Well, I’ve been immensely busy…
But, here I am, finally, with a ‘what’s cooking this season?’ post, having finally got around to watching all of the initial episodes. Let me state immediately for the record that I’m not blogging all of this. I’ve still got to catch up with the blogging of last seasons shows for crying out loud. If only work didn’t consume a ludicrous amount of my time…
Also, the format will be:
- Genre
- Summary
- Screen Caps
- Likeliness of me watching/pursuing…
Anyhow, without further ado:
White Album
Ah, the romanctic eighties pop-scene (no really…)
Romance
Well, this looks to be the winter romance entry. Its been a while since theres been a good one. I took up Akane-Iro under the false pretense that it could have been something, but it devolved into mind-slop (in a good way, mind you, I still mostly enjoyed that series). So, again, the last proper romance focused series I finished would be True Tears. Which was probably this time last year. Jeez. Though I suppose Toradora is partially filling it currently in a rather quirky little way.
Anyway, this is set in the eighties, and follows our male protagonist and his love for childhood friend Yuki, whom has recently become a pop-idol. However, she has become friends with an already famous idol, Ogata Rina, and evidently, a love triangle forms. I also think Yuki has a thing going on with her manager, whom I believe is Rina’s brother. And then there’s the other friends hanging around. Who knows what could happen.
What is interesting in this is how character thoughts are articulated through on-screen subtitles, which is an interesting direction choice that I’ve not seen before. Usually, the characters have monologues to themselves. I also suck up a good sappy piece of entertainment every so often, so thats good. That said, this hasn’t done anything to totally grab me yet, much to my surprise. Its felt, I dunno, wishy-washy? Even after two eps.
Yuki does look very ‘eighties’ here with the weird hair, doesn’t she?
Yeah, maybe, but its in a cute way, right? The subtitle is of him watching her (above) on the telly.
I did? Well, I guess it never hurts, right?
Likelihood of Watching/Pursuing? : 7/10 ~ I’m interested since I like this stuff, but it hasn’t grabbed me yet.
Maria + Holic
How to take traps to new extremes…
Yuri/Mindfuck
Eh, well what can I say? The LOL caption sums it all up. Its an anime about traps. If you’re not up to date with your 4chan vocabulary, a ‘trap’ is literally a guy whom is so beautiful that they can easily get away with being a girl, and is hence skilled in trapping poor innocent hearts (and crotches). They naturally wear clothing of the opposite gender and its very hard to tell the difference. The classic example is ‘Jun’ from ‘Happiness’, but there are innumerate others.
In this case, however, our trap goes to new extremes. She goes to an all girls school and everything. I have no doubt weirdness will ensue. This is definately one of those times where you get confused as whom in this Girls school is ACTUALLY a girl… (sigh…)
When I first watched this, I thought I had a very poor copy, but I eventually figured out that the animation is supposed to be favouring a pastel like, patterned effect, a bit like Sayonara Zetsubou Sensei. The animation style certainly reminds me of that, along with the questionable sense of humour. Eh, its not my cuppa tea, but I know alot of people like this stuff.
Our premium trap, above, gets revealed in the first episode.
The catgirl landlady has a most excellently dressed dog. What the hell did I screencap this for?
Ah, the overflowing Yuri (or is it?) begins…
Likelihood of Watching/Pursuing? : 4/10 ~ Not really my thing….
Asu no Yoichi
A Samurai learns the wonders of fanservice.
Harem
Again, not much to say here. Its the obvious fanservice show of the season, and it doesn’t even try to hide that fact. I laughed when the little girl is asked about the defining features of her older sister, and replies ‘She has huge breasts…’
Its very much a face-palm moment, I’ll agree. But at least it doesn’t pretend to be intellectual. Also, it does have the rare benefit of having a stronger than usual male lead. He actually appears to be a pretty adept swordfighter, rather a total loser as is often the case in these scenarios. I also sympathise with him getting lost in a department store. They are a terrifying place. And, he manages to get nicked by the cops at least three times in the episode, which is refreshing given how the perverts usually get away scott-free in anime.
So yeah. It might have potential if approached with low expectations.
Well, trust the man with the bow. Just do it!
Indeed. A wise choice. Who knows what that handbag thief could do with it.
The cops have some dirt on him. Brandishing a weapon in public, (supposed) kidnapping of a minor, and perversion. But then, he also stopped a thief, rescued a lost child, and apologised for his actions, so they have to let him go.
Likelihood of Watching/Pursuing? : 5/10 ~ Maybe. Depends on how bored I get.
Kurokami
Dopplegangers galore and thirty-hit combos.
Fantasy Action/Mindfuck
See the below post for details of this. I’m definately watching it, and probably blogging it.
Likelihood of Watching/Pursuing? : 10/10 ~ Hell yes.
RIDEBACK
Transforming mecha-motorbikes learn to do ballet.
Mecha
Well, this is last one I watched, since I’m not normally a mecha lover, but I actually enjoyed it quite a bit. Basically, there are psuedo-sentient motorbikes, called RIDEBACKs, which can operate in three dimensions more easily than usual, going into standing modes, having arm like attachments, and even understanding voice commands.
Its set a bit into the future, where the superpowers were apparently taken down by a band of freedom fighters using superior technology. Sounds a bit like a Command & Conquer plot to me with a weird high tech terrorist organization taking the reigns from the UN. Presumably this techology was the RIDEBACKs, but this is not actually stated.
Anyway, our protagonist is the grand-daughter of Ogata Rina, and is hence expected to be an entertainment star. I had to do a double take on that. Yep. Its true. IS IT ONE HELL OF A COINCIDENCE or is this show is related to White Album, above, huh? The generational gap is correct and everything since thats in the 80’s and this the 2020’s. LOL.
However, our protagonist goes in ballet, but tears a ligament, crashing face first on stage, ruining her career before it ever really takes off. Now at college, she accidently gets involved in the RIDEBACK club, and find her old dancing skills are surprisingly cross compatible in making the machine move like a dancer. Some amusing chereography here.
The GGP has taken over the world.
A thunderstorm leads our heroine to seek cover in a club building…
Wow, she has a pretty orgasmic face riding that thing…heh…
Likelihood of Watching/Pursuing? : 8/10 ~ Despite initial reservations, I’m quite interested in this…
Akikan!
My girlfriend is a can of Melonade. I like to slurp her.
Fanservice
Well, that quote really sums it up. This is an obvious fanservice anime that follows the old ‘a strange object actually turns out to be a girl’ premise. Of course, you can do this right, and you can do it wrong. The right way is making a cool series like Demonbane, with its ancient Lovecraft ties and magical tomes that are girls. The wrong way is this way.
This guy randomly buys a can of melonade. He gives it a slurp, and it transforms into a girl. He believes this is a dream and tries repeatedly to do questionable things to her (sigh…). Then we have the ridiculous side-plots, like you must drink from this girl every day (kiss her), re-fill her from time to time (with extra cans from the machine), and make sure that she doesn’t lose her carbonation and go flat, because this kills her (so you need to put her in the fridge).
Despite the rampant objectophilia, there’s really nothing going for this series. Unless total mindless fanservice is your thing. Personally, I need a little more most of the time (even AkaneIro had more, thats as low as I go…)
And I wonder why anime gets a bad rep from the un-educated… (sigh…)
Wow, yeah. Everyone has hobbies like that.
Down the toilet, apparently…
Likelihood of Watching/Pursuing? : 1/10 ~ For the sake of my sanity. No.
Ah yeah, I’ll also continue to watch Toradora, Index, and Tytania.
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Detarame 
2011 Anime Season (April – June) Journal
Posted in Anime, First Impressions, tagged Anime, Anohana, Ao No Exorcist, Astarotte no Omacha, C (anime), Commentary, Deadman Wonderland, Denpa Onna to Seishun Otoko, Hanasaku Iroha, Hidan no Aria, Maria + Holic, Previews, Rant, Thoughts, Yondemasu yo! Azazel-san! on April 24, 2011| Leave a Comment »
Yup, like last season, here’s a depository for my initial thoughts of the season and what I’ve chosen to watch. There’s been a bit of delay before I’ve done this due to the erratic airing schedule which seems to have finally settled down now. If you’re not familiar with this, its just me having a rant and hopefully reviewing things in an amusing fashion.
As always, this post will update based on what I get around to watching and when.
Things that definately secured a slot:
Deadman Wonderland
Well, don’t use 2 pints of blood in every attack, and you’ll be fine!
Well, I’m glad that this immediately grabbed my attention, as I was really looking forward to it. The fact that they have the gall to introduce characters and then massacre them in the first 6 minutes of the show is always amusing. Even moreso when Ganta’s classmates were cookie-cutters at that stage… it somehow feels like a satisfying middle finger to all those shows that feel such character development is enough.
More interestingly, Ganta had his Angst in the second episode and… GOT OVER IT. Probably. Mostly due to Shiro. Who is, by the way, very scary, just in case her sweaty nekkid dance in the stylish intro isn’t enough to suggest that already:
I guess its what you would call ‘broken-happy’; she has that insane regression to childlike innocence to block out all the crap around her. But its the effortless acrobatic drops from 100 ft that she always manages that really seal the deal. I’m very suspicious of her.
Of course, Ganta’s trial was a little rushed through. Even with the leaked ‘confession’ as evidence to frame him; I always thought confidential reports to lawyers couldn’t be used as evidence in a trial. Besides that, and the fact that he’s alive in a massacred room are the only things against him. Anyone with half a brain would question why he injured himself in the class and why he didn’t run if he was the killer, so the instant guilty verdict, at this point, felt more like a bribed judge and jury told to overlook superficial evidence. Which I can swallow.
Electromagnetic Girl
Walking futons recieve a higher proportion of radio waves, eh?
Oh Shinbo, you joker, you.
Seems to me that this is another SHAFT analysis of nutcases, a bit like Sayonara Zetsubo Sensei. Only less deadpan and less shouting. Having only seen the first episode, I would have thought that the madness was restricted to Erio, (whose initials are E.T. from Erio Touya) but actually it seems to be all the girls we’ve seen so far are somehow mentally unbalanced.
Of course, Erio still takes the cake. She ties herself up in a Futon, sleeps in the porch, broke her leg trying to fly off a bridge on a bike, claims all kinds of weird alien experiment knowledge, and has a continual sparklies aura when she’s out of the futon.
Has some amusing lines like “This is how god equalises us. Her appearance was too beautiful, so he corrected it with a huge minus to her brain”, and “This futon’s Panties are JUST PART of the Fabric. Nothing to be concerned about!”.
I guess this is good for your weekly dose of ‘derp?’. Makoto is a decent enough male lead to carry the premise, and Erio’s bizarreness is a highlight.
Hidan no Aria
You’re so competent you made her swirly-eyed!
I’m still going to call it Crimson Bullet Aria (or
Pistol Jutsu Lolis). Correct grammar or no, Scarlet Ammo Aria just sounds weird.To start with the good. There is alot of good. Mainly in the fact that our hero is BOTH competant AND genre-savvy AND tries to avoid his natural urges with all his might. It is now apparent that his ‘hysteria mode’ is a comical self-buff based on him having a sexual overdrive, making him a bit like Ikko the Kannushi from Amaenaideyo in that regard (though much less perverted, as already noted).
Aria is a Kugemiya Rie character again. And though we’ve seen it all before; at least this one is… British Royalty. Since she’s a red (pink?) haired girl, I’m assuming this is the future and she is Prince Harry’s granddaughter. Or something. What does puzzle me is that although she is called Quadra Aria, she doesn’t actually seem to be very good with the pocket dimension Katanas. Pistol melee is definately her main attack. On a side note, they must be pocket dimension katanas or else there would have been several moments in the first episode where she would have impaled herself. Not to mention they were not at all seen when her top was accidently lifted up mere moments before. Puzzling.
Anyway, the second episode also showed us the other girl from the preview picture more. Its apparently an information gathering expert that you can bribe with dating games for services. I guess that explains the wild imagination from the first ep. So far, an entertaining show.
Astarotte’s Plaything
Can you get much sillier than a prudish succubus?
Well, I have to say that this didn’t secure a slot from its first episode, but rather from its second. The first episode was mostly fanservice under the guise of plot exposition. Sure it introduced the concepts and the characters in their fairly cookie-cutter forms; but then it left and really felt a bit all over the place.
However, episode 2 comes along and spends its entire length on character/relationship development; and most of all, by being kinda sweet in the process. Naoya wastes no time in rolling up his sleeves and foiling Astarotte’s schemes to get rid of him. No angst or desire to back out of the situation. Just cool determination to heal the heart of this broken princess and set back on track to her… err… harem tendancies?
I can see why Astarotte ended up as she did… no kid likes to see their parents having it off… but seeing your mother suck ‘juice’ out of a harem member when you’re just a five-year old cranks the ‘Eww, eww, eww’ up to 11.
So yeah, it surprised me with that. I thought they were going to take the concept and fall flat on their face with it; but they only tripped so far, so I’m morbidly interested in how this proceeds. Although its not for the feint-hearted either (well, I guess the whole breast milk in your tea thing is technically not as a bad as it sounds- the maid IS a COW person, after all).
My only derp is the question of why the Yggdrasil’s link to the mortal realm is fixed to a tree in a Japanese Public park of all places. Surely it should be somewhere in Scandanavia?
Hanasaku Iroha
Because apparently, you might feel guilty if it really does happen.
Actually the first new show that came out this season. It, along with Steins;Gate, are now on their 3rd episodes. And its actually very good, in a way that defies explaination. This is not really slice of life as I first thought, but more of a relationship drama.
Its the kind of show you end up being emotionally invested in, and therefore its a big plus that the heroine Ohana is a truly excellent character. It appears PA Works have struck some gold again in this regard. Not only with her, actually, as the other girls are slowly being developed in interesting ways. And you end up shouting ‘ganbarre!’ for some reason.
Its beyond explanation, I guess, but its definately a good watch, and I have the urge to keep it, so I will.
Well, as you can see, I already have 5 shows from that. Still, the other contenders for my time are:
Capitalism: The Card Game
My credit card can totally kick your ass!
Or ‘C: The Money of Soul & Chance Control’ if you want to be picky.
Err, well, this what happens when you mix Yu-gi-Oh, a passing circus, and the Stock Market, I guess. Is it only me that felt the second episode was either ridiculously rushed or subject to some terrible editing decisions? It felt like it was cutting all over the place and all. However, the interactions in the real world are quite interesting; the Midas bank amuses me due to the allegory (that whatever it touches turns to gold, like the legendary Midas), and the fights could be vastly interesting once/if he becomes competent.
Not to mention that having a credit card that turns into Oni-Vampire-Elf loli that can physically slap you through its CHIP is seriously laugh-out-loud amusing. And the fact that the fights somehow use bastardised Kendo rules of having to call out your target (or in this case, the profit you intend to turn). Reminds me of the novel Epic, by Conor Kostick, in which the entire world economy is run through a MMORPG.
Its a bit of a hash at the moment because it can’t decide if it wants to go at casual speed or breakneck speed (it alternates between the two), but its certainly a possibility for me.
Ano Hana
Because you can’t eat curry in the afterlife.
Well, there were fairly obvious pointers from the very start of the show that Menma was dead (this was just the clincher), and in fact it was just her ghost haunting the main character, but even so, the execution behind it was very nice.
What is most interesting is that she is still has poltergeist like effects of sending shivers down the spines, opening doors, moving objects and suchlike. And as the circumstances behind her death become more clear, this has some nice potential to be a good show about redemption in the face of suffering and loss; as it has already showed each of the characters having unique struggles from Menma’s demise and dealing with it in their own ways (again, another show with good character development! WTF!).
There was just enough flashback to keep you interested amidst the drama and humour of the real. This stuff has good potential; but remains here until I’ve seen the second episode.
And yes, I missed this from the preview. Which is weird, since the image for it was uploaded. Oh well, too late now.
Ao No Exorcist
Personally I prefer purple hellfire, but if blue does it for you…
A wonderfully lighthearted opening to a story about the antichrist! Little touches of Rin’s ancestry kept popping up as the show went on and I thought that this was very well handled. I have a suspiscion that the weird bloke in the preview is going to be the big man himself coming to stake his claim now full maturity is reached.
As always, I’m reluctant to immediately pick this up simply due to the fact that I’m generally tired of dragging Shounen titles, which this has the potential to be. However, its opening lends itself to a good sort of story that hopefully won’t descend into something episodic.
That is about it for now, I think. Maria+Holic Alive and Azazel-san are rather borderline at the moment.
I might change my mind; since especially in the of Maria, the first season also had me going ‘eh?’ to begin with but grew on me.
Azazels shortness (12 minute eps) and rather idiotic gags haven’t got me vastly amused yet.
God Only Knows season 2 is more of the same; its one of those things that makes a good light read as a manga, but somehow, to me, it doesn’t click when turned into an anime.
I haven’t had time to watch Steins, SKET, A-Channel or anything else at the moment. They might find entries added later.
As noted, watch this space for updates.
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