Author: psgels

Some quick first impressions – Angel’s Feather, Sky Girls and Naikaku Kenryoku Hanzai Kyousei Torishimarikan Zaizen Jotaro

by psgels, posted in Some Quick First Impressions

A strange patch we have this time. All of these shows were especially made for the fans of one certain niche. These shows are mostly for the yaoi-fans, lolicons and people who like to gouche their eyes out with a spoon.

Angel’s Feather

This is an ova, set at an all-boys high school. It remains shounen-ai, but it’s one of the first of its kind which managed to have caught my interesting. For an OVA, the creators have thrown in a fairly large amount of characters, and all of these characters interacting with each other does provide interesting scenes. Especially if they’re filled with doubt, betrayal, angst and love. Still, the plot isn’t flawless. Only descendants of kings are said to have wings, but right now, it seems that every single character has them. The reason why wings give you superpowers also is oblivious.

Sky Girls

This series is like, 35% action, 60% fanservice and 5% plot. Or in other words, garbage. It’s basically an excuse to please all the lolicon fanboys out there. The plot makes no sense at all and remains uninspired. The graphics are nice, but not something to make you jump up from your chair. The characters also don’t seem to have any personality. About the only good thing was the time pressure given from the government officials.

Naikaku Kenryoku Hanzai Kyousei Torishimarikan Zaizen Jotaro

Seriously, I wouldn’t be surprised if this was to go down as the worst anime of the century. We´ve got a secret agent who’s probably the richest, bravest and coolest person in the world who fights against corrupt government official. A decent premisse, but it has been executed in a horrible way. For example, our hero gets introduced while flying in a jet fighter. He then uses the ejection seat and lands on the ground with a parachute. What happened to the fighter, we never know. The rest of the episode featured even more of these strange events which don´t make any sense at all. The art isn´t much better. Everything looks incredibly low budget. Seriously, though. Stay away from this one.

The Third – 11 – Gravestone

by psgels, posted in The Third


Great to see another episode of The Third released. Thanks a lot to FnT for subbing it. This episode was another great one. 🙂

Last episode, we saw the strange huge glowing thing. This time, Honoka, Boogie, Paife and Ikus get trapped inside of it. The thing seems to be Gravestone. I’m not exactly sure what it is, but it seems that it’s a young boy with special powers. After the great war, he went to sleep. When Ikus came to this planet, he accidentally woke him up. Right now, Gravestone has been engulfed by hatred, and plans to destroy the earth which is planning to destroy him.

Especially Paife got a healthy dose of character development this time. It seems that she was so interested in Honoka, a few episodes back, that she begged the employer to let her go with her. She’s become really interested in Honoka. Ikus reckons that the two of them are on very good terms, because of all their bickering. After all, they like talking happily about each other’s flaws.

I’m not sure what Gravestone wants with Honoka. He’s been calling her, but why? And why does he send the Honoka-clone after her? Perhaps it’s because she was cast away from The Third? It also seems that she’s still haunted by having killed a human. That should prove to be very interesting. Jouganki and the other Third also have an interesting discussion. It seems that both of them are more interested in Honoka than they’re in Ikus. Just what is Honoka? What’s her secret?

The next episode should promise to be very awesome. But what’s up with the rumours about episode 13 being very bad? I hope they aren’t true.

Higurashi no Naku Koro ni – 22 – This totally made up for the horrible fifth arc

by psgels, posted in Higurashi no Naku Koro ni


Now this is more like it! Finally, the horrors of Shion and the fifth arc are over, and the sixth arc begins. And it starts out really great. It seems that Rena’s got some problems of her own, which could turn out to be really interesting in a couple of episodes.

This episode was divided into three parts: a prelude, Rena having fun with her friends and a part centered around Rina, Rena’s father’s new girlfriend. Th prelude was a rather strange one. Rena looks like some kind of prophet. Keiichi, Mion, Satoko and Rika all are watching her as she holds an interesting speech in the local garbage dump from episode 1. A bag containing Satoshi’s body is also seen. It makes you wonder one thing. Why hasn’t Rena yet encountered his body in one of her treasure hunts? I have a feeling that she’ll actually find it during the current arc.

The second part didn’t have anything to do with the story. Still, it was incredibly funny. The water-pistol-fight was awesome, and it was great to see Rena and Irie fangirling over Mion, Rika an Satoko. ^^

Then, the third part. It seems that Rena’s parents have been divorced, and her mother wanted to force Rena to come and stay with her. Let’s just say that Rena didn’t agree. I think that that’s the reason she walked around in school, smashing all of the windows in. In any case, she now lives with her father, who finally got a girlfriend: Rina. The only problem: Rina works together with Satoko’s uncle, and they’re a bunch of hooligans. Rina’s planning to use Satoko’s uncle in order to steal all of Rena’s father’s money through blackmailing. Rena finds out about this. We end the episode with Rina being alone and Rena following her. I wonder what’ll happen. ^^;

Shion (*twitch*) also appeared during this episode. Thank god she wasn’t serious. She’s actually a decent character when she is just having a bit of fun. Just don’t let her get serious. (*twitch*)

I’m not doing a full summary this time. Nothing regarding the main plot really happened. Except for the prelude, perhaps. Still, the prelude looked very promising. If that’s how this arc will go, I’m really looking forward to the remaining four episodes of Higurashi.

xxxHolic – 20 – Picture

by psgels, posted in xxxHolic


A very interesting theme yet again: the burden of murdering someone. It still remains interesting how fast Watanuki and Yuuko can switch from playful and bickering to serious, as showed in this episode. This also is a case in which Yuuko is the main character, with Watanuki just as a bystander/observer.

The case is like this: a woman killed her best friend by pushing her off a cliff. Somehow, a photo of this got taken, and it keeps haunting this girl. It’s interesting that she couldn’t throw it away or burn it. It keeps haunting her unconsciously. She asks Yuuko to keep it in keepsake, sealed away. But even Yuuko’s seal isn’t strong enough. In the end, the girl begs Yuuko to erase the picture from the face of the earth, at the price of anything. Not a wise thing to say in front of Yuuko. She erases the picture, though the price is high. If the girl ever gets captured on photo, image, video, etc, that picture will appear instead.

It’s like Yuuko said. The burden when you kill someone is high. The picture gave her a huge psychological pressure, as it kept reminding her of the things she’d done, while it couldn’t be thrown away or burned. After Yuuko erased the picture, the pressure will probably lessen. But in exchange for that, she has to be careful for her entire life, avoiding all cameras at all costs. She won’t have a minute of rest, unless she’s at her own house, with the curtains closed.

That’s not a good way to live.

In any case, xxxHolic is just like Mushishi in a way. It doesn’t seem that it can produce bad episodes. Or bad moments for that matter. I really enjoyed this episode, it’s another example of the greatness which xxxHolic can achieve.

Simoun – 23 – Let the Finale Begin

by psgels, posted in Simoun


An intermezzo. It’ll probably the intermezzo before the big finale of Simoun. Let us hope it’ll be able to deliver the long-awaited bang.

The important characters this time were Aaeru, Neviriru, Paraietta, Yun, Onashia, The Temple One and a bit of Harukonfu. The Peace treaty has been signed. It’s not a trap. But there is a catch: the Chor Tempest will be disbanded. The Priests from the highlands will be taking over the Sibylla’s duties. This worked exceptionally well to put time pressure on our characters. Especially and surprisingly The Temple One shows this, as she isn’t happy with this decision at all. After all, if the Chor Tempest will be disbanded, it’ll almost be impossible to perform the Emerald Ri Maajon. She freaks out and begs Neviriru and Paraietta, who she happened to run into, to perform it.

Yun has meanwhile left the Arcus Prima, and headed towards the ruins. There, she has a very interesting discussion with Onashia. Onashia once was a member of the Chor Dextra. She could understand Yun, as she lost a lot of former friends herself. Onashia then shows her something very interesting: the result of what happens if you don’t choose your gender. If that’s the case, you’ll end up like her. Your eyes get a weird colour, and your body turns blue and starts shedding away strange sparks, which don’t really look healthy. This also explains how Onashia managed to get such a high position. As she never went to the spring, she remained a holy priest for her entire life. Of course that would give her status.

Aaeru is getting more and more confused. It seems that she really wants to see another world. It seems that she had another reason to become a Sibylla than just not being able to make up her mind. Her grandfather also influenced her, making her wanting to travel to another world. That’s why she joined the Chor Tempest. In any case, later in the episode, we see her getting a bit annoyed and confused with Neviriru. She thinks it’s because Neviriru’s been talking more and more, though I (and Furoe as well) think that she’s still jealous with the possibility of Amuria still existing.

Harukonfu still doesn’t know what he can do. He can’t protect his daughter, he lost his status, he’s nothing. Maybe we can expect some interesting things from him in the latest episodes. Paraietta and Neviriru also finally seem to have understood each other.

It seems that everything is set now for the finale. I’m wondering how it’ll go. It’s got some good ingredients, now all that’s left is how to use them.

Night Head Genesis – 06 – To live or to kill yourself. That’s the question.

by psgels, posted in Night Head Genesis


Okay, Night Head Genesis has its flaws. Naoya’s voice-acting can get annoying at times. The two of them also get entangled in situations for weak reasons. The overall purpose of this series also seems a bit lost, though maybe Shouko can change this.

Still, I love this show. It’s not afraid to deal with disturbing themes such as suicide, homicide and abuse, and it successfully portrays the feelings of all of the persons involved, whether these are Naoto and Naoya, or some side-characters, unimportant to the main story. Because this show deals with such themes, the pain and suffering from each of the characters are huge, only contributing to the awesomeness.

I also like the way that the different stories are integrated with each other. Before the conclusion of one arc is found, evidence for the next arc has already started. It gives this show a nice piece of unpredictability.

Same with this episode. Things didn’t go as I expected. Naoto and Naoya didn’t recognize the woman, so that’ll probably be a story for later. She seems to work for doctor Mikuriya now, so she’s bound to appear later in the anime. The house being gone seems to be a nasty side-effect of Naoto’s power, though full details haven’t been given yet.

The case for this episode revolves around three students, friends of each other who committed suicide. Every week, at the same time and same place for the past three weeks. Furthermore, the school they attended harboured some nasty people. We’ve got one extremely popular girl, who likes to steal boyfriends from others, only do dump them immediately afterwards. Then there’s the corrupt gym teacher and we have a school nurse who’s always calm on the outside, but hates people and likes to stab others on the inside. Somehow, these suicides are linked to these three people.

I’ve got no idea how things happened. After all, the last victim did kill herself. We saw her slitting her wrist. Not because someone forced her to, but because her entire life was boring, and she actually wished to die out of boredom. It’ll be interesting to see how this boredom is linked to the school nurse.

.Hack//Roots – 21 – Trainwreck Continued

by psgels, posted in .Hack//Roots


Don’t you just love episode titles who spoil the climax?

Haseo continues on his rampage, slaying every player possible. He then runs into a player who survived an encounter with Tri-Edge as well, and gets defeated. He’s like a mad bull, charging at everything which even bears the slightest signs of movements.

But yeah, bulls haven’t exactly been known for their outstanding intelligence. Why doesn’t Haseo try to think a bit, and check out the lost grounds? You would suspect some clues who can turn up, instead of committing genocide in the normal fields. Still, I’m curious how Haseo will react now that he’s been defeated. I was hoping that Midori would be able to beat some sense into him, though the last scene suggests that he’ll be turning even more berserk than he already was.

Phyllo, meanwhile, was nowhere to be found during the episode. Tabby founded a guild, along with the purple-haired guy (forgot his name). I liked Pai. It’s indeed clear that her Pai-personality is one big act, as she keeps getting more and more annoyed by Saburou. Saburou herself has gotten more interest in Haseo, which can also be a good sign. I like the two of them, they’re two of the few good character who appeared after the mass character-homicide of episodes 13-15.

Midori also shows promise. I like the way she was introduced. She was introduced because she had an encounter with Tri-Edge, and not the other way around (having an encounter with Tri-Edge because she was introduced). Yata needs some action. All he does is sitting, staring at some blue screens full of techno-babble. We get absolutely no clue why he has to sit there all the time. What does he need. What are all these screens for in the first place?

And what is going on with Haseo in real life? Has he been sitting behind his computer, in emo-mode ever since Shino disappeared? One of the things I loved about .Hack//Sign is that at certain times, it showed small flashes of the real persons behind their computer. I loved the philosophical themes behind //Sing. But ah well, I guess I’m going to have to accept that //Roots will feature none of them at all.

Night Head Genesis – 05 – Awesome

by psgels, posted in Night Head Genesis


Awesomeness. Night Head Genesis proves that it’s capable of providing some highly disturbing, but at the same time very touching scenes. I’m loving this series more and more. Finally we have another show who’s trying to show the worst side of humans. That’s always good for a few juicy scenes, and Night Head Genesis is no exception for this.

Naoto (ugh… it was Naoto after all, not Naota) and Naoya have been heading back to the home in which they grew up. Now that they’ve arrived in their old neighbourhood, they have some flashbacks of the time in which they were young. They discuss two major cases, among a few smaller ones. It’s great to see their younger versions return. They work awesome.

Case 1: Naoto when he was just a baby. He’s playing with a tiny fire truck toy. It’s when his parents first discover his powers when somehow, the truck moves without any batteries being in it. He also gives his father a nosebleed when he tries to take away this truck. It’s interesting that he already had these powers at that age, and was using them to hurt others, unconsciously. Naoto also reveals that at that time, he thought that anyone was able to move things without their hands. Indeed, how do you make a baby like that clear that it’s not okay to hurt others like that?

Case 2: Naoto is six and Naoya has just been born. About a year later, we see the two of them playing with wooden blocks a bit, when an earthquake occurs. Naoto manages to protect Naoya from a falling vase. It’s the first time when Naoto realizes Naoya’s power, when their mother comes in, worried. She then picks up Naoya, who sends her thoughts to Naoto. “There’s nothing to worry about”.

Case 3: A former subordinate of the brothers’ father came to sell a large amount of land to them. He came with his wife and daughter. The daughter, who had heard the rumours about Naoto and Naoya, came to their room, and seemed to enjoy poking fun at them, and treating them like dirt with nobody else around. Naoya then got a bad feeling, and then he touched the former subordinate, getting in shock and revealing his evil plans. What follows is Naoto, protecting his family by hurting the culprits. Because of this, Naoto and Naoya’s power fully awakened. But their mother and father also began to look differently at them. It’s interesting. When you look at it one way, the two of them prevented them from being deceived, and losing a large amount of money. But at the same time, when Naoto keeps using his powers to hurt others in such an “unnatural” way, you could be scared at the same time. And that’s the case with their parents. For some reason, you’re less likely to forget fear than to forget pleasant events.

Case 4: Naoya touched a little girl, who always was carrying a doll with her, and got into shock. He had to be hospitalized for this. When Naoto tried to explain what happened to the doctor, he was just ridiculed. In the end, it seemed that the little girl was heavily being abused by her father. Naoto found the latter hurting the former’s body with a sharp sabre. She was covered in blood and wounds when Naoto found her, took her away and showed the public that her father was a molester. When Naoya heard this, he turned back to normal. When Naoto and Naoya think back about this, they notice that Naoto saw the doll, which the girl used to carry, with red eyes, while Naoya’s vision showed a doll with blue eyes.

Then, the grown up Naoto and Naoya arrive at the place their former house stood. Well, it’s gone. It’s turned into a field of grass. To make things better, when they ask a local, it seems that there’s never been a house on that patch in the first place. A silhouette of Shouko then appeared for a second. The episode ends with the girl from case 5, who runs into them. I’m so curious about how she ended up after her father was imprisoned.

Still, what does this mean? Why has their former house been erased. And more importantly, what happened to their parents? And what the heck is Shouko up to?

Another thing I love about Night head Genesis was the 15-year time-leap. The two brothers have changed so much in that time. The former short-tempered Naoto now has seemed to have learned to control his temper.

Mushishi – 25 – What to choose: Light or Darkness?

by psgels, posted in Mushishi


I’ve been looking forward to another episode of Mushishi. It seems that it doesn’t know how to deliver a bad episode. Each of the stories presented works so incredibly well, dealing with a different problem every single time.

This time, we have a little girl, who’s blind. She encounters a mushi, Ganpuku. This mushi gives her sight. At first she’s incredibly happy, but then the mushi starts showing her things that she shouldn’t be able to see. She’d be able to see right through walls, she could see things which happened miles away from her, nothing was a secret for her anymore. But it didn’t end there. Ganpuku then gave her the ability of foresight. The girl grew up, and many people came to her, in order to get their futures told. Obviously, the girl didn’t have any friends at all. When her father died, she moved away from her village and started living as a shamisen-player (which C1 seems to have turned into a lute).

Of course, while it may seem like joy and goodness in the beginning, if you have to live with this for more than fifteen years, you begin to see the disadvantages. Every good thing has a bad thing, and every bad thing comes along with a good thing, and this is no different. The girl may have had the ability of foresight, she had this 24/7. She had no way to turn this off, and she lived her entire life, seeing things in the future. In the end, she became dizzy and unhappy because of it. Around the end of the episode, it seems that Ganpuku has completely taken over her eyes. They then detach from her body, and turn into their real form.

It’s indeed a dilemma for the woman. She has to choose to either see the future continuously or see nothing at all. It’s a choice between two extremes, with not middle way at all. In the end, the woman didn’t care for herself anymore, and was content with living with Ganpuku. But she didn’t want anyone else to suffer the same fate she did. Therefore, she asks Ginko to bury her eyes, somewhere in the forest.

Otogi Juushi Akazukin – 10 – An Ibara Episode

by psgels, posted in Otogi Juushi Akazukin



Lots of talking this episode, which made the overall story rather hard to understand. It’s an Ibara-episode. Souta and the others end spending the night in a village, in which a special flower grows. It’s called the Sennen Tsubomi. They meet up with a girl, who’s responsible for tending this flower. Still, something strange seems to be the deal with it. It doesn’t seem to bloom, and Souta gets a strange feeling out of it.

Shirayuki tries to bless the flower by pouring some holy water on it, though Ibara (who’s been goofing off for the entire episode) falls asleep on top of her, kindof destroying Shirayuki’s motivation to keep trying. Still, later she’s seen looking at the flower in a suspicious way.

I think the village is living in poverty. If I had to guess, Sennen Tsubomi is the only flower in the village. Perhaps it’s the first flower appearing for quite a long while. The girl, responsible for tending it also gives a lot of food to Souta and the others, as a form of hospitality, while the village itself has barely to eat. I think the villagers are seeing it as a symbol of fertility.

Later in the episode, Randagio pours some strange liquid on the flower. A rather funny scene occurs, in which Randagio ordereds the flower to find Erde’s key, after which Akazukin, Shirayuki, Ibara, Souta and Ringo appear to protect the flower. It’s a nice play with coincidence. ^^ In any case, Sennen Tsubomi gets a dark aura and transforms into a monster. It seems that Sennen Tsubomi appeared because of Cendrillion. Because of her grasp on the country, darkness has started to appear. I think it’s first form is in flowers like these. Randagio recognized this, and helped the flower evolve a bit. Afterwards, Ibara stopped the flower, and it sprouted in tons of other, white, blooming flowers. According to Ibara, these don’t seem to have any evil power.

It’s interesting that the evil starts to appear in the form of flowers like these. I’m wondering what the next stage will be: more flowers or animals.

Some random facts:
– Sweet Phones are called phones for a reason: they acually ARE phones. Shirayuki and Akazukin use them to communicate with each other in an attempt to wake up Ibara.
– Cendrillion seems to have another minion.
– The little girl seems to be speaking about a strange flashback, in which monsters attacked the village, surrounded by flames.

Random cute moments:
– Ibara, casting her spell half-asleep, in gibberish.
– Randagio, getting caught in the act by the girl. And correcting her when she calls him a cat.
– Afterwards, when Akazukin and the others appear, Ringo does hold Souta’s arm.
^^

Overall, it was a very nice episode, though I think this is one of those episodes at which I really need to see the subbed version. I bet that I’ll love it even more when I do. ^^;