This definitely is an unconventional and unique anime! Seriously, no other anime feels more like a novel than this one. Here I thought that the hunters would stir up trouble in this episode, and instead, they leave after hearing about Rarunga. They’ll return when spring comes, and Rarunga has been defeated.
It looks like it’s now just time to wait for Rarunga to come. It’s not the most complex and twisted storyline, but definitely the most realistic one. In the next episode, we’ll finally get to know about Barsa’s past, which will be something to look forward to. This episode basically shows us how the foursome reaches the secret place, where they plan to spend the winter. They spend the rest of the episode, stocking up food like moose and fish.
I’m really curious whether such a climax will work. Basically, at one point (I predict episode 23) Rarunga will come, try to kill Chaggumu and Barsa and Torogai will protect Chaggumu. How were they planning to do that? Will it benefit from the huge amount of time that was spent on building up the story and characters? Or would this series have been better off with only 13 episodes?
There’s one thing I do know, though: even though the episode wasn’t anything special, I really liked it.]]>
Author: psgels
Kaze no Shoujo Emily – 20
Awesome; an Emly/Elizabeth episode, and quite an important one as well: Emily, Teddy, Perry and Ilse have finished their current school, and are ready to move towards the next one. Ilse and Perry’s parents are really enthusiastic, and happily allow them to go to Shrewsberry School in a nearby city. Emily and Teddy have problems, though. Teddy believes that his mother will never allow him to part with her, since they’ll be staying in dormitories at their new school. Surprisingly, though, she lets him go and study. 🙂
Emily’s problems are worse, though. Elizabeth still doesn’t approve of Emily, studying things like literature. She still believes that things like these are useless. To make thing even worse, she finds and reads Emily’s diary, where Emily liked to complain about how evil Elizabeth was. Of course, she wasn’t 100% serious when she wrote it, though Elizabeth does take it seriously, and the two of them get into a fight.
I must say, that seeing the two of them fighting, and eventually making up again was really adorable. And it shows exactly why I love this series so much. This series is in for an interesting finale, by the way. Now that Emily has gotten permission to go and study further as well, it really looks like the last six episodes will be taking place on Shrewsberry School, without Elizabeth, Jimmy and the other adults. I wonder how the creators will decide to go from there. I’m definitely hoping for more time for Emily, Ilse, Teddy and Perry to be together and develop.]]>
Metropolis Review – 90/100
Now this is a movie! Most of you probably figured out by now that I’m on a movie spree, but most of the movies tend to be lots of style and not a lot of substance. While these are perfectly fine to watch, I’d rather watch a movie that’s good in every aspect. Unfortunately, these are quite hard to find, though Metropolis definitely belongs in that category.
For those of you who don’t know about Osamu Tezuka, this link should give you a fairly good impression of why people call him the “God of Manga”. Without him, anime wouldn’t be what it is today, and even now remakes of his works are still being made, and his stories prove to be very good to age. First Hi no Tori baffled me, and now it’s the turn for Metropolis.
Due to the fact that this movie really received a great budget, it has been really detailed, up to the point where it can be seen as on par with Ghibli-movies. The sceneries we see throughout the movie are filled with life and people, who actually react to the things around them. On frequent occasions, you can find different things happening at once. Characters who stand in the background discussing things, for example. When compared to usual anime, where characters don’t move unless they really have to, it felt really refreshing.
Not only does this movie spend a great amount of effort on its details, they’re also used really well in combination with its story and characters. Both of them are really given the time to develop throughout the movie, and if you combine this with the details, you get some pretty interesting character-development, which comes together perfectly in the climaxes, later in the movie. Especially the ending must be one of the most brilliant ideas for an ending in a anime-movie ever; you’ll either absolutely love it, or you’ll absolutely hate it. ^_^;; (you’ll understand when you see it).
Like Hi no Tori, Metropolis also is quite thought-provoking. Even though the themes introduced are nothing I haven’t seen before (they may have been new when the story was first published, I’m not sure about that one), where the setting is a city, fully controlled by the government, where Robots take over most of the dirtier tasks, the movie uses its characters to ask enough interesting questions about morality.
It’s hard to point out any flaws in this one as well. The characters all fit well into the movie, and each of them has a good enough reason to be involved in the events. The main character and especially his father really start out like normal people, and yet it seems perfectly logical why they became the main characters. Each of the important characters is fleshed out well, and the story flows from one event to the other in quite a logical way. I guess the biggest flaw is that this remains a movie. I still like Hi no Tori better than this one, simply because it had 13 episodes. Metropolis used its time well, though there’s only so much you can do in an hour and a half. Because of this, the ending did turn into a collection of clichés, despite the brilliant part.]]>
Baccano! – 04
I’m getting more and more surprised at the lack of attention Baccano has been getting. I’ve only seen one blogger who also picked it up beyond the first episode. I mean, what’s not to like about this series? I really expected this to be one of the more popular series of the season, but yet again I was wrong. I guess that people really do like to watch Schooldays, Moetan and Zero no Tsukaima than this series. O_o
Anyway, while watching this episode, I realized another thing why I love this series: it features so many different types of criminals. We have the demented Ladd and his companions, who are after the people with money on the Flying Pussyfoot. Chane and her companions belong to a sort-of cult, and are completely devoted to their master who is in jail. Then there are Firo, Maiza and the Gandor-family, who may look nice but definitely also have a history of shady business. The Runorata-family is the typical mafia-family, in the middle of vetes with many different parties. In the midst of all this seriousness, there are Isaac and Miria: two simple yet surprisingly brilliant train thieves. Jacuzzi and Nice also steal for “good” purposes, though they steal nonetheless. Czeslaw has also meanwhile showed that he’s more than just an innocent boy and Dallas and Eve could be victims, who happened to be member of the wrong family. I can hardly believe it, but this anime knows exactly what it’s doing with its huge cast of characters.
Anyway, the character most featured in this episode was Ladd. He quickly ends the stick-up of the previous episode by killing some of the guys in black suits. It also seems that he’s a member of an important family. A family who worked under him became the victim of Isaac and Miria’s ‘little’ robbery.
I also mistook Szilard Quates from another guy in the previous episode. We see the real guy make his entrance in this episode, and the guy from the previous episode seems to be working under him. This also busts my theory that every person in the OP is immortal and every person who isn’t in the op is mortal, since we saw the scientist revive in the previous episode. If I’m not mistaken, his name is Barnes. I’m not sure how you spell that, though.
Anyway, it seems that Ennis works for Quates as well, and she’s been ordered to retrieve him. We saw Barnes flee afterwards, though, and I assume that he’s set his place on fire. It’s probably here where Firo helps Ennis to find Barnes, which explains how he turned immortal. But what about Luck, Czeslaw and Isaac?
Also, the mysterious green-clothed girl intrigues me. She’s definitely in te train for a reason, but her mission is still one complete mystery. She’s one of the few people to survive the mess that happens on the Flying Pussyfoot unharmed, and this episode shows that she likes to act as careful as possible when she escapes through a train window when Ladd throws is tantrum.
The episode also ends with quite an interesting cliff-hanger: a mysterious glowy-eyed figure appears out of the train. Is this the same shady figure we’ve seen in episode one? It’s also interesting how Chane has received even less development than her companions, even though she turns out to be their only survivor. It seems that she’ll be doing something interesting in the next episode, though.
Another thing that I’m curious about: Firo, Maiza and the Gandor family. What is their role in this story? I mean, they’ve got nothing to do with what happens on the Flying Pussyfoot. They should be just friends of Isaac and Miria. If that’s the case, then why is so much development spent on them? They can’t just be getting their immortality without having to play any major role in the future…]]>
Mononoke – 06
Taking screenshots was quite hard for this episode, considering the raw file I obtained. It seems that Japan was hit by quite a big tsunami, which covered the entire east-coast of the country, and most of the second half of the episode had some warnings and information pasted on top of it. Let’s hope the damages were minor.
Anyway, this episode introduces the third story: Nopperabou. A woman has killed a number of relatives, and now she’s sentenced to death. The Medicine seller doubts this story, and suspects that a Mononoke is behind the killings, though the woman keeps insisting that she was the murderer. The Mononoke then arrives, in the form of a man, wearing a fox mask. The mask prevents MS from finding out the katachi, and the Mononoke uses this to erase the guy’s face.
The Mononoke flees with the woman, after which he proposes to her. She agrees. Later, we see that MS got his face back with the help of a Japanese ritual. He then tries to see the real face behind the Mononoke’s mask, and the episode ends. Luckily, the episode was fairly understandable again, but I must wait till the next episode to be for sure. If it’s again incomprehensible, I’ll wait for the subs for the last two arcs, unfortunately.
Anyway, I think that this Mononoke was the one who committed the murder, without the woman knowing it. The question is: where does he come from? It’s in any case clear that he’d do anything for her.
I’m a bit afraid, though. In this episode, I noticed some flawed animation for the first time. There were a lot of shots of people in the background, and a few shots of the medicine seller were just off.]]>
Kai Doh Maru Review – 74/100
Kai Doh Maru is making me rather angry while writing this review. Not because it’s incredibly bad, but because it could have been incredibly good. It’s Production IG’s attempt at making a movie, and they went with another setting of Japan’s history. The interesting thing is that while most anime pick a period around the year 1800, with the samurai and shinsengumi and all, Kai Doh Maru goes further back: to the ninth century.
Those who appreciated Sisters of Wellber know what to expect: really stylized art that fits perfectly, an excellent soundtrack (this one has been composed by Yoshihiro Ike, the same guy who did Ergo Proxy), and a nice amount of the screen-time is spent on fleshing out the characters, creating a great mood for this movie to work with. Only the humour is missing in this one. So why did it disappoint?
Simply enough: it’s too short. If only it had gotten twenty, maybe ten more minutes, it could have been so much better, and it could have made a chance to be memorable. Unfortunately, Kai Doh Maru only has a length of 40 minutes, which may be enough to flesh out its characters, but not to flesh out their backgrounds. Right now, the movie was just way too confusing and failed to answer too many questions. What happened in Kai Doh Maru’s past? Why was he or she hunted, and why does she or he keep changing genders? These questions could have been perfectly answered if more time was given.
Then there’s the issue of the ending: there is none. It just ends, and the bad guys still live. What happens next? We’ll never know. One thing I do know is that I really like Production IG’s style of storytelling; it’s just too bad that this movie screwed up. Nevertheless, despite my ranting, it’s quite an enjoyable movie though; you can give it a try if you’re a fan of their style like me. Just be sure for the rather large plotholes it leaves.]]>
Ooedo Rocket – 20
Aha! After Toward the Terra and Claymore Ooedo Rocket will also start its final arc with the next episode. That’s when Seikichi really is going to have to prove himself to take Sora to the moon. His problems with the police will be over now, people don’t have any more secrets for each other, the characters have been fleshed out, and pretty much all roles are set. It’s there where this anime is going to have to prove itself. I’m afraid to say it, but this and the past episode felt a bit weird, and the introduction of an arc-based plot wasn’t as interesting as the individual episodes of the first half, and the time they spent on building up.
The next arc is going to have to prove whether this series succeeds or fails, as it can still go anywhere. It all depends on the character-development. The characters now have their bases built up nicely, now it’s time for the creators to use them. By far the most interesting scenes of the past few episodes were the ones that developed the characters, and not the plot. It’ll basically be Sora and Keiichi vs Akai, now that the blue monsters from the sky are dead. At least, I think they are. The first one definitely is gone, but the death of the third one doesn’t follow the golden rule of anime: unless you see a character die, he’ll live. Blue monster from the sky definitely is gone now; she had her arm ripped off and was in the middle of an explosion. Though the third one, the one who was more dangerous at that time, could have escaped. There’s got to be a meaning to that scene where he attacked the hunter who betrayed the others.
Ghost Hunt showed that it’s possible: its final arc was definitely one of the best. It’s all going to have to depend on one thing: are the creators intending to end this series the standard way, or will they try to be original. Ghost Hunt’s final arc was great because it eliminated a main character for most of its time. Night Head Genesis had a great ending because the biggest threat was basically gone, which looks a lot like Ooedo Rocket right now.
Ah well, there are either four or six episodes left. That’s got to be enough for this situation, but for now I’m sceptical. I’ll have to see this one succeed before getting too optimistic.]]>
Claymore – 20
So, basically because Eclipse took so long with their release for this week, I got impatient and checked out the raws. At times like these, I’m glad that I can understand them. 🙂
Anyway, this is one of the few Claymore-episodes without fighting, but it’s definitely one to look forward to, as there’s a really high emphasis on character-development, and this episode may have been one f the best ones of Claymore yet, especially not considering the fights.
There’s only one part I didn’t like, so I’ll start with that one: Raki. We still don’t know how the heck he ended up in the north in the first place. If I heard correctly, he’s supposed to have been victim of slave-trading in the manga, which is a perfectly good explanation, though I never heard any of the sorts in this episode. Either that or I must have missed it.
Okay, now the good stuff: Raki is getting closer to Priscilla and Isley than I thought. I’m eager to learn of the background of the two of them, as they’re definitely behaving unlike other awakened beings I’ve seen so far. Priscilla also is entirely different from the Priscilla we saw in episode eight. The creators will definitely be using this for when Claire runs into Priscilla. I wonder if Priscilla still recognizes Claire, by the way.
The biggest focus of the episode was on Deneve and Undine, though, and I both loved them. Undine proves yet again that she’s more than just a cocky muscle-machine. It seems that she has learned to always activate a small piece of her youma-powers in order to keep her muscles tense at all times. She’s just someone who likes to act tough, afraid that people will find out her true nature. That second sword of hers, it also seems to be from a good friend of hers.
Deneve was the one who found this out, and she acts really mature at this. I think I finally begin to understand why she chose to be a defensive type: unlike Claire, whose loved one was killed by an identifiable enemy (Priscilla), her loved ones (most likely her family) were killed by unknown Youma. Instead of swearing to kill off all youma, like Priscilla did, Deneve swore to protect as much as possible. That’s why she demands perfection from both herself and others.
Flora, meanwhile, shows that she’s been around since Claire’s youth, because she recognized Irene’s arm. That’s not something you do easily, since Miria, who’s a lot stronger than Flora (I assume, at least) couldn’t recognize it. Because of this, she and Jeane become some of the few to hear Claire’s raison d’Être of killing Priscilla. Flora should be getting character-development in the next few episodes.
To add to that, the fina minutes of the episode show Helen, trying to encourage a minor Claymore, who looks surprisingly unique, and it ends as the second wave of Isley’s henchmen are coming. Look forward to the next episode!]]>
Vampire Hunter D Review – 51/100
Another oldie: this one’s from 1985. It seemed to have enjoyed quite a bit of popularity back in those days, and it still seems to be one of the more well-known movies from the eighties. I got curious as to why this movie turned out much more popular than the others, so I decided to watch this one.
Unfortunately, the reason seems to be the fights and the bad-assness of the main character. The guy is your typical silent powerhouse, and he reminds me of an Alucard without personality. He’s been hardened through many battles, and he’s supposed to be dark and mysterious.
So basically, don’t bother to try and check this one out. The plot maybe has a few interesting elements, especially in the beginning, but in the end it goes nowhere fast. The opponent is your typical evil king (or count in this case) who is evil and has to be defeated. He keeps talking about how he has to rule the country as an aristocrat but we never see him actually ‘rule’. All he does is sit in his chair, trying to look evil.
And this of course wouldn’t be complete without the female love interest. She and her cute brother basically take turns of playing the damsel-in-distress. One particularly bad scene featured a Deus ex Machina, followed by another Deus ex Machina, followed by yet another one. All the characters are interesting when you first see them, but they get old very fast. The few lucky ones who have background often only have to do with one or two lines.
While it’s not the worst movie out there, I’d definitely classify this one as below-average. If you’re looking for a way to burn half an hour, there are so many better choices for movies than this one. This is another one of these movies that just didn’t age well.]]>
Bokura no – 18
MAJOR SPOILER UP AHEAD!!! This episode was amazing, though there’s one plot twist you don’t want to find out until you’ve actually seen the episode. I repeat, if you haven’t seen Bokura no 18, STAY AWAY FROM THIS ENTRY!!! The following line should fill up enough space for the blog aggregators.
I should be complaining that Takami only got one episode for herself, but holy god, Tanaka’s death totally made up for it! She goes down, along with Takami’s father by the hands of the terrorists we’ve seen for the past number of episodes. This not only removed one of the key support-characters from the show, it also means that Koemushi has to select a new final pilot. Something tells me that it’s going to be poor Kana, as Koemushi has been hinting towards her for the past few episodes. O_o
What also surprised me is the relatively short amount of time that is spent on mourning about Tanaka. The only one we really see crying is Tamotsu, and the others seem to have accepted her death, just like she was one of them. These kids have really matured throughout the series. I also wonder when Tamotsu is going to tell Kana and Jun about Tanaka.
So, now there are three pilots left: Kanji, Jun and someone Koemushi still has to decide on. For a chance, we don’t get to see who’s going to be the next pilot. My money is on Kanji, though the finale of this series is going to start in the next episode. This episode definitely proved why Bokura no is one of my favourite series. Will the ending do the same? I definitely do hope so!]]>