility for the things you can control and doing your best with the things you can't. It's a story beautifully animated and wonderfully told. Hyouka is all those things, and more. I enjoyed every single minute of it, and now I'm really sad that there's no North American license, because I would buy it without a second thought. 4 stars out of 4 |
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| Wall of text incoming :D Mardock Scramble: The First Compression Mardock Scramble: The Second Combustion Mardock Scramble: The Third Exhaust I was looking for something short to watch. Well, it didn't go as planned and I ended watching three movies one hour long each. Starting from good parts, animation and art-style are very good with some parts being really amazing (e.g. Casino or reflections in general). Same goes for soundtrack which I could say is even great. Characters are overall good with some being very good or great (like Rune Balot - the MC) and some being not so good (like Dr. Easter). Same goes for story. There are some great parts (e.g. in Casino IMO or cyberpunk setting) and some quite weak. Despite all the flaws it was very enjoyable trilogy to watch. Score: 8/10 Recommendation level: Worth a try. Onsen Yousei Hakone-chan I picked it quite late in the fall season (saw recommendation on Crunchyroll) but it was a pleasant to watch. Nothing really bad or outstanding but it made me laugh way more often than I thought it would. Score: 6/10 Recommendation level: Worst case scenario: you wasted 45 minutes of your life. Sakurako-san no Ashimoto ni wa Shitai ga Umatteiru I don't remember why I picked it from fall season :D Tatewaki Shoutarou, a high schooler living in Asahikawa City, Hokkaido, meets Kujou Sakurako, a bone-loving ojou-san who has an ability to analyse specimen. Because of meeting her, he has to accompany her to various cases. This anime had potential to be really great but unfortunately failed to do so. First few episode gave hope for great mystery solving anime: amazing backgrounds and very good animation (with the exception of some CGI parts), very good soundtrack and voice acting and really intriguing characters. Unfortunately the story was episodic with little to no character development. Only the last few episodes connected the cases shown in previous episodes, but it was no enough to change the overall feel. If there will be a second season, I hope they do a continuous story with actual character development. Score: 8/10 Recommendation level: For Scooby-Doo fans. Ore ga Ojousama Gakkou ni "Shomin Sample" Toshite Gets♥Sareta Ken Yet another typical harem/ecchi anmime but done really well. Animation and art-style are very good with quite few really amazing parts. To my surprise there was actual soundtrack, something I haven't seen in harem/ecchi anime in a long time. The weakest part were character and the story, but I expected it to not be so good in this department :-) Score: 7/10 Recommendation level: Well made harem/ecchi anime. Aki-Sora I don't know how it ended on my PTW list but I picked it because it was short :-) Well, where to start. I thought that 1+2=Paradise was a grey zone between ecchi and hentai. Well, I was wrong. Really, really wrong. The only reason that Aki-Sora is not tagged as hentai is that there are no genitals shown. Otherwise it has everything one would see in every other hentai anime. If there was no incest, it would be a quite good ecchi/hentai. Score: 6/10 Recommendation level: Hentai and ecchi anime are the same :-P Golden Time Watched it by a request from a friend (to share my opinion afterwards). Oh, and it was my 300th completed anime :-) Tada Banri is a first-year student at private law school in Tokyo. During his freshman orientation he encounters another freshman from the same school, Yanagisawa Mitsuo, and they hit it off at once. On their way to the first lecture, they meet the self-proclaimed Yanagisawa's girlfriend... Watching this anime was an unforgettable experience. It starts as a great comedy (the "offering" to the tea club made me laugh till tears) and later changes to a mix of romance and slice of life. And there is also a bit of drama near the end. Characters and relationship between them are simply great (I especially liked Koko and Miss Ultrasonic "friendship" :-)). The progress of romance and friendship is presented brilliantly. And there is actual character development, with Koko being the one that changes the most - and it's a believable change (I can't add more to not spoil it). And I can't say a bad thing about animation, art-style or soundtrack (the second opening is especially great - I still can't get it out of my head :-)). Score: 9/10 Recommendation level: Yes. Aki-Sora: Yume no Naka Continuation of "Aki-Sora". It's as disturbing as prequel, this time with added twincest. I have to admit that animation and art-style in this one are very, very good. Score: 7/10 Recommendation level: Ecchi with twincest. Je T'aime Emotions. This short anime bring out emotions some might forgot they had them. It's a story about a dog wandering around deserted city. It sounds simple and it is simple, but it is very emotional. Score: 7/10 Recommendation level: For those who have (or had) a dog. Tamayura: Hitotose Finally completed it :-) This anime was relaxing as hell :-) It's truly a great successor to Aria series. Watch few episodes of it and all stress goes away :-) But it wouldn't be such good anime if it had only "relaxing properties". It has very good, detailed animation and amazing art-style (some of the backgrounds are mind-blowing). What impressed me the most was the fact that they used real camera (Rollei 35 S), and presented it with great details. If it wasn't enough, the soundtrack is amazing too. The opening and ending songs are beautiful, and there are also insert songs during the episode (not in every episode but in quite many). If it still wasn't enough, there is a great cast of main characters. There is Sawatari Fuu - a bit insecure girl that likes taking photos with her dad's camera, a very cheerful and energetic Okazaki Norie, a very shy Sakurada Maon that whistles when she is too shy to say something and the most normally looking one - Hanawa Kaoru. The weakest part might be the story, but it didn't bother me at all - the healing aspects of this anime were more than enough to balance that. Score: 9/10 Recommendation level: Probably only for Aria fans. Tamayura: Hitotose - Attakai Kaze no Omoide, Nanode I don't know if there is anything I can add, that I didn't already write for the main series. Score: 8/10 Recommendation level: A must if you watched the main series. On-deck: Something for my 2016 Anime Watching Challenge. |
mozgowJan 10, 2016 11:14 PM
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| Noragami Aragoto: Second seasons should be easy to plan: more of what worked and less of what didn’t, further development of reoccurring characters and introduction of new ones, a story that flows naturally from where it left off along with a few surprises here and there to keep things fresh and interesting. Noragami Aragoto does all that and does it really well to boot. Yet some of its charm and a gook chunk of its exuberance got lost somewhere along the way. Noragami grew up, but its newfound respectability (read increased depth of drama) made it feel dull and over-serious at times. It seems a third season might be forthcoming. I’m not sure if I’ll be on board for that. 6/10. Wakako-zake: Wakako is a strong woman: not only is she single and still working at the ripe old age of 26 (her parents must be worried sick!) but she has no qualms going out to eat on her own. And Wakako knows what she likes: good food and the perfect booze to go with it. In a weird way, this is one of the most feminist shows I’ve ever watched. The beauty of it all though, is that it never makes a point of it. What you get are 12 episodes clocking in at barely 2 minutes, 12 dishes complete with drinks pairing, 12 little bubbles of bliss at the end of a long day, 12 reminders that it often doesn’t take much to make yourself happy. 7/10 Kekkai Sensen: If the people involved in making a show truly care about it, chances are I’m bound to feel the same way. Delaying the last episode because you don’t have the bandwidth to do your project justice, and then delaying it some more because you decided that nothing less then a double-length episode would do and you can’t line-up the Japanese TV stations to air it together is pretty gutsy. But then, everything about this show is gusty. And altogether quite crazy. This is the first time I ended-up watching each episode at least three times before the next one aired. If you’ve ever been in a foreign city and decided to just hit the streets to soak it all up, getting back to your hotel room as daylight broke feeling exhausted and elated and confused and so very very glad to be alive, then you know exactly how I feel about this show. Focus on the journey rather than the destination and you’ll be gold. 9/10 |
| Heroic Age The watchword for this would be inconsistent. It has occasionally interesting characters mixed in with naked trope machines, occasionally interesting art and animation mixed with awkward blocky CGI, occasionally interesting plot points mixed in with dumbed-down scenarios, and occasionally interesting worldbuilding mixed in with Just Another Combat Shounen blandness. And it is those last two points that are significant, as Heroic Age was originally published in a seinen magazine. It was these problems that kept it from being a strong anime, but it still had a few things going for it. It took all of its negatives, added them together, and came out with something that was still entertaining in spite of itself. And in the final tally, that's a lot more important to me than any number of failings. Score: 7/10 Recommendation level: Fans of overpowered mecha shows and cheesy space operas. Bikini Warriors Ummm... No. This was awful. A cheap fanservice vehicle from start to stop, there was absolutely nothing worthwhile to be found here. Bland characterizations, awful jokes trying to invoke role-playing games, and far too much emphasis on ecchi at the expense of absolutely everything else, it wasn't even worth the four-minute running time. It was actually insulting how awful this was. Score: 3/10 Recommendation level: Just watch hentai instead. Okusama ga Seitokaicho! On the advise of my attorney, I refuse to answer this question as it may be used against me in a court of law. Score: 5/10 Recommendation level: Lewd. On-deck: Joshiraku and Maria-sama ga Miteru |
| 100-man-nen Chikyuu no Tabi: Bander Book #1 anime for my 2016 Anime Watching Challenge Well, it wasn't as bad as I expected it to be. Only the art-style was a bit odd for me, and I can say I didn't liked it. The rest was just fine. Animation had some impressive moments (like camera changing focus) but also had many reused frames (which was very noticeable). Soundtrack was good, but the transition between scenes ended the music too abruptly. Characters and story-wise it wasn't anything special, but it was enjoyable to watch. Score: 6/10 Recommendation level: Probably only for old anime fans. Dai Mahou Touge Recommended by WingKing in his short anime spotlight. This was a strange anime to watch. It was mahō shōjo, with cute girls doing cute things, and at the same time it wasn't, with seriousness and dark humour. And I can't say which side of it I liked more :-) Animation and soundtrack are good (I liked the opening animation and song). Characters were enjoyable to watch and the overall story was quite good. I think it would work even better if it was a longer, with more time for characters to shine and for story to develop. Score: 7/10 Recommendation level: Not only for magical girl fans :-) Maabou no Kinoshita Toukichirou #2 anime for the challenge This was... hmm... interesting experience. If I lived in that era, I would probably be amazed by this anime. But it's hard to not compare it to more recent one, even from the '70s, and the comparison doesn't look good for it. But I wouldn't say I regret watching it. I think everyone should watch it, to see how much anime industry improved over the years. Score: 6/10 Recommendation level: History lesson about anime industry. Shinigami no Ballad I don't remember why I added this one to my PTW list :-P I'm 100% certain that I watched first episode of this series before*. I might be as long ago as in 2007 or even 2006. I don't know why I didn't watched the rest, as I enjoyed it a lot. Animation and art-style is quite good and really pleasant to watch. Soundtrack is also good, with the opening being very good (IMO :-)). And what I liked the most in the "sound department", was Momo's voice :-) (I think I might have some kind of weird fetish for this kind of voice :D). What I found to be the most appealing, was the story. Each episode is a separate one, connected only by the "main" character - Momo. Each tells a story about someone who is not satisfied with his/her life and how he/she changes it for better. And a final word about Momo. She is supposedly the main character, but in each episode she plays a supportive role. It might sound strange, but that's how it is :-) But why is it so short? I would love to see more! * - I'm certain that I saw the opening animation before and I knew almost exactly what would happen in this episode. Score: 8/10 Recommendation level: Probably not for everyone, but worth a try. Ongaku Shoujo Yet another anime for my challenge. Lord Vivid Colors would be proud of this anime. Everything looks cute and sweet and cute girls are doing cute things. Well... almost :-) There are cute girls and they are doing cute things, but there is more than that. This is also a story about how accidental meeting could change life forever. Too bad that it was so short, as the ending felt rushed a bit. I think (and I hope I'm not the only one) that it would work great as a normal length series. Score: 7/10 Recommendation level: Worth your time. Shakugan no Shana III (Final) It has been on my On Hold list for a very long time (since May, 2013). Finally watched it as part of my anime watching challenge. It was a very good final season for the series. Animation and art-style might not be anything special, but soundtrack, characters and the story are. Starting from the soundtrack, opening and ending songs are really good, and there are really impressive insert songs in quite many episodes. Background music in not bad either, with few really amazing tracks. From the characters the best is of course Shana, who has best character development in the series, and Yuji, who plays a very special role :-) The story starts with a huge plot twist and ends in quite unexpected way (well, everything makes sense, but it's not the ending many would predict). Score: 8/10 Recommendation level: If you watched previous season you should definitely watch this. On-deck: Mirai Nikki (TV). |
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| Joshiraku Normally, comedy titles aren't supposed to be difficult. You're supposed to be able to go in, laugh your ass off to a few straight jokes, and move on. Unfortunately, Joshiraku kept throwing curveballs at us. Set mostly in a dressing room at a rakugo theater, (Yes, the same type of thing that is featured in the currently-airing Shouwa Genroku Rakugo Shinjuu.) Joshiraku features five girls sitting around and making needless conversation. And that's the general thrust of the thing. The main characters are just vehicles for the jokes with very little substance behind them. And the jokes range from "That was too fucking funny!" to "Hold on, lemme pause this so I can wiki that guy and try to figure out what they were talking about. Then I can decide if it was funny." The latter of which, of course, tends to take so long that you miss out on the joke completely. This is a title that is great for the native crowd, but much less so for us foreigners. Some of the references are relatively simple, such as the spot-on K-ON! parody moment, but others were far too complex for me to get. It's also an anime where you find a lot of obscure wordplay that gets filtered out in the translation, at least without extensive Translator Notes stuck in on a regular basis. And it's that part where this title loses out. Score: 6/10 Recommendation level: Fans of Lucky Star, and those who liked Seitokai Yakuindomo but got tired of the blue humor. Maria-sama ga Miteru It had been a while since I had seen a decent shoujo-ai story, and MariMite seemed like it would be right in the middle of my interest zone. Set in an exclusive Catholic school and filled with beautiful young maidens destined to explore their own hearts, it is a title rich with small details that help to decorate the world as a whole. Now, this isn't a lurid story by any stretch of the imagination. It's not anything like Sakura Trick with its blatant displays and adorable fluffiness (and definitely no breakdowns of the basic forces of physics). MariMite is a much more nuanced story than that, as blatant physical displays of affection are uncommon. Instead, it is a story of simple love and adoration shown by small gestures and tender moments. And in those moments, this was beautiful. The characters were fairly symbolic of the age progression throughout high school and are ideal images of their expected maturity levels. The three third-year girls were exceptionally self-assured and comfortable with their roles in the group though two of them were not well featured in the anime, leaving me to assume their background was either cut or was moved to the second part of the split-cour title. While one of the second-year girls vastly outshown the other due to her being one of the main foci of the story, the other was not lacking in screen presence in the meantime. And of the three first-year girls, two are exceptional examples of the breed while the other is... not really. But that's okay, as that one was the main character. Suffering from a lot of shoujo Main Character Syndrome symptoms, Yumi does remain above the mere self-insert character trope but not by all that much. This was not all beauty and bubbles, as there were a couple of problems that nagged on me. First was the date episode at the very end. It felt more like something that should have been in the middle of the show rather than hanging out at the end of the cour. Naturally this was a split-cour show, so I'll wait until next week before deciding whether or not it was a fatal error. But on an entry-by-entry basis, it fell significantly flat. The second problem was that the revelation about Sei's backstory came at an awkward time that broke up the flow of the episodes. It would have been better served to come either before the Valentine's Day scenario got started or afterward so that it came at the very end of the season. As it was, it was a bit jarring to come back to planning for a date after having those very heavy episodes, and I didn't easily recover from the change of mood. Still really damn good, and I reserve the right to upgrade my rating after I watch the second cour. Score: 7/10 Recommendation level: There is nothing so wonderful than the smile of a girl in love. On-deck: Maria-sama ga Miteru Haru. And I'm going to need something a bit lighter than this afterward, so maybe I'll get around to Nurse Witch Komugi-chan Magikarte. Or maybe just Amazing Nurse Nanako. Or maybe something else cheesy and smutty like Kemeko Deluxe. It's still up in the air. |
| Akagami no Shirayuki-hime: Nandemonai Takaramono, Kono Page I waited a long time to finally watch this :-) It was equally good as the main series. Backgrounds are amazing as always, animation is smooth, soundtrack is also great and the characters are the same. The story is mostly a date between Zen and Shirayuki, but it was really enjoyable to watch. Score: 8/10 Recommendation level: A must for Shirayuki fans. Mirai Nikki (TV) I knew about this anime for a long time (probably since I joined MAL) as being the one with the best yandere girl. So I watched it as part of my challenge. What would you do if you had a diary that could predict the future? How would you use it? And what if there is a high price for using it? Watch Amano Yukiteru as he is about to learn the answers to all those questions. When I started watching it I already knew that Yuno is one of the most psychopathic, yandere girl ever and that she has the future diary (some spoilers in top 10 youtube video :-)). So I expected it to be a story about her and her attempts to change future. Partially it was, but for the rest of time it was a story about human desires and how far one would go to fulfill them or how much one would sacrifice to do so. It could be even greater if it were longer, with each character having more time to develop and the viewer to feel for them. Only the two main characters, and a few of supportive ones, got such chance, so they could shine a lot in this series. Yuno was, at the same time, crazy and adorable (I know it might seem weird but that how it is :-P). Yukki, for most of the time, was annoying as hell but later developed a lot and I even liked him at the end. From the supportive cast I liked Uryū Minene the most. At first I thought she would be just a random antagonist, but when I learned more about her, I started to like her a lot :-) Animation is overall very good with few really amazing parts. Soundtrack is much better with opening and ending songs being especially great. As elaborated above, characters and the story are the best part of this anime :-) Score: 9/10 Recommendation level: How far would you go to fulfill your wish? Mirai Nikki Redial The ending of the main series left a lot of unanswered questions. This was supposed to answer them all :-) And in fact it answered a lot of them :-) Some parts I really liked, others not so much. And the ending felt a bit out of place. Nonetheless it was enjoyable to watch. Score: 7/10 Recommendation level: Probably only if you liked the main series. Gekkan Shoujo Nozaki-kun After Mirai Nikki I wanted something lighter, so I picked this from my challenge list. I knew it was a comedy but I didn't expected it to be so great at it. It started very typically for comedy, but with each introduced character it got better and better. Each character has his (or her) own quirks, is unique and likeable. There wasn't a single one in the seven main ones that I didn't liked. Their interactions and their reactions were something I absolutely loved in this anime. Although there is little to the story, it didn't bother me at all as the characters made up for that. Animation is overall very good, with some parts being better and some weaker. Soundtrack is also very good, with some scenes having perfectly chosen background music. Score: 9/10 Recommendation level: Just watch and laugh. Gekkan Shoujo Nozaki-kun Specials It's titled as a specials, but it's more like a direct continuation of the last episode from the main series. And it has a good dose o very good gags, that made me laugh more often than I thought it would. Score: 8/10 Recommendation level: If you liked main series, you would like this too. On-deck: Kill la Kill. |
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| Maria-sama ga Miteru: Haru With the last season starting off so well and ending so not-quite well, I expected it to just flow in from where MariMite last left off. Fortunately, it did. That let me enjoy some more repressed lesbian love stories before the inevitable. With scenes ranging from the adorable to the adorkable, the graduation episodes were all I could hope for. With the new year comes new students, and Shimako found a wonderful and beautiful soul to join her in the White Roses. Unfortunately Sachiko and Yumi didn't do quite so well, as Sachiko's cousin embodied everything bad about the second half of the second season. All in all, it still proved a good anime. And I will one day continue to walk slowly through the garden at Lilian. Score: 7/10 Recommendation level: Those who love to love. Kemeko Deluxe! Wow... What can I say but... Who the fuck thought this was a good idea? No, seriously. I want to find them in a dark alley and beat a thesaurus into them. And if that isn't enough, I'll use some other dinosaur and keep working on it. What could have been halfway decent with maybe one or two of its parts became unweildy and inane with all of them lumped together. As it stands now, it is barely useful for 12-year-olds whose voices haven't cracked yet. The humor is base and disturbing. The characters are flat and boring. The plot revolves around the *plot*. The MC acted like it was developed specifically to serve as a self-insert character in a a first-year in junior high's masturbatory fantasy. And even worse than all of that put together, they dared to pull out the cliffhanger ending! They didn't just try to bring it to a full stop, regardless of how little sense it made. (It's not like anyone would have noticed, as absolutely nothing made sense to begin with!) But no, they couldn't resist the urge to throw in a surprise manga-bait ending just to make absolutely sure that every box on the critics-hate-it-kids-love-it checklist was properly ticked. Gods know that I'm properly ticked off after that one... Score: 2/10 Recommendation level: People with severe brain injuries. Or ten-year-old males, which amounts to the same thing. On-deck: something semi-trashy that doesn't make me want to forcibly remove my Y-chromosome from every cell in my body this time... Maybe Akama no Riddle might fit the bill? And then follow it up with an OVAs-and-movies weekend. It's been a while since I've had one of those to help clear out the old PTW List. |
| Kill la Kill I added it to my PTW thanks to some 9gag gif labelled "When You notice" (or something like that). Matoi Ryūko is a 17-year-old schoolgirl who transfers to Honnouji Academy in search for clues relating to the death of her father. The only lead she has is a half of a giant pair of scissors left by the killer. Hmm... where to start with this one... Animation and art-style are... inconsistent (I think it's the best word to describe them). There are some really amazing parts (like the fight between Ryūko and Tsumugu) and other, where one ask oneself "Are they even trying?" (like most of the fourth episode). But most of the time it's very good. This is accompanied with the best part of this anime, a truly amazing soundtrack. Openings (especially the first one) are very catchy, the background music during the fights is chosen perfectly and there is some unconventional usage of classical music. I think it can rival that of FLCL (which is amazing too). The quality of the story is mixed. The first half is overall good with lots of random gags and absurd situations. The later is much better and can be even considered a great one (I personally consider it to be very, very good). And finally the characters. Most of the supportive cast is good or very good. From the main cast only the female characters are great. Mako and her random interruptions to put Ryūko or other character back on the right track are just hilarious. Ryūko is one-of-a-bad-ass character and Satsuki is not bad either. And there is also one more thing about characters worth mentioning. Sometime ago I wrote for Kurokami The Animation that when you wan't to do a plot twist and change bad character into a good one, you should make it clear right from the start that the bad one might not be really bad. Kill la Kill did it in a perfect way. Score: 9/10 (mostly due to amazing soundtrack) Recommendation level: Tritsch-Tratsch-Polka, Op. 214, by Johann Strauss II, used as background music for fight (link). Kill la Kill Special The aftermath to the final battle. Nothing more, nothing less, but still enjoyable :-) Score: 8/10 Recommendation level: Probably only if you liked the main series. Mahou Tsukai ni Taisetsu na Koto Recommended by WingKing as a mix of Slice of Life and Magic. Kikuchi Yume is a girl who can use magic. She goes to Tokyo to be an apprentice mage so she can get her magic license. It wasn't exactly as I expected it to be, but wasn't bad either. It was just different :-) Starting from the best parts: I love the setting where magic is not almighty and magic users can't do everything they want to. It takes both, a talent and a lot of training, to be recognized as a mage and use magic legally. That was something I haven't seen in anime for since Majo no Takkyuubin (most of the time magic is an OP force that can do anything). The next very good part was soundtrack. The music throughout the whole series is used in a proper way and there are few times when it is simply amazing. And now the a bit weaker parts. Animation is overall good and could be even better if not some bad-aged CGI parts. Characters are overall very good and, again, could be even better if the series was longer. Score: 8/10 Recommendation level: How it could be if magic really existed? On-deck: Mahou Tsukai ni Taisetsu na Koto: Natsu no Sora. |
mozgowJan 30, 2016 7:08 AM
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| Akuma no Riddle Twelve young nubile and attractive assassins are gathered in a classroom at an exclusive all-girls boarding school, and are immediately tasked to kill their equally young nubile and attractive remaining classmate in an almost-anything-goes battle royale. Commonly billed as a yuri action anime, this was as much heavy on the action half as it was light on the yuri part... to the detriment of both sides. Every part about the story itself was weak. The characters were poorly developed and thinly-veiled trope machines, with no apparent motivations and even less explanations. The plot was bland and less developed than the characters, strongly featuring special abilities and thought processes that come from out of nowhere. The one chance they had to try and state what was going on simply fell flat on its face from the start by having the main character just subvert the entire process entirely. (Which was technically the entire point of the story, to be fair.) The yuri consisted mostly of two girls simply clinging to each other the entire time. And that ending was... exceptionally underwhelming and made less sense than the rest of the anime put together. The only saving grace was the art and animation. While the character designs were nothing special, the fight scenes were at least entertaining and wonderfully choreographed. And a neat touch was changing the ED with every episode to act as a character song insert. Still, this really isn't worth your time. Unless, of course, you like watching a bunch of sociopaths hack and slash their way through 12 episodes. (And no, they aren't even yandere.) Score: 4/10 Recommendation level: People who think Sakura Trick would be better if there was no kissing and a lot of explosions. So I wanted to clear a bunch of OVAs and Specials this week, and what worse/better place to start than to clear off the series I had just finished. After all, I might as well set myself up for things getting better as the week went by, yes? Akuma no Riddle: Shousha wa Dare? Nukiuchi Test Yeah, I sure picked the right one if I wanted to start at the bottom. This was nothing more than a thinly-veiled excuse to draw middle-school girls getting their swimsuits ripped off. Completely useless unless you like looking at that kind of thing. And even then, there are still better options out there. Score: 3/10 Recommendation level: Expect Chris Hanson at your door. Hatsukoi Limited: Gentei Shoujo The klutziest girl on the planet makes a terrible mistake one day when she is late for school and forgets one of the foundations of getting properly dressed. She then goes through the entire awful day trying to keep her classmates from noticing that she didn't have any underwear on. Yeah. Chris Hanson is knocking at my door for this one. Which is too bad, as I actually love the parent series. It's simply too bad that they had to feature the least interesting character of the throng... Score: 5/10 Recommendation level: Check for hidden cameras. Azumanga Daioh: Gekijou Tanpen Ah, Osaka-chan. You never change. A short movie about our favorite dunderhead's favorite in-class dream: doing weird things to Chiyo's pigtails. It's more of what makes this series so great, all wrapped up in a far-too-short package. Score: 8/10 Recommendation level: You know you need this. Azumanga Web Daioh Yet another short movie about one of my favorite classrooms, this one is all about what happens when Chiyo brings a video camera to class. The usual hijinks abound, most of the good characters at least put in an appearance, and a lot of camera-lens POV shots get strung together nicely. inally, Osaka takes the video cassette and makes it into a time capsule in her usual completely oblivious fashion. This simple test shot let J.C. Staff know that there really was a market for a full-up Azumanga Daioh anime. And for that, we should all be greatful. Score: 7/10 Recommendation level: Obsessive completionists that want to reward themselves by watching something pretty decent for a change. Gunbuster Renewal EX Three short episodes to expand on what is probably Gainax's best OVA offering, this is worth your time if you are a fan of Gunbuster. The first episode is a wonderfully animated battle sequence that features a bunch of redshirts getting blown to smithereens. The third is an interesting look at the development of what will eventually lead to the mecha used in the Diebuster OVA, helping to show how the technology changed between the shows. If you ever wondered why the mecha were different between Gunbuster and Diebuster, this one brief episode will help you figure things out. Unfortunately, the second episode was a training montage that harkens back to the first episode of Gunbuster. Complete with a still mostly incompetent Noriko and consisting mostly of straight pans over still shots, it definitely felt out of place. Score: 7/10 Recommendation level: A must for fans. Otaku no Video Half anime and half mockumentary interwoven together from 1991, this is basically two hours of watching Gainax poke fun at the entire otaku culture. While the mockumentary parts were well-written and believable on an almost disturbingly accurate level, the anime half was... not so much. Honestly, it's worth it just for the Gainax staff's acting ability alone. One brief point of note, however, was at the final scene of the entire series when there is a very long shot of a drill on the tip of a rocket that is piercing the heavens. Kinda reminds you of a little something, doesn't it? Score: 7/10 Recommendation level: Nah, I'm not going to repeat the line here. Kyoukai no Kanata Movie: I'll Be Here - Kako-hen A rather decent summary of the original series. If you've seen the show, nothing really new is here to surprise you. If you haven't seen the series and just want to run through it really quickly, it's definitely a decent substitute. Of course, with a condensed version like this, you run into two standard things. It takes away most of the awkward pacing problems of a full-up 12-episode series, but it also takes away some of the character building and interpersonal interactions that help breathe more life into the characters. Score: 6/10 Recommendation level: Still not my least-favorite KyoAni series... And I realize that's not much of a recommendation. Kyoukai no Kanata Movie: I'll Be Here - Mirai-hen And this is why I sat through Kako-hen, as I haven't opened a single episode of this series since it was airing. And honestly, it has the same problems with the resolution that the main run had. It relies far too much on flashy effects and an epic fight scene to carry the night, but the writing as a whole was still sub-par. It left me with a sense that something momentous happened, but with nary a hint as to why it was significant. However, unlike the rest, there is an actual sense of resolution at the end. A decent full-stop to an anime that desperately needed one. And while it didn't do enough to boost the score, I'd have to call it my favorite part of the sequence. Score: 6/10 Recommendation level: Anyone who liked the series should watch this immediately. Juubee Ninpuuchou AKA: Ninja Scroll Ah, yes. The early-90s. Back when the term "anime" meant "not-Disney". Filled with blood, guts, decapitations, traumatic amputations, full-frontal nudity, bone-aching violence, rape, and enough gore and GAR to fill a swimming pool... And that's just the first 20 minutes. This is the epitome of old-school cool, with brilliant sasuga moments on a regular basis instead of just one or two at a time. Much like MADhouse's other movies at the time like Wicked City and Demon City Shinjuku, this is a title that does not hold anything back at all. And for that, we should be greatful. Score: 8/10 Recommendation level: Yes. |
| Mahou Tsukai ni Taisetsu na Koto: Natsu no Sora Another story set in the same universe as "Mahou Tsukai ni Taisetsu na Koto". But this time a much different one, and not only in animation (which is noticeable right from the start) but also in overall feel. Animation and art-style consists of two very different parts. Backgrounds, which are photos of real places in Hokkaido and Tokyo converted into drawings, and characters, which are drawn with very minimalistic style. There are times when it works and there are other when it do not. And I can understand if someone drops it due to this style. Soundtrack, on the other hand, is on complete opposite side of the scale. It seems simple and nothing special, but is used in a perfect way. Opening and ending are catchy as hell and the insert songs are strong with this one :-) From the characters in this show only the main cast is good or even very good. The interactions between them feel real and believable. From the supportive cast only Kuroda and Asagi are noticeable. The rest is not bad, but could be better if it was a longer series. For most of the show the story was solid, nothing really great nor terrible. But some unexpected plot twist changed it to something very good, with great and satisfying ending. Score: 8/10 Recommendation level: Unexpected journey to feeladelphia. Skip Beat! After the previous one I wanted to watch something that would made me laugh. And it made me laugh a lot. Most of the time thanks to Kyoko inner monologues and/or fights with inner demons. Every time she let her demons go rampage I laughed like a maniac. Oh, and there were also some SSJ transformations too :-) Kyoko herself is an amazing character and actress, as she was able to surprise even more experienced actors and film making staff. And it had to be a lot of fun for seiyū too :-) Moving to the sound department, openings and endings are catchy (especially the first ones) and the music in the show is amazing too (I was really surprised when I heard "Space Odyssey 2001" theme music - "Also sprach Zarathustra"). The animation is overall good (nothing really amazing nor terribad) and it fits the show. The story feels simple but at the same time it's satisfying. I wish it was a longer series... Score: 9/10 (includes +1 for extremely high enjoyment) Recommendation level: Pure gold. Now, where's my season 2? On-deck: Shoujo Kakumei Utena. |
mozgowFeb 7, 2016 2:07 AM
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| Zetsumetsu Kigu Shoujo: Amazing Twins I watched it because it had Magic and Slice of Life tags. Well, although it had some SoL elements, it had more in common with action and comedy. The story is set in a world where magic do exists and is called Incomprehensible Skill of Human beings (ISH). Individuals possessing those powers have to hide them from rest of the society and disguise themselves as illusionists. Animation-wise is rally good, with some very good parts and a few of a weaker ones. The soundtrack is used correctly to set the mood for some of the scenes. Not much can be said about characters, as it was too short. That said I think it would work really good if it was a full TV-series. Score: 7/10 Recommendation level: Worth a try. Shoujo Kakumei Utena Once upon a time, years and years ago there was a little princess, and she was very sad for her mother and father had died. Before the princess appeared a travelling prince riding upon a white horse. He had a regal bearing and a kind smile. The prince wrapped the princess in a rose-scented embrace and gently wiped the tears from her eyes. "Little one," he said "who bears up alone in such deep sorrow. Never lose that strength of nobility, even when you grow up. I give you this to remember this day. We will meet again. This ring will lead you to me, one day." Perhaps the ring the prince gave her was an engagement ring. This was all well and good, but so impressed was she by him that the princess vowed to become a prince herself one day. But was that really such a good idea? What would you think if you heard such story? Probably something like "A nice story about princess looking for her prince." Well, that's what I thought when I started watching Utena. At first it moved along that way, but later more and more darker themes emerged, with last few episodes changing completely the meaning of the story. It is and at the same time it is not the typical story about princess looking for the prince she dreams about. It is, because there is a princess, a prince on a white horse and even a castle. It is not, because the princess behaves like a prince, saving other girls, the real prince lost something important and cannot leave the castle, and the castle itself is an inaccessible fortress. Every single thing, no mater how small, can have more than two meanings, characters are very complex and not typical for a fairy tale, and the story itself is not a fairy tale at all. Animation and art-style are not what the beat quality of the '90s could give you, but overall it's good, with few really amazing parts (some of the sequences during the fights and the reflections). Soundtrack, on the other hand, is truly amazing. Opening song, insert songs in the arena, the background music - everything makes what you see and feel more intense. Utena is a perfect example of how it should be done. And a final bit of advice. It's painfully slow with the story. It wasn't until episode 7 when the story got decent, episode 14 when it was actually good, episode 22 when it got very good and episode 29 when it started to be great. Score: 9/10 Recommendation level: Yes, but you have to have a lot of patience. On-deck: Yahari Ore no Seishun Love Comedy wa Machigatteiru. |
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| Just finished the first movie in a 3 movie series. Ajin part 1 Shoudou. I love stories about people who are immortal and this one doesn't disappoint. About a school kid who discovers he is one of a new species of human who can't be killed. The rest of humanity hates and fears this new breed called Ajin, and hunts them down to experiment on them to find out why they are like this. I can't wait for the next movie to come out. This movie runs concurrently with a 13 ep series that is also airing. |
| Yahari Ore no Seishun Love Comedy wa Machigatteiru. "He's the hero our school deserves, but not the one it needs right now. So we'll hate him. Because he can take it. Because he's not our hero. He's a silent student, a watchful loner. A dark saviour." This paraphrase of the famous quote describes Hikigaya Hachiman, the male protagonist of the series, almost perfectly. He is a loner, talks with almost no one, has no friends nor girlfriend and is hated by many. He is forced to join the "Service club" where he and other members have to help other people with their problems. And when someone has a problem and needs help, he finds a very dark and/or twisted solution that, while fixing the problem, will make him hated even more. But he does not care. Nor does he thinks he should even care. While watching him and his companions "fixing" problems, you will get a good dose of laugh (and in quite many times it's a dark humour). As for the other characters, Yukinoshita Yukino, the female protagonist, is also quite unique. In a way she is a mirror image of the male lead. She is also a loner, has no friends and while talking with others she often makes herself hated a lot. It was very nice and entertaining to see the two lead characters interact. More often than not it was a source of really good comedic moments. The supportive cast is not bad either, with few really intriguing characters (like the homeroom teacher Hiratsuka Shizuka). Animation is overall really good and the soundtrack is very good too. I have to admit that I didn't expect it to have such good music during the show. The story is mostly episodic, with arcs lasting from one to three episodes. It was not bad, as I enjoyed it a lot, but I would like to see a more continuous story. Score: 8/10 Recommendation level: The most atypical school RomCom anime I've seen so far. Yahari Ore no Seishun Love Comedy wa Machigatteiru. OVA An OVA episode for the first series. While it started really good, with all the things I liked in the main series, it failed miserably when Komachi appeared. Although some of the random gags that followed were hilarious, most of them were not in the mood of the series. It was not bad but could be better. Score: 7/10 Recommendation level: Maybe. It was entertaining but lacked some of the charm from main series. Yahari Ore no Seishun Love Comedy wa Machigatteiru. Zoku Everything I wrote for the prequel is still true, with one exception. The story got much better. Although it starts as episodic, it soon changes to a continuous one, where we can see how Hikitani starts to realize that the life he lived till now is wrong. The change is at first small, but then it gets bigger as the story progress (there is one scene where he finally acts like a teenager of his age should act :-)). It ended with quite a big cliffhanger, so there's a chance for season 3 (in 2017 at the earliest). Score: 9/10 Recommendation level: One of the rare cases where sequel is better than main series. On-deck: Ginga Eiyuu Densetsu - it will take me 4-5 weeks to complete it :-P |
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| Hal Kurumi shut herself in after sudden death of her boyfriend in a tragic air-plane accident. A brilliant scientist devised a plan to bring her back to the society by using modern technology. He intend to use an android that will look exactly as her deceased boyfriend, Hal. When I started watching it I was immediately amazed by great art-style an animation. As the story progressed I noticed that the soundtrack is also very good. But those two aspects are not enough to make a enjoyable anime to watch. There have to be at least decent story and characters. And the story is more than decent. It starts with intriguing concept and moves smoothly along the predicted lines. And when I thought it would have very good but also predictable ending, the story took totally unexpected turn (well, when I think about it now, there were hints that it might be the case). Too bad the characters are only good, as it could be truly a great anime otherwise. Score: 8/10 Recommendation level: Yes, a quite unexpected journey to feeladelphia. Quiz Magic Academy: The Original Animation Quiz Magic Academy: The Original Animation 2 Hmm... it had potential. I really liked the concept, setting and some of the characters. The story was a bit too random for me, some of the characters had no time to be properly introduced and it was way too short. It could be much better if it was a normal length series... Score: 6/10 (both) Recommendation level: Maybe, in worst case scenario you wasted one hour of your life. On-deck: Ginga Eiyuu Densetsu (progress: 18/110). |
mozgowFeb 28, 2016 8:24 AM
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| I was just sitting here poking around one day, and I came across a list known as the AniMetaCritic. As a compilation of MAL entries from bloggers and critics, it gives a few rather interesting results. And seeing a little link down near the bottom called "Obscure anime ratings", I couldn't help but to click that one first. Yet what was found at the top was something I had never even heard of before... Hi no Tori An adaptation of the 1967 manga (No. I didn't typo that.), this was an interesting experiment that almost succeeded incredibly. Bringing the feel of Sixties-era anime to the modern time is not an easy task, yet Tezuka Productions managed it with grace and aplomb. From the old-school character designs to the orchestra-led music, this had a certain texture to the animation that made it seem like it would be just as much a home on a modern display as it would on a beat-up black-and-white set with a pair or rabbit-ears on top. The stories themselves... Those were more of a mixed bag. Two of them, namely the Sun and Strange Creatures arcs, are extremely well done and make the entire series worth watching. Others, such as the Resurrection and Future arcs, weren't quite up to the task. And the first, the Dawn arc, serves best to introduce the concept than it does as an independent story. I did have a few other problems with it. The overarching moral of the story was excessively ham-handed and could have used more of an update to be applicable in modern times. The score felt repetitive, where the themes were constantly reprised even in eras as widely separated as 200AD and the far future. And the recycled character designs, though explained by the overarcing plot, served more to be confusing than beneficial. Score: 7/10 Recommendation level: If you want to be the first person you know to watch a title, then this is a better choice than many. Steamboy Essentially, this is just a Japanese take on the steampunk genre. Though it was filled with impossible machines, improbable situations, and implausible characters, they still somehow managed to make it work. Set during the Great Exhibition of 1851 in London, this is all about a young inventor from a family of inventors. With an innate understanding of machinery and how things are put together, he gets forced into a situation where he has to put all of his knowledge into action. So as a story, it's pretty darned generic and can be boiled down to being a standard shounen action movie. The setting, on the other hand, is Steamboy's reason. A period-accurate representation of London is hard to come by in anime, yet this was a visual treat for the eyes. The backgrounds were lovingly reproduced from photographs of the actual event, the city streets were detailed and came complete with a touch of grime and soot, and even the random passersby were exquisitely costumed. And it is in these artistic touches where Steamboy really finds its value. Score: 7/10 Recommendation level: I'd rather recommend Eikoku Koi Monogatari Emma, to be honest. On-deck: Key the Metal Idol |
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