Neverending New Beginnings

New winter 2012 anime

2012-01-23T02:32:00.002+09:00

Spring and Autumn are usually the season where there are usually many new and interesting anime, with the Winter and Summer ones usually not much and just filling in the 12-episode anime that ended before in their TV time slot. Oddly, I noticed that not happening for Autumn 2011, so that means that it spilled over to the following season, which is Winter 2012. I'm not writing much here because I don't have much to say. More details of each individual would come at a later time if they survived being dropped at the end.

Screenshots are from episode 2 or 3, and may not feature the main character. This list does not include titles that I don't watch or as a spillover from the previous season.

For future reference, I'll be stating if I would continue watching or drop it too.

Aquelion Evo (アクエリオンEVOL)

I picked this up at the 3rd episode at the same time when I dropped Mirai Nikki (Autumn 2011), and just wanting to take a break from the high-school environment that seems so common these days. I haven't confirmed if I would continue watching it or, with Rinne no Laguranje having the same genre airing at the same time, drop one over the other.

Chance of dropping? Yes

Kill Me Baby (キルミーベイベー)

This is an odd one: a more simplified version of Nichijou (Summer 2011) or something. I feel like my IQ level has dropped from watching this.

Chance of dropping? No

Nisemonogatari (偽物語)

A sequel of the Bakemonogatari I watched in 2009. (Has it been that long already?) The only thing I remember are the opening and ending, and scenes like the above.

Chance of dropping? Yes

Rinne no Raguranje (輪廻のラグランジェ)

Comparing this with Aquelion EVOL mentioned earlier, I don't know which is better. In the first episode, it seemed that they just calmly introduced to the robots oblivious to the surroundings. I don't like the protagonist's hairstyle and outfit while inside these machines and the design of the other two pilots.

Chance of dropping? Yes

Another (アナザー)

This takes place in 1999. Electric operated things did seem scarier that that of today's. The time where there are computer-operated things, but things are somewhat still analog. This anime take advantage of technology of that time that are different (and less scary/noisy) today.

If you look at snapshots of this anime, you would notice that the majority of the scenes are dark. Character design is by the same person who did Haruhi (Itou Noichi), and the animation studio (PA Works) is the same as Angel Beats in Spring 2010.

Chance of dropping? Unknown

Inu x Boku Secret Service (妖狐×僕SS)
(What a confusing title to enter: 妖狐 means mythical fox, and pronounced as "youko".)

An ultra-luxurious apartment of a town is used as a disguise for a group of creatures and people with supernatural abilities to gather together. I don't really get what's this anime is about though.

Chance of dropping? Yes

Daily Lives of High School Boys (男子高校生の日常)

Easily one of my favourites and overtaking Nichijou (Spring 2011) for a slice-of-life anime that has different skits in one episode. This is can't be compared with Kill Me Baby as it's a different... species.

Chance of dropping? No

Waiting For That Summer (あの夏で待ってる)

It's like the middleground of extremes of the other anime:

Highschool life, but with no comedy and has a degree of seriousness
Special abilities, but not showing it openly, and only to certain people
Worried for someone or an event, not for supernatural beings and such.
Stretching sci-fi without being futuristic or having spirits/deity/tradition or gundams-like machines

Chance of dropping? No

Listen to Me, Girls. I Am Your Father! (パパの言うことを聞きなさい)

I don't know what kind of anime is this yet. You could say that it's like Usagi Drops (Summer 2011), but with more people, reduced age gap difference, plus a mix of different genres. What are these genres I speak of? Family, unexpected plot twist, fanservice to some degree. Unlike the 7 or 8 anime mentioned above, there isn't any high school-going main character in it.

Chance of dropping? Unknown

Mirai Nikki dropped

2012-01-18T01:59:00.001+09:00

"I used to be able to predict the future like you, but then I took an arrow to the knee."

When the first episode of Mirai Nikki (未来日記) anime came out, I had already spoiled myself by reading the manga from the beginning to the end. The fun of watching it kind of got lost because of that.Actually, even as I read the manga, I never like how much of a coward the protagonist (Amano Yukiteru) is, or how much of a crazy girl Gassai Yuno is. In fact, I felt that the concept of Mirai Nikki itself could have been portrayed better.

Although the anime is based on the manga, the character design seemed somewhat dated (Amano looked like a Pokemon trainer). That omake section at the end of the anime already tells me that there would be quite a number of filters. Having known what the end is like, you would wonder why they had wasted a lot of time with all of those filters. I only hung around to see what difference the anime is from the manga is, but seems like exactly the same thing. If you had read the previous post, I had talked about what my expectations are.

What pushed me to drop it is that I found myself not wanting to watch more episodes, and the massive amount of new winter anime coming in, which themselves seem quite good, I see no reason to keep watching it.

What Is A Good Anime To Me?

2012-01-15T02:13:00.003+09:00

(Cross-posted from my main blog)

K-On! (Spring 2009)

Dual! Parallel Trouble Adventure (Spring 1999)

Excluding anime that seem to go on forever (eg. Bleach) or targeted at children (eg. Doraemon), I have watched new anime, since 2006. Of course, I had watched some older ones like Kahimashi, Cowboy Bebop, and Lain.

I never noticed it unless I looked back (for anime since 2006) or watched older ones, but character design and background details in general has improved. Or it could simply because more recent ones looked better in widescreen in HD over the older lower-definition letterbox standard.

The early 2000s was a transitioning period for animation studios for doing each frame using computers over a cell sheet. To the viewers, this means that higher detail could be inserted, and scenes with things moving would not have everything else on the scene to be "moving".

Character designs can sometimes be timeless or be specific to the general era, but you can generally tell. The differences between the original Kanon (Winter 2002) and the remake (Autumn 2006) is an example of a big improvement of design. Not just visually, but how the story is executed too.

Death Note (Autumn 2006)

The main thing that tells you about an anime is its opening and ending, and the segments surrounding it. While I do agree that Death Note is the odd one out with the use of (very) heavy metal music, the best ones to me are ones that do not have scenes from its episodes, something that you wouldn't dread looking at many times. Another one, which I don't mind if it's not used, are the way the text of the credits are displayed being anything other than the generic one. Speaking of generic, I noticed that the animation of the ending of some anime, like Hanasaku Iroha (Spring 2011) and Durarara!! (Winter 2010), seems to have very minimal animation. I'm also not a fan of having new ending song in every episode, though I don't mind those once-in-a-while things that reflect a sad atmosphere (eg. the death of a major character). As for those that use a song that has been used in several anime, it's a mixed bag. However, songs like Secret Base: Kimi ga Kureta Mono, is the most often, and the most emotional, one I know of by singers used in Kyou no Go no Ni (Autumn 2008) and Ano Hi Mita Hana no Namae wo Bokutachi wa Mada Shiranai (Spring 2011).

Kill Me Baby (Spring 2012)

Nowadays, anime having an opening some minutes after it started instead of the very beginning seems to be the norm. From my observations, those that don't, or always have a flashback, or have something that repeats every time like Yakitate!! Ja-pan (Autumn 2004), generally don't have a good storyline. On the opposite end, anime that do not have an opening (most commonly the first and last episode), replaced with credits in its place, or have the main episode overlapping with the ending in certain episodes are quite good.

It's hard for me to decide what is a good anime between a slice-of-life anime with simple design with playful schoolgirls in a school as main characters (eg. Nichijou), or lots of action with serious men and highly detail things (eg. Gundam series). Generally, it's easy to tell a bad one, and I seem to find a lot of anime with little content in the middle of the series falling into this group. It's also hard for me to watch one with a good story, but not-so-good in the character design part.

In the past, I used to be able to tell the kind of anime that would be produced just by looking at the name of the animation studio. Before Puella Magi Madoka Magica (Winter 2011), I used to think that animation studio Shaft would be only be producing slapstick-like anime like Sayonara Zetsubou-sensei (Winter 2008). Madoka was a big surprise as they suddenly have moe characters, and a plot that's a big departure from what they (or those with magical girls) normally have. Actually, not really sudden as they produced Bakemonogatari (Summer 2009) in between: still have elements typical of earlier Shaft anime, but a bit more to the serious side.

Angel Beats (Spring 2010)

Speaking of animation studio, I heard that Angel Beats could have been produced by Kyoto Animation instead of P.A. Works as most of the works written by Jun Maeda (Canon, Air, Clannad) are usually produced by former. The reason possibly being that KyoAni was already busy producing K-On! at production time.

What would the the most ideal anime for me? Protagonist being a smart girl that should not be ugly or extremely sexy. She is a serious girl who could accurately tell if she's lied to, which you can't tell unless you paid attention to her tone of voice. These days, character design seems to be based on that of K-On!. Of course, that won't happen, would it?

[Review] Ben-To

2012-01-13T00:54:00.001+09:00

BEN-TO (ベン・トー )

Screencaps for my Autumn 2011 reviews were/are chosen at random

I've seem to have been picking up and dropping this anime before, usually because I found it boring at first and, either found out that it got better later on, or, after dropping all the other titles, this seemed to be the better than what I had dropped and don't have much to watch. In this case, it's the latter.

I've been sitting on this since after writing the Un-Go review, wondering how to review this anime, and my mind is a blank. Well, not really. Just short of what I usually write.

To sum this up, this anime really ended the same way it started, which is really about high school students (and older) hanging around at supermarkets waiting for a staff to have the price of lunch boxes be reduced by half. If you're unfamiliar of this concept, it's like unsold sushi close to the end of the day, which should be consumed on the same day it's made. These lunch boxes usually cost around 450 yen (as prominently displayed in the anime), so, to a student, the amount saved matters to them. The only challenge with this is the number of other people fighting (no, really) over the limited remaining quantity of the said lunch boxes.

Logically speaking, I don't think fighting over discount food like this actually happens in real life. At least, not in the way portrayed with this anime. What I'm more surprised is that the supermarket staff, other customers not involved in it, and, if any, security staff, seem to be quite oblivious to this despite the amount injured from the fighting and the noise they make.

I don't get this anime, even after watching all of its episodes.

[Review] Un-Go

2012-01-06T23:09:00.000+09:00

UN-GO (アンゴ)

When I wrote the first impressions of the anime, I never though I would continue watching. It's one of those few good anime where you wouldn't be impressed if you had only watched the first few episodes, which is usually the opposite. This anime is about solving the mysteries of crimes. Of course, there's also the usual things that I'm disappointed that didn't appear.

This anime is quite good in developing storyline and developing suspense, though I don't exactly remember their names despite their name being shown in every episode.

The cases are something you don't quite expect to turn out, but there's always some kind of pattern and I've seen those where the suspense is built up, or something that appears minor that appears in earlier episodes turning out to be something major later on.

At least the main character has some brains instead of being a coward, dumb or perverted. Besides Chihaya Full and anime made up of only female characters (eg. K-On, Idolmaster, Kill Me Baby), I haven't seen any female characters being the protagonist (as in being focused at most of the time) in most anime these days. The closest is them tagging along with the male protagonist.

[Review] Boku wa Tomodachi ga Sukunai

2012-01-01T20:03:00.001+09:00

I Have A Few Friends (僕は友達が少ない)

Also known as Haganai for short (based on the non-kanji parts of the name), is a slice-of-life anime.

I don't know what to think of this anime, but this somewhat a love-hate relationship with me. The noticeable thing with the anime compared to others are the eyes and the lips, especially ones of girls. The lips seems to always have some kind of lipstick on.

In terms of content, only the first 2 and last 2 episodes has actual content, and the rest are just filters and fanserverce with little actual content. So much that I actually felt like dropping it.

I don't really remember much at the top of my head, but I do have to say that it's better than Seitokai no Ichizon (Autumn 2009) or other anime that I dropped quickly.

[Review] Mawaru-Penguindrum

2011-12-31T03:31:00.000+09:00

Rolling Penguin Drums (輪るピングドラム)

A scene from episode 3 that was also used in the trailer.

When this anime was in it's first few episodes, nobody knew what this anime was about. The first few trailers was about love and destiny, but, out of the blue, we have a trailer that shows a cat crashing into a penguin, and the fish that the cat was carrying hit a girl (Himari Takakura) nearby and a lot of crazy action that contradicts the earlier trailers. You were probably even left wondering what on earth you watched by the end of that trailer.

Masako Natsume

To sum this anime up: here's a summery of what I though of this anime.

Arch 1: Himari is declared dead, but mysteriously comes back to life when the hat bought earlier revived her again. Around this time, the penguins are introduced.

Arch 2: Himari asks the brothers to retrieve a thing called a "penguin drum". It was latter found out that it was a diary that a girl (Ringo Oginome) that she has in possession.

Arch 3: The Takakura brothers start the hunt to retrieve the diary by finding the right time to steal it while unaware. It was through this that the brothers found out that she stalks an another man.

Arch 4: The hunt is made more difficult when Ringo made friends with Himari.

Arch 5: The love relation between the man Himari was stalking, and an another woman.

Arch 6: At this point, I don't even know what the hell I was watching. Not sure why I didn't drop at this point.

Arch 7: It was found out that the Takakura siblings aren't actually related by blood, and there are more conflict with the characters.

Some guy

Arch 8: It turns out that Ringo's sister and some guy was split into two black rabbits and two hats 15 years earlier around the believed terrorist attacked in the subway, with one being featured in the first episode.

Arch 9: Epilogue. The Takakura brothers became random children on the street. Himari appears to had a different set of parents and no siblings. No memories from when she had those "brothers" were brought over, but seeing traces of it made her cry without knowing why herself.

Storyline-wise, it's one big mess. Too many characters were introduced, obvious and unnecessary diversions form it. The penguins introduced in the beginning, and one more (for Kanba's actual ferternal twin, Masako Natsume) seemed to be completely forgotten and give nothing more than background distractions. Seems that they must show a subway train interior of some sort in every episode, along with "Today's slogan", in the place of where ads would usually be, different in every episode.

Also, I thought Ringo is a minor character that would only appear for a while, but it seems that she appears in every episode! She looks ugly, and the colour scheme of the uniform, which I have to tolerate, is awful. That, or the design seem to be stuck in the early 2000s. (If you watched K-On, you would know what my standard of a good-looking character is now.)

Would I recommend this? If you are bored, yes. Otherwise, a strong no. I don't care how many other people say otherwise.

Picking up and dropping anime

2011-12-16T17:36:00.001+09:00

Well, I know that there is only a week or two left for the Autumn anime, but I would be dropping two anime at this time: Haganai (僕は友達が少ない) and Kimiboku (君と僕。). In exchange, I would (again) be picking up Ben-to (ベン・トー).

I tried to follow Haganai and Kimiboku, but I didn't find myself dreading watching them. That's a sign that I'm not interested with what I'm watching. As to why I picked up Ben-to, well, let's just say it's more interesting to watch and make up the boredom I suffered while watching the other two.

I'm also thinking of dropping Mirai Nikki, not because I'm saying that it's not good (though I do have to say that the main character is annoyingly a big coward), but that I had read through the entire manga that it is based on from the start all the way to the end. I mean, there isn't really any meaning watching suspense if I already know everything that happened from the start, all the way to the end. It's just a waste of my time.

Un-Go ep 1-2 first impresstions

2011-11-07T04:57:00.000+09:00

This was what I thought when I saw certain points of the anime.

Episode 1

Burning car? What happened?

Huh? What's this?

Oh, the previous image is super zoomed from this, but why place it at the very start of the opening animation? It's long and making a viewer pause just to read this (which you can't while it is being aired) is bad. Also, the name of the anime comes from the given name of the main character.

His chin is quite sharp and angular. I wonder if you can cut things with it?

She may be the first character you see after the opening and appear in this episode the most, she's not the main character.

The man who could solve criminal mysteries, but he doesn't ever leave his chair. Father of the girl in the previous screenshot.

Yes, he's pratically glued to the chair. I never saw him get out of it. This is the only thing I remembered about this episode: the lazy smart guy who makes his daughter (and other people) do everything for him.

Episode 2

Not this again.... and there's nothing right before this.

A new case: culprit is a cross-dresser.

While solving, the main character come across a girl who could sing well. Turns out that she's the victim's daughter of the case they were on.

There's a problem here: the episode and case has abruptly ended.

Possibly Dropped anime: C³, Kimi to Boku, Ben-To

2011-10-17T01:41:00.002+09:00

Covering three different anime at the same time. That's something rare of me to do, but long time readers would remember that I would put up a longer list and a short summary of it, but that didn't allow me to write much.

C³ (Cube×Cursed×Curious)
So the father's protagonist sends to his son a mysterious parcel from overseas. Then a girl who seemed to lack common sense pops out of it like magic. Then the protagonist dares to leave her alone while she knows nothing about the world, resulting in having a house in a wreck.

I can't watch this anime: from the characters lack of intelligence, and character design. As for the opening and ending themes, you may like the song though.

Kimi to Boku (君と僕。)

I'm not sure why I dropped this. I watched it again and found nothing wrong with it. Maybe I'm just disturbed on seeing a guy with long hair...

I think I'll watch it again.

Ben-To (ベン・トー)

Another strange anime: it's about groups of people fighting over half-priced lunch boxes towards the end of the end of the day. There's even a club dedicated to this kind of thing.

Just looking at the opening alone, and the way girl's bodies are portrayed, it's obviously not the kind of anime for me. I rather watch Haganai (僕は友達が少ない) than this anime that doesn't even make sense.

Other anime

As of the time of writing, there are quite a number of anime on my watch list. Other anime I'm thinking of dropping, but not yet, are:

Mawaru Penguin Drum: It's starting to become a girl's love fantasy drama who is rudely awakened to reality than a pair of brothers doing whatever it takes to prevent her sister from dying from a strange illness. I was expeting Ringo Oginome (girl in a green and white sailor uniform)
Sakugan no Shana 3 -Finale-: I felt that the end of season 1 as an Autumn 2005 anime was the true end of it and my attention for it's future season, are just extensions of it. Also, as of the second episode, there's too much talk and little action. A deja vu of To Aru Majutsu no Index (season 1 & 2), which is also produced by the same animation studio.

Anime I could have watched: Tamayura -hitotose-

2011-10-11T08:06:00.000+09:00

I had watched the OVA that was released months before the anime, and the first episode of the anime itself. It about a girl who had gain interest on taking photos with her late father's (analog) camera.

There isn't really anything wrong with this anime I should say, apart the image quality appearing up-scaled at 720p, suggesting that it was upscalled.

However, this anime is just... too normal for me to catch my interest. I tried to watch this, but because it failed to catch my attention, I would find myself falling asleep. Possibly even more quickly than an anime that I would drop in later episodes.

Add this to the amount of anime I watch at the same time (e.g. Penguindrum, Mirai Nikki, Haganai), and the other things I do, this has fallen out of favour.

[Review] Kamisama no Memo-chou

2011-10-06T05:34:00.002+09:00

This whole scene makes me go "HUH? What?"

As I was watching God's Notebook (神様のメモ帳), I sometimes question the intelligence and common sense of the characters. My impression of this anime has dropped by a lot since I wrote a post when it was still new back in May.

There is a lot of potential in this anime, but it seemed to have gone to waste. I see a lot of talking, physical fighting, and some scenes that just doesn't realistically happen in real life. I see the potential relationship between Narumi and Ayaka, but seems to be forgotten mid-way. In fact, it would seem that Ayaka is nothing more than an unimportant character in the background until episode 10. Like No.6, it's a potential main character that has gone to waste.

Episode 9: An obvious filter episode

Episodes 2-9 seemed very much like filter episodes that, except for 4 and 9 (sarashi thief and baseball episodes), don't seem quite obvious. This makes the last few episodes seems quite rushed, which makes up for only a third of the total episodes. Steins;Gate, which I was watching at the same time, had every episode related to the main plot and spaced out evenly. It also doesn't have annoying mini arches.

To be fair to the animation studio, these filter episodes and arches were also in the manga with the same name that was released earlier than the anime. For the chapters relating to the anime's episode 2-3, I could see that the story is expanded in the manga. Most of the parts in episode 1 are also an anime original.

I did say before that I had dropped Hanasaku Iroha at mid-point for this, and I'm kind of regretting that decision because, storyline-wise, is too predictable. I might reconsider watching it again, but I won't be writing about it when I do. Speaking of which, I have decided not to watch Ro-Kyu-Bu I mentioned a few days ago. Maid outfits are a huge turn-off for me.

By the way, how many anime features a female as the main character instead of a secondary/supporting character? Not much. One who also has intelligence and looks beautiful (well, more than what I had watched), but does not boast about it herself or not take place in some poor or rich/elite (especially the latter) place? Even fewer. Well, that's Chihaya...

Wait I'm going off topic here. This shows how much I want to forget about how bad this was.

In memory of Ayaka the forgotten girl, who, as of the finale, is still in hospital and unconscious.

[Review] Nichijou

2011-10-03T02:10:00.004+09:00

From left: Yukko, Mai, Mio

Now, this is one of the few anime I keep looking forward to: Nichijou (日常). For the first 12 weeks as part of the Spring 2011 lineup, it was aired together with A-Channel, which is also a slice-of-life anime based on a manga of the same name. It's not fair for me to compare the difference between the two, since they are completely different and have nothing in common except the categories both fall under. What I'm glad about is that Nichijou did not have mention or exaggerated on girl's bodies, or have episodes heading to the beach/pool that most anime that seems very predictable. In fact, the time of the year things happen is not mentioned, but clothes people wear, and the plants in the background gives a not-so-obvious hint.

Misato's friend, though doesn't appear much

Each Nichijou episode is divided into several skits instead of a story that spans the whole series, though the skits are in chronological order. It features several characters that, may not know another character featured, and their friends too. Of course, the main characters (Mio, Mai, Yukko, Nano, Misato, Sasahara) are the more frequently shown characters.

As the episodes go by, I noticed that certain main characters don't see, or even know each other, even though the two have a mutual friend in common. Example: We didn't see Mio meeting up with Misato even though both knew Sasahara and Mio's older sister.

If you are looking for an anime that takes a break from action, fantasy, the typicality of other high school-based anime, or are busy and just want to watch without worrying who's who, what happened previously, this might be the one just right for you.

Anime I could have watched: Ro-Kyu-Bu

2011-10-01T02:49:00.001+09:00

I have heard of Ro-Kyu-Bu (ロウきゅーぶ！) back when the summer anime lineup was announced, but did not pick up interest because it contains the following keywords that would have me to automatically not watch it:

primary school (小学校)
centres around a type of sport (basketball)
lolicon

What is having me reconsider is that I only have 1 anime to watch as most of the other anime have ended and the above music video relating to the opening theme song.

[Review] Yuru Yuri

2011-10-01T01:57:00.001+09:00

Back in July, I asked if I should watch this anime, but never got a reply to it.

Honestly speaking, I wasn't really paying attention to this anime. I was watching it, but couldn't remember much about it at the top of my head. All I could say that it's about first year middle school girls feeling affectionate to each other. Sometimes one-sided and annoy others.

Would you believe me if I had watched No.6 at the same time as this? It's a whole different type of anime to begin with.

If Yuru Yuri was like this... but I guess not.

[Review] Bunny Drops

2011-10-01T01:13:00.001+09:00

If you are looking for something family-orientated or heart-warming, you would find that Bunny Drops (うさぎドロップ) would be just the anime for you.

Bunny Drops centres around a single man, Daikichi, in his 30s. At his grandfather's funeral, he discovered that he had a child that is 6 years old. None of his other relatives are willing to take her in, so he took the initiative to do it.

As time passed, he realized how mature Rin is, but still has to juggle with work. It was difficult at first, but he found a way to get around it. Rin's friends, and staff of her school even thought that Daikichi is her father. Along the way, she made a new friend with Houki and grew up together.

If you had read the manga, you would notice that the anime ended at the chapter right before the time skip by ten years. I would say that it's a good point to end the anime as after that, it would be from Rin's point of view mostly, and I'm already too familiar with anime taking place in high school.

That's a lot of things to carry.

[Review] No.6

2011-09-30T05:30:00.001+09:00

I have mixed feelings for No.6. It has a good storyline and visuals, but certain elements with the design of supporting characters (Safu was okay), episodes that progressed very slowly, and the behavior of the main character, makes it difficult for me to recommend or re-watch it as I dread happening.

When I watched it, I was thinking that Safu would appear more frequently than Nezumi, but the opposite happened. Explanation of the other cities, except for a brief moment of No.5 where Safu did her overseas studies, were not even mentioned.

What I could see about No.6 is that it is being run by a fascist government that spreads propaganda, conducts experiments on it citizens, and killing those who did not follow, or come across some truth that the government does not want them to know. How those bees got into people, or how it made them age rapidly wasn't explained. In fact, a lot of things weren't explained and leaving me puzzled about things.

Also, is there a significance with the baby Shion saved in episode 9? I fail to see how, and it appearing near the end of the final episode seemed unnecessary.

I never noticed it until close to the last episode, but I didn't realize that there wasn't a very tall wall in the first episode, or the slum in the desert on the other side of it used to have beautiful houses and green hills.

Safu really said that.

[Review] Steins;Gate

2011-09-30T03:21:00.000+09:00

Note: This story centers a lot around the Radio Kaikan building in Akihabara, right outside the JR station. If you haven't heard, to damage from earthquakes, particularly the M9.0 in March 2011, and built at a time where building codes to withstand it are not as stringent as today, the building has been dismantled since July. It would be rebuilt with modern building codes by 2014. Most of its tenants has moved to 3 buildings nearby.

Steins;Gate centers around time-travel and "world lines" (different course of routes resulting from a particular action if something at a particular point in time happened, did not happen, or happened differently). It centers around Okabe Rintarou, Mayuri, Makise Kurisu, and Akane Suzuha. It mostly takes place at their "lab", which is just a rented apartment unit above a CRT store, but Radio Kaikan is an important place relating to events.

I liked how the anime was expressed, the suspense of mysteries and wanting to know more at the end of each episode. It managed to describe the complexity and paradox of changing the past. At times, I even found myself shocked of what has been revealed during the anime for the first time, if it weren't for the spoilers from the visual novel it's based on.

Steins;Gate is one of the best anime that I've seen so far for this year that ranks among anime like Purella Magica Madoka (魔法少女まどか), and Anohana (あの日見た花の名前を僕達はまだ知らない。). It managed to stray away from the norm that are quite predictable, obvious filter episodes, and at the same time, has good storyline, and attention to detail. Character design could still be improved on, but is enough to overlook on because of the good storyline.

With regards to the paragraph at the very top of this post, I had to say it because phrases such as "since it can't change places while time machine, this time machine remained at the same spot" would conflict with a newer, taller, building in its place if referred to in real life, with about a 20 year gap of the time Suzuha came from.

In memory of Amane Suzuha (born 2017, died in 2001 at around 60 years of age)
[in one of the timelines; calculating age is complicated if time travel is involved]

Yuru Yuri... Should I watch it?

2011-07-18T23:38:00.008+09:00

Cute girls just starting in middle school doing cute things and a catchy opening song (ゆりゆららららゆるゆり大事件) to sing along with, but is this the anime to watch?

Well, I would have my expectations to be currently lower than anime like A-Channel (Spring 2011). Don't forget that I'm also watching Kami-sama no Memo-chou and Steins;Gate at the same time. Oh, and No. 6 too.

I don't know... I'm leaning more towards dropping it though, but... they're so cute.

Episodes that takes place at beaches

2011-07-10T10:49:00.000+09:00

Having watched several different anime, I'm starting to notice something that has been rather common: a whole episode dedicated to playing by the beach in the summer with a group of people. This theme has been used too much.

So, why the dislike towards it? Here:

too common
always takes place during the summer vacation
a lot of emphasis on the girl's swimsuit
the whole episode (and maybe the ones around it) is focused mainly on it
no meaningful storyline development
etc.

On top of that, I'm starting to watch more of the more serious ones. Love comedy ones are also fallen out of favor.

[New Series] God's Notebook

2011-07-05T01:34:00.000+09:00

Japanese name: 神様のメモ帳 (Kami-sama no Memo-chou)
Season: Summer 2011

This first episode was a 1 hour special and aired ahead of its regular schedule. It also confirmed my wanting to "drop" Hanasaku Iroha after episode 12 and 13 failed to keep me from watching it and a lot of positive/negative reasons on it. I don't want to say anything bad about it, but let's just say I'm looking for something with a faster pace and more action.

This 1-hour special allows us to see more what this anime is about, character background, and the first case being solved of a group that deals with hunting down NEETs. The first case involves helping Miku on finding Sakuma Shouko, her senior, who is with her boyfriend. I need to watch this again to catch what happened as my watching of this episode has been interrupted with several hour gaps in between.

In terms of how similar to other anime this anime is let's put it this way since there are so many:

more real-life/serious version of Ookami-san (Summer 2010)
Has the same kind of atmosphere that Sigofumi (Autumn 2008) has, and oddly mixing it with N.H.K. ni Youkoso! (Summer 2006)
visual-wise, by the same artist who did Hanasaku Iroha (Spring 2011)
Steins;Gate (Spring 2011) for the mouthful/detail explanation of things (and Dr. Pepper references)
Somewhat like To Aru Kakaku no Railgun (Autumn 2009), but in a more ordinary setting and without lengthy fighting scenes.

We'll see how this goes.

[Completed] - A-Channel

2011-06-29T17:15:00.000+09:00

Japanese Name: Aチャンネル
Season: Spring 2011

This anime is exactly what its genre falls into: slice-of-life as what it should be and, in the anime timeline, ended a year later.

For the insert songs, at first I thought it was the ending theme due to it being so close to the end of the first episode. Another shocker was that there were insert songs that were all good and matches the scene it was played at, with the exception being the final episode.

The anime is heartwarming and has this warm and fuzzy feeling. It's fun to see Run making mistakes, which are easy to tell from her eyes when she's prone to.

Despite the nice things to say about it, re-watch value is kind of low. Not recommended if you want action and not want nothing to happen.

[Completed] - We Still Don't Know the Name of the Flower We Saw That Day

2011-06-25T19:06:00.000+09:00

Japanese name: あの日見た花の名前を僕達はまだ知らない。 (Ano Hi Mita Hana no Namae wo Bokutachi wa Mada Shiranai.)
Season: Spring 2011

This was a heartfelt anime that (almost) made me cry. It ended on a good note.

At some point in time, I actually felt like dropping this anime. What had me to pick it up again was the many positive reviews it had. Watching it over again, and paying close attention, I'm starting to like it more.

This follows a group of childhood friends, Jintan in particular, shut himself out from the outside world when the spirit of Menma kept pestering him. It turns out that only Jintan can see her, but Menma can interact with objects. Jintan gathers his other childhood friends to help send her back to heaven, though they think he's crazy. Trying to achieve exactly Menma wants was not easy, like money to make fireworks, and conflict among each other.

[Possible Dropped] - Blooming Fundamentals

2011-06-25T02:43:00.000+09:00

Japanese title: 花咲くいろは (Hanasaku Iroha)
Season: Spring 2011
Might have dropped at: I don't know what's going on anymore (Episode 12), maybe until an episode with a new opening and/or ending sequence to know for sure.

Well, this anime is on the borderline of continuing to watch this, and the possibility of dropping it completely. I'm kind of lost.

Visual and music wise, there's nothing wrong actually, one of the best I've come across to tell you the truth. The reason for dropping is mostly because of my diminishing interest and the lack of any interesting progress in storyline. Almost too slow.

Why I'm even considering is my schedule, not knowing that this a 24-episode anime, A-Channel ended at 12 episodes instead of the expected 24, and the recent end of Anohana.

[Dropped] - [C]: The Money of Soul and Possibility Control

2011-06-25T02:16:00.000+09:00

Japanese title: [C]
Season: Spring 2011
Dropped at: just before the collapse of the Southeast Asian financial district (episode 7)

This anime was dropped quite a while ago, so I might not remember clearly on why I dropped it or details of the anime itself.

This anime started off interestingly of receiving a lot of money, but in exchange of having to fight battles weekly with others in the same situation in the "Financial District", an alternate world. Loosing a battle means having misfortune that could range from failing a minor test, to having one's child to be unborn.

Well, I kind of tolerated the character design, but the creature attached to the protagonist (called Myshuu or something) was kind of... not visually appeasing.

As the episodes go on, it starts to become clear that the battles that I wasn't interested in became the main focus of the anime, and nothing interesting to watch. At some parts, English was spoken, but spoken with obviously simple vocabulary with a Japanese accent. I'm not making fun of the voice actors behind it, but it does make me uneasy having heard real American and British accents for quite a while. Combining all the tiny things that I have been tolerating has become a reason for me to drop this.

Change of the way of posting

2011-06-25T01:19:00.000+09:00

I'm going to rework the way I post things on this blog, seeing that the current way of doing things had resulted in me not following it.

When I had stopped watching an anime ("dropped") that is currently on TV in Japan that is at the 3rd or more episode, I usually don't write a post about it except for a brief mention on twitter and the anime in question disappearing from my "Anime Watch List" section at the sidebar, but do give a detailed description at the end of the season. The problem with this is writing a very long list, plus writing the preview of the next season, and possibly having forgotten in detail of why I had dropped it. Anime dropped before this month (June 2011), but after the spring anime started, are not reflected.

With that, I am no longer writing the end-of-season review, but write each one of them individually as soon as it ended or had them "dropped". Anime that has been dropped after many episodes are usually ones that fail to progress in storyline (entertain me in the case of slice-of-life) or had tolerated it for quite some time due to other reasons like being related to an another anime (To Aru Majutsu no Index 2), or had very detailed landscaping (Hanasaku Iroha).

Spring 2011 Anime Preview - Part 3

2011-04-18T17:55:00.000+09:00

Note: Since writing part 2, I've dropped Sket Dance as of episode 2. Clearly it's not something I would continue watching, especially with many other, better, anime.

The World God Only Knows 2

神のみぞ知るセカイII

Well, after dropping the first season, and only watched it casually again later on, it seemed fitting that I would watch the second season casually too. Some of the reason for not picking it up regularly is probably the same as not picking it up at all, except the part of having an interesting plot.

The main reason for not picking it up is the it's-neither-good-nor-bad character design, Elise being so annoying, and a change of route every one or two episodes (this also applies to Sket Dance, which I've just dropped), and maybe the Austin Powers-like main character design.

Electromagnetic Girl and a Teenage Boy

電波女と青春男

(Warning: You might find the opening a pain to your ears.)

If you weren't paying attention to the credits, you probably wouldn't think that this is another SHAFT anime due to the obvious lack of their signature strange style of theirs, and Maria Holic Alive that they too produced also being in this season's lineup. The protagonist's aunt looked somewhat like Kawashima Ami of Toradora (Autumn 2008).

This episode is just mostly an introduction. Protagonist moves from the countryside and into the city, a lot of conversation over the dinner table, and nothing new here. What is the strange one is an unnoticed girl lying around in the house, wrapped most of her body around in a futon for most of the episode. Oddly, she doesn't want the the futon externally tied around her to be removed, until close to the end of the episode where we get to see her for the first time outside that futon as if a butterfly has hatched out of the cocoon as she was pretty and instantly mature, which is the last you would expect from a largely ignored girl who was previously only seen wrapped in a futon and behaving childishly.

Well, I'm hoping that it wouldn't take a turn for the worse. I can't really compare this with other anime made by SHAFT.

We Still Do Not Know the Name of the Flower We Saw that Day.

あの日見た花の名前を僕達はまだ知らない。

Well, I don't really like anime that feature a group of primary (elementary) school kids partly because of my own history during those days, or their older selves looking back, how people have changed, and how something happened to one of them. I would probably need to watch again to get what's going on. I only picked it up because of the ending theme below, or maybe something about one of the preview trailers.

This video seemed to lack animation as only the song and the credits are displayed in the closing minutes of the episode, and only parts of this video was used for the ad of the ending song album.

[C] The Money of Soul and Possibility Control

So, this anime starts with a salaryman trying to use all the cards he has on an ATM, but all failed. His very last one would give him all the money he wants and access to the surreal Financial District, but on the condition of exchanging it for his life.

I really don't get what's going on, but it seems to have that same atmosphere that Death Note (Autumn 2006) has. It's certainly more interesting to watch than Aria mentioned below. Also, it's rare for an anime where the protagonist is not in High School (college in this case), which most anime seems to be based on these days.

Aria the Scarlet Ammo

緋弾のアリア

Watched a bit of it only because it was one of the titles I wrote down while looking at the previews of all the spring anime and I don't know what I had just watched. Guns? Bombs? Machine gun-mounted segways that moves by itself? Also, the level of male-orientated fanservice makes me feel uneasy and disgusted.

Sorry to say, I don't want to write much about this. Unless you are a guy that likes pretty girls with guns and in combat, I wouldn't want to even mention this anime.

To sum it up, this spring season offers plentiful amount of new anime that meets that standard of giving me a warm, fuzzy feeling, wanting to watch more, and quite good character and background design. Detail is not important as you could see that I'm watching Nichijou (least detailed BG, happy-go-lucky lifestyle), and Hanasaku Iroha (most detailed BG, goes through hardships) at the same time. This is the first time in a long while that I've seen so many good anime. Spring and Autumn are the usual season when this happens.

Will we see another time like this? There's a likely chance there won't be, at least, among the well known names we know now: the recent Touhoku Earthquake on top of the already strained economy, some of the screenwriters passing on, amongst other unpredictable reasons.

Well, let's savior it while it lasts.

Spring 2011 Anime Preview - Part 2

2011-04-10T12:53:00.000+09:00

Here's the second part of the Spring anime, covering the second week of April. I'll promise you that it will be longer than part 1.

Steins;Gate

The story follows a man called Okabe, who calls himself a Mad Scientist. He attends a meeting in a building near Akihabara for a conference discussing the theories of time travel.

He was soon brought out and questioned by a lady (Kurisu Makise) he has never met before, questioning what he had wanted to tell her, but he is sure he he was elsewhere at the time she claimed to have met him.

Not long afterwards, Makise was found dead, and there's a satelite crashed into the building he was in. What's even stranger was that he was told that the lecturer of the meeting he attended never turned up, puzzling him further on what just happened.

At his base, he talks to the TV with an image of an Llama with a human face, use a space gun-like remote control, and mobile phone operated microwave oven. It's funny to see his reaction when the TV broke and thinks that somebody has been sabotaging his "equipment" and sent it to be repaired. It's a bulky CRT TV, so it is troublesome to carry.

Back at the base again, he noticed that his friend never talked about a message he sent to him. On being asked, he said that the message was sent days earlier. Something strange is happening. What's even stranger was that Kurisu Makise is somehow alive again, despite Okabe seeing her lying on the floor lifelessly in a pool of her own blood. Looks like some time traveling is involved.

"If these two are images of the same woman, and the left image taking place earlier than on the right, how is this possible?"

Sket Dance

(Audio only; A company listed in this anime's credits might remove the video version via content ID)

Every aspect of the anime seems as if the odd mix of Setokai Yakuindomo (Summer 2010) and Bleach (Autumn 2004; ongoing) were mixed together, but it has that energetic, feel good feeling.

Sket Dance follows the misadvantures of the Campus Support Group, which solve problems brought to them by students and staff, along with the abilities of its members

Although not as obvious as A-channel or Nichijou, this is an another slice-of-life anime with no real plot. It seems that every episode might have a new client. The first episode got me confused as it focused on the said client instead of the group: I actually thought that he would actually join the team.

Members of the group: Bossun (lying down), Himeko (reading magazine), Switch (with computer)

Maria Holic Alive

まりあ†ほりっくあらいぶ

Knowing SHAFT, this opening can't be the one you will be seeing for the rest of the season. There's this song, the old-school music, oddly huge typeface size, and the animation in this opening itself appearing to be a summary of what happened in the first season back in Winter 2009.

Still in Amenokiseki Academy, Kanako still nosebleeds on thinking too much of girls, although she's a girl herself. I didn't liked the first season and wanted to see if this was better, but it seems to be the same. Looking at the other titles, I would say that this would be the first title to drop.

A-channel

Aチャンネル

Well, this is that other anime by Studio Gogumi that supposedly competes with KyoAni's (Kyoto Animation) Nichijou that is also in the Spring lineup (see part 1). Studio Gogumi is so relatively new that the only other anime you could search is the OVA of Koe de Oshigoto from last year. On closer look, you would notice that most of the staff are the same people form GONZO who worked on Saki (Spring 2009). GONZO has been in the news around 2009 for having financial problems.

Screenshots:

The opening seemed warm when compared to Nichijou, which is energetic.

Characters from left: Nagi, Yuko, Toru, Run

Being one of the few anime with character design meeting my standard, here's an another slice-of-life anime to enjoy. It looks like there might be some yuri involved, especially when Yuuko and Toru are in the same scene like Toru whacking Yuko's breast (twice in this episode) because she's so jealous about its size, though poor Yuko herself doesn't seem to know about it. Toru is so fond of Run that dates back from before Run had met Nagi and Yuko, that she whacks anyone else in the way, including Run's male friends.

Seemingly out of nowhere, there's an insert song not long before the ending theme that wouldn't look out of place as the final scene in the final episode, but this is the first episode and there's a scene between this and the ending theme.

That's all for part 2. Part 3 would cover anime airing soon, which looks likes there's another 5 more anime that I would be interested in that would stretch for an another week.

FYI, episode 2 of Nichijou just aired.

End-Winter 2011 Anime Review

2011-04-09T21:40:00.000+09:00

The Winter season has ended, and the first episode of the first Spring anime has begun, but the Tohoku Earthquake (officially named as "Great Eastern Japan Earthquake Disaster" or 東日本大震災) has disrupted. As of the time of writing, people living in the tsunami-hit areas and the radioactive treat from the damaged Fukushima No.1 nuclear reactor plant still have yet-to-resolve issues. In case you know nothing about radiation, there's radiation everywhere. Current radiation levels in Tokyo is lower that that of other major cities in the world.

I'm not here to talk about the new Spring season, but how the Winter season has been. I have to say that this is the most disappointing lineup ever, but let's cover it to at least say how bad it was.

Oh, before I continue on here's a list from the winter season that I've mentioned in the two parts of the First Impressions posts that I never picked up:

Rio - Rainbow Gate
I Don't Like You At All, Big Brother! (お兄ちゃんのことなんかぜんぜん好きじゃないんだからねっ!!)
Is This a Zombie? (これはゾンビですか？) → reason

Kind of short isn't it? Well, it doesn't include ones I've never mentioned, like the second season of 君に届け (To You). Anyways, here are the anime I'm featuring in this post:

Infinite Stratos

IS ＜インフィニット・ストラトス＞

At first, it seemed like one of the best anime for the season. The layout, as my thoughts at the first few episodes, was eerily almost similar to what I had in mind for a location of one of my novels in terms of the technologies and facilities of the school.

Looking back, I don't remember what this anime is about at the top of my head besides harem, fighting with seemingly incomplete machines, some arguments. Well, men may like this, but not me. I'm more of having anime with serious storyline, and the occasional slice-of-life ones. Suddenly, anime from 2006 and earlier seems visually dated now.

I never liked this typical common thing where the character would go "it's the summer vacation! Let's buy swimsuits and head to the beach/sea!" or something like that. Sadly, even the good anime I had watched has that thing too. What is making the difference is this:

Someone disappears and/or got killed, most likely with thunderstorm too
Nothing happened. The beach just happens to be nearby.
Camera angles focuses a lot of the girl's swimsuits and them playing around

If you had read my review of Nichijou in Part 1 of the Spring 2011 preview and were wondering what I was talking about, here's why:

You can see that there's not much to look at.

Wondering Son

放浪息子

It was one of the few titles that I've never thought of picking up with its low profile and if it weren't for being in Fuji TV's noitaminA slot.

The theme surrounds around gender-bending subjects of a middle school boy (Nitori) and cross-dresses frequently after school, but it does raises topics like gender equality. If you are looking for erotic things that most anime based on this theme like Kämpfer (Autumn 2009) and To Love-ru (Spring 2008), you would be disappointed as there aren't any. Rather, it leans towards the side of being serious to the point that they actually want to be turned into the opposite sex. Though nothing as extreme as Kashimashi (Winter 2006).

Character and scenic colouring seemed like watercolour with soft colours that somehow matches the theme of this anime, but the contrast is too bright. Character design is okay, but not enough to be popular.

Well, let's end this with a live performance of the ending theme song.

A Specific Prohibited Catalog of Magic - 2

とある魔術の禁書目録II

(Autumn 2010, 24 episodes)

This review only covers the later 12 episodes, and the anime as a whole. Please refer to the end-Autumn post for the first 12. Some of my opinion of this, and the 2nd OP video, is already written in an another post.

With influence from its more recent Railgun spin-off, character design are improved, Uiharu having more appearances that she actually speaks in (Saten only appear in its DVD special), and winter uniforms you would actually see them wearing. There are also rumors of a Railgun2 and Index3, along with the person directing this series since Index1 having left/sacked or something recently. I don't know what this means or if I should be happy/sad about it.
Still sticking to the same format, the later part still suffers from having too many episodes fighting with some nuns or priests. The pace is too slow too.
Which is more exciting to watch? A young man that has no abilities except blocking even the most powerful magic with his right hand, or a girl who has the most powerful eletric-based attack ever? Oh, and how useful and annoying their partners are too.

Puella Magi Madoka Magica

魔法少女まどか☆マギカ

It's not everyday that you see a magical girl themed anime to have this scary and dark feeling, or ending the series on a sad note. Produced by Shaft, the usual traits that are included with all the other anime produced by them are obvious. I'm tired of describing what they are, so I'm not saying them. To name a few, they are Natsu no Arashi, and Maria Holic. I've never watched much of Arakawa Under the Bridge or Sorede Machi wa Mawatte iru, so I can't say if they were good from after where I dropped it. In general, I don't really like most of the anime produced by them. Also, they have this trend to add horizontal bars (usually plain black) in an already widescreen aspect ratio for a prolonged length of time.

That aside, this anime has a level of seriousness and sadness that stands out in a good way, but it's hard not to mention the "unique" style that SHAFT has added to all the anime produced by them because they add things that are visually distracting and annoying. Bakemonogatari, also produced by them is a good anime, but you could say that they ruined it.

Plot and story-wise, it's actually quite good. As of the time of writing, I didn't get to watch episode 12 due to the numerous news coverage relating to the recent 9.0 magnitude earthquake in Tohoku region and its chain reactions around when episode 11 was being aired. The schedule says that the delayed episode should have aired on April 6, but I haven't been able to watch it. It eats into the schedule of the Spring anime.

I could have higher opinion if I could follow the heavy storyline in the latter episodes and the oddities of the production studio that made it.

To reflect the sadness in the anime, here's a piano version of the opening by a skilled pianist:

Well, the winter season didn't have much new anime interesting enough to have me looking forward to. Among which, this winter season and the previous autumn season don't have total regular episodes to be about 24. Index2 was an exception, but as I said before, it was a disappointment. Hourou Musuko (放浪息子) is the only one I had look forward to a newer episode in the following week, which I had not even though of picking it up until it started airing.

Spring 2011 Anime Preview - Part 1

2011-04-08T02:14:00.000+09:00

(Note: Due to the earthquake that happened while typing on 7 April, it's not known how this would affect the already-affected schedule from the 11 March earthquake.)

This year's Spring line-up offers more interesting choices than before for quite a while. Spring and autumn seasons are when these usually happen. Due to the intensive news coverage earthquake in Touhoku and its resulting tsunami, the schedule of some has been changed around, most commonly by a week. Anime like Moshidora, a winter anime originally scheduled in late-march, is pushed to a month later.Its OP/ED CD releases, due early April, seems unchanged.

nichijou

日常

Produced by Kyoto Animation, the same studio that produced anime like K-On and Lucky Star, this anime gives me this warm fuzzy feeling that I've never felt for quite a while. Something most anime I've watched lately seem to lack a lot.

Screenshots:

As with most anime made by them, the opening and ending themes are so good that it makes you want to watch it over and over again. This has the x-factor that most anime I've watched lately seem lack, especially the ending where there's only a static image that zooms (High School of the Dead; Summer 2011), scroll (Durarara!!; Winter 2010), or the characters running without moving or changing scenery (Infinite Stratos; Winter 2011).

There seems to have an another anime in the spring line-up, A-channel, is said to be of the same genre as Nichijou, but better. It's still to early to tell though.

Oh, before I forget here's the ending:

Fundamentals of Blooming

花咲くいろは

This is an anime original produced by PA Works to celebrate their 10th aniversary.
The story surrounds a girl called Matsumae Ohana (松前緒花) in Tokyo who is tired of living in the city. Her mother doesn't seem to care for her and has found a new boyfriend. Ohana too doesn't know her other relatives as her mother never introduces them. With this, she moves to her grandmother's place in the countryside that, upon arriving, finds out that it is a large Ryoukan built in the Taisho era.

A surprise thrown to her is that her grandmother saying that she is "a product of that ungreatful child" and having to work right away. She meets up with the other people working there, including her uncle.

The background of a broken family is something serious, especially from the child's point of view. Being an original, there are no references to say what will happen next. I will stick around to watch it.

Most anime with potential intense atmosphere have the opening moved to the very end, with the actual ending animation not appearing. This can happen in certain episodes (usually the first and 2nd last) of that anime.

Well, this is shorter than what I wanted to be, but the schedule is so stretched out that the above mentioned anime would already be in their 3rd episode by the time the last in the Spring lineup starts airing. Next up would be part 2, most likely to talk about Steins Gate and Sket Dance as I've just watched those earlier on the day this post is published (late night of 7 April).

I'm currently doing the draft of the Winter 2011 end-review alongside and doing some fine-tuning to it, so this could take a while as I'm only done with only the entry of 1 anime out of the several I plan to list in that post.

Disruption of Anime TV airings

2011-03-26T11:09:00.000+09:00

This is Shibuya alright, but with not much lights on at night

Due the Fukushima No.1 Nuclear power plant problems resulted from the great Tohoku earthquake and its chain reactions, which news around the world are reporting enough to not have me the need to describe in detail.

Due to these news updates, and the constant messages about the earthquake and planned blackouts, some anime are pushed back or have those annoying frame around.

Anime like MoshiDora (short for "もし高校野球の女子マネージャーがドラッカーの『マネジメント』を読んだら") that was previously scheduled as the end of March, is pushed to the end of April. Other anime is delayed too, but having only about 2 episodes left for most anime, and the usual "buffering space" between the end of a season and the beginning of an another, it's simply pushed forward, with minimal impact with the upcoming 2011 Spring Anime.

PS. I'm aware that I didn't update the list saying what anime I'm watching.

Puella Magi Madoka Magica Episode 6

2011-02-12T03:17:00.001+09:00

[This is the first post with the "quick summary" label. Basically, I'm covering the episode I watched, but not as full length review as a regular episode like the post before last. You could say that it a very summarized first impressions based on what I could remember at a glance, and maybe what I've stumbled upon while writing it. My attention span while watching it does impact how I write it, probably not remembering what I even saw.]

What I remember about this episode:

Dancing game machine + techo & instrumental version of the opening theme

A very long talking scene

Another long talking scene

"Madoka?! What on earth were you trying to do by throwing that thing?!"

Sayaka is suddenly dead right after she said that.

The magical artifact that Madoka threw earlier has been retrieved and....

Sayaka is alive again, puzzled as to what just happened.

"Where are the subtitles?"

2011-02-12T02:30:00.000+09:00

(Note: I've already dropped this anime, Yumekui Merry, since episode 2)

So, the above is something you would most likely to see to most of you in openings of most anime, and you are so used to it that when you see screenshots or the videos that I used to put up, you don't see any text at all.

Preview at the end of an episode. The following episode of the same scene would be shaking and cropped.

Take this image from a post dated last week as an example: If you've watched where this screenshot came from, you would have heard some narration.

You want me to add some subtitles? Well.... (refers to a post from a year ago)

If you understood the original audio, you know these subs are lying, but you wouldn't know if you didn't since it has the sense of shock of what is happening.

That is what you get. Actually, subbing is not my kind of thing. Syncing the subs with the correct timing is a nightmare by itself, made worse by, not by the duration of what is being subbed, but the number of lines.

Subtitles, despite what they are intended for can get too distracting if you know what is being said, but not the subtitled languages. They can be very much of a visual distraction if there are many of them, especially if they are hard-subbed into the video.

However, as much as I don't like subtitles, it's also a necessary thing if I couldn't catch what is being said. I also don't like dubbed audio as they tend to be out of sync. They may add the original music that is being played while the characters are saying things, but those might be faded out. Also, the background atmospheric sounds are lacking a lot. Except maybe cartoons and 3D characters, it's very hard to sync with the lips without rephrasing the words.

To Aru Majutsu no Index - Season 2 Episode 17

2011-02-05T23:39:00.000+09:00

(Note: I don't normally write an episode summary, but this one caught my attention in terms of how different it was from the previous episodes. Oh, unless otherwise mentioned, Misaka refers to the main person and not the clones based on her.)

#17: 罰ゲーム (Penalty Game)

Fanning while kneeling down out in the public while (unintentionally) blowing Msaka's skirt up.

Misaka: "Ehehehe" | Kuroko: *stares*

As the episode begins, you could easily be mistaken to be watching its Railgun spinoff since they are featured inside their dorm instead of Touma or a summary of previous episode(s) with his voice, but nevertheless, they are characters of the main series too. They don't appear as much in this season though, but Uiharu does make an appearance with an actual conversation with Misaka and Kuroko as compared to none at all and a cameo appearance in season 1. The first scene where the left image came from is just Misaka dreaming about the recent Gakuen Toshi wide festival and Kuroko being jealous over what Misaka is sleep talking. It's quite short since the (new) opening appeared after this scene. ["Gakuen Toshi" means Academic City in Japanese (学園都市), but the name Gakuen Toshi did appear on a map in one of the Railgun episodes]

We had finally see the characters wearing the summer uniforms that were previously not seen outside the short novel and manga (with the small exception of the bank robbery flashback scene in Railgun). At Touma's school, we see them already arguing and fighting over the smallest things, and arguing with Misaka.

Meanwhile, we also see Accelerator and Last Order (Misaka Clone no. 20001) being assigned a new apartment to stay at an apartment resting. The reason for being allowed to stay there being guarding the house from buglers while the owner goes to work. Accelerator showed us what those strings and a collar around his head are for that, with a switch around the collar, would have him to hear normally, or some strange fading echoing sound.

After school, and after the "skirt fanning" incident (see top image), Misaka wants to meet Touma as part of the "Penalty Game". While waiting, Uiharu walks up to her and on how ~~she's running away from Judgement work and passes them to~~ Kuroko is busy at the moment. Uiharu adds that she's envious that Tokiwadai Middle school has violin lessons and asks to teach her how to play it. Misaka agrees without question and does it in an elegant way that makes Uiharu feels as though she's dreaming. It's funny to point out that the sound from the violin (which seems to appear out of nowhere) is terrible to the ear. This was disrupted as she saw Kuroko approaching her and being dragged away. By this time, Touma arrives, about half an hour later than the appointed time.

In truth, she wants to sign up a mobile contract involving something that works like peer-to-peer (P2P) to be able to get cheaper calls so that she could get the free Keroro strap (the green frog she's so crazy over with). To sign up, she needs Touma, being the only guy she knows who could fit that position, and a photo that requires to be together and really looking like a couple. They tried to do it, but failed and, eventually, Kuroko appears out of nowhere to drag Misaka away.

The last section was about the Misaka clones. There are quite a number of them, and the newer ones are more capable of emotions, able to hide part of themselves from the Misaka Network (how all the clones share knowledge and know what the other clones know), but are still unable to have the power that the real Misaka has and are comparatively weaker. All of the clones add a description of their actions after they talked. The Misaka Clones in this episode are:

No. 10032 - clone Touma has met before and is featured the most of the time
No. 10039
No. 13577
No. 19090 - has more emotions that the other Misaka present at the briefing
No. 20001 - Last Order: and admin and a failswitch should the other Misaka clones go wrong. Looks and behaves like a grade-school kid.

No. 10032: "I know you are trying to persuade me, but
since we are of the same gender, I find it rather
irritating."

Towards the end of the episode, clone no. 20001, was locked out of the apartment that she and Accelerator are now staying at, encounters clone no. 10032 and complained about it to her, despite already being known through the Misaka Network. No. 20001 notices that all of the other Misaka Clones has a gadget worn on their head while she herself does not have it at all. Being jealous, no. 20001 steals it from no. 10032 and runs away. Taking it as a provocation, no.10032 takes out a gun from inside the bag, loaded it up, and pointing at where no. 20001 was last seen running towards (it's unclear if she was already out of sight or if the nearby apartment building is where she stays at), saying that it would be a revolution.

Looks like there could be bullets/magic/electricity running all over in the next episode.

Threat identified

Failing Expectations

2011-02-05T03:56:00.000+09:00

Why? Oh WHY?

Two of the currently airing anime I'm watching are starting to annoy me, but did not drop for what I'm hoping would happen, or historical reasons. These two are これはゾンビですか？ (Is this a Zombie?) and Season 2 of とある魔術の禁書目録 (A Specific Forbidden Index of Magic). I'm starting to get annoyed because of things in it that I tried to tolerate, but seemed to made a turn for the worse.

I would like to talk about お兄ちゃんのことなんかぜんぜん好きじゃないんだからねっ!! (I don't like you at all big brother), but I dropped that at the first episode and never even took a glance of its latter episodes. This is about ones that I've manage to watch past the initial episode.

What's with the identical shirts?

For Index2, there's a spin-off, Railgun and it's upcoming 2nd season, has, ironically, more enjoyable to watch than the main series, but I'm not talking about that. It surrounds around a common thing: nuns and priests, with the big give away being Index tagging along Touma a lot with her trademark robes and blue-ish hair.

"Everything is solved with Touma's right hand". That simple?

My next complain is how Touma could do nothing more than block magic spells with his right hand without going into research of how it works, and how time is filled with long, boring/unnecessary, conversation or battles. And maybe some level of stupidity included. Add that to the second and the current story arc (Crazy nuns fighting; magic ship in Italy), and it's a recipe to make me ask why was I even watching it. Well, actually, I find the episodes that don't have the religious conflict more enjoyable.

That current arc looked as though they went to a (stereotyped ancient) city in Italy Misaka and Kuroko, main characters of the Railgun spin-off, hardly even make an appearance as compared to Index1. Well, I've watched episode 16 at this point, which is the episode where the current arc ends and a (brief preview) of what happens next.

They sure know how to make a day seem like months. The summer vacation seemed like forever as it lasted from the start of around the first episode of season 1 to around the middle of season 2. Except for the manga and a flashback in Railgun about a bank robbery, you don't see the characters in their winter uniforms at all. Looking at the episode 17 preview, they might finally do. Well, it seems like it: everyone except for the Misaka clones are wearing the winter clothing.

This anime has two extremes of both wanting to watch or drop this and I'm stuck as to what to do.

The trailers of KoreZom during the Winter preview did caught my attention of wanting to watch it, but everything went downhill by the end of the first episode. I didn't know anything about this anime, so I continued watching, hoping that things would improve, but episode 2 made me think otherwise.

Well, depending on your tastes, you might say that it has gotten better, but, to me, it's the opposite. It's already episode 4 and I still don't remember the character's names, not even vaguely. Well... maybe I'm the kind of person who would prefer the more serious themes.

Character wise, they are kind of... strange. In a way that it's not as bad as that anime with a crazily long name, but not enough for me to like either.

Let's say the character in the right image. She's Nepheoloasasi from the world of Nulaedjccoi, and speaks dotdeas. (Or something like that) Too much jargon. She mostly hangs around the house most of the time, not doing anything other than taking care of the household chores. What's up with that?

As with most anime, the parents of the main character of anime of this genre are always absent from home for some long duration, typically long enough to not be needed to be introduced at all in the anime.

(o_O)

I don't really mind the main character (still don't remember the name) becoming a magical girl, but only if they completely look and behave like a girl. Not some sick pervert that crossdresses and what not. I can't stand looking at it. It's giving me nightmares just looking at it.

At this point (up to episode 4), you could see that there is a character that's yet to be introduced appearing in the opening animation. Given how much disappointment I have for this anime for the boredom and disappointment I had to go through, I won't be watching anymore just to find out. It's like hoping to be familiar with someone you randomly met on the train, but with no contact info and the routes you take to get home are completely different with no pattern. It's a whole lot of a storyline that goes around in circles and/or making very little progress. Anything with fanservice is a huge negative point for me.

Well, maybe my standards are high from having watched Death Note, Depression of Suzumiya Haruhi, K-On, Eden of the East, Code Geass, and so on.

Just from this cap alone, I could already see the things that I don't like.

What's that rotating blue/grey cylinder thing with a stand beneath it seen in the house while the characters are having a meal? Nobody mentioned about it, but it's the most obvious unusual household appliance seen in the anime. That's an electric fan. No really. It appears to be "invented" as recently as 2009, though it does look out of place of where it's shown.

Winter 2011 Anime First Impressions (Part 2)

2011-01-15T16:52:00.001+09:00

This continues the earlier Winter 2011 anime written a week ago. This covers anime that has been aired and watched since the last entry of that post. Here, there are anime that I'm more likely to drop, looking at the content.

There was some tiny text below the title indicating a caution or warning should part of the video and/or audio (especially parts like opening, ending, and insert songs) be uploaded to places like YouTube or NicoNico Douga. What's the difference a caution and a warning? Here are some tips bases on what I've come across and actual experience, and it's related to what companies are listed in the credits and, more confusingly, be removed under the parent company of one of the listed companies or the little known full name. (Note to those who can't read Japanese: The name might be listed as plain-text Katakana/Kanji instead of the logo or romanised name, and don't expect the subs to translate that since they usually only bother with the music that's being played as it's happening.)

(By the way, I'm watching Hourou Musuko ep1 and Mahou Shojo Madoka Magika ep2 as I'm typing the first and second entry of this post)

Is this a Zombie? (これはゾンビですか？)
Caution: Kadokawa is listed in the credits
Episode 1: はい、魔装少女です (Yes, It's A Girl's Magical Clothes)
Aired on 11 January, watched on 12 January

This looks like an earlier version of the opening, because the opening animation in episode 1 is different. The music remains the same though.

It's already the beginning of the episode and the protagonist already reveals that he is a zombie, with the people around him not even realizing that. To prove that he can't die, he jumps in front of a truck to save a kitten who was crossing the road with its parent. It causes shock and confusion to witness since he is flung into the air, far away from the accident site.

Well this started when he was killed accidentally for being in a middle of a fight. Next thing he knows, he's caught in the middle of an another and was sawed into pieces. The girl who was fighting tried to fix him, but somehow mistakenly transfers her powers to him that makes her powerless. When another monster appears, he has no choice but, with the transferred powers, turn into a "magic girl". But those powers did not transform his body that gave the following impression on seeing: a pervert.

The other trailers gave me a completely different impression of the anime. How it turned out is on the negative side of shock. The character design of the main character is boring and, in the "magic girl" mode, disgusting. If I'm looking for a more serious magic girl anime in this season, that would be Madoka. I'm sticking with this for a while though, because of the interesting opening and ending, the potential to improve, and characters that have yet to appear being shown.

I Don't Like You At All, Big Brother! (お兄ちゃんのことなんかぜんぜん好きじゃないんだからねっ!!)
Aired 9 January, watched 14 January

Since the very first time I saw the character design, I have already felt my dislike towards this anime. Even when compared with Kore ha Zombie Desuka? above, the glaring main negative point is the character design: long, thin necks, odd body proportions. You might think that this is a sister-brother love like the the Autumn 2010's OreImo, but this is below average for me.

When I watched this, more glaring negative points is the opening and the first part of the first episode, though there are some serious stuff in the second half. In fact, I've even had my doubts about watching this that there's even almost a week's delay between it being aired and actually watching it.

Wandering Son (放浪息子)
Warning: Aniplex and Enterbrain are listed in the credits
Aired & Watched 14 Jan
Episode 1: おんなのこってなんでできてる？～Roses are red, violets are blue～ (Why are Girls Able To Do It? - Roses are red, violets are blue)

This anime has the obvious watercolor-like look that oddly matches nicely, almost like a still motion and blacks are not complete blacks. However, the watercolor look seems to last throughout the whole episode, including the opening and ending credits.

This anime is about a boy and girl who are in middle school who wants to become the other gender due to circumstances. If you are looking for fanservice like that of Sora no Otoshimono or anything other than a lot of dialogue, this is not what you are looking for as it's on the opposite end of that scale. The degree of seriousness is there.

There are some scenes designs that can appear otherwise. Take the above image for example: by just looking at it, is it a dormitory or a bedroom? Well, here are the things that are telling me this:

The two girls are in uniforms
A double decked bed
Hallway is barely visible, and the parts that could be seen is bare
The boy knocked the door

There's a manga of it, but I had not read that yet. I've found a general summary of it though:

Shuicihi Nitori appears to be a shy and quiet preteen boy, when he transfers to a new school he quickly makes friends with the tomboyish Yoshino Takatsuki who sits next to him. It soon becomes apparent that both Shucihi and Yoshino are more than simply a sensitive boy and masculine girl, they both are transgendered. Together they decide to take the first steps toward becoming the people they want to be.

Wait, what? Transgendered?! Anyways, it looks like there aren't any new anime of interest until March or April, not including OVAs and movies, so that's all for now.

Winter 2011 Anime First Impressions (Part 1)

2011-01-06T00:34:00.198+09:00

For the first time, I am writing this review as I'm watching the titles below, with the first in the Winter 2011 lineup. Season 2 of To Aru Majutsu no Index is not included in this since this is a spillover of the Autumn 2010 anime lineup.

Note: Any late night anime aired at or after midnight would be considered as early morning of the following day. Example: Tuesday 25:31 would become Wednesday 1:31am

Rio - Rainbow Gate
Episode 1: ゴッデスオブヴィクトリー (Goddess of Victory)
Aired on 4 January, watched and written on 5 January

The first thing that comes to mind is that the dealer, Rio is supposedly a woman who brings luck to anyone who sees her at the casinos she goes to. Then the protagonist, Mint, a young girl who carries a teddy bear around, wonders what the adults are all crazy over. She came with her grandfather to do some business and then the girl gets bored quickly and so on. This was based on several video games that feature Rio enough to have this to come out.

ARGHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!

From the trailer, I could already tell that this is not the kind of anime I'm looking forward to watch. Elements that turn me down from the first episode are: revealing uniform of the dealers, body measurements mentioned for no particular reason (also mentioned in the preview), no built up tension leading to the villains attacking for the teddy bear, and, most importantly, scary looking eyes that make them look like in a daze. Well, this was displayed in the trailer too, but episode 1 made it more obvious.

To tell you the truth, this is so boring to watch as an anime. It's obvious that it has fan-service and no real storyline that I could see. Combine that with the character design is a sure way to have me to not pick this up after only the first part of the first episode. There was no opening in this episode. Might have been as an ending for this episode: but I'm not hanging around to watch it.

IS - Infinite Stratos
Episode 1: クラスメイトは全員女 (All of My Classmates Are Girls)
Aired, watched and written on 7 January
Warning to YT-uppers: MediaFactory, TBS, & Sony Music Communications are listed in the credits

An opening scene

What better way to break away from the typical birds chirping or happy music (or a flash forward to a time around where the series would end) to start a new anime series than to have going straight to the action of what the anime is about? Well, actually, my focus of where the anime started is after the opening theme. It's on the first day of school, after the entrance ceremony. As you can see from the trailers, most of the scenes are from the first episode, like what I'm describing below appearing around 6 seconds into the trailer above.

Orimura Ichika has just been admitted into an IS academy, and is the only male in the entire world who can operate those exoskeleton machines. Since the very beginning, most of the girls are already interested in him for reasons that are various and unknown. Well, it's a girl's natural reaction of wanting to attract guys.

They are both eating the same kind of food

This episode focuses on him and his childhood friend Houki Shinonono who was from the same Primary/Grade school since year one up to year 4 and were both in the kendo club. Ichika doesn't seems to remember what happens after that year, and Houki seems to have some kind of a mixture of love and hate towards him. What's even more shocking is that they both share the same dorm room. Whether we see this relationship go downhill or not, it's still to early to tell.

It's interesting that the voice actors of (Houki & ED singer) and (Cecilia Alcott; girl with blonde hair) are involved. Background character and landscape design are among the best I've seen since K-On season 2 (Somehow, I don't feel the same for Index/Railgun). Yes, though insignificant, background details, even for unimportant characters, does create the atmosphere of the place. Scarily, the technology and architecture of the academy (including the dorm) is almost something of what I had in mind of Mihara Academy in my novels on my main blog. I've never had any actual drawings of it, so I can't complain about it. There's that odd feeling of possibility that there are some relationship with this anime and Strike Witches in terms of character design.

Yumekui Merry
Episode 1: 夢現 (Half asleep and half awake)
Aired 7 January, watched and written 8 January

First opinion: Watched it for a few minutes, but could see that this isn't something I could watch. The part just after the opening was just so absurd seeing talking cats chasing a man. I don't want to watch this.

Second opinion: Well, watching this again after Madoka, Gosick, plus the above trailer, it does make me change my opinion a bit. It's not as bad as what I thought it might have been that I might continuing watching more to see if it interests me more. Still, I'm not a fan of talking animals that can walk on two feet and talk like a human.

Mahou Shoujo Madoka Magika
Episode 1: 夢の中で会った、ような・・・・・ (Met in a Dream, or something like that....)
Aired 7 January, watched and written on 8 January
Warning to YT-uppers: Aniplex is listed in the credits

Well there are two things I want to talk about first: there are too many anime that has "Mahou Shoujo" in the title that I kept confusing it with Nanoha. Another thing is that, if you have been reading my past reviews, since at least around when I talked about Bakemonogatari (Summer 2009), you might have seen me complaining about how the animation studio, SHAFT, has been using unnecessary effects that kind of spoils the anime, but this one looks quite good. I heard that the character designer who did Hidamari Sketch is involved with that of this anime too.

Gosick
(Sometimes I wonder if this is a misinterpretation of ゴシック, which means "Gothic")
Episode 1: 黒い死神は金色の妖精を見つける (The Black Reaper Has Found a Golden Elf)
Aired and watched on 8 January, written 9 January

This anime takes place in the early 20th century of a fictitious country in Europe (don't remember the name) where horse carriages are still mixed with automobiles, but still not used to visitors from places far enough to be very noticeably different from what they are used to.

The protagonist is from Japan on a cultural exchange program in a large academy. The people around him there called him the black death god because nobody else there has black hair. While researching in the library tower, he saw something bright from near the roof. After a long climb up, he finds a botanical garden and a strange girl who could see facts that are otherwise not known or faked.

End Autumn 2010 Anime Review

2010-12-26T11:45:00.000+09:00

This Autumn season has many interesting anime that I have not seen in a while. I will be covering the review of the entire year later on as I need to gather info since it has been quite a while, particularly Winter and Spring seasons. All of my reviews do not include anime that I do not watch at all, for as far I can remember. I might do a separate review for OVAs, movies, and DVD/BD-only episodes that are released outside the year of the first TV broadcast of final regular episode.

The anime listed below are sorted by what's on my mind the most at the time of writing, and only lists what I had watched.

俺の妹がこんなに可愛いわけがない (There's no way my sister can be this cute)
Category: anime in an anime, otaku, slice of life, siblings
Episodes watched: 12 (completed)

Better known by it's unofficial shortened name of OreImo, this is one of the few anime for quite a while. Though I saw some points that could be improved on, this could be overlooked by everything else.

OreImo is about a middle school die-hard visual novel (rated 18 years and above) on sibling relationship and magic girl anime fan so secret that you couldn't even tell until her brother spotted an anime cover with an eroge disc inside lying around.

To make sure that this secret is not made known to anyone else, especially their father, she made him have "life counseling" sessions, which is just things like making him play her games or heading out to Akiba (Akihabara) to buy her stuff. The money to support her hobby comes from her job as a model.

The opening and ending animation changes with every episode, though the ending animation and song are completely different. There's animation for the opening, but the ending is (mostly) panning around an image of a character art with effects added. That same artwork appears in the background of the sponsor screen after the show, or posters included with the ending song album included with the video disc.

This anime has de-emphasized of the school life as, except for Kirino's close friends and Kyousuke's childhood friend, they don't really show much of what most school-going anime usually has. It's been reduced to nothing more than the place they meet..

There has been announced that there are additional 3 DVD-only episodes, with one being an alternate version of episode 12, but nothing else is known about them other than episode 11 being the determining factor.

Would like to see more of Kirino with black hair though.

とある魔術の禁書目録Ⅱ (A Certain Catalog of Forbidden Magic 2)
Category: Magic, high school, large school, futuristic, religion/cult, science research, several story arches
Episodes watched: 11 (ongoing)

Touma and Mikoto in the left-center. Their parents are seated across.

Picking up on where season 1 left off, this is about a guy with no magical abilities but a mysterious ability to block off or disable magic powers. It's got less of "have most of an episode spent on talking/fighting at the same place" and improvement on character design. The only time we see the characters in their winter uniform are in the cover art of the novel, the manga, and a flashback of the bank robbery scene about 1.5 years before the current timeline in Railgun.

It's spin-off based on the secondary characters (Misaka Mikoto and Shirai Kuroko), Railgun, however, still seems like a better title to watch. Though that takes about the same time frame and occasional appearance of Touma in there, we don't see the the same thing happening in both. Uiharu made an actual appearance in Index2, but not Saten. Though these two did make a brief appearance in Index season 1, more noticeably in both the 1st and 2nd opening.

There are about another 12 or so episodes extending into the Winter 2011 season, and there are rumors of a second Railgun season being made.

神のみぞ知るセカイ (The World God Only Knows)
Category: creatures from above, game addict, several story arches, odd character outfits, high school
Episodes watched: 4 (dropped)

Well, I'm not saying that I dropped this because I don't like it, but this anime seems to slip my mind completely due to the difficulty of being able to watch this and with anime like the two mentioned above that attracts more of my attention. I might watch this later, but I won't review it when I'm done with it except maybe as a brief insignificant tweet.

For the characters, well... I have forgotten their names by now. One is a (visual novel) game addict that he even plays them in the middle of lessons and prefers girls in his games over "three dimensional" ones. The male school uniform reminded me of a character of a movie I watch when I was younger, holding what is obviously a PSP (but calls it by a different name) he plays his games on. The female character is a deity of some sort from the sky or something that is assigned to him as part of their quest to remove the evil spirits residing in the hearts of girls. The only way to get it out is to have the girls to fall in love with him.

Opening animation reminded me of Eden of the East with how the background animation is done.

アマガミSS (Amagami SS)
(This is a 25-episode series as part of the Summer Anime lineup)
Category: several story arches, high school, story that goes around in circles, revolves around Christmas
Episodes Watched: 20 (dropped)

Opening for the latter half of the series

Well, yes, 20 is such a large number for me to drop this anime, but it seems to go very much along the same lines but with a different girl and a different perspective. The Sae story arc (episode 5-8) was a big shock as it suddenly has a narrator only for this arc and disappears again in the latter episodes.

Well, maybe my expectations was kind of high for me to drop this. I've seen TV drama that are more interesting to watch and this is nothing more than a big disappointment that looked as though it's following a template repeated several times. This could be inherited from the visual novel having several different routes leading to different endings, but who wants to watch the same thing 6 times in different ways? (I had watch through all 8 "Endless Eight" episodes of Suzumiya Haruhi [Spring 2009 renewal]) From the very beginning, I wanted to drop this since the 4th episode for having such a rushed ending, but continued on to see what the other arches are like. I don't know what's with the (covered) nudity of the featured girls in the ending too. The second opening was the only thing I liked for being a big improvement over the previous, though the part where the line "ハニかんで見つめあった優しいキモチ溢れた" is being said keeps poping up in my mind.

えむえむっ！(MM!)
Category: story that goes around in circles, high school, club activities, crazy behavior, cross-dressing, revealing costumes, near-incest
Episodes Watched: about 4-5 (dropped)

This opening kind of tells you what the anime is like. Apart from minor changes to some scenes and some weird sound effects added to the music, it's not much different from the first opening.

Err... You can tell at a glance that this is not what I would like to watch.

FORTUNE ARTERIAL ～赤い約束～ (Fortune Arterial: Akai Yakusoku)
Category: large school, vampires
Episodes Watched: first few episodes (dropped)

I found this difficult to pick up with the strange setting and themes I found disturbing.

Autumn 2010 Anime First Impressions

2010-10-16T19:43:00.000+09:00

The new autumn anime offers the most interesting line-up for the whole year. Some of them are second season of anime like Arakawa Under the Bridge x Bridge, Motto To Love-ru, and To Aru Majutsu no Index II (third if you counted the Railgun spin-off). Here are my thoughts of it after the first or second episode, depending on when the first episode aired. I might give an individual episode summary in here, or just have that as part of my general opinion. Except for the second season of Index mention below, I do not know much about any of the anime listed here prior to the announcement of the Autumn lineup.

MM! (えむえむっ！)

Sweet, and gentle at first

But being sweet and all that is not her usual self

How do I say it... the main character likes to be tortured, and another has a fear for males. They head to the second volunteer club (where's the first?) for advice. Then, all the crazy things start to happen. I shall not spoil any further for those who have yet to watch it, as saying what I know could spoil the fun than watching it first without knowing anything. This anime is not recommended if you are looking for non-repetitive action with actual progress in storyline.

My Sister Can't Be This Cute (おれの妹がこんなに可愛いわけがない)
That's a rather long title, even with the title in kanji, so let's just call it OreImo.

(Audio starts at 0:11)
(If t h e s e l i n k s do not work, blame some subdivision(s) of Sonii)

The opening theme only started in the second episode, but I have to say that it is quite good and it actually goes well with the music. The opening animation looks like it might change according to the location and/or places featured in the episode in question.

As for the ending, it was just horizontal credits scrolling rapidly overlaying the last few moments of that episode and faint background music, like the variety shows I see in the evenings, so I'm not sure if there would be an actual ending animation. If there is, it's probably not showing it yet because of things yet to happen to be in it. I haven't heard the ending song long enough to recall if it was the same song in episode 1 and 2 or how the song goes.

Episode 1 summary:
Kirino has a secret obsession of collecting anime goods and visual novels, including ones rated for people above 18. She hides them behind the cabinet, knowing the father being against having such a hobby, and uses the money from her pay as a model. She eventually drag her older brother (Kyousuke) in with her hobby. She even made him complete the game she had tasked him to do.

Episode 2 summary:
Kirino has never met anyone else who is an anime otaku like her, due to her hobby being hidden from everyone. (Kyousuke was the first person she revealed this to.) So, with some help from her older brother, she follows a group in an offline meeting. Sadly, she didn't manage to talk to anyone at the end of that meeting. She did, however, receive a hand-grabber, and 2 of the people from that group caught up with her and go around shopping around Akihabara.

Relying on the Sky (ヨスガノソラ)
(or "Sora Relying on Others" if the "Sora" in the title refers to the name of one of the twins)

It's about twin siblings who are moving to their grandparent's place after their parents have been killed in a traffic accident. The younger twin could not attend school because of a disability. The style kind of reminds me of H2O: Footprints in the Sand anime back in Winter 2008: Nice music, small town setting, some heavy stuff at the beginning, a lot of girls, but hard to follow. There's just something lacking that is making me wanting to look forward for more.

The two are identical twins, but gender differences makes the two look different. I need not explain the theory behind how these two are actually the same person, but experience different things.

Yet the Town Keeps Going (それでも町が廻っている)

It's an another anime produced by SHAFT. My dislike towards them is that they add unnecessary things that I find annoying like the rapid flashing of mountains of words in Bakemonogatari (2009) or too much distraction from storyline for Natsu no Arashi or Maria Holic. It's a slice of life anime like K-On (Spring 2009 & 2010), but there's something annoying about it. Maybe it's the way SHAFT presents it.

This kind of says it. 大人気ない means "not very popular"

The glaring annoyance this time is that there is girl whose ugly appearance was not explained. I mean, why is it even there? It looks like an American stereotyped view Chinese/Asians some time ago. It's worse than accidentally drawing 6 or more fingers for a hand. It spoils all the other characters in the anime. Why???

Er... yes. This was what I was talking about.

Except for Sayonara Zetsubou Sensei (Summer 2007) I have never really liked anime produced by them. (Looks at list)... and maybe Negima!? (Autumn 2006) and Ef: A Tale of Memories/Melodies (Autumn 2007/2008) too. Bakemonogatari (Summer 2009) too if it didn't look so lifeless, fill it with a lot of text that are too quick to read. don't foresee picking this one up. Also, the ending theme is boring. Okay, enough about this. Let's move on.

Fortune Arterial: Akai Yakusoku (FORTUNE ARTERIAL ～赤い約束～)

It does seem interesting to watch, but the feeling of wanting to watch more of it is not there. Maybe I need to watch an another episode to be sure. The protagonist says that he is a 5th year there, but of what level? Certainly too old to be a Grade 5, and looking at them, and a mention of Year 6, it could refer to a secondary education system or High School Year 2 if the first 3 is of a middle school education level.

A Certain Forbidden Index of Magic 2 (とある魔術の禁書目録Ⅱ)

It starts at the last day of the summer holidays where Touma is struggling to finish off the homework he wasn't able to during the summer holidays, which the whole of season 1 took place in, when Index was kidnapped in front of him by a mysterious magician.

Index is back after a long time! I enjoyed the first season and the Railgun spin-off, though the former had the most part of an episode being at the same spot for too long. Besides that, I enjoyed the action and music. For the second episode, I wasn't really paying attention other than there being a lot of Nuns.

There are 4 anime I have listed above that I am likely to drop. I did not mention anything about Motto To Love-ru at all despite it being listed in my watch list, and there are certainly more anime that other anime bloggers and people at Twitter that I did not even mention.

End Summer 2010 review

2010-10-09T17:48:00.000+09:00

Since I wrote the mid-season summer anime review, there has been some changes of opinions of the anime I had reviewed that aired in the Summer season. This includes episodes 13 to 26 of an even earlier Spring anime and Summer anime that still continues on into the Autumn season.

Occult Academy (世紀末オカルト学院)
For the third straight anime released released under TV Tokyo's Power of Anime (アニメノチカラ), it still fails to keep my interest despite the nice graphics and original storyline. Maybe it's the storyline part that is the main reason.

For one thing, it started off in July 1999 as the academy principal's death and his daughter, Maya, not caring about him even at the funeral until something strange happened. Then a guy from the future (2012) wanting to fix the bad things from his time that started happening in 1999. Apart from the character designs, I decided to tolerate because of what I saw so far was interesting.

Then, things start to go downhill.

It became filled with boring filter episodes, a love story, family problems, going out with friends, and whatever that has nothing to do with the main character or the academy. This is the point around where I dropped. When I took a sneak peak of the second last episode, it made me at a loss of words: two of the secondary characters were hidden good and evil witches, fight each other, and... you get the idea. I stopped watching at that point. Couldn't stand it.

The other two anime under the Power of Anime are So Ra No Wo To (Winter 2010) and Senko no Night Raid (Spring 2010).

Ms. Okami & 7 friends (オオカミさんと七人の仲間たち)
As mentioned before, this anime has bizarre character designs to the extent to being ugly (though not as ugly as that senior citizen-looking high school girl in a maid-themed autumn anime I watched earlier today) and have useless secondary characters. I don't get what's going on other than a so-called bank that has a posh lounge hidden behind the small, poor-looking room. Oh, the ending animation is a pain to watch with that 8-bit music and the curtain repeatedly opening and closing. It's just summarizes on how awful I find the anime to be, especially when I'm watching K-On!! season 2 ending 2 at the same time too.

Seitokai Yakuindomo (生徒会役員共)
Besides K-On!! and Amagami, This anime is relatively decent enough for me to be able to tolerate during the Summer season. It has somehow kept me away from even thinking of dropping it and wanting for more. In contrast, the other student council I have watched, Seitokai no Ichizon (Autumn 2009) was boring as 85% of the time takes place in the room and lack something to look forward to.

Amagami (アマガミ)
I was just happily watching when suddenly, out of the blue, there is a narrator for Nakata Sae's arc (episode 9-12) and then mysteriously disappears. What was that about?

Anyways, from what I see featured in the opening, it seems that the better (-looking) girls would be featured from episode 13 with the second half, and a newer, better opening from episode 14. Since I last talked about it, it didn't follow exactly the pattern I mention then as some started from the present summer instead of Christmas of 2 years ago or things like that. However, the girls do appear in all of the arcs that doesn't focuses on them, but relatively minor. This anime is still ongoing now.

K-On season 2 (けいおん！！)
This ever-popular anime ended with 26 episodes. The graduation in episode 24 marked the end with the graduation ceremony. It was sad after knowing them for a long time and not seeing them again. Episodes 25 and 26 covers the gap between episode 21 and 23. I was expecting the epilogue and what they are doing outside instead like what was promised in the first episode of the first season (Spring 2009). Maybe we would see it for the OVA later on, but that's a long time from now.

I find it good that they went into detail of the girls' daily lives to show a more personal side of them. What is lacking is Tsumugi's house being featured, as the 4 other main characters had already shown theirs. From the hints of the summer training, and how excited she becomes over seemingly normal things, that's probably enough to know what she lives in. Anyways, the visual quality, attention to detail, and the opening and ending themes are the things that are usually missing in most anime.

The summer and spring seasons had limited amount of anime worth watching on TV, but among those, they are quite good to watch. Due to work constrains and how late anime are usually aired, I had to record them (which explains the channel logo) and watch them at a later time. Sometimes, almost a week later.

The new autumn anime has just started, and I need to watch a few episodes, and maybe that episode a few times, to get what is going on. This would be enough to see what anime to drop, and what to continue watching. There's an anime I saw of a boy who is very obsessed of playing visual novel games and then some crazy things happen. I don't remember what the title is, but it doesn't give me a good first impressions and not something I would continue with.

I haven't been doing any MAD on my YouTube channel lately mainly because I'm not good with creating something new, and the copyright take-down crap going on is unmotivated me to do more. The way copyright law is enforced these days are more of not allowing creativity, and only concerned of their target audience, which is made worse by the people who are outside of it having knowing nothing. Any anime by Kadokawa would at least have ads pasted on it (it's strange that a video footage of students doing the Hare Hare Yukai dance fall into this group too since there's no footage from the anime and the sound is muffled mixed with background noise), but the worse culprits block/remove the video completely are mainly Aniplex (or any company owned by Sony), TV Tokyo, and quite recently, Tokyo Broadcasting System (TBS). You could tell from the credits and the 10-sec sponsor screen after the opening and ending animations. A good example is that you don't see anime under those titles. Videos blocked/removed means that far fewer people would know about it and popularity would drop sharply once the first TV airing has ended. An example of this is BakaTest (Winter 2010) as, despite being popular when it was aired, seems to be relatively forgotten as compared to an older popular series that did not remove the unofficial videos. These companies see it as a hindrance to making profit, but they are making it worse by letting fewer people know about it and actually killing themselves. Why would a customer support something they know nothing of unless they are involved with it's production? Previews and low-quality legal online streaming sites (which is not available in all countries for the above reasons) are not enough.

K-On! Season 2 Episode 24 (Finale)

2010-09-18T19:32:00.000+09:00

(Cross-posted from the Japanese version)

Except for Azusa, it's graduation day for everyone in the Light Music Club.

Yui: "It's the graduation ceremony isn't it?"

Girl on the left: "See you later"

It is this day that the third year students making their final departure from the school. Will they see each other again?

These are the seniors' graduation diplomas, isn't it? (cries) Please don't graduate...

Don't worry, Azu-nyan. I'll give you a picture of us when we were in our first year.

Hokago (After-school) Teatime's last music performance in the school's music room

(For sub-less or closed-captioned Japanese lyrics, refer to the Japanese version)

Azusa is crying.

Although this is the final episode in the K-On series, I don't want to write about it in detail: it's too sad to write about. The next two episodes are extras outside the storyline.

Culture Japan Episode 0: カルチャージャパン (1時間英語版)

2010-09-15T19:31:00.001+09:00

(This video is posted directly from youtube)

Well, here's something interesting that Danny Choo has posted up recently on YouTube. It's about an hour long. As at the time I'm posting this, I'm only at about 33 minutes through, and what I have seen so far is of Fujisawa High School he has visited earlier to show what a high school in Japan is like, which is rarely known except through anime. Earlier on are of various rooms (well, 3 actually. Danny Choo and Sato Satomi doesn't count) that are filled with anime stuff. I had seen the raw footage of that dance somewhere during the first 30 minutes, but a long time ago.

Mid-Summer 2010 Review

2010-08-09T21:59:00.000+09:00

SUPER KICK!!!

To put it simply, this is my review of the Summer anime that survived the filtering of what I would had watched and the latter half of 24-episode Spring anime. For the summer ones, I am review them from the point of knowing more than what I didn't know at the beginning and watched it long enough to know the direction it's taking. For anime that I might drop in the near future, this would at least serve as to how I found it to be like before it happened instead of just tweeting it and not get noticed or just quietly remove it. Doing a review at the end of Summer instead (beginning of Autumn actually) means that I might not recall it accurately since I don't have reference material for it as I might dropped because of something persistent that I didn't like or something I was hoping would happen not happening.

Light Music (season 2)
Japanese name: けいおん！！
Characters: Very good, but background characters are strangely better
Background Detail: Very good, people and items are not lazily simplified/omitted and there's action even though the focus is elsewhere. Lacks people walking around, but there is interaction between the main character and a non-primary/secondary character.
How clear does it look in 720p?: Very good, 1080p + the above
Status: Watching

Well, I'm sure everyone knows what this is about or at least how popular it is, so I'm skipping the background story.

I'm glad that they paid more attention to the minor characters and explore more perspectives that were absent in the first season. For the first season, they squeezed two academic years into 12 episodes, but for the second season, it was the third year spread over 24 episodes, a 4x increase. What I'm disappointed is the lack of new songs (though Angel Beats that was airing during the first half was an overkill), and... how good the background characters are over the main characters themselves. What we have yet to see is Yui and the others graduating or performing at the Budokan, though we did see that happening at other places or to other people.

Just to add on, the opening and ending animation for the second half of this season was among one of the best I have ever seen since the 2006 airing of Haruhi Suzumiya. Those in-between seem to lack the X-factor even though they can be visually quite good. Also, visual-wise, I've never seen other anime that are at that level.

Okami and Her Seven Companions (Top image too)
Japanese Name: おおかみさんと七人の仲間たち
Characters: What's with the bizarre character designs and personalities? Why does every heroine in anime by JC Staff/Genco look like Aisaka Taiga?
Background Detail: Good, almost the same as K-on season 1. They do detail posters and bookshelves, but the wordings on them are not.
How clear does it look in 720p?: Not good, appears upscaled. Does all anime produced by JC Staff look like this too? Even the BD versions of anime released by them (eg. Railgun) seem to lack something, like contrast levels.
Status: Watching, but thinking of dropping

So, next up is "Ookami-san to Shichinin no Nakama-tachi" that I'm not exactly sure what it's about.

In the first scene of the first episode, we see someone being confronted by... er... what? Who would wear that? And then there's... the annoying narration who is voiced by the same person as the annoying Kuruko of "To Aru Majutsu/Kagaku no Index/Railgun" (another JC Staff produced anime). To add that, we have a shy guy with long bangs hiding in the shadows and abruptly confesses to... her. Then there's a one-sided loving couple, a crossdresser, and a useless magician.

To add on to the bizarreness they put on (ugly) costumes and attack students of a rowdy school just to meet the student council president that was just elected. We see a flashback of a heroine during a particular summer that looks a lot different than her current self. Another flashback scene shown was her being toured and bullied by classmates. It's not known when that was, but she did transfer out to where she met the little red hood . She mentioned that they were in the same class since middle school.

This is too generic mixed with things that I'm tired of seeing. Let's drop this: I don't want to waste time with it hoping what I was expecting that doesn't seem that it might happen. Also, must they put "Ookami-san" in every episode title?

End-of-Century Occult Institute
Japanese Name: 世紀末オカルト学院
Characters: It's worse than Ookami-san above in terms of design that I have ever seen for a post-2005 anime.
Background Detail: Better than K-on actually, but lacks that warm and fuzzy feeling
How clear does it look in 720p?: Quite good. Somewhere between the above two anime mentioned above
Status: Watching, but I'm not sure if I will

Occult Academy is the 3rd anime under TV Tokyo's アニメノチカラ (The Power of Anime) collaborating with people to produce anime originals that have no prior basis on light/visual novels, manga, video games or drama. I think of it as something similar to Fuji TV's ノイタミナ ("Animation" written backwards). Past shows under the Animenochikara brand include Sora no Maninami and Senkou no Night Raid, which, I've both dropped for different reasons.

The anime begins with Maya (heroine; pictured) to attend the funeral of her father that she's not really close with at an academy he founded that is obsessed with the occult, as showed by the "this is a waste of time" look on her face. It should be noted that Hisaka Youko, who voices Maya, also voices Mio of K-On and Shino of Setokai Yakuin-domo too.

After the above, the storyline starts off with some guy who literally came from the sky, well, the 13 years in the future, and tries to stop the things that are happening in the future. Recent episode seems to add in some filters and stray off from what it seem would happen at the beginning. It's hard to watch this with character design that are... err, different from what I'm used to.

Student Council Staff Members
Japanese Name: 生徒会役員共
Characters: Girls that have dirty thoughts in their minds.
Background Detail: Almost at par with K-On season two actually. You could see words on posters in the background, nice background characters to make up the atmosphere. Well, look at the second image in this section.
How clear does it look in 720p?: Appears upscaled too, as visible with the stack of papers in episode 3, but background details make up for it
Status: Watching. Despite the themes featured, I don't find it disturbing unlike certain people

The school Seitokai Yakuin-domo takes place in Ousai Gakuen, which is a former all-girls school that has recently become co-ed. Despite that, the population of male students there is still a handful that Tsuda's (protagonist; that tiny dot in the center middle in the sea of girls on the right image) class only has 2 boys, including himself and, during events like end-of-semester ceremony in episode 6, you can still see that more than 90% of the school population are females. Tsuda chose it only because it's close to where he lives. His sister is planning on joining that school too in the following year.

On the first day, he is unnecessarily stopped by Shino (left of first image), a member of the student council, and held him there long enough until the chime of the first lesson. To "make up for it", she asks him to join the student council as the male representative.

Since it's a slice-of-life genre like K-On and have not read the manga it's based on, there's not much I can say about it in term of storyline. Also, I find this way better than Seitokai no Ichizon of Autumn 2009

Play-Biting
Japanese name: アマガミ
Characters: ... a little better than Ookami-san, i guess
Background detail: Building structures are detailed, but not books or posters
How Clear Does it Look in 720p?: Not bad, but background and character designs
Status: Watching. It "resets" with another girl every 4 episodes, so it's annoying to see the same thing again

Amagami is based a visual novel where the protagonist would choose one of the six girls from his school, including his own younger sister, and try to win their heart.The story is repeats itself after every 4 episodes, but with a different girl and with very noticeable patterns:

Waited on a Christmas night 2 years ago for a girl, but she didn't show up
Just as he's about to give up the girl he will get along for the next 4 episodes would show up
Protagonist did something to make the girl fall in love in him
Some talk among other girls
At some quiet corner, the girl would offer the protagonist to lick her belly (Erm, what?)
Some talk among other characters again
Relationship reaches climax around christmas
Time forwards by 10 years where they are apparently married
back to point 1, but with a different girl

Well, this is the pattern it seems to be taking after 6 episodes. It reminds me of "Endless Eight" episodes in Suzumiya Haruhi no Yuuutsu. Number of girls (6) + number of episodes focused on each girl (4) = 24 episodes, so with season 2 of Index coming up in autumn, I don't think I would watch all the way until the end of the year.

Well, that's all that I had picked up for the summer season, with the rest being already dropped or never picked up, including "High Shool of the Dead" during mid-June you might have seen on my anime watch list before then.

Looking at the upcoming list of autumn anime, I can already see that there would be a large amount that I won't pick up, but I would look at the trailers and the first few episodes to be sure. To end this post, here's a hint of the latest anime episode episode I am at time of publishing.

Hint: No words were spoken in this scene

Just how many characters is too much?

2010-07-31T00:40:00.001+09:00

Watching several anime for some time now, I've noticed things that they all have in common: the number of characters affects how the anime would go. The more the are, the overall focus for each is reduced.

That many main characters?

Take Negima for example. On the image on the right, you would see everyone that appears at least once in the entire series. Sure there's a lot, but the focus is mostly on characters number 8, 13, 27, 28, and that kid in the middle bottom. What happened to the rest? They became just background characters, or supporting the earlier mentioned characters. I would prefer focus on no. 2, 5, 13 (again), 28 as the main characters, but guess they wasted it on filters.

In recent posts, I've mentioned about Angel Beats and Durarara having introducing unnecessary characters. That acting/vice president of the student council does seem good to introduce for a short-term character, but they kept him around for too long that, besides regaining Otonashi's memories, his presence was unnecessary and his constant arguing with Hinata was getting too annoying. In Durarara's case, the focus of all the characters featured in the opening and endings meant that, given the amount, means that the main characters (Kida, Masaomi, Anri) were given lesser importance than they should be getting. It seemed like a 3-character focus, but this somehow increased to over 20 that it has become a big mess, adding to the jumping around the timeline all over the place. Kind of reminds me of how seasons 3-5 of Pokemon seem to have this "a-Pokemon-an-episode" theme, large diversions by having filters that were not in the game they were based on, or having the main characters of the first season to mysteriously become the main characters again for any beginnings of a new region.

Rightmost top, leftmost bottom, and the 2 next to her

Who is this?

So, this brings me to the next topic: background characters. Have you seen background ("mob") characters of any anime that looks better than the main characters themselves? I mean, I could see how much better their personality is compared to the main character is. In the ending theme of "Seitokai Yakuindomo", they featured a girl from the same school the anime is set in, but is also not any of the introduced characters. Well, it's nice to have an another perspective.

In short, having just 2-3 characters and focusing on them most of the time as compared to having too many and focusing on them only once.

Test

2010-07-30T22:04:00.000+09:00

This is a test.

Final thoughts on Angel Beats

2010-07-13T21:48:00.001+09:00

Angel Beats was a 13 episode Spring 2010 anime that ended around the third week of June.

Just a little background about the production process: it is an anime original by Key and Jun Maeda, who also did Clannad, Air, and Little Busters. Maeda went to PA Works because he was impressed on how they did True Tears (or Kyoto Animation they usually go with was busy with K-On).

(I am listing the events in chronological order, so you might find some spoilers if you have not watched the episodes of the latter half.)

Did they say what illness she's suffering from that she has to be hospitalized for a long time?

Otonashi Yuzuru was a high school student who has a younger sister being in hospital for a long time as she waits for a suitable donor. Back then, Otonashi was at his lowest point in life and taking several part time jobs to earn a living, barely enough to have money to eat.

Despite permission being denied by the doctors, Otonashi brought out his sister out of the hospital on Christmas night to look at the Christmas decorations. It was that night that she died on her brother's shoulders. Otonashi didn't realize it until later.

With that, he realized that the sister wasn't the only thing in his life and wants to save people. That courage had him to study hard to have his grades improve.

"Everyone's dead?"

However, on the way to take his college entrance test, the subway he was in was caved in with no way to get out by themselves and external communication unavailable. Reminded of his sister, he chooses to lead everyone until help arrives. However, help came too late to save Otonashi. This is where he soon finds himself in the afterlife world where most of the anime takes place.

..........well that's the summary. Now I would like to point out my thoughts about it.

Iwasawa appeared for only 3 episodes? She was way more cooler than Yui.

The first episode was impressive, along with the music. Until after the title screen appears in episode 4, things start to go downhill with filters and rushed storyline, even with the last episode.

Visual-wise, I thought that the "brightness" and shiny heads was part of the afterlife universe, but things remained the same style in the real world.

What I find lacking is, how did Yurippe die? The flashback she had was when she was younger, and suicide is out of the question as they won't end up in that world. There was also the lack of interaction with other members of the war-front or the Guild. Naori's introduction seemed to be of little significance and unnecessary too. The last 2 episodes raised a lot of unanswered questions.

This "dream" scene was too short

Confusingly, this anime looks like it's focused on Yuri being together with Otonashi, but she doesn't even care at the end and suddenly interested in ~~Tenshi~~ Kanade like the last scene of the last episode.

"End"... That's it?

Including the opening and ending theme songs, the songs featured in the anime have more songs that are actually quite good compared to other anime that has songs too, including K-on. In the below PV, the band arrangement and instruments are strangely the same models featured in K-On too:

oh, and sparkling water too

Overall, the anime seems to be a big mess or a slice-of-life with some action added. It's one of the few anime in the spring lineup that I enjoyed watching. As you had seen in the above screenshots, their heads are unusually shiny, but when combined with a background like on the right, the scenery can be quite nice: something quite rare even in popular anime.

Final thoughts on "Durarara!!"

2010-07-02T00:37:00.001+09:00

Scenes like this seems to be lacking in later episodes.

Durarara was a 23 episode series that was part of the Winter 2010 anime lineup.

Here's a brief background on what this anime is about:
It started as the main character. Ryuugamine Mikado, arrives into the urban Ikebukuro from a rural town to enroll into a high school there with a recommendation from a childhood friend of his, Kida Masaomi (because the latter was lonely). Mikado wanted to be in the city as he sees the urban area as where one would have new adventures there, and that he has never left his hometown his whole life prior to that. At the school, after some commotion caused by missing classmates (Harima Mika, Yagiri Seiji), they met Sunohara Anri.

This series has two main arcs that are based on the light novel series. The first half is about Celty's head and how crazy the Yagiri siblings are over it. The rest of Celty's body is searching for the head, but to some frustrations. gave up. The second half are about the gangs mentioned in the first episode that reside within Ikebukuro, the slasher, and the secret behind the 3 main characters that they hide from each other.

That aside, how the anime is expressed seemed as though they are following a template they have to stick to and not make any variation to it. The same seems to apply to an another anime by the same novel author (Baccano!), which might explain the cameo appearance somewhere in episode 12 that leave audience who have never watched that wondering what's with the focus on them. (Some say that they would be involved in a latter Durarara arc not currently covered by the anime)

Smoking?!

On top of that, too many characters are introduced on top of the secondary characters, resulting in a one-character-per-episode like thing that resulted in backtracking of events and timelines already covered in earlier episodes (but in different perspective), which resulted in very little character development and resulted in the main characters (Mikado, Masaomi, Anri) almost the same time as the secondary characters (Shinra, Celty, Simon, etc.), reducing yheir importance. Characters with very little appearance like Tom Tanaka, Shizuo's younger brother, and the police that haunts Celty since episode 13, strangely appear in the second opening like they would appear as important characters later on when this second opening first appeared in episode 13. It also seems that none of the episodes are OP/ED-less that, in other anime, suggests an important or serious episode. Even the last few minutes and ending theme of the last episode seemed so cliched and boring with jazz music and fast forwarding from the first to last. If you have seen anime like Code Geass (Autumn 2006, Summer 2008) Sola (Spring 2007), True Tears (Winter 2008) or, more recently, Angel Beats (Spring 2010), you would know what I'm talking about.

Overall, this anime is worth watching with good storyline and character design, but the second half seemed poorly expressed than the first. In fact, my impression of this anime remained good until about 3/4 through where it became apparent that things have to be rushed or left out.

K-On!! first impressions

2010-04-24T01:30:00.001+09:00

(note the extra examination mark in the title for the second season)

They actually paid more attention to the background characters more

K-On is now back again after last year's Spring 2009 season becoming popular that KyoAni was too focused on its sequel (and "The Disappearance of Haruhi Suzumiya") that they indirectly lost the bid to do Angel Beats as they had previously done other "Key" visual novels (Air, Clannad). Well, to be fair, PA Works studio wasn't too bad either as they had done "True Tears" some time ago.


New opening theme: The cake is a lie

To remind you, this is a slice-of-life anime with no real storyline to follow. I've always express my dislike towards anime with no storyline (did I?) as those are usually more towards fan-service and/or quite boring to watch. Also, partly because of the transition from analog to digital transmission, TBS has apparently discontinued making cropped letterbox (4:3) versions around the fourth quarter of 2009 probably because the old analog transmission would be shut down in Japan on July 2011. It may seem not that far away, but that's only about 400 days.

Too bad this didn't last long.

Compared to the first season, it seems that this covered more perspective. However, Tsumugi's daily life from her point of view is not shown. Sure she does appear, but what about when she's not with the rest? How rich is she? The summer houses we see in season 1 are considered "one of the smallest" despite it appearing huge.

The latter part of this particular scene seem rather popular.

Also, we get to see the main characters interacting with the minor/side/background characters and vice versa, which seem rather lacking in most anime without making them an important character later on.

What's your focus on this image? Azusa, Jun, or one of the two classmates in the background?

As you might recall, the first season ended on an unknown part of winter of their second year as Christmas and New Year is not shown. (Well, there is, but that's a year earlier in the timeline.) So, logically, they would begin in their third year.

The girl on the far left appears to be the most popular background character in this debut scene. Well, she does appear in the OP, but this made her famous.

Much to everyone's delight, everyone got into the same class and Sawako was behind it. Realizing that Azusa might be alone when the four graduate, they began their search for new members, which failed.

Another infamous scene

When Sawako asks for the costumes borrowed from the drama club, Mio notices the personal items that got accumulated over time. While cleaning up (despite hesitation from Yui and Ritsu), they discovered an old electric guitar that Sawako receive from a friend of her dad. She doesn't need it, so she had them sell the the guitar and have the money from it for the club's funds.

Erm, before I spoil you with more description about episodes you might have not watched here's part of a class photo of 3-1.

Yui and the rest are in 3-2 by the way.

Durarara!! Episode 2 - Ikkyo Ichijitsu

2010-04-23T23:54:00.000+09:00

一虚

一実

Constantly Changing Phase and Being Highly Unpredictable

It's the first day at Mikado's High School. As the principal talks about how there are so many new students despite Japan's declining birth rate, Enri notices that one of the teachers was staring at her body, but looks away when she turns to look at him.

Mikado and Enri are posted to class 1-A, Masomi and Kamichika Rio, the girl who was kidnapped two days earlier, are both in 1-B. Back in 1-A, the teacher calls out for Harima Mika, but she's not around. Just at that moment, a guy called Yagiri Seiji walks in late just to say that he would not be coming to school as he has "more important things in life" to do.

The focus switches to Rio. Why is she there if she should have been kidnapped and died two days earlier? It all began during her middle school days when she found out that her father had been cheating on her mother. She ensured that her mother saw the envelope containing the evidence, but not letting her know it was from Rio. However, nothing seemed to have changed. She turned to an online friend called Nakura who claims to go through the same problems too. Nakura suggested that they die together in order to make their parents understand what they should have cherished.

Her meeting with someone called Nakura at the appointed location, which is on the same night as the previous episode. She knows that the person she met there wasn't Nakura, but followed the imposer anyway. Meanwhile, the real Nakura, Orihara Izaya, is watching them from a distance. Rio ends up in being kidnapped , but before she lost consciousness, she decided that this was destiny.

Meanwhile, Izaya pops out of the bushes to extinguish a lit cigarette that one of the kidnappers threw just before they sped away, and Celty was sent to rescue the girl.

Angel Beats! Episode 1

2010-04-04T04:26:00.001+09:00

(fig.1) You wake up to see a girl in front of you with a sniper pointed towards something

The long awaited anime by ~~Maeda Jun~~ Key (did Air and Clannad too) has begun. There was no opening theme song here, but there is the slow-paced piano version and you might have heard parts of it in the trailers anyway.

(fig.2) Yes, the title is just a white background with black text with a Georgia/Times typeface.

Now, this episode title screen is rather plain... but having fanciful fonts and colours that is small overlaying the main episode is just distracting. Durarara and Railgun are examples of having a (near) basic background and might carry over audio from the scene prior to it being displayed. BakaTest is um, hard, and that is already without the fansubs. Haruhi is kind of okay as the text is large and white despite being on top of the episode itself. Like, look at company logos of today to just 25 or more years ago. Speaking of overlays, the display of sponsors appears as an overlay after the CM break around the middle instead of the usual 10 seconds, with the background from a scene of the episode or what the producers made up, within about the first 7 minutes or after the opening theme, whichever is earlier. This episode seem to have a lot of overlays from winning prizes by visiting some site with some password within a specified time, to a soundtrack selling at the end of May, to next episode starting at a different time. A lot.

(fig.3) Lighting adjusted

The (male) protagonist, who has amnesia, is suddenly thrown with Yui (fig.1) pointing a sniper rifle to an "Angel" (fig.3) who looks very much like a girl. Not believing he's in the afterworld, he just walks up to her and have a conversation before being stabbed. The protagonist wakes up in a infantry to find that he doesn't have any scar and thinks it was all a dream until he saw his blood-stained torn uniform hung nearby. Eventually, he finds out about the SSS (死んだ世界戦線) and Yui introduces to everyone. (Why the male and female uniforms are completely different in design is beyond me. Shouldn't it look closer to what "the angel" is wearing?) There are no hospitals as everyone is already dead, but that doesn't explain where the weapons everyone is carrying comes from.

(fig.4) Very detailed

This afterlife world is the transitional phase between one's death and the next phase. As Yui describes, anyone who follows what the angel says are like NPCs in a video game who abide by the law, while others, go against them. In fact, the afterlife world is full of them or the world wouldn't be like that and be lifeless instead.

(fig.5) Blueprint of the place

Yuri: Anyways, it's about time we start with Operation Tornado. Guys, you head to key locations at specified times around the cafeteria, while I have the girls to have a "live band" to create a distraction. As for me, I'm going to hide during the duration of the entire operation. Oh, and the "live concert" is scheduled to end three hours from now. Here's a rough illustration of how the band would look:

(fig.6) Let's see, some adjustments here and there...

(fig.7) ゴーゴー水色。。。

Otonashi: Hey! How did you do that?
Yuri: The same way how I got the hat I'm wearing now or the large projection behind me: it just magically appears when I need it. I'm telling you this as the music is so loud that you could hear it as you fight the angel and get lost in thought while fighting as to what is going on inside. Go on, the clock is already ticking from when we started the meeting.
Otonashi: Why didn't you say so earlier!

(fig.8) Mommy!!!!

As Otonashi stand-by at one of the bridges, the "Angel" who stabbed him earlier appears. He had shot her, but despite a direct hit at the stomach with visible blood flowing out, it seems that it's ineffective. From that point, she uses the "blade" to reflect the attacks like a force field surrounding her. Even reinforcements who came can't overcome her strong defense. Eventually, they withdraw from the fight but still achieve their primary objective: to steal food tickets by using several large fans inside and blow them out of the building. Yes, all the heavy duty things just for that. (=_=)0

(fig.9) Those flying things in the air are the food tickets

...I've rarely the first episode of an anime to be this hyped up and closely matches my expectations of what to look out for in a typical anime. The ranking of this is even higher than Durarara, but comparable to Eden of the East. I'm speechless. P.A. Works had did anime like True Tears or sola some years ago, but to be this detailed is quite rare, probably more detailed than Marcorss Frontier. It's something like Someday's Dreamers (魔法遣いに大切なこと) in 2008, or what SHAFT would have done if they have not added mountainous words in kyuujitai, references to other anime, and other nonsense most other animation studios usually don't do. Not sure if it's me, but I did notice lags during the concert animation. At least this lifts up my spirits on how BakaTest ended recently and all the other anime that look good, but failed to keep my attention (eg. Sora no Woto, Fullmetal Alchemist).

(fig.10) Yes, like (fig.2), this plain looking thing is the preview too.

I'm not sure if the on-screen credits before we see the spinning logo of SSS is the actual ending, but it's normal for the first, last, and some significant episodes (suspense, a main character died, end of a major event). Since almost all of the trailers has content from episode 1, and the preview is nothing more than a random excerpt of lines from that episode, I have no clue as to what to expect.

Final thoughts on "Baka to Test to Shōkanjū"

2010-04-02T17:06:00.001+09:00

The most grandest "battle" (Yuuko vs. Minami)

BakaTest (バカとテストと召喚獣) is a 13-episode Winter 2010 anime that has ended recently.

Well, as mentioned in the Winter 2010 anime post, is is about a school named Fumizuki Academy with contrasts between classrooms, with those with better grades getting the better classroom facilities. This, however, focuses on the worse class, F, and proving to everyone that they are not lazy people.

Why is my similar-looking dumb twin brother more popular than me?

Throughout the anime, we see Himeji failing to give a love letter to Akisa, but also the diminishing importance of the battle the anime is about and more nosebleed, fan-service (including the emphasis of how much Hideyoshi is a trap), and a lot of filters.

Until Akisa's sister returns from university somewhere halfway, Akisa is portrayed as a lazy student who spends a lot on games and photos of girls (including Hideyoshi when cross-dressing) that he has barely enough money to afford a decent meal to the point that he even resorts to eating leftovers, cutting cup noodles to 1/64 of its size, and even raw sugar. There's also the one-sided love of Shouko and Yuuji.

As for the battles, we rarely see non-2nd year students being involved and the high desire of the battle between F and A and almost no mention of the classes in-between. Battles systems are not illustrated well: the battlefield area is triggered by having an Iron Bracelet or a teacher. I don't get how this is triggered by simply raising their (right?) arm into the air in the school grounds. Health points depends on the subject triggered (literature, history, mathematics, physical ability, etc.), which puts F-class people at a big disadvantage for most subjects. Avatar-like things called summoned beings have this feedback system where the owner feels the pain "the thing" feels.

The last scene in the last episode featuring everyone (except Akisa)

Overall, this anime seem to have the potential to become popular, but sadly, I've rarely come across anime that stayed consistent from the start to the end with no-nonsense in between. Beach/pool/amusement-park held in summer are too common. It's not easy for an anime to want me to watch more but things like character-design, plot, amount of filters, fewer fanservice, and other things. (Highly promoted in media ≠ good) Bakatest does make me want to watch another episode, but filter episodes and how the last episode ended degrades it. It's still good if you just want to pass time as it's one of the better anime in the Winter 2010 anime lineup.

Final thoughts on "To Aru Kagaku no Railgun"

2010-03-28T16:56:00.001+09:00

When I first heard of this after the last episode of Index in 2008, I wasn't sure what to think of it as Index was boring, but the two girls that appeared in the openings (Saten and Uiharu) made me wonder why they appear there, talking to Kuroko, despite not appearing in that anime.

Fast forward to October 2009, it's spin-off anime, Railgun, started. I wasn't expecting anything other than somewhat parts of Index to appear. I liked the opening and ending: quite catchy and upbeat. As time passed, and with reference to the Railgun manga, I realized that any reference to Index is very minimal as events from Index involving Misaka and Kuroko never appeared. Even Touma is treated like a one-off character. I wished they do that instead of the pointless filters.

Speaking of filters, things start to go downhill after a few episodes and are forgettable. Episode 13 (modeling agency) was very boring, episode 19 (midsummer festival) seemed like they tried to squeeze everyone in, the pace was too fast, and the character design (Kongou Mitsuko and Uiharu especially) in this episode is glaringly obvious that it looks awful. Since these long filters, there has been nothing exciting until episode 23, the second last episode. The mini-arc involving Konori Mii was interesting. The opening and ending theme for most of the second half of the season was not as upbeat as the first half. I don't know why both Index and Railgun takes place only in a particular summer vacation, which also means that, except for (an episode worth of) a flashback, we never see the characters in their winter uniform, which looks better than the summer ones.

Overall, it had a good start, but things went downhill. Less than half of its total episodes were something to look forward to. As Railgun episode 13 was around when the 2010 Winter anime (Durarara, BakaTest, etc.) began, I wasn't really looking forward to keep watching Railgun since then. Maybe it's best to stick to its manga or light novel. I've only read up to volume 3 of the manga. (Can't seem to buy volume 4 or latter: it's either sold out or require a mode of payment I can't use)

ALL HAIL THE GREAT ONEE-SAMA!!!

Background Characters

2010-03-27T03:31:00.001+09:00

Background characters. Though we might be more focused on the more important characters that is the main focus, have you ever wondered why do they look better than the main characters?

To begin with, the design of the main characters are design the earliest. Usually, far earlier than the anime series. So, the background characters are drawn later.

Sometimes, the main character might not be the main focus and most likely not given a name. If they even say anything, it would appear with names like "Girl A" in the credits.

Of course, without these background characters, it would look out of place. There would either be silhouettes (Bakatest), or even completely void of them (Bakemonogatari). Sometimes, they are included, but are not animated (K-on) or very little (Railgun).

Unfortunately, in images like these, there are errors
Take this screenshot for example: in the left image, there are details included like the posters or the duty roster next to the chalkboard, but that girl closest to the teacher on the right is wearing a blue tie instead of a red ribbon. In the right image, the second and third girl from the left have the body proportions out of place: their head is smaller than the body! Of course, the right image is displayed quickly.

Of course, the background characters has to match with the style used for most of the characters, but sometimes, they would just use the same face, but with different hairstyle, outfits, and body language.

There are those where the background characters look a lot better than primary and secondary characters.

There are those that add to the realism of having a background character reacting to what secondary characters are doing to them, even if it does not have any actual outcome. Here, a girl (in uniform) is forced out of her seat by Harima Mika (wearing white). She is forced to move to the empty seat behind the main character (Mikado). This all happens while the main character is narrating about Seiji (guy next to Mika) who finally turned up in school and switches focus to Sunohara Eri who is looking at Harima and Seiji and is seated at the front left.

It's sad that these background characters that look a lot better than the main characters don't appear much and won't be remembered as they appeared for only a while.

Oh, and one last thing. Can you guess who this is?

To Aru Kagaku no Railgun 13

2010-02-27T01:53:00.002+09:00

The weather is so hot that I can't eat outdoors~

Misaka-senpai, Kuruko-san, would you help us to be models?

Uiharu and Saten was invited along. They are amazed at how nice the building is.

Kuroko: Kongo Mitsuko, Konori-senpai, what are you two doing here? And you, did you know that Tokiwadai students are supposed to wear the uniform even on days off?
Mitsuko: Today I'm not a Tokiwadai student. I'm a model with a large audience ever since I was a child.

Kuroko: By "audience", you mean the people at your household?

Lady in the foreground: Okay, pick a swimsuit you like, and, when you girls are ready, let me know.

Lady from earlier: This virtual-reality room is the most advanced in the academic city: you could actually feel what you see. It's currently not switched on though.

WOW!

Now what?

Now this is the extreme opposite of what we had earlier.

Mikoto: Wow, what a nice view. Look, that's... the earth? Wait, we're on the moon surface?!

What is that large rectangular black thing over there?

Lady: Oh, sorry. There were technical problems with the machine. While it's being fixed, have a meal. The ingredients are over there.

Wow! Nice curry!

Touma: Biribiri, what are you doing?

I won't be applying the style used for Durarara!! here due to different interests towards anime. On top of that, this episode of Railgun is one of the most boring filter episode I've seen for quite a while. Even how I covered K-On! is different. I currently have no plans to do the BD/DVD-only episode 14, but it is possible in the future. Just that I would do it some time after everyone else has written their reviews of it.

Not sure about other anime, but this series has the longest (ビキニは目線が上下に分かれますけどワンピースは身体のラインが出ますから細い方しか似合わないんですよ; episode 13) and the shortest (声; episode 21) episode titles I've ever seen.

Durarara!! Episode 1: Kaikou Ichiban

2010-02-26T21:13:00.010+09:00

開口

一番

The First Words You Say Out of Your Mouth

Though this isn't as dramatic as Eden of the East or Code Geass, the atmosphere of me wanting to watch it for more is there. This feeling applies to K-On! too: there's no real storyline, but yet, I liked watching it. This used to apply to Railgun too, until they had filter episodes, especially episode 13 onwards and major difference in sequence from the manga and how little it had on parts that co-inside with the main storyline (Index). One of the best anime in the Winter 2010 lineup. A sharp contrast with Winter 2009, where I had dropped everything I had picked up as those were so boring. Look in the archives of this blog dated around April or December for that year or last month for my review.

Watching the opening theme for the first time tells me that there will be a large set of characters being featured. The opening animation matches quite well with the music (裏切りの夕焼け; Treachery Sunset), but the PV of that song is nothing more than the band playing musical instruments on the roof a low-rise building during sunset, which actually looks quite nice. As I mentioned in an earlier post, there's a woman who had the same effect displaying their names like everyone else, but there is no name given.

This episode introduces to us the world of Durarara through a 15-year old Ryugamine Mikado. Mikado has never left his hometown prior to heading to Ikebukuro to start in his High School education there. There, he met Kida Masaomi, his friend from primary school. Though they had not seen for ages, they had kept contact with each other online. Kida brings him around Ikebukuro and tells him about the people they should pay special attention to.

The focus gradually changes to a girl that had walked past them to meet someone they had only known online for the first time, only to be kidnapped later. There are already rumors of people disappearing in the area between Ikebukuro and Shinjuku, targeting people who are least likely to be noticed missing like illegal foreigners. The group that kidnaps this girl seem to have a particular interest in teenage girls (十代女子).

After another brief section of Ryuugamine and Kida introducing to more people, like Simon who works for a Russian-own sushi restaurant, the kidnappers were waiting in a multi-story carpark for their higher-ups when a motorbike rider appears and tries to rescue the girl from the kidnappers. When one of the kidnappers try to ram her with the car, it was revealed that she did not have a head. This is the legendary black rider everyone has been talking about. Ryuugami and Kida were lucky enough to see her with their own eyes. Shortly before that, they encountered a strange woman that had a scar on her neck. (If you look closely, the skin tones of the head and body do not match)

Throughout the anime, there appears to be a chat room and a same voice (changes in each episode, and it seemed to be done by whoever was narrating the preview in the previous episode) narrating what they had typed. They are Kanra (甘楽), Seton (セットン) and Tanaka Tarou (田中太郎). As at episode 8, the real identities of these people are currently unknown, but it is for certain it was not the girl who was kidnapped.

To Aru Kagaku no Railgun 11 & 12

2010-02-22T16:30:00.002+09:00

We've infiltrated the office, but she's not around.

What is this?

This is the Anti-Skill. Please leave your car and put your hands in the air.

*sigh* Not again...

Fine, fine you win.

Hey, what are you doing?

What's going on?

The Anti-Skill was whipped out just like that?

Uiharu!

I've thrown some empty cans into the air. What are you going to do about it?

I bet you weren't expecting them to explode.

Wait! How did you...?

Thundershock!

What is this I'm seeing?

Kiyama as a teacher?

A double-faced old man?

What was that I saw while using my thunderbolt on her?

YOU! You saw my memories, didn't you?

If it wasn't for that old man, I wouldn't have become a villain as I am now! Argh! The pain! Something's coming out of my head!

What on earth is that thing?

Kuroko: I can't stand it! I need to go find onee-sama!
Mii: Hey, wait!

Kuroko: But...
Mii: What can you do with those injuries anyway? You might be causing more trouble.

Uiharu? What are you doing here?

It's apparently not interested in me...

All the Level Upper patients suddenly became like this at the exact same time.

What's a civilian like you doing here? It's dangerous here.

You're really starting to annoy me...

What on earth is a place like this doing here? I didn't see it earlier?

A weird sound is being played across the academic city. This apparently has the opposite effect to those who had used the Level Upper.

Oh! It stopped regenerating!

Misaka finds the core of the monster and destroys it.

What just happened?

You might be seeing me heading to jail now, but it won't be long before you see me out.

In the meantime, have fun while you can.

Oh, by the way Uiharu. All the Level Upper victims have recovered, so Saten should have recovered too.

Oh? Uiharu, you're here.

I'm now back to normal!

To Aru Kagaku no Railgun 10

2010-02-22T14:49:00.002+09:00

Hnn.....

Are you sure this is working?

What? It actually worked! Just like magic!

Hey, Ruiko! That "Level Upper" actually worked!

Ruiko?

What the heck is this?

Uiharu: Transfer Complete
Kuroko: Is this music file the "Level Upper" everyone is talking about? It's hard to believe that it's just audio.

Uwaa!!!

Jeez!

Hey, you're annoying.

Give me a break...

Uiharu: Wow, look at all the injuries.

Uiharu: Don't worry, besides the two of us, Misaka-san would be the only ones who would see you like this.

Kuroko: I... DON'T... WANT... ONEE-SAMA... TO... SEE... ME... LIKE... THIS...

Mikoto: Hey! Do you guys want anything?
Kuroko: Crap!

Oh, hi there, onee-sama! Good day!

Phew...

Uiharu: You have the Tree Diagram supercomputer to solve this case?
Kiyama: Yeah, come here if you like to.

Hey! What happened?

That's what happened to my friend. I'm scared of the same thing happening to me any time now.

Don't say such weird things. Look, I'm coming over.

Saten-san...

You two! Could you come over here?

Mikoto: A real-life Gekota!

Um, you're mistaken.

These are the brainwaves of all the Level Upper victims and we noticed that the patterns have a common pattern.

That's a lot...

Kiyama: I see. That's what happened to your friend.

Kiyama: I'm going to get some coffee to calm you down.

Hm? What's that?

Based on all the info the professor gave us, we've found someone who matches the common brainwave the most.

This, and this, this too. They are all...

You shouldn't be looking through people's things you know.

Kiyama Harumi?!

By the way, what's with the flowers on your head?

What you had seen me doing is just a small part of what is to come.

Onee-sama! Wait! It's too dangerous to go there.

ALL HAIL THE GREAT MIKOTO ONEE-SAMA!

Hey, what did you make me say that for?

To Aru Kagaku no Railgun 09

2010-02-22T03:46:00.002+09:00

Kiyama spots some yuri action as it's happening.

N-n-no! You're mistaken. Kuroko was just trying to wake me up.

Uiharu is so used to her skirt being lifted by Saten that she doesn't care about it.

Hey, Uiharu! I see realistic life-size figures of people we both know behind that shopping window!

Saten just before entering the academic city. Hairstyle makes her look completely different.

Saten runs off to somewhere.

Meanwhile, someone is attacking Kuroko.

She defeats him by luring him to the uppermost floor, teleports the glass windows into the supporting pillars some floors down, causing the pillars there to be sliced.

And causing the building to collapse. Well, the building was vacated, neglected, and marked for demolition anyways.

Again?! In the same direction too!

Ruiko! Over here!

To Aru Kagaku no Railgun 08

2010-02-22T03:14:00.002+09:00

Today's topic: "Personal Reality". Let me explain the theories behind this

Argh, he's babbling about stuff I don't understand... again...

Brainfreeze!

Kuroko: Here onee-sama, have a taste of mine.
Mikoto: Don't we both have the same flavor?

Uiharu's feeling sick.

*whisper* *whisper*
Uiharu: No I did not!

The same restaurant where Index 1 took place. Possibly on the same night too.

I was like, um, hoping you guys could tell me?

I'm feeling nervous about this...

Please, I beg you. I had s****** cars, k***** many people and even used some cheat codes just to get here.

Onee-sama, you've played too much of that game that you mixed up what you did in your gaming world with real life. Games these days, they're too realistic.

I wasn't happy when they showed this gang instead of chasing after Touma. They appear again in episode 14.

Who are you? Are you lost?

Not you two. Over there.

To Aru Kagaku no Railgun 07

2010-02-22T02:15:00.002+09:00

(sorry for not reviewing this since November: was busy. Will quickly cover up to episode 20 and maybe cover Durarara in a different style.)

Ah? Onee-sama?

Lessons are so boring...

I actually liked how they did the lighting for this scene. Wasn't expecting for it to be so long though.

Now that Saten and Uiharu are away, let me try out this... WHY IS HE HERE?!!

Kuroko: I've some urgent info. The bomber is targeting Seven Smith.
Uiharu: Seven Smith? Where's that?
Saten: That's where are now!

Agh! It's that bomb! It's going to explode!

What did onee-sama do to leave this oddly shaped unaffected area at the epicenter of the explosion?

Celty's head

2010-02-14T21:54:00.000+09:00

In the opening sequence of Durarara (デュラララ！！) , you would notice that only this woman does not have a name, but yet appear as an important character.

Enri Sunohara shows her diary of her with Harima, a friend from middle school who had gone missing before school began. Sunohara mentioned that Mika Harima was stalking Seiji Yagari, the guy in the second episode who came late only to declare that he won't be coming to school for "something more important". Notice that Mika Harima likes to wear a hat and clothes that are white and pink.

When I first saw this in episode 2, I didn't realize that there were two empty seats instead of just one right behind Mikado Ryuugami. The other one is in the red circle of the right image.

Sunohara became the class representative as she and Harima wanted to become one. She looked at the empty desk where she should have sat. Since Ryuugami was sitting right in front the empty desk and she was looking for a male class representative (as indirectly mentioned by the old man), her looking at that direction made him raise up his hand.

Who is this woman that has an odd scar that Ryuugami bumped into episode 1 that later became Yagiri Seiji's lover? Notice that the colour of the skin is diifferent. I would assume that this was just after the head transfusion. Well, how do you explain the odd scar mark and the uneven skin tone? The mention of Celty's head gone missing in episode 4 and the head shown in episode six must mean something, though it is revealed that the kidnappers seen in the first two episodes is actually (one of) the supplier(s) for the Yagiri Pharmaceutical.

Here's a theory of what might have happened: The Yagiri Pharmaceutical company (managed by Seiji's older sister) hunts for people that wouldn't be noticed if they had went missing. Yagiri Seiji likes Celty's head, but Mika Harima likes him. Mika Harima might have heard (after stalking Yagiri) that the company does experiments and have somehow acquired Celity's head. So to have Yagiri love Mika, she decides to have her head swapped with that of Celity. Just after the surgery, she decides to have a walk around with her new head. She bumps into someone (Ryuugami), thinking that it's Yagiri, but upon realization that it's someone else, she runs away in horror. (This was the only time we heard her voice) She searches high and low around Ikebukuro, but eventually, she found him.

Speaking of episode 6, this episode revealed a lot of the mysteries from the earlier and made me look back at the earlier episodes and would notice details that I wouldn't notice.

Winter 2010 Anime First Impressions

2010-01-10T13:28:00.004+09:00

Here are some of my first impressions of the new winter 2010 anime that has been aired as at the time of this post. I am facing this weird problem where if I were to take a snapshot of a 1080i video, the aspect ratio goes funny, but nothing wrong when playing it. The screenshots are taken at random, so having fewer or more screenshots does not mean that they are very/not good.

Ladies vs. Butlers (レディ✕ばと！)

Opening:

This opening is actually quite upbeat and good, but there are some hints of fanservice and signs that I won't be watching this.

Episode 1:
That's ridiculously thick and long!
A "lost kid"
Isn't she cute?
Haruhi with evil eyes
You could sense the evil aura from her
What and how is the bag hung up there?

A high school girl that looks like a kid, another with weird hair, one who had tortured the protagonist in primary school (who awfully looks a lot like Haruhi in the flashback). But this episode is just mostly about the protagonist being chased by the weird-haired girl for randomly accusing him of being suspicious in the school of a female-majority. I was waiting for it to get somewhere, but that wasn't until towards the end and the last scene (not snapshoted) confirms my suspicious of this being not what I would want to watch. This was produced by Xebec, which also did To Love-ru some time ago.

Ending:

It's just the two main girls sitting on a hill with the wind blowing. zzzz

Dance in the Vampire Bund (ダンスインザヴァンパイアバンド)

Episode 1:
Iogi, Tokyo See you tomorrowIs this a re-enactment?
What's that?
Even the program sponsors are fictional.
What kind of an anime is this?
Taxi driver?
Uh oh, there's trouble.

"What am I watching?" is my first impression when I first saw this. I wouldn't mind it for the first few minutes, but not the whole episode... This anime is produced by Shaft, which did Maria Holic and Natsu no Arashi, so there's the scary-looking eyes when shown up close, the annoying horizontal black bars in a widescreen image that they overused in Bakemonogatari. I would say that this is not a good way to start an anime, but the first episode of the 2006 broadcast of Suzumiya Haruhi no Yuuutsu also had the something's-not-right feeling (on top of the 1:1 or 4:3 aspect ratio in videotape quality) until the end of it (and the sudden switch to HD widescreen) where it was revealed that it was a film for their upcomming school festival. If they had not seen the trailer below or have heard of its related media, people might not have gone past before the surprise happened. It's not as impactful as the first episode of Ga-Rei Zero though.

Trailers:

(Couldn't find any without those Spanish subs)

Baka to Test to Shoukanjyuu (バカとテストと召喚獣)

Opening:

Glowing spinning cube

The title

This opening animation make me feel like I'm watching that of a visual novel with catchy music and animation.

Episode 1:
A nice way to start the anime.
The contrasts between classes 2A and 2F
You wouldn't believe how bad the classroom facilities are
Kinoshita Hideyoshi: He looks very much like a girl
Hey, I'm pointing at you. Why are you looking the other way?
What's with the weather stats for an indoor virtual fight?
You can loose HP by hitting yourself against the table
Looks like Hideyoshi finally decides to cross... oh wait, that's his fraternal twin, Yuuko.

The school has a system whereby whichever class they end up in is determined by their test results. The A class has sofas, coffee maker, computers, flat panel displays behind the teachers' desk, in a large room with posh finishing. F class however, has tatami flooring, floor cushions, with things falling apart. (Class D looks like an average class) During the test, however, Mizuki Himeji falls sick and ends up in F class. In virtual fights, the F class competes with other classes to take over their classes that has better facilities.

Ending:

The ending features the guys in the gakuran uniform. I think the words in the background is the English translation of the ending song.

Sora no Woto (ソ・ラ・ノ・ヲ・ト)

Episode 1
Nice drawing
Doesn't her face look a lot like Nodoka of K-On!???
Oh my, that's a huge doll!!
Water festival
The sunrise is beautiful.
Crap, I can't play the trumpet

This is the first of TV Tokyo's "アニメノチカラ" (The Strength of Anime) formed in April 2009 to produce original animation by various creators together, with this anime being the first. You can think of it as something like noitaminA on Fuji TV, but different in some ways. It's glaringly obvious for me to not say it, but I wonder if the character designs of K-On! are involved. Since it's an anime original, nobody knows what it will be about. I do know that the heroine joined the army because she thinks that is where she could play music or something like that.

Ending:
(Note: Video might be removed, and I don't know what language the subs are in)

The ending seems to be focused on what the girls (including those that are yet to be introduced) do together during peacetime.

Dyurarara! (デュラララ!!)

Opening:

The girl would only be introduced in the next episode.
What?
"I'm attacked by a can of soda!!!"

I'm surprised at how recent anime pay more attention to detail
"The First Things You Say" is the title. The reading order to read 2 x 2 kanji is confusing as you could start from the top right and then down or top left towards the right.
What's the point of setting up a cardboard person there?
Holo of Spice and Wolf?
A scary, yet friendly, gaijin.
This online chat conversation with narration seems to pop up frequently, with no revelation as to who's who other than their nicknames and avatar.
What happened to her? She has odd scar marks on her neck.

Ryuugamine Mikado wants an exciting life in the big city. So, with an invitation from his childhood friend Masaomi, he transfers into a school in Ikebukuro. The rest... I don't even know what's going on, but it does look like something I would pick up.

I know there's more anime in the winter 2010 list, but, except for Nodame Cantabile: Finale (which has yet to air), none of those appeal to me. Among what I've listed above, it seems that I would only pick the last 3 titles (Bakatest, Sora no Woto, Durarara!) for the winter anime. I did want to mention Seikon no Qwaser, but when I read the summary on how the hero receives his power and saw the ending, I became disturbed and not watch it. Of course, I did not forget about the earlier anime that are still airing

2009 Anime Review

2010-01-03T13:19:00.001+09:00

This includes Autumn 2008 anime that has episodes aired in 2009. However, it does not include 2009 anime that are still airing currently. Anime with images are the ones I would wish to highlight the most. The rest are anime that were also aired and may have my comments on them. Some anime (mostly targeted at kids), OAV, and movies are not listed here.

	Toradora (Autumn 2008, 25 episodes) Though the chracter designs were somewhat erm different from anime I've watched prior to this, I really looked forward to this anime. From Yuuji's sacry face, to Aisaka reducing from fierce to rather shy.
	To Aru Majutsu no Index (Autumn 2008, 24 episodes) Well, it's great, but the long draggy scenes in the first few episodes made me drop this once. I mean, 75% of those episodes at the same spot talking about the same thing. Did picked it up later on and its spinoff (Railgun) though. Related anime: To Aru Kagaku no Railgun (Autumn 2009)
Shugo Chara!! Doki— (Autumn 2008, 51 episodes) Related anime: Shugo Chara! (Autumn 2007), Shugo Chara!!! Dokki Doki (Autumn 2009)
Skip Beat! (Autumn 2008, 25 episodes) I did watch some of this. A girl who follow a guy she likes after graduating from middle school to be a star by heading to the capital, only to be dumped. She takes her revenge by climbing up the stairs to fame and blah blah blah... You get the rest.
Mobile Suit Gundam 00 Second Season (Autumn 2008, 25 episodes) Despite being how popular this is, Gundam series are hard for me to follow. Related anime: Mobile Suit Gundam (1979), Mobile Suit Zeta Gundam (1985), Mobile Suit Gundam ZZ (1986), Mobile Suit Victory Gundam (1993), Mobile Fighter G Gundam (1994), Mobile Suit Gundam Wing (1995), After War Gundam X (1996), Mobile Suit Gundam Seed (2002), Mobile Suit Gundam Seed Destiny (2004), Mobile Suit Gundam 00 (2007)
One Outs (Autumn 2008, 25 episodes)
Michiko to Hatchin (Autumn 2008, 22 episodes) The fact that it took place in South America attracted my attention. But the first episode airing a lot latter than most of the other anime, irregular timeslots, and reasons I can't really explain that made me drop this.
White Album (Winter 2009, 13 episodes) White Album 2nd Season (Autumn 2009, 13 episodes) The setting is in the early-mid 1980s. No mobile phones and no email. How do you contact someone who is on the move and be sure the person you want to contact is there or not someone else? That seemed to the the (over-)emphasis theme of this anime. As for the fashion of this era? Let's just say it's scary since I wasn't born in the decade (well, the last 5 months of 1989).
Minami-ke: Okaeri (Winter 2009) The third season of this slice-of-life anime. I've watched the first two, but not sure why I did not watch this. Could be because of Toradora and some others that was airing at that time... Related anime: Minami-ke (Autumn 2007), Minami-ke: Okawari (Winter 2008)
Asu no Yoichi! (Winter 2009) Well, the first episode looked promising, but then it remain stagnant or went downhill. Since it was on TBS just before another anime I liked ("Clannad: After"?), I watched it with a grain of salt. The last episode was... let just say it's not what I liked and doesn't seem to have progressed since the first episode. I just don't like "the main hero is an idiot" type of anime. (This also applies to anime like Sora no Otoshimono, and Natsu no Arashi!)
Birdy the Mighty Decode:02 (Winter 2009) I really enjoyed the first season, until I go WTF with the end of the last episode of that season. So I'm not watching this and I don't care what happens in it. Related anime: Birdy the Mighty Decode (Summer 2008)
Shikabane Hime: Kuro (Winter 2009) Related anime: Shikabane Hime: Aka (Autumn 2008)
Maria-sama ga Miteru 4th Season (Winter 2009) Related anime: Maria-sama ga Miteru (Winter 2004), Maria-sama ga Miteru ~Haru~ (Summer 2004)
Zoku Natsume Yūjin-Chō (Winter 2009) Related anime: Natsume Yūjin-Chō (Summer 2008)
Sora Kake Girl (Winter 2009) Didn't watch this. My previous experiences with ALI PROJECT music as the opening music since I first heard it being used for Shigofumi was...horrifying. Maybe that was the reason I didn't watch it.
Viper's Creed (Winter 2009)
Hajime no Ippo: New Challenger (Winter 2009) Related anime: Hajime no Ippo (Autumn 2000)
The Tower of Druaga: the Sword of Uruk (Winter 2009) Liked the first season a lot and actually looked forward to this second season, but it was a big disappointment. On top of that, most of the episodes don't take place in the tower itself. Related anime: The Tower of Druaga: the Aegis of Uruk (Spring 2008)
Chrome Shelled Regios (Winter 2009)
Kemono no Sou-ja Erin (Winter 2009)
Rideback (Winter 2009)
Slayers Evolution-R (Winter 2009) Related anime: Slayers Try (Spring 1997), Slayers Revolution (Summer 2008)
Sora o Miageru Shōjo no Hitomi ni Utsuru Sekai (Winter 2009) The pace is too quick for me to follow.
	Clannad After Story (Autumn 2008, 25 episodes) Continuation of the previous season, focusing on Tomoya's working life after high school, Nagisa's death, and Ushio's birth. I wonder what happened to that old man? Or, what Ushio looks like when grown up? Related anime: Clannad (Autumn 2007)
Casshern Sins (Autumn 2008, 24 episodes) The character design alone make me not want to watch this. Related anime: Shinzo Ningen Casshan (Autumn 1973)
Genji Monogatari Sennenki (Winter 2009)
Hetalia - Axis Powers (Winter/Summer 2009)
Ristorante Paradiso (Spring 2009)
Sengoku Basara (Spring 2009)
Phantom ~Requiem for the Phantom~ (Spring 2009)
Basquash! (Spring 2009) I never liked sports-themed anime. They all have the typical "do your best" theme too. I've also heard it was made to promote a well known international sports brand too.
Queen's Blade: Rurō no Senshi (Spring 2009) Queen's Blade: Gyokuza no Tsugumono (Autumn 2009) Seriously, what were they thinking?!
	K-On! (Spring 2009) Featuring the cutest characters I've ever seen in all of the anime I've ever watched. It also indirectly helped music stores to see an unexpected boost in sales, particularly those featured in the anime. Just as I thought the "Live Alive" episode of Haruhi was good enough, this was way better. There even was an announcement of a 2nd season.
Asura Cryin' (Spring 2009) Asura Cryin' 2 (Autumn 2009)
Pandora Hearts (Spring 2009) Since this replaced Asu no Yoichi and K-On! took over Clannad:After's timeslot on TBS, I've had to watch this before K-On!. Was not interesting though.
Slap Up Party: Arad Senki (Spring 2009)
	The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya (Spring 2009 renewal, 28 episodes) Everyone has been waiting for a 2nd season since 2006.What did they give us? A chronological order of the 2006 episodes (plus minor extended scenes), "Bamboo Leaf Rhapsody", 8 different versions of "Endless Eight", and a 5-part "The Sigh of Haruhi Suzumiya". Yes, 4/7 (more than half) of the new episodes are coincidentally called "Endless Eight". I was expecting more of the uncovered parts of the novel. The good news is that they are making a movie for the Disappearance arc that is 150 minutes (2hr 30min) long. Related anime: The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya (Spring 2006, 14 episodes), The Disappearance of Haruhi Suzumiya (2010 movie)
	Hayate the Combat Butler!! (Spring 2009, 25 episodes) (Note the extra examination mark) This was a big letdown. Sure it continues more of the storyline from where the last season left off, but the first OP was a headache. There also seem to be noticeable changes in the character design (since it was done by a different animation studio that ironically also did Nodame and Shana) that made it look as though it was even more worse. Sure it seems to have improved in the later episodes, but first impressions counts. Related anime: Hayate no Gotoku! (Spring 2007, 52 episodes)
Shinkyoku Sōkai Polyphonica crimson S (Spring 2009) Related anime: Shinkyoku Sōkai Polyphonica (Spring 2007)
Gokujō!! Mecha Mote Iinchō (Spring 2009)
Valkyria Chronicles (Spring 2009)
	Natsu no Arashi! (Spring 2009) Natsu no Arashi! Akinai-chū (Autumn 2009) As mentioned above for Asu no Yoichi, I don't really like anime whose main character is an idiot. I've watched the entire first season and found that SHAFT (animation studio) seem to like to add a lot of references to other anime and "too quick to see" shots that was displayed in all the anime they made all the time. For Sayonara Zetsubou Sensei is okay, but Bakemonogatari too??? Anyways, the only part I like is the part they time-traveled back to the second world war, but the rest is... a lot of filters. The last episode of the first season had the characters do the moves that we had always seen in the opening, which are redundant and pointless. I didn't watch the second season due to my dissatisfaction with the first.
Tayutama -Kiss on my Deity- (Spring 2009)
	Shangri-La (Spring 2009) A mixed bag. The animation was good and the opening theme was sung by May'n (featured in Marcross Frontier). But then there are these 2 transsexuals for no particular reason with the Tokyo as we know becoming an overgrown ruin submerged in water. Inhabitants around there live in a village-like settlement. "Carbon-offsets", "largest tropical city", and stuff that was not explained well. I wasn't the only one who didn't liked it. They even canceled its DVD Volume 7 and later.
Tears to Tiara (Spring 2009)
	Saki (Spring 2009) Mahjong-themed anime. Hard to follow something I'm not familiar with that you can say that what I do with sports-based anime might apply here. Oddly enough, side/secondary characters introduced some episodes later are more popular than the main characters themselves.
Guin Saga (Spring 2009)
07-Ghost (Spring 2009)
Sōten Kōro (Spring 2009)
	Eden of The East (Spring 2009) An anime original (I think) that seems to pay attention to minor details. My first impressions was that this would take place mostly in Washington DC, with the heroine's university in New York. Well, with the anime taking place mostly in Tokyo and Osaka, I was slightly disappointed. Still, it being in ways better than most of the anime I watch, I would rate this high (but I don't) and highly recommend it and its movie sequels. Since it was on Fuji TV, it conflicted an another anime (don't remember what it was) I wanted to watch too. I didn't need to wait long (less than an hour) for an another popular anime to air on TV (K-On!, TBS).
	Hatsukoi Limited (Spring 2009) Since it aired shortly before my "drop any boring anime since I have insufficient time" frenzy, I didn't, but I would have if it aired later. There wasn't really anything to talk about this anime, except that the opening and ending credits typeface (font) resembled a lot like Toradora! mentioned earlier and the voice talents are doing the main characters of the more popular anime too.
Umi Monogatari ~Anata ga Ite Kureta Koto~ (Spring 2009) I stopped watching it at episode 2: couldn't stand it. I actually got confused the title with Bakemonogatari and Umineko no Naku Koro ni too.
	Umineko no Naku Koro ni (Summer 2009) Well, this would have looked a lot better if it were to be produced in HD instead of web-streaming quality. Anyways, this started off well and... went downhill from there. By Episode III-? (ep10+), I don't even know what is going on anymore. It's worse than Haruhi's Endless Eight episodes mentioned earlier. Character designs were inherited from the visual novel of the same name though. Ugh, let move on... Related anime: Higurashi no Naku Koroni (Spring 2006), Higurashi no Naku Koroni Kai (Summer 2007)
Sweet Blue Flowers (Summer 2009) I don't feel comfortable on the subject of yuri...
Taishō Yakyū Musume. (Summer 2009) Replaced K-On!'s timeslot on TBS. Though I don't like sports-themed anime in general (or not-produced-for-HD quality), what I found interesting was that it took place 84 years ago, where women were restricted in a lot of things that aren't today and their struggles starting a girls' baseball club in a time where Japan was just starting to adopt western things.
	Bakemonogatari (Summer 2009) **k Anyplex for the removal of that thing and causing my opinion of this anime towards the negative side. I won't buy stuff from you with no thanks to that. Though the overall anime is actually quite good, the characters looked somewhat flat from the non-anime-based official artwork. It was one of the better anime produced by SHAFT* and the first I see by them produce in HD (1080p). Related anime: Katanagatari (Winter 2010)
Yoku Wakaru Gendai Mahō (Summer 2009)
Zan Sayonara Zetsubō Sensei (Summer 2009) This is where all SHAFT's jokes and parodies fit in the most. Sad to say it wasn't produced in HD though. Had watched some of this and it's prior seasons, but as for reasons similar to Hatsukoi Limited mentioned earlier, it wasn't the must-watch anime I picked up. Related anime: Sayonara Zetsubō Sensei (Summer 2007), Zoku Sayonara Zetsubō Sensei (Winter 2008)
CANAAN (Summer 2009) First episode was impressive, but I don't remember why I stopped watching it...
Princess Lover! (Summer 2009)
Kanamemo (Summer 2009)
GA: Geijutsuka Art Design Class (Summer 2009)
	Sora no Manimani (Summer 2009) This anime is actually quite good, but since I'm living in a light-polluted area for quite a long time, I never get to see the stars in the sky for a long time. What I found odd was that they introduced a new character towards the end of the anime.
Spice and Wolf II (Summer 2009) Related anime: Spice and Wolf (Winter 2008)
	Tokyo Magnitude 8.0 (Summer 2009, 11 episodes) Replacing Eden of the East comes a highly rated anime made by the same studio that produced Darker than Black and Fullmetal Alchemist is a Bones original production. It features Mirai and her brother in a situation based on the possibility of Tokyo being struck by a 8-magnitude earthquake and making it real. It starts of shortly before the quake happened when the siblings went to a robot exhibition. They had a toilet break when it happened. While Mirai was waiting, the earthquake happened. The mass evaluation and collapsing buildings made it harder to reunite, but not without the help of a woman they met earlier. Using the Tokyo Tower as a guide (which they could also see from home), they start their long way home as transport and telecommunications are out of service due to damaged infrastructure. Sadly, along the way, her brother was killed by a collapsing building, but did not realize it until she reunites with everyone when she realizes that it was a spirit when people said he wasn't there even though she is seeing him. (That's a lot of text for an anime I dropped at episode 2)
Nyan Koi! (Autumn 2009) It's quite obvious from episode 1 that it would be focused a lot on cats and would not get anywhere.
	Kämpfer (Autumn 2009) (When I first saw this, I thought someone copied my ideas since there are too many things similar to my 2nd blog story, from the idea of transformations, to the (unexplained) use of German words, to the publishing date of the first manga volume this anime is based on being 21 days after I published my first part of my 2nd story (23 September 2008), the idea of weird-looking-dolls being somewhat involved (1st story), and whatever I can't think of now. What it doesn't follow, though, is the direction I wanted the storyline to go. There's just too much similarities to not attract my attention.) This follows Senou Natsuru who's just your average high school guy who was chosen to be a Kämpfer (German for fighter) to fight with other Kämpfer with weapons. The catch is that you can't choose, and would need the body of a girl to use the powers. Since Natsuru is a guy... you know what this means. Anyways, it wasn't obvious at first, but since the episode on preparing for the school festival, this anime went downhill with too much fan-service and dropped around when the white Kämpfers make an appearance.
	Seitokai no Ichizon (Autumn 2009) I don't know what to say about this, since I've dropped this twice. It's about a school's ~~harem~~ student council committee with most episodes taking place in the same room (reminds me of Genshiken). There were a lot of parodies and references to other anime (reminds me of Sayonara Zetsubou Sensei and Natsu no Arashi!) that you might not understand if you have never watch the anime in question. They even said so themselves at the first episode that the anime would not be following the novel of the same title. There's inconsistency all over. The ending has, um... many different versions of the same song in each episode that has the same (boring) animation. The mysterious girlish-guy (well, that's how I would describe him) seen in most of their imaginations appears in the last episode. Heck, WHAT IS THIS???!!!
The Sacred Blacksmith (Autumn 2009)
Miracle Train ~Ōedo-sen e Yōkoso~ (Autumn 2009)
Sora no Otoshimono (Autumn 2009) Another "the hero is an idiot" kind of anime plus things that makes me uncomfortable watching. The interesting thing is that the ending has different song and animation, depending on what the episode in question is about. (Episode 2 ending made me go ROFL)
Shin Koihime†Musō (Autumn 2009)
Nogizaka Haruka no Himitsu: Purezza (Autumn 2009) Another other-anime-reference/fanservice anime? Well, though I liked the first season, this is something I wasn't looking forward to, from the title, to other Autumn anime that are alot better. Related anime: Nogizaka Haruka no Himitsu (Summer 2008)
Kimi ni Todoke (Autumn 2009) I've heard from many people that this is actually quite good.
11eyes (Autumn 2009)
	Sasameki Koto (Autumn 2009) Besides Aoi Hana mentioned above, this is one of the few yuri-themed titles for this year. Well, this is more watchable though. What's even more unique from all the other yuri (or yaoi) series is that it takes place in a co-ed school instead of an all-girls school. Wait... why was I watching this, knowing that it's yuri-themed?
	Darker Than Black: Ryūsei no Gemini (Autumn 2009, 12 episodes) I was expecting this to be 24 episodes long, but it instead being 12 was a big shocker and unexpected. It's also one of the few anime (including Eden of the East) that I thought would take place mostly in a foreign country, but headed (back) to Japan in the first few episodes. Hei, Yin, and Mao (the main characters of the previous season) don't seem to be of any significance in this season. Makes me wonder if this is supposed to be an OAV-like anime to the unanswered questions raised in the first season. The fact that I mentioned it to unexpectedly end means that it's quite good. (Speaking of a good ending, the ending of Railgun ep12 and episodes leading up to it looks like it's a good place to end the series, but it's only halfway) Related anime: Darker than BLACK: Kuro no Keiyakusha (Spring 2007, 26 episodes)
Kūchū Buranko (Autumn 2009) (or Sky Swing or Trapeze or The Strange Methods of Dr. Irabu, whatever you want to call this) Irabu Ichiro is a psychiatrist who lives in a colorful alternate version of Tokyo. Patients would visit him to have a counseling on their problems. However each of the patients feel perplex about Ichiro's behavior. Ichiro wears a bear head mask & is able to change change his appearance from an adult to a kid. Despite Ichiro's zealous attitude, he does succeed in helping out each of the patients who come to his office. This is one weird anime to be in the noitaminA timeslot on Fuji TV, known to have anime like Nodame Cantabile and TokyoM8. Let's just say it's unique.

Well. that's it. That's a lot of anime I've listed. Since I've mentioned Autumn 2009 anime above, I won't be doing an autumn review. I plan to do the upcoming Winter 2010 lineup soon. Yes, I know it's late, but I'm busy, so it can't be helped.

Differences From the Manga and Anime

2009-11-07T23:28:00.002+09:00

I recently bought the manga, I don't mind the chronological order being mixed up, but switching characters is very glaringly obvious. Especially episode 6.

	Some unknown judgment girl has been switched with Konori Mii during the searching scene. They are also searching at a bridge instead of a tree. I can understand a tree, but why a bridge?

	But the reverse for the bomb explosion scene. The male accomplice remains unchanged.

	This actually takes place later, after the bag-searching hunt. Instead of a fat guy who spotted trouble from far, it's our Mikoto who had walked past the trouble-makers a while earlier in misery. Also notice the lack of shade from the sun.

	Although there isn't any character change, the impact illustrated in the manga is lost in the anime version, though for the latter, she shows her anger at Mikoto instead. Also, Kuroko is not visible when she starts to eat until Uiharu notices her presence. Oh in the manga, Uiharu also has a cold.

	I don't know if it's because of the gore or just want to give the suspense that he's still alive (I think), the anime only showed his right arm, where the judgment armband is visible.

Did I say that the timeline is all over the place in the anime? Mikoto is not supposed to have met Kiyama Harumi (木山春生) until later on, sometime after the first episode of Index where we see Touma being chased by thugs.