Category: Series which were Dropped

Magi – 07

by psgels, posted in Magi

Well, the start of the episode made it rather obvious that this was originally written by a woman. In a way, I like that this show has fanservice for both genders, and that the fanservice also knows when to shut up. Afterwards this episode turned into a pretty interesting episode for wurld building by showing the city that Sindbad the Sailor founded.

All accompanied by some good old fashioned chemistry. Sindbad already is an interesting character from the start, but he works particularly well. With Aladdin meanwhile it’s good to already spot a bit of character development: he has become more aware of his goal, and he’s definitely less ignorant than what he was in the first episodes.

Also, A-1 is on fire this week. First there was the surprisingly good animation for Sword Art Online, and now this episode too had some really good inbetween animation, although a lot more polished. But the characters here look so incredibly dynamic: everything is just moving, and this definitely is a great use of a big budget. Also, next season A-1 will do seven shows at the same time. Holy crap.
Rating: 5/8 (Great)

Hunter X Hunter – 56

by psgels, posted in Hunter X Hunter

That. Was. Awesome! I mean, I rarely rewatch series for the reason that I’d much rather spend my time on stuff I haven’t seen before, plus that the impact of watching something again is just not as good as when watching it for the first time. And yet I was completely thrilled when watching this episode.

I mean, what can I say? This episode just showed so well why the Spider Troupe is my favorite organization for a shounen series. This time they really act as a team and they are acted so well, and they all make so good use of each other’s powers. This is also where Gon really shines, and does something that no other main character would do: sacrifice himself so that his friend would not get noticed. All of these characters worked incredibly well together, and I’m so glad that this series has also managed to capture that.

The music also was just perfect. I mean, in the past I criticized this show a lot for not using its soundtrack right, but the scene in which Squala died, it was just perfect. It really sent chills through my spine. That scene also showed one of the strengths of this show: from out of nowhere it can take a random side character and make him or her ten times better from out of nowhere in a realistic way. I loved just showing him taking care of his dogs, and his problems of trying to feed them all. I loved how he just has a completely normal girlfriend. THAT was exactly what was missing in the Hunter Exam arc, and the creators actually found it again!

On top of that, I’m just completely fanboying over my favorite character. And yet again I’m not telling who it is until the arc for this person is over for the sake of spoilers.
Rating: 6.5/8 (Amazing)

Uchuu Kyoudai – 33

by psgels, posted in Uchuu Kyoudai

First of all, I’d like to share this xkcd comic, just because it just fits this show so well: realistic depictions of spacecraft with tons of dry humour.

Now, this episode was about the moon landing: Hibito finally reaching his dream of setting a foot on the moon, and this was even better than what I could have hoped. This is where everything came together, all of the build-up on Hibito came together, and finally we get to see the moon, but the way in which the creators depicted it was also just amazing: they just showed everyone living towards that moment. All the characters, from the NASA staff, to the JAXA staff, to the major and minor characters, including a brilliant opening of the episode done by Mutta and Hibito’s father.

What also was awesome was that we got to see the creators poke fun at the moon landing of Neil Armstrong. I loved the scene where Mutta found out about the sentence that Hibito uttered as he first stepped on the moon, and how he could have seen it coming from miles away. On top of that, his video message using Apo also had me in stitches.

After this we’ll probably start focusing on Mutta again, but with the pacing of this series you’ll never know. There are just so many great characters that this show can do something with, but on top of all I love how Hibito’s launch has basically been one giant awesome red herring for Mutta’s final exam. These are all tropes that spice up this series even more, and it already was incredibly good.
Rating: 6.5/8 (Amazing)

Hunter X Hunter – 55

by psgels, posted in Hunter X Hunter

Yes! It has finally started! It was just one sentence, but it has started, and… must… AVOID… posting… spoilers…

So… Hisoka this episode. Talk about cunning; this is just one of those cases in which these elaborate plans are entirely justified, because this was the perfect opportunity for him to keep the Troupe in one place that would allow him to fight Chrollo. It entirely depended on Chrollo being smart as well, which only gave him more reason to get excited.

On Kurapika’s side time was mostly spent to get throught he final bits of build-up for Gon and Killua. I won’t comment on what it’s building up for, but I do want to say that I loved Killua at the end of this episode. This is a bit of a short entry, I know, but we’re NEARLY at my favorite point of Hunter X Hunter!
Rating: 5.5/8 (Excellent)

Uchuu Kyoudai – 32

by psgels, posted in Uchuu Kyoudai

Yes! Finally after such a long wait, we get to look into the mind of Azuma, and boy was it worth the wait. This was a wonderful episode, and I love how Azuma turned out to be completely different from expected, even taking into consideration that the creators were hinting a lot that there’s more to this guy than just the exterior he shows.

What really did it for me was that the creators portrayed him as a real character, just like a lot of other characters in this series. His love for his family was SO down to earth, and they really succeeded in showing how important they are to him without any sort of cheese. His disgust for the media also is very believable, and it does put the interview they showed a number of episodes ago in a very different light.

Meanwhile, the details around Hibito’s mission continue. I loved his media attention, how he described various details about space flight (the watch was a very nice touch, considering how time has been such a challenge for Mutta and the others in the second exam arc). They are really making him out to be some kind of supernatural hero, which I guess is pretty normal considering how today, Neil Armstrong and the other astronauts are regarded. Speaking of heroes: Brian Jay is also more and more turning into one. When we first saw his death, he was just a random astronaut, but as the show goes on, it just becomes clearer and clearer what an important guy this was.
Rating: 6/8 (Awesome)

Magi – 06

by psgels, posted in Magi

There is one thing that this series really likes to drive through, doesn’t it? Slavery sucks. Slavery is evil. Slavery should be banished from this world altogether. While I totally agree with that, my problem with that is that it makes the villains of this series rather one-sided. There just are a lot of bad guys in this show that look too much like each other, and I would have liked to see a bit more variety.

On the other hand, I’m really digging the rest of the characters in this series. I even feel sorry for the really minor side-characters, so those villains are at least doing something well. This episode was all about Morgiana (and a half-year time skip!), and I really like that Goltias still plays a prominent role in this series. He could have just been some random goon that got forgotten as soon as he died, but the creators did a great job of making sure that he still has impact.

This show also has the talent to instantly make the people who the main characters run into likable. I’m not yet entirely sure why this is, but it still is something that definitely not every series can boast. Either way, I like the warmth between them, and they’re quite well acted, and together they feel like an actual community: they strengthen each other, which especially was true near the end of the episode.
Rating: 5/8 (Great)

Little Busters – 06

by psgels, posted in Little Busters

So in the end, Komari: a girl who couldn’t get over the death of her brother. As someone who tends to prefer characters with… at least a bit of independence, I do feel a bit let down. At least Fuuko and the Uguu girl had their reasons for having the minds of five year olds. Setting therapy aside, I really find her to be the most annoying Key character I have seen.

And yet, I actually really liked the rest of the cast in this episode. Riki was the only one who really was able to do anything, but I really liked the way in which everyone supported him. I also quite liked Riki as he tried to get Komari back on her feet. The story is here so simple that yeah, Komari did need to just get hit on the head a few times, so I liked their idea to do this with another picture book, and even though Riki was just terrible at drawing, I like how he still went through with it. That’s for me the biggest difference between the beginning of this series and Kanon: the Uguu girl also was annoying, but beyond that it didn’t have much else that caught my attention, making it a lot less bearable for me to watch.

I expected more from gramps, though. In the end he was also partially responsible for Komari ending up the way she did because he refused to help her, instead just staying away from her. He’s an important person in her life, and yet he just abandoned her under the pretext that she’d cry when he’d die. Well, in that case I’d better stop making friends if all I’m going to do is make people cry when I eventually pass on. This guy needs to be healed too here. Does he also have his own arc? I’d love to see that actually.
Rating: 4.5/8 (Good)

K – 06

by psgels, posted in K

We’re nearly at the halfway point of this show and it’s time to bring in the background episode: the episode that shows who it was that Yashiro supposedly killed. It was a strange guy who liked to try out a lot of different things, hung around with thugs, even though he wasn’t one himself and who was also very charismatic to boot. This episode seemed to hint that at one point he split in two, with Yashiro being his other half, who afterwards just lost his memory. What the cat has to do with this… I have no idea.

Again, this episode was neat, but again I feel like the creators could have done more with this. It’s all very straight forward, and none of the characters really stands out or sets himself apart. What I liked best was Yashiro this episode as he realized that his memory was fake, but even that was a bit monotone.

Oh, and I still quite like the detail that the creators put in their environment. The backgrounds in this series are probably rendered photos, but they still look gorgeous. Plus, you can see that the creators of this show like food quite a bit, with all of the details they put into the different kinds of food that the characters eat. Whether this will be enough for this series though… I’m not sure.
Rating: 4/8 (Nice)

Little Busters – 05

by psgels, posted in Little Busters

Ah, screw Sword Art Online. I’m still going to watch and finish it, but there is no point in blogging it anymore. I actually really liked the first half, but the entire set-up of the second half is just wrong. There is no way the creators are going to be able to make up for that. I’d rather focus my limited time on something else. Now, why that something else turned out to be Little Busters of all things probably needs some explanation.

– The best Autumn 2012 show that I’m not currently blogging is pretty much Jormungand. I really support what that series is trying to do and if you got through the first season, I do urge you to check out the second. I just don’t have any inspiration to write a full entry about it. I noticed that when writing about its first season.
– Saint Seiya Omega unfortunately has gotten much worse again with its second half, introducing a sting of no less than TWELVE over the top battles against all odds against golden saints that will probably only get good near the end again. It’s pointless to blog it at this point.
– Sukitte Ii na Yo is also pretty good, but it comes off a tad forced at times. It’s good, but when characters come with their past it feels like the creators are running down a checklist instead of genuinely try to tell a story.
– The best other alternative would be Btooom: short and sweet suspense. In the case of that series though, I think it lacks depth, and probably isn’t going to get much with just 1 cour. Not to mention that an analysis of the fight scenes would just devolve into a string of complaints about the bad physics.

Now, Little Busters has its problems. DEAR GOD, it has problems. However, I do have a few reasons why I want to blog it, which I’ll get to below. To summarize though: its five opening episodes are better than the first five opening episodes of Kanon, and worse for Angel Beats, Air and Clannad. Still, it has something.

This is pretty much my mindset while watching an episode of Little Busters: “HATE HATE HATE HATE hate hate HATE HATE hate… oh this is actually pretty good… this is surprisingly good, whoa”. And this not in the way in which other bad or dull shows have a few redeeming moments: while those moments are enjoyable, they usually don’t succeed in removing my annoyance with the series by being dull or still not doing anything significant. I remember how Guilty Crown had one good episode. Well, whoop-tee-doo, it didn’t make up for the rest of the show. Little Busters actually succeeds in this. I’ve blogged a number of other series that were clearly flawed, but had enough to make up for them (Zetman, Deadman Wonderland), and to be honest, I want to give a more nuanced view over this series. I do feel like it has been getting too much negative reactions because there are enough things to like about it, and I want to highlight this series from a different perspective.

Yeah, so what if Kyoani doesn’t animate this. I actually don’t consider them to be that much better than JC Staff to be honest. Yeah sure, their animation is better, but they also keep making shows I’m not interested in. JC Staff also has these series, but they also make plenty of interesting shows, on top of shows that sound cliched, but are surprisingly well executed (Kimi to Boku, Milky Holmes, Yumekui Merry, Kamisama no Memo-Chou, Otome Youkai Zakuro, Aoi Hana, Nodame Cantabile, etc).

Now, the worst part of Little Busters BY FAR is the voice acting. I managed to get used to all of the characters by now, except for ONE: Komari. Dear god, she is annoying. Every time she opens her mouth something horrible comes out. And it doesn’t help that she’s trying to be incredibly ditzy and klutzy. This girl. Who the heck thought that that voice would fit her well!?

Now, with the key visual novel adaptations, the worst characters also get their arcs in first, and that very much is the case here. Nanami indeed is the worst key character so far, although she still is not without her merits: her story is at least more interesting than Kanon’s Uguu-girl, the previous holder of this title. The people around her: I find them actually very interesting, that missing brother and the grandfather, to the point where they actually make up for her annoyingness.

What also is a huge plus for this series: the chemistry between the characters. That is something of a pet peeves of mine: if the chemistry is good, then I can let a lot of things slide because I’m enjoying myself. And it’s not like this show is particularly funny or anything, but the side-characters all feel genuine. The cast is also quite large and full of interesting characters that aren’t just girls, unlike what you’d expect from other visual novels. The chemistry in this series is not of the kind that is immediately enjoyable, but the kind that makes me go “that was actually pretty fun” afterwards. I like this effect a lot actually, and for that, plus the promise that this series has for its future episodes makes me want to blog it.

But dear lord… I do hope that upcoming Winter will be a small season…
Rating: 4/8 (Nice)

Magi – 05

by psgels, posted in Magi

I see that it’s a bit of a challenge for this series to balance out its morals and stories. What I mean by that is the following: the past episodes focused all on this community of ordinary people who are about to be annexed, and a lot of focus was put into not fighting, resulting even in the death of the village elder as she tried to promote her ideas. Those ideas got through, the villagers decided to abandon fighting… only for the main characters to pick up their arms instead and slaughter the enemy nevertheless. Screw negotiations.

It’s obvious why they did it of course: the villain in this episode could not be talked out of his plans, but still: this set-up does deminish the storlyline for the tribe a bit: these two stories next to each other don’t really strengthen each other. Yet, this is still much better than Sword Art Online, which doesn’t even seem to care about its unimportant characters. Magi definitely does care about them, and that care definitely made it through in this episode.

Also, this arc seemed to be for Aladdin to realize what his purpose is, and to meet other kinds of genies and magi that also were there to select kings. I’m definitely feeling the grandeur of this setting with this, and this episoe showed that there is so much more to this setting than what has been shown so far. And really: I like the village elder a lot more than I thought I would. Because of that, her realization of what Aladdin is at the end of this episode made all the more impact.
Rating: 5/8 (Great)